Rereads and Rewatches The Wheel of Time

Reading The Wheel of Time: Mat Is Reunited With Some Aes Sedai in Winter’s Heart (Part 14)

Mat’s plans to escape Ebou Dar are complicated by Aes Sedai…

By Sylas K Barrett

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Published on April 9, 2024

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This week in Reading The Wheel of Time, we’re covering Chapters 18 and 19 of Winter’s Heart. In these chapters, Mat works to plot his escape from Ebou Dar, only to have those plans complicated, not by Tylin, but by Aes Sedai. How will our hero cope? Let’s hit the recap to find out.

Mat hears stories about a man being killed by wolves just outside the city, but he knows it was the gholam. Thom and Beslan keep going out in the evenings and Mat knows they are up to something, though neither will tell him what. Juilin keeps sneaking into the upper floors, even after he is caught by Suroth and flogged. Mat is convinced that Juilin is meeting with one of the Seanchan noblewomen.

More Seanchan settlers continue to arrive. Mat learns about the strange creatures they brought with them from Seanchan soldiers drinking in taverns and hears rumors from traders about the Dragon Reborn. Mat thinks he would know if Rand died, and is confident that Rand would never willingly go anywhere near the White Tower. The rumors seem to agitate the Seanchan.

Mat visits the Wandering Woman, which he doesn’t normally go to because the rooms are all rented to high-ranking Seanchan officers and lesser lords and ladies. Inside he is greeted by Setalle Anan, who immediately asks after Nynaeve, Elayne, and the Kin. Mat answers that they are all safe, as far as he knows, then says he is looking for a place to store money and supplies.

Setalle’s price for the space Mat needs is for him to do a spin for her, which he reluctantly does. In return, he gets a shelf in her cellar and a hollow under her kitchen floor in which to hide his chest of gold.

Back in the Palace, Nerim and Lopin have discovered where Tylin hid all Mat’s old clothes. Mat gives them instructions to start slowly secreting the clothes and his money to the Wandering Woman. Later, he goes to find the only bellmaker in the city, who is annoyed when Mat asks him questions related to Illuminators. Some kissing and cuddling with Aludra doesn’t get him any answers to her riddle, either.

Tylin begins lacquering the first two fingernails on each hand, and admits that she is planning to shave the sides of her head. Mat doesn’t fault her for adjusting to the reality of the Seanchan, but Beslan disapproves. Tylin and Tuon seem to be becoming friends, and Mat is confused by the relationship between Suroth, Tuon, and Anath. 

Tuon in particular troubles Mat, and he finds he often runs into her. One day he comes into Tylin’s apartments to find Tuon inspecting his ashandarei. She asks what it is and how Mat came to possess it, and he answers cheekily that it’s a spear, and that he bought it. She offers to pay ten times what he did for it.

She studies him for a moment with an unreadable expression, then just leaves the room, as if Mat had just ceased to exist.

Mat stays away from the Wandering Woman to avoid attracting Tylin’s notice, but after a while he starts to get nervous about someone discovering his hidden money. He decides to go himself and check, but when he arrives at the inn, he finds that Setalle has gone out, leaving her daughter Marah in charge. Mat makes up a story about missing the food, and decides to wait in the kitchen.

Mat is just finishing his meal when Setalle comes into the kitchen from the stableyard, along with a woman wearing a cloak and hood. Setalle makes everyone but Mat leave the kitchen.

Mat is shocked when the woman removes her cloak and he recognizes Joline’s ageless Aes Sedai face. Suddenly they hear a Seanchan voice demanding to be let into the kitchen. Mat tugs Joline down into his lap and pretends to be kissing her as a stern-faced Seanchan woman comes in, along with a so’jhin who looks familiar to Mat.

Mat can’t figure out how an Illianer came to be so’jhin, but Setalle replies calmly that if Captain of the Green outranks those who are currently staying in her best rooms, then that is a matter for the Seanchan to work out among themselves. Egeanin remarks that it is nice to deal with someone who has a little nerve, and admits that she does not outrank many here—however, she has orders from Suroth to remain close to her. Glancing at Mat and Joline, who are still keeping up their act, Egeanin adds that she hopes Mistress Anan doesn’t allow that sort of thing very often. 

The so’jhin is also frowning at Mat but Egeanin tugs his sleeve and he follows her back into the common room. After they’ve left, Joline is too shaken even to get out of Mat’s lap, and he has to carry her down the cellar steps as she cries in his arms.

Once they have Joline settled in the cellar, Mat tells her that he will help her, if she can, and remarks that she is lucky to have been able to evade the Seanchan. Joline counters that she could have escaped except that she was unconscious when the Seanchan attacked—Teslyn drugged her and Joline’s Warders had to carry her away and hide her. She says it serves Teslyn right that she was captured.

Mat repeats that he will help Joline, in payment for his debt for the note she left him. Joline pretends to know what he’s talking about, but Mat realizes that it wasn’t her who left the note in his coat, which means it must have been Teslyn.

Wishing he had never learned the truth, Mat goes back to the Palace and sneaks up into the attic level where the Seanchan have assembled small rooms to hold the damane. He has to look into quite a few to find the right one, but eventually he locates Teslyn. He asks why Teslyn left him the note, and Teslyn answers that she wished to inconvenience Elaida; she even dosed Joline with forkroot so that she couldn’t interfere with Nynaeve and Elayne.

Mat tries to tell himself that Teslyn wasn’t actually trying to help Nynaeve and Elayne, that he doesn’t owe her anything, but now that he has spoken to her he can’t bring himself to leave her. He promises to try to help her escape, and while Teslyn doesn’t believe him at first, she eventually decides that he is serious. She tells Mat that he must also help another sister, Edesina Azzedin, to escape as well. Mat points out that he’s not even sure he can get one sister out, and that he’s seen three or four other Aes Sedai wearing the collar.

Coming out of the stairwell, Mat runs into Tuon again. She tells him that the damane kennels are forbidden to men, but Mat makes up a quick story about how he was looking for a Windfinder who once did him a favor—he wanted to ask if she would like something nice from the kitchens.

He’s surprised to see Tuon’s normally stern expression melt into a smile, and she remarks that it is good to know that he is kind to damane. Still, she warns him to be careful, since there are some men who like to take damane to their beds, and that he wouldn’t want anyone to think he was perverted. Unsettled, he thanks her for the warning, wondering what kind of man would want to bed a woman on a leash.

Tuon leaves, and Mat is left with the problem of having three Aes Sedai, one hidden in the cellar and two who wear the damane leashes, all expecting him to save them somehow.

Okay, Tuon definitely knows that Mat is her future husband, and she is definitely collecting information about him. I imagine that she is taking the ravens about his person—on the signet ring, on the ashandarei—as an omen, even if the Foretelling didn’t name them as a sign of how she would recognize him. Interestingly, I think the penance she assigned herself of wearing the veil is the thing that is preventing him from learning who she is. When she comes on deck in Chapter 14, Anath remarks that the veil makes her “just the High Lady Tuon.” Of course, as Anath also points out, all the Seanchan know who she really is—that’s why Suroth takes her suggestions as orders—but it means that they all behave outwardly as if she is just another High Lady. They greet her as an equal, and they don’t call her by her title. Once that veil comes off, they will defer to her as, and probably address her as, Daughter of the Nine Moons. And then Mat will know exactly who she is.

I was initially inclined to be skeptical of Tuon’s belief in omens, partly because so much of Seanchan’s beliefs feels like propaganda. We know that the Seanchan prophecies say that the Dragon will serve the Crystal Throne, and that they consider other versions of the Karaethon Cycle where the Crystal Throne isn’t mentioned to be corrupted. From where I’m sitting, it seems much more likely that the Seanchan version is corrupted. Or perhaps a better way to put that is to say it has been misinterpreted.

I feel relatively confident that any interpretation of the Karaethon Cycle that says Rand is going to serve or bow to any other ruler, or nation, or Amyrlin Seat, is incorrect. But perhaps there was a part of the Karaethon Cycle that mentions Rand in conjunction with the Seanchan Empress in a way that could not be recognized by the people of this continent. In turn, the Seanchan may have interpreted this connection in a way that suggested Rand would be subservient to the Empress, but might in fact have had another meaning. Perhaps Rand will sign a treaty with her in which they both do something for the other, much like the agreement he has with the Sea Folk. That would count as serving, but would not be submitting or becoming a vassal to her. And we know that at some point Rand is going to have to come to some kind of truce with the Seanchan in order to unite everyone against the Shadow, so the concept seems plausible.

But whether or not the Seanchan version of the Karaethon Cycle has been differently interpreted or even deliberately changed, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the Seanchan are fools, or that they are so blinded by propaganda that everything they believe is nonsense. And after all, in a world that is ruled by the Pattern, omens kind of make a lot of sense. So perhaps I was too quick to judge Tuon, especially since her reliance on omens appears to be having such an effect on the unfolding of the plot.

If there’s one thing I’ve picked up on in these books, it’s that whenever a main character gets bad vibes from someone for seemingly no reason, there’s always a reason—and that reason is Darkfriend shenanigans. Anath is a highly suspicious character, narratively speaking. For one, Tuon is afraid of Anath, and deliberately looking for reasons not to listen to her, even though she doesn’t actually seem to have a reason for her fear, and this is not how her family taught her to react to her Truthspeaker. For another, Tuon’s previous Truthspeaker, Neferi, died very mysteriously by randomly falling down the stairs, which reminds me of nothing so much as the “accidents” all of Tamara’s searchers had. And then instead of Neferi being succeeded by the person who was already trained to take her place, the Empress named Anath instead. And then Tuon immediately felt anxious and afraid of the woman.

She pretty much has to be a Darkfriend. She could even be one of the Forsaken in disguise—we know Suroth is a Darkfriend but obviously the Forsaken aren’t going to leave an entire, very powerful Empire in the hands of other Darkfriends. At least one of them is going to take an interest of their own. They also don’t generally tend to be rulers themselves, usually going for a powerful position adjacent to the ruler so that they can manipulate them the most effectively without drawing too much attention, either from good guys or from their fellow Chosen, to themselves.

Also, Jordan loves his dramatic irony and the idea of Suroth demanding that Tuon have Anath flogged, and Anath turns out to be Semirhage. I’m pretty sure Semirhage is the only female Forsaken whose secret identity is still unaccounted for, unless Cyndane isn’t Lanfear after all. Though I suppose Moridin could be having Moghedien pose as Tuon’s new Truthspeaker. Or Graendal, for that matter. It seems unlikely that Mesaana would have left the White Tower, and obviously we know where Aran’gar has been.

There is a moment in Chapter 14 when Tuon is considering the fact that she wants to resist the advice of her Soe’feia that felt very important to me:

This moment affects whether or not Tuon arrives in Ebou Dar presenting herself as High Lady Tuon instead of Tuon, Daughter of the Nine Moons, heir to the Empress May She Live Forever (or however she would be officially announced). If she knows who Mat is destined to be and he doesn’t know her, Tuon has a chance to get to know him without complication, as she is clearly attempting to. Since the Seanchan are the antagonists against this continent, against Rand and his friends, any chance of Tuon becoming fond of Mat might make a big difference in how willing she is to compromise and make some kind of truce with Rand when the time comes.

This is still speculation on my part, of course, but I think the logic makes sense. The encounter after Mat left the damane’s rooms seemed particularly significant, when Tuon said “It is good that you are kind to damane.” She is clearly relieved to find kindness in the man who is going to be her husband. The moment would almost be cute, except for the fact that kindness to damane means two very different things to these two people.

I’m hoping that setting Tuon up in the narrative as a “kind” slave owner is a prelude to her learning to change the way she thinks of channelers, because if not, there’s no real way to redeem her character, especially since she herself is a potential channeler, capable of “training” and controlling damane. I imagine that she will learn the truth about what being a sul’dam means, resulting in the evolution of how the Seanchan think of sul’dam and channelers coming from the top of the social order as well as from the middle. But right now, when she says it is good that Mat is kind to damane, from her perspective that is the same as saying that it is good her future husband is kind to dogs.

And when she says that men who want to bed damane are perverted, she is thinking of it as closer to bestiality, while Mat is disturbed by the idea of sleeping with a collared slave who, by virtue of that status, can’t consent. Of course, Mat wouldn’t have put it in anything like those terms to himself, but in many ways that makes his reaction even more moral—he simply can’t wrap his head around experiencing desire in such circumstances. The narrative has already been very clear about Mat’s attitude towards the idea of pursuing a woman who doesn’t want to be pursued.

Mat’s reaction to finally speaking with Teslyn also shows what kind of person he is. Mat’s a very interesting character in this respect; he talks a big game, even to himself, about worrying primarily about his own safety and telling Beslan that there’s nothing they can do about the Seanchan, and yet here he is trying to come up with ways of using the Illuminator fireworks as weapons against the Seanchan and volunteering to try to help Teslyn escape. What was it that Thom predicted about Mat in Chapter 16? Oh right;

It sure didn’t take very long for Thom to be proven right.

I love that Mat, the trickster, needs “a schemer” or two to help him plot out this plan. I do think that between the three of them, Mat, Thom, and Juilin can probably come up with a pretty clever plan, although the dangers here are very great. I expect that forkroot is probably going to feature in this escape. Joline was not detected by any of the damane while she was dosed, which suggests that being temporarily cut off from the ability to channel by the herb also makes one undetectable to other female channelers. Which makes sense, of course, but this would also mean that the a’dam wouldn’t work on a woman who has consumed forkroot. Not that it would really matter, I suppose, since it would render her unconscious anyway. The a’dam itself isn’t secured by any special means—the latch is merely cleverly hidden, and surely Mat or one of his friends could figure that part out. But the damane and the sul’dam they are attached to can still sense a woman who can channel if she is nearby, so forkroot seems the way to go.

Ironic, isn’t it, that Joline assumes that she would have been able to escape the city if she hadn’t been dosed with forkroot and unconscious, when in fact it is the very thing that saved her from being caught and collared as Teslyn was. Joline clearly doesn’t know that it was forkroot, so she doesn’t realize that her ability to channel had been blocked; she probably assumes it was just some kind of sleeping draught. 

Fortunately, Mat has most of his things ready for escape, so all he has to do is figure out how to free Teslyn and Edesina and how to disguise all three women long enough to get them to Valen Luca. And then convince Luca to leave earlier than he planned. Maybe Aludra can help? She seems to really like Mat, even if she won’t tell him the answer to her riddle. Men do gossip, after all.

