The Fires of Heaven (83 page)

That was her bluntest reminder yet of the promised hundred gold marks, but for once it did not slow him. “Enough people? Enough people! People must be attracted, woman. Chin Akima has been in place three days, and he has a fellow who juggles swords and axes. And nine acrobats. Nine! Some woman I’ve never heard of has two women acrobats who do things on a hanging rope that would make the Chavanas’ eyes pop. You would not believe the crowds. Sillia Cerano has men with their faces painted like court fools, splashing each other with water and hitting each other over the head with bladders, and people are paying an extra silver penny just to watch!” Suddenly his eyes narrowed, focusing on Birgitte. “Would you be willing to paint your face? Sillia doesn’t have a woman among her fools. Some of the horse handlers would be willing. It doesn’t hurt, getting hit with an inflated bladder, and I will pay you. . . .” He trailed off, musing—he did not like parting with money any more than Nynaeve did—and Birgitte spoke into his momentary silence.

“I am not a fool, and will not be a fool. I am an archer.”

“An archer,” he muttered, eyeing the intricate glossy black braid pulled over her left shoulder. “And I suppose you call yourself Birgitte. What are you? One of those idiots hunting the Horn of Valere? Even if the thing exists, what chance any one of you will find it more than another? I was in Illian when the Hunters’ oaths were given, and there were thousands in the Great Square of Tammaz. But for glory that you
can
attain, nothing can outshine the applause of—”

“I am an archer, pretty man,” Birgitte broke in firmly. “Fetch a bow,
and I will outshoot you or anyone you name, a hundred gold crowns to your one.” Elayne expected Nynaeve to yelp—it was they who would have to cover the wager if Birgitte lost, and whatever she claimed, Elayne did not think Birgitte could be fully recovered already—yet all Nynaeve did was close her eyes briefly and draw a deep, long breath.

“Women!” Luca growled. Thom and Juilin did not have to look as if they agreed. “You are a fine match for the
Lady
Morelin and Nana, or whatever their names are.” He swept his silk cloak in a wide gesture at the surrounding hustle of men and horses. “It may have escaped your keen eye,
Birgitte,
but I have a show to get under way, and my rivals are already draining Samara of coin like the cutpurses they are.”

Birgitte smiled, a slight curving of her lips. “Are you afraid, pretty man? We can make your side a silver penny.”

Elayne thought Luca might have apoplexy from the color that crept into his face. His neck suddenly looked too big for his collar. “I will fetch my bow,” he almost hissed. “You can work off the hundred marks with your face painted, or cleaning cages for all I care!”

“Are you sure that you are well enough?” Elayne asked Birgitte as he stalked off muttering to himself. The only word she caught was a repeat of “Women!” Nynaeve was looking at the woman with the braid as if she wanted the ground to open and swallow her; herself, not Birgitte. A number of the horse handlers had gathered around Thom and Juilin for some reason.

“He has nice legs,” Birgitte said, “but I have never liked tall men. Add a pretty face, and they are always insufferable.”

Petra had joined the group of men, twice as wide as any other. He said something, then shook hands with Thom. The Chavanas were there as well. And Latelle, talking earnestly with Thom while darting dark looks at Nynaeve and the two women with her. By the time Luca returned with an unstrung bow and a quiver of arrows, no one was making preparations any longer. The wagons and horses and cages—even the tethered boar-horses—stood abandoned, the people all clustered around Thom and the thief-catcher. They followed as Luca led the way a short distance out of the camp.

“I am accounted a fair shot,” he said, carving a white cross chest-high to himself on the trunk of a tall oak. He had some of his jauntiness back, and he swaggered as he strode off fifty paces. “I will take the first shot, so you can see what you face.”

Birgitte plucked the bow from his hand and walked off another fifty as he stared after her. She shook her head over the bow, but braced it on her
slippered foot and strung it in one smooth motion before Luca joined her and Elayne and Nynaeve. Birgitte pulled an arrow from the quiver he held, examined it a moment, then tossed it aside like rubbish. Luca frowned and opened his mouth, but she was already discarding a second shaft. The next three went to the leaf-covered ground as well before she stuck one point-down in the soil beside her. Of twenty-one, she kept only four.

“She can do it,” Elayne whispered, trying to sound certain. Nynaeve nodded bleakly; if they had to pay out a hundred gold crowns, they would soon be selling the jewelry Amathera had given them. The letters-of-rights were all but useless, as she had explained to Nynaeve; their use would eventually point a finger to where they had been been for Elaida, if not where they were.
If I had just spoken up in time, I could have stopped this. As my Warder, she has to do as I say. Doesn’t she?
From the evidence so far, obedience was no part of the bond. Had those Aes Sedai she had spied on made the men give oaths as well? Now that she thought of it, she believed one of them had.

Birgitte nocked an arrow, raised the bow, and loosed seemingly without pausing to aim. Elayne winced, but the steel point struck dead center in the middle of the carved white cross. Before it stopped quivering, the second brushed in beside it. Birgitte did wait a moment then, but only for the two arrows to still. A gasp rose from the onlookers as the third shaft
split
the first, but that was nothing to the absolute silence as the last split the other just as neatly. Once could have been chance. Twice . . .

Luca looked as if his eyes were coming out of his head. Mouth hanging open, he stared at the tree, then at Birgitte, at the tree, then Birgitte. She proffered the bow, and he shook his head weakly.

Suddenly he flung the quiver away, spreading his arms wide with a glad cry. “Not knives! Arrows! From a hundred paces!”

Nynaeve sagged against Elayne as the man explained what he wanted, but she made not one sound of protest. Thom and Juilin were collecting money; most handed over coins with a sigh or a laugh, but Juilin had to snag Latelle’s arm as she tried to slip away, and speak some angry words before she dug coins from her pouch. So that was what they had been up to. She would have to speak to them firmly. But later. “Nana, you don’t have to go through with this.” The woman only stared at Birgitte, eyes haggard.

