“I am convinced the Second Librarian is . . . a spy, my Lady,” Mistress Harfor said finally, ignoring Norry as if to make him dis?appear. She had resisted lettinganyone else know that she was searching out spies in the palace, yet the First Clerk knowing seemed to grate on her worst of all. His only authority over her, if such it was, came from paying the palace accounts, and he never questioned an expenditure, but even that little was more than she wished. “Every three or four days Master Harnder visits an inn called the Hoop and Arrow, supposedly for the ale made by the innkeeper, one Millis Fendry, but Mistress Fendry also keeps pigeons, and whenever Master Harnder visits, she sends off a pigeon that flies north. Yesterday, three of the Aes Sedai staying at the Silver Swan found reason to visit the Hoop and Arrow, though it caters to a much poorer crowd than the Swan. They came and went hooded, and were closeted with Mistress Fendry in private for over an hour. All three are Brown Ajah. I fear that indicates Master Harnder’s employer.”
“Hairdressers, footmen, cooks, the master cabinetmaker, no fewer than five of Master Norry’s clerks, and now one of the librar?ians.” Leaning back in her chair and crossing her legs, Dyelin glowered sourly. “Is there anyone wewon’t eventually learn is a spy, Mistress Harfbr?” Norry stretched his neck uncomfortably; he took the malfeasance of his clerks as a personal affront.
“I have hopes I may be reaching the bottom of that barrel, my Lady,” Mistress Harfor said complacently. Neither spies nor the High Seats of powerful Houses ruffled her. Spies were pests she intended to rid the palace of as surely as she kept it clear of fleas and rats - though she had been forced to accept Aes Sedai aid with rats recently - while powerful nobles were like rain or snow, facts of nature to be endured until they went away, but nothing to get flustered over. “There are only so many people who can be bought, and only so many can afford to buy, or want to.”
Elayne tried to picture Master Harnder, but all she could bring up in her mind was vague, a chubby, balding man who blinked incessantly. He had served her mother, and as she recalled, Queen Mordrellen before that. No one commented on the fact that it seemed he also served the Brown Ajah. Every ruler’s palace between the Spine of the World and the Aryth Ocean contained the Tower’s eyes-and-ears. Any ruler with half a brain expected it. Doubtless the Seanchan would soon be living under the White Tower’s gaze, too, if they were not already. Reene had discovered several spies for the Red Ajah, assuredly legacies of Elaida’s time in Caemlyn, but this librarian was the first for another Ajah. Elaida would not have liked other Ajahs knowing what went on in the palace while she was advisor to the Queen.
“A pity we have no false stories we want the Brown Ajah to believe,” she said lightly. Agreat pity they, and the Reds, knew about the Kin. At best, they had to know there were a large num?ber of women in the palace who could channel, and it would not take them long to figure out who they were. That would create any number of problems down the road, yet those difficulties did lie somewhere in the future. Always plan ahead, Lini used to say, but worry too hard over next year, and you can trip over tomorrow. “Watch Master Harnder and try to find out his friends. That will have to suffice for the time being.” Some spies depended on their ears, either to hear gossip or listen at doors; others lubricated tongues with a few friendly cups of wine. The first part of counter?acting a spy was to find out how he learned what he sold.
Aviendha snorted loudly and, spreading her skirts, started to sit down on the carpet before realizing what she wore. With a warning glance at Dyelin, she perched stiffly on the front edge of a chair instead, the picture of a court lady with her eyes flashing. Except that a lady of the court would not have checked the edge of her belt knife with a thumb. Left to her own devices, Aviendha would slit every spy’s throat as soon as it could be stretched for the knife. Spying was a vile business, in her view, no matter how often Elayne explained that every spy found was a tool that could be used to make her enemies believe what she wanted.
Not that every spy necessarily worked for an enemy. Most of those the First Maid had uncovered took money from more than one source, and among those she had identified were King Roedran of Murandy, various Tairen High Lords and Ladies, a handful of Cairhienin nobles, and a fair number of merchants. A good many people were interested in what happened in Caemlyn, whether for its effect on trade or other reasons. Sometimes it seemed that every?one spied on everyone else.
“Mistress Harfor,” she said, “you haven’t found any eyes-and-ears for theBlackTower.”
