Towers of Midnight (88 page)

Perrin lowered his tools. On the anvil
 
still glowing with an inner heat
 
was a beautiful hammer. A work beyond anything he'd ever created, or thought that he might create. It had a thick, powerful head, like a maul or sledge, but the back was fonned cross-face and flattened. Like a blacksmith's tool. It was four feet from bottom to top, maybe longer, an enormous size for a hammer of this type.

The haft was all of steel, something he'd never seen on a hammer before. Perrin picked it up; he was able to lift it with one hand, but barely. It was heavy. Solid.

The ornamentation was of a Crosshatch pattern with the leaping wolf stamped on one side. It looked like Hopper. Perrin touched it with a callused thumb, and the metal quieted. It still felt warm to the touch, but did not burn him.

He turned to look, and was amazed at the size of the crowd watching him. The Two Rivers men stood at the front, Jori Congar, Azi al'Thone, Wil al'Seen and hundreds more. Ghealdanin, Cairhienin, Andorans, Mayeners. Watching, quiet. The ground around Perrin was blackened from the falling sparks; drops of silvery metal spread out from him like a sunburst.

Neald fell to his knees, panting, his face coated with sweat. Grady and the women of the circle sat down, looking exhausted. All six Wise Ones had joined in. What had they done?

Perrin felt exhausted, as if all of his strength and emotion had been fotged into the metal. But he could not rest. "Wil. Weeks ago, I gave you an order. Burn the banners that bore the wolfhead. Did you obey? Did you burn every one?"

Wil al'Seen met his eyes, then looked down, ashamed. "Lord Perrin, I tried. But . . . Light, I couldn't do it. I kept one. The one I'd helped sew."

"Fetch it, Wil," Perrin said. His own voice sounded like steel.

Wil ran, smelling frightened. He returned shortly, bearing a folded cloth, white with a red border. Perrin took it, then held it in a reverent hand, hammer in the other. He looked at the crowd. Faile was there, hands clasped before her. She smelled hopeful. She could see into him. She knew.

"I have tried to send you away," Perrin announced to the crowd. "You would not go. I have failings. You must know this. If we march to war, I will not be able to protect you all. I will make mistakes."

He looked across the crowd, meeting the eyes of those who stood there. Each man or woman he looked at nodded silently. No regrets, no hesitations. They nodded.

Perrin took a deep bteath. "If you wish this, I will accept your oaths. I will lead you."

They cheered him. An enormous roar of excitement. "Goldeneyes! Goldeneyes the wolf! To the Last Battle! Tai'shar ManetherenV

"Wil!" Perrin bellowed, holding up the banner. "Raise this banner high. Don't take it down again until the Last Battle has been won. I match beneath the sign of the wolf. The rest of you, rouse the camp. Get every soldier ready to fight. We have another task tonight!"

The young man took the bannet and unfurled it, Jori and Azi joining him and holding it so it didn't touch the ground. They raised it high, running to get a pole. The group broke up, men running this way and that, shouting the summons.

Perrin took Faile by the hand as she walked up to him. She smelled satisfied. "That's it, then?"

"No more complaining," he promised. "I don't like it. But I don't like killing, either. I'll do what must be done." He looked down at the anvil, blackened from his work. His old hammer, now worn and dented, lay across it. He felt sad to leave it, but he had made his decision.

"What did you do, Neald?" he asked as the Asha'man
 
still looking pale
 
stumbled up to his feet. Perrin raised the new hammer, showing the magnificent work.

"I don't know, my Lord," Neald said. "It just . . . well, it was like I said. It felt right. I saw what to do, how to put the weaves into the metal itself. It seemed to draw them in, like an ocean drinking in the water of a stream." He blushed, as if he thought it a foolish figure of speech.

"That sounds right," Perrin said. "It needs a name, this hammer. Do you know much of the Old Tongue?"

"No, my Lord."

Perrin looked at the wolf imprinted on the side. "Does anyone know how you say 'He who soars'?" "I ... I don't . . ."