Speaking of gossip, I’m not as sure as Mat is that Juilin is seeing a woman. I certainly don’t see him being interested in a Seanchan noblewoman, given Juilin’s feelings about the nobility and the way the Seanchan view it. I think Mat’s right that a noblewoman might fool around in secret with someone below her station, but I do not think Juilin would stand for that hypocrisy for one second. And even a servant or a da’covale seems unlikely, unless perhaps he found someone who didn’t like her life with the Seanchan and shared more values with Juilin than she does with her native country. 

Or someone who was taken prisoner, maybe, and isn’t Seanchan at all. That seems to be what’s happened to Bayle Domon, after all, and we know that it has happened to other people in the lands the Seanchan have conquered. Although if that’s the case, I can’t imagine Juilin being willing to leave without her. Which would be hilarious, watching Mat figure out how to accommodate rescuing yet another woman from the clutches of the Seanchan in Ebou Dar.

I am, of course, assuming that there’s no chance of Juilin having met a nice so’jhin man or something. Gay guys don’t seem to exist in Wheel of Time. And I still wouldn’t be at all surprised if Juilin is up to something else entirely, something that has nothing to do with romance—but like Mat, I can’t think of what that might be.

But there is a so’jhin man of some significance to us in these Chapters, and that man is most definitely Bayle Domon. We last saw him And Egeanin sailing off with the bracelets that Liandrin and co. were looking for, which would be capable of chaining a male channeler to two female handlers, much like a damane to a sul’dam. They were supposed to drop the things into the ocean, and Bayle was going to try to take his ship somewhere safe, away from the Seanchan. Clearly at least the latter part of that plan didn’t go quite as they hoped, and something tells me that means the former didn’t, either. But we’ll be seeing more of Bayle and Egeanin next week, so I’ll leave speculation until then.

It’s interesting to consider how the different folk in Ebou Dar are adjusting to the presence of Seanchan occupation. For Tylin, there really isn’t any material loss—in fact there is some material gain—so in many ways her comparatively easy adjustment to her new situation makes sense. But making her one of the Blood is a much more insidious type of occupation than taking her throne and giving it to the Seanchan, just as the settlers who are beginning their new life as Altaran soldiers will be much harder to remove than an occupying army. It’s very clever of the Seanchan, really—but if there one thing their society knows how to do, it’s how to break someone to a new way of life and make them think that they prefer it. Those who are taken as damane are, of course, experiencing the most intense and horrible version of this. Teslyn can see it happening to herself in real time, and has seen it happen to some of her Aes Sedai sisters.

We’ll see more of this next week in Chapters 20 and 21, as we get to catch up with Bethamin, of all people, as well as Egeanin and Bayle. Chapter 20 is a particularly rough read, but it does present us with some interesting information on how the truth about the sul’dam is starting to affect every Seanchan who has learned of it. [end-mark]

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Mat Is Reunited With Some Aes Sedai in <i>Winter’s Heart</i> (Part 14) appeared first on Reactor.

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Reading The Wheel of Time: Mat Faces a Gholam, and His Future, in Winter’s Heart (Part 13)

This week, Mat makes a spectacle of himself before both his current lover and his future wife…

By Sylas K Barrett

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Published on April 2, 2024

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This week in Reading the Wheel of Time, we are covering Chapters 16 and 17 of Winter’s Heart, in which Mat has not one, not two, but three fateful encounters, and in which his pathological demand avoidance has him appearing before his current lover and his future wife covered in mud and sporting a very cheeky attitude. For a man who always wishes to be safe and away from danger, he certainly does like to stick his neck out, doesn’t he? I love him.

Mat, Thom, Beslan, and Olver make their way back to Ebou Dar, and Mat notices how little damage was done to the city when it was conquered.

When they make their way through the gate everyone stops to stare at streets so full of Seanchan and carts and livestock that everyone can barely move. Mat realizes that the harbor had been full of ships as well, and that there could be even more beyond the horizon, waiting to dock.

Mat suggests that Beslan and Thom make their way to the Palace via back alleys. He also warns them not to try anything, to wait for Rand to come and sort out the Seanchan. Thom suggests that whatever Mat ends up doing will be far more dangerous than anything he or Beslan might try, but agrees to take Olver back to the Palace.

Left on his own, Mat goes looking for an inn where he can rent a space where he can hide clothes and small bits of money—taking very much at a time from his chests in the Palace will alert Tylin that he’s trying to escape her. But he doesn’t have any luck and eventually gives up.

He has fully memorized the back alleys of Ebou Dar during his recovery, so it’s easy to make his way back to the Palace without encountering many people. He’s nearly to the square in front of the Palace when he trips and falls over, landing in the mud. Someone trips over top of him, sprawling in turn, and Mat turns to see the gholam that attacked them in the Rahad. He realizes that if he hadn’t tripped, the gholam would have had him easily.

Mat throws his walking staff, buying himself a second to pull the foxhead medallion off and swing it. He manages to burn the gholam with it, but he’s tired and sore, barely able to keep the thing off of him. Suddenly he hears a voice shouting “He’s down the alley!” and “Hurry, he’ll get away!”

The gholam hisses at him that it has been told to avoid notice, and so Mat will live a little longer. Mat runs after it as it retreats, aware that the thing will just come back from him again and wondering if the medallion could kill the creature. But the gholam finds a small hole in the brick wall and slithers into it, astounding Mat and the old man who has come to his aid.

The old man admits there wasn’t anyone with him—he used the ruse to scare off Mat’s attacker. However, seeing what the creature could do, he thinks maybe he and Mat both have the Dark One’s own luck. He introduces himself as Noal Charin, and Mat thinks that the man’s face looks familiar, though he can’t place it. He offers to put Noal up in the Palace with his own men.

Suddenly Mat realizes that the dice hadn’t stopped spinning when the gholam attacked him. Which means there is something else out there, still waiting for him.

Mat takes Noal to one of the stableyard gates, where both Seanchan and Ebou Dari soldiers are standing guard. He greets the Ebou Dari officer politely, and is irked when the man remarks that “she” will be upset when she sees the state of him. When a Seanchan messenger asks the Ebou Dari guards, not the Seanchan ones, to be let into the palace, Noal asks what the Seanchan would do if the Ebou Dari refused. The officer tells Mat to educate his friend on what should and shouldn’t be said aloud.

They go into the stableyard, and Mat explains about the Seanchan Seekers, who make the Whitecloak ones look tame by comparison. He also observes the sul’dam exercising their damane. The ranks of the damane include Sea Folk windfinders and Teslyn Baradon. Mat mutters that he supposes being collared is better than being dead—the Mistress of the Ships and her Master of the Blades had chosen to die at the stake—but when Noal asks if Mat really believes that, Mat isn’t sure he does.

Mat takes Noal and introduces him to his men. Seeing the state of him, they are eager to fight whoever it is, but Mat has Noal explain what happened. The man is an excellent storyteller. Mat tells them in the morning he’ll give them gold so that they can buy passage out of the city, but they all refuse. Noal remarks he has seen great leaders like Mat before.

Mat leaves, heading to his own quarters to get cleaned up, but so many servants remark on the state of him, warning that Tylin won’t like it and offering to help him get cleaned up, that he gets annoyed. He also runs into Juilin, who is supposed to stay in the servants’ areas. Mat warns Juilin about the gholam, but Ju​​lin observes, looking guilty, that he has a reason to stay. Mat deduces that he has met a woman. He tries to advise that Juilin can meet plenty of others, but Juilin gets huffy with him, calling Mat “My Lord” and reminding him of what Tylin said she would do to Mat if she caught him in such a state again.

Mat sails brazenly into Tylin’s apartments and throws his hat across the room, only to stop dead when he realizes that there are other people with her—and more importantly the dice have stopped tumbling in his head. They land so hard his head is ringing, putting him in a state of shock as he takes in Tylin, Suroth, various servants, and a petite woman wearing a veil, with red-lacquered nails and a completely shaven head.

The woman, Tuon, begins scolding Suroth for not making the streets safe, and Mat can see that Tylin is angry with him for causing a problem. He tries to assert that he fell down, but Tuon can tell that he’s lying. When she suggests that this might be because Mat fears Tylin’s anger, Mat gets reckless again, telling her that he was hurt during the Seanchan attack. Tuon seems intrigued that Mat would have fought the Seanchan if he could have and circles him, taking particular note of his signet ring.

She invites Tylin to accompany her to her rooms and Tylin accepts. As the so’jin are fixing the High Ladies’ clothing, Tylin and Mat take a moment apart, and Mat explains about the gholam. He suggests it might be safer for everyone if he left, but Tylin asserts that the thing cannot have him, and neither can High Lady Tuon. Furthermore, she promises to dress Mat in pink as punishment for this interruption.

Tylin, Suroth, Tuon, and their entourage leave. Mat sits alone in Tylin’s room as a servant clears up, puzzling over the dice stopping and how nothing seems to have happened. Always before when the dice stopped something had happened to him immediately. But when Tylin returns and breaks out the pink ribbons, he has something else to think about.

I don’t understand Tylin. I really liked her character back when she was just interacting with Nynaeve and Elayne, but her behavior towards Mat is abhorrent. In the beginning it wasn’t too bad, and I thought it might be interesting for Mat to unlearn some of his beliefs about proper gender roles when it comes to who is “supposed” to be the pursuer and who is “supposed” to be pursued. The man likes money and nice things, after all, and gambling and relaxing and not having responsibilities. If being a “pretty” was just being a sugar baby for a while, I think he might actually really enjoy it.

But of course, it’s not working out that way at all. For one, Tylin doesn’t want Mat to have much freedom to do the things he enjoys, even though she must be busy and can’t be spending all her time with him. She seems to delight in making him uncomfortable, and when he doesn’t behave and do as she wishes, she punishes him. Ironic that she had to tell Tuon that Mat was a free man who couldn’t be bought or sold, given that she clearly does not want him to have much freedom, and is quite content to treat him as a prisoner, which isn’t a position very far from being owned. Mat himself could have laughed when Tylin uses the term “free man,” and for once, I wouldn’t say he was being dramatic.

It’s unclear how much of Tylin’s controlling and abusive behavior towards Mat is typical for Altaran/Ebou Dari culture and now much is specific to her and might be considered crossing a line by others from her nation. But even if the general shape of Mat and Tylin’s relationship is normal for Ebou Dar, even including some aspect of control exerted over the younger party, we do have clues that Tylin has gone too far even for her own culture. The biggest one is, of course, Beslan’s willingness to help Mat plan his escape. Beslan was initially very approving of his mother’s relationship with Mat, and even now has pointed out that his mother needs the distraction. If he is willing to help Mat escape her, and while he’s also focused on how to resist the Seanchan, I think Beslan believes that his mother has become more than “a little” too possessive. Of course he’s going to downplay what he says about it, but the action speaks louder than the words.

Even the servants, who used to be amused by Mat’s predicament, mostly seem concerned now about keeping him from getting in trouble. Maybe it’s because they need their mistress to be in as good of a mood as possible, given everything that has happened, but there also might be some genuine concern for Mat as well. Even Tuon, who has just met both of them, wonders if Mat is afraid of Tylin, and she is right about that, though Mat tries to downplay it in his own head.

And Tylin demands so much more of Mat than to let himself be cosseted and have a lot of good sex with her. She doesn’t just want him to let her spoil him and to make her feel wanted in return—she’s taking his clothes and controlling his access to his own money. When he doesn’t behave in the way she wants, she punishes him, including by withholding food and, it seems, in sexual encounters. Not to mention the extreme power imbalance here—as the queen she could do much more than order the servants not to feed him. If she wanted she could have him arrested, or possibly even executed. I don’t think she would, but the threat exists purely because of their respective positions in society. And when Mat brings up the gholam, Tylin doesn’t show much concern about his safety, or about the safety of the people who might be close to him.

I guess that there’s a chance that Tylin doesn’t really understand the full threat the gholam poses, but she was warned by Nynaeve and Elayne, and the thing is clearly shadowspawn. If she cares about Mat so much, it would certainly be in his best interest to be allowed to try to escape it, and if she loves her people, she should want to do anything in her power to get such a creature out of the city. And the only thing in her power is to let Mat leave and hope the gholam follows him. Instead, she just tells Mat “it can’t have you,” as though her saying so will make any difference at all.

I can certainly appreciate how impotent Tylin feels, however. She’s a very interesting queen, in that she has the authority of a ruler but only over a very small part of the country. Perhaps that is part of the reason she behaves the way she does—the status she holds and the power she wields is very great compared to those under her rule, but compared to other rulers you could almost say she isn’t really a queen in anything but name. Actually, in many ways she’s a lot like Berelain, who is the ruler of her own country but one who doesn’t get the respect of other rulers and even of high-ranking lords of larger, more powerful nations.

And now that I think about it, my response to the character of Berelain was very similar to my response to Tylin. When she’s interacting with other women Berelain is interesting, clever, and even admirable. But put her around Perrin (or Rand, before he scared her off) and she seems like a different person, and her motivations don’t make any sense. Like Berelain, Tylin had a great introduction and her interactions with Nynaeve and Elayne, especially that first one, really made her stand out among the nobility our Two Rivers’ heroes have encountered.  And then she met Mat, and she turned into this weird sex predator for no really discernible reason.

Of course, it’s not unrealistic for a person who seems interesting, smart, and even morally upright to have such a flaw, but after being so frustrated by Berelain, seeing such a similar story unfolding with Tylin and Mat makes me wonder if Jordan isn’t driving at a larger theme. The way The Wheel of Time navigates gender politics makes me a little wary of such an exploration, but I’ll try to maintain an open mind and see where this goes.

It is interesting, also, to note that Berelain and Faile actually are very similar people in many respects, and now Mat is trying to escape a queen while (as yet unknowingly) drawing closer to the future Empress he is fated to marry. As Tylin and Tuon attempt to understand each other, the one keeps Mat a prisoner while the other is going to be his wife.

The culture clash between the Seanchan and those they invade has always been interesting to watch. Every time it’s brought up, I find myself wondering if the Seanchan actually believe that these foreigners they are conquering understand the oath they are swearing. They certainly behave as though they believe it—but I think it’s more likely that they are so dedicated to their societal rules that they expect those they conquer to either adapt or suffer the consequences, which is no more or less than they expect from their own citizens. Mat notices the hanged people on the gates of Ebou Dar and that the Seanchan are punished equally for the same crimes—even those of the Blood are held to the same standards, and although their punishments are carried out differently, one can safely assume that if someone like Tylin or Beslyn were caught breaking a law, they would be also treated the way the Seanchan High Lords and Ladies are.

