Knife of Dreams (96 page)

Mishima joined them and dismounted to stand peering uncertainly at Sulin and the Maidens. He probably believed the night hid his expression. He smelled wary, now. He was followed quickly by the first of the red-coated Seanchan soldiers scrambling up the muddy slope, each carrying two middling-sized jute sacks. Middling, but not heavy. Each contained only ten pounds. Eyeing the Aiel suspiciously, the wiry woman set her sacks down and slashed one open with her dagger. A handful of fine dark grains spilled on the muddy ground.

“Do that over the opening,” Perrin said. “Make sure every grain goes into the water.”

The wiry woman looked to Mishima, who said firmly, “Do as Lord Perrin commands, Arrata.”

Perrin watched as she emptied the sack into the aqueduct, hands lifted over her head. The dark grains floated away toward Malden. He had dropped a pinch into a cup of water, hating to waste even that, and they took some time to absorb enough water to sink. Long enough to reach the big cistern in the town, he hoped. And if not, they could steep in the aqueduct itself. The cistern would still turn to forkroot tea eventually. The Light send it would be strong enough. With luck, maybe even strong enough to affect the
algai’d’siswai
. The Wise Ones who could channel were his target, but he would take any advantage he could gain. The Light send it did not grow strong faster than he expected. If those Wise Ones began staggering too soon, they might puzzle out the cause before he was ready. But all he could do was go ahead as if he knew exactly. That, and pray.

By the time the second sack was being poured into the stone channel, the others began crowding up the slope. First came Seonid, a short woman holding her dark divided skirts up out of the mud. Shifting his attention from the Maidens to her, Mishima made one of those small gestures to
ward off evil. Strange that they could believe a thing like that worked. The soldiers lined up with their sacks stared at her, wide-eyed for the most part, and shifted their feet. The Seanchan were none too easy about working with Aes Sedai. Her Warders, Furen and Teryl, were at her heels, each with a hand resting on his sword hilt. They were just as uneasy about the Seanchan. The one was dark with gray streaking his curly black hair, the other fair and young, with curled mustaches, yet they were alike as two beans, tall, lean and hard. Rovair Kirklin came a little behind them, a compact man with dark receding hair and a glum expression. He did not like being separated from Masuri. All three of the men had small bundles containing food strapped to their backs and fat waterskins hanging from their shoulders. A lanky man rested his sacks on the side of the opening as the wiry woman headed downslope to fetch more. The carts were piled high with them.

“Remember,” Perrin told Seonid, “the biggest danger will be getting from the cistern to the fortress. You’ll have to use the guardwalk on the wall, and there might be Shaido in the town even at this hour.” Alyse had seemed unsure on that. Thunder boomed hollowly in the distance, then again. “Maybe you’ll have rain to hide you.”

“Thank you,” she said icily. Her moonshadowed face was a mask of Aes Sedai serenity, but her scent spiked with indignation. “I would not have known any of that if you had not told me.” The next moment her expression softened, and she laid a hand on his arm. “I know you are worried about her. We will do what can be done.” Her tone was not exactly warm—it never was—but not so chill as before, and her scent had mellowed to sympathy.

Teryl lifted her up onto the edge of the aqueduct—the Seanchan emptying forkroot into the thing, a tall fellow with almost as many scars as Mishima, nearly dropped his sack—and she grimaced faintly before swinging her legs over and lowering herself into the water with a small gasp. It must have been cold. Ducking her head, she moved out of sight toward Malden. Furen climbed in after her, then Teryl, and finally Rovair. They had to bend sharply to fit under the roof of the aqueduct.

Elyas clapped Perrin on the shoulder before hoisting himself up. “Should have trimmed my beard short like yours to keep it out of that,” he said, gazing down at the water. That graying beard, ruffled by the breeze, spread across his chest. For that matter, his hair, gathered at the back of his neck with a leather cord, hung to his waist. He carried a small bundle of food and a waterskin, too. “Still, a cold bath helps a man keep his mind off his troubles.”

“I thought that was for keeping your mind off women,” Perrin said. He was in no mood for joking, but he could not expect everyone to be as grim as he was.

