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Elayne dragged her mouth away from Aviendha’s as the smell of smoke filled the kitchen. “Mother’s milk in a cup!”
She hastened over to the oven, coughing and waving away smoke. She almost reached in to grab the tray of honeycakes, then remembered it would be hot in there, and instead wove Air around the tray to rescue it and plop it down on the little stone table next to the oven.
“They’re ruined!” Elayne cried, taking in the tragic sight of the crisp, blackened honeycakes. How had that happened? They hadn’t been in there that long, had they? She had gotten rather distracted with Aviendha…
Aviendha had come over too and was peering over her shoulder. “That does not look correct,” she agreed. Elayne burst into tears, and Aviendha hastily added, “But there is no need to weep over cakes, shade of my heart.”
“Bloody pregnancy moods!” Elayne blubbered, wiping her eyes in annoyance, but she couldn’t stop crying. “Everything’s ruined, we made Rand wait all this time for nothing, and now he’s—b-burn me, he’s coming this way!”
There was an abrupt change in her bond with Rand as she felt him get suddenly closer. No doubt he’d sensed her upset and had Traveled from her apartments upstairs down to a basement storeroom. He hurried down the corridor to the kitchens, and Elayne rushed to the door to try and head him off.
He crashed into her when he entered. “Elayne? What’s wrong?” he asked in concern, taking her by the shoulder.
“N-Nothing!” Elayne sniffled stubbornly. “I told you to wait upstairs, you’re going to spoil the surprise!” Her shoulders slumped. “Not that it isn’t already spoiled.”
Rand sniffed the air, and his gaze fell on something behind her. Probably the awful honeycakes. “Were you trying to cook something?” he said uncertainly.
His choice of the word “trying” wounded Elayne’s pride even further. “We wanted to make honeycakes for your nameday,” she said, a few more tears leaking out. “You mentioned once that your father would make them for you every year. And I’ve eaten them so many times, I was so sure I could figure it out.”
“Oh. So some burned honeycakes is all you’re upset about?” Rand said, sounding relieved. Elayne glared at him, and he held his hand up. “Sorry. I just mean, I’m glad no one’s hurt.” He threaded his fingers through her hair to bring her closer and kiss the top of her head. “It was nice of you to want to bake me something, but I don’t mind that it didn’t work out. Come on, let’s go back upstairs and forget about all this.”
“No!” Elayne protested. “It’s not just about—I wanted—” A wave of grief hit her, and she felt her throat get even tighter. “This is the only nameday we’ll get to celebrate with you. I wanted it to be perfect.”
Aviendha placed a comforting hand on her shoulder as sorrow welled up in Rand’s end of the bond too. But then he smiled at them, softness and affection chasing away most of that sorrow. “The fact that I get to spend it with both of you already makes this the best nameday I’ve ever had,” he said, and the bond told Elayne that he truly meant it. “But if you like, I’ll teach you how to make honeycakes. Then you can bake them for all the twins’ namedays, and each other’s. It can be a family tradition.”
He moved his hand to rest on Elayne’s belly, thumb gently stroking back and forth. Elayne laced her fingers through his, feeling some of her grief ease. As impossible as it was to imagine a future without Rand, a future with a family of four rather than five…it was nice to think that she and Aviendha could have a tradition of his to pass down to the twins. Even something as small as honeycakes on their nameday.
“Yes,” Elayne said. “That would be wonderful.”
She wiped her eyes and composed herself as Rand bustled around the kitchen locating all the ingredients. It turned out Elayne and Aviendha had made several errors there, despite their very logical attempts to work backwards from a completed honeycake and figure out what would go into it. Who would have thought there would be eggs in a cake?
Aviendha kindly disposed of their first attempt so Elayne wouldn’t have to look at it anymore, then Traveled up to their rooms and back to fetch pen and paper. She began dutifully recording the ingredients and recipe while Rand went through each step with Elayne.
