Rand grunted. They don't die so easily as that.
He glanced into one of the large, windowless buildings, stopping to look through the door. To his surprise, it seemed to be one huge room, open to the sky in the middle and lined with balconies, with a large dais at one end. He had never seen or heard of anything like it. People jammed the balconies and the floor watching people perform on the dais. He peeked into others as he passed them, and saw jugglers, and musicians, any number of tumblers, and even a gleeman, with his cloak of patches, declaiming a story from The Great Hunt of the Horn in sonorousvoice High Chant.
That made him think of Thom Merrilin, and he hurried on. Memories of Thom were always sad. Thom had been a friend. A friend who had died for him. While I ran away and let him die.
In another of the big structures, a woman in voluminous white robes appeared to make things vanish from one basket and appear in another, then disappear from her hands in great puffs of smoke. The crowd watching her oohed and aahed loudly.
“Two coppers, my good Lord,” a ratty little man in the doorway said. “Two coppers to see the Aes Sedai.”
“I don't think so.” Rand glanced back at the woman. A white dove had appeared in her hands. Aes Sedai? “No.” He gave the ratty man a small bow and left.
He was making his way through the throng, wondering what to see next, when a deep voice, accompanied by the plucking of a harp, drifted out from a doorway with the sign of a juggler over it.
“... cold blows the wind down Shara Pass; cold lies the grave unmarked. Yet every year at Sunday, upon those piled stones appears a single rose, one crystal teardrop like dew upon the petals, laid by the fair hand of Dunsinin, for she keeps fast to the bargain made by Rogosh Eagleeye.”
The voice drew Rand like a rope. He pushed through the doorway as applause rose within.
“Two coppers, my good Lord,” said a ratfaced man who could have been twin to the other. “Two coppers to see —”
Rand dug out some coins and thrust them at the man. He walked on in a daze, staring at the man bowing on the dais to the clapping of his listeners, cradling his harp in one arm and with the other spreading his patchcovered cloak as if to trap all the sound they made. He was a tall man, lanky and not young, with long mustaches as white as the hair on his head. And when he straightened and saw Rand, the eyes that widened were sharp and blue.
“Thom.” Rand's whisper was lost in the noise of the crowd.
Holding Rand's eye, Thom Merrilin nodded slightly toward a small door beside the dais. Then he was bowing again, smiling and basking in the applause.
Rand made his way to the door and through it. It was only a small hallway, with three steps leading up to the dais. In the other direction from the dais Rand could see a juggler practicing with colored balls, and six tumblers limbering themselves.
Thom appeared on the steps, limping as though his right leg did not bend as well as it had. He eyed the juggler and the tumblers, blew out his mustaches disdainfully, and turned to Rand. “All they want to hear is The Great Hunt of the Horn. You would think, with the news from Haddon Mirk and Saldaea, one of them would ask for The Karaethon Cycle. Well, maybe not that, but I'd pay myself to tell something else.” He looked Rand up and down. “You look as if you're doing well, boy.” He fingered Rand's collar and pursed his lips. “Very well.”
Rand could not help laughing. “I left Whitebridge sure you were dead. Moiraine said you were still alive, but I ... Light, Thom, it's good to see you again! I should have gone back to help you.”
“Bigger fool if you had, boy. That Fade” — he looked around; there was no one close enough to hear, but he lowered his voice anyway — “had no interest in me. It left me a little present of a stiff leg and ran off after you and Mat. All you could have done was die.” He paused, looking thoughtful. “Moiraine said I was still alive, did she? Is she with you, then?”
Rand shook his head. To his surprise, Thom seemed disappointed.
“Too bad, in a way. She's a fine woman, even if she is ...” He left it unsaid. “So it was Mat or Perrin she was after. I won't ask which. They were good boys, and I don't want to know.” Rand shifted uneasily, and gave a start when Thom fixed him with a bony finger. “What I do want to know is, do you still have my harp and flute? I want them back, boy. What I have now are not fit for a pig to play.”
“I have them, Thom. I'll bring them to you, I promise. I can't believe you are alive. And I can't believe you aren't in Illian. The Great Hunt setting out. The prize for the best telling of The Great Hunt of the Horn. You were dying to go.”
Thom snorted. “After Whitebridge? Likely I'd die if I did go. Even if I could have reached the boat before it sailed, Domon and his whole crew would be spreading the tale all over Illian about how I was being chased by Trollocs. If they saw the Fade, or heard of it, before Domon cut his lines ... Most Illianers think Trollocs and Fades are fables, but enough others might want to know why a man was pursued by them to make Illian somewhat more than uncomfortable.”
“Thom, I have so much to tell you.”
The gleeman cut him off. “Later, boy.” He was exchanging glares down the length of the hall with the narrowfaced man from the door. “If I don't go back and tell another, he will no doubt send the juggler out, and that lot will tear the hall down around our heads. You come to The Bunch of Grapes, just beyond the Jangai Gate. I have a room there. Anyone can tell you where to find it. I'll be there in another hour or so. One more tale will have to satisfy them.” He started back up the steps, flinging over his shoulder, “And bring my harp and my flute!”
Chapter 26
(Harp)
Discord
Rand darted through the common room of The Defender of the Dragonwall and hurried upstairs, grinning at the startled look the innkeeper had given him. Rand wanted to grin at everything. Thom's alive!
He flung open the door to his room and went straight to the wardrobe.
Loial and Hurin put their heads in from the other room, both in their shirtsleeves and with pipes in their teeth trailing thin streams of smoke.
“Has something happened, Lord Rand?” Hurin asked anxiously.