The large map of Tarabon spread out on the table in front of her and held flat by four lamps gave reason enough for worry. Markers covered it, red wedges for Seanchan forces on the move and red stars for forces holding in place, each supporting a small paper banner inked with their numbers and composition. Scattered across the map, across the entire map, lay black discs marking engagements, and even more white discs for enemy forces, many of those without the banners. How could there be any enemies in Tarabon? It was as secure as….
“What happened?” she demanded.
“Raken began arriving with reports from Lieutenant-General Turan about three hours ago,” Galgan began in conversational tones. Pointedly not making a report himself. He studied the map as he talked, never glancing in her direction. “They aren’t complete—each new one adds to the lists, and I expect that won’t change for a while—but what I’ve seen runs this way. Since dawn yesterday, seven major supply camps overrun and burned, along with more than two dozen smaller camps. Twenty supply trains attacked, the wagons and their contents put to the torch. Seventeen small outposts have been wiped out, eleven patrols have failed to report in, and there have been an additional fifteen skirmishes. Also a few attacks against our settlers. Only a handful of fatalities, mostly men who tried to defend their belongings, but a good many wagons and stores burned along with some half-built houses, and the same message delivered everywhere. Leave Tarabon. All this was done by bands of between two and perhaps five hundred men. Estimates are a minimum of ten thousand and perhaps twice that, nearly all Taraboners. Oh, yes,” he finished casually, “and most of them are wearing armor painted with stripes.”
She wanted to grind her teeth. Galgan commanded the soldiers of the Return, yet she commanded the Corenne, the Forerunners, and as such, she possessed the higher rank in spite of his crest and red-lacquered fingernails. She suspected the only reason he did not claim that the Forerunners had been absorbed into the Return by its very arrival was that supplanting her meant assuming responsibility for Tuon’s safety. And for that apology, should it become necessary. “Dislike” was too mild a word. She loathed Galgan.
“A mutiny?” she said, proud of the coolness of her voice. Inside, she had begun to burn.
Galgan’s white queue swung slowly as he shook his head. “No. All reports say our Taraboners have fought well, and we’ve had a few successes, taken a few prisoners. Not one of them can be found on the rosters of loyal Taraboners. Several have been identified as Dragonsworn believed to be up in Arad Doman. And the name Rodel Ituralde has been mentioned a number of times as the brain behind it all, and the leader. A Domani. He’s supposed to be one of the best generals this side of the ocean, and if he planned and carried out all this,” he swept a hand over the map, “then I believe it.” The fool sounded admiring! “Not a mutiny. A raid on a grand scale. But he won’t get out with nearly as many men as he brought in.”
Dragonsworn. The word was like a fist clutching Suroth’s throat. “Are there Asha’man?”
“Those fellows who can channel?” Galgan grimaced and made a sign against evil, apparently unconscious of doing so. “There was no mention of them,” he said dryly, “and I rather think there would have been.”
Red-hot anger needed to erupt at Galgan, but screaming at another of the High Blood would lower her eyes. And, as bad, gain nothing. Still, it had to be directed somewhere. It had to come out. She was proud of what she had done in Tarabon, and now the country appeared to be halfway back to the chaos she found when she first landed there. And one man was to blame. “This Ituralde.” Her tone was ice. “I want his head!”
“Never fear,” Galgan murmured, folding his hands behind his back and bending to examine some of the small banners. “It won’t be long before Turan chases him back to Arad Doman with his tail between his legs, and with luck, he’ll be with one of the bands we snap up.”
“Luck?” she snapped. “I don’t trust to luck!” Her anger was open, now, and she did not consider trying to suppress it again. Her eyes scanned the map as though she could find Ituralde that way. “If Turan is hunting a hundred bands, as you suggest, he’ll need more scouts to run them down, and I want them run down. Every last one of them. Especially Ituralde. General Yulan, I want four in every five—no, nine in every ten—raken in Altara and Amadicia moved to Tarabon. If Turan can’t find them all with that, then he can see if his own head will appease me.”
Yulan, a dark little man in a blue robe embroidered with black-crested eagles, must have dressed in too great a hurry to apply the gum that normally held his wig in place, because he was constantly touching the thing to make sure it was straight. He was Captain of the Air for the Forerunners, but the Return’s Captain of the Air was only a Banner-General, a more senior man having died on the voyage. Yulan would have no trouble with him.
