The Great Hunt

16 (Dragon’s Fang) In the Mirror of Darkness

“You should not have done it, Lord Rand,” Hurin said when Rand woke the others just at daybreak. The sun yet hid below the horizon, but there was light enough to see. The fog had melted away while dark still held, fading reluctantly. “If you use yourself up to spare us, my Lord, who will see to getting us home?”

“I needed to think,” Rand said. Nothing showed the fog had ever been, or Ba’alzamon. He fingered the kerchief wrapped around his right hand. There was that to prove Ba’alzamon had been there. He wanted to be away from this place. “Time to be in the saddle if we are going to catch Fain’s Darkfriends. Past time. We can eat flatbread while we ride.”

Loial paused in the act of stretching, his arms reaching as high as Hurin could have standing on Rand’s shoulders. “Your hand, Rand. What happened?”

“I hurt it. It’s nothing.”

“I have a salve in my saddlebags—”

“It is nothing” Rand knew he sounded harsh, but one look at the brand would surely bring questions he did not want to answer. “Time’s wasting. Let us be on our way.” He set about saddling Red, awkwardly because of his injured hand, and Hurin jumped to his own horse.

“No need to be so touchy,” Loial muttered.

A track, Rand decided as they set out, would be something natural in that world. There were too many unnatural things there. Even a single hoofprint would be welcome. Fain and the Darkfriends and the Trollocs had to leave some mark. He concentrated on the ground they passed over, trying to make out any trace that could have been made by another living thing.

There was nothing, not a turned stone, not a disturbed clod of earth. Once he looked at the ground behind them, just to reassure himself that the land did take hoofprints; scraped turf and bent grass marked their passage plainly, yet ahead the ground was undisturbed. But Hurin insisted he could smell the trail, faint and thin, but still heading south.

Once again the sniffer put all his attentions on the trail he followed, like a hound tracking deer, and once again Loial rode lost in his own thoughts, muttering to himself and rubbing the huge quarterstaff held across his saddle in front of him.

They had not been riding more than an hour when Rand saw the spire ahead. He was so busy watching for tracks that the tapering column already stood thick and tall above the trees in the middle distance when he first noticed it. “I wonder what that is.” It lay directly in their path.

“I don’t know what it can be, Rand,” Loial said.

“If this — if this was our own world, Lord Rand …” Hurin shifted uncomfortably in his saddle. “Well, that monument Lord Ingtar was talking about — the one to Artur Hawkwing’s victory over the Trollocs — it was a great spire. But it was torn down a thousand years ago. There’s nothing left but a big mound, like a hill. I saw it, when I went to Cairhien for Lord Agelmar.”

“According to Ingtar,” Loial said, “that is still three or four days ahead of us. If it is here at all. I don’t know why it should be. I don’t think there are any people here at all.”

The sniffer put his eyes back on the ground. “That’s just it, isn’t it, Builder? No people, but there it is ahead of us. Maybe we ought to keep clear of it, my Lord Rand. No telling what it is, or who’s there, in a place like this.”

Rand drummed his fingers on the high pommel of his saddle for a moment, thinking. “We have to stick as close to the trail as we can,” he said finally. “We don’t seem to be getting any closer to Fain as it is, and I don’t want to lose more time, if we can avoid it. If we see any people, or anything out of the ordinary, then we’ll circle around until we pick it up again. But until then, we keep on.”

“As you say, my Lord.” The sniffer sounded odd, and he gave Rand a quick, sidelong look. “As you say.”

Rand frowned for a moment before he understood, and then it was his turn to sigh. Lords did not explain to those who followed them, only to other lords. I didn’t ask him to take me for a bloody lord. But he did, a small voice seemed to answer him, and you let him. You made the choice; now the duty is yours.

“Take the trail, Hurin,” Rand said.

With a flash of relieved grin, the sniffer heeled his horse onward.

The weak sun climbed as they rode, and by the time it was overhead, they were only a mile or so from the spire. They had reached one of the streams, in a gully a pace deep, and the intervening trees were sparse. Rand could see the mound it was built on, like a round, flat-topped hill. The gray spire itself rose at least a hundred spans, and he could just make out now that the top was carved in the likeness of a bird with outstretched wings.

