The great hunt - By Robert Jordan Page 0,204

opened it, even if they took Loial and him in, none of the doors he saw would stop a Trolloc. All that would do would be to offer up more victims with Loial and himself.

“Rand,” Loial said finally, “there is nowhere else to go.”

They had reached the eastern edge of the Foregate; the tall buildings to either side of them were the last. Lights in windows on the upper stories mocked him, but the lower floors were all shut tight. Ahead lay the hills, cloaked in first twilight and bare of so much as a farmhouse. Not entirely empty, though. He could just make out pale walls surrounding one of the larger hills, perhaps a mile away, and buildings inside.

“Once they push us out there,” Loial said, “they won’t have to worry who sees them.”

Rand gestured to the walls around the hill. “Those should stop a Trolloc. It must be a lord’s manner. Maybe they’ll let us in. An Ogier, and an outland lord? This coat has to be good for something sooner or later.” He looked back down the street. No Trollocs in sight yet, but he drew Loial around the side of the building anyway.

“I think that is the Illuminators’ chapter house, Rand. Illuminators guard their secrets tightly. I don’t think they would let Galldrian himself inside there.”

“What trouble have you gotten yourself into now?” said a familiar woman’s voice. There was suddenly a spicy perfume in the air.

Rand stared: Selene stepped around the corner they had just rounded, her white dress bright in the dimness. “How did you get here? What are you doing here? You have to leave immediately. Run! There are Trollocs after us.”

“So I saw.” Her voice was dry, yet cool and composed. “I came to find you, and I find you allowing Trollocs to herd you like sheep. Can the man who possesses the Horn of Valere let himself be treated so?”

“I don’t have it with me,” he snapped, “and I don’t know how it could help if I did. The dead heroes are not supposed to come back to save me from Trollocs. Selene, you have to get away. Now!” He peered around the corner.

Not more than a hundred paces away, a Trolloc was sticking its horned head cautiously into the street, smelling the night. A large shadow by its side had to be another Trolloc, and there were smaller shadows, too. Darkfriends.

“Too late,” Rand muttered. He shifted the flute case to pull off his cloak and wrap it around her. It was long enough to hide her white dress entirely, and trail on the ground besides. “You’ll have to hold that up to run,” he told her. “Loial, if they won’t let us in, we will have to find a way to sneak in.”

“But, Rand—”

“Would you rather wait for the Trollocs?” He gave Loial a push to start him, and took Selene’s hand to follow at a trot. “Find us a path that won’t break our necks, Loial.”

“You’re letting yourself become flustered,” Selene said. She seemed to have less trouble following Loial in the failing light than Rand did. “Seek the Oneness, and be calm. One who would be great must always be calm.”

“The Trollocs might hear you,” he told her. “I don’t want greatness.” He thought he heard an irritated grunt from her.

Stones sometimes turned underfoot, but the way across the hills was not hard despite the twilight shadows. Trees, and even brush, had long since been cleared from the hills for firewood. Nothing grew except knee-high grass that rustled softly around their legs. A night breeze came up softly. Rand worried that it might carry their scent to the Trollocs.

Loial stopped when they reached the wall; it stood twice as high as the Ogier, the stones covered with a whitish plaster. Rand peered back toward the Foregate. Bands of lighted windows reached out like spokes of a wheel from the city walls.

“Loial,” he said softly, “can you see them? Are they following us?”

The Ogier looked in the direction of the Foregate, and nodded unhappily. “I only see some of the Trollocs, but they are coming this way. Running. Rand, I really don’t think—”

Selene cut him off. “If he wants to go in, alantin, he needs a door. Such as that one.” She pointed to a dark patch a little down the wall. Even with her telling him, Rand was not certain it was a door, but when she strode to it and pulled, it opened.

“Rand,” Loial began.

Rand pushed him