Telling Them Apart

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Part 3

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Dawn was still a thing of the future and the usual town night wanderers were out trudging through the snow, one shabbier than the next, one more hurried than the next. Anthared prowled like a leopard next to Yamela, every motion he made a promise of violence. His bond was still a bead of thunder in the back of Yamela's head.

"Who's following us tonight, Anthared?" she asked him softly.

He didn't even need to look. "It's a little girl with a dirty dress and black hair. Perhaps five years old, if even that. She's not as sly about it as the last one."

"A shame," said Yamela. "Well, there's nothing for it. We need to lose her."

He glanced at her. It was the first time he had looked at her since they left the inn; much of that thunder was aimed at her. "I thought you didn't mind being followed?"

"Usually I don't. But right now I do."

Anthared shrugged his Warder's cloak over them both, then moved them in closer to a nearby wall. There they stood, pressed together. That close the intimacy of the bond was a palpable thing; Yamela could feel touch of the chill breeze on the tip of Anthared's nose as easily as she could feel it on the tip of her own. His bad knee was aching; she reminded herself to Heal the bloody thing for him again. They stood very still for a long time, while the little girl Anthared had described passed them several times, searching for them. Yamela almost felt sorry for her. She could see the panic in the girl's expression, the tears beginning to stain her cheeks. But there was nothing for it. Right now was not the time to be followed. Only when the girl had been gone for a long while did she deem it safe to move. Still beneath the cloak, she led Anthared down a side street and away into the city. They left prints in the snow, but the street was full of footprints and two extra pairs would make little difference.

Only when they reached their destination did she pull free of the Warder's cloak. She had found the dyers' shops not far from the seamstresses'. There were two. She chose the one which looked the richest, and banged on the door as loudly as she could.

"What are you up to, Yamela Sedai?"

"I need to find Rosly, or whatever her name really is. And I didn't want that other girl seeing me search for her."

"And you search here?"

"Her fingers. Her fingertips were a greenish purple. That's typical of those working with dyes, and that particular colour comes from an expensive dye. She does some work in this store, or I'm a feathered goose."

"Yes, but it's the middle of the night."

"Can't be helped." She banged again on the door.

Anthared grumbled something about manners, but she ignored him. He took post beside her, half-hidden beneath his cloak, alertly watching the streets.

He still barely looked at her. Yes, he was most definitely upset with her. Vaston Morrent had made him angry – she thought she hadn't ever felt him so angry – and she had made it worse: "Do this for me, Vaston, and I'll see what I can do to help your brother." Vaston hadn't believed her, but he didn't have much of a choice. He'd disappeared into the night and left Yamela to face her Warder's displeasure. For her Warder had believed her, and he hadn't approved at all. His anger still grew with every passing moment. She wasn't sure why. She really should ask him. She didn't like when he was angry with her. It made her skin crawl.

The door opened. There stood a burly woman, a head taller than Yamela and wide as an oxen. She wore a night tunic and over it a thick, colourful shawl, and her fingertips and hands were stained the very same colour as Rosly's had been. At the sight of Yamela, her eyes widened. "Light, milady! What's one like you doing here in the middle of the night?"

"Good night to you too, mistress Kovallis," Yamela said, having read the name on the sign next to the door. "I'm sorry I'm here so late, but I'm looking for a girl who works with you. She has a thin face, is about this tall, has reddish hair."

Kovallis' eyes widened, and her jaw worked thrice before the words came out. "I don't know any girl –"

"You're lying," snapped Yamela, taking a step closer and staring Kovallis right into the face. She used the blunt speech she'd learned from Velde Sedai, which was the quickest and most brutally honest way she knew of verbally bludgeoning someone along to your point. "If you're trying to protect her, all and good, I'm not here to hurt her. She hasn't stolen anything from me, and I'm not setting the watch on her, or on you. But I need to talk to her. Now. So go inside, mistress, and fetch her, or tell me where she is."

The mistress's face was white, her lower jaw set tight. Her stance in the doorway was, if anything, even more forbidding. Yamela couldn't see her hands – they were behind the door frame – but she wouldn't have been surprised if one clasped some sort of weapon. Her reply was terse. "The girl's here. You can talk to her, milady, but you keep it nice and friendly. She's my cousin's child, and I pulled her off the streets myself. Takes more work to pull the streets out of her, but she's not a bad girl, milady. So Light help me, but I won't see her hurt."