“A hawk,” Rand said. “It is Hawkwing’s monument. It must be. There were people here, whether there are now or not. They just built it in another place here, and never tore it down. Think of it, Hurin. When we get back, you’ll be able to tell them what the monument really looked like. There will only be three of us in the whole world who have ever seen it.”

Hurin nodded. “Yes, my Lord. My children would like to hear that tale, their father seeing Hawkwing’s spire.”

“Rand,” Loial began worriedly.

“We can gallop the distance,” Rand said. “Come on. A gallop will do us good. This place may be dead, but we’re alive.”

“Rand,” Loial said, “I don’t think that is a—”

Not waiting to hear, Rand dug his boots into Red’s flanks, and the stallion sprang forward. He splashed across the shallow ribbon of water in two strides, then scrabbled up the far side. Hurin launched his horse right behind him. Rand heard Loial calling behind them, but he laughed, waved for the Ogier to follow, and galloped on. If he kept his eyes on one spot, the land did not seem to slip and slide so badly, and the wind felt good on his face.

The mound covered a good two hides, but the grassy slope rose at an easy slant. The gray spire reared into the sky, squared and broad enough despite its height to seem massive, almost squat. Rand’s laughter died, and he pulled Red up, his face grim.

“Is that Hawkwing’s monument, Lord Rand?” Hurin asked uneasily. “It doesn’t look right, somehow.”

Rand recognized the harsh, angular script that covered the face of the monument, and he recognized some of the symbols chiseled on the breadth, chiseled as tall as a man. The horned skull of the Da’vol Trollocs. The iron fist of the Dhai’mon. The trident of the Ka’bol, and the whirlwind of the Ahf’frait. There was a hawk, too, carved near the bottom. With a wingspan of ten paces, it lay on its back, pierced by a lightning bolt, and ravens pecked at its eyes. The huge wings atop the spire seemed to block the sun.

He heard Loial galloping up behind him.

“I tried to tell you, Rand,” Loial said. “It is a raven, not a hawk. I could see it clearly.” Hurin turned his horse, refusing even to look at the spire any longer.

“But how?” Rand said. “Artur Hawkwing won a victory over the Trollocs here. Ingtar said so.”

“Not here,” Loial said slowly. “Obviously not here. ‘From Stone to Stone run the lines of if, between the worlds that might be.’ I’ve been thinking on it, and I believe I know what the ‘the worlds that might be’ are. Maybe I do. Worlds our world might have been if things had happened differently. Maybe that’s why it is all so … washed-out looking. Because it’s an ‘if,’ a ‘maybe.’ Just a shadow of the real world. In this world, I think, the Trollocs won. Maybe that’s why we have not seen any villages or people.”

Rand’s skin crawled. Where Trollocs won, they did not leave humans alive except for food. If they had won across an entire world… “If the Trollocs had won, they would be everywhere. We’d have seen a thousand of them by now. We’d be dead since yesterday.”

“I do not know, Rand. Perhaps, after they killed the people, they killed one another. Trollocs live to kill. That is all they do; that is all they are. I just don’t know.”

“Lord Rand,” Hurin said abruptly, “something moved down there.”

Rand whirled his horse, ready to see charging Trollocs, but Hurin was pointing back the way they had come, at nothing. “What did you see, Hurin? Where?”

The sniffer let his arm drop. “Right at the edge of that clump of trees there, about a mile. I thought it was … a woman … and something else I couldn’t make out, but …” He shivered. “It’s so hard to make out things that aren’t under your nose. Aaah, this place has my guts all awhirl. I’m likely imagining things, my Lord. This is a place for queer fancies.” His shoulders hunched as if he felt the spire pressing on them. “No doubt it was just the wind, my Lord.”

Loial said, “There’s something else to consider, I’m afraid.” He sounded troubled again. He pointed southward. “What do you see off there?”

Rand squinted against the way things far off seemed to slide toward him. “Land like what we’ve been crossing. Trees. Then some hills, and mountains. Nothing else. What do you want me to see?”

“The mountains,” Loial sighed. The tufts on his ears drooped, and the ends of his eyebrows were down on his cheeks. “That has to be Kinslayer’s Dagger, Rand. There aren’t any other mountains they could be, unless this world is completely different from ours. But Kinslayer’s Dagger lies more than a hundred leagues south of the Erinin. A good bit more. Distances are hard to judge in this place, but … I think we will reach them before dark.” He did not have to say any more. They could not have covered over a hundred leagues in less than three days.