The Seanchan societal structure already relies on the idea that those who suffer consequences according to culture and law have brought it upon themselves, and whether it be through intentional illegal action, honest mistakes, or failures makes no difference. So why should it make a difference if those they conquer fail to uphold their oaths because they do not understand them, or because they swore them under duress, or because they lied while swearing with the exact intention of breaking the oath at the first opportunity. The consequences are the same, and the responsibility to act according to what is expected of you is on the individual. This is how some of Tuon’s siblings were made da’covale, even though they were children of the Empress herself. And in the same way, this is how those who perform with the most excellence find themselves raised in societal station.

It is a system that treats everyone equally, but not with equity. But for those who believe in it wholeheartedly, as Tuon does, the two would feel like one in the same.

We see this culture clash between her and Tylin. Tuon seems absolutely genuine in her desire for Tylin to be comfortable and content in her new role, for her not to fear Tuon and to see her as a sister (though not like the actual sisters she had to compete with, I’ll wager). It either would not occur to her or not matter to her that, from Tylin’s perspective, her home is being invaded and her culture replaced with that of the invaders. She might control more territory now that she did before the Seanchan’s arrival, she might be Queen of Altar in name, but she will not be passing her own laws, or ruling as she sees fit. She will be enforcing Seanchan laws, and answering to the Empress, and the consequences of failing to do so will always remain dire.

Perhaps many Seanchan find comfort in the intense hierarchical structure of their society. It prizes ability, after all, and at least in theory suggest that talent and strength and brains are (somewhat) more important than what class you were born into. Yes, it’s quite possible to fall very far through accident or failure, but the trade off is having life’s rules be very clear, if complicated. In theory, this sort of structure prevents the high from abusing the low for no reason other than their own whims or feelings of superiority—though in practice of course human nature will always play a significant factor, and any social system can be abused, or ignored, by those with power and influence.

And let us not forget, the Seanchan are invaders to the Altarans, but the Seanchan Empress and those of the Blood who trace their lineage back to Luthair believe they are reclaiming something stolen, and the people of this continent have forgotten who the land actually belongs to. This, too, is a mistake that brings its own punishment, and will earn little sympathy for those who might struggle to adapt to Seanchan rule.

Still, Tuon seems to be honest and dedicated, and loyal to both the letter and the spirit of Seanchan law. She performance penance when she abuses her power, she follows omens and listens to her Truthspeaker even when she does not agree with Anath, and she takes an active role in caring for the people in her charge. If one were to accept for a moment the morality of her culture, she would seem to qualify as a good person.

Of course, much of the Seanchan society is entirely amoral, especially the attitudes towards damane. But what’s interesting to me is the idea that a woman who is destined to be the Empress of this rigid, highly controlled society is also destined to marry Mat, who is figuratively and literally an agent of chaos and chance. What effect would such a person have on the ruler of the Seanchan, and how will that effect trickle down into the rest of society, especially when the Seanchan settlers mix and intermingle with the people of this continent, with all their varied cultural beliefs and different laws and customs?

That remains to be seen, but in the meantime, I, like Tuon, will take special note that Mat’s signet ring has ravens on it. Bought by chance, this object also seems to herald the wife he is destined to have, since the Roses and Ravens are the symbol of the Empress herself. And is he the fox, perhaps? He’s crafty enough for such a description, certainly.

I’m also so curious about Noal. He’s obviously someone important, and not just because Mat thought his face looked familiar. Some of the way he phrases things was very puzzling to me, such as when Mat explains the Seanchan Seekers.

I can certainly understand why someone might feel awkward and irritated at making a potentially dangerous mistake, but Noal’s reaction feels more like a kid’s reaction than that of an adult, as does the way he protests when the officer initially becomes upset with him. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but the way he’s stumbled into Mat’s life, the way he says “I had no idea you were so important” as though Mat is someone he’s known for a long time just seems… significant. Plus, this is Mat. When is the last time he made a random fortuitous connection that wasn’t important.

Noal just seems to know things, and I think that will matter later in the story. I was also struck by his compassion and insight when Mat observed that being made a damane was still better than being dead, and Noal asked if he really believed that. Mat had the grace to realize that he didn’t, and the empathy to relate to the damane in their literal collars while he himself is trapped by a figurative one.

Will Mat succeed in escaping from Tylin? Will he find out who Tuon really is before he goes, or will the truth remain hidden until much later? What rebellious act are Thom and Beslan considering? Will Mat figure out Alludra’s riddle? And what exactly is Juilin up to? So many questions, but we’ll be staying with Mat in Ebou Dar as we continue on to Chapters 18 and 19. Until then, dear readers![end-mark]

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Mat Faces a Gholam, and His Future, in <i>Winter’s Heart</i> (Part 13) appeared first on Reactor.

Rereads and Rewatches The Wheel of Time

Reading The Wheel of Time: Tuon Arrives and Mat Tries to Escape in Winter’s Heart (Part 12)

This week we encounter the Daughter of the Nine Moons, Tuon Athaem Kore Paendrag herself…

By Sylas K Barrett

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Published on March 26, 2024

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This week in Reading The Wheel of Time, the Return begins, and the name of a person we know but have never met joins our tale. Also, Mat plots his escape from Ebou Dar and ponders the invention of a new weapon. It’s Chapters 14 and 15 of Winter’s Heart.

Hundreds of Seanchan ships sail over the sea. The Corenne, the Return, has begun. On the lead ship, a woman named Tuon sits having her head shaved by her dresser, Selucia. When Tuon was a baby, Selucia’s mother gave her to Tuon as a gift, to be her nursemaid and her shadow, a secret bodyguard. When Tuon turned sixteen, she gave the traditional gifts to Selucia to thank her for the work, which included Selucia choosing her next appointment. But she chose to be Tuon’s dresser, and to remain her secret shadow.

Tuon is troubled because the night before she gave an order in anger. To balance herself, she chooses to wear a veil rather than the gold lace cap which would expose her shaved head and “mark her with the Raven-and-Roses.” She is uncomfortable asking her Soe’feia, Anath, to administer a penance because she still doesn’t know the woman very well.

In the second cabin she greets six of her sul’dam with their damane. One damane, Lidya, was the cause of Tuon’s anger the night before—she commanded the damane to read her fortune, then had her beaten when she did not like what she heard. Now she praises Lidya as being a good damane, and orders her wounds tended. Tuon checks in with all the other damane as well and gives orders to the sul’dam—she believes that no one should own damane without taking an active role with them. She has even been able to train Mylen, a damane who was once Aes Sedai and who refused to eat or drink and nearly died, before Tuon purchased and trained her.

Some of the five hundred Death Watch guards are stationed in the outer cabin, each one of whom would die to protect her—and will die, if she dies. Seeing her veil, the captain orders only two to accompany her on deck…

The nobles on deck greet her as an equal when they see her veil. Her secretary Yuril, who is secretly also her Hand and commander of her Seekers, kneels, and “the Macura woman,” prostrates herself. Tuon doesn’t know why this woman hates Aes Sedai so much, but she has given Tuon much valuable information, and seems eager to do more.

Anath is standing by the railing. When Tuon’s previous Soe’feia died unexpectedly, the Empress named Anath as replacement, and Tuon is a little afraid of her. Anath is dismissive of the veil, pointing out that everyone still knows who she is, even if the veil has them pretending otherwise, and that Tuon is a fool for thinking that she took on shame for such a little thing as having a damane beaten. She asks what the damane said to enrage Tuon so, but Tuon only answers that she will wear the veil until an omen tells her that it is time to stop.

Tuon listens as Anath continues telling her what a fool she is, loudly enough for those nearby to hear. The Captain is clearly horrified, but the traditions of Tuon’s family say that a Truthspeaker is always allowed to tell the truth. Still, Tuon isn’t comfortable with the idea of taking a penance from Anath—she believes that is taking the easy way out.

Tuon steers the conversation to Suroth, and then to the Dragon Reborn. The prophecies say that he must kneel to the Crystal Throne before Tar’mon Gaidon, or all is lost. Anath warns Tuon not to let the man know how dangerous she is to him until it is too late for him to escape. Tuon listens, and looks ahead to where she can see the harbor of Ebou Dar.

Mat sits in a wagon with Aludra, who he discovered in Ebou Dar when Valan Luca’s traveling show came to the city. Mat is still recovering from the injuries he received when a wall fell on him during the Seanchan attack. Attempting to persuade Aludra to share the secret of fireworks with him, he tells her that there isn’t a Guild of Illuminators anymore. When the members at the Tanchico Chapter House refused to let Seanchan soldiers inside, there was a battle—and somehow half the compound exploded. Afterwards, everyone at the Chapter House who was left alive, or who even appeared to be an Illuminator, was gathered up and made da’covale.

Aludra grieves over other Illuminators’ stubbornness, and tells Mat that the Guild lives on in her. She asks Mat what he will do if she does give him the secret to fireworks. Mat suggests that the tubes used to throw nightflowers into the sky could be aimed horizontally against an enemy. Aludra admits that Mat’s idea is a decent one, but she has already been thinking about the subject and tells Mat that, if he can tell her what she wants a bellfounder for, she will tell him all her secrets, including the ones that will make him blush.

She sends him away to ponder the question for a few days. As Mat is leaving, she murmurs something about how she would think of kissing him, if he didn’t belong to another. Mat is irked, especially because Tylin had taken all his clothes while he was bedridden and recovering. As a result, he’s dressed in flashy, revealing clothes which include a lot of lace and breeches that he deems far too tight. 

He leaves the wagon, puzzling over Aludra’s question and wondering if Tylin has changed him into the sort of man women chase. Outside he considers the picket line, and wonders if he should have Vanin steal some of Luca’s horses, but Mat isn’t recovered enough yet to ride very far.

When Mat thinks about Rand or Perrin, faint colors swirl in his head. He wishes it would stop. He wishes he could get away from Ebou Dar, and from Tylin, and take the secret of fireworks with him.

He goes to extract Olver from a group of women he is intently flirting with. He lectures the boy that women want quiet, well-mannered men, but Olver looks incredulous. Mat finds Thom and Beslan, and Thom reports that Luca has agreed to let them leave Ebou Dar with the traveling show, for a very high price. Unfortunately, however, he does not intend to leave until spring at the earliest. Beslan remarks that his mother will not be happy with him if she learns that he is helping “her pretty” to leave Ebou Dar. 

As they prepare to return to the Palace, Mat groans. The dice have just started tumbling in his head.

I almost forgot about Mat’s future wife—I haven’t thought about her since he stopped asking people if they’d ever heard of the Daughter of the Nine Moons. In his defense, and mine, he’s been a little bit busy with other things lately. I do have a vague memory of a Seanchan spy recognizing the title when Mat asked about it around some gaming table or other. I can’t remember when exactly that was, but of course the greater clue as to her identity was in The Fires of Heaven, when Elayne and Nynaeve were traveling with Valan Luca’s show and met Cerandin. It was then that they, and we the reader, learned that the Seanchan Empresses’ Court is called the Court of the Nine Moons—which pretty much told us exactly who the Daughter of the Nine Moons must be.

As far as ta’veren powers and the needs of the Pattern goes, it makes a lot of sense that Mat should end up married to the Empress’s Daughter, a woman who one day will herself be the Empress of Seanchan. Though the Seanchan are enemies to all of the other lands, and especially to channelers, they are not a nation of Darkfriends, and they do intend to fight in the Last Battle. Their prophecies say that the Dragon will kneel to the Empress, of course, which I doubt will happen, but Rand is going to have to find a way to bring them under his control, or at least into some kind of alliance, if everyone on the side of the Light is going to go into the Last Battle united. He has already suffered incredible losses in battle with the Seanchan, and having to fight even more into submission would be a costly loss of time, lives, and resources, even if he could manage to win an outright war against them. On the other hand, tying their princess to one of his best friends would be a sound political move for Rand, and Mat is a significant ta’veren as well, which might also help steer things in the way Rand/the Pattern needs them to go.

While very little happens in chapter 14, we do learn more about the culture of the Seanchan, some of which is quite interesting. They do seem to be a fairly superstitious culture, and Tuon in particular is very focused on the idea that omens—sightings of animals or occurrences of nature—can be used to guide her course and her decisions. I wonder if this kind of belief will make her accept Mat fairly easily, once she meets him and figures out that he is the person Foretold to be her husband.

I mean, that almost has to be what Lidya’s “fortune telling” was, right? The chapter doesn’t give the contents of Lidya’s words, but Tuon thinks that the nobles would be gossiping about her fate if they had overheard. This suggests that the fortune Lydia told concerns something significant in Tuon’s future, but not related to the fate of the Seanchan or the Return. We also know that Tuon didn’t like what she was told, but that she seems fairly resigned the next morning, which means that the news probably wasn’t as devastating as, for example, learning of her impending death. Or that she will never be Empress. Given that we the readers already know a very important piece of Tuon’s future, and given Jordan’s love of dramatic irony and of creating parallels between characters, I feel confident that I’m right in my guess.

But what’s really fascinating, if my assumption is correct and Lidya did actually Foretell Tuon’s marriage to some country-boy turned general with magical snake-people memories (okay, she probably didn’t word it like that), this raises some very interesting questions about the abilities of the female channelers in Seanchan. Tuon mentions that Lidya’s words were “cryptic,” which also lines up with how Foretellings go—they usually have to be deciphered and often only make sense in retrospect. But Tuon commanded Lidya to tell her fortune, which means that Lidya was able to summon this Foretelling at will. That is not how it works among the Aes Sedai, and as far as we know the ability to have a Foretelling has never been voluntary, even at the height of this Age’s Aes Sedai strength.

The Seanchan kill men born with the spark and imprison women who present with the ability to channel, so one would expect that they might also be suffering from a decline in the average power of their female channelers as they have been culling the ability out of their population just as the Aes Sedai have. It is possible, however, that sul’dam usually end up having families, which would mean that more people with the ability to channel are having children in Seanchan than in lands connected to Aes Sedai. We know that Alivia is stronger even than Nynaeve, despite having been born around four hundred years ago, which may suggests that there are a greater number of very powerful women among the damane than there are among the Aes Sedai. However, it’s also possible that Alivia’s strength might be exceptional among damane, and there may have been more Aes Sedai born four hundred years ago who could match her, all of whom would be dead now because the Oath Rod shortened their lifespan.

Additionally, the concept that the number of channelers is declining because of genetic lines being cut is only a theory among the Aes Sedai, and we don’t really know how, or even if, genetics are important to the birth of new channelers. So all this is really just speculation, though if genetics were significant in the birth of new channelers, that might pose an interesting problem for the Seanchan. If a lot of sul’dam were having children, their children might have a higher likelihood of being born with the spark. It’s an interesting thought, if purely theoretical.

