“She asked you to . . .” Egwene gasped, but could not finish.

Bair nodded as if it were not very much out of the ordinary at all. “I gave her a few extra for troubling me with it. If ji was involved, her obligation is not to me. Very likely her so-called lies were nothing anyone but a Far Dareis Mai would worry about. Maidens, even former Maidens, are sometimes as fussy as men.” Amys gave her a flat look that was plain even in the thick steam. Like Aviendha, Amys had been Far Dareis Mai before becoming a Wise One.

Egwene had never met an Aiel who was not fussy about ji’e’toh, the way she saw it. But this! Aiel were all mad as loons.

Apparently, Bair had already put the matter out of her mind. “There are more Lost Ones in the Three-fold Land than I can ever remember before,” she said to the tent at large. That was what the Aiel had always called the Tinkers, the Tuatha’an.

“They flee the troubles beyond the Dragonwall.” The sneer in Melaine’s voice was clear.

“I have heard,” Amys said slowly, “that some of those who run after the bleakness have gone to the Lost Ones and asked to be taken in.” A long silence followed. They knew now that the Tuatha’an had the same descent as themselves, that they had broken away before the Aiel crossed the Spine of the World into the Waste, but if anything the knowledge had only deepened their aversion.

“He brings change,” Melaine whispered harshly into the steam.

“I thought you were reconciled to the changes he brings,” Egwene said, sympathy welling up in her voice. It must be very hard to have your whole life stood on end. She half-expected to be told to hold her tongue again, but no one did.

“Reconciled,” Bair said, as though tasting the word. “Better to say we endure them, as best we can.”

“He transforms everything.” Amys sounded troubled. “Rhuidean. The Lost Ones. The bleakness, and telling what should not have been told.” The Wise Ones—all the Aiel, for that matter—still had difficulty speaking of that.

“The Maidens cluster about him as though they owe more to him than to their own clans,” Bair added. “For the first time ever, they have allowed a man beneath a Roof of the Maidens.” For a moment Amys looked about to say something, but whatever she knew about the inner workings of Far Dareis Mai she shared with no one but those who were or had been Maidens of the Spear.