Without thinking, Rand muttered, “Maybe this place is like the Ways.” He heard Hurin moan, and instantly regretted not keeping a rein on his tongue.

It was not a pleasant thought. Enter a Waygate — they could be found just outside Ogier stedding, and in Ogier groves — enter and walk for a day, and you could leave by another Waygate a hundred leagues from where you started. The Ways were dark, now, and foul, and to travel them meant to risk death or madness. Even Fades feared to travel the Ways.

“If it is, Rand,” Loial said slowly, “can a misstep kill us here, too? Are there things we have not yet seen that can do worse than kill us?” Hurin moaned again.

They had been drinking the water, riding along as if they had not a concern in the world. Unconcern would kill quickly in the Ways. Rand swallowed, hoping his stomach would settle.

“It is too late for worrying about what is past,” he said. “From here on, though, we will watch our step.” He glanced at Hurin. The sniffer’s head had sunk between his shoulders, and his eyes darted as if he wondered what would leap at him, and from where. The man had run down murderers, but this was more than he had ever bargained for. “Hold on to yourself, Hurin. We are not dead, yet, and we won’t be. We will just have to be careful from here on. That’s all.”

It was at that moment they heard the scream, thin with distance.

“A woman!” Hurin said. Even this much that was normal seemed to rouse him a little. “I knew I saw—”

Another scream came, more desperate than the first.

“Not unless she can fly,” Rand said. “She’s south of us.” He kicked Red to a dead run in two strides.

“Be careful you said!” Loial shouted after him. “Light, Rand, remember! Be careful!”

Rand lay low on Red’s back, letting the stallion run. The screams drew him on. It was easy to say be careful, but there was terror in that woman’s voice. She did not sound as if she had time for him to be careful. On the edge of another stream, in a sheer-banked channel deeper than most, he drew rein; Red skidded in a shower of stones and dirt. The screams were coming … There!

He took it all in at a glance. Perhaps two hundred paces away, the woman stood beside her horse in the stream, both of them backed against the far bank. With a broken length of branch, she was fending off a snarling … something. Rand swallowed, stunned for a moment. If a frog were as big as a bear, or if a bear had a frog’s gray-green hide, it might look like that. A big bear.

Not letting himself think about the creature, he leaped to the ground, unlimbering his bow. If he took the time to ride closer, it might be too late. The woman was barely keeping the … thing … at the edge of the branch. It was a fair distance — he kept blinking as he tried to judge it; the distance seemed to change by spans every time the thing moved — yet a big target. His bandaged hand made drawing awkward, but he had an arrow loosed almost before his feet were set.

The shaft sank into the leathery hide for half its length, and the creature spun to face Rand. Rand took a step back despite the distance. That huge, wedge-shaped head had never been on any animal he could imagine, nor that wide, horny-lipped beak of a mouth, hooked for ripping flesh. And it had three eyes, small, and fierce, and ringed by hard-looking ridges. Gathering itself, the thing bounded toward him down the stream in great, splashing leaps. To Rand’s eye, some of the leaps seemed to cover twice as much distance as others, though he was sure they were all the same.

“An eye,” the woman called. She sounded surprisingly calm, considering her screams. “You must hit an eye to kill it.”

He drew the fletching of another arrow back to his ear. Reluctantly, he sought the void; he did not want to, but it was for this that Tam had taught him, and he knew he could never make the shot without it. My father, he thought with a sense of loss, and emptiness filled him. The quavering light of saidin was there, but he shut it away. He was one with the bow, with the arrow, with the monstrous shape leaping toward him. One with the tiny eye. He did not even feel the arrow leave the bowstring.

The creature rose in another bound, and at the peak, the arrow struck its central eye. The thing landed, fountaining another huge splash of water and mud. Ripples spread out from it, but it did not move.

“Well shot, and bravely,” the woman called. She was on her horse, riding to meet him. Rand felt vaguely surprised that she had not run once the thing’s attention was diverted. She rode past the bulk, still surrounded by the ripples of its dying, without even a downward glance, scrambled her horse up the bank and dismounted. “Few men would stand to face the charge of a grolm, my Lord.”

