“She’s a sul’dam?” Gawyn asked. “Or is she a damane?”

“All sul’dam can be trained to channel,” Dimana explained. “Elayne thinks that fact will undermine their entire culture once revealed, so she’s had us focus on teaching the sul’dam to access their powers. Many refuse to admit that they can see the weaves, but a few have been honest with us. To a woman, they’ve insisted that they should be made damane.”

She nodded back toward Kaisea. “This one is most troubling. We think she’s intentionally working to learn the weaves so that she can create an ‘accident,’ and use our own reasoning against us—if she does something violent with the One Power, she can claim that we were wrong to leave her free.”

A woman who could be trained to kill with the One Power, who was not bound by the Three Oaths, and who had a determination to prove that she was dangerous? Gawyn shivered.

“We keep some forkroot in her most days,” Dimana said. “I don’t tell you this to worry you, but to warn you that what she says and does may not be reliable.”

Gawyn nodded. “Thank you.”

Dimana led him back, and the sul’dam remained on the ground. “How may Kaisea serve you, great Lord?” Her actions seemed a parody of Marille’s subservience. What Gawyn had originally taken for mockery wasn’t that at all—instead, it was the imperfect efforts of one who was highborn to imitate the lowly.

“Have you ever seen one of these before?” Gawyn asked casually, taking out the Bloodknife.

Kaisea gasped. “Where did you find that? Who gave it to you?” She cringed almost immediately, as if realizing that she’d stepped out of her assumed role.

“An assassin tried to kill me with it,” Gawyn said. “We fought, and he got away.”

“That is impossible, great Lord,” the Seanchan woman said, her voice more controlled.

“Why do you say that?”

“Because if you had fought one of the Bloodknives, great Lord, you would be dead. They are the most expert killers in all of the Empire. They fight the most ruthlessly, because they are already dead.”

“Suicide troops.” Gawyn nodded. “Do you have any information about them?”

Kaisea’s face grew conflicted.

“If I see you leashed?” Gawyn asked. “Will you answer me then?”

“My Lord!” Dimana said. “The Queen would never allow it!”

“I’ll ask her,” Gawyn said. “I can’t promise that you’ll be leashed, Kaisea, but I can promise I’ll intercede with the Queen for you.”

“You are powerful and strong, great Lord,” Kaisea said. “And wise indeed. If you will do this thing, Kaisea will answer you.”

Dimana glared at Gawyn.

“Speak,” Gawyn said to the sul’dam.

“Bloodknives do not live long,” Kaisea said. “Once they are given a duty, they do not rest from it. They are granted abilities from the Empress, may she live forever, ter’angreal rings that make them into great warriors.”

“Those blur their forms,” Gawyn said. “When they are near shadow.”

“Yes,” Kaisea said, sounding surprised that he knew this. “They cannot be defeated. But eventually, their own blood will kill them.”