The Dragon Reborn - By Robert Jordan Page 0,68

woman, stepped forward. They were all young women, but still older than Nynaeve. Nynaeve’s rapid Acceptance had been extraordinary. In the normal course of things, it took years as a novice to earn the Great Serpent rings they wore, and would take years more before they could hope to be raised to full Aes Sedai.

“Take them to their rooms,” Sheriam commanded, “and keep them there. They may have bread, cold broth, and water until the Amyrlin Seat says otherwise. And if one of them speaks even a word, you may take her to the kitchens and set her to scrubbing pots.” She whirled and stalked away, even her back expressing anger.

Faolain eyed Egwene and the others with almost a hopeful air, especially Nynaeve, who wore a glower like a mask. Faolain’s round face held no love for those who broke the rules so extravagantly, and less for one like Nynaeve, a wilder who had earned her ring without ever being a novice, who had channeled power before she ever entered Tar Valon. When it became obvious that Nynaeve meant to keep her anger to herself, Faolain shrugged. “When the Amyrlin sends for you, you’ll probably be stilled.”

“Give over, Faolain,” another of the Accepted said. The oldest of the three, she had a willowy neck and coppery skin, and a graceful way of moving. “I will take you,” she told Nynaeve. “I am called Theodrin, and I, too, am a wilder. I will hold you to Sheriam Sedai’s order, but I will not bait you. Come.”

Nynaeve gave Egwene and Elayne a worried look, then sighed and let Theodrin lead her away.

“Wilders,” Faolain muttered. On her tongue, it sounded like a curse. She turned her stare to Egwene.

The third Accepted, a pretty, apple-cheeked young woman, stationed herself beside Elayne. Her mouth was turned up at the corners as if she liked to smile, but the stern look she gave Elayne said she would brook no nonsense now.

Egwene returned Faolain’s stare with as much calm as she could manage, and, she hoped, a measure of the haughty, silent contempt that Elayne had adopted. Red Ajah, she thought. This one will definitely choose the Reds. But it was hard not to think of her own troubles. Light, what are they going to do to us? She meant the Aes Sedai, the Tower, not these women.

“Well, come along,” Faolain snapped. “It’s bad enough I have to stand guard on your door without standing here all day. Come along.”

Taking a deep breath, Egwene gripped Elayne’s hand and followed. Light, let them be Healing Mat.

CHAPTER

12

The Amyrlin Seat

Siuan Sanche paced the length of her study, pausing now and again to glance, with a blue-eyed gaze that had made rulers stammer, at a carved nightwood box on a long table centered in the room. She hoped she would not have to use any of the carefully drawn documents within it. They had been prepared and sealed in secret, by her own hand, to cover a dozen possible eventualities. She had laid a warding on the box so that if any hand but hers opened it, the contents would flash to ash in an instant; very likely the box itself would burst into flame.

“And burn the thieving fisher-bird, whoever she might be, so she never forgets it, I hope,” she muttered. For the hundredth time since being told that Verin had returned, she readjusted her stole on her shoulders without realizing what she was doing. It hung below her waist, broad and striped with the colors of the seven Ajahs. The Amyrlin Seat was of all Ajahs and of none, no matter from which she had been raised.

The room was ornate, for it had belonged to generations of women who had worn the stole. The tall fireplace and broad, cold hearth were all carved golden marble from Kandor, and the diamond-shaped floor tiles, polished redstone from the Mountains of Mist. The walls were panels of some pale striped wood, hard as iron and carved in fantastic beasts and birds of unbelievable plumage, panels brought from the lands beyond the Aiel Waste by the Sea Folk before Artur Hawkwing was born. Tall, arched windows, open now to let in the new, green smells, let onto a balcony overlooking her small private garden, where she seldom had time to walk.

All that grandeur was in stark contrast to the furnishings Siuan Sanche had brought to the room. The one table and the stout chair behind it were plain, if well polished with age