“What did you do?” Even deep in the cold emotionless Void as he was, his voice grated. “Tell me! I made no promises not to hurt you. If you don’t tell me—”

“She bonded you,” Verin said quickly, but if her serenity had been ruffled, it cloaked her again in an instant. “She bonded you as one of her Warders. That is all.”

Alanna recovered her composure even faster. Shielded, she faced him calmly, arms folded, a hint of contentment about her eyes. Contentment! “I said I would not injure you, and I have done exactly the opposite of injury.”

Drawing deep slow breaths, Rand tried to settle himself. He had walked into it like a puppy. Rage crawled across the outside of the Void. Calm. He must be calm. One of her Warders. She was Green then; not that that made any difference. He knew little of Warders, certainly not how to break the bond, or if it could be broken. All Rand felt from Lews Therin was a sense of stunned shock. Not for the first time Rand wished Lan had not gone galloping away after Moiraine died.

“You said you won’t be going to Tar Valon. In that case, since you don’t seem to know whether you know where the rebels are, you can remain here in Caemlyn.” Alanna opened her mouth, but he rode over her. “Be grateful if I decide not to tie off those shields and leave you like that!” That got their attention. Verin’s mouth tightened, and Alanna’s eyes could have done for that furnace he had felt. “You will stay away from me, though. Both of you. Unless I send for you, the Inner City is barred to you. Try to break that, and I will leave you shielded, and in a cell besides. Do we understand one another?”

“Perfectly.” Despite her eyes, Alanna’s voice was ice. Verin merely nodded.

Flinging open the door, Rand stopped. He had forgotten the Two Rivers girls. Some were talking to the Maidens, some were just studying them and whispering over their tea. Bode and a handful of the Emond’s Fielders were questioning Bashere, who had a pewter mug in his fist and one foot up on a bench. They looked half-entertained, half-aghast. The door banging open whipped their heads around.

“Rand,” Bode exclaimed, “this man is saying awful things about you.”

“He says you’re the Dragon Reborn,” Larine spluttered. The girls in the rest of the room apparently had not heard; they gasped.

“I am,” Rand said wearily.

Larine sniffed and folded her arms beneath her breasts. “As soon as I saw that coat I knew you had gotten a big head, running off with an Aes Sedai the way you did. I knew it before you talked so disrespectfully to Alanna Sedai and Verin Sedai. But I didn’t know you had become a stone blind jack-fool.”

Bode’s laugh was more appalled than amused. “You shouldn’t say such a thing even as a joke, Rand. Tam raised you better than that. You’re Rand al’Thor. Now stop this foolishness.”

Rand al’Thor. That was his name, but he hardly knew who he was. Tam al’Thor had raised him, but his father had been an Aiel chief, now long dead. His mother had been a Maiden, but not Aiel. That was as much as he really knew of who he was.

Saidin still filled him. Gently he wrapped Bode and Larine in flows of Air and lifted them until their shoes dangled a foot above the floor. “I am the Dragon Reborn. Denying won’t change it. Wishing won’t change it. I’m not the man you knew back in Emond’s Field. Do you understand now? Do you?” He realized he was shouting and clamped his mouth shut. His stomach was lead, and he was trembling. Why had Alanna done what she did? What Aes Sedai scheme was hatching behind that pretty face? Trust none of them, Moiraine had said.

A hand touched his arm, and his head jerked around.

“Please let them down,” Alanna said. “Please. They are frightened.”

They were more than frightened. Larine’s face seemed drained of blood, and her mouth gaped as wide as it would go, as if she wanted to scream and had forgotten how. Bode was sobbing so hard she quivered. They were not the only ones. The rest of the Two Rivers girls had huddled together as far from him as they could get, and most of them were crying too. The serving maids were in that tight cluster as well, weeping as hard as anyone else. The innkeeper had sagged to his knees, goggle-eyed and gurgling wordlessly.

Rand eased the two girls back down and hastily let go of saidin. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” As soon as they could move, Bode and Larine fled to join the other girls clutching one another. “Bode? Larine? I’m sorry. I won’t hurt you, I promise.” They did not look at him. None of them did. Sulin was certainly looking at him, and the rest of the Maidens too, blank-faced, flat-eyed disapproving stares.

“What’s done is done,” Bashere said, setting down his mug. “Who knows? Perhaps it’s for the best.”

Rand nodded slowly. It probably was. Best that they wanted to stay clear of him. Best for them. He just wished he could have talked a little while longer about home. A little while longer with them seeing only Rand al’Thor. His knees still wobbled from the bonding, but once he began moving, he did not stop until he was back in Jeade’en’s saddle. Best that they were afraid of him. Best that he forgot the Two Rivers. He wondered whether that mountain ever got lighter for a time, or only kept on getting heavier.

CHAPTER

11

Lessons and Teachers

As soon as Rand was out the door Verin let loose the breath she had been holding. Once she had told Siuan and Moiraine how dangerous he was. Neither had listened, and now the passage of little more than a year saw Siuan stilled and probably dead, while Moiraine. . . . The streets crawled with rumors about the Dragon Reborn in the Royal Palace, most beyond belief, and none that was credible mentioned an Aes Sedai. Moiraine might have decided to let him think he was going his own way, but she would never allow him to get far from her, not now when he was rising to such power. Not now when the hazard he presented had grown so great. Had Rand turned on her, more violently than he just had on them? He had aged since she last saw him; his face bore the tightness of struggle. The Light knew he had reason enough, but could it be the struggle for sanity as well?

So. Moiraine dead, Siuan dead, the White Tower broken, and Rand possibly on the edge of madness. Verin tsked irritably. If you took risks, sometimes the bill came due when you least expected, in the last way you expected. Almost seventy years of delicate work on her part, and now it might all go for naught because of one young man. Even so, she had lived too long, been through too much, to allow herself to be dismayed. First things first; take care of what can be done now before worrying too long over what might never be. That lesson had been forced on her, but