Nynaeve felt her stomach twist. One of the Forsaken! Her brain numbed with shock. The Dark One and all the Forsaken are bound in Shayol Ghul, bound by the Creator in the moment of creation. But the catechism did not help; she knew too well how much of it was false. Then the rest of it came home to her. Thirteen Myrddraal. And thirteen sisters of the Black Ajah. She heard Elayne screaming before she realized she was screaming herself, jerking uselessly in those invisible bonds of Air. It was impossible to say which was louder, their despairing screams, or the laughter from Liandrin and Rianna.

CHAPTER
52

In Search of a Remedy

Slumped on the stool in the gleeman’s room, Mat grimaced as Thom coughed again. How are we going to keep looking if he’s so bloody sick he can’t walk? He was ashamed as soon as he thought it. Thom had been as assiduous in searching as he had, pushing himself day and night, when he had to know he was coming down sick. Mat had been so absorbed in his hunt that he had paid too little attention to Thom’s coughing. The change from constant rain to steamy heat had not helped it.

“Come on, Thom,” he said. “Lopar says there’s a Wise Woman not far. That is what they call a Wisdom here—a Wise Woman. Wouldn’t Nynaeve like that!”

“I do not need . . . any foul-tasting . . . concoctions . . . poured down my throat, boy.” Thom stuffed a fist through his mustaches in a vain attempt to stop his hacking. “You go ahead looking. Just give me . . . a few hours . . . on my bed . . . and I’ll join you.” The wracking wheezes doubled him over till his head was almost on his knees.

“So I am supposed to do all the work while you take your ease?” Mat said lightly. “How can I find anything without you? You learn most of what we hear.” That was not exactly true; men talked as freely over dice as they did while buying a gleeman a cup of wine. More freely than they did with a gleeman hacking so hard they feared contagion. But he was beginning to think that Thom’s cough was not going to go away by itself. If the old goat dies on me, who will I play stones with? he told himself roughly. “Anyway, your bloody coughing keeps me awake even in the next room.”

Ignoring the white-haired man’s protests, he pulled Thom to his feet. He was shocked at how much of the gleeman’s weight he had to support. Despite the damp heat, Thom insisted on his patch-covered cloak. Mat had his own coat unbuttoned completely and all three ties of his shirt undone, but he let the old goat have his way. No one in the common room even looked up as he half carried Thom out into the muggy afternoon.