"I won't hurt her," Yamela repeated.

Kovallis nodded, and closed the door in Yamela's face.

Yamela grimaced. "My Velde Sedai impression still needs some work," she said to Anthared, in an attempt to lighten the mood between them. "She looked as if she couldn't decide if she wanted to curtsy or slam my face in."

Anthared grunted. "If you had been Velde Sedai, she'd have curtsied."

"What do you think I need to do? Speak quicker, slower? Bite down on key words?"

"You need the Ageless face, Yamela Sedai," said her Warder, "that, fifty more years, a good dose of sense, and a hint of grey hairs."

"It'll take more than fifty years before I get any grey hairs."

"Meanwhile mine are going from grey to white. Why do you –?"

Before he could finish the door opened again, and before mistress Kovallis stood Rosly, with the mistress's hands firm on her thin shoulders. Her small eyes narrowed when they looked up at Yamela.

"I need you to do me a favour," Yamela said. "Early this morning. It's important."

"How – how did you find me?" Rosly asked, with less bluster than she had shown in the alley. She steadied herself against the mistress's solid frame.

"I have my ways," Yamela replied. She knelt down to come to the girl's level, and smiled her warmest smile, hoping to put her at ease. She held out three silver coins in one palm, then plucked one and held it out to Kovallis. "One for your mistress, as excuse for waking you both in the middle of the night. Two for you, which you will receive when you return to me, with a package." She returned the two other silvers to her pocket. "That package you will bring from the kitchen entrance of the lord Hoyoth's estate. When you fetch it, you will be clean and wear something which fits a servant girl. Can you do that?"

Rosly nodded.

"When you tell Yemerry about this little errand, be sure to inform him that I'm coming to see him tomorrow. He can be easy or difficult to find, as he chooses, but find him I will. And when I do, I expect him to tell me where the good captain Parrim has hidden Dakenya Allar. If he wants to be on my good side, he can deliver Dakenya Allar to me himself. I figure he'll be able to produce her, as he was in on the hiding of her."

Kovallis gasped. "Mistress Allar? I thought she'd just gone out of town. What's that Parrim thug done with her? And – and Yemerry? Lovis, isn't that the man who –"

So the girl's name was Lovis. Not Rosly, not Jenniel, not Pet. It was amazing how many names a girl could have and still not be confused. Yamela wondered if she could even remember all of her own old names.

"That's him, right," Lovis cut in. Her gaze was bright and alert now, aimed at Yamela. "What's Yemerry done to mistress Allar?"

"Left her to Parrim. Word of the Morrents."

"The Morrents lie."

"Not this time. Vaston Morrent told me of how the mistress looks after you gutter runners. The Morrents were gutter runners too, when they were young. If mistress Allar needs something, that's serious business to the Morrents."

"Lovis, I've told you to keep away from –" mistress Kovallis began.

"Later, mistress," Lovis said to her, quickly focusing back on Yamela. "You might be right, milady. The Morrents were always cozy with mistress Allar. As are we all."

If mistress Allar offered the gutter runners shelter, they wouldn't soon forget it. It was a win-win arrangement; to have her personal company of gutter runners all around the town would only have helped Dakenya Allar's reports to the Eyes and Ears, and she could always trust them to keep what she asked of them to themselves. Regular food and shelter and warm smiles were strong promoters of loyalty. Yamela could see that loyalty in Lovis' sudden solemnity. She went on: "Vaston Morrent told me that mistress Allar asked his brother and him to come with her to one of the warehouses to help her carry boxes. Only mistress Allar and Durrak Morrent were caught by the watch, and Vaston Morrent barely escaped. He'd seen one of Yemerry's boys with the watch, though, so he went to Yemerry, but Yemerry was on the captain's side. We're trying to get Durrak Morrent and the mistress Allar back."

"What's your interest in them?"

