Winter's Heart

rough gloves, and he was… beautiful.

He leaped from his chair at the sight of her, too, but before he was completely upright, he staggered and grabbed the table with both hands, gagging and heaving with dry retches. Elayne embraced the Source and took a step toward him, then stopped and made herself let go of the Power. Her ability with Healing was tiny, and anyway, Nynaeve had moved as quickly as she, the shine of saidar suddenly around her, hands raised toward Rand.

He recoiled, waving her away. 'It's nothing you can Heal, Nynaeve,' he said roughly. 'In any case, it seems you win the argument.' His face was a rigid mask hiding emotion, but his eyes seemed to Elayne to be drinking her in. And Aviendha as well. She was surprised to feel gladdened by that. She had hoped it would be that way, hoped she could manage for her sister's sake, and now it took no managing at all. Straightening up was a visible effort for him, and pulling his gaze away from her and Aviendha, though he tried to hide both. 'It is past time to be gone, Min,' he said.

Elayne's jaw dropped. 'You think you can just go without even speaking to me, to us?' she managed.

'Men!' Min and Aviendha breathed at almost the same instant, and gave one another startled looks. Hastily they unfolded their arms. For an instant, despite the disparity in just about everything about them, they had been almost mirror images of womanly disgust.

'The men who tried to kill me in Cairhien would turn this palace into a slag heap if they knew I was here,' Rand said quietly. 'Maybe if they just suspected. I suppose Min told you it was Asha'man. Don't trust any of them. Except for three, maybe. Damer Flinn, Jahar Narishma and Eben Hopwil. You may be able to trust them. For the rest…' He clenched gauntleted fists at his sides, seemingly unaware. 'Sometimes a sword turns in your hand, but I still need a sword. Just stay away from any man in a black coat. Look, there's no time for talking. It's best I go quickly.' She had been wrong. He was not exactly as she had dreamed of him. There had been a boyishness about him sometimes, but it was gone as if burned away. She mourned that for him. She did not think he did, or could.

'He is right in one thing,' Lan said around his pipestem with the same sort of quiet. Another man who seemed never to have been a boy. His eyes were blue ice beneath the braided leather cord that encircled his brows. 'Anyone near him is in great danger. Anyone.' For some reason, Nynaeve snorted. Then put her hand on a leather scrip with hard bulges lying on the table and smiled. Though after a moment her smile faltered.

'Do my first-sister and I fear danger?' Aviendha demanded, planting her fists on her hips. Her shawl slipped from her shoulders and fell to the floor, but she was so intent that she seemed unaware of the loss. 'This man has toh to us, Aan'allein, and we to him. It must be worked out.'

Min spread her hands. 'I don't know what anybody's toes have to do with anything, or feet either, but I'm not going anywhere until you talk to them, Rand!' She affected not to notice Aviendha's outraged glare.

Sighing, Rand leaned against a corner of the table and raked gloved fingers through the dark, reddish curls that hung to his neck. He seemed to be arguing with himself under his breath.

'I'm sorry you ended up with the sul'dam and damane,' he said finally. He did sound sorry, but not very; he might have been regretting the cold. 'Taim was supposed to deliver them to the sisters I thought were with you. But I suppose anyone can make a mistake like that. Maybe he thought all those Wisdoms and Wise Women Nynaeve has gathered were Aes Sedai.' His smile was quiet. It did not touch his eyes.

'Rand,' Min said in a low, warning tone.

He had the nerve to look at her questioningly, as if he did not understand. And he went right on. 'Anyway, you seem to have enough of them to hold on to a handful of women until you can turn them over to the… the other sisters, the ones with Egwene. Things never turn out quite the way you expect, do they? Who would have thought a few sisters running away from Elaida would grow into a rebellion against the White Tower? With Egwene as Amyrlin! And the Band of the Red Hand for her army. I suppose Mat can stay there awhile.' For some reason he blinked and touched his forehead, then went on in that irritatingly casual tone. 'Well. A strange turn of events all around. At this rate, I won't be surprised if my friends in the Tower work up enough courage to come out in the open.'