Elyas laughed. “What else causes a man’s troubles?” He disappeared into the water, and Tallanvor replaced him.

Perrin caught his dark coatsleeve. “No heroics, mind.” He had been of two minds about letting the man be part of this.

“No heroics, my Lord,” Tallanvor agreed. For the first time in a long time, he looked eager. The smell of him quivered with eagerness. But there was an edge of caution in it, too. That caution was the only reason he was not back in their camp. “I won’t put Maighdin at risk. Or the Lady Faile. I just want to see Maighdin that much quicker.”

Perrin nodded and let him go. He could understand that. Part of him wanted to climb into the aqueduct, too. To see Faile again that much quicker. But every piece of the work had to be done properly, and he had other tasks. Besides, if he were actually inside Malden, he was not sure he could restrain himself from trying to find her. He could not catch his own scent, of course, but he doubted there was any caution in it now. The windmill heads turned again with loud squeaks as the wind shifted back. At least it never seemed to die up here. Any stoppage of the water flow would be disastrous.

The ridgetop was becoming crowded, now. Twenty of Faile’s hangers-on were waiting their turn at the aqueduct, all that remained save the two who were spying on Masema. The women wore men’s coats and breeches and had their hair cut short except for a tail at the back in imitation of the Aiel, though no Aiel would have worn a sword as they did. Many of the Tairen men had shaved their beards because Aiel did not wear them. Behind them fifty Two Rivers men carried halberds and unstrung bows, their bowstrings safely tucked away inside their coats and each with three bristling quivers tied to his back along with a parcel of food. Every man in the camp had volunteered for this, and Perrin had had to let them choose lots. He had considered doubling the number, or more. Hangers-on and Two Rivers men had their bundles of food and their waterskins. The constant flow of Seanchan soldiers continued, carrying full sacks up the slope and empty sacks back down. They were disciplined. When a man slipped in the mud and fell, as happened with some regularity, there was no cursing or even mutters. They just got up and went ahead.

Selande Darengil, wearing a dark coat with six horizontal stripes of color across the chest, stopped to offer Perrin her hand. She only came up to his chest, but Elyas claimed she handled the sword at her hip credibly.
Perrin no longer thought she and the others were fools—well, not all the time—in spite of their attempts to copy Aiel ways. With differences, of course. The tail of dark hair at Selande’s nape was tied with a length of dark ribbon. There was no fear in her scent, only determination. “Thank you for allowing us to be part of this, my Lord,” she said in that precise Cairhienin accent. “We will not let you down. Or the Lady Faile.”

“I know you won’t,” he said, shaking her hand. There had been a time when she had been pointed about serving Faile, and not him. He shook the hand of every one of them before they climbed into the aqueduct. They all smelled determined. So did Ban al’Seen, who commanded the Two Rivers men going into Malden.

“When Faile and the others come, wedge the outer doors shut, Ban.” Perrin had told him this before, but he could not help repeating himself. “Then see if you can get them back up the aqueduct.” That fortress had not kept the Shaido out the first time, and if anything went wrong, he doubted it would keep them out this time either. He did not mean to renege on his bargain with the Seanchan—the Shaido were going to pay for what they had done to Faile, and besides, he could not leave them behind to continue ravaging the countryside—but he wanted her out of harm’s way as soon as possible.

Ban propped his bowstave and halberd against the aqueduct and hoisted himself up to reach a hand down inside. When he lowered himself back to the ground, he wiped his damp hand on his coat then rubbed the side of his prominent nose. “Below the water, it’s coated with something feels like pond slime. We’re going to have a hard enough time getting down that last slope without sliding the whole way, Lord Perrin, much less trying to climb it again. I expect the best thing is to wait in that fortress till you reach us.”

Perrin sighed. He had thought of sending ropes, but they would have needed nearly two miles of it to span that last slope, a lot to be carried, and if any Shaido spotted the butt end of it in the Malden end of the aqueduct, they would search every nook and cranny in the town. A small risk, perhaps, yet the bitter loss that might result made it loom large. “I’ll be there as fast as I can, Ban. I promise you that.”