Tuon also has the ability to be a sul’dam, which means she has the ability to learn to channel. How ironic for Mat, the man with the anti-saidar medallion, that he is going to end up married to a channeler of saidar. Or at least a potential channeler. The truth about sul’dam is bound to become common knowledge eventually, but Seanchan culture might be too inflexible to adapt to this information quickly, or well. It may take more than a generation for those with the ability to be sul’dam to accept the idea of becoming channelers in their own right, even after society has generally accepted that such a thing is possible.

The ownership of damane is, of course, abhorrent, but if we examine the culture from the inside, Tuon’s perspective on it is interesting. She is high-born and powerful, a person who has beaten out many siblings in order to be her mother’s heir; she clearly must be capable of great strength and ruthlessness when the situation calls for it. And yes, she believes in her right to own people, as most of the Seanchan do, but she also believes in the responsibility that comes with that ownership, that comes with the power she has over others.

This balancing point of rights and responsibility seems to be the linchpin of Seanchan society. They are very hierarchically ordered, and yet there is room for great mobility, both upwards and downwards. The highest-born may find themselves made da’covale if they make a mistake or are taken out by a political opponent and it seems no one (save perhaps the Empress herself?) is immune to such a fall. Someone low-born can be raised in status and even made one of the Blood, through impressive performance of their duties and service to their leaders. Or the occasional blackmail, as we saw with Alwhin. And excluding damane, who are not viewed as people, even slaves can be set free or raised to a high position, and some slaves may even be more powerful and respected than many free people.

You can understand how many Seanchan might believe that their society is both just and moral. It requires accepting certain truths, about channelers but also about concepts of failure, and what constitutes failure. If you believe these things, however, the clear rules and order of society might indeed feel very fair, as well as useful in guiding your own actions. I can even see how the rigid structure of their society might appeal to the Ogier, who often find humans much too flighty and changeable.

We learned earlier in the series that the Ogier Gardeners are owned by the Empress herself, and that this arrangement is different and separate from the way ownership works in Seanchan. I’ve been eagerly awaiting more information about this arrangement since it was first mentioned, but I was surprised to learn that the Ogier Gardeners seem to be serving primarily as soldiers, very similarly to the Death Watch guards.

The Ogier societies we have encountered so far are peace-loving and quiet, very reserved people who keep to themselves, though they still do stonemason work in the cities and have a relationship with the Aiel. We know they can be powerful warriors when roused to it, as we have seen with Loial, but there is something very different going on with the Seanchan Ogier. It’s one thing for a being who primarily loves nature and peace to take up arms to defend his friends and fight against the growing Shadow, and quite another to be a martial force in service to—and owned by—an Empress. To be so dedicated to her daughter that they would accompany her on a mission to reclaim—i.e. conquer—another land.

The narration even states that these Ogier asked, specifically, to be part of Tuon’s guard, and are so loyal to her that she trusts them with her life. That’s no small amount of loyalty and dedication, making me very curious how this relationship came to be. It seems unlikely that any Ogier sailed with Luthair Paendrag, given the Longing would have made that a very dangerous trip. So there must have been Ogier and steddings in the lands Luthair and his followers settled on and conquered. These Ogier might have been very different than their counterparts on the other continent, just as the “Aes Sedai” in Seanchan were very different.

I’m not sure what I find more off-putting, Olver the baby horndog or the fact that Jordan has given us yet another powerful woman described as being petite, big-eyed, and with a childlike sort of beauty, who will end up romantically entangled with one of the main men. Sir, your kink is showing, and Tuon’s distress over not having a more commanding presence doesn’t really do anything to distract from the fact.

I am glad Mat is doing okay. I mean, he’s not doing great but the Seanchan arrival in Ebou Dar hasn’t actually made things worse for him. Tylin had already made him basically her sex prisoner, which is gross but at least it’s not a new grossness. And I really like Aludra and her friendship with him, so I’m excited to see her back—as long as that relationship doesn’t get weird and sexual, anyway. She’s a very interesting person, and I know she got kicked out of the Illuminator’s Guild because Rand blew up some of the fireworks, but it seems like there’s more in her background that might come up later.

Based on the comment about the bellfounder, I’d say she and Mat are on their way to inventing cannons. Mat is already thinking about how to shoot people with fireworks, and a person who casts bells in (I assume) iron or bronze would probably be able to make cannons. Such a weapon would be very useful against the Seanchan, and would deliver a destructive power that could, potentially, rival some of what the damane can do. 

It will be interesting to see if Mat and Tuon meet up soon, or if they are going to be ships in the night as she arrives in, and he escapes from, Ebou Dar. Ironically he’s just wondering if Tylin has turned him into the sort of man that women like to chase just as the woman he is destined to marry is sailing towards him.

It took me a moment to remember who the heck “the Macura woman” was, but I got there in the end. I guess Ronde hates Aes Sedai now because of what Nynaeve and Elayne did to her. Probably Elaida punished her as well, when she found out that Ronde had had the two in her grasp and lost them again. That’s very much her move, harshly punishing failure to the point where her attempt to enforce loyalty results instead in resentment, mistrust and even—as in this instance—betrayal. Ronde Macura on the side of the Seanchan is an alarming prospect. As a former member of the Yellow eyes-and-ears network she probably has useful information on the Aes Sedai, but more importantly, she can tell the Seanchan about forkroot. This knowledge could be very dangerous to any channelers that the Seanchan encounter, whether Aes Sedai, or Kin, or wilder, and could make them easier to catch and collar. It’s not a pleasant thought.

We’ll be sticking with Mat for the next two weeks as we continue on with Chapters 16 and 17. I haven’t read them yet, but I can guess that there will be hijinx and urban guerilla warfare against the Seanchan. And, possibly, a daring escape. I’m rooting for him, anyway, and the sooner he is out of Tylin’s sphere of influence, the better.

I am amused at the idea that there might be folks using Luca’s traveling show for cover again, though. And curious about why Luca doesn’t seem to like Mat at all.

Or… did they? [end-mark]

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Tuon Arrives and Mat Tries to Escape in <i>Winter’s Heart</i> (Part 12) appeared first on Reactor.

Rereads and Rewatches The Wheel of Time

Reading The Wheel of Time: Champion of the Light, Nae’blis of the Dark

Sylas explores the parallels between Rand Al’Thor and the Nae’Blis.

By Sylas K Barrett

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Published on March 19, 2024

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When a reader first picks up The Wheel of Time, they are initially introduced to the concept of the Dragon Reborn through the superstitions and scattered bits of information that the people in the Two Rivers have about him. Later, as Rand, Perrin, and Mat learn from Moiraine about who and what the Dragon Reborn is really supposed to be, the reader does as well. The continually reincarnated soul known in Lews Therin’s time as the Dragon, and in the current Age as the Dragon Reborn, is in many ways a typical fantasy savior-hero, a quasi-magical champion who is fated—though birth, prophecy, or both—to save humanity from the threat of Evil-with-a-capital-E. But what I found especially interesting about the character of the Dragon Reborn was that he was prophesied, specifically, to fight the Dark One himself. As far as I understood from what was revealed in The Eye of the World, there was no human counterpart to the Dragon, no champion of the Dark One to mirror the champion of the Creator.

Because the character of Ba’alzamon was believed to be the Dark One, not only by Rand and his friends but by the forces of the Dark as well, it did indeed seem as though Rand was facing the Dark One himself throughout the events of The Eye of the World and The Great Hunt. Even Moiraine believed that it was the Dark One who was visiting Rand, Mat, and Perrin’s dreams; she told Rand that he hadn’t killed the Dark One in the confrontation in the sky because she knew the Dark One couldn’t have been slain in such a way, not because she guessed that the being Rand had faced was someone else. Ba’alzamon wasn’t killed, in any case, and it was eventually revealed that he was not the Dark One at all, but Ishamael. Ishamael, Betrayer of Hope, the enemy who showed up to revel in Lews Therin’s taint-induced murder of his family, and to make sure the man knew the truth about what he had done in his madness and whose hand had cursed him to that madness.

During that encounter, Ishamael also made the claim that he and Lews Therin had been fighting the same war since the beginning of Time, saying that they have fought a thousand battles and will continue to fight until the Shadow triumphs. Of course, one can’t exactly trust Ishamael’s words—he’s evil and also clearly kind of  insane. As far as we know, there aren’t any prophecies about the Dragon having a human counterpart in the Dark, and the Forsaken themselves don’t seem to have the full picture of how souls are reincarnated, or when, or which ones. However, whether or not Ishamael was correct in believing that he and the Dragon have been fighting across Time, whether or not he was the truest enemy of Lews Therin (there’s a few of the male Forsaken who think they’re Lews Therin’s most important and dangerous enemy), he certainly made himself the most significant enemy of Rand, right up until Rand killed him.

From a narrative standpoint, I was surprised when Rand killed Ishamael so early in the series, but that was because I forgot about the fact that the Dark One can bring back the souls of those sworn to him. When Ishamael returned as Moridin, we finally had a true counterpart to Rand. The Nae’blis, the one to whom all other Darkfriends must submit, who will lead the forces of the Dark into Tarmon Gai’don, becoming the regent of the world that the Dark One will remake in his own image. And the Dragon Reborn, who is born to unite the world under him so that he can lead the forces of the Light to victory in the Last Battle.

One of those most interesting things about the Forsaken is that they are people from another Age. They were Lews Therin’s antagonists, and they’re only here now because they were trapped in the Bore outside of Time (or in Aginor and Balthamel’s case, right up against the edge of Time). And even when they die, they are not reincarnated by the Wheel into new lives and new threads of the Pattern. Instead, their souls go to the Dark One, from whence they can be placed into the living bodies of other people.

These reborn Forsaken are still not truly of this Age, much in the way that Birgitte isn’t of this Age. However, just as Birgitte is changing as a result of being alive in this Age, the reincarnated Forsaken are also being affected. The story marks this change most obviously in Aran’gar, because of the narrative importance of the difference between men and women. When the person formerly known as Balthamel protests against the change in sex, Shaidar Haran says;

And that does seem to be true of Aran’gar, and so must be true of Osan’gar and Moridin. Moridin is changed from the Ishamael he was, and in that way he belongs to this Age, and to Rand, in the way that Ishamael never did. Ishamael was Lews Therin’s enemy, haunting Rand in the same way that Lews Therin’s legacy and Lews Therin’s mistakes haunted him as he struggled to accept the truth of his identity.

Moridin is something new.

Their first encounter established this clearly. Ba’alzamon was a raging monster, with eyes and mouth of flame, pursuing Rand in his dreams and taunting him with words about the inevitability of the Dark One’s victory and offering bribes to tempt Rand over to his side. But when Moridin saves Rand’s life in Shadar Logoth, he is sardonic and vaguely helpful. In a way, he’s almost friendly—so much so that Rand doesn’t see him as a threat, even with his obvious knowledge about Sammael. One can imagine Lews Therin and Ishamael meeting in a similar way, with Ishamael deriding Lews Therin’s intelligence and abilities, but in such a casual way that it might only be read as a gentle jibe between friends. But Rand is not Lews Therin and Moridin is not quite Ishamael anymore—this is old and yet new, another part of the cycle as the Wheel turns.

Moridin also mirrors Rand physically. When Moghedien first meets him, her impression is of a tall and broad-shouldered young man who can’t be much older than twenty.

Moridin is physically close to Rand’s age now, as tall as he is, broad-shouldered and very physically striking. You can easily picture how they would look standing beside each other in Shadar Logoth—their matching heights and statures, Rand’s unusual red hair and gray eyes complimenting Moridin’s dark hair and striking blue gaze. Even Moridin’s body language in the above paragraph is reminiscent of the posture and attitude Rand often adopts when he’s receiving guests as steward of Cairhien or Caemlyn, or as king of Illian. Moridin even dresses in a coat as black as an Asha’man’s, though arguably has more claim to the color than any of Rand’s human weapons.

And now Moridin has been named Nae’blis. I think it’s very interesting that he has been granted this honor despite his failure in Tear and death at the hands of a Callandor-wielding Rand. Of course it’s quite possible that Moridin was punished by the Dark One before being named, either when he was a soul in the Dark One’s grasp or after being given a new body but before the meeting with Moghedien. Still, one wonders if the title and position of Nae’blis was always going to be Ishamael’s, and the Dark One only made it seem like a position others could contend for as a means of controlling and manipulating his followers. Though we don’t know what is in the Dark One’s mind, Ishamael has always narratively stood out in comparison to the other Forsaken. He is the one we met in the Prologue of The Eye of the World. He was revealed as the true identity of Ba’alzamon, the practically non-human entity that terrorized Rand for the first several books. And he appears to have been the architect of many of the movements and schemes made by Darkfriends and the Black Ajah throughout the Age, almost as though he has been free from imprisonment longer than the other Forsaken.

Or perhaps he was never imprisoned at all. Ishamael did visit Lews Therin after the confrontation in Shayol Ghul, in which the Dragon and his Companions sealed the hole in the Dark One’s prison and the Dark One laid the taint on saidin. All the Forsaken were supposed to be locked away by that point, so one wonders if Ishamael has been free all this time, preparing for the eventual eroding of the seals and the escape of his fellow Chosen, reading the forces of the Dark for the birth of the Dragon Reborn and the coming of Tarmon Gai’don.

In any case, Nae’blis is to the Dark as the Dragon is to the Light, near enough. Moridin is now roughly the same age and roughly in the same position as Rand. He has more experience, true, but if Rand had a little more access to Lews Therin’s memories and a little less trouble with the concept of them being two different people, but in one body, and also being the same soul, you could argue that it’s not that different for Rand to remember his time as Lews Therin than it is for Moridin to remember his time as Ishamael.

The real question is how much of Rand’s part in the Last Battle will be facing Moridin and how much will be facing the Dark One himself. But for the moment, the Dark One is only affecting things from a distance, and is still relying on his human and Shadowspawn servants, just as the Creator is working through Rand and others who walk in the Light, and whose lives make up the Pattern of Creation.

And there is one other, very interesting, parallel between Moridin and Rand that is beginning to become apparent as we learn more about the True Power. Perhaps the best part about being a Darkfriend for a channeler of saidin is that the Dark One can protect them from the taint. Graendal brings this up during the Forsaken’s discussion of Rand’s plan to cleanse saidin, suggesting that the Dark One might not trust his male channelers once they are no longer reliant on him for this special protection. It’s ironic, in a way, that the Dark One’s touch upon saidin corrupts the minds of all men who channel it, except those who serve him. But in serving him they have, of course, dedicated their souls to the Dark. A corruption of the soul instead of the mind is still a corruption, and in the long run, arguably a even worse fate.

