Page 10 (1/1)

Setting the bundle atop the blankets, he untied one end and partially unfolded it A gleeman’s cloak, turned inside out to hide the hundreds of patches that covered it, patches in every size and color ih; the patches were a gleee

Inside nestled two hard leather cases The larger held a harp, which he never touched The harp was neverand slioldandsilver chased flute he had used to earn his supper and bed ht hilee Tho whitethe bundled cloak into his hands and shouting for hiically in his hands as if he were perfor to kill them

With a shiver, he redid the bundle "That’s all over with" Thinking of the wind on the tower top, he added, "Strange things happen this close to the Blight" He was not sure he believed it, not the way Lan had apparently meant it In any case, even without the Aone fro into the coat he had kept out -- it was a deep, dark green, and made him think of the forests at horown up, and the Waterhere he had learned to swi his quiver, bristling with arrows, on the other side His unstrung bow stood propped in the corner with Mat’s and Perrin’s, the stave two hands taller than he was He hadto Fal Dara, and besides hi his blanketroll and his new cloak through the loops on his bundles, he slung the pair fros atop the cords, and grabbed the bow Leave the swordarerous Maybe so the door revealed the hall all but empty; one liveried servant dashed by, but he never so lanced at Rand As soon as the man’s rapid footfalls faded, Rand slipped out into the corridor

He tried to walk naturally, casually, but with saddlebags on his shoulder and bundles on his back, he knew he looked like what he was, ato co fainter here inside the keep

He had a horse, a tall bay stallion, in the north stable, called the Lord’s Stable, close by the salley gate that Lord Agel Neither the Lord of Fal Dara nor any of his faht be empty except for the stableboys There were tays to reach the Lord’s Stable from Rand’s room One would take hielh the farrier’s smithy, likewise certainly eh that way for orders to be given, for a search to start, before he reached his horse The other was far shorter; first across the outer courtyard, where even now the A with another dozen or ht; he had had h of Aes Sedai for any sane lifetime One was too many All the stories said it, and he knew it for fact But he was not surprised when his feet took hiendary Tar Valon -- he could not afford that risk, now or ever -- but he limpse of the A a queen There can’t he anything dangerous in just looking, froone before she ever knoas there

He opened a heavy, ironstrapped door onto the outer courtyard and stepped out into silence People forested the guardwalk atop every wall, topknotted soldiers, and liveried servants, and ether cheek by joith children sitting on shoulders to look over their elders’ heads or squeezing in to peer around waists and knees Every archers’ balcony was packed like a barrel of apples, and faces even showed in the narrow arrowslits in the walls A thick mass of people bordered the courtyard like another wall And all of the the wall, in front of the smithies and fletchers’ stalls that lined the court -- Fal Dara was a fortress, not a palace, despite its size and griizing quietly to the people he jostled Soave a second stare to his saddlebags and bundles, but none broke the silence Most did not even bother to look at who had bumped past theh toon in the courtyard Just inside the ate, a line of men stood beside their horses, sixteen of them No tore the same kind of armor or carried the same sort of sword, and none looked like Lan, but Rand did not doubt they were Warders Round faces, square faces, long faces, narrow faces, they all had the look, as if they saw things otherat their ease, they looked as deadly as a pack of wolves Only one other thing about the cloak he had first seen on Lan, the cloak that often seemed to fade into whatever was behind it It did notor a still stomach, so many men in those cloaks

A dozen paces in front of the Warders, a roomen stood by their horses’ heads, the cowls of their cloaks thrown back He could count them, now Fourteen Fourteen Aes Sedai They must be Tall and short, slender and plu loose down their backs or braided, their clothes were as different as the Warders’ were, in as many cuts and colors as there omen Yet they, too, had a saether like this To a woeless Fro, but closer he knew they would be like Moiraine Youngsee yet not, smoothskinned but with faces too

Closer? Fool! I’ way He pressed on toward his goal, another ironbound door at the far end of the court, but he could not stop looking

Calnored the onlookers and kept their attention on the curtained palanquin, now in the center of the courtyard The horses bearing it held as still as if ostlers stood at their harness, but there was only one tall woman beside the palanquin, her face an Aes Sedai’s face, and she paid no ht before her with both hands was as tall as she, the gilded fla i