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Rand took a gulp fro harder and harder to see in him the boy Nynaeve had known in the Two Rivers Had his jaays been set with those lines of deterrown so sure, his posture so de? This man almost seemed aninterpretation of the Rand she’d once known Like a statue, carved froerated in heroic lines

"Well?" Rand de apprentice, Kerb, sat tied in Air upon one of the roolanced at hiainst eavesdropping Rand looked at her sharply "You channeled?" he asked He could sense when she did so without taking precautions; he felt goose buwene and Elayne’s investigations

"A ward," she said, refusing to be cowed "Last I checked, I didn’t need your perhty, Rand al’Thor, but don’t forget that I paddled your backside when you were barely as tall as a otten a reaction from him, if only a huff of annoyance Now he just looked at her Those eyes of his seeed the hed "Why have you wakened me, Nynaeve? Who is this spindly, terrified youth? If it had been anyone else who sent that ht, I’d have sent the"

Nynaeve nodded at Kerb "I think this ’spindly, terrified youth’ knohere the King is"

That got Rand’s attention, and Min’s as well She’d poured herself a cup of tea and was leaning against a wall Why weren’t they ?" Rand asked "Graendal too, then How do you know this, Nynaeve? Where did you find hieon where you sent Milisair Chad hiht to treat a person in such a manner’

He didn’t rise to that comment either Instead, he si froation?"

"No," Nynaeve said "But I think he killed the er I know for a fact that he tried to poison Milisair She’d have been dead by the end of the week if I hadn’t Healed her"

Rand glanced at Nynaeve, and she could alure out what she had been doing "You Aes Sedai," he finally said, "share much with rats, I have come to realize You are always in places where you are not wanted"

Nynaeve snorted "If I’d stayed away, then Milisair would be dying and Kerb would be free"

"I assuer"

"Not yet," Nynaeve said "I did find the poison as, however, and confirmed that he had prepared food both for Milisair and for the"Rand, I’m not certain that he’ll be able to answer our questions I Delved him, and while he’s not sick physically, there’sso there In his mind"

"What do you mean?" Rand asked softly

"A block of some sort," Nynaeve said "The jailer seeer had been able to resist his ’questioning’ I think thereto keep hi too much"

"Co his tea to his lips

Compulsion was dark, evil She’d felt it herself; she still shivered when she considered what Moghedien had done to her And that had been only a s some memories

"Few are as skilled with Coly "Perhaps this is the confirreat discovery indeed, Nynaeve Great enough to et how you obtained it"

Rand rounded the bench and leaned down toman’s eyes

"Release him," Rand commanded her

She complied

"Tell me," Rand said to Kerb, "who told you to poison those people?"

"I don’t know anything!" the boy squeaked "I just--"

"Stop," Rand said softly "Do you believe that I can kill you?"

The boy fell silent and--though Nynaeve wouldn’t have thought it possible--his blue eyes opened wider

"Do you believe that if I simply said the word," Rand continued in his eerie, quiet voice, "your heart would stop beating? I aon Reborn Do you believe that I can take your life, or your soul itself, if I so ain, the patina of darkness around Rand, that aura that she couldn’t quite be certain was there She raised her tea to her lips-- and found that it had suddenly grown bitter and stale, as if it had been left to sit too long

Kerb slouched down and began to cry

"Speak," Rand coroan came out He was so transfixed by Rand that he didn’t--or couldn’t--blink the sweat frohtfully "This is Coht" He looked at Nynaeve "You will have to unravel the web of Compulsion, wipe it from his mind, before he can tell us what he knows"

"What?" she asked incredulously

"I have little skill with this kind of weaving," Rand said with a wave of his hand "I suspect that you can re, in a way Use the same weave that creates Co the poor boy sounded like a fine idea--every wound should be Healed, after all But trying so so in front of Rand, was not appealing What if she did it wrong and somehow hurt the boy?

Rand sat down on the cushioned bench seat across froarding her tea with a grimace; apparently, hers had spoiled as suddenly as Nynaeve’s had

Rand watched Nynaeve, waiting

"Rand, I--"

"Just try it," Rand said "I can’t tell you how it is done specifically, not for a woe"

His unintentionally patronizing tone sent her back into a rage Being as tired as she was didn’t help She gritted her teeth, turning toward Kerb, and wove all five Powers His eyes darted back and forth, though he couldn’t see the weaves

Nynaeve laid a very light Healing across hi hi into his head as delicately as she could, prodding at the weaves that clumped across his mind Yes, she could see it now, a complex web made fro at it with herthe youth’s brain Bits of the weave touched here and there, like tiny hooks, jutting deep into the brain itself