Balwer rose from his table as Niall entered the anteroom. “Omerna was here, my Lord. He left these for you.” Balwer touched a sheaf of papers tied with a red ribbon on the table. “And this.” Thin lips tightened as he drew a tiny bone tube from his pocket.

Niall took the tube with a mutter and stumped into the inner room. Omerna was becoming more useless every day, for some reason. Leaving his reports with Balwer was bad enough, nonsense as they were, but even Omerna knew better than to hand one of these tubes with three red stripes to anyone but Niall himself. He held the tube close to a lamp to examine the wax. Unbroken, before his thumbnail pierced it. He would have to light a fire under Omerna, put the fear of the Light into him. The fool was no good as a decoy unless he played the consummate spymaster as far as he was able.

The message was from Varadin again, Niall’s private cipher in that mad, spidery scrawl on a strip of thin paper. He almost burned it unread; then something at the end caught his eye. Beginning at the beginning, he consciously worked the cipher in his mind. He wanted to be absolutely sure. Just as before, it was gibberish about Aes Sedai on leashes and strange beasts, but right at the last. . . . Varadin had helped Asidim Faisar find a hiding place in Tanchico; he would try to smuggle Faisar out, but the Forerunners kept such a guard that a whisper could not pass the walls without permission.

Niall rubbed his chin in thought. Faisar was one of those he had sent to Tarabon to see if anything could be salvaged. Faisar knew nothing of Varadin, and Varadin should know nothing of Faisar. The Forerunners kept such a guard that not a whisper could pass the walls. A madman’s scrawl.

Stuffing the paper into his pocket, he returned to the anteroom. “Balwer, what is the latest from the west?” Between them, “the west” always meant the border with Tarabon.

“No change from before, my Lord. Patrols that penetrate very deeply into Tarabon do not return. The worst trouble near the border is refugees trying to cross.”

Patrols that penetrated too deeply. Tarabon was a pit writhing with poisonous vipers and rabid rats, but. . . . “How quickly could you get a courier to Tanchico?”

Balwer did not even blink. The man would not show surprise if one day his horse spoke to him. “The problem will be fresh horses once he crosses the border, my Lord. Normally, I would say twenty days there and back, perhaps a few less with luck. Now, twice that, with luck. Maybe twice that just to reach Tanchico.” A pit that could swallow a courier and not even leave bones behind.