She was all in white, her dress divided for riding and belted in silver, and her boots, peeking out from under her hems, were tooled in silver, too. Even her saddle was white, and silver-mounted. Her snowy mare, with its arched neck and dainty step, was almost as tall as Rand’s bay. But it was the woman herself — she was perhaps Nynaeve’s age, he thought — who held his eyes. She was tall, for one thing; a hand taller and she could almost look him in the eyes. For another, she was beautiful, ivory-pale skin contrasting sharply with long, night-dark hair and black eyes. He had seen beautiful women. Moiraine was beautiful, if cool, and so was Nynaeve, when her temper did not get the better of her. Egwene, and Elayne, the Daughter-Heir of Andor, were each enough to take a man’s breath. But this woman … His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth; he felt his heart start beating again.

“Your retainers, my Lord?”

Startled, he looked around. Hurin and Loial had joined them. Hurin was staring the way Rand knew he had been, and even the Ogier seemed fascinated. “My friends,” he said. “Loial, and Hurin. My name is Rand. Rand al’Thor.”

“I have never thought of it before,” Loial said abruptly, sounding as if he were talking to himself, “but if there is such a thing as perfect human beauty, in face and form, then you —”

“Loial!” Rand shouted. The Ogier’s ears stiffened in embarrassment. Rand’s own ears were red; Loial’s words had been too close to what he himself was thinking.

The woman laughed musically, but the next instant she was all regal formality, like a queen on her throne. “I am called Selene,” she said. “You have risked your life, and saved mine. I am yours, Lord Rand al’Thor.” And, to Rand’s horror, she knelt before him.

Not looking at Hurin or Loial, he hastily pulled her to her feet. “A man who will not die to save a woman is no man.” Immediately he disgraced himself by blushing. It was a Shienaran saying, and he knew it sounded pompous before it was out of his mouth, but her manner had infected him, and he could not stop it. “I mean … That is, it was …” Fool, you can’t tell a woman saving her life was nothing. “It was my honor.” That sounded vaguely Shienaran and formal. He hoped it would do; his mind was as blank of anything else to say as if he were still in the void.

Suddenly he became conscious of her eyes on him. Her expression had not changed, but her dark eyes made him feel as if he were naked. Unbidden, the thought came of Selene with no clothes. His face went red again. “Aaah! Ah, where are you from, Selene? We have not seen another human being since we came here. Is your town nearby?” She looked at him thoughtfully, and he stepped back. Her look made him too aware of how close to her he was.

“I’m not from this world, my Lord,” she said. “There are no people here. Nothing living except the grolm and a few other creatures like them. I am from Cairhien. And as to how I came here, I don’t know, exactly. I was out riding, and I stopped to nap, and when I woke, my horse and I were here. I can only hope, my Lord, that you can save me again, and help me go home.”

“Selene, I am not a … that is, please call me Rand.” His ears felt hot again. Light, it won’t hurt anything if she thinks I’m a lord. Burn me, it won’t hurt anything.

“If you wish it … Rand.” Her smile made his throat tighten. “You will help me?”

“Of course, I will.” Burn me, but she’s beautiful. And looking at me like I’m a hero in a story. He shook his head to clear it of foolishness. “But first we have to find the men we are following. I’ll try to keep you out of danger, but we must find them. Coming with us will be better than staying here alone.”

For a moment she was silent, her face blank and smooth; Rand had no idea what she was thinking, except that she seemed to be studying him anew. “A man of duty,” she said finally. A small smile touched her lips. “I like that. Yes. Who are these miscreants you follow?”

“Darkfriends and Trollocs, my Lady,” Hurin burst out. He made an awkward bow to her from his saddle. “They did murder in Fal Dara keep and stole the Horn of Valere, my Lady, but Lord Rand will fetch it back.”

Rand stared at the sniffer ruefully; Hurin gave a weak grin. So much for secrecy. It did not matter here, he supposed, but once back in their world …

“Selene, you must not say anything of the Horn to anyone. If it gets out, we’ll have a hundred people on our heels trying to get the Horn for themselves.”

“No, it would never do,” Selene said, “for that to fall into the wrong hands. The Horn of Valere. I could not tell you how often I’ve dreamed of touching it, holding it in my hands. You must promise me, when you have it, you will let me touch it.”

“Before I can do that, we have to find it. We had better be on our way.” Rand offered his hand to help her mount; Hurin scrambled down to hold her stirrup. “Whatever that thing was I killed — a grolm? — there may be more of them around.” Her hand was firm — there was surprising strength in her grip — and her skin was … Silk? Something softer, smoother. Rand shivered.

