Work Text:
“It was wise of you to not answer the Car’a’carn’s summons, Mat Cauthon.”
Mat stirred from his pleasantly drowsy state when Melindhra ducked into the tent—most of the houses and manors in Eianrod were too ruined to spend even a single night in. She placed her spears and buckler on the floor before him, and unwrapped the shoufa around her head. It was not late, but weeks of hard riding had worn him down, and Rand had been keen to push quickly through Jangai Pass. No, lingering there would not have been wise; the scouts had found no Shaido hiding in the rocks, but their camp had been attacked by Darkfriends shortly after they arrived at Taien. The Forsaken could have chosen to ambush them and slaughter their forces if they had used the One Power to hide Darkfriends in the pass. Just as the Battle of Jolvaine Pass had descended into a bloody slaughter ending only when—
“The Car’a’carn’s summons?” he asked distractedly, shivering. Nobody had said that Rand had summoned him that he heard of—the Aiel had enough gai’shain to make certain that he could be found if he was needed.
“He has chosen a building for himself and named it the Roof of the Winespring Brothers,” Melindhra said, giving him a sidelong look as she unlaced her boots. “And declared that no one can enter who has not tasted the Winespring itself. The Maidens were laying bets on whether you would share his shade tonight. I myself told them you would not.” There was a suggestiveness in that sentence as she started to take off her cadin’sor that tempted Mat, and yet…
“The Roof of the Winespring Brothers?” he asked slowly. It seemed Rand had time to spare for his old friends after all. If the Maidens had been making bets on whether he would approach Rand, there might be more truth to it than Mat might believe. He shot to his feet. “I think I will see him tonight, Melindhra.”
“You are his equal,” Melindhra said, sounding disapproving now. “Does he not dishonour you by not inviting a near-brother to his roof himself? Even a chief is expected to afford more courtesy to a near-brother; if he really intended to share his shade with you, he should have at least sent a gai’shain to fetch you.”
“Dishonour me?” He asked incredulously. “It’s not all so complicated as all that, Melindhra.” Aiel ways of honour were too arcane to unravel by himself, and Mat doubted Rand would expect him to understand all that anyway. But he could sense that Melindhra was unhappy—she was often displeased that Mat was content living in Rand’s shadow, as she liked to say—so he added, reluctantly, “I’ll return later, likely.” He would share a few drinks with Rand, and if he did not fall asleep before dawn, he would keep his word to Melindhra.
That pleased her. He let her kiss him, briefly, before striding out of the tent. While the night was warmer than it should have been at this time of the year, Mat found his palms feeling slick for entirely different reasons. He had to hasten his steps when he slipped past a street that had nearly been burnt to the last timber—the streets of Eianrod might have been once prosperous, but the city had suffered several calumnies as the civil war in Cairhien escalated until it seemed there would be no end to it. The last round of burning had been enacted by bandits and thieves, however, if the broken furniture and shattered belongings scattered in the streets were any indication—but the arsonry that had taken place in Eianrod held not even a candle to the flame of the tragedy that had befallen Aren Mador when the First Lord had been murdered, shortly before the—
Bloody ashes, it had not been this bad in Rhuidean. Those folk on the other side of the doorway had given him more than he bargained for, and rushing headlong into the ravaged landscape left behind by the Shaido only seemed to tease out memories that did not belong to him more often than not—he had plenty of those to spare, and too few of the pleasant kind. Battles, most of them, and Mat was always hard-pressed to find a memory that might have carried any joy in it.
The Roof of the Winespring Brothers. The name clanged through his head like it was trying to burst out of it, a worse violation of his mind than the memories that had been planted in his head, in some ways. Rand could have chosen any name to keep the Maidens away—had he thought he would get rid of them that easily? Mat hardly managed to weasel out of entertaining Melindhra some nights, and had to insist that he was in no mood for it before she would believe him! The Maidens of the Spear certainly didn’t seem to be trying hard to conceal how closely they watched the building—it seemed to Mat that they were humouring Rand in his little game. Rand could try to keep them out of his roof, but that only meant they could set themselves right at his doorstep, and he could not protest that because they were not breaking any rule.
A Maiden squatting on the steps rose to her feet the moment he started up the steps toward the door. “I see you, Mat Cauthon,” Sulin said. “How do you fare, tonight?”
