“That sounds just fine to me,” he told her. “Mat's alive because of it.”
“It is terrible, Rand.” An urgent note entered her, voice. “Why do you think even the Forsaken feared to use it? Think of the effect on the Pattern of a single thread, one man, removed from hours, or days, that have already been woven, like one thread picked partly out of a piece of cloth. Fragments of manuscripts remaining from the War of Power say several entire cities were destroyed with balefire before both sides realized the dangers. Hundreds of thousands of threads pulled from the Pattern, gone for days already past; whatever those people had done, now no longer had been done, and neither had what others had done because of their actions. The memories remained, but not the actions. The ripples were incalculable. The Pattern itself nearly unraveled. It could have been the destruction of everything. World, time, Creation itself.”
Rand shivered, nothing to do with the cold cutting through his coat. “I can't promise not to use it again, Moiraine. You yourself said there are times when it's necessary to do what's forbidden.”
“I did not think that you would,” she said coolly. Her agitation was vanishing, her balance restored. “But you must be careful.” She was back to “must” again. “With a sa'angreal like Callandor, you could annihilate a city with balefire. The Pattern could be disrupted for years to come. Who can say that the weave would even remain centered on you, ta'veren as you are, until it settled down? Being ta'veren, and so strongly so, may be your margin of victory, even in the Last Battle.”
“Perhaps it will,” he said bleakly. In tale after heroic tale, the protagonist proclaimed he would have victory or death. It seemed that the best he could hope for was victory and death. “I have to check on someone,” he went on quietly. “I will see you in the morning.” Gathering the Power into him, life and death in swirling layers, he made a hole in the air taller than he was, opening into blackness that made the moonlight seem day. A gateway, Asmodean called it.
“What is that?” Moiraine gasped.“Once I've done something, I remember how. Most of the time.” That was no answer, but it was time to test Moiraine's vows. She could not lie, but Aes Sedai could find loopholes in a stone. “You are to leave Mat alone tonight. And you won't try to take that medallion away from him.”
“It belongs in the Tower for study, Rand. It must be a ter'angreal, but none has ever been found that —”
“Whatever it is,” he said firmly, “it is his. You will leave it with him.”
For a moment she seemed to struggle with herself, back stiffening and head coming up as she stared at him. She could not be used to taking orders from anyone except Siuan Sanche, and Rand was willing to wager she had never done that without a tussle. Finally she nodded, and even made the suggestion of a curtsy. “As you say, Rand. It is his. Please be careful, Rand. Learning a thing like balefire by yourself can be suicide, and death cannot be Healed.” This time there was no mockery. “Until the morning.” Lan followed her as she left, the Warder giving Rand an unreadable expression; he would not be pleased by this turn of events.
Rand stepped through the gateway, and it vanished.
He was standing on a disc, a sixfoot copy of the ancient Aes Sedai symbol. Even the black half of it seemed lighter against the endless darkness that surrounded him, above and below; he was sure that if he fell off, he would fall forever. Asmodean claimed there was a faster method, called Traveling, for using a gateway, but he had not been able to teach it, partly because he did not have the strength to make a gateway while wearing Lanfear's shield. In any case, Traveling required that you know your starting point very well. It seemed more logical to him that you should have to know where you were heading well, but Asmodean seemed to think that that was like asking why air was not water. There was a great deal that Asmodean took for granted. Anyway, Skimming was fast enough.
As soon as he planted his boots on it, the disc lurched what seemed to be a foot and stopped, another gateway appearing in front of it. Fast enough, especially over this short distance. Rand stepped into the hallway outside the room where Asmodean was.
The moon through the windows at the ends of the corridor gave the only light; Asmodean's lamp was out. The flows he had woven around the room were still in place, still firmly tied. Nothing moved, but there was still a faint smell of burned sulphur.
Moving close to the bead curtain, he peered through the doorway. Moonshadows filled the room, but one of them was Asmodean, tossing in his blankets. Wrapped in the Void, Rand could hear his heartbeat, smell the sweat of troubled dreams. He bent to examine the pale blue floor tiles, and the prints impressed in them.
He had learned to track as a boy, and reading them was no difficulty. Three or four Darkhounds had been there. They had approached the doorway one by one, it seemed, each stepping almost in the others' footprints. Had the net woven around the room stopped them there? Or had they merely been sent to look, and report? Troubling, to think of even Shadowspawn dogs having that much intelligence. But then, Myrddraal used ravens and rats for spies, too, and other animals closely linked to death. Shadoweyes, the Aiel called them.
Channeling fine flows of Earth, he smoothed out the floor tiles, lifting up the compressions until he was out in the empty, nightcloaked street and a hundred paces from the tall building. In the morning, anyone would be able to see the trail ending there, but none would suspect that the Darkhounds had gone anywhere near Asmodean. Darkhounds could have no interest in Jasin Natael the gleeman.
Every Maiden in the city was likely awake by this time; certainly none would still be asleep under the Roof of the Maidens. Making another gateway there in the street, a deeper blackness against the night, he let the disc carry him back to his own room. He wondered why he had chosen the ancient symbol — it was his choice, if unconscious; other times it had been a stairstep Or a piece of floor. The Darkhounds had oozed away from that sign before reforming. Under this sign will he conquer.
Standing in his pitchblack bedchamber, he channeled the lamps alight, but he did not let go of saidin. Instead he channeled again, careful not to spring any of his own traps, and a piece of the wall vanished, revealing a niche he had carved there himself.
In the little alcove stood two figurines a foot tall, a man and a woman, each in flowing robes and serene of face, each holding a crystal globe aloft in one hand. He had li