“There always are,” Selene said. The tall white mare frisked and bared her teeth once at Red, yet Selene’s touch on the reins quieted her.

Rand slung his bow across his back and climbed onto Red. Light, how could anyone’s skin be so soft? “Hurin, where’s the trail? Hurin? Hurin!”

The sniffer gave a start, and left off staring at Selene. “Yes, Lord Rand. Ah… the trail. South, my Lord. Still south.”

“Then let’s ride.” Rand gave an uneasy look at the gray-green bulk of the grolm lying in the stream. It had been better believing they were the only living things in that world. “Take the trail, Hurin.”

Selene rode alongside Rand at first, talking of this and that, asking him questions and calling him lord. Half a dozen times he started to tell her he was no lord, only a shepherd, and every time, looking at her, he could not get the words out. A lady like her would not talk the same way with a shepherd, he was sure, even one who had saved her life.

“You will be a great man when you’ve found the Horn of Valere,” she told him. “A man for the legends. The man who sounds the Horn will make his own legends.”

“I don’t want to sound it, and I don’t want to be part of any legend.” He did not know if she was wearing perfume, but there seemed to be a scent to her, something that filled his head with her. Spices, sharp and sweet, tickling his nose, making him swallow.

“Every man wants to be great. You could be the greatest man in all the Ages.”

It sounded too close to what Moiraine had said. The Dragon Reborn would certainly stand out through the Ages. “Not me,” he said fervently. “I’m just” — he thought of her scorn if he told her now that he was only a shepherd after letting her believe he was a lord, and changed what he had been going to say—“just trying to find it. And to help a friend.”

She was silent a moment, then said, “You’ve hurt your hand.”

“It is nothing.” He started to put his injured hand inside his coat — it throbbed from holding the reins — but she reached out and took it.

He was so surprised he let her, and then there was nothing to do except either jerk away rudely or else let her unwrap the kerchief. Her touch felt cool and sure. His palm was angrily red and puffy, but the heron still stood out, plainly and clearly.

She touched the brand with a finger, but made no comment on it, not even to ask how he had come by it. “This could stiffen your hand if it’s untended. I have an ointment that should help.” From a pocket inside her cloak she produced a small stone vial, unstopped it, and began gently rubbing a white salve on the burn as they rode.

The ointment felt cold at first, then seemed to melt away warmly into his flesh. And it worked as well as Nynaeve’s ointments sometimes did. He stared in amazement as the redness faded and the swelling went down under her stroking fingers.

“Some men,” she said, not raising her eyes from his hand, “choose to seek greatness, while others are forced to it. It is always better to choose than to be forced. A man who’s forced is never completely his own master. He must dance on the strings of those who forced him.”

Rand pulled his hand free. The brand looked a week old or more, all but healed. “What do you mean?” he demanded.

She smiled at him, and he felt ashamed of his outburst. “Why, the Horn, of course,” she said calmly, putting away her salve. Her mare, stepping along beside Red, was tall enough that her eyes were only a little below Rand’s. “If you find the Horn of Valere, there will be no avoiding greatness. But will it be forced on you, or will you take it? That’s the question.”

He flexed his hand. She sounded so much like Moiraine. “Are you Aes Sedai?”

Selene’s eyebrows lifted; her dark eyes glittered at him, but her voice was soft. “Aes Sedai? I? No.”

“I didn’t mean to offend you. I’m sorry.”

“Offend me? I am not offended, but I’m no Aes Sedai.” Her lip curled in a sneer; even that was beautiful. “They cower in what they think is safety when they could do so much. They serve when they could rule, let men fight wars when they could bring order to the world. No, never call me Aes Sedai.” She smiled and laid her hand on his arm to show she was not angry — her touch made him swallow — but he was relieved when she let the mare drop back beside Loial. Hurin bobbed his head at her like an old family retainer.

