He avoided looking at the Maidens. They were warriors to their toenails, but women, too. And he had promised not to keep them from danger, even death. He had made no promise not to flinch at it, though, and it ripped at him inside when he had to, but he kept his promises. He did what he had to do even when he hated himself for it.
With a sigh he tossed the dagger aside. “Your question,” he said politely. “Why?”
“Because you are who you are,” Bashere said plainly. “Because you—and those men you’re gathering, I suppose—are what you are.” Rand heard feet shuffling behind him; for all they tried to, the Andorans could never hide their horror at his amnesty. “You can do what you did with the dagger every time,” Bashere went on, putting his raised boot down and leaning forward, “but for any assassin to reach you, he has to get past your Aiel. And my horsemen, for that matter. Bah! If anything gets close to you, it won’t be human.” Throwing his hands wide, he settled back again. “Well, if you want to practice the sword, do it. A man needs exercise, and relaxation. But don’t get your skull split open. Too much depends on you, and I don’t see any Aes Sedai around to Heal you.” His mustache almost hid his sudden grin. “Besides, if you die, I don’t think our Andoran friends will maintain their warm welcome for me and my men.”
The Andorans had put up their swords, but their eyes remained on Bashere malevolently. Nothing to do with how close he had come to killing Rand. Usually they kept their faces smooth around Bashere, for all he was a foreign general with a foreign army on Andoran soil. The Dragon Reborn wanted Bashere there, and this lot would have smiled at a Myrddraal if the Dragon Reborn wanted it. But if Rand might turn on him. . . . No need to hide anything then. They were vultures who had been ready to feed on Morgase before she died, and they would feed on Bashere given half a chance. And on Rand. He could hardly wait to be rid of them.
The only way to live is to die. The thought came into his head suddenly. He had been told that once, in such a way he had to believe it, but the thought was not his. I must die. I deserve only death. He turned away from Bashere clutching at his head.
Bashere was out of his chair in an instant, clutching Rand’s shoulder though it was head high to him. “What is the matter? Did that blow really crack your head?”
“I am fine.” Rand pulled his hands down; there was never any pain in this, only the shock of having another man’s thoughts in his head. Bashere was not the only one watching. Most of the Maidens were eyeing him as closely as they did the courtyard, especially Enaila and yellow-haired Somara, the tallest of them. Those two would probably bring him some sort of herb tea as soon as their duties were done, and stand over him till he drank it. Elenia and Naean and the rest of the Andorans were breathing hard, clutching at coats and skirts, studying Rand with the wide-eyed fear of people afraid they might be seeing the first signs of madness. “I am fine,” he told the courtyard. Only the Maidens relaxed, and Enaila and Somara not very far.
Aiel did not care about “the Dragon Reborn”; to them Rand was the Car’a’carn, prophesied to unite them, and to break them. They took it in stride, though they worried about it too, and they seemed to take his channeling in stride as well, and everything that might go with it. The others—The wetlanders, he thought dryly—called him the Dragon Reborn, and never speculated on what that meant. They believed he was the rebirth of Lews Therin Telamon, the Dragon, the man who had sealed the hole into the Dark One’s prison and ended the War of the Shadow three thousand years ago and more. Ended the Age of Legends as well, when the Dark One’s last counterstroke tainted saidin, and every man who could channel began to go insane, starting with Lews Therin himself and his Hundred Companions. They called Rand the Dragon Reborn, and never suspected that some part of Lews Therin Telamon might be inside his head, as mad as the day he had begun the Time of Madness and the Breaking of the World, as mad as any of those male Aes Sedai who had changed the face of the world beyond recognition. It had come on him slowly, but the more Rand learned of the One Power, the stronger he became with saidin, the stronger Lews Therin’s voice became, and the harder Rand had to fight to keep a dead man’s thoughts from taking him over. That was one reason why he liked sword practice; the absence of thought was a barrier to keep him himself.
“We need to find an Aes Sedai,” Bashere muttered. “If those rumors are true. . . . The Light burn my eyes, I wish we had never let that one leave.”
A good many people had fled Caemlyn in the days after Rand and the Aiel seized the city; the Palace itself nearly emptied overnight. There were people Rand would liked to have found, people who had helped him, but they had all vanished. Some still slipped away. One fleeing in those first days had been a young Aes Sedai, young enough that her face still lacked the distinctive agelessness. Bashere’s men sent word when they found her at an inn, but when she found out who Rand was, she ran screaming. Literally screaming. He never even learned her name or Ajah. Rumor said another was somewhere in the city, but a hundred rumors were loose in Caemlyn now, a thousand, each less likely than the next. Definitely unlikely any would lead to an Aes Sedai. Aiel patrols had spotted several passing Caemlyn by, each plainly going somewhere in a hurry and none with any intention of entering a city occupied by the Dragon Reborn.
“Could I trust any Aes Sedai?” Rand asked. “It was just a headache. My head isn’t hard enough not to ache a little when it’s hit.”
Bashere snorted hard enough to stir his thick mustaches. “However hard your head is, sooner or later you’ll have to trust Aes Sedai. Without them, you’ll never bring all the nations behind you short of conquest. People look for such things. However many of the Prophecies they hear you’ve fulfilled, many will wait for the Aes Sedai to put their stamp on you.”
“I won’t avoid fighting anyway, and you know it,” Rand said. “The Whitecloaks aren’t likely to welcome me into Amadicia even if Ailron agrees, and Sammael certainly won’t give up Illian without a fight.” Sammael and Rahvin and Moghedien and. . . . Harshly he forced the thought from his consciousness. It was not easy. They came without warning, and it was never easy.
A thump made him look over his shoulder. Arymilla lay in a heap on the paving stones. Karind was kneeling to pull her skirts down over her ankles and chafe her wrists. Elegar swayed as though he might join Arymilla in a moment, and neither Nasin nor Elenia appeared in much better state. Most of the rest looked ready to sick up. Mention of the Forsaken could do that, especially since Rand had told them that Lord Gaebril really had been Rahvin. He was not sure how much they believed, but just considering the possibility was enough to unhinge the knees of most. Their shock was why they were still alive. Had he believed they had served knowingly. . . . No, he thought. If they’d known, if they were all Darkfriends, you’d still use them. Sometimes he was so sick of himself that h