Page 76 of The Gathering Storm (The Wheel of Time 12)

“I don’t care what Cadsuane said,” he snarled. “She is my advisor, and she gives advice. Only advice. I am the Dragon Reborn, and I will decide how we fight.” He stopped, taking a deep breath. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter if the Forsaken return, it doesn’t matter who or what the Dark One sends at us. In the end, I will destroy him, if possible. If not, then I will at least seal him away so tightly that the world can forget him.”

He glanced down at her. “For that . . . I need the voice, Min. Lews Therin knows things. Or . . . or I know things. Whichever it is, the knowledge is there. In a way, the Dark One’s own taint will destroy him, for it is what gave me access to Lews Therin.”

Min glanced at her books. Herid’s little slip of paper still peeked from the depths of Thoughts Among the Ruins. “Rand,” she said. “You have to destroy the seals to the Dark One’s prison.”

He looked at her, frowning.

“I’m sure of it,” she said. “I’ve been reading Herid’s books all this time, and I believe that’s what he meant by ‘clearing away the rubble.’ In order to rebuild the Dark One’s prison, you will first need to open it. Clear away the patch made on the Bore.”

She had expected him to be incredulous. Shockingly, he just nodded. “Yes,”

he said. “Yes, that sounds right. I doubt that many will wish to hear it. If those seals are broken, there is no way to tell what will happen. If I fail to contain him . . .”

The prophecies didn’t say Rand would win. Only that he would fight. Min shivered again—blasted window!—but met Rand’s gaze. “You’ll win. You’ll defeat him.”

He sighed. “Faith in a madman, Min?”

“Faith in you, sheepherder.” Suddenly viewings spun around his head. She ignored them most of the time, unless they were new, but now she picked them out. Fireflies consumed in darkness. Three women before a pyre. Flashes of light, darkness, shadow, signs of death, crowns, injuries, pain and hope. A tempest around Rand al’Thor, stronger than any physical storm.

“We still don’t know what to do,” he said. “The seals are brittle enough that I could break them in my hands, but what then? How do I stop him? Does it say anything of that in your books?”

“It’s hard to tell,” she admitted. “The clues—if that’s what they are—are vague. I will keep looking. I promise. I’ll find answers for you.”

He nodded, and she was surprised to feel his trust through the bond. That was a frighteningly rare emotion from him recently, but he did seem softer than he had during previous days. Still stone, but perhaps with some few cracks, willing to let her inside. It was a beginning.

She tightened her arms around him and closed her eyes again. A place to begin, but with so little time left. It would have to do.

Carefully shielding her burning candle, Aviendha lit the pole-mounted lantern. It flickered alight, illuminating the green around her. Slumbering soldiers snored in rows of tents. The evening was cold, the air crisp, and branches rattled in the distance. A lonely owl hooted. And Aviendha was exhausted.

She’d crossed the grounds fifty times, lighting the lantern, blowing it out, then jogging back across the green and lighting her candle at the manor before walking carefully—shielding the flame—to light the lantern again.

Another month of these punishments and she’d probably go as mad as a wetlander. The Wise Ones would wake one morning and find her going for a swim, or carrying a half-full waterskin, or—even—riding a horse for pleasure! She sighed, too exhausted to think any further, and turned toward the Aiel section of camp to finally sleep.

Someone was standing behind her.

She started, hand going to her dagger, but relaxed as she recognized Amys. Of all the Wise Ones, only she—a former Maiden—could have sneaked up on Aviendha.

The Wise One stood with hands clasped before her, brown shawl and skirt flapping slightly in the wind. Aviendha’s skin prickled at the particularly chilly gust. Amys’ silver hair seemed almost ghostly in the evening light; a pine needle passing on the breeze had gotten lodged in it. “You approach your punishments with such . . . dedication, child,” Amys said.

Aviendha looked down. Pointing out her activities was to shame her. Was she running out of time? Had the Wise Ones finally decided to give up on her? “Please, Wise One. I only do as duty demands.”

“Yes, you do,” Amys said. She reached up, running her hand through her hair, and found the pine needle, then let it drop to the dead grass. “And, also, you do not. Sometimes, Aviendha, we are so concerned with the things we have done that we do not stop to consider the things we have not.”

Aviendha was glad for the darkness, which hid her shameful blush. In the distance, a soldier rang the evening bell to chime the hour, the soft metal ringing with eleven melancholy peals. How did she respond to Amys’ comments? There didn’t seem to be any proper response.

Aviendha was saved by a flash of light just beyond the camp. It was faint, but in the darkness, the flicker was easy to notice.

“What?” the Wise One asked, noticing Aviendha’s gaze and turning to follow it.

“Light,” Aviendha said. “From the Traveling grounds.”

Amys frowned, then the two of them moved toward the grounds. Soon they encountered Damer Flinn, Davram Bashere, a small guard of Saldaeans and Aiel walking into the camp. What did one think of a creature such as Flinn? The taint had been cleansed, but this man—and many of the others—had come, asking to learn, before that had happened. Aviendha herself would have sooner embraced Sightblinder himself as done that, but they had proven to be powerful weapons.

Amys and Aviendha moved to the side as the small party hurried toward the manor house, lit only by the distant flickering torches and the cloud-covered sky above. Though most of the force sent to meet the Seanchan had been made up of Bashere’s soldiers, there were several Maidens in the group. Amys locked eyes with one of them, an older woman named Corana. She hung back, and though it was difficult to tell in the darkness, she looked concerned. Perhaps angry.

“What news?” Amys asked.

“The invaders, these Seanchan,” Corana nearly spat the word, “they have agreed to another meeting with the Car’a’carn.”