But Moridin channels the so-called True Power, not saidin. And this power, stemming directly from the Dark One himself, is described as being “a drug more addictive than saidin, more deadly than poison.” Even Demandred, another Forsaken and one who also aspires to be made Nae’blis, thinks that Moridin is insane to use the True Power so often; Demandred himself has only ever used it in emergencies, back when there was no Nae’blis and other Forsaken had permission to channel the True Power.

But Moridin is being corrupted by the True Power while Rand is being corrupted by the taint. Standing on opposite sides of the eternal conflict between Light and Dark, for a moment, these two are not so much opposite sides of a coin as they are, just… the same.

When Moridin and Rand encountered each other in Shadar Logoth and Moridin saved Rand from falling through the floor and probably dying, they both shot balefire at Mashadar at the same time, and the bolts collided. Rand was unable to sense the man channeling saidin, and we know that Moridin is using the True Power pretty much all the time, if not exclusively. Which means that balefire-channeled One Power interacted with balefire-channeled True Power. We saw the immediate effects on Rand as he experienced intense double vision and his head ringing like a gong. And it seems likely that some of the new symptoms he has when channeling—the dizziness and increased nausea—are also related to this entanglement. It’s almost as if he has been tainted anew, this time by the same thing tainting and destroying Moridin. The two men have become even more entangled, narratively and metaphysically.

At the writing of this essay, I am a bit less than halfway through reading Winter’s Heart. No doubt as my reading continues, I’ll learn more about Ishamael and Lews Therin’s backstory, and more about how the Dark One and his powers works, which may shift some aspects of my current reading of the character of Ishamael. But it is clear that the narrative is building a story around Rand and Moridin, a study in similarities and contrasts, and it promises to be very interesting indeed. [end-mark]

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Rereads and Rewatches The Wheel of Time

Reading The Wheel of Time: Flinn Heals, Cadsuane Studies, and Demandred plots in Winter’s Heart (Part 11)

Cadsuane and Demandred feature heavily in Sylas’s Wheel of Time discussion this week.

By Sylas K Barrett

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Published on March 12, 2024

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Cadsuane is holding an audience with Wavemistress Harine and her Sailmistress, Derah, who are demanding that Windfinder Shalon be returned to them. Cadsuane isn’t done questioning Shalon about the attack on Rand, and idly cites Tower Law as the precedent they must follow as the windfinder “assists” them with their investigation. She finds the Sea Folk irritating, but her attention is mostly elsewhere.

She has Elza, Sarene, Nesune, Erian, and Beldeine in the room with her, as well as Daigian and Eben. Cadsuane is suspicious of the sisters who recently swore fealty to Rand. The captive Aes Sedai were nowhere near Rand when they decided to swear, and although these five all have believable reasons, some of the others have begun to make Cadsuane doubt.

Sorilea and Verin come in, and Cadsuane sees Sorilea hand Verin a vial of something that helps with sleep, along with a warning about dosages and that too much can be fatal. Cadsuane notes that, like herself, Verin is also having trouble sleeping since “the boy” fled the sun palace.

Harine upbraids Cadsuane for not listening to her, giving her a tap on the cheek to get her attention. Cadsuane restrains herself from using the One Power on the woman.

Cadsuane instructs Sarene to escort the Sea Folk women back to their rooms, where they will fast and meditate on civility; if they are uncivil, Sarene is instructed to spank them. Harine seems ready to resist, but after some whispered words from Derah she allows herself to be escorted out.

Sorilea tells Cadsuane that the last of the prisoner Aes Sedai—Chisaine, Janine, Pavlara, Innina, and Vayelle—have all asked to serve the Car’a’carn. None have been allowed to speak to any of the others, and Sorilea is confident that there hasn’t been any collusion. Thus, she has accepted their requests. Cadsuane wonders what could possibly make a Red sister swear fealty to a man who can channel.

Sorilea moves to speak to the other Aes Sedai in the room, leaving Cadsuane alone with Verin. Verin tells Cadsuane that, since Bera and Kiruna were getting nowhere, she went to have her own conversation with Shalon and Ailil. She was able to get the entire story from the women of how they came to be bound and gagged under Ailil’s bed the day Rand was attacked. The two had begun meeting together to share information about Rand and their respective cultures, and the contact had resulted in a sexual relationship.

Cadsuane is shocked that the women would spend days being put to the question and hiding something so trivial, but Verin points out that the Cairhienin are very prim and prudish in public. And Shalon is a married woman—apparently breaking marriage vows is a very serious offense in Sea Folk culture, and she could be severely punished if this information got out. Cadsuane instructs Verin to use the information to blackmail the women into reporting to Cadsuane—Ailil on her brother, and Shalon on events among the Sea Folk. Verin isn’t sure how far Shalon will betray Harine. 

Corele arrives, seeming uncharacteristically uncertain, and reports to Cadsuane that she let Damer examine the stilled sisters, and that he has completely Healed Irgain. Irgain somehow knows about the oaths the others swore, and is ready to swear as well.

The ability to Heal stilling is a world-shaking discovery, especially since it was a man who did it, although Cadsuane still considers it a storm in a teacup compared to Rand al’Thor. She gives Corele permission to let Damer try on the other two stilled sisters.

Jahar comes in and reports, in a near-panic, that Alanna has passed out and won’t wake up. Cadsuane, Sorilea, Corele and Verin follow Jahar through the halls towards the room Alanna has been taken to, but they are interrupted by Dobraine, who stops Cadsuane to inform her that Lady Caraline and High Lord Darlin are no longer Lady Arilyn’s palace where Cadsuane was keeping them—they are on a riverboat bound for Tear, and out of her reach.

He tells her that she shouldn’t punish the servants who were left in charge of the pair. They were strong enough to keep two “guests” but could not stand up to Dobraine’s soldiers. He also explains that Darlin is to be the Dragon Reborn’s steward in Tear, and that it seemed wise to send Caraline out of the country, in case someone wanted to use her in the fight for the throne. Impatient to get to Alanna, Cadsuane only remarks that she hopes Dobraine will still have the same opinions in a year.

Arriving to where Merise is sitting with Alanna, they examine the unconscious Aes Sedai. Corele tries Healing, and Merise adds that she has tried as well—there has been no change. Verin looks terrified, and Cadsuane feels some terror of her own. With nothing else to do, they all sit down to wait until she wakes up.

Demandred waits in a meeting place near Shayol Ghul, with Graendal, Osan’gar, and Aran’gar. He knows it is hard for Semirhage to attend these meetings, but Mesaana has also stopped coming very often. He wonders if Mesaana is thinking of ending the alliance Demandred has with her and Semirhage, in which they all work together to overthrow other members of the Chosen and promise not to turn on each other until everyone else has been eliminated.

Demandred complains about the failure to kill al’Thor in Cairhien, and about how the man has been seen in many places since. He also complains about the primitive nature of communication in this Age. Osan’gar suggests that probability will eventually turn in their favor, and that chance can’t always work for al’Thor forever. Aran’gar teases him for failing to keep track of al’Thor while she has her own charge well in hand, but Graendal suggests that Aran’gar should be more worried about al’Thor’s successes.

They have learned of Rand’s intention to remove the taint from saidin. Osan’gar lectures that even he himself probably couldn’t devise a way to remove the taint, and al’Thor is just a primitive. Greandal calls him blind.

Moridin arrives, shadowed by Cyndane, and announces that the Dark Lord is certain of all of their loyalty, for now. He remarks that Mesaana should be here for what he has to say, and points out that the small, unimportant matters can suddenly become important. 

He is carrying a rat, and when it tries to bite him he incinerates it by channeling the True Power. Demandred thinks the man must be mad, using the True Power so frequently. As Nae’blis, Moridin is the only one allowed to use the True Power, but even when Demandred had the ability, he only used it when he had to.   

When ordered, Cyndane explains to the others that “Lews Therin” has two of the access keys to the Choedan Kal, one for each gender, and that he plans to use them in his attempt to cleanse saidin. Everyone is horrified—back during the War of Power, only balefire had been more feared than the power of the Choedan Kal.

Moridin replies that, when Rand touches the Choedan Kal, they will know where he is. Then, they are to go there and take him, or kill him if necessary. They all respond respectfully, bowing their heads to the Nae’blis, as Demandred notes that Moridin doesn’t intend to join them in this dangerous act. He considers how he might arrange things so that the next time Moridin dies, he doesn’t get another body.

Wait, hang on. Did Cadsuane have Hopwil, Narishma, and Flinn bonded as Warders?

At first I thought maybe the Eben mentioned in the beginning was not Eben Hopwil but a different person who is also named Eben, but the other men mentioned are Damer and Jahar… more commonly referred to in the text by their last names, Flinn and Narishma. And while the words “bonded” or “warder” aren’t ever used, there are plenty of clues within the chapter.

When she decides to blackmail Ailil and Shalon, Cadsuane considers that she doesn’t particularly like using blackmail as a tactic, but that she has already used it on the three Asha’man. Daigian is possessive over Eben. Cadsuane observes that some of Damer’s firm personality is already rubbing off on Corele. Jahar is described as wearing a blue coat that Merise picked out for him, and later when he is impatient over Dobraine’s interruption, Cadsuane observes that Merise has a firm hand.

Taken separately, none of these clues would make my mind jump straight to the Warder bond, but all together they paint a specific picture. It might be possible that Cadsuane is merely blackmailing the men into behaving as servants to the Aes Sedai, but the close relationships that each pair seems to have developed in such a short span of time, and the fact that it’s only one specific Aes Sedai in charge of each man, makes me think this is a bonding situation. Cadsuane did consider, when she found out about Alanna and Rand, that as abhorrent as Alanna’s actions were, Cadsuane herself was also prepared to do whatever is necessary, even bond someone against their will. So I wouldn’t put it past her to command the followers she trusted most to bond these three, and then blackmail the Asha’man into accepting it—coercing someone into a bond is the same as bonding without consent, just with a little more warning than Alanna gave Rand.

Rand is going to lose it when he finds out. After all, these are the only three Asha’man he feels he may be able to trust—he even mentioned as much to Elayne in the last chapter. No, that trust is going to be replaced by Rand’s intense suspicion of the Aes Sedai and those attached to them. And while he certainly must have expected Cadsuane to get up to (what Rand would view as) trouble in his absence, and certainly shouldn’t be surprised that she had her own designs that she was free to execute in his absence, I doubt he would have expected anything like this. Sure, it happened to him, but he would expect his Asha’man to be on guard against trickery from the Aes Sedai, just as he himself has become even more suspicious and on guard since Alanna took advantage of his trust in her.

I wonder what Cadsuane had to blackmail these Asha’man with that was so serious that she could push all three into accepting Warder bonds with Aes Sedai who aren’t even sworn to Rand. It would have to be something pretty serious, I would think. Although Cadsuane’s forceful personality probably helped as well, and both Hopwil and Narishma are quite young, as well.

After seeing the Sea Folk behave with such disdain towards Nynaeve—and everyone else for that matter—it was kind of refreshing to see Cadsuane take Harine down a peg. Last week I mused over the hostility the Atha’an Miere hold towards the Aes Sedai, and all the shorebound, it occurs to me, in addition to the other theories I had, that the Sea Folk place such a great deal of cultural value on the ability to bargain that it may be difficult for them to respect anyone who isn’t able to hold their own at the negotiation table. Both Nynaeve and Elayne’s bargain (which Harine may or may not be aware of) and the one that Merana and Rafela made on Rand’s behalf favor the Atha’an Miere, especially since Rand’s interpretations of the gift of land hasn’t yet been put into practice.

The reveal about Ailil and Shalon is interesting. Verin claims they are “pillow friends” which as far as I can tell is just an Aes Sedai terms for novices and Accepted who have a sort of friends with benefits situation to find comfort and closeness during a time when life is full of hard work and obedience. However, given what we learn about Shalon—that she is married and that breaking marriage vows is a very grave offense that would result in serious consequences if she was found out—it seems unlikely that she would take such risks for a fling with some shore-bound woman she’s been exchanging information with. It may be that this relationship is actually quite serious, and that in addition to risking punishment (for Shalon) and acute embarrassment and/or shame (for Ailil), being found out might also mean that each would lose someone she truly cares deeply for. It will be interesting to see if anything comes of this, and I hope it’s handled well.

Verin is fascinating in this chapter. Cadsuane notes that Verin often notices things others don’t, and doesn’t seem surprised when Verin was able to get the truth from Ailil and Shalon in one conversation after Bera and Kiruna failed multiple times. But she still seems to be underestimating Verin. She doesn’t question if any of Verin’s easy submissiveness towards the Wise Ones might be adopted purely of necessity, and might not come as comfortably as it appears to. She also overhears Sorilea giving Verin a “sleeping” drug which sounds like absolutely the perfect thing to poison someone with and doesn’t even have a second’s thought about it.

In part, of course, this is evidence of how strong the Aes Sedai patterns of thinking are. Even Cadsuane, who uses Daigian to spy on other sisters because she recognizes that Daigian is very smart and capable, but always overlooked because of her lack of strength in the One Power, can miss things, like how Verin might be a common denominator among the Aes Sedai prisoners who swore to Rand. Not that I think she really has enough information to get there, in any case. She probably knows some of what the sworn Aes Sedai get up to as apprentices, since they all report to her, but Verin doesn’t have to volunteer anything she’s not asked about—even if she can’t lie outright, which I sometimes suspect she might be able to, she can still omit information, and Verin is very, very skilled in this area. Perhaps even a match for Cadsuane the legend.

And while Cadsuane is aware of, and presumably on the lookout for, the Black Ajah, nobody’s mind would first suspect that Darkfriends might be in charge of encouraging all Aes Sedai to swear allegiance to the Dragon Reborn. Sure, many of them think it’s dangerous and wrong for Aes Sedai to serve Rand, rather than the other way around, but it doesn’t necessarily follow that it would be in the Dark’s best interest to make sure the two are forced into an alliance. It’s also kind of a leap to suspect Verin is getting the drug from Sorilea to poison someone, given that there’s no suggestion that Verin has anybody she needs out of the way. Cadsuane herself is having trouble sleeping from worry, and Sorilea is a (somewhat) trusted ally, so it makes sense to think that the sleeping drug is for just that.

It’s not so much that I think Cadsuane should be catching onto something that is right in front of her, but rather that I am aware, again, of how easily Verin is glossed over by others. And whenever she is mentioned I’m back to wondering about her. The fact that she is able to use a form of compulsion on other Aes Sedai kind of suggests to me that she is free of the Three Oaths but doesn’t prove it; manipulating someone with compulsion is certainly amoral, but it’s not quite using the One Power as a weapon. Just as bonding someone against their will is amoral, but doesn’t count. We still have the fact that Verin lied that one time about having been sent by Moiraine when she wasn’t, which I’m so curious about for a number of reasons, including that it would have been pretty simple for her to Aes Sedai her way to having everyone conclude that she had been sent.

