“Does anyone speak in their defense?” he asked. “Does anyone know any mitigation?” If any did, they held their tongues; counting the servants, nearly two dozen pairs of eyes watched him, waiting. Perhaps the servants most intently of all. Sulin and the Maidens watched everything except him. “Their titles are forfeited, their lands and estates confiscated. Arrest warrants are to be signed for every man whose name is known. And every woman.” That could present a problem; the penalty in Tear for rebellion was death. He had changed some laws, but not that one, and it was too late now. “Publish it that whoever kills one of them will be absolved of murder, and whoever aids them will be charged with treason. Any who surrender will be spared their lives,” which might solve the difficulty of Estanda—he would not order a woman executed—if he could work how to manage it, “but those who persist will hang.”

The nobles shifted uneasily and exchanged glances, whether Tairen or Cairhienin. Blood drained from more than one face. They had certainly expected the death sentences—there could be no less for rebellion, and with war in the offing—but the stripping of titles plainly shocked them. Despite all the laws Rand had changed in both lands, despite lords hauled before magistrates and hanged for murder or fined for assault, they still thought there was some difference bred in the bone, some natural order that made them lions by right and commoners sheep. A High Lord who went to the gibbet died a High Lord, but Darlin and the others would die peasants in these men’s eyes, a much worse fate than the dying itself. The servants remained poised with their pitchers, waiting to refill any goblet that had to be tilted very far in drinking. Features as expressionless as ever, there seemed to be a cheerfulness in some of those eyes not there before.

“Now that that’s settled,” Rand said, dragging off the shoufa as he went to the table, “let’s see the maps. Sammael is more important than a handful of fools rotting in Haddon Mirk.” He hoped they did rot. Burn them!

Weiramon’s mouth tightened, and Tolmeran quickly smoothed out a frown. Sunamon’s face was so smooth it might have been a mask. The other Tairens looked as doubtful, and the Cairhienin as well, though Semaradrid hid it well. Some had seen Myrddraal and Trollocs during that attack on the Stone, and some had seen his duel with Sammael at Cairhien, yet they thought his claim the Forsaken were loose a symptom of insanity. He had heard whispers that he had wrought all the destruction at Cairhien himself, striking out maniacally at friend and foe alike. Going by Liah’s stony face, one of them was going to get a Maiden’s spear through him if they did not guard those looks.