"Mah'alleinir" Berelain said, stepping up from where she'd been watching.

"Mah'alleinir" Perrin repeated. "It feels right. Sulin? What of the Whitecloaks?"

"They have made camp, Perrin Aybara," the Maiden replied.

"Show me," he said, gesturing to Arganda's map.

She pointed out the location: a piece of land on the side of a hill, heights running to the north of it, roadway coming in from the northeast, wrapping around the south of the heights
 
following the ancient riverbed
 
and then bending southward when it hit the campsite by the hill. From there, the road headed toward Lugard, but the campsite was protected from wind on two sides. It was a perfect campsite, but also a perfect place for an ambush. The one Arganda and Gallenne had pointed out.

He looked at that passageway and campsite, thinking of what had happened the last few weeks. We met travelers. . . . said that the muds to the north were almost completely impassable with wagons or carts . . .

A flock of sheep, running before the pack into the jaws of a beast. Faile and the others, walking toward a cliff. Light!

"Grady, Neald," Perrin said. "I'm going to need another gateway. Can you manage?"

"I think so," Neald said. "Just give us a few minutes to catch our breath."

"Very well. Position it here." Perrin pointed to the heights above the Whitecloaks' camp. "Gaul!" As usual, the Aiel man waited neatby. He loped up. "I want you to go speak with Dannil, Arganda, Gallenne. I want the entire army to cross through as quickly as possible, but they are to keep quiet. We move with as much stealth as an army this size can manage."

Gaul
nodded, running off. Gallenne was still nearby; Gaul started by speaking with him.

Faile watched Perrin, smelling curious and a little anxious. "What are you planning, husband?"

"It's time fot me to lead," Perrin said. He looked one last time at his old hammet, and laid fingers on its haft. Then he hefted Mah'alleinir to his shouldet and strode away, feet crackling on drops of hardened steel.

The tool he left behind was the hammer of a simple blacksmith. That person would always be part of Perrin, but he could no longer afford to let him lead.

From now on, he would carry the hammer of a king.

Faile ran her fingers across the anvil as Perrin strode away, calling further orders to prepare the army.

Did he realize how he'd looked, standing amid those showers of sparks, each blow of his hammer causing the steel befóre him to pulse and flare to life? His golden eyes had blazed as brightly as the steel; each peal of the hammet had been nearly deafening.

"It has been many centuries since this land has seen the creation of a Power-wrought weapon," Berelain said. Most others had left to follow Perrin's orders, and the two were alone, save for Gallenne standing nearby and studying the map while rubbing his chin. "It is a strong Talent the young man just displayed. This will be of use. Perrin's army will have Power-wrought blades to strengthen them."

"The process seemed very draining," Faile said. "Even if Neald can repeat what he did, I doubt we will have time to make many weapons."

"Every small advantage helps," Berelain said. "This army your husband has forged, it will be something incredible. Ta'veren is at work here. He gathers men, and they learn with amazing speed and skill."

"Perhaps," Faile said, walking around the anvil slowly, keeping her eyes on Berelain, who strolled around it opposite her. What was Berelain's game, here?

"Then we must speak with him," Berelain said. "Turn him from this course of action."

"This course of action?" Faile asked, genuinely confused.

Berelain stopped, her eyes alight with something. She seemed tense. She's worried, Faile thought. Worried deeply about something.

"Lord Perrin must not attack the Whitecloaks," Berelain said. "Please, you must help me persuade him."

"He's not going to attack them," Faile said. She was reasonably certain of that.

"He's setting up a perfect ambush," Berelain said. "Asha'man to use the One Power, Two Rivers bowmen to shoot from the heights down on the camp of the Children. Cavalry to ride down and sweep up after." She hesitated, seeming pained. "He's set them up perfectly. He told them that if he and Damodred both survived the Last Battle, he'd submit to punishment. But Perrin is going to make certain the Whitecloaks don't reach the Last Battle. He can keep his oath that way, but also avoid turning himself in."