“I’ve been keeping well.” Mat waved at the door impatiently. “Did Rand really summon me?”
“If it was his wish to have you summoned, he did not tell us,” Sulin said ponderously, but with sufficient scepticism that Mat wavered. But she stood aside before he could let that tendril of doubt and suspicion sink its claws into him, and the gai’shain that Rand had not been able to keep away led him straight to Rand’s chambers, as if there was no doubt that it had been a summons all along.
“Summon?” Rand asked, brows rising, when Mat stepped through the door. His profile was dimly lit by the candlelight in the room—the edges of his tattooed wrists glittered gold in the shifting light, as the flames danced in the breeze wafting through the windows thrown wide open. “I did not summon you, Mat. I was simply hoping to spend a night by myself—there’s hardly a moment of peace when I am around the Maidens.” When Mat hesitated at the doorstep, trying to ignore the sudden acrid taste in his mouth, he added, “But it’s just as well that you’re here. I could do with a bit of advice.”
Mat shut the door behind him. It was well and good that the gai’shain here could attend to their needs, but privacy was always a luxury one could never have too much of. “Advice that chiefs or Lan can’t offer?” he asked dryly. Two Rivers folk would have doubled over and laughed themselves hoarse if they thought Mat could offer Rand any advice that did not eventually land them both in a fine mess. Lan and the Aiel certainly would have.
“This and that,” Rand said, and launched into an explanation about the Tairen and Cairhienin lords who had found him and explained the situation in Cairhien at present. “I told Rhuarc and Mangin to treat Estean as he would a fellow ally when they questioned him, but how far can he be trusted? Do you think he’s the sort of man who would have sold himself out to Couladin to mislead us? You know them better than I do.”
He supposed he had gambled with them, but that had nearly been the extent of their acquaintance. Too often, only the promise of gold to be won had kept Mat from reaching across the table to strangle some young lordling when they launched into one of their drunken tirades about the peasants.
He took a moment to compose himself first, pouring himself a drink to soothe his parched mouth. Rand stepped aside so that he could reach for the pitcher—it was only lately that Mat had become aware of how tall he was—how tall Rand had always been—since the Aiel had taken the Stone of Tear. “Faithful?” he asked, as Rand started to pace. “You know how faithful they are, Rand. But Estean and Edorion don’t have the spine to lie to your face.” This Couladin fellow sounded like the sort who used his knives first and his head last; he was out for every Treekiller’s blood, as the Aiel liked to say, and Mat doubted he could set his self-importance aside long enough to think of them as anything less than animals, much less scheme with them. Melindhra had described him often, and even her distaste for his actions had become abundantly clear to Mat. He couldn’t help a wince, though—he did not think Rhuarc was cruel, but he did not know Mangin well. “Are you sure Mangin will not—”
“He will not hurt Estean,” Rand said firmly. “He can be quick with his blade sometimes, but I trust him.” A strange laugh—Rand never used to laugh like that before. Mat found his hackles rising whenever Rand laughed to himself like that. Either he had grown fond of telling himself jokes that he cared not to share with his company or the—
“I find myself thinking I could easily find common interest with him,” Rand continued, distracting Mat from the thought. Mat took the liberty of tugging his coat off and draping it on the only chair in the room.
“He seems like a fine fellow,” Mat told him politely. The night air was warm enough to make a coat uncomfortable—coat buttoned all the way up, Mat wondered how Rand hadn’t broken into a sweat, by now. He hardly seemed to notice the heat these days—odd that. He was Aiel by birth, but he’d grown up in the Two Rivers, same as Mat.
“It’s easy to like him because he’s much the same as you,” Rand said. He stopped pacing. “I think you would like him, Mat.”
Mat grunted. “You don’t make friends all the time wondering how much they’re like me, do you?” When his words were met only with silence, Mat stared at him. “Do you, Rand?” He had to feel stuffy in that coat. Why was he wearing all the buttons even in his bedchambers? It was an itch starting to bother Mat enough that he asked, before Rand could answer, “Aren’t you going to take the coat off? I didn’t expect I would find myself missing the bloody Waste, but I’d sooner freeze in the dark instead of stewing in this miserable heat.” Sometimes he woke in the mornings wondering whether he had ever left the Waste.