"The mistress Allar is an old friend of the Tower, and the Tower helps old friends." As long as they might still be useful to the Tower, but Yamela didn't say that aloud. "Vaston Morrent just wants his brother. I want what mistress Allar showed the Morrents. If it's what I think it is, I'm going to use it to dig a big metaphorical pit beneath the captain Parrim and shove him into it. Which is why I need you to pick up this package for me, and to deliver my message to Yemerry."

"Is there a pit for Yemerry too?"

"Do you want there to be one?"

Lovis chewed on that for a moment, and then shrugged. "If he's ratted mistress Allar, lots of people are going to be angry with him. Might be he's already dug himself his own pit."

"I don't want you in on these things, Lovis –" began Kovallis in a rumble, but Lovis twisted free.

"I'm already in on it, ma'am," she snapped. "I'll be out of it soon enough." She disappeared back into the shop.

"Lovis!"

Yamela touched mistress Kovallis' arm gently. "This time, let her go," she said. "This time, it's about someone who has fed her. Next time, it'll just be money and mischief again. Then you can keep her home."

Mistress Kovallis's face had set in hard lines. "I'm trying to teach her a better way."

"Yes. And she'll come around. I did. But it took a few years."

"Milady," said the mistress quietly, "if you ask me, you haven't come around yet. You look like you have, dressed up all nice like that, but you haven't yet." Again she closed the door in Yamela's face.

"You deserved that," muttered Anthared from beside her.

"I suppose I did. Let's go find this warehouse Vaston spoke of."

"As you wish, my Aes Sedai." There was far too much docility spread over his words, like butter trying to hide the bread beneath. It was so at odds with the bond that it made her skin crawl.

They strode side by side down the street, not touching, and not looking at one another. The bond rode between them like a sore spot, a bead of frustration and fury. He was even angrier, and she was beginning to be annoyed with him for being angry with her.

"Could you stop that?" she finally snapped at him.

"Stop what, Yamela Sedai?"

"Being so angry at me. It's –"

In a whirl of motion Anthared turned and seized her by the upper arms, pulling her close and lifting her so that only the toes of her boots touched the street, in order to get her face close to his. If it had been anyone else she'd have been scared that he was about to hurt her, but with Anthared, all she could feel was astonishment. That fury in the bond had boiled over and was plastered all across his face. "It's what?" he hissed at her. "Annoying? Like an itch you can't scratch?"

"Anthared," she said quietly, "you're hurting my arms. You do know that, don't you?"

He let her sink back onto solid ground, and eased his grasp on her arms. But he didn't let go. He took a deep breath, and then another one, and still didn't let go. "I'm entitled to my own bloody emotions, Yamela Sedai," he told her sharply.

Of course he was. "I didn't mean –"

"What did you mean, then?"

She drew a steadying breath herself. Her heart was racing in her chest, as if she was a little girl being scolded. "I meant… that was my way of asking you why you're angry."

He stared at her. Then the answer came, squeezed out between his gritted teeth. "I'm angry because you're putting yourself in danger. And worse; you're not telling me about it beforehand. I'm terrified that you'll land yourself and me in some situation that I'm not ready for. You need to talk to me, Yamela. Tell me what you're up to. Tell me what you're planning. If you do, I can also make plans, and I'll be better able to protect you."

Yamela's annoyance faded away. Now that it had been named, she could sense the fear beneath his anger. She cupped her hands gently about his face, but he twisted aside.

"I'm serious, Yamela. If this isn't bloody madness incarnate, I don't know what it is. You're planning to break a known scoundrel out of prison Light knows how, you're planning to break into a warehouse, you're provoking the Magistrate, you're provoking that captain Parrim, and now you're provoking the town's crime lords. Without warning me. Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

"No, but this is the easiest way to get their attention."

"I'm sure I don't want any more of their attention than we already had."

"It's not as bad as you think, my Gaidin. Yemerry's a mid-level man who stepped out of line when he started taking gold from captain Parrim. He's likely already lost what on-high support he had, and what gutter runners and scoundrels follow him won't do so for long when they hear what he's done to mistress Allar. If Vaston Morrent was right – and from Lovis' reaction, I think he was – that was a bad move on Yemerry's part. Yemerry isn't dangerous."

"Captain Parrim is."

"We would be up against captain Parrim no matter how we played this, Anthared."

He grimaced. "We shouldn't be alone here. You're too young to handle this on your own. Atherie Sedai should –" He bit down on that before he finished it. It wasn't his place to criticize other Aes Sedai.

