Everyone was affected. Servants who normally hurried now moved hesitantly, casting fearful glances over their shoulders. Even Aes Sedai seemed wary beneath their calm, eyeing each other in a calculating manner. There were few soldiers in the streets now, as though Tarna had not seen her fill the first day and come to her own conclusions. The wrong answer to the Hall would put nooses around all their necks; even rulers and nobles who wanted to stand aside from the Tower troubles would likely hang any soldiers they laid hands on, just to keep the notion of rebellion from spreading. Feeling the uncertainty, those few wore carefully blank faces or anxious frowns. Except for Gareth Bryne, waiting patiently in front of the Little Tower. He had been there every day, from before the Sitters arrived until they left. She thought he wanted to make sure they remembered him, and what he was doing for them. The one time she had seen the Sitters coming out, they had not appeared pleased to see him.
Only the Warders seemed no different for the Red sister’s arrival. The Warders and the children. Nynaeve gave a start when three small girls burst up in front of her like quail, ribbons in their hair, sweaty, dusty and laughing as they ran. The children did not know what Salidar waited for, and likely would not understand if they did know. Each Warder would follow his Aes Sedai, whatever she decided and wherever she went, and never turn a hair.
Most of the muted talk seemed to be about the weather. That and tales from elsewhere about strange happenings, two-headed calves talking and men smothered by swarms of flies, all the children in a village disappearing in the middle of the night and people struck dead by something unseen in broad daylight. Anyone who could think clearly knew that the drought and unseasonable heat were the Dark One’s hand touching the world, but even most Aes Sedai doubted Elayne and Nynaeve’s claims that the other happenings were as real, that bubbles of evil were rising from the Dark One’s prison as the seals weakened, rising and drifting along the Pattern till they burst. Most people could not think clearly. Some blamed it all on Rand. Some said the Creator was displeased that the world had not gathered behind the Dragon Reborn, or displeased that the Aes Sedai had not captured and gentled him, or displeased that Aes Sedai were opposing a seated Amyrlin. Nynaeve had heard people say the weather would come right as soon as the Tower was whole again. She pushed through the crowd.
“. . . swear it’s true!” murmured a cook all flour to her elbows. “There’s a Whitecloak army massed the other side of the Eldar, just waiting word from Elaida to attack.” Aside from the weather and two-headed calves, tales of Whitecloaks outnumbered every other sort, but Whitecloaks waiting orders from Elaida? The heat had melted the woman’s brains!
“The Light stand witness, it’s true,” a grizzled carter muttered to a frowning woman whose well-cut wool dress marked her an Aes Sedai’s maid. “Elaida’s dead. The Red’s come to summon Sheriam to be the new Amyrlin.” The woman nodded, accepting every word of it.
“I say Elaida’s a fine Amyrlin,” one rough-coated man said, shifting a bundle of fagots on his shoulder. “As fine as any.” He did not murmur to his companion. He spoke loudly, trying hard not to look around to see who had heard him.
Nynaeve’s mouth twisted sourly. He wanted to be overheard. How had Elaida discovered Salidar so quickly? Tarna must have left Tar Valon soon after Aes Sedai began gathering in the village. Siuan had pointed out darkly that a goodly number of Blue sisters were still missing—the original message to gather in Salidar had been aimed at Blues—and Alviarin was accomplished at applying the question. A stomach-turning thought, but not as wrenching as the most common explanation: secret supporters of Elaida here in Salidar. Everybody looked sideways at everybody else, and the woodman was not the first Nynaeve had heard say much the same, in the same manner. Aes Sedai might not say it, but Nynaeve suspected some wanted to. It all stirred Salidar into a stew, and not a tasty one. It made what she was doing even more right.
Finding who she sought took time. She needed groups of children playing, and there were not many children in Salidar. Sure enough, Birgitte was watching five boys scramble about the street throwing a small bag of pebbles at each other, all laughing uproariously whenever one of them was hit, including the one hit. It made no more sense than most boys’ games. Or men’s.
Birgitte was not alone, of course. She seldom was unless she made an effort to be. Areina stood at her shoulder, dabbing at the perspiration streaming down her face and trying not to show boredom with the children. A year or two younger than Nynaeve, Areina wore her dark hair in a braid patterned after Birgitte’s golden one, though still little below her shoulders; Birgitte’s hung properly to the waist. Her clothes copied Birgitte, too, a waist-length coat of pale gray and voluminous bronze-colored trousers, gathered at the ankle above short boots with raised heels, as did the bow she carried and the quiver at her waist. Nynaeve did not think Areina had ever held a bow before meeting Birgitte. She ignored the woman.
“I need to talk to you,” she told Birgitte. “Alone.”
Areina glanced at her, blue eyes close to contempt. “I’d think you’d be wearing your shawl this fine day, Nynaeve. Oh, my. You seem to be sweating like a horse. Why is that?”
Nynaeve’s face tightened. She had befriended the woman before Birgitte had, but the friendship melted on reaching Salidar. Learning that Nynaeve was not full Aes Sedai brought something more than disappointment. Only a request from Birgitte had held Areina back from informing the Aes Sedai that she had masqueraded as one. Besides, Areina had taken the oaths as a Hunter for the Horn, and Birgitte was certainly a better model for that life than Nynaeve. To think she had once pitied the woman her bruises!
“From your face,” Birgitte said with a sweaty grin, “either you’re ready to strangle somebody—probably Areina here—or else your dress fell off in the middle of a pack of soldiers and you weren’t wearing a shift.” Areina snorted a laugh, but she looked shocked. Why she should, Nynaeve did not know; the woman had had plenty of time to become used to Birgitte’s so-called sense of humor, more suited as it was to some unshaven man with his nose in a mug and his belly full of ale.
Nynaeve studied the boys’ play for a minute to give her irritation a chance to die down. Worse than useless to let herself get angry when she had a favor to ask.
Seve and Jaril were among the boys dodging and tossing the bag. The Yellows had been right about them; time was what they had needed. After close to two months in Salidar with other children and no fear, they laughed and shou
