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

The two snug rooms were neatly furnished, the bed made to perfection, the two chairs precisely aligned at the table, where a blue vase in the exact center held a small fan of greenery. Lini had always been a great one for neatness. Morgase was willing to wager that within the wardrobe in the bedchamber every dress was arranged just so with every other, and the same for pots in the cupboard beside the fireplace in the other room.

Six painted ivory miniatures in small wooden stands made a line on the mantelpiece. How Lini could have afforded them on a nurse's stipend was more than Morgase had ever been able to imagine; she could not ask such a question, of course. In pairs, they showed three young women and the same three as babes. Elayne was there, and herself. Taking down the portrait of herself at fourteen, a slender filly of a girl, she could not believe that she had ever looked so innocent. She had worn that ivory silk dress the day she had gone to the White Tower, never dreaming at the time that she would be Queen, only harboring the vain hope that she might become Aes Sedai.

Absentmindedly she thumbed the Great Serpent ring on her left hand. She had not earned that, precisely; women who could not channel were not awarded the ring. But short of her sixteenth nameday she had returned to contest the Rose Crown in the name of House Trakand, and when she won the throne nearly two years later, the ring had been presented to her. By tradition, the DaughterHeir of Andor always trained in the Tower, and in recognition of Andor's long support of the Tower was given the ring whether or not she could channel. She had only been the heir to House Trakand in the Tower, but they gave it to her anyway once the Rose Crown was on her head.

Replacing her own portrait, she took down her mother's, taken at perhaps two years older. Lini had been nurse to three generations of Trakand women. Maighdin Trakand had been beautiful. Morgase could remember that smile, when it had become a mother's loving beam. It was Maighdin who should have had the Lion Throne. But a fever had carried her away, and a young girl had found herself High Seat of House Trakand, in the middle of a struggle for the throne with no more support in the beginning than her House retainers and the House bard. I won the Lion Throne. I will not give it up, and I will not see a man take it. For a thousand years a queen has ruled Andor, and I will not let that end now!

“Meddling in my things again, are you, child?”

That voice triggered longforgotten reflexes. Morgase had the miniature hidden behind her back before she knew it. With a rueful shake of her head she put the portrait back on its stand. “I am not a girl in the nursery any longer, Lini. You must remember that, or one day you will say something where I must do something about it.”

“My neck is scrawny and old,” Lini said, setting a net bag of carrots and turnips on the table. She looked frail in her neat gray dress, her white hair drawn back in a bun from a narrow face with skin like thin parchment, but her back was straight, her voice clear and steady, and her dark eyes as sharp as ever. “If you want to give it to hangman or headsman, I am almost done with it anyway. 'A gnarled old branch dulls the blade that severs a sapling.'”

Morgase sighed. Lini would never change. She would not curtsy if the entire court were watching. “You do grow tougher as you grow older. I am not certain a headsman could find an axe sharp enough for your neck.”

“You've not been to see me in some time, so I suppose there's something you need to work out in your mind. When you were in the nursery — and later — you always used to come to me when you couldn't work matters out. Shall I make a pot of tea?”

“Some time, Lini? I visit you every week, and a wonder I do, given how you speak to me. I would exile the highest lady in Andor if she said half what you do.”

Lini gave her a level look. “You have not darkened my doorway since the spring. And I talk as I always have; I'm too old to change now. Do you want tea?”

“No.” Morgase put a hand to her head in confusion. She did visit Lini every week. She could remember... She could not remember. Gaebril had filled her hours so completely that sometimes it was hard to remember anything other than him. “No, I do not want tea. I do not know why I came. You cannot help me with the problem I have.”

Her old nurse snorted, though somehow she made it a delicate sound. “Your trouble is with Gaebril, isn't it? Only now you're ashamed to tell me. Girl, I changed you in your cradle, tended you when you were sick and heaving your stomach up, and told you what you needed to know about men. You have never been too shamed to discuss anything with me, and now is no time to begin.”

“Gaebril?” Morgase's eyes widened. “You know? But how?”

“Oh, child,” Lini said sadly, “everyone knows, though no one's had the courage to tell you. I might have, if you hadn't stayed away, but it is hardly something I could go running to you with, now is it? It is the kind of thing a woman won't believe until she finds out for herself.”

“What are you talking about?” Morgase demanded. “It was your duty to come to me if you knew, Lini. It was everyone's duty! Light, I am the last to know, and now it may be too late to stop it!”

“Too late?” Lini said incredulously. “Why should it be too late? You bundle Gaebril out of the Palace, out of Andor, and Alteima and the others with him, and it is done with. Too late, indeed.”

For a moment Morgase could not speak. “Alteima,” she said finally, “and... the others?”

Lini stared at her, then shook her head in disgust. “I am an old fool; my wits are dryrooted. Well, you know now. 'When the honey's out of the comb, there's no putting it back.' ” Her voice became gentler and at the same time brisk, the voice she had used for telling Morgase that her pony had broken a leg and had to be put down. “Gaebril spends most of his nights with you, but Alteima has nearly as much of his time. He spreads himself thin with the other six. Five have rooms in the Palace. One, a bigeyed young thing, he sneaks in and out for some reason all swathed in a cloak, even in this heat. Perhaps she has a husband. I'm sorry, girl, but truth is truth. 'Better to face the bear than run from it.' ”

Morgase's knees sagged, and if Lini had not hurriedly pulled a chair from the table to shove under her, she would have sat down on the floor. Alteima. Him watching the two of them as they gossiped took on a new image, now. A man fondly watching two of his pet cats at play. And six others! Rage boiled up in her, a rage that had been lacking when she only thought he was after her throne. That she had considered coldly, clearly; as clearly as she could consider anything recently. That was a danger that had to be looked at with cold reason. But this! The man had ensconced his jades in her palace. He had made her just another of his trulls. She wanted his head. She wanted him flayed alive. The Light help her, she wanted his t