Page 313 of A Memory of Light (The Wheel of Time 14)

“Not exactly? What do you mean by that? Look, woman, I need a gateway. If we don’t have one, this battle could be lost. Please tell me we have some channelers here who can send me where I need to go.”

Tinna drew her lips to a line. “I’m not trying to irritate you, Lord Cauthon. Old habits make for strong ropes, and I have learned not to speak of certain things. I was turned out of the White Tower myself, for… complicated reasons. I’m sorry, but I do not know the weave for Traveling. I do know for a fact that most who joined us are too weak for that weave. It requires a great deal of the One Power, beyond the capacity of many who—”

“I do be able to make one.”

A woman in a red dress stood up from the lines of wounded, where she had apparently been Healing. She was thin and bony and had a sour expression on her face, but Mat was so happy to see her, he could have kissed her. Like kissing broken glass, that would have been. He’d have done it anyway. “Teslyn!” he cried. “What are you doing here?”

“Fighting in the Last Battle, I do believe,” she said, dusting off her hands. “Don’t we all be?”

“But the Dragonsworn?” Mat asked.

“I did not find the White Tower to be a comfortable place once I did return,” she said. “It do be changed. I did avail myself of the opportunity here, as this need do be greater. Now, you wish a gateway? How large?”

“Large enough to move as many of these troops as we can, the Dragonsworn, the Ogier, and this cavalry banner from the Band of the Red Hand.” Mat said.

“I’ll need a circle, Tinna,” Teslyn said. “No complaining that you can’t channel; I can sense it in you, and all former allegiances and promises are broken for us here. Gather the other women. Where are we going, Cauthon?”

Mat grinned. “To the top of those Heights.”

“The Heights!” Karede said. “But you abandoned those at the beginning of the battle. You gave them up to the Shadowspawn!”

“Yes, I did.”

And now… now he had a chance to finish this. Elayne’s forces holding along the river, Egwene fighting in the west… Mat had to seize the northern part of the Heights. He knew that with the Seanchan gone and most of his own troops occupied around the lower part of the Heights, Demandred would send a strong force of Sharans and Trollocs across the top to the northeast, to swing down across the riverbed and behind Elayne’s armies. The armies of Light would be surrounded and at Demandred’s mercy. His only chance was to keep Demandred’s troops from coming off the Heights, despite their superior numbers. Light. It was a long shot, but sometimes you had to take the only shot you had.

“You’re spreading us dangerously thin,” Karede said. “You risk everything by moving armies that are needed here up to the Heights.”

“You did want to go to the front lines,” Mat replied. “Loial, are you with us?”

“A strike at the enemy’s core, Mat?” Loial asked, hefting his axe. “It will not be the worst place I’ve found myself, following one of you three. I do hope Rand is all right. You do think so, don’t you?”

“If Rand were dead,” Mat said, “we’d know it. He’ll have to watch out for himself, without Matrim Cauthon saving him this time. Teslyn, let’s have that gateway! Tinna, organize your forces. Have them ready to charge through the opening. We need to seize the northern slope of those Heights fast and then hold it no matter what the Shadow tosses at us!”

Egwene opened her eyes. Though she shouldn’t have been in a room at all, she lay in one. And a fine one. The cool air smelled of salt, and she rested on a soft mattress.

I’m dreaming, she thought. Or perhaps she had died. Would that explain the pain? Such terrible pain. Nothingness would be better, far better, than this agony.

Gawyn was gone. A piece of herself, snipped away.

“I forget how young she is.” Whispers drifted into the room. That voice was familiar. Silviana? “Care for her. I must return to the battle.”

“How does it go?” Egwene knew that voice, too. Rosil, of the Yellow. She had gone to Mayene, with the novices and Accepted, helping Heal.

“The battle? It goes poorly.” Silviana was not one to put honey on her words. “Watch her, Rosil. She is strong; I do not doubt she will pull through this, but there is always a worry.”

“I’ve helped women with lost Warders before, Silviana,” Rosil said. “I assure you, I’m quite capable. She’ll be useless for the next few days, but then she will begin to mend.”

Silviana sniffed. “That boy… I should have known he would ruin her. The day I first saw how she looked at him, I should have taken him by his ears, hauled him to a distant farm, and set him to work for the next decade.”

“You cannot so easily control a heart, Silviana.”

“Warders are a weakness,” Silviana said. “That is all they have ever been, and all they ever will be. That boy… that fool boy…”

“That fool boy,” Egwene said, “saved my life from Seanchan assassins. I would not be here to mourn if he had not done so. I would suggest that you remember that, Silviana, when you speak of the dead.”

The others were silent. Egwene tried to overcome the pain of loss. She was in Mayene, of course. Silviana would have taken her to the Yellows.

“I will remember it, Mother,” Silviana said. She actually managed to sound contrite. “Rest well. I will—”