“What do you mean? He is to fight Tarmon Gai’don. The Horn is to summon dead heroes from the grave to fight in the Last Battle. Has Moiraine once again made some new plan without consulting me?”

“This is none of Moiraine’s doing, Mother. We plan, but the Wheel weaves the Pattern as it wills. Rand was not first to sound the Horn. Matrim Cauthon did that. And Mat now lies below, dying of his ties to the Shadar Logoth dagger. Unless he can be Healed here.”

Siuan shivered. Shadar Logoth, that dead city so tainted that even Trollocs feared to enter, and with reason. By chance, a dagger from that place had come into young Mat’s hands, twisting and tainting him with the evil that had killed the city long ago. Killing him. By chance? Or by the Pattern? He is ta’veren, too, after all. But . . . Mat sounded the Horn. Then—

“So long as Mat lives,” Verin went on, “the Horn of Valere is no more than a horn to anyone else. If he dies, of course, another can sound it and forge a new link between man and Horn.” Her gaze was steady and untroubled by what she seemed to be suggesting.

“Many will die before we are done, Daughter.” And who else could I use to sound it again? I’ll not take the risk of trying to return it to Moiraine, now. One of the Gaidin, perhaps. Perhaps. “The Pattern has yet to make his fate clear.”

“Yes, Mother. And the Horn?”

“For the moment,” the Amyrlin said finally, “we will find some place to hide this where no one but we two know. I will consider what to do after that.”

Verin nodded. “As you say, Mother. Of course, a few hours will make one decision for you.”

“Is that all you have for me?” Siuan snapped. “If it is, I have those three runaways to deal with.”

“There is the matter of the Seanchan, Mother.”

“What of them? All my reports say they have fled back across the ocean, or to wherever they came from.”

“It seems so, Mother. But I fear we may have to deal with them again.” Verin pulled a small leather notebook from behind her belt and began leafing through it. “They spoke of themselves as the Forerunners, or Those Who Come Before, and talked of the Return, and of reclaiming this land as theirs. I’ve taken notes on everything I heard of them. Only from those who actually saw them, of course, or had dealings with them.”

“Verin, you are worrying about a lionfish out in the Sea of Storms, while here and now the silverpike are chewing our nets to shreds.”