And Verin does seem to be fighting for the Light. She is securing the Aes Sedai for Rand, views the action of taking him prisoner as foolish and dangerous, and is obviously concerned for Rand’s safety; she and Cadsuane are both terrified by Alanna’s collapse because they think it means something happened to Rand. I still don’t know what to make of Verin, really, but I’m paying very close attention to her, and it’s interesting to see how many characters, even smart, suspicious characters like Cadsuane, don’t seem to be.

I assume what happened to Alanna has to do with Elayne, Aviendha, and Min co-bonding Rand. This bond is something that Elayne invented, so it might have unintended consequences to Alanna that she couldn’t foresee. It’s also possible that this would have happened even if someone else had bonded Rand in a more traditional fashion; since it’s something that isn’t done, there might be preparation that is necessary for the already bonded woman to undergo before the second bond is placed. It’s hard to say, but it will be interesting to see what happens when Alanna wakes up.

But getting back to Cadsuane for a moment, she references in this chapter her two bitterest failures. One is getting close to rooting out the Black Ajah but ultimately having her quarry slip through her fingers. The second, which she regards as much worse even than that, is “failing to learn what Caraline Damodred’s cousin had been up to in the Borderlands until the knowledge was years too late to do any good.” Caroline’s cousin is, of course, Moiraine. Since I skipped ahead and read New Spring in anticipation of the Wheel of Time television show, I know that what Moiraine was doing in the Borderlands was looking for the Dragon Reborn, and that she encountered Cadsuane while she was out there. Cadsuane warned Moiraine about the dangers of galavanting around alone as a newly-minted sister, and Moiraine promptly slipped away to continue her hunt.

At that time, Moiraine and Siuan thought Cadsuane must either have been Black Ajah or one of Tamra’s searchers for the Dragon. We the readers know that Cadsuane isn’t Black, and given the fact that she survived the Black Ajah murdering all the searchers, I doubt she was one of those either. Also, if Cadsuane had had as much information about Rand’s birth as Moiraine and Siuan did, I think she would have been successful in finding him, or at least have been able to keep pace with Moiraine’s search. It’s much more likely, I think, that Cadsuane was observant and clever enough to have a sense that something important was up, and chased after it, but wasn’t quite able to find out the truth. Perhaps she was suspicious about Tamra’s death. It’s possible that she encountered Moiraine in the Borderlands because she was chasing the Black Ajah—they were very active murdering Amyrlins and Aes Sedai at that time, and these events might have caught Cadsuane’s interest.

Of course, New Spring wasn’t published until a few years after Winter’s Heart. There’s a whole other book, Crossroads of Twilight, in between them. Someone reading Winter’s Heart when it came out wouldn’t yet have those background details about Cadsuane yet, and I can imagine how curious and excited I would be at these little hints that maybe she knew something about what Moiraine was doing, even though Moiraine was clearly unaware that Cadsuane was watching her so closely.

Cadsuane is suspicious of the Aes Sedai who have sworn to Rand, especially those who were prisoners first, but it’s even more interesting to see how she also has a team of sisters she really does trust. I can’t help thinking that it must be really great for these sisters who have been operating under her direction for so long. They don’t have to figure out what happened in the Tower schism, or whether or not they should stay loyal to Elaida. Elaida might be the Amyrlin, but Cadsuane is a legend, and one who has decided (very fairly so, in my estimation) that Elaida and the division in the Tower is far less important for Cadsuane to be involving herself in than what is going on in Cairhien—especially with Min’s viewing. These sisters can still have the certainty around who they are following and what they are meant to be doing. After all, the Aes Sedai hierarchy says that they should yield to the strongest sister in the room.

The comment by Corele, echoed in Cadsuane’s own head, that she can’t see letting any sister remain stilled if there’s another option is a good reminder to us, the readers, of how dire a fate being stilled/gentled is. Cadsuane even considers that the revelation will cause a stir among the Aes Sedai in part because every woman lives with the fear of one day having the ability to touch the One Power taken from her. And of course there’s also the fact that the ability to Heal stilling was discovered by a man.

As far as they know, anyway! Nynaeve still got there first, but that news hasn’t made it to Cairhien yet.

Corele remarks that Flinn is convinced that there is nothing that can’t be Healed. Like Nynaeve, he is new to channeling and to Healing, and while part of both of their successes is obviously down to being very strong in the One Power and possibly more exceptionally Talented in Healing than any channeler has been in a long time (or ever?) I imagine that not having a context of what can and can’t be done with Healing helped as well. 

The fact that Flinn was able to fully Heal Irgain “as if she’d never been” stilled at all, and Nynaeve was able to Heal Logain’s gentling and restore him to his full strength, but that Leane and Siuan were restored to a lesser strength is interesting. It’s too small a sample size to come to any definite conclusion, but it’s possible that the connection to saidin and the connection to saidar are different enough enough from each other that the technique of the Healing must also be done differently. When Nynaeve figured out how to Heal Logain she was feeling her way along, trying to understand what she was looking at. With Siuan and Leane, she was recreating something she had already done. Even if she tried to approach it exactly as she approached studying Logain, what she did before would still be on her mind, and she might have missed the fact that she needed to do something slightly differently with them than with him.

Men and women are different in this, after all. The physical/metaphysical something that allows someone to connect to saidar might look a little bit, or a lot, different than the one that allows someone to connect to saidin. Nynaeve’s impression of what she finds in Logain is similar to what she felt in Leane and Siuan, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a difference. In the case of Flinn, he may have been able to examine those men of the Black Tower who burned themselves out—we don’t know for sure. But presumably we would have heard about it if he had been successful at Healing any of them, in either case. But he was able to Heal Irgain.

Perhaps there is something about the connections that’s easier to understand by a channeler of the opposite half of the One Power. Perhaps a man can Heal a woman more easily than he could a man, and vice-versa? The two halves are supposed to be complimentary, after all, the ancient Aes Sedai symbol strongly resembling the symbol for Yin and Yang. Two sides, push and pull, the Flame and the Fang, whose friction drives the movement of the One Power over the Wheel of Time. Just as in the Age of Legends the best works of channeling were done by men and women working together, perhaps if the patient and the Healer are different genders, the Healing works better. I don’t like that idea nearly as much as the idea that men and women simply need to be Healed with a slightly different technique, but it would make thematic and world-building sense if it were true.

If memory serves, I believe we learned at one point that Healing stilling/gentling was thought to be impossible even in the Age of Legends, so it’s also possible that this is a particular Talent that has resurfaced from a by-gone era. Many old things are coming back, as observed by Someshta and others, so Nynaeve and Flinn’s abilities may be something new… as far as anything can be new when all of Time is an ever-turning Wheel, anyway.

Speaking of the Age of Legends, I was intrigued to learn that the giant statues, the Choedan Kal, were actually feared back then—that the power that one could draw through them was too great even for that exalted time. Lanfear didn’t seem too fazed by them, though, when she first suggested that she and Rand could use them to challenge the Dark One, and possibly even the Creator himself. But I guess Lanfear, like Moridin, is considered a little out there even by the other Forsaken.

Last week, after reading the section with Shiaine and Murellin, I wondered if Moridin’s identity as Ishamael was now known to at least some Darkfriends. We now have confirmation that the other Forsaken, at least, know who he is and was, and also know who Aran’gar and Osan’gar are. (Or were? This is getting a little confusing.) Osan’gar also thought that Cyndane was Lanfear reincarnated, but now he thinks otherwise because Cyndane is so much less powerful than Lanfear.

I also assumed Cyndane was Lanfear, although my thought was that she was in disguise, not reincarnated. If the weaves of her disguise were inverted, no one could tell, right, not even another female Forsaken? Except I believe that the illusion is difficult to maintain when touched—we saw that with Alviarin grabbing the hem of Mesaana’s dress, and it has also been mentioned a few other times. With the way Moridin’s always grabbing her, I’m less certain that she could be maintaining a disguise made with the One Power.

But either way, the fact that Cyndane is less powerful than Lanfear is also a wrinkle. Reincarnated or in disguise, I don’t think one’s strength in the One Power is easy to hide. But there could be a way. For that matter, there’s probably a way for Lanfear to have been reduced in strength—we know of at least one way that can happen, after all. There could certainly be others.

I do think I should mention, at this point, that I have been spoiled for something regarding Moiraine and Lanfear’s deaths by falling into the redstone doorway. Highlight the next paragraph to read it, or if you’re a first time reader and want to avoid spoilers, skip it!

A while back I accidentally stumbled across something mentioning that Moiraine ends up marrying Thom Merrilin. I had already formed the theory that she had survived her fall through the doorway, partly because we didn’t see a body and it would be much more narratively interesting for her to have survived, perhaps trapped in that other dimension. No body, no death, is usually how it goes in genre fiction. And also, Moiraine is the Gandalf of the Wheel of Time, so she really has to “come back to life” at a particularly exciting moment. I suppose Thom also plays a Gandalf role in the early books, so I guess in that way it’s fitting that they end up together? Two halves of a whole Gandalf, as it were. Though I’ll be honest, I don’t have a lot of hope for that relationship being interesting to me. Anyway, this knowledge is definitely in my mind when I’m musing over Lanfear, too, and so that’s affecting my predictions about her in a way. I suppose that it’s inevitable that, being on the internet, I might occasionally run across a spoiler or two for a book that was published over twenty years ago.

Moving on, I thought Demandred’s horror of the True Source was really interesting. He wants to be Nae’blis as much as the next member of the Chosen, and surely the Nae’blis should be using the True Power to some extent. Especially if the Dark One ever actually wins and remakes Creation in his own image. Also, why did Jordan have to name the guy Demandred? I’ve accidentally typed Moiraine’s last name instead of his several times already. It’s Elayne and Egwene all over again.

I also noticed throughout this chapter how differently people refer to Rand. Cadsuane calls him “the boy,” even in her own head. Verin’s version is a slightly more respectful “young al’Thor.” Graendal says, “the young man” and Moridin sticks to al’Thor. Cyndane still calls him Lews Therin, which is another reason it seems like she’s Lanfear. Each one is slightly different, some reducing his importance by referring to him as “boy,” most distancing themselves from the truth of who he is by avoiding ever using his name. Everyone, from a legend of the current Age to the Forsaken of the Age of Legends, has a delicate relationship to the idea of who and what Rand is, and what he may become.

Demandred’s section was also a good reminder of how the Forsaken see the current Age as being underdeveloped and backwards, and its channelers equally so. Osan’gar is confident that Rand couldn’t even begin to tackle the problem of cleansing saidin because he’s too primitive to have the necessary understanding. But we the readers know that this Age has its own legends, and its own miracles, and I think that all Darkfriends are predisposed to underestimate the Dragon. Even in Lews Therin’s Age this was probably true—after all, it was the Dark One who defeated him, not the Forsaken. I think that if you’re a Darkfriend, part of the worldview you’re subscribing to is that the Dark One is stronger than the Creator, and that those who join him are stronger, smarter, and better than those who walk in the Light. Otherwise, you wouldn’t believe in your own ability to triumph over them, in the Dark’s ability to triumph over the Light. And that, I think, is one of the reasons that in the end, it’s difficult for the Dark to win.

I have an essay planned for next week, and then it’s off to catch up with the Seanchan, and a very special prophesied someone who is about to arrive and stir some things up. Just when Rand finally had a moment’s hard-won peace from them, too. In the meantime, I’ll leave you with a few final thoughts. Have a great week!

– Who’s Isam? I don’t think I’ve heard that name before, but there are a lot of names so I might have forgotten it. It’s interesting that the Forsaken have sent someone to kill Fain, though. I someone doubt they’ll succeed.  

– Apparently peaches are poisonous in Rand’s world, at least in his Age. Nynaeve mentioned something about peaches and poison a few chapters ago, I think, but it didnt’t quit sink in for me until it was mentioned again, here.

– I find it hilarious that Osan’gar, who’s supposed to know about metaphysical stuff, doesn’t understand that of course change can keep favoring Rand. He’s ta’veren, that’s the whole point! [end-mark]

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Flinn Heals, Cadsuane Studies, and Demandred plots in <i>Winter’s Heart</i> (Part 11) appeared first on Reactor.

Rereads and Rewatches The Wheel of Time

Reading The Wheel of Time: Rand Surrenders to What Must Be in Winter’s Heart (Part 10)

Rand’s bonds with Aviendha, Elayne, and Min deepen even further…

By Sylas K Barrett

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Published on March 5, 2024

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This week in Reading The Wheel of Time, Min, Aviendha, Elayne and Rand are all finally in the same place at the same time. Rand tries to resist his fate, and everyone learns a bit more about how unconventional links and bonds can be troublesome things. It’s Chapter 12 of Winter’s Heart!

With Aviendha and Min, Elayne stalks through the corridors of the palace, intent on finding and cornering Rand. As they walk, servants are startled out of their work by the sight of Elayne’s female guards and their impressive regalia. Elayne reminds her companions not to tell Rand about the attempt on her life, and privately wonders what to do about Min and Aviendha.

Elayne leaves her bodyguards, Caseille and Deni, on guard outside the door. She suspects the women believe Min has brought Elayne to meet a lover. Inside, she finds Nynaeve and Lan, but only has eyes for Rand. He leaps to his feet, then staggers, but waves Nynaeve off, telling her that it isn’t anything she can Heal, and that she wins their argument. He tells Min that it is time to go, and Elayne is incensed that he is trying to leave without even speaking to her. Rand responds by warning her not to trust any Asha’man except, maybe, for Flinn, Narishma and Hopwil.

Elayne isn’t swayed by Rand’s warning, however, and pushes past his attempts to talk about other things, insisting that there is only one thing the four of them need to talk about. Defeated, Rand admits that he loves each of them. They each respond in turn, declaring their love for him. Nynaeve is disgusted, and Lan looks shocked, but Elayne is satisfied, and tells him that the rest of their discussion can continue in her rooms, in private.

Rand changes his appearance, shocking Elayne and amusing Min and Aviendha. The bodyguards are also shocked when they emerge with such an unfortunate looking man. Once they are alone in Elayne’s apartments, she tells Rand that all three of them want to bond him as their Warder.

Elayne is furious and horrified, and explains to Aviendha that Alanna has more toh to Rand than she could ever meet. But she also explains to Rand that it is possible for more than one woman to bond the same Warder, and that they all still want to share him. A little despairingly, Rand accuses Min of knowing what would happen if he laid eyes on them again. Min responds that she didn’t know about the bonding, but did hope for something like this. Rand relents, admitting that he does want this, but also begging them to think of the price they’ll all pay.

