He would have eavesdropped if he could; they were hiding more than talk about the Aielwomen. For one thing, Alanna refused to tell him how she knew where Rand was—“There is knowledge that would burn any mind but Aes Sedai,” she had told him, cool and mysterious, but she fairly reeked of anxiety and pain—and she would not even admit to having said he was injured in some way. Verin hardly said a word to him, only watched everything with those dark birdlike eyes and a small secret smile, yet she gave off waves of frustration and anger. By smell he would have said Bera or Kiruna was the leader; Bera, he thought, though it was close and sometimes seemed to shift the other way for a time. It was hard to say otherwise, though one or the other rode beside him a good hour every day, repeating variations of their original “advice” and generally assuming they were in charge. Nurelle seemed to think they were, taking their commands without so much as a glance at Perrin, and Dobraine did no more than glance first. For a full day and a half Perrin assumed Merana had remained in Caemlyn, and it came as a shock to hear the slim hazel-eyed woman addressed by that name. Rand had said she headed the embassy from Salidar, but for all that the Aes Sedai appeared equals on the surface, Perrin marked her as low wolf in the pack; dull resignation and anxiety filled her scent. No surprise that Aes Sedai kept secrets, of course, but he intended to rescue Rand from Coiren and the lot ahead, and he would have liked a hint as to whether he would have to rescue him from Kiruna and her friends.