Arching an eyebrow, Elayne glanced at Nynaeve. Wisdoms and Wise Women? The Band was Egwene's army, and Mat was with it? Nynaeve's attempt at wide-eyed innocence made her look like guilt nailed to a door. Elayne supposed it did not matter. He would learn the truth soon enough, if he could be talked into going to Egwene. In any case, she had more important matters to take up with him. The man was babbling, however offhand he managed to sound, tossing out anything they might snap at in hopes of diverting them.

'It won't do, Rand.' Elayne tightened her hands on her skirts to keep herself from shaking a finger at him. Or a fist; she was not sure which it would be. The other sisters? The real Aes Sedai, he had been about to say. How dare he? And his friends in the Tower! Could he still believe Alviarin's strange letter? Her voice was cool and firm and steady, brooking no nonsense. 'None of that matters a hair, not now. You and Aviendha and Min and I are what we need to talk about. And we will. We all will, Rand al'Thor, and you are not leaving the Palace until we do!'

For the longest time, he simply looked at her, his expression never changing. Then he inhaled audibly, and his face turned to granite. 'I love you, Elayne.' Without a pause, he went on, words rushing out of him, water from a burst dam. And his face a stone wall. 'I love you, Aviendha. I love you, Min. And not one a whisker more or less than the other two. I don't just want one of you, I want all three. So there you have it. I'm a lecher. Now you can walk away and not look back. It's madness, anyway. I can't afford to love anybody!'

'Rand al'Thor,' Nynaeve shrieked, 'that is the most outrageous thing I ever heard out of your mouth! The very idea of telling three women you love them! You're worse than a lecher! You apologize right now!' Lan had snatched his pipe from his mouth and was staring at Rand.

'I love you, Rand,' Elayne said simply, 'and although you haven't asked, I want to marry you.' She blushed faintly, but she intended to be much more forward before very long, so she supposed this hardly counted. Nynaeve's mouth worked, but no sound came out.

'My heart is in your hands, Rand,' Aviendha said, treating his name like something rare and precious. 'If you make a bridal wreath for my first-sister and me, I will pick it up.' And she blushed, too, trying to cover it in bending to take her shawl from the floor and arranging it on her arms. By Aiel customs, she should never had said any of that. Nynaeve finally got a sound out. A squeak.

'If you don't know by this time that I love you,' Min said, 'then you're blind, deaf and dead!' She certainly did not blush; there was a mischievous light in her dark eyes, and she seemed ready to laugh. 'And as for marriage, well, we'll work that out between the three of us, so there!' Nynaeve took a grip on her braid with both hands and gave it a steady pull, breathing heavily through her nose. Lan had begun an intense study of the contents of his pipe's bowl.

Rand examined the three of them as if he had never seen a woman before and wondered what they were. 'You're all mad,' he said finally. 'I'd marry any of you—all of you, the Light help me!—but it can't be, and you know it.' Nynaeve collapsed into a chair, shaking her head. She muttered to herself, though all Elayne could understand was something about the Women's Circle swallowing their tongues.

'There is something else we need to discuss,' Elayne said. Light, Min and Aviendha could have been looking at a pastry! With an effort she managed to make her own smile a little less… eager. 'In my rooms, I think. There's no need to bother Nynaeve and Lan.' Or rather, she was afraid that Nynaeve would try to stop them, if she heard. The woman was very quick to use her authority when it came to Aes Sedai matters.

'Yes,' Rand said slowly. And then, strangely, added, 'I said you'd won, Nynaeve. I won't leave without seeing you again.'

'Oh!' Nynaeve gave a start. 'Yes. Of course not. I watched him grow up,' she blathered, turning a sickly smile on Elayne. 'Almost from the start. Watched his first steps. He can't go without a good long talk with me.'

Elayne eyed her suspiciously. Light, she sounded for all the world like an aged nurse. Though Lini had never babbled. She hoped Lini was alive and well, but she was very much afraid that neither was true. Why was Nynaeve carrying on in this fashion? The woman was up to something, and if she was not going to use her standing to carry it off, it was something even she knew was wrong.

Suddenly, Rand seemed to waver, as though the air around him were shimmering with heat, and everything