Crossroads of Twilight (19 page)

Ignoring Luca, the Seanchan officer stepped up onto his gelding, adjusted his sword, and barked orders that sent his men flowing into their saddles and forming a column of twos that moved off at a slow walk toward the entrance. Luca stood watching them leave with a fixed smile on his face, poised for another bow if any looked back.

Mat stayed well to the side of the street and let his mouth hang open, affecting to gape in wonder as the soldiers rode by. Not that any of them so much as glanced his way—the officer stared straight ahead and so did the soldiers behind him—but no one ever paid any mind to a country yokel, or remembered one.

To his surprise, Egeanin studied the ground in front of her toes, clutching the scarf knotted beneath her chin, until the last horseman passed. Lifting her head to look after them, she pursed her lips for a moment. “It seems I do know that boy,” she drawled softly. “I carried him to Falme on
Fearless.
His servant died, mid-voyage, and he thought he could use one of my crew. I had to put him straight. You’d have though he was of the Blood, the fuss he put up.”

“Blood and bloody ashes,” Mat breathed. How many other people had she gotten crosswise, fixing her face in their minds? Egeanin being Egeanin, probably hundreds. And he had been letting her walk around with just a wig and a change of clothes for disguise! Hundreds? Thousands, more likely. She could irritate a brick.

In any case, the officer was gone now. Mat exhaled slowly. His luck really was still with him. At times he thought that was all that kept him from bawling like a baby. He headed for Luca to find out what the soldiers had wanted.

Domon and Blaeric reached Luca as quickly as he and Egeanin did, and the scowl on Domon’s round face deepened as he stared at Mat’s arm around Egeanin’s shoulder. The Illianer understood the necessity for the pretense, or said he did, yet he seemed to believe they could carry it off without so much as touching hands. Mat removed his arm from her—there was nothing to carry off here; Luca knew the truth; of everything—and Egeanin started to release him, too, yet after a look at Domon, she tightened her grip on Mat’s waist instead, all without the slightest change of expression. Domon continued to scowl, but at the ground, now. Mat decided he would understand the Seanchan long before he understood women. Or Illianers, for that matter.

“Horses,” Luca growled almost before Mat stopped walking. His frown took in all of them, but he focused most of his anger on Mat. A little the
taller, Luca stretched to stare down at Mat. “That’s what he wanted. I showed him the warrant exempting me from the horse lottery, signed by the High Lady Suroth herself, but was he impressed? It didn’t matter to him that I rescued a high-ranking Seanchan.” The woman had not been high-ranking, and he had not so much rescued her as given her a way to travel as a hired performer, but Luca always exaggerated to his own advantage. “I don’t know how long that exemption is really good for, anyway. The Seanchan are desperate for horses. They might take it back any day!” His face was turning almost as red as his coat, and he jabbed a finger at Mat repeatedly. “You’re going to get my horses taken! How do I move my show with no horses? Answer me that, if you can. I was ready to leave as soon as I saw that madness in the harbor, until you twisted my arm. You’re going to get my head cut off! I could be a hundred miles from here, if not for you, riding in out of the night and snaring me in your crazy schemes! I’m not earning a penny here! There haven’t been enough patrons the last three days to pay for feeding the animals one day! Half a day! I should have left a month ago! More! I should have!”

Mat almost laughed as Luca ran down into splutters. Horses. That was all; just horses. Besides, the notion that the show’s heavy-laden wagons could cover a hundred miles in five days was as ludicrous as Luca’s wagon. The man could have gone a month ago, two months, except for wanting to eke every copper he could out of Ebou Dar and its Seanchan conquerors. And as for talking him into staying, six nights past, that had been as easy as falling out of bed.

Instead of laughing, Mat put a hand on Luca’s shoulder. The fellow was vain as a peacock, and greedy besides, but there was no point making him angrier than he already was. “If you’d left that night, Luca, you think nobody would have gotten suspicious? You would have had Seanchan tearing your wagons apart before you made two leagues. You could say I saved you from that.” Luca glowered. Some people just could not see beyond their own noses. “Anyway, you can stop worrying. As soon as Thom returns from the city, we can put as many miles behind us as you want.”

Luca leaped so suddenly that Mat stepped back in alarm, but all the man did was caper in a little circle laughing. Domon goggled at him, and even Blaeric stared. Sometimes, Luca seemed a flat bull-goose fool.