“A wise move, High Lady,” he said, frowning at the map, “but may I suggest leaving the raken in Amadicia and those assigned to Banner-General Khirgan. Raken are the best way we have to locate Aiel, and in two days we still haven’t found those Whitecloaks. That will still give General Turan—”
“The Aiel are less of a problem every day,” she told him firmly, “and a few deserters are nothing.” He inclined his head in assent, one hand keeping his wig in place. He was only low Blood, after all.
“I hardly call seven thousand men a few deserters,” Galgan murmured dryly.
“It shall be as I command!” she snapped. Curse those so-called Children of the Light! She still had not decided whether to make Asunawa and the few thousand who had remained da’covale. They had remained, yet how long before they offered betrayal, too? And Asunawa seemed to hate damane, of all things. The man was unbalanced!
Galgan shrugged, utterly unperturbed. A red-lacquered fingernail traced lines on the map as though he were planning movements of soldiers. “So long as you don’t want the to’raken, too, I raise no objections. That plan must go forward. Altara is falling into our hands with barely a struggle, I’m not ready to move on Illian yet, and we need to pacify Tarabon again quickly. The people will turn against us if we can’t give them safety.”
Suroth began to regret letting her anger show. He would raise no objections? He was not ready for Illian yet? He was all but saying that he did not have to follow her orders, only not openly, not so he had to take her responsibility along with her authority.
“I expect this message to be sent to Turan, General Galgan.” Her voice was steady, kept so by will alone. “He is to send me Rodel Ituralde’s head if he has to hound the man across Arad Doman and into the Blight. And if he fails to send me that head, I will take his.”
Galgan’s mouth tightened briefly, and he frowned down at the map. “Turan sometimes needs a fire lit under him,” he muttered, “and Arad Doman has always been next for him. Very well. Your message will be sent, Suroth.”
She could stay no longer in the same room with him. Without a word, she left. Had she spoken, she would have screamed. She stalked all the way back to her rooms without bothering to mask her fury. The Deathwatch Guards took no notice, of course; they might as well have been carved of stone. Which made her slam the anteroom door behind her with a crash. Perhaps they noticed that!
Padding toward her bed, she kicked off her slippers, let the robe and sash fall to the floor. She must find Tuon. She had to. If only she could puzzle out Tuon’s target, puzzle out where she was. If only—
Suddenly the walls of her bedchamber, the ceiling, even the floor, began to glow with a silvery light. Those surfaces seemed to have become light. Gaping in shock, she turned slowly, staring at the box of light that surrounded her, and found herself looking at a woman made of roiling flames, clothed in roiling flames. Almandaragal was on his feet, awaiting his owner’s command to attack.
“I am Semirhage,” the woman of fire said in a voice like a tolling funeral gong.
“Belly, Almandaragal!” That command, taught as a child because it amused her to have the lopar prostrate himself before her, ended with a grunt because she obeyed it herself even as she gave it. Kissing the red-and-green-patterned carpet, she said, “I live to serve and obey, Great Mistress.” There was no doubt in her mind that this woman was who she said. Who would dare claim that name falsely? Or could appear as living fire?
“I think you would also like to rule.” The tolling gong sounded faintly amused, but then it hardened. “Look at me! I dislike the way you Seanchan avoid meeting my eyes. It makes me believe you are hiding something. You don’t want to try hiding anything from me, Suroth.”
“Of course, not, Great Mistress,” Suroth said, pushing herself up to sit on her heels. “Never, Great Mistress.” She raised her gaze as far as the other woman’s mouth, but she could not make herself raise it higher. Surely that would be enough.
“Better,” Semirhage murmured. “Now. How would you like to rule in these lands? A handful of deaths—Galgan and a few others—and you could manage to name yourself Empress, with my help. It’s hardly important, but circumstances provide the opportunity, and you would certainly be more amenable than the current Empress has been so far.”
Suroth’s stomach clenched. She feared she might vomit. “Great Mistress,” she said dully, “the penalty for that is to be taken before the true Empress, may she live forever, and have your entire skin removed, great care being taken to keep you alive. After that—”
“Inventive, if primitive,” Semirhage broke in wryly. “But of no account. The Empress Radhanan is dead. Remarkable how much blood there is in a human body. Enough to cover the whole Crystal Throne. Take the offer, Suroth. I will not make it again. You will make certain matters slightly more convenient, but not enough for me to put myself out a second time.”