Elayne links with Aviendha, and the two create the weaves that Elayne worked out for this after seeing how the Aiel adoption ceremony worked. Once she, Aviendha, and Min are all connected by a web of Spirit, Elayne uses a thread from each of them and connects them into one Warder bond. 

When the weave settles into Rand, they all become aware of him. They’re struck by the horrible and unbearable pain he carries, and the hard knot of his emotions, held far too rigidly. But also by the strength of his love, which appears like threads of gold whenever he looks at any of them. Elayne knows that she’ll never have to doubt his feelings for her again.

Rand declares that it’s time for him to go, and his pleasure at the fact that he will always know when the three of them are safe, but Elayne has one more thing she needs from him. Min and Aviendha hastily excuse themselves, leaving Rand and Elayne alone. She tells Rand that Min and Aviendha have had something from him that Elayne hasn’t, and instructs him to help her with the buttons of her dress.

As she and Aviendha make their way down the hallway, Min ponders over the presence of Rand in her mind, how she knows so much more about him and how he must have the same knowledge of her. But the bundle of emotions and sensations changes as she walks, growing into a sort of inferno, and Min suddenly realizes what she’s sensing.

Elayne has taught her how the Aes Sedai mask the bond by imagining a kerchief wrapped around the bundle of emotions in her mind, but it doesn’t help. Desperate to move her attention elsewhere she starts talking to Aviendha, mentioning her vision that Elayne will become pregnant with Rand’s twins from this encounter. She explains how her visions work to a curious Aviendha, and wonders if she should tell Aviendha about the quadruplets she sees the other woman having in the future.

Noticing that Aviendha seems to be struggling the same way Min is, Min asks if the handkerchief trick isn’t working for her either. Aviendha admits that she forgot about it, and is able to mask the bond. Aviendha offers to get Min drunk, then spots a woman coming down the hall towards them.

Min sees more visions around Elayne’s Captain-General than she’s ever seen around anyone when the woman, who appears flushed and shaky, angrily accuses Aviendha of helping Elayne do this.

Aviendha insists that Birgitte needs to stop treating Elayne and Aviendha like children, and Min realizes that she’s looking at Birgitte Silverbow. Birgitte responds that Silverbow is dead, and that she is Birgitte Trahelion now. Min introduces herself and explains that she, Elayne, and Aviendha have just bonded a Warder, and Elayne has every right to celebrate a little. Birgitte realizes that Elayne must be with Rand.

Still, Birgitte insists that Elayne has to stop what she is doing—she’s so wrapped up with Rand she clearly keeps forgetting to mask her bond with Birgitte. Min explains the handkerchief trick, but it doesn’t work for Birgitte any more than it did for Min. She tries to push past Min, but Aviendha, desperately, offers to get Birgitte drunk on oosquai, and even offers to pledge herself as Birgitte’s apprentice if only Birgitte will not shame Elayne by interrupting her.

Birgitte pauses, thoughtfully, and then decides that Aviendha’s early assertion, to think of the whole situation as a funny joke, suddenly sounds more appealing. She instructs the two other women to lead her to the oosquai, and that she wants to get as drunk as a drowned mouse.

The next morning, Elayne wakes to a cold, empty room. Rand is gone, but he has left a golden lily on her pillow, fully in bloom and still touched with dewdrops. 

It’s reported to her that Alivia has disappeared during the night, and later that Nynaeve and Lan have also left the Palace without anyone seeing them go. Much later she finds out that several of the artifacts from the cache in Ebou Dar have also been taken, including the most powerful angreal.

I’m so tickled by the title of this chapter. I had assumed that the name would be an elaborate metaphor about beauty and hidden strength in the face of hardship, probably describing Elayne, maybe someone else. But instead it’s literal, a gift Rand leaves for Elayne after they’ve spent the night (and part of the day) together.

It’s lovely to see that little bit of the old Rand. Even though he can’t let anyone see it directly, and keeps trying to harden himself against the kindness and care he used to possess so abundantly, the fact that his impulse was to find (or maybe create?) such a gift shows that the original Rand is still in there somewhere. And one can imagine that having this bond with three people who love him deeply—a connection that remains, however thinned, over whatever physical distance may separate them—might also nurture that side of Rand that he has been trying to destroy. In the same way that he couldn’t resist their decision to attach themselves to him, he might not be able to resist the influence of their love, and might come to appreciate those parts of himself in a new light.

When the bond connects them, Elayne is instantly aware that Rand’s emotions aren’t right. She perceives them as being too rigid “like a knot of hardened pine sap, almost stone.” And when he brings up the price they will pay for bonding him, she feels that knot grow a little bit harder as he steels himself against the knowledge. In a way, the bond allows those it connects to experience the metaphysical in a physical way—just as the weaves can be perceived as seen and felt by those with the ability. Rand’s feelings of love for Min, Aviendha, and Elayne—and, presumably, theirs for him—look like pulsing veins of gold. And the damage to Rand’s emotions, the ones he’s trying to harden, can instantly be perceived.

We know from Cadsuane’s sections that she and Sorilea believe that it is vital to teach Rand the difference between being “hard” and being “strong.” This is no doubt the important lesson that Min’s viewing showed that Cadsuane is going to teach Rand and his Asha’man. But Cadsuane being instrumental in this lesson, according to the viewing, doesn’t necessarily mean that she will be the only teacher. I think that Aviendha, Elayne, and Min will all play their part as well in helping Rand understand that his emotions do not make him weak, and that hardening himself will bring disaster, not only to him and the people in his life, but to his quest to save the world and defeat the Dark One.

Truly, nothing sounds quite so Darkfriend as the idea of turning off all your sympathetic, kind, and caring emotions in order to get a job done. But I can see how Rand ended up thinking that this was the only way. After all, who does he look to as a model of how to fashion himself into the leader he needs to be. Kings and generals, of course—and he saw what the weight of fear did to Ingtar—but also the Aes Sedai and the Aiel.

The Aes Sedai put a great deal of energy into making the rest of the world think that they are always calm, detached, and unbothered by the difficult decisions required of world leaders. Or rather, they show the world that the decisions aren’t difficult, not for the Aes Sedai. The calm demeanor is supposed to suggest detachment and omnipotence, as though Aes Sedai are something other than merely people. No one who is not a full sister is privy to the emotions they have in private, the doubts they might express to a peer or a trusted friend. Even those limited by rank and status have to have confidants, which is one of the reasons the distrust the Black Ajah is sowing in Elaida’s Tower is so very damaging. But an outsider would never see that—even Moiriane didn’t show Rand when she had doubts or when the burden she carried was difficult for her.

The Aiel don’t actually want to make others think they don’t have emotions; they just have a culture that is very strict about the proper way to handle one’s emotions, and about when and where it is appropriate to express them. But while an Aiel might be shamed by expressing their emotions in a culturally inappropriate way, the Aiel don’t expect people not to have emotions like fear or doubt. In some cases even the usual rules about ji’e’toh are different, such as among first siblings.

But again, to an outsider, the harsh demands of Aiel society might very much make them seem cold and heartless, even to people who haven’t faced them in battle. Even Min has had the occasional difficulty with it, despite her friendship with the Wise Ones. She isn’t hostile to Aviendha, but she’s understandably a little on guard against interacting with Aiel customs, especially after what she saw the Maidens do to Rand. Rand knows a good deal more of Aiel customs and way of thinking that Min does, but he’s also their car’a’carn, prophesied to destroy them, and what he’s learned he uses to interact effectively, not to become a part of them. (This is one of Sorilea’s concerns about him.) Rand engages in the occasional performance of ji’e’toh, for example, to keep the Aiel happy, but he doesn’t find any pleasure or comfort in meeting his toh the way the Aiel do. The way Egwene did, when she confessed to lying about her status as Aes Sedai and asked her friends and teachers to help her meet her toh.

Aviendha, Elayne and Min are all in different but excellent positions to aid Rand in the personal side of his journey. Aviendha is Aiel and a Wise One (apprentice), who understands a lot about personal hardship, pain, and sacrifice. Although she also grieves for Rand when she feels the pain of his un-healing wounds, Aviendha also finds a kind of exaltation in seeing how much pain Rand is able to carry, exclaiming that the car’a’carn is as strong as the Three-fold Land itself. In her, Rand may have someone who can at least partly understand the physical pain he has to contend with, who he might be able to confide in without worry that he sounds weak or that the other person will be overwhelmed by their own feelings in the matter.

Elayne is a leader, by temperament and by training, and as the (future) Queen of Andor and a powerful Aes Sedai, she can help him understand the difference between making a hard decision and being hard himself, how to balance the good of the many and the good of the few, and when it is necessary to allow others to help carry the burden. Elayne knows the pain of watching her people suffer and not necessarily being able to save everyone, but she is undaunted in her determination to make Andor flourish. She and Rand need to work on their communication skills—the bond will make this easier—but they actually have very similar dreams and ideas about the future.

Min’s visions are very useful to Rand, but perhaps moreso is her attitude towards life, and towards him. Min sees herself as a simple person—she isn’t nobility, or a channeler, and she comes from a family of miners and seamstresses. Her background is much closer to Rand’s own, and in her he has a tether to ordinary people, to the sort of person he himself was before his identity was revealed to him. Min is even from Baerlon, which is comparatively quite close to the Two Rivers. Min’s playfulness is also more accessible to Rand than Aviendha’s, due to the cultural differences.

Jordan isn’t the best at writing how people fall in love, but I can’t help but think there might be more to this tangle of romances than the author leaving a lot of things to develop “off screen” so to speak. The fact that each woman seems so significant to Rand’s personal journey, the fact that the three of them also fit together so well as friends and sister-wives, and the fact that Min viewed their connection to Rand so strongly all suggest that there might be a little bit of the Pattern at work here, as well. Min’s viewing came before she had even fallen in love with Rand, after all, and all three were guided by it to start working on their relationship with each other. It’s possible that Rand’s ta’veren nature is partly at work here, on all four of them, just as it is partly at work on his connection with Perrin and Mat. Even the prediction of children supports this idea—you would want such a powerful channeler to pass his genetics on to future generations, especially with all the culling the Aes Sedai have been doing.

In the previous chapter, upon seeing that Lan had ended up with Nynaeve after all, that the man hadn’t taken his own advice, Lan answered that “Sometimes, she is stronger than you.” How true that also ended up being for Rand, just one chapter later. And how important the message, from these women to him—that he is lovable, that loving him is worth sacrifice and even great loss, and that he does not have the right to dictate to other people what risks they decide to take with their own emotions.

Of course, Rand is aware that he will also suffer if he loses any of the people he lets get close to him. But his primary concern has always been not for the pain he might experience losing someone but for the guilt and responsibility he feels for causing suffering in others. Which makes a lot of sense for his character. He has already decided that suffering and death is what his life is made for, what his life is. While he certainly fears losing Aviendha, Elayne, and/or Min, I think he is much more afraid of the guilt of being responsible than he is of the pain of the loss for his own sake. He is more afraid for them than for himself. 

The whole thing about Min (and Birgitte, when Elayne forgets herself) being able to feel what’s going on in Elayne’s bedroom was really quite funny. It also raised some interesting questions about how the Warder bond works. Elayne was able to establish that link between Min and Rand, despite Min not being a channeler, but she doesn’t have the same ability to muffle it that Aviendha and Elayne do. There are a few possibilities for this, I think. The first is simply that only a channeler can affect the bond—that the visualization of the kerchief is simply a trick to help someone do the necessary channeling. That seems unlikely, however—Elayne would know whether she was actually interacting with saidar or not, and certainly would ​​have made the distinction. However, if it were a trick using the One Power, one wonders if Rand would be able to mask a bond from his end. Not using the same technique, of course, but possibly.

More likely, the kerchief visualization is like the not-sweating trick—something that doesn’t actually require the One Power to do, but that utilizes a similar mental discipline that non-channelers don’t have. For Min, picturing the kerchief is just imaging something in her mind’s eye, but she’s not actually doing anything. It might also have something to do with who made the bond. Although Elayne was the one to pull the cords from each of them and attach them to Rand, Aviendha was also involved in spinning the web between Min, Elayne, and herself. Perhaps the bond can only be muted at the source, so to speak, by the person or persons who made it. This would fit with the way many bonds—the Warder bond, the bond created by the a’dam—flow in one direction more strongly than the other. An Aes Sedai or sul’dam can compel through the bond, but it can’t be done the other way around, just as a Warder can’t mask the bond the way his Aes Sedai can, despite having some sense of her through their shared connection.

Before we wrap up, I leave you with the following thoughts:

– I loved the way that Aviendha and Min kept mirroring each other without meaning to. It was a really neat way to show that they have a lot in common with each other, and to foreshadow their friendship becoming as strong as the ones they each share with Elayne. Also they’re both knife girls, and I respect it.

– It always amuses me that women in genre fiction are always getting pregnant the very first time they sleep with the Important Man. Sure, it’s possible, and I guess we can blame the Pattern and ta’veren stuff again, but it really comes off as silly. I am a little concerned for Elayne, though, that she’s going to get pregnant and have to deal with that while also trying to secure her throne, prepare for the Last Battle, and maybe even participate in the Last Battle. That timing is not ideal, though I suppose if Rand does die during Tarmon Gai’don then his ladies will have to get pregnant before then. Still, it feels a little weird.

– Did Nynaeve take Alivia with her for some reason? That would be a big change in attitude from their earlier encounter, but maybe Nynaeve wanted some backup, and preferred the unknown of Alivia to dealing with one of the Kin. Alivia is quite strong in the One Power, after all. Also, if Alivia is truly so happy to be free, she might have respect for Rand, or even feel she’s in his debt. That could make her a powerful ally to him, one who is not only an impressive channeler but might also know some helpful things about Seanchan culture.

Next week we’re tackling the very interesting and somewhat complicated Chapter 13, which is a Cadsuane chapter. There will be a lot to talk about there, that’s for sure. [end-mark]

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Rand Surrenders to What Must Be in <i>Winter’s Heart</i> (Part 10) appeared first on Reactor.

I’m kind of amused at the way our heroes, along with everything else they have to deal with, are in this constant, swinging-pendulum battle against the weather. Of course, it wouldn’t be funny to me if I had to live through it (which I kind of do, thanks climate change) but it’s still sort of ironically amusing to watch winter drag on too long in The Eye of the World, then to have the temporary reprieve segue into a horrible, endless summer… and then have everyone be completely blindsided by the Bowl of the Winds-induced winter.