Faile shook her head. "He'd never do that, Berelain."

"Can you be certain?" Berelain asked. "Absolutely certain?"

Faile hesitated. Perrin had been changing lately. Most of the changes were good ones, such as his decision to finally accept leadership. And the ambush Berelain spoke of would make a kind of perfect, ruthless sense.

But it was also wrong. Terribly wrong. Perrin wouldn't do that, no matter how much he'd changed. Of that, Faile could be certain.

"Yes," she said. "Giving a promise to Galad, then slaughtering the Whitecloaks in this way, it would rip Perrin apart. He doesn't think that way. It won't happen."

"I hope that you are right," Berelain said. "I had hoped some sort of accommodation could be reached with their commander before we left . . ."

A Whitecloak. Light! Couldn't she have picked one of the noblemen in camp to give her attentions to? One who wasn't married? "You aren't very good at picking men, are you, Berelain?" The words just slipped out.

Berelain turned back to Faile, eyes widening in either shock or anger. "And what of Perrin?"

"A terrible match for you," Faile said with a sniff. "You've shown that tonight, by what you think he is capable of."

"How good a match he was is irrelevant. I was promised him."

"By whom?"

"The Lord Dragon," Berelain said.

"What?"

"I came to the Dragon Reborn in the Stone of Tear," she said. "But he would not have me he even grew angry with my advances. I realized that he, the Dragon Reborn, intended to marry a much higher lady, probably Elayne Trakand. It makes sense
 
he cannot take every realm by the sword; some will have to come to him through alliances. Andor is very powerful, is ruled by a woman, and would be advantageous to hold through marriage."

"Perrin says Rand doesn't think like that, Berelain," Faile said. "Not so calculating. It's my inclination, too, from what I know of him."

"And you say the same thing about Perrin. You'd have me believe they're all so simple. Without a wit in their heads."

"I didn't say that."

"And yet you use the same old protests. Tiring. Well, I realized what the Lord Dragon was implying, so I turned my attentions towatd one of his close attendants. Perhaps he did not 'promise' them to me. That was a poor choice of words. But I knew he would be pleased if I made a union with one of his close allies and friends. Indeed, I suspect that he wished me to do it
 
after all, the Lord Dragon did place me and Perrin togethet for this mission. He could not be frank about what he desired, however, so as to not offend Pettin."

Faile hesitated. On one hand, what Berelain said was purely foolish . . . but on the other, she could see what the woman might have seen. Or, perhaps, what she wished to see. To her, breaking apart a husband and wife was nothing immoral. This was politics. And, logically, Rand probably should have wanted to tie nations to him through bonds of marriage to those closest to him.

That didn't change the fact that neither he, nor Perrin, regarded matters of the heart in such a way.

"I have given up on Petrin," Berelain said. "I hold to my promise there. But it leaves me in a difficult situation. I have long thought that a connection to the Dragon Reborn is Mayene's only hope in maintaining independence in the coming years."

"Marriage isn't only about claiming political advantages," Faile said.

"And yet the advantages are so obvious that they cannot be ignored."

"And this Whitecloak?" Faile asked.

"Half-brother of the Queen of Andor," Berelain said, blushing slightly. "If the Lord Dragon does intend to marry Elayne Trakand, this will give me a link to him."

It was much more than that; Faile could see it in the way Berelain acted, in the way she looked when she spoke of Galad Damodred. But if she wanted to rationalize a political motivation for it, Faile had no reason to dissuade her, so long as it helped distract her from Perrin.

"I have done as you asked," Berelain said. "And so now, I ask your aid. If it appears that he is going to attack them, please join me in trying to dissuade him. Together, perhaps we can manage it."

"Very well," Faile said.

Perrin rode at the head of an army that felt unified for the first time. The flag of Mayene, the flag of Ghealdan, the banners of noble Houses from among the refugees. Even a few banners the lads had made up representing the parts of the Two Rivers. Above them all flapped the wolfhead.