“Put that away,” Mat growled around a mouthful. “I don't want to talk about killing.” Light, that fellow is still lying right out there in the street. Burn me, I ought to be on a ship by now. “I just asked why you're in Tar Valon. If you had to leave Cairhien because you killed someone, I do not want to know about it. Blood and ashes, if you can't pull your wits out of the wine enough to talk straight, I'll leave now.”
With a sour look, Thom made the knife disappear. “Why am I in Tar Valon? I'm here because it is the worst place I could be, except maybe Caemlyn. It's what I deserve, boy. Some of the Red Ajah still remember me. I saw Elaida in the street the other day. If she knew I was here, she would peel my hide off in strips, and then she would stop being pleasant.”
“I never knew you to feel sorry for yourself,” Mat said disgustedly. “Do you mean to drown yourself in wine?”
“What do you know of it, boy?” Thom snarled. “Put a few years on you, see something of life, maybe love a woman or two, and then you'll know. Perhaps you will, if you have the brains to learn. Aaaah! You want to know why I'm in Tar Valon? Why are you in Tar Valon? I remember you shivering when you found out Moiraine was Aes Sedai. You nearly soiled yourself every time anybody even mentioned the Power. What are you doing in Tar Valon, with Aes Sedai on every side?”
“I am leaving Tar Valon. That's what I am doing here. Leaving!” Mat grimaced. The gleeman had saved his life, and maybe more. A Fade had been involved. That was why Thom's right leg did not work as well as it should. There could not be enough wine on a ship to keep him this drunk. “I am going to Caemlyn, Thom. If you need to risk your fool life for some reason, why not come with me?”
“Caemlyn?” Thom said musingly.
“Caemlyn, Thom. Elaida will likely be going back there sooner or later, so you'd have her to worry about. And from what I remember, if Morgase puts her hands on you, you will wish Elaida had you.”
“Caemlyn. Yes. Caemlyn would fit my mood like a glove.” The gleeman glanced at the chicken platter and gave a start. “What did you do, boy? Stuff them up your sleeve?” There was nothing left of the three birds but bones and carcasses with only a few strips of flesh remaining.
“Sometimes I get hungry,” Mat muttered. It was an effort not to lick his fingers. “Are you coming with me, or not?”
“Oh, I will come, boy.” As Thom pushed himself to his feet, he did not seem as unsteady as he had been. “You wait here — and try not to eat the table — while I get my things and say some goodbyes.” He limped away, not staggering once.
Mat drank a little of his wine and stripped off a few shreds that were left on the chicken carcasses, wondering if he had time to order another, but Thom was back quickly. His harp and flute in their dark leather cases hung on his back with a tied blanketroll. He carried a plain walking staff as tall as he was. The two serving women followed on either side. Mat decided they were sisters. Identical big brown eyes looked up at the gleeman with identical expressions. Thom was kissing first Saal, then Mada, and patting cheeks as he headed for the door, jerking his head for Mat to follow. He was outside before Mat could finish collecting his own belongings and pick up his quarterstaff.
The younger of the two women, Saal, stopped Mat as he reached the door. “Whatever you said to him, I forgive you for the wine, even if it is taking him away. I've not seen him this alive in weeks.” She pressed something into his hand, and when he glanced at it, his eyes widened in confusion. She had given him a silver Tar Valon mark. “For whatever it was you said. Besides, whoever is feeding you is not doing a good job of it, but you still have pretty eyes.” She laughed at the expression on his face.
Mat was laughing, too, in spite of himself, as he went out into the street, rolling the silver coin across the backs of his fingers. So I have pretty eyes, do I? His laughter shut off like the last drip from a wine barrel: Thom was there, but not the corpse. The windows of the taverns down the street put enough light across the cobblestones for him to be sure of it. The city guard would not have carried a dead man away without asking questions, at those taverns and at The Woman of Tanchico, too.
“What are you staring at, boy?” Thom asked. “No Trollocs in those shadows.”
“Footpads,” Mat muttered. “I was thinking about footpads.”
“No street thieves or strongarms in Tar Valon, either, boy. When the guards take a footpad — not that many try that game here; the word spreads — but when they do, they haul him to the Tower, and whatever it is the Aes Sedai do to him, the fellow leaves Tar Valon the next day as wideeyed as a goosed girl. I understand they're even harder on women caught thieving. No, the only way you'll have your money stolen here is somebody selling you polished brass for gold or using shaved dice. There are no footpads.”
Mat turned on his heel and strode past Thom, heading toward the docks, quarterstaff thumping off the cobblestones as if he could push himself ahead faster. “We're going to be on the first ship sailing, whatever it is. The first, Thom.”
Thom's stick clicked hurriedly after him. “Slow down, boy. What's your hurry? There are plenty of ships, sailing day and night. Slow down. There aren't any footpads.”
“The first bloody ship, Thom! If it's sinking, we'll be on it!” If they weren't footpads, what were they? They had to be thieves. What else could they be?
Chapter 32
(Waves)
The First Ship
Southharbor itself, the great Ogiermade basin, was huge and round, surrounded by high walls of the same silverstreaked white stone as the rest of Tar Valon. One long wharf, most of it roofed, ran all the way around, except where the wide water gates stood open to give access to the river. Vessels of every size lined the wharf, most moored by the stern, and despite the hour dockmen in coarse, sleeveless shirts hurried about loading and unloading bales and chests, crates and barrels, with ropes and booms, or on their backs. Lamps hanging from the roof beams lit the wharfs and made a band of light around the black water in the middle of the harbor. Small open boats scuttled through the darkness, the square lanterns atop their tall sternposts making it seem as if fireflies skittered across the harbor. They were small only compared to the ships, though; some had as many as six pairs of long oars.
When Mat led a stillmuttering Thom under an arch of polished redstone and down broad steps to the wharf, crewmen on one threemasted ship were unfastening the mooring lines not twenty paces away. The vessel was larger than most Mat could see, between fifteen and twenty spans from sharp bow to squared stern, with a flat, railed deck almost level with the wharf. The important thing was that it was casting off.