Page 89 (1/2)

"Coh Nynaeve--breaking into a trot--beat her to the gateway

They stepped out onto a carpet of brown pine needles, dirtied fro slued one another in the breeze, and the mountain air was more chilly than the breeze had indicated Min wished for a cloak, but there wasn’t tih the forest, Nynaeve trotting up to hiet anything useful out of Rand, not when he was in this kind of ht sight of soli care to hide They certainly had taken well to life in the wetlands How did a people raised in the Waste know so instinctively how to hide in a forest?

Up ahead, the trees broke Min hastened to join Rand and Nynaeve, who had stopped at the top of a gently sloping ridge Here, they could see over the forest, and the trees continued down below like a sea of green and brown The pines parted at the shores of a sular depression of the land

Atop a ridge of its own, high above the water, was an iular and tall, it was built in the forhtly thinner than the one beneath That gave the palace an elegant shape--fortified, yet palatial "It’s beautiful," she said breathlessly

"It was built during a different tiht that the th"

The palace was distant, but not so distant that Min couldn’t uard, halberds at their shoulders, breastplates reflecting the late sunlight A late party of hunters rode in through the gates, a fine buck deer lashed to the packhorse, and a group of workers chopped at a fallen tree nearby, perhaps for firewood A pair of serving women in white carried poles, bucket at each end, up froth of the structure It was a living, working estate bundled up in a single

"Do you think Ramshalan found his way?" Nynaeve said, ar not to look impressed

"Even a fool like hi He still carried the statuette in his pocket Min wished he had left the thing behind It ered it Caressed it

"So you sent Ramshalan to die," Nynaeve said "What will that accomplish?"

"She won’t kill him," Rand said

"How can you be sure of that?"

"It isn’t her way," Rand said "Not when she can use hiainst me"

"You don’t expect her to believe that story you told hiiance of the Domani lords?"

Rand slowly shook his head "No I hope for her to believe so of that tale, but I do not expect it I meant what I said about her, Min-- she’s more crafty than I am And I fear that she knows me far better than I know her She will compel Ramshalan and pull from him that entire conversation we had Froainst me"

"How?" Min asked

"I don’t knoish I did She’ll think of so clever, then infect Ramshalan with a very subtle Compulsion that I won’t be able to anticipate I’ll be left with the choice to keep him nearby and see what he does, or to send him away But of course, she will think of that as well, and whatever I do will set in motion her other plans"

"YouShe didn’t seem to notice the chill at all In fact, neither did Rand Whatever that "trick" about ignoring cold and heat was, Min had never been able to figure it out They clai to do with the power, but if that were so, ere Rand and the Aes Sedai the only ones who could e it? The Aiel didn’t seem to be bothered by the cold either, but they didn’t count They never seeh they could be very touchy about the s

"We can’t win, you say?" Rand asked "Is that e’re trying to do? Win?"

Nynaeve raised an eyebrow "Do you not answer questions any on the other side of him, Min couldn’t see as in his face, but she could see Nynaeve grow pale It was her own fault Couldn’t she sense how on edge Rand was? Perhaps Min’s chill didn’t just come from the cold She moved up close to hiht once have When he finally turned away frohtly, as if she had been dangling, held up by his gaze

Rand did not speak for soe as the distant sun ers stretching away froroohts had been lit in the fortress s How many people did Graendal have in there? Scores, if not hundreds

A crashing sound in the brush suddenly drew Min’s attention; it was accompanied by curses She juroup of Aiel approached a fewa disheveled Ra stuck with needles and scratched from branches He dusted himself off, then took a step toward Rand

The Maidens held hion?"

"Is he infected?" Rand asked of Nynaeve

"By what?" she asked

"Graendal’s touch"

Nynaeve walked over to Ramshalan and looked at him for a moment She hissed and said, "Yes Rand, he’s under a heavy Compulsion There are a lot of weaves here Not as bad as the chandler’s apprentice, or maybe just on, what is going on? The lady of the castle down there was quite friendly--she is an ally,to fear from her! Very refined, Idark, sun setting behind the distant ht, the only illuateway behind the portal back to warmth, away from this place of shadow and coldness

Rand’s voice sounded so hard Worse than Min had ever heard it before