The great hunt - By Robert Jordan Page 0,172

him. I know as well as you, as well as any sister who cares to find out, that the seals holding the Dark One in Shayol Ghul are weakening. The Illianers call the Great Hunt of the Horn. False Dragons abound. And two of them, Logain and now this fellow in Saldaea, able to channel. When was the last time the Reds found two men channeling in less than a year? When did they last find one in five years? Not in my lifetime, and I am a good deal older than you. The signs are everywhere. Tarmon Gai’don is coming. The Dark One will break free. And the Dragon will be Reborn.” Her cup rattled as she set it down. “I suppose that is why I feared you might have seen some sign of him.”

“He will come,” Moiraine said smoothly, “and we will do what must be done.”

“If I thought it would do any good, I’d pull Adeleas’s nose out of her book and set off for the White Tower. But I find I am glad to be here where I am instead. Perhaps we will have time to finish our history.”

“I hope that you will, Sister.”

Vandene rose to her feet. “Well, I have tasks to be about before bed. If you have no more questions, I will leave you to your studies.” But she paused and revealed that however long she had spent with books, she was still of the Green Ajah. “You should do something about Lan, Moiraine. The man is rumbling inside worse than Dragonmount. Sooner or later, he will erupt. I’ve known enough men to see when one is troubled with a woman. You two have been together a long time. Perhaps he has finally come to see you are a woman as well as Aes Sedai.”

“Lan sees me as what I am, Vandene. Aes Sedai. And still as a friend, I hope.”

“You Blues. Always so ready to save the world that you lose yourselves.”

After the white-haired Aes Sedai left, Moiraine gathered her cloak and, muttering to herself, went into the garden. There was something in what Vandene had said that tugged at her mind, but she could not remember what it was. An answer, or a hint to an answer, for a question she had not asked—but she could not bring the question to mind, either.

The garden was small, like the house, but neat even in moonlight aided by the yellow glow from the cottage windows, with sandy walks between careful beds of flowers. She settled her cloak loosely on her shoulders against the soft coolness of the night. What was the answer, and what was the question?

Sand crunched behind her, and she turned, thinking it was Lan.

A shadow loomed dimly only a few paces from her, a shadow that appeared to be a too-tall man wrapped in his cloak. But the face caught the moon, gaunt-cheeked, pale, with black eyes too big above a puckered, red-lipped mouth. The cloak opened, unfolding into great wings like a bat’s.

Knowing it was too late, she opened herself to saidar, but the Draghkar began to croon, and its soft hum filled her, fragmenting her will. Saidar slipped away. She felt only a vague sadness as she stepped toward the creature; the deep crooning that drew her closer suppressed feeling. White, white hands—like a man’s hands, but tipped with claws—reached for her, and lips the color of blood curved in a travesty of a smile, baring sharp teeth, but dimly, so dimly, she knew it would not bite or tear. Fear the Draghkar’s kiss. Once those lips touched her, she would be as good as dead, to be drained of soul, then of life. Whoever found her, even if they came as the Draghkar let her fall, would find a corpse without a mark and cold as if dead two days. And if they came before she was dead, what they found would be worse, and not really her at all any longer. The croon pulled her within reach of those pale hands, and the Draghkar’s head bent slowly toward her.

She felt only the smallest surprise when a sword blade flashed over her shoulder to pierce the Draghkar’s breast, and little more when a second crossed her other shoulder to strike beside the first.

Dazed, swaying, she watched as if from a great distance as the creature was pushed back, away from her. Lan came into her view, then Jaem, the gray-haired Warder’s bony arms holding his blade as