Rand was relieved, but he missed her presence, too. She was only two spans away — he twisted in his saddle to stare at her, riding by Loial’s side; the Ogier was bent half double in his saddle so he could talk with her — but that was not the same as being right there beside him, close enough for him to smell her heady scent, close enough to touch. He settled back angrily. It was not that he wanted to touch her, exactly — he reminded himself that he loved Egwene; he felt guilty at the need for reminding — but she was beautiful, and she thought he was a lord, and she said he could be a great man. He argued sourly with himself inside his head. Moiraine says you can be great, too; the Dragon Reborn. Selene is not Aes Sedai. That’s right; she’s a Cairhienin noblewoman. And you’re a shepherd. She doesn’t know that. How long do you let her believe a lie? It’s only till we get out of this place. If we get out. If. On that note, his thoughts subsided to sullen silence.

He tried to keep a watch on the country through which they rode — if Selene said there were more of those things … those grolm … about, he believed her, and Hurin was too intent on smelling the trail to notice anything else. Loial was too wrapped up in his talk with Selene to see anything until it bit him on the heel — but it was hard to watch. Turning his head too quickly made his eyes water; a hill or a stand of trees could seem a mile off when seen from one angle and only a few hundred spans when seen from another.

The mountains were growing closer, of that much he was sure. Kinslayer’s Dagger, looming against the sky now, a sawtooth expanse of snow-capped peaks. The land around them already rose in foothills heralding the coming of the mountains. They would reach the edge of the mountains proper well before dark, perhaps in only another hour or so. More than a hundred leagues in less than three days. Worse than that. We spent most of a day south of the Erinin in the real world. Over a hundred leaguer in less than two days, here.

“She says you were right about this place, Rand.”

Rand gave a start before he realized Loial had ridden up beside him. He looked for Selene and found her riding with Hurin; the sniffer was grinning and ducking his head and all but knuckling his forehead at everything she said. Rand glanced sideways at the Ogier. “I’m surprised you could let her go, the way you two had your heads together. What do you mean, I was right?”

“She is a fascinating woman, isn’t she? Some of the Elders don’t know as much as she does about history — especially the Age of Legends — and about — oh, yes. She says you were right about the Ways, Rand. The Aes Sedai, some of them, studied worlds like this, and that study was the basis of how they grew the Ways. She says there are worlds where it is time rather than distance that changes. Spend a day in one of those, and you might come back to find a year has passed in the real world, or twenty. Or it could be the other way round. Those worlds — this one, all the others — are reflections of the real world, she says. This one seems pale to us because it is a weak reflection, a world that had little chance of ever being. Others are almost as likely as ours. Those are as solid as our world, and have people. The same people, she says, Rand. Imagine it! You could go to one of them and meet yourself. The Pattern has infinite variation, she says, and every variation that can be, will be.”

Rand shook his head, then wished he had not as the landscape flickered back and forth and his stomach lurched. He took a deep breath. “How does she know all that? You know about more things than anybody I ever met before, Loial, and all you knew about this world amounted to no more than a rumor.”

“She’s Cairhienin, Rand. The Royal Library in Cairhien is one of the greatest in the world, perhaps the greatest outside Tar Valon. The Aiel spared it deliberately, you know, when they burned Cairhien. They will not destroy a book. Did you know that they—”

“I don’t care about Aielmen,” Rand said hotly. “If Selene knows so much, I hope she read how to get us home from here. I wish Selene—”

“You wish Selene what?” The woman laughed as she joined them.

Rand stared at her as if she had been gone months; that was how he felt. “I wish Selene would come ride with me some more,” he said. Loial chuckled, and Rand felt his face burn.

Selene smiled, and looked at Loial. “You will excuse us, alantin.”

The Ogier bowed in his saddle and let his big horse fall back, the tufts on his ears drooping with reluctance.

For a time Rand rode in silence, enjoying Selene’s presence. Now and again he looked at her out of the corner of his eye. He wished he could get his feelings about her straight. Could she be an Aes Sedai, despite her denial? Someone sent by Moiraine to push him along whatever path he was meant to follow in the Aes Sedai’s plans? Moiraine could not have known he would be taken to this strange world, and no Aes Sedai would have tried to fend off that beast with a stick when she could strike it dead or send it running with the Power. Well. Since she took him for a lord and no one in Cairhien knew different, he might keep on letting her think it. She was surely the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, intelligent and learned, and she thought he was brave; what more could a man ask from a wife? That’s crazy, too. I’d marry Egwene if I could marry anyone, but I can’t ask a woman to marry a man who’s going to go mad, maybe hurt her. But Selene was so beautiful.