Luca had barely begun his dance when Egeanin shoved Mat away from her. “As soon as Merrilin returns? I gave orders no one was to leave!” Her glare swung between him and Luca in cold fury, a cold that burned. “I expect my orders to be obeyed!”

Luca stopped cavorting abruptly and eyed her sideways, then suddenly made her a bow with so many flourishes you could practically see the cloak. You could almost see the
embroidery
on the cloak! He thought he had a way with a women, Luca did. “You command, my sweet Lady, and I leap to obey.” Coming upright, he shrugged apologetically. “But Master Cauthon has gold, and I fear gold commands my first obedience.” Mat’s chest full of gold coins in this very wagon had been all the arm-twisting needed to convince him. Maybe Mat being
ta’veren
had helped, but for enough gold, Valan Luca would help kidnap the Dark One.

Egeanin drew a deep breath, ready to berate Luca further, but the man turned his back and went scampering up the steps into his wagon shouting, “Latelle! Latelle! We must roust everybody out immediately! We’re leaving at last, the minute Merrilin returns! The Light be praised!”

A moment later, he was back again, dashing back down the short stair followed by his wife drawing a black velvet cloak, sewn with glittering spangles, around herself. A stern-faced woman, she wrinkled her nose at Mat as though he had a bad smell and gave Egeanin a look that likely made her trained bears climb trees. Latelle disliked the idea of a woman running away from her husband even when she knew it was a lie. Luckily, she seemed to worship Luca for some reason, and she liked gold nearly as well as he did. Luca ran to the nearest wagon and began pounding on the door, and Latelle did the same at the next.

Not waiting around to watch, Mat hurried off down one of the side streets. More of an alley compared to the main street, it wound among the same sort of wagons and tents, all shut up tight against the cold, with smoke streaming from the metal chimneys. There were no platforms for performers here, but lines for drying laundry hung between some of the wagons, and here and there wooden toys lay scattered on the ground. This street was for living only, the narrowness meant to discourage outsiders.

He moved quickly despite his hip—he had walked most of the ache out—but he had not gone ten steps before Egeanin and Domon caught up to him. Blaeric had vanished, probably gone to tell the sisters they were still safe and could finally leave. The Aes Sedai, masquerading as servants sick with worry that their mistress’s husband would catch them, were fed up with being confined to their wagon, not to mention fed up with sharing with the
sul’dam.
Mat had made them share, so the Aes Sedai could watch the
sul’dam
while the
sul’dam
kept the Aes Sedai out of his hair. Still Mat was glad Blaeric had taken away the necessity for him to visit that wagon again. One or another of the sisters had summoned him four or five times
a day since their escape from the city, and he went when he could not avoid it, but it was never a pleasant experience.

Egeanin did not put her arm around him this time. She strode at his side staring straight ahead, not bothering to check her wig, for once. Domon lumbered behind like a bear, muttering under his breath in his heavy Illianer accent. The stocking cap exposed the fact that his dark beard stopped abruptly at the middle of each ear, with only stubble above. It made him look . . . unfinished.

“Two captains on one ship make sure course for disaster,” Egeanin drawled with overdone patience. Her understanding smile looked as if it hurt her face.

“We aren’t on a ship,” Mat replied.

“The principle’s the same, Cauthon! You are a farmer. I know you’re a good man in a tight spot.” Egeanin shot a dark look over her shoulder at Domon. He was the one who had brought her and Mat together, back when she thought she was getting a hired man. “But this situation needs judgment and experience. We’re in dangerous waters, and you have no knowledge of command.”

“More than you might think,” he told her dryly. He could have spun out a list of the battles he remembered commanding, but only an historian would recognize most of them, and maybe not even an historian. No one would believe it, anyway. He certainly would not if someone else had made that claim. “Shouldn’t you and Domon be getting ready? You wouldn’t want to leave anything behind.” Everything she owned was already stowed away in the wagon she and Mat shared with Domon—not a comfortable arrangement, that—but he quickened his step, hoping she would take the hint. Besides, he saw his destination ahead.

