At first Birgitte just glowered, but then she took Elayne’s arm and very nearly hustled her to the mouth of an alley. No one passing by glanced at them twice, and Areina remained where she was, if darker of face than before, but Birgitte still looked around carefully and spoke in a whisper. “Always when the Wheel spun me out, I was born, lived and died without ever knowing I was bound to the Wheel. I only knew that in between, in Tel’aran’rhiod. Sometimes I became known, even famous, but I was like everyone else, not somebody out of a legend. This time I was ripped out, not spun out. For the first time wearing flesh, I know who I am. For the first time, other people can know too. Thom and Juilin do; they say nothing, but I am sure. They don’t look at me the way they do other people. If I said I was going to climb a glass mountain and kill a giant with my bare hands, they’d just ask if I needed any help on the way, and they would not expect me to.”

“I don’t understand,” Elayne said slowly, and Birgitte sighed and let her head hang.

“I don’t know that I can live up to that. In other lives, I did what I had to, what seemed to be right, enough for Maerion or Joana or any woman. Now, I’m Birgitte of the stories. Everyone who knows will expect. I feel like a feather-dancer walking into a Tovan conclave.”

Elayne did not ask; when Birgitte mentioned things from past lives, the explanations were usually more confusing than ignorance. “That is nonsense,” she said firmly, taking the other woman by the arms. “I know, and I certainly don’t expect you to kill any giants. Egwene doesn’t either. And she already knows.”

“As long as I don’t admit it,” Birgitte muttered, “it is as if she didn’t. Don’t bother saying that’s nonsense too; I know it is, but that changes nothing.”

“Then what about this? She is the Amyrlin, and you are a Warder. She deserves your trust, Birgitte. She needs it.”

“Are you done with her yet?” Areina demanded from a pace away. “If you’re going to go away and leave me, the least you can do is help me with my archery the way you said you would.”

“I will think on it,” Birgitte told Elayne quietly. Turning to Areina, she caught the woman’s braid at the base of her neck. “We will speak of archery,” she said, pushing her up the street, “but first we will speak of manners.”

Shaking her head, Elayne suddenly remembered Aviendha and hurried on. The house was not far.