“Our wager?” Birgitte said when Luca ran out of wind. He grimaced, then fished slowly into his pouch and tossed her a coin. Elayne caught the glint of gold in the sun as Birgitte examined it, then tossed it right back. “The bet was a silver penny on your part.”

Luca’s eyes widened in startlement, but the next moment he was laughing
and pressing the gold crown into her hand. “You are worth every copper of it. What do you say? Why, the Queen of Ghealdan herself might come to see a performance such as yours. Birgitte and her arrows. We will paint them silver, and the bow!”

Desperately Elayne wanted Birgitte to look at her. They might as well put up a sign for Moghedien as do what the man suggested.

But Birgitte only bounced the coin on her hand, grinning. “Paint will ruin an already shabby bow,” she said finally. “And call me Maerion; I was called that, once.” Leaning on the bow, she let her smile widen. “Can I have a red dress, too?”

Elayne heaved a sigh of fervent relief. Nynaeve looked as if she were going to sick up.

F
or what seemed the hundredth time, Nynaeve held a lock of her hair up to look at it and sighed. Thick murmurs of talk and laughter from hundreds if not thousands of throats, distant music that was nearly drowned out, drifted in through the wagon walls. She had not minded spending the parade through the streets of Samara in the wagon with Elayne—occasional peeks through the windows had convinced her that she would just as soon not be out in those packed crowds, yelling and barely making way for the wagons—but every time she looked at the brassy red of her hair, she wished she had been doing somersaults with the Chavanas rather than dyeing it.

Carefully not looking at herself, she wrapped up completely in her plain dark gray shawl, turned, and gave a start to find Birgitte standing in the doorway. The woman had ridden in Clarine and Petra’s wagon during the parade, with Clarine altering a spare red dress she had been making for Nynaeve at Luca’s direction; he had given Clarine her instructions before Nynaeve ever agreed. Birgitte wore it now, her black-dyed braid pulled over her shoulder so it nestled between her breasts, totally unconscious of the low square neck. Just looking at her made Nynaeve fold her shawl tighter; Birgitte could not show a fingernail more of pale bosom and retain the slightest claim to decency. As it was, such a claim would be feeble, really
quite laughable. Looking at her made Nynaeve’s stomach knot up, but not for reasons of clothes or skin.

“If you are going to wear the dress, why cover up?” Birgitte came inside and closed the door behind her. “You are a woman. Why not be proud of it?”

“If you think I shouldn’t,” Nynaeve replied hesitantly, and slowly let the shawl slide down to her elbows, revealing the twin of the other woman’s garment. She felt all but naked. “I only thought . . . I thought . . .” Gripping her silk skirts hard to keep her hands at her sides, she held her gaze on the other woman. Even knowing she wore exactly the same herself, it was easier that way.

Birgitte grimaced. “And if I wanted you to lower the neck another inch?”

Nynaeve opened her mouth, face going as scarlet as the gown, but for a moment nothing came out. When it did, she sounded as if she were being strangled. “There isn’t an inch to lower it. Look at your own. There isn’t a
tenth
!”

Three quick, frowning strides, and Birgitte bent slightly to put her face right in Nynaeve’s. “And if I said I wanted you to rid yourself of that inch?” she snarled, showing teeth. “What if I wanted to paint your face, so Luca could have his fool? What if I stripped you out of it altogether and painted you from head to toe? A fine target you would make then. Every man inside fifty miles would come to see.”

Nynaeve’s mouth worked, but this time no sound emerged at all. She wanted very much to close her eyes; maybe when she opened them, none of this would be happening.

With a disgusted shake of her head, Birgitte took a seat on one of the beds, one elbow on her knee and her blue eyes sharp. “This must stop. When I look at you, you flinch. You run about waiting on me hand and foot. If I glance for a stool, you fetch one. If I lick my lips, you have a cup of wine in my hands before I know I am thirsty. You would wash my back and put the slippers on my feet if I let you. I am neither monster nor invalid nor child, Nynaeve.”

“I am only trying to make up for—” she began timidly, and jumped when the other woman roared.

“Make up? You are trying to make me less!”

“No. No, it is not that, truly. I am to blame—”

“You take responsibility for my actions,” Birgitte broke in fiercely. “
I
chose
to speak to you in
Tel’aran’rhiod. I
chose to help you.
I
chose to track Moghedien. And
I
chose to take you to see her.
Me!
Not you, Nynaeve, me! I was not your puppet, your pack hound, then, and I will not be now.”

Nynaeve swallowed hard and gripped her skirts more tightly. She had no right to be angry with this woman. No right at all. But Birgitte had every right. “You did what I asked. It is my fault that you . . . that you are here. It is all my fault!”

“Have I mentioned fault? I see none. Only men and dim-witted girls take blame where there is none, and you are neither.”

“It was my foolish pride that made me think I could best her again, and my cowardice that let her . . . that let her . . . If I had not been so afraid I could not spit, I might have done something in time.”

“A coward?” Birgitte’s eyes widened, openly incredulous, and scorn touched her voice. “You? I thought you had more sense than to confuse fear with cowardice. You could have fled
Tel’aran’rhiod
when Moghedien released you, but you stayed to fight. No fault or blame to you that you could not.” Drawing a deep breath, she rubbed her forehead for a moment, then leaned forward intently again. “Listen to me close, Nynaeve. I take no blame for what was done to you. I saw, but I could not twitch. Had Moghedien tied you into a knot or cored you like an apple, still I would take no blame. I did what I could, when I could. And you did the same.”