Feeling that knife enter her side, pierce her skin, dig toward her womb…that had been different. The terror. She could remember the world blackening around her, her heartbeat thudding, growing louder, like the drumbeats at the end of a performance. The ones that came before the silence.

Birgitte regarded Elayne appraisingly. She could feel Elayne’s emotions. She was Queen. She could not avoid risks. But…perhaps she could rein herself in.

“Well,” Birgitte said, “did you at least discover anything?”

“I did,” Elayne said. “I—”

At that moment, a scarf-wrapped head appeared in the doorway. Mat had his eyes closed. “You covered up?”

“Yes,” Elayne said. “And in a far more fashionable way than you, Matrim Cauthon. That scarf looks ridiculous.”

He scowled, opening his eyes and pulling off the scarf, revealing the angular face beneath. “You try moving through the city without being recognized,” he said. “Every butcher, innkeeper and bloody backroom slipfinger seems to know what I look like these days.”

“The Black sisters were planning to have you assassinated,” Elayne said.

“What?” Mat asked.

Elayne nodded. “One mentioned you. It sounded like Darkfriends had been searching for you for some time, with the intent of killing you.”

Birgitte shrugged. “They’re Darkfriends. No doubt they want us all dead.”

“This was different,” Elayne said. “It seemed more…intense. I suggest keeping your wits about you the next while.”

“That’ll be a trick,” Birgitte noted. “Seeing as to how he doesn’t have any wits in the first place.”

Mat rolled his eyes. “Did I miss you explaining what you were doing in the flaming dungeons, sitting in a pool of your own blood, looking for all the world like you’d seen the losing end of a battlefield skirmish?”

“I was interrogating the Black Ajah,” Elayne said. “The details are none of your concern. Birgitte, have you a report from the grounds?”

“Nobody saw Mellar leave,” the Warder said. “Though we found the secretary’s body on the ground floor, still warm. Died from a knife to the back.”

Elayne sighed. “Shiaine?”

“Gone,” Birgitte said, “along with Marillin Gemalphin and Falion Bhoda.”

“The Shadow couldn’t leave them in our possession,” Elayne said with a sigh. “They know too much. They had to end up either rescued or executed.”

“Well,” Mat said, shrugging, “you’re alive, and three of them are dead. Seems like a reasonably good outcome.”

But the ones who escaped have a copy of your medallion, Elayne thought. She didn’t speak it, however. She also didn’t mention the invasion that Chesmal had spoken of. She would talk of it with Birgitte soon, of course, but first she wanted to consider it herself.

Mat had said the night’s events had a “reasonably good outcome.” But the more Elayne thought about it, the more dissatisfied she was. An invasion of Andor was coming, but she didn’t know when. The Shadow wanted Mat dead, but as Birgitte had pointed out, that was no surprise. In fact, the only certain result of the evening’s adventures was the sense of fatigue Elayne felt. That and a week confined to her rooms.