Foolish as a girl in knee-length skirts, she thought at herself—careful to shield her thoughts from him—barely old enough to know the difference between boys and girls. And in the middle of a war, too.
She found it hard to steel her emotions—as an Aes Sedai should—while linked with Androl. Their selves mixed, like swirling paints poured in the same bowl. She fought against it, determined to maintain her own identity. This was vital when linking, and she had been taught it time and time again.
Androl flung his hand forward at a group of Trollocs that had begun loosing arrows at him. The gateway went up, consuming the arrows. She glanced about, and found them falling on another group of Trollocs.
Gateways opened in the ground, dropping Trollocs through, making them appear hundreds of feet in the air. A tiny gateway split the head off a Myrddraal at the neck, leaving it to thrash about, pumping inky blood on the soil. Androl’s team stood near the western section of the Heights, where the dragons had once been positioned. There were Shadowspawn and Sharans on all sides.
Androl, channeling! She could feel it, rising above them on the Heights. Something powerful.
Taim! Androl’s immediate flare of anger felt as if it would burn her away. In it was the loss of friends, and fury at betrayal by one who should have protected them.
Careful, she sent. We don’t know it's him.
The one attacking them was in a circle with men and women, otherwise Pevara would not have been able to feel him. Of course, she could only see the weaves of saidar. A thick column of air struck at them, fully a pace wide, the heat of it enough to redden the rocky ground beneath.
Androl put a gateway up in time, barely, catching the column of fire and directing it back the way it had come. Twin streams burned Trolloc corpses and caused weeds and patches of grass to burst alight.
Pevara didn’t see what happened next. Androl’s gateway vanished, as if ripped from him, and an explosion of lightning struck right next to them. Pevara hit the ground in a heap, Androl slamming into her.
In that moment, she let go of herself.
She did it by accident because of the shock of impact. In most cases, the link would have slipped away, but Androl had a powerful grip. The dam holding back Pevara’s self from his own broke, and they mixed. It was like stepping through a mirror, then looking back on herself.
She forcibly pulled herself out again, but with an awareness she couldn’t describe. We need to get out of here, she thought, still linked with Androl. The others all seemed alive, but that would not last long if their enemy brought more lightning. Pevara began the complex weave for a gateway by instinct, though it wouldn’t do anything. Androl was leading their circle, so only he—The gateway snapped open. Pevara gaped. She’d done that, not him. This was among the most complex, most difficult and most power-intensive weaves she knew, but she’d done it as easily as waving her hand. While in a circle someone else was leading.
Theodrin stumbled through first. The lithe Domani woman tugged a stumbling Jonneth after her through the gateway. Emarin followed, limping, one arm hanging uselessly at his side.
Androl regarded the gateway, stunned. "I thought you aren’t supposed to be able to channel if someone else is leading a circle you are in".
"You aren’t", she said. "I did it by accident".
"Accident? But—"
"Through the gateway, you knothead", Pevara said, shoving him toward it. She followed, then collapsed on the other side.
"Damodred, I need you to stay where you are", Mat said. He did not look up, but he heard Galad's horse snort through the open gateway.
"One is led to question your sanity, Cauthon", Galad replied.
Mat finally looked up from his maps. He was not sure he would ever grow accustomed to these gateways. He stood in their command building, the one Tuon had erected in the cleft at the foot of Dashar Knob, and there was a gateway in his wall. Outside it Galad sat his horse wearing the gold and white of the Children of the Light. He was still positioned near the ruins, where a Trolloc army was trying to push its way across the Mora.
Galad Damodred was a man who could have used a few stiff drinks in him. He could have been a statue, with that pretty face and unchanging expression. No, statues had more life.
"You’ll do as you’re told", Mat said, looking back to his maps. "You are to hold the river up there and do as Tam tells you. I don’t care if you think your place isn’t important enough".
"Very well", Galad said, voice as cold as a corpse in the snow. He turned his horse away, and Mika the damane closed the gateway.
"It’s a bloodbath out there, Mat", Elayne said. Light, her voice was colder than Galad’s!
"You all put me in charge. Let me do my job".
"We made you commander of the armies", Elayne said. "You are not in charge".
Trust an Aes Sedai to argue over every little word. It. . . . He looked up, frowning. Min had just said something softly to Tuon. "What is it?" he asked.
"I saw his body alone, on a field", Min said, "as if dead".
"Matrim", Tuon said. "I am . . . concerned".
"For once we agree", Elayne said from her throne on the other side of the room. "Mat, their general is outmatching you".
"It’s not so bloody simple", Mat said, fingers on the maps. "It’s never that bloody simple".
The man leading the Shadow was good. Very good. It’s Demandred, Mat thought. I’m fighting one of the bloody Forsaken.
Together, Mat and Demandred were composing a grand painting. Each responded to the other’s moves with subtle care. Mat was trying to use just a little too much red in one of his paints. He wanted to paint the wrong picture, but still a reasonable one.
It was hard. He had to be capable enough to keep Demandred back, but weak enough to invite aggression. A feint, ever so subtle. It was dangerous, possibly disastrous. He had to walk on a razor edge. There was no way to avoid cutting his feet. The question was not whether he would be bloodied, but whether he would reach the other side or not.
"Move in the Ogier", Mat said softly, fingers on the map. "I want them to reinforce the men at the ford". The Aiel fought there, guarding the way as the White Tower’s men and the members of the Band of the Red Hand retreated off the Heights per his order.
The command was relayed to the Ogier. Stay safe, Loial, Mat thought, making a notation on the map where he had sent the Ogier. "Alert Lan, he’s still on the western side of the Heights. I want him to swing around the back of the Heights, now that most of the Shadow’s forces are on top, and back toward the Mora, behind the other Trolloc army trying to cross near the ruins. He’s not to engage them; just stay out of sight and
