The Fires of Heaven (The Wheel of Time #5) 75

Nynaeve swallowed her heart and breathed again, raggedly, but she knew it was not over.

Raising her hands above her head, Elayne suddenly cartwheeled herself along the rope, black tresses whipping, whitesheathed legs flashing in the sun. Nynaeve yelped and clutched Luca's arm as the girl reached the far platform, stumbled in landing and caught herself just short of going over the edge.

“What's the matter?” he murmured beneath the gasp rising from the crowd. “You've seen her do this every evening since Sienda. And a good many other places, too, I would think.”

“Of course,” she said weakly. Eyes fixed on Elayne, she barely noticed the arm he slipped around her shoulders, certainly not enough to do anything about it. She had tried to talk the girl into feigning a sprained ankle, but Elayne insisted that after all of that practice with the Power, she did not need it now. Maybe Juilin did not — apparently he did not — but Elayne had never gone scrambling over rooftops in the night.

The return cartwheels went perfectly, and the landing, but Nynaeve did not look away, or loose her hold on Luca's sleeve. After what now seemed the inevitable pause for applause, Elayne returned to the rope for more pivots, one leg raised and whipping down and up so quickly that it seemed she kept it outstretched the whole while, and for a slow handstand that lifted her straight as a dagger, whiteslippered toes pointed to the sky. And a backflip that had the crowd gasping and her swaying from side to side, only just catching her balance. Thom Merrilin had taught her that, and the handstand.

From the corner of her eye Nynaeve caught Thom, two places down from her, eyes riveted to Elayne, poised on the balls of his feet. He looked as proud as a peacock. He looked ready to rush forward and catch her if she fell. If she did fall, it would be at least partly his fault. He should never have taught her those things!

One last passage of cartwheels, white legs flashing and glittering in the sun, faster than before. A passage that had never been mentioned to Nynaeve! She would have eviscerated Luca with her tongue had he not muttered angrily that Elayne adding to the act just for applause was a good way to break her neck. One last pause to pose for more of that applause and Elayne at last climbed down.

Shouting, the crowd rushed in on her. Luca and four horse handlers with cudgels appeared around her as if by the Power, but even so Thom beat them to her, limp and all.

Nynaeve jumped as high as she could, just managing to see over enough heads to make out Elayne. The girl did not seem frightened, or even taken aback, by all the waving hands trying to touch her, stretching between her encircling guards. Head high, face flushed from effort, she still managed a cool and regal grace as she was escorted away. How she could do that, garbed as she was, Nynaeve simply could not imagine.

“Face like a bloody queen,” the oneeyed man muttered to himself. He had not gone running with the others, but merely let them stream past. Roughly dressed in a plain coat of dark gray wool, he certainly looked solid enough to have no fears of being knocked down and trampled. He appeared as if he could use that sword. “Burn me for a sheepgutted farmer, but she's flaming well brave enough for a bloody queen.”

Nynaeve gaped at him as he strode away through the crowd, and it was not his language. Or rather, it was, partly. Now she remembered where she had seen him, a oneeyed man with a topknot who could not say two sentences without the vilest curses.

Forgetting about Elayne — she was certainly safe enough — Nynaeve began pushing her way through the throng after him.

Chapter 38

(Serpent and Wheel)

An Old Acquaintance

With the crowds, it took Nynaeve some little time to catch up, muttering every time she was jostled by a man gaping at everything in sight or a woman dragging a child with either hand, children usually trying to drag her to two different attractions at once. The oneeyed man barely paused to look at anything except the big snake and the lions, until he reached the boarhorses. He had to have seen them earlier, situated as they were near the patrons' entrance. Every time the s'redit stood on their hind legs, as they were doing now, the great tusked heads of the adults could be seen by those outside the canvas fence, and the press to enter intensified a little more.

Beneath a wide red sign that said VALAN LUCA in ornate gold script on both sides, two of the horse handlers collected admission from people funneled between two thick ropes, taking the money in clear blownglass pitchers — both thick and flawed; Luca would never lay out coin for better — so they could see that the coins were right without touching them. They dumped the money straight from the pitchers through a hole in the top of an ironstrapped box so wrapped about with chain that Petra had to have put it in place before the first silver penny went in. Another pair of horse handlers — thickshouldered, brokennosed men with the sunken knuckles of brawlers — stood nearby with cudgels to make sure that the crowd remained orderly. And to keep an eye on the men taking the money, Nynaeve suspected. Luca was not a trusting man, especially when it came to coin. In fact, he was as tight as the skin on an apple. She had never met anyone so stingy.

Slowly she elbowed close to the man with the graystreaked topknot. He had had no trouble reaching the front rank before the s'redit, of course; his scar and painted eyepatch would have seen to that, even without the sword on his back. At the moment he was watching the big gray animals with a grin, and what she supposed was wonder on that stony face.

“Uno?” She thought that was the right name.

His head turned to stare at her. Once she had the shawl back in place, he raised the stare to her face, but no recognition lit in his dark eye. The other, the painted red glaring one, made her a little queasy.

Cerandin waved her goad, shouting something slurred beyond intelligibility, and the s'redit turned, Sanit, the cow, placing her feet, on Mer's broad, rounded back while he remained upright. Nerin, the calf, put her feet low on Sanit's back.

“I saw you in Fal Dara,” Nynaeve said. “And again on Toman Head, briefly. After Falme. You were with...” She did not know how much she could say with people cheekbyjowl around her, rumors of the Dragon Reborn had circulated all through Amadicia, and some even had his name right. “With Rand.”

Uno's real eye narrowed — she tried not to see the other — and after a moment he nodded. “I remember the face. I never forget a flaming pretty face. But the hair was bloody well different. Nyna?”

“Nynaeve,&rd