Rhuarc cleared his throat. “When a man wishes to become a clan chief, he must go to Rhuidean, in the lands of the Jenn Aiel, the clan that is not.” He spoke slowly and frowned often at the red-fringed silk carpet under his soft boots, a man trying to explain what he did not want to explain at all. “Women who wish to become Wise Ones also make this journey, but their marking, if they are marked, is kept secret among themselves. The men who are chosen at Rhuidean, those who survive, return marked on the left arm. So.”

He pushed back the sleeves of his coat and shirt together to reveal his left forearm, the skin much paler than that of his hands and face. Etched into the skin as if part of it, wrapped twice around, marched the same gold-and-scarlet form as rippled on the banner above the Stone.

The Aiel let his sleeve fall with a sigh. “It is a name not spoken except among the clan chiefs and the Wise Ones. We are. . . .” He cleared his throat again, unable to say it here.

“The Aiel are the People of the Dragon.” Moiraine spoke quietly, but she sounded as close to startlement as Mat could remember ever hearing her. “That I did not know.”

“Then it really is all done,” Mat said, “just as the Prophecies said. We can all go on our way with no more worries.” The Amyrlin won’t need me to blow that bloody Horn now!

“How can you say that?” Egwene demanded. “Don’t you understand the Forsaken are loose?”

“Not to mention the Black Ajah,” Nynaeve added grimly. “We took only Amico and Joiya here. Eleven escaped—and I would like to know how!—and the Light alone knows how many others there are we do not know.”

“Yes,” Elayne said in a tone just as hard. “I may not be up to facing one of the Forsaken, but I mean to take pieces out of Liandrin’s hide!”

“Of course,” Mat said smoothly. “Of course.” Are they crazy? They want to chase after the Black Ajah and the Forsaken? “I only meant the hardest part is done. The Stone has fallen to the People of the Dragon, Rand has Callandor, and Shai’tan is dead.” Moiraine’s stare was so hard that he thought the Stone shook for a moment.

“Be quiet, you fool!” the Aes Sedai said in a voice like a knife. “Do you want to call his attention to you, naming the Dark One?”

“But he’s dead!” Mat protested. “Rand killed him. I saw the body!” And a fine stink that was, too. I never thought anything could rot that fast.

“You saw ‘the body,’ ” Moiraine said with a twist to her mouth. “A man’s body. Not the Dark One, Mat.”