Towers of Midnight (21 page)

"Jowdry," Chaser said as Mat shook his dice. "They found him dead this morning. Throat ripped clean out. Body was drained of blood, like a wineskin full of holes."

Mat was so startled that he threw the dice, but did not watch them roll. "What?" he demanded. "What did you say?"

"Here now," Chaser said, looking toward Mat. "It's just someone we knew. Owed me two crowns, he did."

"Drained of blood," Mat said. "Are you sure? Did you see the body?" "What?" Chaser said, grimacing. "Bloody ashes, man! What's wrong with you?"

"I-"

"Chaser," Clare said. "Will you look at that?"

The lean man glanced down, as did Mat. The dice he had tossed
 
all three of them
 
had landed still and were balanced on their corners. Light! He had tossed coins so they fell on their sides before, but he had never done anything like this.

Right there, all of a sudden, the dice started rattling inside his head. He almost jumped clear to the ceiling. Blood and bloody ashes! Those dice in his head never meant anything good. They only stopped when something changed, something that usually meant bad news for poor Marrim Cau-thon.

"I ain't never . . ." Chaser said.

"We'll call that a loss," Mat said, tossing a few coins down and scooping up the rest of his winnings.

"What do you know about Jowdry?" Clare demanded. She was reaching for her waist. Mat would have bet gold against coppers on her having a knife there, the way she glared at him.

"Nothing," Mat said. Nothing and too much at the same time. "Excuse me."

He hastily crossed the tavern. As he did, he noticed one of the thick-armed toughs from the door standing and talking to Bernherd the tavern-keeper, pointing at a piece of paper in his hands. Mat could not see what was on it, but he could guess: his own face.

He cursed and ducked out onto the street. He took the first alley he saw, breaking into a run.

The Forsaken hunting him, a picture of his face in the pocket of every footpad in the city and a corpse killed and drained of its blood. That could only mean one thing. The gholam was in Caemlyn. It seemed impossible that it could have gotten here this quickly. Of course, Mat had seen it squeeze through a hole not two handspans wide. The thing did not seem to have a right sense of what was possible and what was not possible.

Blood and bloody ashes, he thought, ducking his head. He needed to collect Thom and get back to the Band's camp outside of the city. He hastened down the dark, rain-slicked street. Paving stones reflected the lit oil lamps ahead. Elayne kept the Queen's Walk well illuminated at night.

He had sent word to her, but had not gotten a reply. How was that for gratitude? By his count, he had saved her life twice. Once should have been enough to reduce her to tears and kisses, but he had not seen even a peck

on the cheek. Not that he wanted one; not from royalty. Best to avoid them.

You're married to a bloody high lady of the Seanchan, he thought. Daughter of the Empress herself. There was no avoiding royalty now! Not for him. At least Tuon was pretty. And good at playing stones. And very keen of wit, good for talking to, even if she was flaming frustrating most of the . . .

No. No thinking of Tuon right now.

Anyway, he had received no reply from Elayne. He would need to be more firm. It was not just Aludra and her dragons now. The bloody gholam was in the city.

He stepped out onto a large, busy street, hands pushed into the pockets of his coat. In his haste, he had left his walking staff back in The Dead Man's Breath. He grumbled to himself; he was supposed to be spending his days relaxing, his nights dicing in fine inns, and his mornings sleeping late while waiting for Verin's thirty-day requirement to run out. Now this.

He had a score to settle with that gholam. The innocents it had slaughtered while lurking around Ebou Dar were bad enough, and Mat had not forgotten Nalesean and the five Redarms who had been murdered either. Bloody ashes, it had had enough to answer for already. Then it had taken Tylin.

Mat removed a hand from his pocket, feeling at the foxhead medallion, resting
 
as always
 
against his chest. He was tired of running from that monster. A plan started to form in his mind, accompanied by the rattling of dice. He tried to banish the image of the Queen lying in bonds Mat himself had tied, her head ripped free. There would have been so much blood. The gholam lived on fresh blood.