The bright blue wall-tent, crowded between a virulent yellow wagon and an emerald green one, was barely large enough to hold three cots, but providing shelter for everyone he brought out of Ebou Dar had required bribes to make people move and more bribes to make others let them in. What he had been able to hire was what the owners were willing to let him have. At rates suitable for a good inn. Juilin, a dark compact man with short black hair, was sitting cross-legged on the ground in front of the tent with Olver, a thin little boy, if not so skinny as when Mat first saw him, and short for ten, the age he claimed. Both coatless despite the wind, they were playing Snakes and Foxes on a board the boy’s dead father had drawn for him on a piece of red cloth. Tossing the dice, Olver counted the
pips carefully and considered his move along the spiderweb of black lines and arrows. The Tairen thief-catcher was paying less attention to the game. He sat up straight at the sight of Mat.

Abruptly, Noal darted around from the rear of the tent, breathing hard as if he had been running. Juilin glanced up in surprise at the old man, and Mat frowned. He had told Noal to come straight here. Where had he gone instead? Noal looked at him expectantly, not with any guilt or embarrassment, just eager to hear what Mat had to say.

“You know about the Seanchan?” Juilin asked, turning his attention to Mat, too.

A shadow moved inside the tent’s entry flaps, and a dark-haired woman, seated on the end of one of the cots with an old gray cloak wrapped around her, leaned forward to rest a hand on Juilin’s arm. And to give Mat a wary look. Thera was pretty, if you liked a mouth that always seemed to be pouting, and it seemed that Juilin did, from the way he smiled at her reassuringly and patted her hand. She was also Amathera Aelfdene Casmir Lounault, Panarch of Tarabon and the next thing to a queen. At least, she had been, once. Juilin had known that, and so had Thom, yet no one thought to tell Mat until they reached the show. He supposed it hardly mattered, alongside everything else. She answered faster to Thera than to Amathera, she made no demands, except on Juilin’s time, and there seemed little chance anyone would recognize her here. In any case, Mat hoped she felt more than gratitude for being rescued, because Juilin certainly felt more for her. Who was to say a dethroned panarch could not fall in love with a thief-catcher? Stranger things had happened. Though he was not sure he could name one, offhand.

“They just wanted to see the warrant for Luca’s horses,” he said, and Juilin nodded, visibly relaxing a little.

“As well they didn’t count the horselines.” The warrant listed the exact number of horses Luca was allowed to keep. The Seanchan could be generous with their rewards, but given their need for mounts and wagon teams, they were not about to hand anyone a license to set up horse trading. “At best, they would have taken the extra. At worst . . .” The thief-catcher shrugged. Another cheerful soul.

With a gasp, Thera suddenly pulled her cloak tighter and jerked back into the depths of the tent. Juilin looked behind Mat, his eyes going hard, and the Tairen could match the Warders when it came to hard. Egeanin did not seem to catch hints, and she was glaring at the tent. Domon stood
beside her with his arms folded, sucking his teeth in thought or forced patience.

“Get your tent packed up, Sandar,” Egeanin ordered. “The show is leaving as soon as Merrilin returns.” Her jaw tightened, and she did not quite glare at Mat. Not quite. “Make sure your . . . woman . . . doesn’t give any trouble.” Most lately, Thera had been a servant,
da’covale,
the property of the High Lady Suroth, until Juilin stole her away. To Egeanin, stealing
da’covale
was almost as bad as freeing
damane.

“Can I ride Wind?” Olver exclaimed, bounding to his feet. “Can I, Mat? Can I, Leilwin?” Egeanin actually smiled at him. Mat had yet to see her smile at anyone else, even Domon.

“Not yet,” Mat said. Not until they were far enough from Ebou Dar that no one was likely to remember the gray winning races with a small boy on his back. “In a few days, maybe. Juilin, will you tell the others? Blaeric already knows, so the sisters are taken care of.”

Juilin did not waste time, aside from ducking inside the tent to reassure Thera. She seemed to need reassuring frequently. When he came out, carrying a dark Tairen coat that was beginning to show wear, he told Olver to put the game away and help Thera with the packing until he returned, then settled his flat-topped conical red hat on his head and started off, shrugging into the coat. He never so much as glanced at Egeanin. She considered him a thief, offensive in itself to a thief-catcher, and the Tairen had no love for her, either.

Mat started to ask Noal where he had been, but the old man darted nimbly after Juilin, calling over his shoulder that he would help let the others know the show was leaving. Well, two could spread the word faster than one—Vanin and the four surviving Redarms shared a crowded tent on one side of the show, while Noal himself shared another with Thom and the two serving men, Lopin and Nerim, on the opposite side—and the question could wait. Probably, he had just delayed to put his precious fish somewhere safe. In any case, the question suddenly seemed unimportant.