Rand started to open his mouth—he could only begin to guess which of Mat’s questions he intended to answer—but that itch had grown so persistent that Mat found himself crossing the distance between them and tugging the buttons off before Rand could say anything. “You can thank me later for this,” he muttered. If he fainted from the heat, the Aiel would blame Mat for it, no doubt, and tell him that he had toh to Rand, as his near-brother, for not caring for him like Far Dareis Mai would have in his place. The red silk parted to reveal a shirt beneath, an exposed collarbone, the arch of a long neck that the long collar had concealed; Rand was taller—and the Wastes had made him harder too. “Not so terrifying up close,” Mat realised he was saying. This close, Rand just seemed like ordinary flesh. The buttons were undone, but he was still wearing the coat, and somehow Mat could not bring himself to finish the act. His fingers skittered across Rand’s heart, through his shirt—his heart was beating very fast. Why was his heart beating so fast?
He felt Rand’s fingers under his chin. “I look for you in everything I see,” Rand said, as if it was the answer to every question Mat had, and slid his fingers back along Mat’s jaw to wind it in his hair before pulling him in for a kiss.
It would be difficult for Mat to remember, later, exactly why he kissed him back or how the rest of it happened. But Mat remembered feverishly tugging at his shirt, feeling a fierce sense of pleasure when his fingers finally managed to slip past all those layers of cloth and finally found skin. Not so terrifying. This was Rand al’Thor—this was his friend. And he had asked Mat to stay, when Mat had hesitated on the doorstep. He let out a gasp that might have been Rand’s name when he frantically pulled Mat’s shirt over his head before reaching for the rest of his clothes, making quick work of his own pants and smallclothes before they stumbled into the mattress.
Rough hands—now moulded to fit a sword and bearing the proof of prophecy—seemed to reach for places on him that he could never have imagined Rand would have wanted to touch. His head spun. If somebody had told Mat he was drowning, or drunk, or dying, he would have agreed to any of the three, or all. His own hands skidded across Rand’s skin, now slick with sweat. Rand buried his face in Mat’s shoulder, stumbling and crushing the breath out of him with his weight when Mat reached between the ever-narrowing space between their bodies. He was overcome, lost although Rand’s ta’veren tug was a beacon that had called to him, haunting his every waking moment since as long as he could remember it existing.
He didn’t believe he could have brought himself to put a stop to it, even had he wanted to. Had Rand ever spent a night learning all the things people could do together this way? He doubted it. Mat himself had never been with a man before; but that did not matter. It put them on more even footing that Rand might begin to realise—Mat didn’t feel nearly this uncertain or overcome when he spent the nights with Melindhra.
Calling luck his friend, burning with wonder and triumph with each new sensation, Mat drew Rand in for another kiss and gave himself over to the heat and haze of the moment.
“You’re promised to Elayne, of course,” Mat said, later, his foxhead shining in the moonlight as he rose out of the bed. Rand had never taken it off, because he found himself dreaming another man’s memories and doing and saying things he could never remember wanting too often, these days. If the ter’angreal protected Mat from him, it was better that he kept it close.
While he was lost in his thoughts, Mat had wandered over to the windows and was studying the Maidens who were guarding the streets, absently pulling his trousers on as he did so. He did not seem in any hurry to pick up the shirt Rand had tossed on the floor in his haste—and well for Rand. He enjoyed looking at Mat, although he didn’t know if Mat would like being told that.
They’d seen plenty of one another growing up in the Two Rivers, as childhood friends were wont to do, but never in the way they had tonight; there had been daydreams, hungry glimpses at an exposed strip of skin or a lingering of a gaze over the rise of Mat’s throat, but not in a way he could understand what it might mean. Now that he thought he had an inkling of an idea about what it did, Rand didn’t know what to make of it.
He propped himself up on an elbow. “I’m not promised to her,” Rand protested. Why did everybody insist that sharing a few kisses with Elayne made him hers? Aviendha hardly went a day without reminding him that he belonged to her or trying to describe her features while he spluttered and desperately tried to get her to stop. Of all the people he had hoped would insist that it was the case, he’d least expected Mat to be one of them. “No more than you intend to give up the spear for Melindhra.”
When Mat blinked in uncomprehending confusion, he explained how some men allowed Far Dareis Mai who had no intention to give up the spear to take them gai’shain in order to capture their attention.
