Egwene appeared, cautiously leading Bela. She tied the mare's reins to one of the smaller branches of the oak, and made polite sounds when Perrin introduced her to Elyas, but her eyes kept drifting to the rabbits. She did not seem to notice the man's eyes. When Elyas motioned them to the food, she fell to with a will. Perrin hesitated only a minute longer before joining her.

Elyas waited silently while they ate. Perrin was so hungry he tore off pieces of meat so hot he had to juggle them from hand to hand before he could hold them in his mouth. Even Egwene showed little of her usual neatness; greasy juice ran down her chin. Day faded into twilight before they began to slow down, moonless darkness closing in around the fire, and then Elyas spoke.

"What are you doing out here? There isn't a house inside fifty miles in any direction."

"We're going to Caemlyn," Egwene said. "Perhaps you could —" Her eyebrows lifted coolly as Elyas threw back his head and roared with laughter. Perrin stared at him, a rabbit leg half raised to his mouth.

"Caemlyn?" Elyas wheezed when he could talk again. "The path you're following, the line you've taken the last two days, you'll pass a hundred miles or more north of Caemlyn."

"We were going to ask directions," Egwene said defensively. "We just haven't found any villages or farms, yet."

"And none you will," Elyas said, chuckling. "The way you're going, you can travel all the way to the Spine of the World without seeing another human. Of course, if you managed to climb the Spine – it can be done, some places – you could find people in the Aiel Waste, but you wouldn't like it there. You'd broil by day, and freeze by night, and die of thirst anytime. It takes an Aielman to find water in the Waste, and they don't like strangers much. No, not much, I'd say." He set off into another, more furious, burst of laughter, this time actually rolling on the ground. "Not much at all," he managed.

Perrin shifted uneasily. Are we eating with a madman?

Egwene frowned, but she waited until Elyas's mirth faded a little, then said, "Perhaps you could show us the way. You seem to know a good deal more about where places are than we do."

Elyas stopped laughing. Raising his head, he replaced his round fur cap, which had fallen off while he was rolling about, and stared at her from under lowered brows. "I don't much like people," he said in a flat voice. "Cities are full of people. I don't go near villages, or even farms, very often. Villagers, farmers, they don't like my friends. I wouldn't even have helped you if you hadn't been stumbling around as helpless and innocent as newborn cubs."

"But at least you can tell us which way to go," she insisted. "If you direct us to the nearest village, even if it's fifty miles away, surely they'll give us directions to Caemlyn."

"Be still," Elyas said. "My friends are coming."

Bela suddenly whinnied in fear, and began jerking to pull her reins free. Perrin half rose as shapes appeared all around them in the darkening forest. Bela reared and twisted, screaming.

"Quiet the mare," Elyas said. "They won't hurt her. Or you, if you're still."

Four wolves stepped into the firelight, shaggy, waist-high forms with jaws that could break a man's leg. As if the people were not there they walked up to the fire and lay down between the humans. In the darkness among the trees firelight reflected off the eyes of more wolves, on all sides.

Yellow eyes, Perrin thought. Like Elyas's eyes. That was what he had been trying to remember. Carefully watching the wolves among them, he reached for his axe.

"I would not do that," Elyas said. "If they think you mean harm, they'll stop being friendly."

They were staring at him, those four wolves, Perrin saw. He had the feeling that all the wolves, those in the trees, as well, were staring at him. It made his skin itch. Cautiously he moved his hands away from the axe. He imagined he could feel the tension ease among the wolves. Slowly he sat back down; his hands shook until he gripped his knees to stop them. Egwene was so stiff she almost quivered. One wolf, close to black with a lighter gray patch on his face, lay nearly touching her.

Bela had ceased her screaming and rearing. Instead she stood trembling and shifting in an attempt to keep all of the wolves in view, kicking occasionally to show the wolves that she could, intending to sell her life dearly. The wolves seemed to ignore her and everyone else. Tongues lolling out of their mouths, they waited at their ease.

"There," Elyas said. "That's better."

"Are they tame?" Egwene asked faintly, and hopefully, too. "They're ... pets?"

Elyas snorted. "Wolves don't tame, girl, not even as well as men. They're my friends. We keep each other company, hunt together, converse, after a fashion. Just like any friends. Isn't that right, Dapple?" A wolf with fur that faded through a dozen shades of gray, dark and light, turned her head to look at him.

"You talk to them?" Perrin marveled.

"It isn't exactly talking," Elyas replied slowly. "The words don't matter, and they aren't exactly right, either. Her name isn't Dapple. It's something that means the way shadows play on a forest pool at a midwinter dawn, with the breeze rippling the surface, and the tang of ice when the water touches the tongue, and a hint of snow before nightfall in the air. But that isn't quite it, either. You can't say it in words. It's more of a feeling. That's the way wolves talk. The others are Burn, Hopper, and Wind." Burn had an old scar on his shoulder that might explain his name, but there was nothing about the other two wolves to give any indication of what their names might mean.

For all the man's gruffness, Perrin thought Elyas was pleased to have the chance to talk to another human. He seemed eager enough to do it, at least. Perrin eyed the wolves' teeth glistening in the firelight and thought it might be a good idea to keep him talking. "How ... how did you learn to talk to wolves, Elyas?"

"They found out," Elyas replied, "I didn't. Not at first. That's always the way of it, I understand. The wolves find you, not you them. Some people thought me touched by the Dark One, because wolves started appearing wherever I went. I suppose I thought so, too, sometimes. Most decent folk began to avoid me, and the ones who sought me out weren't the kind I wanted to know, one way or another. Then I noticed there were times when the wolves seemed to know what I was thinking, to respond to what was in my head. That was the real beginning. They were curious about me. Wolves can sense people, usually, but not like this. They were glad to find me. They say it's been a long time since they hunted with men, and when they say a long time, the feeling I get is like a cold wind howling all the way down from the First Day."

"I never heard of men hunting with wolves," Egwene said. Her voice was not entirely steady, but the fact that the wolves were just lying there seemed to give her heart.

If Elyas heard her, he gave no sign. "Wolves remember things differently from the way people do," he said. His strange eyes took on a faraway look, as if he were drifting off on the flow of memory himself. "Every wolf remembers the history of all wolves, or at least the shape of it. Like I said, it can't be put into words very well. They remember running down prey side-by-side with men, but it was so long ago that it's more like the shadow of a shadow than a memory."

"That's very interesting," Egwene said, and Elyas looked at her sharply. "No, I mean it. It is." She wet her lips. "Could ... ah ... could you teach us to talk to them?"

Elyas snorted again. "It can't be taught. Some can do it, some can't. They say he can." He pointed at Perrin.

Perrin looked at Elyas's finger as if it were a knife. He really is a madman. The wolves were staring at him again. He shifted uncomfortably."You say you're going to Caemlyn," Elyas said, "but that still doesn't explain what you're doing out here, days from anywhere." He tossed back his fur-patch cloak and lay down on his side, propped on one elbow and waiting expectantly.