Chapter 41

(Rising Sun)

The Craft of Kin Tovere

One hand on his sword hilt, the other holding the green-and-white tasseled length of Seanchan spear, Rand ignored the others on the sparsely treed hilltop for the moment while he studied the three camps spread out below in the midmorning sun. Three distinct camps, and that was the rub. They were all the Cairhienin and Tairen forces at his disposal. Every man else who could use sword or spear was penned in the city, or the Light alone knew where.

The Aiel had rounded up refugees in hordes between the Jangai Pass and here, and a few had even straggled in on their own, lured by rumors that these Aiel at least were not killing everyone in sight, or else too dispirited to care so long as they had a meal before dying. Too many thought they would die, at the hands of the Aiel or the Dragon Reborn, or in the Last Battle, which they seemed to think was shaping up for any day now. A goodly number all together, but farmers and craftsmen and shopkeepers for the most part. Some knew how to use bow or sling to fetch a rabbit, but there was not a soldier in the lot and no time to teach them. The city of Cairhien itself lay little, more than five miles to the west, some of the fabled "topless towers of Cairhien" visible above the intervening forest. The city sprawled across hills hard by the River Alguenya, encircled by Couladin's Shaido and those who had joined him.

One haphazard set of tents and cook-fires in the long shallow valley below Rand held some eight hundred Tairens, armored men. Nearly half were Defenders of the Stone in burnished breastplates and rimmed helmets, their plump coatsleeves striped black and gold. The rest were levies from a double handful of lords whose banners and pennants made a circle in the camp's center around the silver Crescent-and-Stars of the High Lord Weiramon. Guards stood thickly along their picket lines as if they expected a raid against the horses any minute.

Three hundred paces away, the second camp guarded their horses as tightly. The animals were a mixed lot, few approaching the fine arch-necked stock of Tear, and some former plow and cart horses were tied along those ropes or Rand missed his guess. The Cairhienin numbered perhaps a hundred more than the Tairens, but their tents were fewer and most often patched, and their banners and con represented some seventy-odd lords. Few Cairhienin nobles still had many retainers, and the army had broken apart early in the civil war.

The last gathering lay another five hundred paces along, full of Cairhienin for the most part, yet well and truly separated from the others by more than distance. Larger than the other pair combined, this camp held few tents or horses. It displayed no banners, and only the officers wore con, the small pennants on their backs in solid colors meant to pick them out for their men rather than signify a House. Infantry might be necessary, but rare was the lord of Tear or Cairhien, either one, who would admit it. Certainty none would agree to actually lead such. It was the most orderly of the camps, though, the cookfires in neat rows, the long pikes stacked upright where they could be seized in a moment and clusters of archers or crossbowmen dotted along the lines. According to Lan, discipline kept men alive in battle, but infantry were more likely to know it and believe than cavalry.

The three groups were supposedly together, under the same command – the High Lord Weiramon had brought them in from the south late the day before – but the two camps of horsemen watched each other nearly as warily as they did the Aiel on the surrounding hills, the Tairens with a dose of contempt that the Cairhienin echoed in ignoring the third, which in turn eyed the others sullenly. Rand's followers, his allies, and as ready to fight each other as anyone else.

Still pretending to study the camps, Rand examined Weiramon, helmetless and iron-spined straight nearby. Two younger men, minor Tairen lords, hung at the High Lord's heels, dark beards trimmed and oiled in perfect imitation of Weiramon's except that his was streaked with gray, and their breastplates, worn over brightly striped coats, bore gold-work only a touch less ornate than his. Aloof, apart from everyone else on the hilltop yet close to Rand, they could have been waiting for some martial ceremony at a royal court, except for the sweat rolling down their faces. They ignored that as well, though.

The High Lord's sigil lacked only a few stars to duplicate Lanfear's, but the long-nosed fellow was not her in disguise, with his mainly gray hair oiled like his beard and combed in a vain attempt to hide its thinness. He had been coming north with reinforcements from Tear when he heard that Aiel were attacking the city of Cairhien itself. Instead of turning back or sitting still, he continued north as hard as his horses could stand, gathering what forces he found along the way.

That was the good news of Weiramon. The bad was that he had fully expected to dispel the Shaido around Cairhien with what he had brought. He still did. And he was none too happy that Rand would not let him be about it or that he was surrounded by Aiel. One Aiel was no different from another to Weiramon. To the others, too, for that matter. One of the young lords pointedly sniffed a scented silk handkerchief whenever he looked at an Aiel. Rand wondered how long the fellow would survive. And what Rand would have to do about it when he died.

Weiramon noticed Rand watching, and cleared his throat. "My Lord Dragon," he began in a gravelly bark, "one good charge will scatter them like quail." He slapped his gauntlets against his palm loudly. "Foot never stands up to horse. I will send in the Cairhienin to flush them, then follow with my —"

Rand cut him off. Could the man count at all? Did the number of Aiel he could see here give him no clue to how many might be around the city? It did not matter. Rand had heard as much of this as he could stomach. "You are certain of the news you bring from Tear?"

Weiramon blinked. "News, my Lord Dragon? What—? Oh, that. Burn my soul, there's nothing to that. Illianer pirates often try to raid along the coast." They were more than trying, by what the man had said when he arrived.

"And the attacks on the Plains of Maredo? Do they often do that, as well?"

"Why, burn my soul, those are just brigands." It was more statement of fact than protest. "Perhaps not Illianers at all, but certainly not soldiers. The jumble those Illianers make of things, who can say whether king or Assemblage or Council of Nine has the whip-hand on any given day, yet if they do decide to move, it will be armies striking at Tear under the Golden Bees, not raiders burning merchants wagons and border farms. You can mark me on that."

"If you wish it," Rand replied, as politely as he could. Whatever power the Assemblage, or the Council of Nine, or Mattin Stepaneos den Balgar had, it was what Sammael chose to leave them. But relatively few knew that the Forsaken were loose already. Some who should know refused to believe, or ignored it – as if that would make the Forsaken go away – or seemed to think that if it had to happen, it would be in some vague and preferably distant future. There was no point in trying to convince Weiramon, whichever group he belonged in. The man's belief or disbelief changed nothing.

The High Lord scowled at the hollow between the hills. More specifically, at the two Cairhienin camps. "With no proper rule here as yet, who can say what riffraff have drifted south?" Grimacing, he slapped his gauntlets even harder before turning back to Rand. "Well, we will bring them to heel soon enough for you, my Lord Dragon. If you will only give the order, I can drive..."

Rand brushed past him, not listening, though Weiramon followed, still asking authority to attack, the other two trailing him like heel-hounds. The man was a stone-blind fool.