Mat shivered, shoving his hand back into his pocket as he approached the city gate. Despite the darkness, he could pick out signs of the battle that had been fought here. An arrowhead embedded into the doorway of a building to his left, a dark patch on the wall of a guardhouse, staining the wood beneath the window. A man had died there, perhaps while firing a crossbow out, and had slumped down over the window's ledge, bleeding his lifeblood down the wood.

That siege was over now, and a new Queen
 
the right Queen
 
held the throne. For once, there had been a battle and he had missed it. Remembering that lightened his mood somewhat. An entire war had been fought over the Lion Throne, and not one arrow, blade or spear had entered the conflict seeking Matrim Cauthon's heart.

He turned right, along the inside of the city wall. There were a lot of

inns here. There were always inns near city gates. Not the nicest ones, but almost always the most profitable ones.

Light spilled from doorways and windows, painting the road golden in patches. Dark forms crowded the alleyways except where the inns had hired men to keep the poor away. Caemlyn was strained. The flood of refugees, the recent fighting, the . . . other matters. Stories abounded of the dead walking, of food spoiling, of whitewashed walls suddenly going grimy.

The inn where Thorn had chosen to perform was a steep-roofed, brick-fronted structure with a sign that showed two apples, one eaten down to the core. That made it stark white, the other was stark red
 
colors of the An-doran flag. The Two Apples was one of the nicer establishments in the area.

Mat could hear the music from outside. He entered and saw Thorn sitting atop a small dais on the far side of the common room, playing his flute and wearing his patchwork gleeman's cloak. His eyes were closed as he played, his mustache drooping long and white on either side of the instrument. It was a haunting tune, "The Marriage of Cinny Wade." Mat had learned it as "Always Choose the Right Horse," and still was not used to it being performed as slowly as Thorn did.

A small collection of coins was scattered on the floor in front of Thom. The inn allowed him to play for tips. Mat stopped near the doorway and leaned back to listen. Nobody spoke in the common room, though it was stuffed so full Mat could have made half a company of soldiers just with the men inside. Every eye was on Thom.

Mat had been all around the world now, walking a great deal of it on his own two feet. He had nearly lost his skin in a dozen different cities, and had stayed in inns far and near. He had heard gleemen, performers and bards. Thom made the entire lot seem like children with sticks, banging on pots.

The flute was a simple instrument. A lot of nobles would rather hear the harp instead; one man in Ebou Dar had told Mat the harp was more "elevated." Mat figured he would have gone slack-jawed and saucer-eyed if he had heard Thom play. The gleeman made the flute sound like an extension of his own soul. Soft trills, minor scales and powerfully bold long holds. Such a lamenting melody. Who was Thom sorrowing for?

The crowd watched. Caemlyn was one of the greatest cities in the world, but still the variety seemed incredible. Crusty Illianers sat beside smooth Domani, crafty Cairhienin, stout Tairens and a sprinkling of Bor-derlanders. Caemlyn was seen as one of the few places where one could be safe from both the Seanchan and the Dragon. There was a bit of food, too.

Thorn finished the piece and moved on to another without opening his eyes. Mat sighed, hating to break up Thorn's performance. Unfortunately, it was time to be moving on back to camp. They had to talk about the gholam, and Mat needed to find a way to get through to Elayne. Maybe Thorn would go talk to her for him.

Mat nodded to the innkeeper
 
a stately, dark-haired woman named Bromas. She nodded to Mat, hoop earrings catching the light. She was a little older than his normal taste
 
but then, Tylin had been her age. He would keep her in mind. For one of his men, of course. Maybe Vanin.

Mat reached the stage, then began to scoop up the coins. He would let Thorn finish and
 

Mat's hand jerked. His arm was suddenly pinned by the cuff to the stage, a knife sticking through the cloth. The thin length of metal quivered. Mat glanced up to find Thorn still playing, though the gleeman had cracked an eye before throwing the knife.