"I can handle this better than Atherie could," Yamela told him. "She knows the courts and the nobles. She'd be up there, bandying words with the Magistrate, and I'm not sure how far it would have gotten her. But down here, down in the streets… this is where I thrive, Anthared –"

"Thrive. Thrive? Wasn't it on the streets you were caught and almost hanged before Hessina Sedai found you?"

She dismissed that with a jerk of her head. "That was a one-time thing. Trust me, Anthared. I can spin Yemerry like a top, and before he knows it he'll point the way to Dakenya Allar and likely serve me captain Parrim on a silver platter."

"And the Magistrate?"

"Between what Hallomer offered me and what I found in the good Magistrate's office, I think I already have him."

"You don't know that. You don't know exactly what Hallomer's giving you, or what you found in that office. It might be his grandma's secret cake recipes."

"Cake recipes –?" She laughed. "Oh, Anthared, you're wonderful."

"I'm not wonderful. I'm trying to make you –"

"Be careful, I know. But I'm not careful, Anthared. I never have been. When I'm careful, I don't get anything done. My dearest Gaidin, try to remember why you're with me. You're with me because I rush into things, I break rules, I'm blunt and I'm reckless. If I hadn't been, I'd never have shown up in that practice yard and wanted to learn the sword, and I'd never have dragged you out of that room you'd decided to die in."

"I'm with you because I was stupid enough to take on the task of keeping you alive. A Green!" He whispered the last word. "Why in the Light did I get myself bonded to a bloody Green?"

She laughed at that, too.

"Don't laugh. It isn't a laughing matter. I'm your Warder, and I know my duties. But you have responsibilities too, Yamela. Responsibilities which came when you laid that weave over my head. You should know that – especially a Green should know that. Do you remember what happens to me if you're killed?"

She stopped laughing. There was such pain in his voice, such hollowness in his eyes. He was back to thinking about Vaserre, his first Aes Sedai, and how he had lost her. He described it as an abyss that opened beneath him and swallowed him. His grasp on her arms weakened and she felt any and all emotion in the bond flicker and disappear like candles blown out. Before she knew it her Warder was on his knees before her, and through the bond came nothing but a far-off agony. He would have folded right down to the snowy street if she hadn't caught him there; she wrapped her arms about his head and shoulders, held him close and whispered soothing things. She sent warmth and comfort through the bond in an attempt to pull him back, let some of her own strength seep into him. Those first few days after she had bonded him this had been a common thing, him falling back into that abyss. Several times she'd tried to comfort him and ended up hugging him and weeping for hours, unable to pull either herself or him up. By now she had learned to separate her own emotions from his far enough that she wasn't drawn helplessly into them, but it still put tears in her eyes, still made her limbs heavy and still made her lungs constrict as if they intended never to let her breathe again. To keep her balance and give him strength was no easy thing, but it was a thing she had had to learn, and after what felt like forever the bond stirred with something other than emptiness. He drew a shuddering breath and clutched at her dress, and stayed where he was, his face buried against her stomach. "Please don't die," he whispered.

She suspected that if she did, he'd be one of those Warders who followed her. The shock of her loss would kill him. She imagined it would be swift, and painless – as long as her own departure wasn't a drawn out mess. But she didn't voice those thoughts. They wouldn't make him better, wouldn't soothe him. Instead, she kissed the top of his head, and let a Healing sink into him. Both for his emotional pain and for that bad knee. "Oh Anthared, my darling Gaidin. I'm glad we talked. And I'll try to remember to keep you informed on what I'm planning. Remind me if I forget. But, I'm sorry, but we're still in the middle of the street in Wesseron. And it's night. And there's work to be done."

Like a puppet on strings he climbed to his feet and resumed his watch of their surroundings. She took his arm – not his sword arm, of course – and pulled the flap of his colour-shifting cloak over her own shoulders, too. The night was cold and they could both use a bit of shared warmth. Besides, the bond was a quiet thing now, one she needed to fill with life again. Touching him made that easier.

Talking improved it even further, she had learned. "Vaston Morrent. Did you catch him easily? How well did he resist you?"

