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assuming responsibility for Tuon’s safety. And for that apology,
    should it become necessary. “Dislike” was too mild a word. She loathed Galgan.
    “A mutiny?” she said, proud of the coolness of her voice. Inside, she had begun to burn.
    Galgan’s white queue swung slowly as he shook his head. “No. All reports say our
    Taraboners have fought well, and we’ve had a few successes, taken a few prisoners. Not
    one of them can be found on the rosters of loyal Taraboners. Several have been identified
    as Dragonsworn believed to be up in Arad Doman. And the name Rodel Ituralde has been
    mentioned a number of times as the brain behind it all, and the leader. A Domani. He’s
    supposed to be one of the best generals this side of the ocean, and if he planned and
    carried out all this,” he swept a hand over the map, “then I believe it.” The fool sounded
    admiring! “Not a mutiny. A raid on a grand scale. But he won’t get out with nearly as
    many men as he brought in.”
    Dragonsworn. The word was like a fist clutching Suroth’s throat. “Are there Asha’man?”
    “Those fellows who can channel?” Galgan grimaced and made a sign against evil,
    apparently unconscious of doing so. “There was no mention of them,” he said dryly, “and
    I rather think there would have been.”
    Red-hot anger needed to erupt at Galgan, but screaming at another of the High Blood
    would lower her eyes. And, as bad, gain nothing. Still, it had to be directed somewhere. It
    had to come out. She was proud of what she had done in Tarabon, and now the country
    appeared to be halfway back to the chaos she found when she first landed there. And one
    man was to blame. “This Ituralde.” Her tone was ice. “I want his head!”
    “Never fear,” Galgan murmured, folding his hands behind his back and bending to
    examine some of the small banners. “It won’t be long before Turan chases him back to
    Arad Doman with his tail between his legs, and with luck, he’ll be with one of the bands
    we snap up.”
    “Luck?” she snapped. “I don’t trust to luck!” Her anger was open, now, and she did not
    consider trying to suppress it again. Her eyes scanned the map as though she could find
    Ituralde that way. “If Turan is hunting a hundred bands, as you suggest, he’ll need more
    scouts to run them down, and I want them run down. Every last one of them. Especially
    Ituralde. General Yulan, I want four in every five—no, nine in every ten—raken in Altara
    and Amadicia moved to Tarabon. If Turan can’t find them all with that, then he can see if
    his own head will appease me.”
    Yulan, a dark little man in a blue robe embroidered with black-crested eagles, must have
    dressed in too great a hurry to apply the gum that normally held his wig in place, because
    he was constantly touching the thing to make sure it was straight. He was Captain of the
    Air for the Forerunners, but the Return’s Captain of the Air was only a Banner-General, a
    more senior man having died on the voyage. Yulan would have no trouble with him.
    “A wise move, High Lady,” he said, frowning at the map, “but may I suggest leaving the
    raken in Amadicia and those assigned to Banner-General Khirgan. Raken are the best
    way we have to locate Aiel, and in two days we still haven’t found those Whitecloaks.
    That will still give General Turan—”
    “The Aiel are less of a problem every day,” she told him firmly, “and a few deserters are
    nothing.” He inclined his head in assent, one hand keeping his wig in place. He was only
    low Blood, after all.
    “I hardly call seven thousand men a few deserters,” Galgan murmured dryly.
    “It shall be as I command!” she snapped. Curse those so-called Children of the Light! She
    still had not decided whether to make Asunawa and the few thousand who had remained
    da’covale. They had remained, yet how long before they offered betrayal, too? And
    Asunawa seemed to hate damane, of all things. The man was