Mael
So now he was officially an Asha’man of the Grey Tower. Mael wondered idly if he should feel any different. He’d been given quarters in the Red Ajah section of the Tower; the place was bigger than what he’d had in the Black Tower, but then, he had ever spent little enough time there. Looking around, he wondered if this place would ever feel like home. The Black Tower hadn’t, not really.
His gaze fell on the flowers in a delicate vase on the tea table. That had been Marle’s doing; the Yellow had simply flashed an enigmatic smile when Mael had — very politely — tried to protest that he didn’t need flowers. Mael had placed a Keeping on them, anyway, once the Healer had gone.
He’d spent most of the night staring at those flowers as though they could answer his questions.
They didn’t.
Oddly enough, though he’d only got a couple of hours of sleep in the end, he felt well enough rested this morning. Rationally thinking, he didn’t imagine the flowers had anything to do with it… Or maybe they had, if not in a medicinal way. There had not been too much… kindness, in his life in the Black Tower, and he didn’t quite know what to do when faced with it now, but he did know that if the Grey Tower was an environment that could nurture the kindness inherent in people like Marle instead of killing it… He still wasn’t sure he belonged here, but he wanted to try.
And that was why he headed out to meet with Kosari as soon as he was done with his breakfast; he’d joined the Red Ajah for a reason, and unlike most of the rest of the Tower at present, Kosari was willing to work with him.
Mael couldn’t say he was much impressed with the man calling himself M’Hael around here — Feroce Liendin reminded him too much of Artan Sandhill, a petty bureaucrat, but perhaps there were hidden depths to the Cairhienin if people like Kosari tolerated his leadership. Liendin’s female counterpart, Ninya Evoneigh, seemed a beast of a slightly different nature, perhaps, and not much different from what Mael would have expected of an Aes Sedai of any Tower. As for the Gaidin who made up the last third of the Triumvirate, as they called it… Ravak Darrow was a Borderlander and Mael was sure he could find something to respect in the man, but at a glance he seemed like someone better suited to the battlefield than politics and his presence in the Hall had felt a little jarring.
The room he entered was bright and elegant, consistent with what Mael had already come to associate as Kosari’s style. Mael noted the untouched breakfast on the desk, and it took him a second to identify the odd twinge of pain the sight brought; nothing else about the space or Kosari himself reminded him of Alastair in any way, but Mael couldn’t count the times he’d found Alastair so immersed in his work that his food had gone cold untouched. Mael had commented on it, once or twice, only to have his concern brushed irritably aside.
He pushed the memory aside; he wasn’t ready to deal with that yet. Investigating his death was one thing, even avenging him if it came to that… Remembering all the little details of living and working with him, quite another.
He took the offered seat and looked at Kosari. “My questions are simple enough,” he said, “though I suspect finding the answers will be anything but.” He’d thought about this a lot in the past couple of days, and he still didn’t see a way to proceed that wouldn’t end in a disaster. And even bigger disaster. “I want to know what happened. I want to know what triggered a confrontation now, when the entire time I’ve known him… knew him… Alastair took care not to upset the balance too much. He always said he wasn’t tired of his life yet.”
He shook his head with a slight grimace. Wild, black curls fell forward over his eyes and he brushed them back with an impatient gesture. “There’s a theory,” he began slowly. “One that I’m almost not sure I should suggest out loud… But,” and he leaned forward a little, eyes intent on the man before him, “I expect you’ve seen and heard worse in your time. There’s one thing that could have made Alastair take action, no matter how desperate it seemed. And that is if he found evidence that the M’Hael of the Black Tower was a Darkfriend. Hells, maybe they found out that Alastair knew and decided to take him out before he could act.”