The man in the goldstriped coat sneered. “You will be honored to die on the blade of the High Lord Darlin, peasant, if I allow it so.” It was the first time he had deigned to speak. “Instead, I think I will have the pair of you hung by the heels, and watch while the skin is stripped from your bodies —”
“I do not think I'd like that,” Mat said.
The High Lord's face reddened with indignation at being interrupted, but Mat gave him no time for any outraged comment. Quarterstaff whirling in a tight doubleloop weave, so quick the staff blurred at the ends, he leaped forward. It was all a snarling Darlin could do to keep the staff from him. For the moment. Mat knew he could not keep this up very long, and if he was lucky then, it would all go back to the strike and counterstrike. If he was lucky. But he had no intention of counting on luck this time. As soon as the High Lord had a moment to set himself in a pattern of defense, Mat altered his attack in midwhirl. The end of the staff Darlin had been expecting at his head dipped instead to sweep his legs out from under him. The other end did strike at his head then, as he fell, a sharp crack that rolled his eyes back up in his head.
Panting, Mat leaned on his staff over the unconscious High Lord. Burn me, if I have to fight one or two more like this, I'll bloody well fall over from exhaustion! The stories do not tell you being a hero it such hard work! Nynaeve always did find a way to make me work.
Sandar came to stand beside him, frowning down at the crumpled High Lord. “He does not look so mighty lying there,” he said wonderingly. “He does not look so much greater than me.”
Mat gave a start and peered down the hall, where a man had just gone trotting across along a joining corridor. Burn me, if I did not know it was crazy, I would swear that was Rand!
“Sandar, you find that —” he began, swinging his staff up onto his shoulder, and cut off when it thudded into something.
Spinning, he found himself facing another halfdressed High Lord, this one with his sword on the floor, his knees buckling, and both hands to his head where Mat's staff had split his scalp. Hastily, Mat poked him hard in the stomach with the butt of the staff to bring his hands down, then gave him another thump on the head to put him down in a heap on top of his sword.
“Luck, Sandar,” he muttered. “You cannot beat bloody luck. Now, why don't you find this bloody private way the High Lords take down to the cells?” Sandar had insisted there was such a stairway, and using it would avoid having to run through most of the Stone. Mat did not think he liked men so eager to watch people put to the question that they wanted a quick route to the prisoners from their apartments.
“Just be glad you were so lucky,” Sandar said unsteadily, “or this one would have killed us both before we saw him. I know the door is here somewhere. Are you coming? Or do you mean to wait for another High Lord to appear?”
“Lead on.” Mat stepped over the unconscious High Lord. “I am no bloody hero.”
Trotting, he followed the thiefcatcher, who peered at the tall doors they passed, muttering that he knew it was here somewhere.
Chapter 55
(Dragon)
What Is Written in Prophecy
Rand entered the chamber slowly, walking among the great polished redstone columns he remembered from his dreams. Silence filled the shadows, yet something called to him. And something flashed ahead, a momentary light throwing back shadow, a beacon. He stepped out beneath a great dome, and saw what he sought. Callandor, hanging hilt down in midair, waiting for no hand but that of the Dragon Reborn. As it revolved, it broke what little light there was into splinters, and now and then it flared as if with a light of its own. Calling him. Waiting for him.
If I am the Dragon Reborn. If I am not just some halfmad man cursed with the ability to channel, a puppet dancing for Moiraine and the White Tower.
“Take it, Lews Therin. Take it, Kinslayer.”
He spun to face the voice. The tall man with closecropped white hair who stepped from the shadows among the columns was familiar to him. Rand had no idea who he was, this fellow in a red silk coat with black stripes down its puffy sleeves and black breeches tucked into elaborately silverworked boots. He did not know the man, but he had seen him in his dreams. “You put them in a cage,” he said. “Egwene, and Nynaeve, and Elayne. In my dreams. You kept putting them in a cage, and hurting them.”
The man made a dismissive gesture of his hand. “They are less than nothing. Perhaps one day, when they have been trained, but not now. I confess surprise that you cared enough to make them useful. But you were ever a fool, ever ready to follow your heart before power. You came too soon, Lews Therin. Now you must do what you are not yet ready for, or else die. Die, knowing you have left these women you care for in my hands.” He seemed to be waiting for something, expectant. “I mean to use them more, Kinslayer. They will serve me, serve my power. And that will hurt them far more than anything they have suffered before.”
Behind Rand, Callandor flashed, throwing one pulse of warmth against his back. “Who are you?”
“You do not remember me, do you?” The whitehaired man laughed suddenly. “I do not remember you, either, looking this way. A country lad with a flute case on his back. Did Ishamael speak the truth? He was ever one to lie when it gained him an inch or a second. Do you remember nothing, Lews Therin?”
“A name!” Rand demanded. “What is your name?”
“Call me Be'lal.” The Forsaken scowled when Rand did not react to the name. “Take it!” Be'lal snapped, throwing a hand toward the sword behind Rand. “Once we rode to war side by side, and for that I give you a chance. A bare chance, but a chance to save yourself, a chance to save those three I mean to make my pets. Take the sword, country man. Perhaps it will be enough to help you survive me.”
Rand laughed. “Do you believe you can frighten me so easily, Forsaken? Ba'alzamon himself has hunted me. Do you think I will cower now for you? Grovel before a Forsaken when I have denied the Dark One to his face?”
“Is that what you think?” Be'lal said softly. “Truly, you know nothing.” Suddenly there was a sword in his hands, a sword with a blade carved from black fire. “Take it! Take Callandor! Three thousand years, while I lay imprisoned, it has waited there. For you. One of the most powerful sa'angreal we ever made. Take it, and defend yourse