He shook hands with every one of them, too. Lantern-jawed Tod al’Caar and Leof Torfinn, with a white streak through his hair where a scar ran, given to him by Trollocs. Young Kenly Maerin, who was making a stab at growing a beard again unfortunately, and Bili Adarra, who was almost as wide as Perrin if a hand shorter. Bili was a distant cousin, and some of the
closest kin Perrin had living. He had grown up with many of these men, though some were a few years older than he. Some were a few years younger, too. By now, he knew the men from down to Deven Ride and up to Watch Hill as well as he did those from around Emond’s Field. He had more reason than Faile alone to reach that fortress as fast as he could.

Had al’Lora, a lean fellow with thick mustaches like a Taraboner, was the last of the Two Rivers men. As he climbed into the aqueduct, Gaul appeared, face still veiled and four spears gripped in the hand that held his bull-hide buckler. He put a hand on the edge of the aqueduct and leapt up to sit on the stone coping.

“You’re going in?” Perrin said in surprise.

“The Maidens can do any scouting you need, Perrin Aybara.” The big Aiel glanced over his shoulder toward the Maidens. Perrin thought he scowled, though it was hard to be sure because of the black veil that hid all but his eyes. “I heard them talking when they thought I was not listening. Unlike your wife and the others, Chiad is properly
gai’shain
. Bain, too, but I care nothing about her. Chiad still has the rest of her year and a day to serve after we rescue her. When a man has a woman as
gai’shain
, or a woman a man, sometimes a marriage wreath is made as soon as white is put off. It is not uncommon. But I heard the Maidens say they would reach Chiad first, to keep her from me.” Behind him, Sulin’s finger flashed in Maiden handtalk, and one of the others slapped a hand over her mouth as if stifling laughter. So they had been goading him. Maybe they were not so hard against his suit for Chiad as they pretended. Or maybe there was something Perrin was missing. Aiel humor could be rough.

Gaul slipped into the water. He had to bend almost parallel to the surface to get under the aqueduct’s top. Perrin stared at the opening. So easy to follow Gaul. Turning away was hard. The line of Seanchan soldiers still snaked up and down the slope.

“Mishima, I’m going back to my camp. Grady will take you to yours when you’re done here. Do what you can to blur the tracks before you go.”

“Very well, my Lord. I’ve told off some men to scrape grease from the axles and grease these windmills. They sound as if they could seize up any minute. We can do those at the far ridge, too.”

Taking up Stepper’s reins, Perrin looked up at the slow-turning sails. Slow, but steady. They had never been made to turn fast. “And if some Shaido decide to come out here tomorrow and wonder where the fresh grease came from?”

Mishima regarded him for a long moment, his face half-hidden by
moonshadows. For once, he did not seem put off by glowing yellow eyes. His scent. . . . He smelled as if he saw something unexpected. “The Banner-General was right about you,” he said slowly.

“What did she say?”

“You’ll have to ask her, my Lord.”

Perrin rode down the slope and back to the trees thinking how easy it would be to turn around. Gallenne could handle everything from here. It was all laid out. Except that the Mayener believed every battle climaxed with a grand charge of horse. And preferably began with one, too. How long would he stick to the plan? Arganda was more sensible, but he was so anxious for Queen Alliandre that he might well order that charge, as well. That left himself. The breeze gusted hard, and he pulled his cloak around him.

Grady, elbows on his knees, was in a small clearing sitting on a half-worked mossy stone that was partially sunken into the ground and no doubt left over from building the aqueduct. A few others like it stood around. The breeze kept his scent from Perrin’s nose. He did not look up until Perrin drew rein in front of him. The gateway they had used to come here still stood open, showing another clearing among tall trees, not far from where the Seanchan were now camped. It might have been easier to have had them set up close to Perrin’s camp, but he wanted to keep the Aes Sedai and Wise Ones as far from the
sul’dam
and
damane
as possible. He was not afraid of the Seanchan breaking Tylee’s word, but the Aes Sedai and Wise Ones practically came down with the pip just thinking about
damane
. Probably the Wise Ones and Annoura would stay their hands for the time being. Probably. Masuri, he was not so sure of. In a number of ways. Better to keep a few leagues between them for as long as it could be managed.