Two days of quiet ended with a knock on the inn's door.
Spencer was in the common room when it happened, nursing a cup of tea and trying to ignore the anxiety that had been building since the Palace incident. Mat was upstairs, sleeping again — the corruption still draining his energy, still feeding on his paranoia despite Spencer's best efforts to keep him calm. Rand was somewhere in the city, probably staring at the Palace walls and thinking about red-gold hair.
The knock was firm. Authoritative. The knock of someone who expected to be admitted.
Master Gill opened the door, and Spencer's Thread Sight exploded with familiar signatures.
---
Moiraine's silver-blue thread entered first, controlled and purposeful as always. Lan's gray-green followed, coiled and ready for violence. Behind them came threads Spencer hadn't seen since Shadar Logoth — Egwene's bright potential, Nynaeve's fierce gold-touched determination, and Perrin's deep amber that had changed since Spencer last saw it.
Golden eyes. Wolf-brother. It happened.
Perrin's thread was shot through with something new — amber and brown, the colors of earth and hunt, wild energy that hadn't been there before. His eyes caught the light as he entered, and they were no longer human.
Relief flooded through Spencer like cool water. They were alive. All of them. The separation at Shadar Logoth hadn't killed anyone, hadn't broken the group beyond repair.
The party is together again. We can move forward.
We can—
Perrin's nostrils flared.
---
The wolf-brother's reaction was immediate and visceral.
Perrin went rigid, his newly golden eyes fixing on Spencer with an intensity that had nothing human in it. His thread pulsed with alarm — the amber brightening, the wild energy surging toward the surface like a predator scenting something wrong.
Spencer forced himself to stay still. To breathe normally. To not reach for Thread Sight or any other ability that might make things worse.
He can smell the Codex. Or whatever the Codex makes me.
I knew this would happen eventually. I just hoped it would take longer.
Egwene was embracing Rand, who'd appeared from the kitchen. Nynaeve had gone straight to Master Gill, demanding to know where Mat was. Moiraine was speaking with Lan, making arrangements. Nobody noticed Perrin's reaction.
Nobody except Spencer.
"A word," Perrin said quietly. "Now."
He didn't wait for agreement. He simply walked toward the inn's back corridor, golden eyes never leaving Spencer's face, and Spencer followed because refusing would only make things worse.
---
The corridor was narrow and dim, lined with storage closets and servant doors.
Perrin rounded on Spencer the moment they were out of sight, his bulk seeming to fill the entire space. This close, Spencer could see how much the young blacksmith had changed — the wildness in his eyes, the tension in his shoulders, the way he moved like something that hunted rather than something that was hunted.
"You smell wrong," Perrin said.
Spencer kept his voice level. "Wrong how?"
"Not Shadowspawn. Not Dark. Just... wrong." Perrin's nose twitched, still sampling the air between them. "Like you shouldn't be here. Like the Pattern doesn't quite know what to do with you."
Accurate. More accurate than I'd like.
"I don't fully understand it either," Spencer said. The truth, as far as it went. "I've had... abilities since I was young. Impressions about people and places. Things I shouldn't know."
"This isn't impressions." Perrin's golden eyes narrowed. "I've been around Aes Sedai now. I've smelled channelers and Shadowspawn and things that belong to the Pattern but don't sit right in it. You're different. You're like a... a stitch that doesn't match the cloth."
That's what Ba'alzamon called me. The stitch that doesn't belong.
Perrin and the Dark One agree on something. That's not comforting.
"I'm not a threat to you," Spencer said carefully. "Or to Rand. Or to anyone in this group."
"How do I know that?"
"Because I've been protecting Mat since Shadar Logoth. Because I got him to Caemlyn alive. Because I've been watching Rand's back since before you even left the Two Rivers."
Perrin was silent for a long moment, his thread churning with conflicting impulses — the wolf's instinct to attack what didn't belong, the human's desire to trust an ally, the smith's practical need to assess threats accurately.
"I'm watching you," Perrin said finally. "Whatever you are — whatever that smell means — I'm watching."
"I know." Spencer met the golden eyes without flinching. "I'd be worried if you weren't."
They stood in the dim corridor, two young men who were both more than they appeared, and neither looked away.
---
Moiraine Healed Mat in a private room upstairs.
Spencer positioned himself in the doorway, close enough to observe but far enough to avoid interfering. Thread Sight showed him the Healing weave in exquisite detail — silver Power-threads extending from Moiraine's hands, weaving through Mat's body, targeting the corruption that had been eating at him since Shadar Logoth.
Different from canon. Mat's corruption is mental, not physical. The dagger would have poisoned his body. The coin poisoned his mind.
Moiraine's adjusting the weave. More Spirit, less Fire. Targeting the paranoid ideation, the distrust, the fear.
The corruption fought back. Spencer watched it writhe and resist, trying to dig deeper into Mat's fate-thread, trying to escape the cleansing Power. But Moiraine was Aes Sedai, trained for centuries in the White Tower's arts, and her will was stronger than Fain's distant malice.
[Skill Archive: Recording. Category: Channeling-Adjacent. Entry: Healing Weave — Mental Corruption Variant. Comprehension: 0.]
The corruption dissolved. Mat's thread cleared, the paranoid darkness fading to leave only the golden light of a gambler's luck and a loyal friend's heart. His back arched, his eyes flew open, and he gasped like a man breaking surface after nearly drowning.
"Light," Mat whispered. "Light, I can think again."
---
Mat's first coherent words were an apology.
"Spencer." He pushed himself upright on the bed, still weak but present in a way he hadn't been since before Four Kings. "The knife. The coin. Everything I said — I didn't mean—"
"I know." Spencer crossed to the bedside, ignoring Moiraine's sharp gaze. "You weren't yourself."
"I pulled a knife on you." Mat's voice cracked with shame. "I accused you of stealing, of leading us into traps, of—"
"It was the corruption talking. Not you."
"But I—"
"Mat." Spencer put a hand on his friend's shoulder, feeling the tremor of exhaustion and relief running through the other man's body. "You have terrible taste in coins. That's the only thing you need to apologize for."
Mat stared at him for a moment, searching Spencer's face for judgment or accusation. Then something broke in his expression — the last walls of paranoid defense crumbling — and he laughed.
The laugh was weak and ragged, but it was Mat's laugh. The real one. The sound of a man who'd been given back to himself.
"Blood and bloody ashes," Mat said, wiping his eyes. "I owe you more drinks than I can count."
"I'm keeping track."
"You would." Mat's grin was tired but genuine. "You always do."
Spencer squeezed his shoulder once, then stepped back to let Nynaeve fuss over her patient. The relief of having his friend back was sharp enough to feel like pain — the good kind of pain, the kind that meant something broken was starting to heal.
One crisis resolved. Half a dozen more waiting.
But at least Mat will face them as himself.
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