The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time #2)

The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time #2) Page 63

“Yes, my Lord. Yes. With pleasure. That way, my Lord. They're still heading south.”

They rode away leaving the dead Myrddraal where it hung, the wind stirring its black cloak. Hurin was first beyond the wall, not waiting on Ingtar for a change, but Rand came close behind him.

Chapter 11

(Serpent and Wheel)

Glimmers of the Pattern

For once, Ingtar called a halt to the day's march with the sun still golden above the horizon. The toughened Shienarans were feeling the effects of what they had seen in the village. Ingtar had not stopped so early before, and the campsite he chose had the look of a place that could be defended. It was a deep hollow, almost round, and big enough to hold all the men and horses comfortably. A sparse thicket of scrub oak and leatherleaf covered the outer slopes. The rim itself stood more than high enough to hide anyone in the campsite even without the trees. The height nearly passed for a hill, in that country.

“All I'm bloody saying,” he heard Uno tell Ragan as they dismounted, “is that I bloody saw her, burn you. Just before we found the goatkissing Halfman. The same flaming woman as at the flaming ferry. She was there, and then she bloody wasn't. You say what you bloody want to, but you watch how you flaming say it, or I'll bloody skin you myself, and burn the goatkissing hide, you sheepgutted milkdrinker.”

Rand paused with one foot on the ground and the other still in the stirrup. The same woman? But there wasn't any woman at the ferry, just some curtains blowing in the wind. And she couldn't have gotten to that village ahead of us if there had been. The village ...

He shied away from the thought. Even more than the Fade nailed to the door, he wanted to forget that room, and the flies, and the people who were there and not there. The Halfman had been real — everybody had seen that — but the room ... Maybe I'm finally going mad. He wished Moiraine was there to talk to. Wishing for an Aes Sedai. You are a fool. You're well out of that, now stay out. But am I out? What happened there?

“Packhorses and supplies in the middle,” Ingtar commanded as the lancers went about setting up camp. “Rub the horses down, then saddle them again in case we must move quickly. Every man sleeps by his mount, and there'll be no fires tonight. Watch changes every two hours. Uno, I want scouts out, as far as they can ride and return before dark. I want to know what is out there.”

He's feeling it, Rand thought. It isn't just some Darkfriends and a few Trollocs and maybe a Fade anymore. Just some Darkfriends and a few Trollocs, and maybe a Fade! Even a few days before there would not have been any “just” about it. Even in the Borderlands, even with the Blight less than a day's ride, Darkfriends and Trollocs and Myrddraal had been bad enough for a nightmare, then. Before he had seen a Myrddraal nailed to a door. What in the Light could have done that? What not in the Light? Before he had walked into a room where a family had had their supper and their laughter cut off. I must have imagined it. I must have. Even in his own head he did not sound very convincing. He had not imagined the wind on the tower top, or the Amyrlin saying—

“Rand?” He jumped as Ingtar spoke at his shoulder. “Are you going to stay all night with one foot in the stirrup?”

Rand put his other foot on the ground. “Ingtar, what happened back at that village?”

“Trollocs took them. The same as the people at the ferry. That is what happened. The Fade ...” Ingtar shrugged and stared down at a flat, canvaswrapped bundle, large and square, in his arms; he stared at it as if he saw hidden secrets he would rather not know. “The Trollocs took them for food. They do it in villages and farms near the Blight, too, sometimes, if a raid gets past the border towers in the night. Sometimes we get the people back, and sometimes not. Sometimes we get them back and almost wish we hadn't. Trollocs don't always kill before they start butchering. And Halfmen like to have their ... fun. That's worse than what the Trollocs do.” His voice was as steady as if he were talking of every day, and perhaps he was, for a Shienaran soldier.

Rand took a deep breath to steady his stomach. “The Fade back there didn't have any fun, Ingtar. What could nail a Myrddraal to a door, alive?”

Ingtar hesitated, shaking his head, then pushed the big bundle at Rand. “Here. Moiraine Sedai told me to give you this at the first camp south of the Erinin. I don't know what is in it, but she said you would need it. She said to tell you to take care of it; your life may depend on it.”

Rand took it reluctantly; his skin prickled at the touch of the canvas. There was something soft inside. Cloth, maybe. He held it gingerly. He doesn't want to think about the Myrddraal either. What happened in that room? He realized suddenly that for him, the Fade, or even that room, was preferable to thinking about what Moiraine might have sent him.

“I was told to tell you at the same time that if anything happens to me, the lances will follow you.”

“Me!” Rand gasped, forgetting the bundle and everything else. Ingtar met his incredulous stare with a calm nod. “That's crazy! I've never led anything but a flock of sheep, Ingtar. They would not follow me anyway. Besides, Moiraine can't tell you who your second is. It's Uno.”

“Uno and I were called to Lord Agelmar the morning we left. Moiraine Sedai was there, but it was Lord Agelmar who told me. You are second, Rand.”

“But why, Ingtar? Why?” Moiraine's hand was bright and clear in it, hers and the Amyrlin's, pushing him along the path they had chosen, but he had to ask.

The Shienaran looked as if he did not understand it either, but he was a soldier, used to odd commands in the endless war along the Blight. “I heard rumors from the women's apartments that you were really a ... ” He spread gauntleted hands. “No matter. I know you deny it. Just as you deny the look of your own face. Moiraine Sedai says you're a shepherd, but I never saw a shepherd with a heronmark blade. No matter. I'll not claim I would have chosen you myself, but I think you have it in you to do what is needed. You will do your duty, if it comes to it.”

Rand wanted to say it was no duty of his, but instead he said, “Uno knows about this. Who else, Ingtar?”

“All the lances. When we Shienarans ride, every man knows who is next in line if the man in command falls. A chain unbroken right down to the last man left, even if he's nothing but a horseholder. That way, you see, even if he is the last man, he is not just a straggler running and trying to stay alive. He has the command, and duty calls him to do what must be done. If I go to the last embrace of the mother, the duty is yours. You will find the Horn, and you will take it where it belongs. You will.” There was a peculiar emphasis i