“If you ever treat a man half as well as you do that horse,” Birgitte said dryly, “he’ll be yours for life. I think I’ll just sit awhile; I’ve ridden long enough today. I’m not at your beck and call all the time. We can play that game in front of the sisters and the other Warders, to spare your blushes, but you and I know better.” Despite the mocking words, what Elayne felt from her was affection. No; stronger than affection. Her own eyes stung suddenly. Her death would hurt Birgitte to the bone — the Warder bond made that certain — but it was friendship that made her stay now.
“I am thankful to have two friends such as you,” she said simply. Birgitte grinned at her as if she had said something silly.
Aviendha, however, blushed furiously and stared at Birgitte, wideeyed and flustered, as though the Warder’s presence were to blame for her fiery cheeks. Hurriedly she shifted her gaze to the people still short of the first hill, perhaps half a mile distant. “Best to wait until they are out of sight,” she said, “but you cannot wait too long. Once you have started the unweaving, the flows begin to grow... slick... after a time. Letting one slip free before it is out of the weave is the same as letting go of the weave; it will fall into whatever it wishes, then. But you must not hurry, either. Each thread must be pulled free as far as it will go. The more that come loose, the easier others will be to see, but you must always pick the thread that is easiest to see.” Smiling warmly, she pressed her fingers firmly against Elayne’s cheek. “You will do well, if you are careful.”
It did not sound that difficult. She just had to be careful. It seemed to take a long time for the last woman to vanish over the hill, the slender noble bent under the bulk of her dresses. The sun barely appeared to settle any at all, but it seemed like hours. What did Aviendha mean precisely by “slick”? She could not explain beyond variations on the word; they became difficult to hold, that was all.
Elayne found out as soon as she began again. “Slick” was what you would get if you coated a live eel with grease. She gritted her teeth just holding on to that first thread, and that was on top of trying to pull it free. All that stopped her from gasping in relief when the thread of Air began whipping about, finally loose, was that there were more to go. If they became much more “slick,” she was not sure she could manage it. Aviendha watched closely, but did not say another word, though she always had an encouraging smile when Elayne needed one. Elayne could not see Birgitte — she did not dare look away from her work — yet she could feel her, a small knot of rocksolid confidence in her own head, enough confidence to fill her.
Sweat slid down her face, down her back and belly, until she began to feel “slick” herself. A bath tonight would be most welcome. No, she could not think of that. All attention on the weaves. They were getting harder to handle, quivering in her grip as soon as she touched one, but they still came free, and every time one thread began to lash about, another seemed to leap out of the mass, to suddenly be clearly perceptible where there had only been solid saidar before. To her eye the gateway resembled some monstrous, distorted hundredheads on the bottom of a pond, surrounded by flailing tendrils, every one thickly haired with threads of the Power that grew and writhed and vanished only to be replaced by new. The opening visible to anyone flexed along its edges, changing shape and even size continuously. Her legs began to tremble; strain stung her eyes as much as sweat did. She did not know how much longer she could go on. Gritting her teeth, she fought. One thread at a time. One thread at a time.
A thousand miles away, less than a hundred paces away through the shuddering gateway, dozens of soldiers swept around the white farm buildings, short men carrying crossbows, in brown breastplates and painted helmets that looked like the heads of huge insects. Behind them came a woman with red panels bearing silver lightning on her skirts, a bracelet on her wrist linked by a silvery leash to the collar around the neck of a woman in gray, and then another sul’dam and her damane, then another pair. One of the sul’dam pointed at the gateway, and the glow of saidar abruptly enveloped her sul’dam.
“Get down!” Elayne screamed, falling backward, out of sight of the farmyard, and silverblue lightning shot through the gateway with a roar that filled her ears, forking savagely in every direction. Her hair lifted, every strand trying to stand on its own, and thunderous fountains of earth erupted wherever one of the forks struck. Dirt and pebbles rained down on her.
Hearing returned suddenly, and a man’s voice from the other side of the opening, a slurred, drawling accent that made her skin crawl as much as the words. “... must take them alive, you fools!”
Abruptly one of the soldiers was leaping into the meadow right in front of her. Birgitte’s arrow punched through the clenched fist embossed on his leather breastplate. A second Seanchan soldier stumbled over the first as he fell, and Aviendha’s belt knife stabbed into his throat before he could recover. Arrows flew from Birgitte’s bow like hail; with one boot on the horses’ reins, she grinned grimly as she shot. The trembling horses tossed their heads and danced as if they would jerk free and run, but Birgitte simply stood and shot as fast as she could draw. Shouts from beyond the gateway said Birgitte Silverbow still struck home with every shaft she loosed. Answer came, quick as bad thought, black streaks, crossbow bolts. So quick, all happening so fast. Aviendha fell, blood running over the fingers clutching her right arm, but she let go of her wound immediately, crawling clear, scrabbling on the ground for the angreal, her face set. Birgitte cried out; dropping her bow, she grabbed her thigh where a quarrel stuck out. Elayne felt the stab of agony as sharply as if it were her own.
Desperately, she seized another thread from where she lay half on her back. And realized to her horror after one tug that it was all she could do to hold on. Had the thread moved? Had it slipped free any at all? If it had, she did not dare let go. The thread trembled greasily in her grasp.
“Alive, I said!” that Seanchan voice roared. “Anyone who kills a woman gets no share of the taking gold!” The flurry of crossbow bolts ceased.
“You wish to take me?” Aviendha shouted. “Then come and dance with me!” Saidar’s glow abruptly surrounded her, dim even with the angreal, and balls of fire sprang into being in front of the gateway and sprayed through again and again. Not very large balls, but the blasts as they burst back in Altara sounded in a steady stream. Aviendha panted with effort, though; her face glistened with sweat. Birgitte had recovered her bow; she looked every inch the hero of legend, blood streaming down her leg, barely able to stand, but an arrow half draw