Thom raised his hand back up and continued playing, a smile showing on his puckered lips. Mat grumbled and yanked his cuff free, waiting as Thom finished this tune, which was not as doleful as the other. When the lanky gleeman lowered the flute, the room burst into applause.

Mat favored the gleeman with a scowl. "Burn you, Thom. This is one of my favorite coats!"

"Be glad I did not aim for the hand," Thom noted, wiping down the flute, nodding to the cheering and applause of the inn's patrons. They called for him to continue, but he shook a regretful head and replaced his flute in its case.

"I almost wish you would have," Mat said, raising his cuff and sticking a finger through the holes. "Blood would not have shown that much on the black, but the stitching will be obvious. Just because you wear more patches than cloak doesn't mean I want to imitate you."

"And you complain that you're not a lord," Thom said, leaning down to collect his earnings.

"I'm not!" Mat said. "And never mind what Tuon said, burn you. I'm no bloody nobleman."

"Ever heard of a farmer complaining that his coat stitches would show?"

"You don't have to be a lord to want to dress with some sense," Mat grumbled.

Thom laughed, slapping him on the back and hopping down. "I'm sorry, Mat. I moved by instinct, didn't realize it was you until I saw the face attached to the arm. By then, the knife was already out of my fingers."

Mat sighed. "Thom," he said grimly, "an old friend is in town. One who leaves folks dead with their throats ripped clean out."

Thom nodded, looking troubled. "I heard about it from some Guardsmen during my break. And we're stuck here in the city unless you decide . . ."

"I'm not opening the letter," Mat said. "Verin could have left instructions for me to crawl all the way to Falme on my hands, and I'd bloody have to do it! I know you hate the delay, but that letter could make a much worse delay."

Thom nodded reluctantly.

"Let's get back to camp," Mat said.

The Band's camp was a league outside of Caemlyn. Thom and Mat had not ridden in
 
walkers were less conspicuous, and Mat would not bring horses into the city until he found a stable that he trusted. The price of good horses was getting ridiculous. He had hoped to leave that behind once he left Seanchan lands, but Elayne's armies were buying up every good horse they could find, and most of the not-so-good ones, too. Beyond that, he had heard that horses had a way of disappearing these days. Meat was meat, and people were close to starving, even in Caemlyn. It made Mat's skin crawl, but it was the truth.

He and Thom spent the walk back talking about the gholam, deciding very little other than to make everyone alert and have Mat start sleeping in a different tent every night.

Mat glanced over his shoulder as the two of them crested a hilltop. Caemlyn was ablaze with the light of torches and lamps. Illumination hung over the city like a fog, grand spires and towers lit by the glow. The old memories inside him remembered this city
 
remembered assaulting it before Andor was even a nation. Caemlyn had never made for an easy fight. He did not envy the Houses that had tried to seize it from Elayne.

Thom stepped up beside him. "It seems like forever since we left here last, doesn't it, Mat?"

"Burn me, but it does," Mat said. "What ever convinced us to go hunting those fool gir's? Next time, they can save themselves."

Thom eyed him. "Aren't we about to do the same thing? When we go to the Tower of Ghenjei?"

"It's different. We can't leave her with them. Those snakes and foxes
 
"

"I'm not complaining, Mat," Thom said. "I'm just thoughtful."

Thom seemed thoughtful a lot, lately. Moping around, caressing that

worn letter from Moiraine. It was only a letter. "Come on," Mat said, turning back along the road. "You were telling me about getting in to see the Queen?"

Thom joined him on the dark roadway. "I'm not surprised she hasn't replied to you, Mat. She's probably got her hands full. Word is that Trollocs have invaded the Borderlands in force, and Andor is still fractured from the Succession. Elayne
 
"

"Do you have any good news, Thom?" Mat said. "Tell me some, if you do. I've a mind for it."

"I wish that The Queen's Blessing were still open. Gill always had tidbits to share."

"Good news," Mat prodded again.