"He had good reflexes," Anthared muttered dully, "and he knows how and where to hit. If he'd gone for his knife it'd come down to bloodshed. But he was more interested in getting away from me than in hurting me."

"How do you think he'd do with a sword?"

"He didn't have a sword. And from the look of him, I doubt he's ever been schooled."

"I'm sure he'd learn fast, if you gave him a sword. He and his brother are con-men. Con-men learn fast, or they don't last."

Anthared shrugged and Yamela let the subject drop. When dealing with Lovis and Vaston she had felt her younger self re-assert itself. Mistress Kovallis had been right. She felt a kinship with these alley folk, and she could easily sympathize with the mess Vaston and his brother had landed in. She wanted to help them. Con men such as he and his brother did not belong in a cell. They were simply too much fun.

But she was Aes Sedai now, and her Warder wouldn't approve of such sentiments.

They neared the warehouses Vaston had directed them to, but only after spending some time being lost in the neighborhood. Wesseron wasn't a particularly large town, but it wasn't neatly arranged either. It gladdened Yamela that by the time they found the warehouses, Anthared's emotions were returning; concentration, wariness, nervousness, fear. She squeezed his arm. "I'm still carrying that knife. And the silk ribbon. Does that make you feel better?"

"A little. Stay under the cloak for a while. I want to see what's moving."

"As you wish, my Gaidin."

He drew them both into a shadow beneath a staircase, from where they had a good view of the main street. Five large, blocky warehouses stood on line on the other side of it. Vaston had directed them to the fourth one. They stood there until the cold bit into Yamela's toes before Anthared was satisfied that absolutely nothing was moving, no noises came from anywhere.

"Vaston said there's a watchman in each of the houses. A couple of them have dogs with them, but they change houses on whim so he doesn't know where the dogs are tonight."

"Best be careful. Dogs don't like channellers."

"Not a problem, I can just set them snoring."

"Do it before they bark and wake the entire block. And the watchmen?"

"Best if they don't see us. If they do, try not to hurt them."

"If Yemerry or Parrim shows up?"

"Why would they?"

Anthared grunted. "That little tattle-tale likely ran right to Yemerry and told him all she knew. As for Parrim, he's already caught Dakenya Allar seeing what she shouldn't have, and Yemerry must have told him about Vaston Morrent. If I was him, I'd not leave anything important to a watchman and a dog for much longer. Besides, I don't trust that Vaston Morrent. What's to stop him from running right to Yemerry or captain Parrim, carrying tales, hoping to get his brother back that way?"

Yamela couldn't formulate any reply to that. She couldn't see any reason why Vaston wouldn't turn on her, except for her instincts telling her that he wouldn't. She trusted her instincts, but she couldn't turn them into a logical reason. Still, she recognized the itch in Anthared's bond. "You want to scout about."

He nodded, so they did. Yamela wove a weave of silence over the two of them, so as not to alert the eventual dogs, and they rounded each of the warehouses in turn, gently checking door handles. Anthared studied the patterns of foot prints on the alleys and streets, muttering things like "see this? This is a watchman's usual round. He's plodded around and checked doors just as we're doing now."

"But no soldiers?"

"Doesn't seem to have been any soldiers about," he confirmed, but when they reached the fourth warehouse he changed his mind. He stopped, quite suddenly, and pulled Yamela with him against the wall, the colour-shifting cloak about the two of them. He pointed down at the marks leading to a back door at the fourth warehouse. "There's your soldiers, Aes Sedai."

"How can you tell?"

"Civilians are messy. They move messily. These ones all have boots made by the same shoe maker and they're moving in patterns. Even if they're not in formation, they tend to move in patterns."

Yamela trusted his judgment and they continued around the warehouse. Anthared searched for signs that the soldiers had left again but didn't find any. By the time they returned to the shadow beneath that staircase, Anthared had begun to grumble that this was a bad idea.

"But if Vaston's right…" Yamela reminded him.

"Vaston didn't know himself. His information is second-hand. He heard mistress Dakenya Allar say what was in that box, before the soldiers came and snatched her. We need to find mistress Allar, we don't need to see these boxes for ourselves."

"I want to see these boxes."

Anthared's mouth set to a very thin line, and his bond settled into discontent. "As my Aes Sedai deems necessary," he said, his voice as flat as that discontent.