She was studying his sword, he saw. He readied the words in his head. No, he was not a blademaster, but his father had given him the sword. Tam. Light, why couldn’t you really be my father? He squashed the thought ruthlessly.

“That was a magnificent shot,” Selene said.

“No, I’m not a—” Rand began, then blinked. “A shot?”

“Yes. A tiny target, that eye, moving, at a hundred paces. You’ve a wonderful hand with that bow.”

Rand shifted awkwardly. “Ah … thank you. It’s a trick my father taught me.” He told her about the void, about how Tam had taught him how to use it with the bow. He even found himself telling her about Lan and his sword lessons.

“The Oneness,” she said, sounding satisfied. She saw his questioning look and added, “That is what it is called … in some places. The Oneness. To learn the full use of it, it is best to wrap it around you continuously, to dwell in it at all times, or so I’ve heard.”

He did not even have to think about what lay waiting for him in the void to know his answer to that, but what he said was, “I’ll think about it.”

“Wear this void of yours all the time, Rand al’Thor, and you’ll learn uses for it you never suspected.”

“I said I will think about it.” She opened her mouth again, but he cut her off. “You know all these things. About the void — the Oneness, you call it. About this world. Loial reads books all the time; he’s read more books than I’ve ever seen, and he’s never seen anything but a fragment about the Stones.”

Selene drew herself up straight in her saddle. Suddenly she reminded him of Moiraine, and of Queen Morgase, when they were angry.

“There was a book written about these worlds,” she said tightly. “Mirrors of the Wheel. You see, the alantin has not seen all the books that are.”

“What is this alantin you call him? I’ve never heard—”

“The Portal Stone beside which I woke is up there,” Selene said, pointing into the mountains, off to the east of their path. Rand found himself wishing for her warmth again, and her smiles. “If you take me to it, you can return me to my home, as you promised. We can reach it in an hour.”

Rand barely looked where she pointed. Using the Stone — Portal Stone, she called it — meant wielding the Power, if he were to take her back to the real world. “Hurin, how is the trail?”

“Fainter than ever, Lord Rand, but still there.” The sniffer spared a quick grin and bob of his head for Selene. “I think it’s starting to angle off to the west. There’s some easier passes there, toward the tip of the Dagger, as I recall from when I went to Cairhien that time.”

Rand sighed. Fain, or one of his Darkfriends, has to know another way to use the Stones. A Darkfriend couldn’t use the Power. “I have to follow the Horn, Selene.”

“How do you know your precious Horn is even in this world? Come with me, Rand. You’ll find your legend, I promise you. Come with me.”

“You can use the Stone, this Portal Stone, yourself,” he said angrily. Before the words were out of his mouth he wanted them back. Why does she have to keep talking about legends? Stubbornly, he forced himself to go on. “The Portal Stone didn’t bring you here by itself. You did it, Selene. If you made the Stone bring you here, you can make it take you back. I’ll take you to it, but then I must go on after the Horn.”

“I know nothing about using the Portal Stones, Rand. If I did anything, I don’t know what it was.”

Rand studied her. She sat her saddle, straight-backed and tall, just as regally as before, but somehow softer, too. Proud, yet vulnerable, and needing him. He had put Nynaeve’s age to her — a handful of years older than himself — but he had been wrong, he realized. She was more his own age, and beautiful, and she needed him. The thought, just the thought, of the void flickered through his head, and of the light. Saidin. To use the Portal Stone, he must dip himself back into that taint.

“Stay with me, Selene,” he said. “We’ll find the Horn, and Mat’s dagger, and we’ll find a way back. I promise you. Just stay with me.”

“You always …” Selene drew a deep breath as if to calm herself. “You always are so stubborn. Well, I can admire stubbornness in a man. There is little to a man who’s too easily biddable.”

Rand colored; it was too much like the things Egwene sometimes said, and they had all but been promised in marriage since they were children. From Selene, the words, and the direct look that went with them, were a shock. He turned to tell Hurin to press on with the trail.

From behind them came a distant, coughing grunt. Before Rand could whirl Red to look, another bark sounded, and three more on its heels. At first he could make out nothing as the landscape seemed to waver in his eyes, but then he saw them through the widespread stands of trees, just topping a hill. Five shapes, it seemed, only half a mile distant, a bare thousand paces at most, and coming in thirty-foot bounds.

“Grolm,” Selene said calmly. “A small pack, but they have our scent, it seems.”