Winter's Heart

had to make sure no one found out how soon before it was too late.

The wind picked up strength as the morning wore on, but he had Pips saddled and rode his endless circles in the Palace stable-yard, huddling a little in his saddle and clutching his cloak close. He rode more slowly than usual, so Pips' steel shoes made a lazy, plodding sound on the paving stones. Now and then he grimaced at the darkening clouds in the sky and shook his head. No, Mat Cauthon did not like being out in this weather. Mat Cauthon would be staying somewhere warm and dry until the skies cleared, yes, he would.

The sul'dam walking damane in their own circle in the stable-yard knew he was leaving soon, too. Maybe the serving women did not talk directly to the Seanchan women, but what one woman knew was always known to every woman inside a mile soon enough. Wildfire did not run through dry woods as fast as gossip ran through women. A tall yellow-haired sul'dam glanced in his direction and shook her head. A short stout sul'dam laughed out loud, splitting a face as dark as any of the Sea Folk. He was just Tylin's Toy.

The sul'dam did not concern him, but Teslyn did. For several days, until this morning, he had not seen her among the damane being exercised. Today the sul'dam let their cloaks fly with the wind, but the damane all held theirs tightly around them, except Teslyn's gray cloak flapped this way and that, forgotten, and she stumbled a little where the pavement was uneven. Her eyes were wide and worried in that Aes Sedai face. Occasionally she darted a glance at the buxom black-haired sul'dam wearing the other end of her silver leash, and when she did, she licked her lips uncertainly.

A tightness settled in Mat's belly. Where had the determination gone? If she was ready to knuckle under…

'Everything all right?' Vanin said when Mat dismounted and gave him Pips' reins. Rain had begun to fall, cold fat drops, and the sul'dam were hurrying their charges inside, laughing and running to avoid getting wet. Some of the damane were laughing, too, a sound to chill Mat's blood. Vanin took no chances anyone might wonder why they were standing in the rain to talk. The fat man bent to lift Pips' left foreleg and study the hoof. 'You look a mite more peaked than usual.'

'Everything is just fine,' Mat told him. The ache in his leg and hip gnawed like a tooth, but he was barely aware of it or of the quickening rain. Light, if Teslyn was cracking now… 'Just remember. If you hear shouting inside the Palace tonight, or anything that sounds like trouble, you and Harnan don't wait. You ride out right then and go find Olver. He'll be—'

'I know where the little tyke'll be.' Letting go of Pips' leg and straightening, Vanin spat through one of the gaps in his teeth. Raindrops ran down his face. 'Harnan ain't too stupid to put his boots on alone, and I know what to do. You just take care of your piece of it and make sure your luck is working. Come on there, boy,' he added much more warmly to Pips. 'I got some good oats for you. And a fine hot fish stew for me.'

Mat knew he should eat, too, but he felt as though he had swallowed a stone, and it did not leave room for food. Hobbling back up to Tylin's apartments, he threw his damp cloak over a chair, and for a time, stood staring at the corner where his black-hafted spear stood propped next to his unstrung bow. He planned to come back for the ashandarei at the last moment. The Blood should all be abed by the time he moved, and the servants, as well, with only the guards outside remaining awake, but he would not risk being seen with it before he had to. Even the Seanchan who called him Toy would take notice of him carrying a weapon through the halls in the middle of the night. He had meant to carry the bow, too. Good black yew was almost impossible to find outside the Two Rivers, and they cut it too short besides. Unstrung, a bow should be two hands taller than the man who would draw it. Maybe he should abandon it after all, though. He would need both hands to use the ashandarei, if it came to that, and the moment needed to drop the bow might be the moment that killed him.

'Everything will go according to plan,' he said aloud. Blood and ashes, he sounded as wool-headed as Beslan! 'I am not going to have fight my way out of the bloody Palace!' And almost as fool-witted. Luck was a very fine thing with the dice. Depending on luck other places could get a man dead.

Lying down on the bed, he propped one booted foot atop the other and lay studying the bow and the spear. With the door to the sitting room open, he could hear the cylinder-clock softly chime each hour away. Light, he needed his luck tonight.

