The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time #2)

With the last, the six soldiers began to sing in raucous tones, though not the words Rand knew.

"We rode down to River Iralell

just to see the Tairen come.

We stood along the riverbank

with the rising of the sun.

Their horses blacked the summer plain,

their banners blacked the sky.

But we stood our ground on the banks

of River Iralell.

Oh, we stood our ground.

Yes, we stood our ground.

Stood our ground along the river in the

morning."

It was not the first time that Rand had discovered a tune had different words and different names in different lands, sometimes even in villages in the same land. He played along with them until they let the words die away, slapping each other's shoulders and making rude comments on one another's singing.

When Rand lowered the flute, the officer rose and made a sharp gesture. The soldiers fell silent in midlaugh, scraped back their chairs to bow to the officer with hand on breast — and to Rand — and left without a backwards look.

The officer came to Rand's table and bowed, hand to heart; the shaven front of his head looked as if he had dusted it with white powder. “Grace favor you, my Lord. I trust they did not bother you, singing as they did. They are a common sort, but they meant no insult, I assure you. I am Aldrin Caldevwin, my Lord. Captain in His Majesty's Service, the Light illumine him.” His eyes slid over Rand's sword; Rand had the feeling Caldevwin had noticed the herons as soon as he came in.

“They didn't insult me.” The officer's accent reminded him of Moiraine's, precise and every word pronounced to its full. Did she really let me go? I wonder if she's following me. Or waiting for me. “Sit down, Captain. Please.” Caldevwin drew a chair from another table. “Tell me, Captain, if you don't mind. Have you seen any other strangers recently? A lady, short and slender, and a fighting man with blue eyes. He's tall, and sometimes he wears his sword on his back.”

“I have seen no strangers at all,” he said, lowering himself stiffly to his seat. “Saving yourself and your Lady, my Lord. Few of the nobility ever come here.” His eyes flicked toward Loial with a minute frown; Hurin he ignored for a servant.

“It was only a thought.”

“Under the Light, my Lord, I mean no disrespect, but may I hear your name? We have so few strangers here that I find I wish to know every one.”

Rand gave it — he claimed no title, but the officer seemed not to notice — and said as he had to the innkeeper, “From the Two Rivers, in Andor.”

“A wondrous place I have heard, Lord Rand — I may call you so? — and fine men, the Andormen. No Cairhienin has ever worn a blademaster's sword so young as you. I met some Andormen, once, the CaptainGeneral of the Queen's Guards among them. I do not remember his name; an embarrassment. Perhaps you could favor me with it?”

Rand was conscious of the serving girls in the background, beginning to clean and sweep. Caldevwin seemed only to be making conversation, but there was a probing quality to his look. “Gareth Bryne.”

“Of course. Young, to hold so much responsibility.”

Rand kept his voice level. “Gareth Bryne has enough gray in his hair to be your father, Captain.”

“Forgive me, my Lord Rand. I meant to say that he came to it young.” Caldevwin turned to Selene, and for a moment he only stared. He shook himself, finally, as if coming out of a trance. “Forgive me for looking at you so, my Lady, and forgive me for speaking so, but Grace has surely favored you. Will you give me a name to put to such beauty?”

Just as Selene opened her mouth, one of the serving girls let out a cry and dropped a lamp she was taking down from a shelf. Oil splattered, and caught in a pool of flame on the floor. Rand leaped to his feet along with the others at the table, but before any of them could move, Mistress Madwen appeared, and she and the girl smothered the flames with their aprons.

“I have told you to be careful, Catrine,” the innkeeper said, shaking her nowsmutty apron under the girl's nose. “You'll be burning the inn down, and yourself in it.”

The girl seemed on the point of tears. “I was being careful, Mistress, but I had such a twinge in my arm.”

Mistress Madwen threw up her hands. “You always have some excuse, and you still break more dishes than all the rest. Ah, it's all right. Clean it up, and don't burn yourself.” The innkeeper turned to Rand and the others, all still standing around the table. “I hope none of you take this amiss. The girl really won't burn down the inn. She's hard on the dishes when she starts mooning over some young fellow, but she's never mishandled a lamp before.”

“I would like to be shown to my room. I do not feel well after all.” Selene spoke in careful tones, as though uncertain of her stomach, but despite that she looked and sounded as cool and calm as ever. “The journey, and the fire.”

The innkeeper clucked like a mother hen. “Of course, my Lady. I have a fine room for you and your Lord. Shall I fetch Mother Caredwain? She has a fine hand with soothing herbs.”

Selene's voice sharpened. “No. And I wish a room by myself.”

Mistress Madwen glanced at Rand, but the next moment she was bowing Selene solicitously toward the stairs. “As you wish, my Lady. Lidan, fetch the Lady's things like a good girl, now.” One of the serving girls ran to take Selene's saddlebags from Hurin, and the women disappeared upstairs, Selene stiffbacked and silent.

Caldevwin stared after them until they were gone, then shook himself again. He waited until Rand had seated himself before taking his chair again. “Forgive me, my Lord Rand, for staring so at your Lady, but Grace has surely favored you in her. I mean no insult.”

“None taken,” Rand said. He wondered if every man felt the way he did when they looked at Selene. “As I was riding to the village, Captain, I saw a huge sphere. Crystal, it seemed. What is it?”

The Cairhienin's eyes sharpened. “It is part of the statue, my Lord Rand,” he said slowly. His gaze flickered toward Loial; for an instant he seemed to be considering something new.

“Statue? I saw a hand, and a face, too. It must be huge.”

“It is, my Lord Rand. And old.” Caldevwin paused. “From the Age of Legends, so I am told.”

Rand felt a chill. The Age of Legends, when use of the One Power was everywhere, if the stories could be believed. What happened there? I