Like most people who heard theBlackTowermentioned, Dyelin shivered, and took a deep drink of her wine, but Reene just grimaced faintly. She had decided to ignore the fact that they were men who could channel, since she could not change matters. To her, theBlackTowerwas . . . an annoyance. “They haven’t had time, my Lady. Give them a year, and you’ll find footmen and librarians taking their coin, too.”
“I suppose I will.” Dreadful thought. “What else do you have for us today?”
“I’ve had a word with Jon Skellit, my Lady. A man who turns his coat once is often amenable to turning it again, and Skellit is.” Skellit, a barber, was in the pay of House Arawn, which for the present made him Arymilla’s man.
Birgitte bit off an oath in midword - for some reason, she tried to watch her language around Reene Harfor - and spoke in a pained voice. “You had aword with him? Without asking anyone?”
Dyelin was under no compunctions regarding the First Maid, and she muttered, “Mother’s milk in a cup!” Elayne had neyerheard her use an obscenity before. Master Norry blinked and almost dropped his folder, and busied himself with not looking at Dyelin. The First Maid, however, merely paused until sure she and Birgitte were done, then went on calmly.
“The time seemed ripe, and so did Skellit. One of the men he hands his reports to left the city and hasn’t returned yet, while it appears the other broke his leg. The streets are always icy where a fire has been put out.” She said that so blandly, it seemed more than likely she had engineered the man’s fall somehow. Hard times uncovered hard talents in the most surprising people. “Skellit is quite agreeable to carrying his next communication out to the camps himself. He saw a gateway made, and he won’t have to pre?tend terror.” You would have thought she herself had been seeing merchants’ wagons rumble out of holes in the air for her entire life.
“What’s to stop this barber keeping on running once he’s out?side thefla. . . uh . . . the city?” Birgitte demanded irritably, be?ginning to pace in front of the fire with her hands clasped behind her. Her heavy golden braid should have been bristling. “If he goes, Arawn will hire somebody else, and you’ll have to hunt him out all over again. Light, Arymilla must have heard of the gate?ways almost as soon as she arrived, and Skellit has to know it.” It was not the thought of Skellit escaping that irritated her, or not only that. The mercenaries thought they had been hired to stop soldiers, but for a few silvers they would allow one or two to slip through the gates by night in either direction. One or two could do no harm, as they saw matters. Birgitte did not like being reminded of that.
“Greed will stop him, my Lady,” Mistress Harfor replied calmly. “The thought of earning gold from the Lady Elayne as well as from Lady Naean is enough to make the man breathe hard. It’s true, Lady Arymilla must already have heard of the gateways, but that only adds credit to Skellit’s reason for going in person.”
“And if his greed is great enough for him to try earning still more gold by turning his coat a third time?” Dyelin said. “He could cause a great deal of . . . mischief, Mistress Harfor.”
Reene’s tone became a little crisper. She would never step over the boundaries, but she dislikedanyone thinking her careless. “Lady Naean would have him buried under the nearest snowdrift, myLady, as I made certain he is aware. She has never been patient. As I am sure you are aware. In any case, the news we get from the camps is quite sparse, to say the least, and he might see a few things we would like to know.”
“If Skellit can tell us whichcampArymilla, Elenia and Naean will be in and when, I’ll give him his gold with my own hand,” Elayne said deliberately. Elenia and Naean stayed close to Arymilla, or she kept them close, and Arymilla was much less patient than Naean, much less willing to believe that anything could function without her presence. She spent half of each day rid?ing from camp to camp, and never slept in the same two nights running, as far as anyone could learn. “That is the only thing he can tell us of the camps that I want to know.”
Reene inclined her head. “As you say, my Lady. I will see to it.” She too often tried not to say things straight out in front of Norry, but she gave no sign that she had heard any reproof. Of course, Elayne was not sure she actually would rebuke the woman openly. Mistress Harfor would continue to perform her duties properly if she did, and she certainly would continue hunting spies with undiminished ardor, if for no other reason than their presence in the palace offended her, yet Elayne might find a dozen inconveniences in every day, a dozen small discomforts that added up to misery, and not a one that she could directly attribute to the First Maid.We must follow the steps of the dance as surely as our servants, her mother had told her once.You can keep hiring new servants, and spend all your time training them and suffering till they learn, only to find yourself back where you started, or you can accept the rules as they do, and live comfort?ably while