The window light faded so slowly he almost got up to see whether the sun had stopped, but eventually gray light faded to purple twilight, then to full dark. The clock chimed twice, and then the only sounds were the drumming of the rain and the rush of the wind. Workmen who had been braving the weather would be downing tools to trudge home. No one came to light the lamps or tend the fires. No one expected him to be there, since he had slept in the bed the night before. The flames in the bedroom fireplace dwindled and died. Everything was in motion, now. Olver was snug in that old stable; it still had most of its roof. The clock sounded the first full hour of the night, and after no more than a week, four chimes for the second.

Rising from the bed, he felt his way into the pitch-dark sitting room and pulled open the hinged casement of one of the tall windows. The strong wind drove raindrops through the intricate white wrought-iron screen, quickly soaking his coat. The moon was hidden behind clouds, and the city was a mass of rain-shrouded darkness without even lightning to break it. All the street-lamps had apparently been extinguished by the rain and wind; the night would hide them when they left the Palace. And any patrol that saw them out in this weather would look twice. Shivering as the wind cut through his damp coat, he shut the casement.

Taking a seat on the edge of one of the bamboo-carved chairs, he propped his elbows on his knees and watched the clock above the dead fireplace. He could not see it in the darkness, but here, he could hear the steady tick. He remained motionless, though the single chime of another hour made him twitch. There was nothing now but to wait. In a little while, Egeanin would be introducing Joline to her sul'dam. If she really had been able to find three who would do as she claimed. If Joline did not panic when they first put the a'dam on her. Thom, Joline and the others from the inn would meet him just before he reached the Dal Eira. And if he did not reach it, Thom had gone ahead with carving his turnip; he was sure he could get them past the gates with his forged order. At least they had a chance, if it all fell apart. If. Too many ifs to think about, now. It was too late for that.

Ding, from the clock, like a piece of crystal tapped with a spoon. Ding. About now, Juilin would be making his way to his precious Thera, and with any luck Beslan was starting to drink hard at an inn somewhere. Drawing a deep breath, he stood in the blackness and checked his knives by feel, up his sleeves, beneath his coat, tucked into the turned-down tops of his boots, one hanging down inside the back of his collar. That done, he left the apartments. Too late for anything but beginning.

The empty hallways he walked along were only dimly lit. One stand lamp in three or four carried flames in front of the mirrors, little pools of light with pale shadows between that never quite reached darkness. His boots were loud on the floor tiles. They rang on the marble stairs. It was unlikely anyone at all would be awake this late, but if someone did see him, he must not look as if he were skulking. Tucking his thumbs behind his belt, he made himself saunter. It was no worse than stealing a pie from a kitchen window sill. Though, come to think of it, the spotty memories that remained of his boyhood seemed to contain getting half-skinned for that a time or two.

Stepping onto the columned walk that bordered the stable-yard, he turned up his collar against the wind- driven rain flying between the fluted white columns. Bloody rain! A man could drown in it, even when he had not really been outside yet. The wall-mounted lamps had blown out, except for the pair flanking the open gates, the only glowing spots in the pouring rain. He could not make out the guards outside the gates. The Seanchan squad would be as motionless as if it were a pleasant afternoon. Very likely the Ebou Dari, too; they did not like being shown up in any way. After a moment he retreated to the anteroom door, to avoid getting completely drenched. Nothing moved in the stableyard. Where were they? Blood and bloody ashes, where…?

Riders appeared in the gates, led by two men afoot carrying pole-lanterns. He could not count them in the rain, but they were too many. Would Seanchan messengers have lantern-bearers? Maybe, in this weather. Grimacing, he took another step back, into the anteroom. The thin light of a single stand-lamp behind him was enough to turn the night outside to a blanket of black, but he peered into it. In a few minutes, four heavily cloaked figures appeared, hurrying toward the door. If they were messengers, they would pass him by without a second glance.

'Your man Vanin is rude,' Egeanin announced, throwing back her hood as soon she was beyond the fluted