The best kept secret

Chapter 3: Guinevere

Guinevere let the box slip from her hands with an indifferent motion, the sound of its contents clattering echoed through the room as it hit the floor. She wistfully glanced around the sombre chambers that belonged to her aunt, struggling to get a hold of her thoughts. She's here. What is she doing in Cairhien after all these years? She's mean and rude to my mother. She can't bear to look at my face and ignores me. She's left again. Why is she so cold and unapproachable? She's leaving again and she's carrying a sword. She can't channel.

She can't touch the Source.

It made so much sense. Why she couldn't feel her, why she couldn't reach to her with the One Power.

She's been stilled.

Guinevere dropped into the mattress, closing her eyes in the process. What in the Creator's name is going on here? The young girl pressed her hands over her forehead, frustrated, trying to put the pieces together, organising her thoughts, folding files of information in drawers within her mind.

Moiraine has been looking for the Dragon Reborn all these years.

Moiraine entered the White Tower with five potential dragons.

Moiraine was exiled from the Tower.

Moiraine left for the Eye of the World, and everyone came back except for one, a male channeler. The Dragon Reborn, presumed dead, at least by Egwene.

Moiraine went missing for months.

Moiraine has been stilled.

Now Moiraine is in Cairhien, searching for something, or someone, she believes to be in danger.

What will the Tower do about it?

Guinevere shot back up at such thought, her heart pounding in her chest, and started to anxiously pace around the room, clicking her fingers in the process. The Amyrlin. She'd completely forgotten about the woman's request. "If you hear from Moiraine, let me know". Guinevere was intruded by a thought upon remembering her words: the older women ought to have known something.

Could the Amyrlin suspect of Moiraine's doings? No, that's unlikely, her fate would have been worse than exile. Unless... they were in it together. Were Siuan aware of Moiraine's endeavours, it wouldn't be the first time she'd heard such rumours of the two women; everyone at the Tower knew they used to be friends as Novices. But why, why was Moiraine hiding from the Amyrlin then? What was she hiding? Maybe she's gone rogue.

And what was she doing in Cairhien? Why did she leave in the middle of the night with a sword on her back? It was too big a puzzle and Guinevere had nothing but vague pieces, she needed more information, but there was no one she could go to willing to provide her some answers.

That night, she had an intriguing dream that bore an uncanny resemblance to a memory, stirring an unsettling sense of familiarity within her.

She couldn't have been more than five years old, and she was crying, scared and confused about all the screaming around her, people pulling on her little body, demanding to take her away. Her father was there, staring with pleading eyes at the woman holding her, Anvaere by his side, extending her arms towards her, and Guinevere wanted to get to her more than anything in the world. To reach her mama. And then, suddenly, her screaming turned into soft whimpers, as she was being carried around her home in her mother's arms. Only it wasn't her mother, it was her Aunt Moiraine. "Shh, it's alright, my dear Winnie. Everything's alright," she soothed her, stroking her hair and whispering comforting words as she walked into what must have been her nursery as a toddler. "Shh," the woman kept on whispering, lovingly caressing her back, "it's alright, I'm here, your mother is here."