“I’m no Aiel,” Mat said dismissively. “We were only indulging each other, and I made no promises to Melindhra.”
“Just indulging each other?” Rand asked weakly. He thought he could still imagine Mat’s sweat-beaded lip hovering over his face, feel the slip-slide of their limbs against one another, and his gasps stirring the hair on his skin when Rand did something that made Mat forget himself. Not for the first time, he wished Mat was not standing so far away. It always seemed they managed to end up looking at one another only across the farthest corners of a room.
“You won’t tell on me to Nynaeve, will you?” Mat asked suspiciously, while Rand was still wishing Mat had stayed in bed so that they could wait long enough to perhaps once again—
Rand stared at him. Tell on…? “Of course not.” In the Two Rivers, the Women’s Circle would have descended down on the pair of them like a storm of crows, and given them a sound lecturing until they wished they had never been born at all, but they were far from home now. “Do you still intend to leave, Mat?” The words tumbled out of him before he could stop himself. Cursing himself for a fool as Mat shifted on his feet, he added hastily, “I will not ask you to be a soldier. But we all have our place in the Pattern. You do yourself no favours by denying it and trying to run from the inevitable. I will need you by my side in the Last Battle, if I am to stand any chance of winning it.”
It had been the wrong thing to say; Rand knew it even before Mat’s shoulders tensed and his mouth tightened at the corners. “You let Perrin leave.”
“Perrin did what he wanted to do,” Rand said wearily. “What he had to, but—” He hesitated. “I don’t want you to think I would ever force you to stay, Mat.”
“You wouldn’t force me,” Mat repeated with some disappointment, as if he had hoped for something else. What else could Rand say to make it more plain? He watched Mat, warily, when he lowered himself to the edge of the bed and stuffed his feet into his boots. “The Maidens think you gave Aviendha a regard-gift. I thought you were fond of Elayne.” Rand thought he detected an accusation there.
“It was not a regard-gift,” Rand muttered, without any real heart.
“Elayne has no competition, then,” Mat said, breathing a sigh of relief, even if Rand had been unable to dredge up any real conviction to his tone. He hesitated a moment before throwing back the sheets, angling slightly away from Mat while he quickly scrambled back into his own clothes. He could sense Mat’s gaze on him anyway, a torturous, steady awareness that was trained on him the whole time. “I should return to my tent.” It sounded like a question.
Was that an invitation? But although Rand had hoped Mat would stay, he had asked Asmodean to visit him tonight. “That would be for the best.”
Mat was nodding along. “I did… enjoy it,” he added. “I forget sometimes that you and I… we used to be closer before.” He sounded wistful. It twisted his insides to hear Mat talk that way.
“I wouldn’t be opposed to spending more time with you,” Rand said carefully. “I try, Mat, but you know I have responsibilities.” If he tried to tell Mat any more, Mat would surely leave him and ride home, then. His first words to Rand after climbing out of bed had been to remind him that another woman already held his heart. For no reason he could understand, Rand found himself thinking of how Bael and Dorindha had married Melaine before crossing the Spine of the World.
“A great mountain of it,” Mat agreed. He patted Rand’s thigh awkwardly. “But you have a friend in me. You don’t have to search for other friends to replace me.”
“How could anybody replace you?” Rand asked him. Mat’s mouth parted, as if he was surprised to hear that—in a way that made Rand desperately wish that he could stop thinking of how his mouth had tasted. While he was still wondering whether he would try risking another kiss, there was a knock on the door. “That will be the gleeman,” he said reluctantly. Asmodean had arrived earlier than he had expected, so it was well that they had managed to finish dressing. Rand could almost convince himself that nothing had happened between them if he tried hard enough—it was not too difficult.
“Of course,” Mat said, neutrally. “I never thought you were so fond of music.”
“In passing,” Rand said, feeling the strange urge to explain himself. “I’m more interested in the tales he can tell me about the Forsaken.” It was not untrue, but Mat had seemed to think Rand was terrifying, he recalled with a pang—how could Mat hope to feel safe around him when he kept a Forsaken’s company?
But Mat had already risen to his feet and slipped out of the room, as if Rand’s confession that he was irreplaceable had managed to spook him. Rand rose from the bed and warded the room while Asmodean entered and shut the door. He met the Forsaken's dark, oily gaze when he was finished. “Tell me what you intend to teach me today, Asmodean.”