Perrin strode impatiently up and down the flowered carpets that floored the tent, shrugging with discomfort in the dark green silk coat he had seldom worn since Faile had had it made. She said the elaborate silver embroidery suited his shoulders, but the wide leather belt supporting his axe at his side, the one as plain as the other, only pointed up that he was a fool pretending to be more than he was. Sometimes he tugged his gauntlets tighter, or glared at his fur-lined cloak, lying across the back of a chair ready for him to put on. Twice, he pulled a sheet of paper from his sleeve and unfolded it to study the sketched map of Malden while he paced. That was the town where Faile was being held.

Jondyn and Get and Hu had caught up to the fleeing inhabitants of Malden, but the only useful thing they had gotten was this map, and making anyone pause long enough to provide that had been a chore. Those strong enough to fight were dead or wearing gai’shain white for the Shaido; those who remained to flee were the old and the very young, the sick and the lame. According to Jondyn, the thought that someone might force them to return and fight the Shaido had quickened their steps north toward Andor and safety. The map was a puzzle, with its maze of streets and the lady’s fortress and the great cistern in the northeast corner. It tantalized him with possibilities. But they were possibilities only if he found a solution to the greater puzzle that was not shown on the map, the huge mass of Shaido surrounding the walled town, not to mention four or five hundred Shaido Wise Ones who could channel. So the map went back into his sleeve, and he continued to pace.