POV Moiraine

The journey to Tar Valon was long, tiring and entirely uneventful. Lans company is a solace and his companionship a balm, Moiraine pities those Aes Sedai who don't have warders, for all the misery, grief and heartache that Aes Sedai who lost their warders are said to suffer, Moiraine is completely sure Warders are worth it, the sheer relief of having someone to completely trust cannot be overstated, especially for Aes Sedai.

Aes Sedai training makes it very difficult to form genuine friendships with other Aes Sedai and White Tower is not a place conducive for such things, whatever political maneuvering that happens at high courts of kings and queens, White Tower is hundred times worse , when every spoken word could be used against you, where every action needs to a calculated thing, even living becomes tiring. After all there is a reason why almost every Aes Sedai who have seen with their own eyes just how close Moiraine and Siuan were as Novices and Accepted now believe that their friendship is, if not dead then close enough to dying to not matter. It is an unspoken expectation of White Tower that Aes Sedai should feel any loyalty to first to the Tower then to her Ajah, then to nothing else, even Warders are supposed be little more than tools to Aes Sedais will, of course it takes a particular type of person to not feel anything for someone bound as tightly as a Warder bound to Aes Sedai, still that is the unsaid expectation.

For all that Moiraine missed Siuan dearly, she is only too happy that her mission brought Moiraine away from White Tower and keeps her away from it for long stretches of time. Moiraine walked the corridors of power her entire life, while Siuan finds all this political maneuvering thrilling, Moiraine is entirely too tired of it, for a young woman who is just in twenty sixth year of her life with perhaps another century or two of Aes Sedai life ahead of her to feel such a way, it spoke entirely too much about the life in White Tower.

But that is neither here nor there, Moiraine timed it so that her arrival to Tar Valon went as unnoticed as possible, meaning her Ajah head heard about it by the time she reached White Towers threshold and every other Aes Sedai in White Tower knew about it by the time she washed dust of the road off herself. Once refreshed enough to meet others, Moiraine sought out the leader of her Ajah, called the First Selector on her own before being summoned, it was generally better to be seen as being obedient and uninterested in power, especially since Moiraines last defiance when she unofficially ran away from White Tower crowning her as Queen of Cairhein just after she was raised to Aes Sedai. This show of obedience will placate any Aes Sedai who is technically above Moiraine in station, which meant her own Ajah Head, Sitters of her Ajah and the Amyrlin and her Keeper, at least, especially when Moiraines strength in One Power is surpassed by only one living Aes Sedai, Cadsuane Melaidhrin, who is as much as legend as flesh and rivaled only by three other women. For all that there are a hundred little things that determine hierarchy amongst Aes Sedai, raw strength in One Power almost always wins out as determining factor if it ever came down to it, it is the reason why no Aes Sedai dared to come after Moiraine when she left the Tower as she did. Hence the farce of reporting to her Ajah head and then to the Amyrlin on her own, instead of waiting to be called. Even then she has to make sure it looked more like being eager to please than being impatient and demanding. Aes Sedai could give Gleemen lessons in mummery.

After all that exhausting song and dance, Moiraine slipped away to the Grove that Ogier planted when they built Tar Valon for Aes Sedai, it is maintained and kept in good condition unlike every other Grove that Ogier planted when they built cities for humans, but was not much in use, Aes Sedai who want peace and quiet generally just retire to the countryside, every other sisters who is at White Tower is there because they want to be there or don't really have any bonds and interests outside of it. And Daes Dae'mar played at the Tower is entertaining enough to keep them occupied. Meaning the Grove is one of the few truly private spaces one could find in Tar Valon. And that is where Siuan found Moiraine.