Yamela tried to find something to say that would justify her demand, but came up with nothing. "We'll be careful," she promised him.

"Of course we will."

A few minutes later they were – carefully, and again under a covering dome of silence – sneaking into the warehouse through a door which Yamela had – carefully – opened. She was being so bloody careful, minding her every move, so that she was half afraid she'd freeze up and forget what she was about..!

She knew how to sneak, and Anthared was a shadow beside her. While the treasonous fabric of her fine dress whispered as she crossed the floor and lowered herself behind a row of crates, Anthared remained as silent as that shadow. He would have made a most excellent thief, though telling him so would likely insult him.

Again they listened. They heard voices, closer to the main entrance of the warehouse. Luckily, the boxes Vaston had directed them to were supposed to be in the back left corner of the warehouse. Still encompassed in their dome of silence, and both beneath Anthared's cloak – because he insisted on it; even though Yamela knew how not to be seen, she didn't have the heart to deny him that request – they made their way to that corner.

Anthared saw the dead man first. In a flash his arm had closed about Yamela's waist and drawn her back, and his blade was in his other hand. She found herself peering past his shoulder out at the scene; a dead soldier sprawled with blood pooling around him, sliced apart from shoulder to spine and down his back, as if he had been cut down while running from something. His uniform was city guard.

"Yamela Sedai," Anthared whispered hoarsely, "do you still insist on seeing these boxes?"

"More than ever," Yamela told him, and freed herself. He released her reluctantly, and followed at her heels. She advanced toward – toward the very box the dead man seemed to be reaching for. A small weave of Air and Earth opened the lock – learning that had been ever so much fun – and she opened the box. The hinges creaked, but fortunately this was within her dome of silence, and the sound would not escape out.

"So that bloody Morrent lad was right," muttered Anthared.

"Yes," Yamela agreed, reaching down to touch the white cloak inside. There was a golden sun emblazoned on it. Shifting it aside revealed pieces of armour, painted white. "Whitecloak gear. Someone's smuggling Whitecloak gear into Ghealdan. Atherie had suspicions, but even she can't have imagined this."

"And there would be no point to it unless there are Whitecloaks somewhere here to receive it." His voice was a hiss. "Let's leave this place, now, while we still can."

Yamela opened the next box, to find the same. Swords, with hilts bound in white leather, the metal distinctly marked with the Children of the Light's sun. "This is an officer's sword. Several of them. That would imply…"

"The need for officers' swords implies officers, and the need for officers implies the presence of a large group of Whitecloaks. My Aes Sedai, I must insist –"

"Yes, yes –"

He grabbed her arm and practically dragged her towards the door where they had snuck in. His bond was such a beacon of insistence that she followed him meekly. She'd seen what she'd come for, and her thoughts were on that dead soldier. He'd been reaching for the crate…

"Leaving so soon, my lady Aes Sedai?"

Anthared spun smartly about. His sword was still in his hand – he hadn't sheathed it – and now he adopted Flame About To Lash, as he'd done toward captain Parrim in the courthouse. This time, Yamela didn't stop him. She let her dome of silence drop and prepared a set of defensive weaves.

"Esquire Vither," Anthared said, and Yamela recognized one of the esquires introduced to her at the Magistrate's table, "what an unexpected surprise."

"I'd lie if I said the same," Vither smiled. He stood perhaps five paces away. Yamela felt her eyebrows rise; he didn't look the type to be able to move silently enough to pass both her and her Warder unnoticed. "But when an Aes Sedai comes sniffing after smugglers and I happen to know about this, it isn't hard to figure where she'll end up."

Anthared's eyes scanned the area. Vither was still the only visible person in their proximity, but there were no longer any voices coming from the other end of the warehouse. With boxes stacked high everywhere, there were uncountable places to hide. Anthared spoke coolly: "Take your hand off your sword, Vither, or you'll lose it."

"I assure you, Warder, my hand is on my sword only in defensive purposes."

"Forgive me if I don't trust you."

"Let's agree to distrust one another, then. My lady Aes Sedai, may I have a word with you?"

