“Have you ever thought of helping them do what they want instead of what you want? If I did what I wanted, I’d have Elayne on a horse and riding to Andor. She needs to do other things—needs to, I think—so I trot around after her, sweating day and night that somebody will manage to kill her before I can prevent it. She will go to Caemlyn when she’s ready.” He sucked at his pipe complacently, but there was a slight edge to his voice at the end, as if he did not like his words even as much as he pretended.

“It seems to me they want to hand their heads to Elaida.” So Thom would have that silly wench on a horse, would he? A gleeman hauling the Daughter-Heir off to be crowned! He did have a grand sense of himself, Thom did.

“You aren’t a fool, Mat,” Thom said quietly. “You know better. Egwene. . . . It’s hard to think of that child as Amyrlin . . .” Mat grunted sourly in agreement; Thom paid him no mind. “. . . yet I believe she has the backbone for it. It’s too early to say whether a few things are just happenstance, but I’m beginning to believe she may have the brains as well. The question is, is she tough enough? If she lacks that, they will eat her alive—backbone, brains and all.”

“Who will? Elaida?”

“Oh, her. If she has the chance; that one lacks nothing for toughness. But the Aes Sedai right here hardly think of Egwene as Aes Sedai; Amyrlin maybe, but not Aes Sedai, hard as that is to believe.” Thom shook his head. “I don’t understand, but it’s true. The same for Elayne and Nynaeve. They try to keep it among themselves, but even Aes Sedai don’t hide as much as they think, if you watch close and keep your wits about you.” He pulled out that letter again, just turning it over in his hands without looking at it. “Egwene is walking the edge of a precipice, Mat, and three factions right here in Salidar—three that I’m sure of—might push her over if she makes one wrong step. Elayne will follow if that happens, and Nynaeve. Or maybe they’ll push them over first to pull her down.”

“Right here in Salidar,” Mat said, flat as a planed board. Thom nodded calmly, and Mat could not stop his voice from rising. “And you want me to leave them here?”

“I want you to stop thinking you’re going to make them do anything. They’ve decided what they are going to do, and you can’t change it. But maybe—just maybe—you can help me keep them alive.”

Mat jumped to his feet. In his head was an image of a woman with a knife stuck between her breasts; not one of the borrowed memories. He kicked the keg he had been sitting on, sending it rolling along the alley. Help a gleeman keep them alive? A faint memory stirred, something about Basel Gill, an innkeeper in Caemlyn, saying something about Thom, but it was like mist, gone as soon as he tried to hold it. “Who’s the letter from, Thom? Another woman you rescued? Or did you leave her where she could get her head cut off?”

“I left her,” Thom said softly. Rising, he walked away without another word.

Mat half reached out to stop him, started to speak. Only he could not think of what to say. Crazy old man! No, he was not crazy. Egwene was mule stubborn, and Nynaeve made her look biddable. Worse, either would climb a tree to see the lightning better. As for Elayne, noblewomen never had enough sense to come in out of the rain. And then they were indignant when they got wet.

Tapping out his pipe, he crushed the embers under heel before the dry weeds could catch, then caught up his hat from the ground and limped out to the street. He needed information from a better source than a gleeman who had delusions of grandeur from running around with that stuck-up chit of a Daughter-Heir. Down to his left he saw Nynaeve coming out of the Little Tower and started toward her, winding between loaded carts drawn by oxen or horses. She could tell him what he needed to know. If she would. His hip gave him a twinge. Burn me, she owes me a few answers.

Just then Nynaeve caught sight of him and stiffened visibly. For a moment she watched him approach, then abruptly hurried off in the other direction, plainly trying to avoid him. She looked over her shoulder twice before people and carts hid her.

He stopped, scowling, and pulled his hat low. First the woman kicked him for no reason; now she would not talk to him. They meant to let him stew, her and Egwene, until he would trot off meekly when they pointed a finger. Well, they chose the wrong man for their game, burn their hides!

Vanin and the others were outside a stable beside a stone building that had surely been an inn once. Aes Sedai streamed in and out of it now. Pips and the rest of their horses were tied to a hitching rail, and Vanin and the two scouts who had been captured were squatting against the wall. Mar and Ladwin were as different as men could be, one tall, lanky and rough-faced, the other short, stocky and mild-seeming, but both looked plain embarrassed when Mat walked up. Neither had gotten over the ease of his capture. The two squadmen stood stiffly, still holding the banners tight against their staffs as if there was any point to it now. They looked more than a little apprehensive. A battle was one thing; all these Aes Sedai were quite another. A man had a chance in battle. There were two Warders watching them. Not openly, and from across the stableyard, but they had not just picked that spot, standing in the full sun, to talk.

Mat stroked Pips’ nose, then after a moment began to examine the horse’s eyes. A fellow in a leather vest came out of the stable, shoving a dung barrow up the street. Vanin walked over to peer into Pips’ eye. Not looking at him, Mat said, “Could you reach the Band?”

“Maybe.” Vanin frowned and lifted Pips’ eyelid. “With a little luck, maybe. Hate to leave my horse, though.”

Mat nodded, looking closer at the eye. “Tell Talmanes I said to sit tight. I may be staying here a few days, and I don’t want any bloody attempted rescue. Try to make it back here. Without being seen, if you can.”

Vanin spat into the dust under Pips. “Man mixes with Aes Sedai, he’s bridled himself and put a saddle on his back. I’ll be back when I can.” Shaking his head, he strolled off into the crowd, a fat rumpled man with a rolling walk who no one could suspect of being able to sneak.

One of the squadmen cleared his throat hesitantly and stepped closer. “My Lord, is everything . . . ? This is what you planned, isn’t it, my Lord?”

“Right to the plan, Verdin,” Mat said, patting Pips. He was headfirst in a sack, and the strings tied tight. He had promised Rand to see Elayne safe to Caemlyn, and he could not leave without her. And he could not go off and let Egwene stretch her neck on the chopping block, either. It might be—Light, how it rankled!—it might be that he was going to have to take Thom’s advice. Try to keep those bloody women’s bloody heads on their bloody shoulders by somehow helping them make this whole mad impossible scheme actually work. While trying to keep his own neck in one piece, incidentally. And that left out keeping Aviendha from Elayne’s throat. Well, at the least, he could be around to get them away when it all fell apart. Small comfort that was. “Everything i