Elayne couldn’t believe he just knew in his head how much of everything to use and in what order to add it into the batter, but then, he’d been startled by her rattling off from memory Tear’s main imports and exports during one of their first political lessons together in the Stone. And they’d both frequently been astonished by the things Aviendha knew offhand, like the best places to stab to incapacitate versus kill or how to extract water from a spiky desert plant called segade.
There could hardly be three upbringings more different than theirs. How might that affect the twins as they grew up? Would they be wetlander royals who lived and breathed ji’e’toh? Would Elayne and Aviendha be able to do enough to pass Rand’s Two Rivers upbringing down to them on his behalf?
Rand started stirring the batter, then reached for the bowl to keep it from moving and stopped suddenly with a flash of grief and frustration in the bond as he realized there was no hand at the end of that arm anymore. Elayne grabbed the bowl to hold it in place for him; he was growing adept at using saidin to make up for the loss of his hand, but she liked to lend him hers when she could.
She leaned back against Rand’s chest and nestled into him as he resumed stirring. “Let me stir,” she said. “You shouldn’t have to do any work on your nameday.”
Rand laughed and wrapped his handless arm around her, snug in the space between her belly and her breasts. “I enjoy it,” he said. “Light, I can’t remember the last time I cooked anything for myself.”
“You have been making great use of wetlander servants,” Aviendha said, then made a face. “As have I, I must admit. Living Elayne’s life brings too many luxuries.”
Elayne rolled her eyes. “Well, then, I’ll hire you both on the kitchen staff if it would make you feel better,” she said. “You can personally cook all my meals for me.”
“I’d like nothing more,” Rand said sincerely, feeling wistful in the bond.
The conversation paused as they focused on doling out blobs of batter onto the baking tray, but resumed once it was in the oven. “A life spent providing for my family,” Rand murmured. “That was all I wanted, once.”
Aviendha hummed in understanding. “All I wanted was a life spent wedded to the spear,” she said. “But in that life, my heart would never have come to know your shade. Just so with your life in the Two Rivers—if it had come to pass, then your family would not have been us.”
“Precisely. It was all I wanted once. Not now,” Rand said. “Whatever had to happen to bring me to this moment here with both of you, I’m glad of it. And I would choose to walk that same path every time.”
Elayne took his hand and Aviendha’s and squeezed them both tight, momentarily overwhelmed by how many different fragile threads of the Pattern formed the picture of this moment. “Me too,” she said. “Although I didn’t have to sacrifice nearly as much for this path as either of you did.” She was the Queen of Andor exactly as she’d always expected, and she hadn’t even had to lose her mother for that to happen, as it turned out.
“Not as much yet, perhaps,” Aviendha said. “But when it comes time to deliver the twins, I daresay that will be more painful than anything that has happened to Rand or myself.”
They all laughed. Then Rand kept a watchful eye on the oven so that Elayne and Aviendha could get back to kissing, but he was taking the tray back out again far sooner than Elayne had expected.
She pulled back from Aviendha and turned to examine the honeycakes. “They look perfect,” she said, surprised. “That was fast. I figured it would take hours for liquid batter to become cake.”
Rand’s mouth twitched. “Elayne, you’re the smartest person I know, sometimes,” he said, and Elayne whacked him on the arm.
Once the honeycakes were cool enough to transport, they brought them through a gateway to their rooms, along with some extra honey to drizzle over the top. Earlier in the evening, Aviendha had also prepared some sort of dish involving goat’s milk and segade fruit (she’d Traveled to the Waste to get some) which was a customary treat for Aiel namedays. Elayne had to admit that it wasn’t to her taste, but Rand seemed delighted with it.
“You didn’t have to go to all this trouble for me,” he said. “Thank you. I couldn’t have imagined a more perfect nameday.”
“It is already perfect?” Aviendha said. “Then I suppose we need not mention the other things we had planned for when we retired to bed.” Rand dropped his fork with a clatter, and Elayne laughed.
It was impossible to imagine a future without him. But she was grateful that she had memories like today to keep with her, always.