"I'm listening, esquire," Yamela told him quietly. "Just don't make any sudden movements. If I lose my temper, I'll tear this whole warehouse to the ground, with you and your men still in it." And likely herself and Anthared too, if she truly lost her temper, but she didn't say that.

"Such a charming prospect," Vither said, in a voice like silk. "I'll keep it brief, then. Captain Parrim has been smuggling Whitecloak gear into the city for the past few months, a bit at the time. Some of it spreads into Ghealdan and further, and some of it remains here. The number of merchants and craftsmen from Amadicia and Amador who settle here and in other border cities has risen dramatically. Most of them are merchants without merchandize and craftsmen without skills, if you take my meaning. None of them bring their families, if it's not a 'brother' or a 'cousin'."

"Fake merchants, fake skills, yes," Yamela agreed, catching on. They must be the Whitecloaks the equipment was meant for, and the influx of Amadicians would have been visible in those court protocols that the Magistrate had denied her. "I assume they spread further into Ghealdan, too?"

"Of course, my lady. Once settle legally here, they can move freely. The Lord Commander will have an army here within half a year and no one will know how it crossed the border. Here, or in our King's capital."

"And since you've done a fair start on killing Whitecloaks – for I assume that man over there was a Whitecloak, dressed in a city guard uniform – I'm guessing you're not too keen on this idea?"

Esquire Vither shrugged. "Our Magistrate isn't always easy to slip by, my lady, but the Children of the Light would be extremely bad for business. My associates in the greater cities and I are in perfect agreement on this."

"You're alley business."

His eyes glittered. "Yes. And so are you."

She laughed. "Is it that obvious?"

"I've never before seen an Aes Sedai who steals into warehouses in the middle of the night. Nor one who bribes gutter runners to run errands for them." Before she could reply to that, he waved a hand dismissively. "Don't bother to deny it, I know all about young Jenniel, or Pet, or whatever name she's given you. Yemerry's dead, by the way. Just as well. He's been a sore spot in my side for almost a year."

"All well and good," Anthared growled, "but I'm really only interested in one thing. And that's whether or not I'm going to have to carve a way through you to get my Aes Sedai out of here, or not."

Vither blinked. "Not, of course. I've no interest in trying to hold you or your precious protégé, Warder. As long as you're as keen on keeping Whitecloaks out of Ghealdan as I am, I'm here to help."

"How can you help?" Yamela asked.

"I'm sending a visitor to you tomorrow morning," Vither said, "someone you'll be very happy to meet. She'll have with her some of the information my associates and I have gathered, and some she has gathered on her own."

"Dakenya Allar?" Yamela guessed hopefully.

"Mistress Dakenya Allar is dead, I'm afraid," said Vither, eyeing her as if wondering from where she had that name. "She took a blow to the head when they brought her in, and never awoke. She's been dead for several weeks, now. So no, the visitor I'm sending you is her sister. Deshya Allar."

Yamela nodded. Deshya, too, was known to the Green Ajah.

"One last thing. If you intend to keep your word to young Morrent, I'd suggest you hurry."

She was hardly surprised that he knew about that. "Let me guess. That little black-haired girl who tried to follow me tonight saw Vaston enter, and made certain she heard our entire conversation?"

"She got most of it," agreed Vither. "She's a talented girl. This is the second time she's snuck past Vaston Morrent."

Yamela had known her rooms in the inn were being observed by the gutter runners. She should have thought to shield her conversation with Vaston under another dome of silence, but it hadn't crossed her mind. Anthared's bond shifted, as if the mistake irked him, too.

"But why should I hurry?"

"Because tonight, I intend to annoy captain Parrim, more than I did by killing his lapdog Yemerry, and when I'm done, he'll be too angry with the alley business to remember that he has any use for the Morrents."

Yamela felt herself smiling again. "Anthared," she said softly, "I think I like this one."

Author's Note:

I've had such trouble with this chapter (most of it being Real Life, and some of it being writer's block). Then I decided to go with an old favourite plot twist: Blow Something Up. Which in this case meant killing off a few characters and adding a lot to the here-to only mentioned and unimportant esquire Vither. But he's really much more interesting this way.

Please review and feed my plot bunnies, in all this time since my last post they've gone quite hungry. Maybe that's why they've gone quiet on me. Poor things.