The Dragon Reborn - By Robert Jordan Page 0,213

three women had come when they did, as he expected to receive orders returning his company to Andor any day. The few inhabitants of Jurene would likely go with them, leaving what remained for brigands and the Cairhienin soldiers of warring Houses.

Elayne kept her face hidden in the hood of her sturdy wool cloak, but none of the soldiers seemed to associate the girl with red-gold hair with their Daughter-Heir. Some asked her to stay; Egwene was not sure whether Elayne was pleased or shocked. She herself told the men who asked her that she had no time for them. It was nice, in an odd way, to be asked; she certainly had no wish to kiss any of these fellows, but it was pleasant to be reminded that some men, at least, thought she was as pretty as Elayne. Nynaeve slapped one man’s face. That almost made Egwene laugh, and Elayne smiled openly; Egwene thought Nynaeve had been pinched, and despite the glare on her face, she did not look entirely displeased, either.

They were not wearing their rings. It had not taken much effort on Nynaeve’s part to convince them that one place they did not want to be taken for Aes Sedai was Tear, especially if the Black Ajah was there. Egwene had hers in her pouch with the stone ter’angreal; she touched it often to remind herself they were still there. Nynaeve wore hers on the cord that held Lan’s heavy ring between her breasts.

There was a ship in Jurene, tied to the single stone dock sticking into the Erinin. Not the ship Aviendha had seen, it seemed, but still a ship. Egwene was dismayed when she saw it. Twice as wide as the Blue Crane, the Darter belied its name with a bluff bow as round as its captain.

That worthy fellow blinked at Nynaeve and scratched his ear when she asked if his vessel was fast. “Fast? I am full of fancy wood from Shienar and rugs from Kandor. What need to be fast with a cargo like that? Prices only go up. Yes, I suppose there are faster ships behind me, but they’ll not put in here. I would not have stopped myself if I hadn’t found worms in the meat. Fool notion that they’d have meat to sell in Cairhien. The Blue Crane? Aye, I saw Ellisor hung up on something upriver this morning. He’ll not get off soon, I’m thinking. That’s what a fast ship brings you.”

Nynave paid their fares—and twice as much again for the horses—with such a look on her face that neither Egwene nor Elayne spoke to her until long after the Darter had wallowed away from Jurene.

CHAPTER

40

A Hero in the Night

Leaning on the rail, Mat watched the walled town of Aringill come closer as the sweeps worked the Gray Gull in toward the long, tarred-timber docks. Protected by high stone wing-walls that thrust out into the river, those docks swarmed with people, and more were leaving the ships of various sizes that lay tied all along them. Some of the people pushed barrows, or pulled sledges or tall-wheeled carts, all piled high with furniture and chests lashed in place, but most carried bundles on their backs, if that. Not everyone bustled. Many men and women huddled together uncertainly, and children clung crying to their legs. Soldiers in red coats and shiny breastplates kept trying to make them move off the docks into the town, but most seemed too frightened to move.

Mat turned and shaded his eyes to peer at the river they were leaving. The Erinin was busier here than he had seen it south of Tar Valon, with nearly a dozen vessels under way in sight, ranging from a long, sharp-prowed splinter darting upriver against the current, pushed by two triangular sails, to a wide, bluff-bowed ship with square sails, still wallowing along well to the north.

Nearly half the ships he could see had nothing to do with the river trade, though. Two broad-beamed craft with empty decks were lumbering across the river, toward a smaller town on the far bank, while three others labored back toward Aringill, their decks packed with people like barrels of fish. The setting sun, still its own height above the horizon, shadowed a banner flying over that other town. That shore was Cairhien, but he did not need to see the banner to know it was the White Lion of Andor. There had been talk enough in the few Andoran villages where