Elsewhere in the crowd, Elayne spotted Birgitte, wisely keeping away from her this morning. For a change that horrid Areina was nowhere to be seen. The night had been well beyond hectic, and Elayne had not gone to bed until the sky was already beginning to lighten toward gray. In truth, she would not have gone at all if Birgitte had not told Ashmanaille she thought Elayne looked unsteady. Not a matter of how she looked at all, of course; the bond with a Warder ran both ways. So what if she had been a little tired? There had been plenty of work to do, and she could still channel more strongly than half the Aes Sedai in Salidar. That bond told her that Birgitte had not slept yet, not her! Elayne sent off to bed like a novice, while Birgitte carried the injured and cleared away wreckage all night!

A glance showed Leane alone now, squeezing into the crowd to find a good place to watch. There was no sign of the tall man.

A yawning, bleary-eyed Nynaeve climbed up beside Elayne, glaring down a leather-vested woodcutter who would have gotten there before her. Muttering to himself, the fellow shoved back into the crowd. Elayne wished Nynaeve would not do that. The yawn, not the glare. Her own jaw cracked in mimicry before she could stop it. There was some excuse for Birgitte—some, maybe; a little—but none for Nynaeve. Theodrin could not possibly expect her to have stayed awake after last night, and Elayne had heard Anaiya tell her to go to bed, yet there she was when Elayne came in, balancing herself on the stool despite its now crooked leg, head nodding every two minutes, muttering about showing Theodrin, showing everyone.

The a’dam bracelet conveyed fear to Elayne, of course, but something that might have been amusement as well. Moghedien had spent the night hiding under her bed, untouched and, because she was well hidden, without picking up one single stick of rubbish. She had even gotten a good night’s sleep once the first commotion died down. It seemed that old saw about the Dark One’s luck held sometimes.

Nynaeve began another yawn, and Elayne jerked her eyes away. Even so, she had to shove her fist against her mouth in a not very successful attempt to avoid imitation. The shuffling feet and coughs took on an impatient sound.

The Sitters were still inside the Little Tower with Tarna, but the Red’s roan gelding already stood in the street before the former inn, and a dozen Warders were holding their horses’ bridles, their color-shifting cloaks making them uneasy to look at, an escort of honor for the first miles of Tarna’s journey back to Tar Valon. The crowd waited for more than the Tower envoy’s departure, though most looked as worn out as Elayne felt.

“You’d think she was . . . was. . . .” Nynaeve gaped hard behind her hand.