Mat hadn’t felt the pull of the ruby dagger in a very long time. He was nearly beginning to forget what it had been like to be tied to it, if it was possible to forget such a thing. But sometimes he remembered that ruby, red like his own blood. And the old lust, the old desire, would seep into him again . . .
Mat shook his head, forcing down those memories. Burn it, he was supposed to be enjoying himself!
“What a time we’ve had,” Thom said idly. “I feel old these days, Mat, like a faded rug, hung out to dry in the wind, hinting of the colors it once showed so vibrantly. Sometimes, I wonder if I’m any use to you anymore. You hardly seem to need me.”
“What? If course I need you, Thom!”
The aging gleeman eyed him. “The trouble with you, Mat, is that you’re actually
“I mean it! Burn me, but I do. I suppose you could run off and tell stories and travel like you used to. But things around here might run a lot less smoothly, and I sure would miss your wisdom. Burn me, but I would. A man needs friends he can trust, and I’d trust you with my life any day.”
“Why Matrim,” Thom said, looking up, eyes glimmering with mirth, “bolstering a man’s spirits when he’s down? Convincing him to stay and do what is important, rather than running off to seek adventure? That sounds downright
Mat grimaced. “Marriage, I guess. Burn me, but I’m not going to stop drinking or gambling!” Ahead, Talmanes turned around and glanced at Mat, then rolled his eyes.
Thom laughed, watching Talmanes. “Well, lad, I didn’t mean to get your spirits down. Just idle talk. I still have a few things I can show this world. If I really can free Moiraine . . . well, we’ll see. Besides, somebody needs to be here to watch, then put this all to song, someday. There will be more than one ballad that comes from all of this.”
He turned, rifling through his saddlebags. “Ah!” he said, pulling out his patchwork gleeman’s cloak. He threw it on with a flourish.
“Well,” Mat said, “when you write about us, you might find a few gold marks in it if you saw your way to include a nice verse about Tal-manes. You know, something about how he has one eye that stares in strange directions, and how he often carries this scent about him which reminds one of a goat pen.”
“I heard that!” Talmanes called from ahead.
“I meant you to!” Mat called back.
Thom just laughed, plucking at his cloak, arranging it for best display. “I can’t promise anything.” He chuckled some more. “Though, if you don’t mind, Mat, I think I’ll separate from the rest of you once we get into the village. A gleeman’s ears may pick up information that won’t be spoken in the presence of soldiers.”
“Information would be nice,” Mat said, rubbing his chin. The trail turned up ahead; Vanin said they’d find the village just beyond the turn. “I feel as though I’ve been traveling through a tunnel for months now, with no sight or sound of the outside world. Burn me, but it would be nice to know where Rand is, if only to know where
“Life’s that tunnel most times, I’m afraid,” Thom said. “People expect a gleeman to bring information, so we pull it out and brush it off for display—but much of the ‘news’ we tell is just another batch of stories, in many cases less true than the ballads from a thousand years ago.”
Mat nodded.
“And,” Thom added, “I’ll see if I can dig up hints for the incursion.”
The Tower of Ghenjei. Mat shrugged. “We’re more likely to find what we need in Four Kings or Caemlyn.”
“Yes, I know. But Olver made me promise to check. If you hadn’t set Noal to keeping the boy distracted, I’d expect to open our saddlebags and find him in there. He really wanted to come.”
“A night dancing and gambling is no place for a boy,” Mat muttered. “I just wish I could trust the men back at camp not to corrupt him worse than a tavern would.”
“Well, he stayed back quietly enough once Noal got out the board.” Olver was convinced that if he played Snakes and Foxes enough, he’d pick out some secret strategy for defeating the Aelfinn and Eelfinn. “The lad still thinks he’s coming with us into the tower,” Thom said more quietly. “He knows he can’t be one of the three, but he plans to wait outside for us. Maybe burst in to save us if we don’t come back soon enough. I don’t want to be there when he discovers the truth.”
