He had blood on his white uniform, and he looked exhausted. Yet he stood upright, straight-backed, and his face was clean. He almost seemed too beautiful to be human, with that perfectly masculine face and graceful, lean figure. And those eyes! Like deep, dark pools. He practically seemed to glow.

“I…What was I saying?” Berelain asked, eyes on Damodred.

“That there is no place for romance in a leader’s life?”

“Yes,” Berelain said, sounding distracted. “It’s just not reasonable at all.”

“Not at all.”

“I—” Berelain began, but Damodred turned toward them. She cut off as their eyes met.

Alliandre suppressed a smile as Damodred crossed the clearing. He executed another set of perfect bows, one for each of them, though he barely seemed to notice Alliandre.

“My…Lady First,” he said. “Lord Aybara says that, when he first approached this battle, you pled to him on my behalf.”

“Foolishly,” Berelain said. “I feared he would attack you.”

“If fearing that makes one a fool,” Damodred said, “then we two are fools together in it. I was certain that my men would soon fall to Aybara.”

She smiled at him. That quickly, she seemed to have forgotten everything she’d been saying previously.

“Would you like some tea?” Damodred said, speaking a little abruptly as he reached for the teacups, which sat on a cloth away from the fire.

“I’m drinking some,” she noted.

“Some more then?” he asked, hastily kneeling and pouring a cup.

“Er.”

He stood up, holding the cup, then seeing that she already had one in her hands.

“There are still bandages to cut,” Berelain said. “Perhaps you could help.”

“Perhaps,” he said. He handed the cup he’d poured over to Alliandre. Berelain—her eyes still holding his—handed hers over as well, seeming oblivious to what she was doing.

Alliandre smiled deeply—now holding three teacups—as the two of them walked over to the stack of cloths to be cut. This might turn out well indeed. At the very least, it would get those blasted Whitecloaks out of her kingdom.

She walked back toward Faile and Perrin. As she did so, she slipped the blue silk shirt from the pile of cloth she’d set aside to cut.

It really would make a nice sash.

Chapter 44

A Backhanded Request

Morgase stepped out of her hillside tent and looked out at Andor. Whitebridge lay below, blessedly familiar, although she could see that it had grown. The farms were failing, the last of the winter stores spoiling, so people made for the cities.

The landscape should have been green. Instead, even the yellowed grass was dying off, leaving scars of brown. It wouldn’t be long before the entire land was like the Waste. She longed to take action. This was her nation. Or it had once been.

She left her tent, looking for Master Gill. On the way, she passed Faile, who was speaking with the quartermaster again. Morgase nodded, showing deference. Faile nodded back. There was a rift between the two of them now. Morgase wished it could be otherwise. She and the others had shared a sliver of their lives when hope had been weaker than a candle’s flame. It had been Faile who had encouraged Morgase to use the One Power—squeezing every last drop from her pathetic ability—to signal for help while they were trapped.