The great hunt - By Robert Jordan Page 0,236

as you, Loial. But I still say, if Barthanes is a Darkfriend, then he must know why we’re here. Going off by ourselves is just asking to be knocked on the head.”

“Verin says he won’t do anything until he finds out whether he can make use of us. Just do what she told us, Rand. Aes Sedai know what they are about.” Loial walked into the crowd, gathering a circle of lords and ladies before he had gone ten steps.

Others started toward Rand, now that he was alone, but he turned in the other direction and hurried away. Aes Sedai may know what they’re about, but I wish I did. I don’t like this. Light, but I wish I knew if she was telling the truth. Aes Sedai never lie, but the truth you hear may not be the truth you think it is.

He kept moving to avoid talking with the nobles. There were many other rooms, all filled with lords and ladies, all with entertainers: three different gleemen in their cloaks, more jugglers and tumblers, and musicians playing flutes, bitterns, dulcimers, and lutes, plus five different sizes of fiddle, six kinds of horn, straight or curved or curled, and ten sizes of drum from tambour to kettle. He gave some of the horn players a second look, those with curled horns, but the instruments were all plain brass.

They wouldn’t have the Horn of Valere out here, fool, he thought. Not unless Barthanes means to have dead heroes come as part of the entertainment.

There was even a bard in silver-worked Tairen boots and a yellow coat, strolling through the rooms plucking his harp and sometimes stopping to declaim in High Chant. He glared contemptuously at the gleemen and did not linger in the rooms where they were, but Rand saw little difference between him and them except for their clothes.

Suddenly Barthanes was walking by Rand’s side. A liveried servant immediately offered his silver tray with a bow. Barthanes took a blown-glass goblet of wine. Walking backwards ahead of them still bowing, the servant held the tray toward Rand until Rand shook his head, then melted into the crowd.

“You seem restless,” Barthanes said, sipping.

“I like to walk.” Rand wondered how to follow Verin’s advice, and remembering what she had said about his visit to the Amyrlin, he settled into Cat Crosses the Courtyard. He knew no more arrogant way to walk than that. Barthanes’s mouth tightened, and Rand thought perhaps the lord found it too arrogant, but Verin’s advice was all he had to go by, so he did not stop. To take some of the edge off, he said pleasantly, “This is a fine party. You have many friends, and I’ve never seen so many entertainers.”

“Many friends,” Barthanes agreed. “You can tell Galldrian how many, and who. Some of the names might surprise him.”

“I have never met the King, Lord Barthanes, and I don’t expect I ever will.”

“Of course. You just happened to be in that flyspeck village. You were not checking on the progress of retrieving that statue. A great undertaking, that.”

“Yes.” He had begun thinking of Verin again, wishing she had given him some advice on how to talk with a man who assumed he was lying. He added without thinking, “It’s dangerous to meddle with things from the Age of Legends if you don’t know what you are doing.”

Barthanes peered into his wine, musing as if Rand had just said something profound. “Are you saying you do not support Galldrian in this?” he asked finally.

“I told you, I’ve never met the King.”

“Yes, of course. I did not know Andormen played at the Great Game so well. We do not see many here in Cairhien.”

Rand took a deep breath to stop from telling the man angrily that he was not playing their Game. “There are many grain barges from Andor in the river.”

“Merchants and traders. Who notices such as they? As well notice the beetles on the leaves.” Barthanes’s voice carried equal contempt for both beetles and merchants, but once again he frowned as if Rand had hinted at something. “Not many men travel in company with Aes Sedai. You seem too young to be a Warder. I suppose Lord Ingtar is Verin Sedai’s Warder?”

“We are who we said we are,” Rand said, and grimaced. Except me.

Barthanes was studying Rand’s face almost openly. “Young. Young to carry a heron-mark blade.”

“I am less than a year old,” Rand said automatically, and immediately wished he had it back. It sounded