I do wonder if the intensity is due to the winter being held back by the Dark One, or possibly if the use/misuse of the Bowl is a factor as well. We still don’t know if Caire used it correctly or as it was intended, after all. But as always, I really enjoy Jordan’s descriptions; he did such an incredible job describing how it feels to be in the heat of the long summer, and I’m obsessed with his description of the thunder snow storm in Caemlyn. But that’s getting ahead of ourselves. First, let’s get into the recap. We’re covering about half of the Prologue of Winter’s Heart today—Seaine and Elayne’s sections. We’ll cover Toveine and Rand’s next week.

Deep in the White Tower, Seaine keeps watch at a door and tries not to think about the torture that is happening behind her. She and Pevara, along with their new allies Yukiri, Doesine, and Seaine, have taken Talene to a ter’angreal called The Chair of Remorse. By channeling into it, Doesine is making Talene hallucinate that she is being tortured by Trollocs. This is their third time torturing Talene in an attempt to convince her to forswear all oaths and then re-swear the Three Oaths on the Oath Rod.

Using the chair on initiates is forbidden by Tower Law, and some of the others worry over whether they have made the right choice and what will happen to them if they are discovered. Privately, Seaine finds herself missing when it was only her and Pevara; it is helpful to have allies, but they are no longer in charge here. Tower hierarchies have taken over, and Saerin is now leading the group.

Saerin orders Doesine to bring Talene out of her torture-trance, and Talene is reluctantly convinced to forswear and reswear. She admits to being Black Ajah, and even though Seaine knew that this had to be the answer, she still finds the confirmation jarring.

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Talene tells them that the Dark knows every report Elaida receives and every order she gives long before she gives it, which means the Amyrlin Seat must be Black Ajah herself. She promises to tell them everything, as long as they all agree to run and hide somewhere together. Seaine wonders if she misunderstood Elaida’s order—Elaida only said to look for traitors, and never actually mentioned the Black Ajah by name.

Saerin doesn’t believe Elaida is Black, but decides it’s best not to tell her about their discoveries until they are prepared to take the Black Ajah out all at once. Pevara and Seaine tell the others about their discovery of Salidar rebels in the White Tower and the scheme to have them all swear obedience and used to hunt the Black Ajah. They all fall to discussing their options, waiting for Saerin to make up her mind about what she wants to do.

In Caemlyn, a huge thunderstorm blizzard rattles the windows in Elayne’s palace. Elayne is irked that Nynaeve and Vandene are busy; for Elayne, securing her claim to the throne is the most important consideration on her plate, and all others must wait, but she knows that Nynaeve and Vandene have Aes Sedai responsibilities. Elayne hopes to one day make Nynaeve her Aes Sedai advisor.

She also wants to rebuild the ranks of the Queen’s Guards by recruiting mercenaries and Hunters for the Horn. Dyelin thinks it’s a bad idea, citing how untrustworthy these groups can be, and is even more upset when she learns that Elayne wants the guards to be a large army. The Guards have never made up the entirety of Andor’s army before, and Dyelin thinks that such an army could alienate all of Elayne’s supporters.

Birgitte and Dyelin rarely agree on anything, but Birgitte, who Elayne has made Captain of her Guard, shares Dyelin’s concerns about mercenaries and hunters being unreliable. She’s also distressed at the idea of recruiting and managing such an army, so much so that she almost references her past in front of Dyelin.

Elayne explains to them both why the army is necessary, not only to face potential enemies from other Houses, but also because of the threat of the Seanchan. They are interrupted by Renaile and Zaida, who barge in unannounced, with Merilille trailing behind. Elayne tries to put them off, but Renaile insists that it is time to talk about Elayne fulfilling the Bargain made with Nesta din Reas—so far they have only received one of the twenty Aes Sedai teachers they were promised. Elayne points out that they have already been given the Bowl of the Winds and that assembling that many free Aes Sedai takes time. Eventually they agree that perhaps some of the Aes Sedai currently in the Palace might find time to do some interim teaching, when they can. Elayne is disconcerted when the Atha’an Miere behave as though they have made a formal bargain.

Mistress Harfor comes in to announce the arrival of Mazrim Taim, who has belatedly arrived after being summoned by Elayne two days earlier. Elayne asks Mistress Harfor to take Taim somewhere to wait when the man comes into the room anyway, followed by two other Asha’man.

He was tall, nearly as tall as Rand, with a hooked nose and dark eyes like augers, a physically powerful man who moved with something of a Warder’s deadly grace, but shadows seemed to follow him, as if half the lamps in the room had gone out; not real shadows, but an air of imminent violence that seemed palpable enough to soak up light.

Elayne instinctively embraces saidar and links with Merilille and Renaile. She can see that the Asha’man are aware that someone embraced saidar, but Taim derisively asks his men if they’re afraid of two Aes Sedai. Elayne realizes that he hasn’t recognized Renaile as a channeler. She takes her seat and interviews Taim. He asks what Rand will think of her taking down his banners and sending the Saldaeans and Aiel out of Caemlyn. Elayne tells him that Andor will ally with Rand when the time comes, but that they are not a conquered territory. Taim has walled off four miles of Andor and is not allowing the Queen’s Guard to enter.

“The law in Andor runs over all of Andor, Master Taim. Justice will be the same for lord or farmer—or Asha’man. I won’t claim I can force my way in.” He began to smile again, or nearly so. “I wouldn’t demean myself. But unless the Queen’s Guard is allowed in, I promise you not so much as a potato will go through your gates, either. I know you can Travel. Let your Asha’man spend their days Traveling to buy food.” The almost-smile vanished in a faint grimace; his boots shifted slightly.

Taim’s composure returns in a moment, and he comments that he has no objections to allowing visits—controlled visits with escorts, to prevent “accidents.” Elayne is furious at the disrespect, but realizes that her anger is being fanned by the fact that Birgitte is also angry. The warder bond is bouncing their anger back and forth between them, compounding it. Elayne controls herself with an effort.

And then she is interrupted yet again, this time by Nadere. Dyelin expresses her astonishment at the constant barging in, but Elayne has been expecting this summons, not knowing when it would come, but knowing that when it did, she needed to obey instantly. She tells Nadere that she will send everyone away and come at once, causing Nadere to suggest that Elayne’s modesty is more important to her than becoming Aviendha’s sister.

Elayne begins to undress, asking Dyelin to help her with the buttons. Taim orders the Asha’man to turn around. Birgitte asks Elayne what is happening, but Elayne has been forbidden to tell the little she does know. Nadere gives Elayne a blanket to shield her from the cold, and Elayne issues a few orders before following Nadere out into the hall.

Rats! There are rats in Tar Valon!

It’s been a bit since the “rats are spies for the Dark One” has been brought up. It was such a big part of The Eye of the World, and it’s been mentioned a few times since then—I believe it was in The Fires of Heaven that Rand was giving his soldiers money for catching rats—but not much. And now we have not only the confirmation that these potential spies for the Dark One are in the White Tower itself but also the metaphor between the rats and the Black Ajah both being recently discovered by Seaine.

The chair of remorse is, ah, really something. I suppose I can kind of understand the need to torture Talene. It’s not so much of a “the ends justify the means” situation as it is “the consequences of the Black Ajah justify the means.” But the fact that this ter’angreal is used on ordinary criminals kind of leaves a bad taste in the mouth. The text says that the criminals “experience carefully selected consequences of their crimes,” so it doesn’t sound like they’re all being metaphysically tortured by Trollocs. But even if the punishment is relatively equal to the crime, it still is relevant, I think, to note that ordinary people are being treated this way by the White Tower.

It actually reminds me a little of Artur Hawkwing. At the height of Hawkwing’s empire there was very little crime, but this peace came, in part, because of the harshness of his laws and punishments. (We see the echos of this in modern Seanchan society, though of course there are many other influences at play there.) In the same way, the reader has long known that there is hardly any crime in Tar Valon, and no repeat offenders, but we are now learning more about how such a peace was achieved—through torture enacted using the One Power. Again, probably not the same level of torture that is used on Talene, but it is impossible for the reader to ignore the fact that in this instance at least, the Aes Sedai interrogators are willing to enact a simulated version of the same horrors that the Dark inflicts on its victims. Putting aside the question of whether such an action is or can be justified, and where that line is, it is still an important moment to note. Especially knowing that use of the Chair of Remorse on Tower initiates is forbidden.

I am very glad that Winter’s Heart opened this way, because I was worried that it might be a while until we found out what happened with the revelation that Talene—a Sitter and a former friend of Seaine’s—is Black Ajah. I thought perhaps we’d be living in suspense until Egwene was Amyrlin, or at least poised to be Amyrlin, and then Seaine and the others would need to bring the discovery to her attention.

It’s a very good thing for Egwene that Tower Aes Sedai with authority have independently discovered the existence of the Black Ajah within the White Tower. She’s going to have her work cut out for her when it comes to gaining the trust of the Tower Aes Sedai, especially if it actually comes down to actual fighting. She needs the Tower Aes Sedai to have some reasons to trust her. Pretty much everybody distrusts Elaida at this point, of course, which doesn’t hurt, but also everyone distrusts each other, and I don’t think anger at Elaida necessarily translates to believing in Egwene. If one of her first moves was to start hunting Black Ajah there might be considerable resistance, but if several Sitters are already secretly doing the same, that would probably be very helpful. They would be more inclined to trust Egwene if she came ready for the fight against the Black Ajah, and could provide her in turn with a plan of action, since they would already have been working on that search.

I feel really bad for the Salidar spies who are going to be roped into the hunt for the Black Ajah now. Especially having to swear to obey this group in all things. These women, most of whom I’m guessing are younger or lower ranking sisters, were ordered to this job by Sheriam and co., and really believe the story about the Red Ajah recruiting Logain—and now, suddenly, they are going to be magically enslaved and put in horrible danger instead. It’s amusing, however, to think about the similarities between these Black Ajah hunters and the last group. Siuan chose Nynaeve, Elayne, and Egwene because they were the only tower initiates she could be completely certain were not Darkfriends. Now, Seaine and Pevara have hatched their scheme based on the fact that interrogating, and then using, the Salidar women feels justified, based on their status as rebels.

On the other hand, I am fully enjoying the dramatic irony of Talene believing Elaida is Black Ajah. Her deductions make sense, of course—for a moment I thought it was strange that no one considered Alviarin in this equation, but then I remembered that even the Keeper wouldn’t be privy to every decision and report an Amyrlin received. None of Talene’s questioners are prepared to believe her claims about Elaida, even though they can confirm that she believes she is speaking the truth, without other evidence, so it would be too soon to leap to someone else who hadn’t even been named yet, even if it eventually occurred that someone close to Elaida might be stealing information for the Black Ajah.

I suppose I have to hand it to Elaida. She has made so many bad decisions, and caused so many problems, because of her own selfishness and destructive ambition. But in her attempts to bring down Alviarin, she has actually started something very important. And although Elaida never suspected that Alviarin might be Black Ajah, the hunt she sent Seaine on is ultimately going to be very dangerous for Alviarin, even if she herself isn’t discovered. And perhaps this points to Alviarin making a mistake—she feels so secure in her power to blackmail Elaida that she never considered that Elaida might find a way to sneak around her, or that such a chance, even if remote, could jeopardize the Black Ajah.

Again, that combination of ambition and overconfidence in their own prowess gets one of the baddies in trouble. Evil sows the seeds of its own destruction.

The description of Talene’s pain at undoing her previous oaths was harrowing. It’s interesting that it would be so challenging to use the Oath Rod to remove an oath previously sworn upon it. It’s possible that the Black oaths are sworn on a different ter’angreal, or some other way, of course. But we do know that Seaine experienced pain when removing even one of the Three Oaths and speculated that removing more than one would be agonizing, so the point stands either way. It makes me wonder what the Oath Rod was originally made for, and how that compares with how it’s being used by the modern Aes Sedai. For that matter, I wonder what the Chair of Remorse was originally used for. With the Oath Rod we know that there’s the lifespan-shortening effect, which suggests that it wasn’t used casually or on many people. But for all we know, the Chair might have been made to give people good visions. Maybe as some kind of therapy tool? After all, though I’m sure the world wasn’t perfect, war seems to have not existed in Lews Therin’s day, before the hole was drilled into the Dark One’s prison. There was still crime and bad people, of course, but it’s interesting to speculate about, especially knowing that the modern Aes Sedai understand so little about the artifacts they have inherited.

And then we have the metaphor of the Dark One’s rats, implicit in Seaine’s section, becoming explicit in Elayne’s section, with Mistress Harfor’s comment about the Asha’man. Which feels particularly apt in the case of Taim, as I have fully committed to my belief that he is definitely a Darkfriend. The way he is described in this section continues the vibe of evil around the man, with the shadows growing around him and everything. And then he goes all sleezing on Elayne, which you know is at least partly because he knows about Rand’s feelings for her.

It is, perhaps, naive of Rand to assume that keeping his distance from Elayne will keep her safe. Partially because plenty of people already know about the connection between them, and won’t be as quick as Rand is to assume that Elayne tearing down a few banners means anything. (You definitely get the vibe from Taim that he’d love to mess with Elayne because he knows how Rand feels.) But even outside of that, Elayne is a powerful and influential person in her own right, an Aes Sedai and the (potential) future Queen of Andor. Morgase was destroyed by Rahvin without needing to be connected to Rand, so it follows that Elayne might be in equal danger. Rand is letting his emotions, both his guilt over potentially endangering those he cares about and his feelings of rejection because of Elayne’s actions in Caemlyn, cloud his judgment. What Elayne really needs is an ally, someone who can support her as an equal. She doesn’t need a protector to gift her a throne, or a lover with a god complex and a painful fragile ego.

I appreciated the reminder from the narration that Rand’s attempts to “gift” the throne to Elayne aren’t just insulting to her, personally, but also undermine the people’s faith in her. Rand may be from Andor, but the Two Rivers was so isolated that they have no cultural relationship to the Lion Throne. He doesn’t understand how most Andorans think of their Queen, and how they would see Elayne as a conqueror or a usurper if they believed she ruled at Rand’s bequest.

This is also part of what Dyelin is pointing out when she objects to Elayne’s intention to build the Queen’s Guards into an army. There is clearly an important social contract in Andor between the ruler and her people. It is litigated primarily through the noble houses, but we saw how Elayne was taking the temperature of ordinary people as she traveled to Caemlyn. However, as Elayne points out, she has worries that past claimants to the throne never had, like the Seanchan. And she doesn’t even get into the fact that she, like every ruler, will need to ready her country for the Last Battle, which means an army to join to Rand’s forces, and possibly to support him in other ways leading up to Tarmon Gai’don.

Poor Birgitte. It makes sense that she keeps accidentally almost outing herself to everyone; the weight of that identity is the reason she wants to keep the secret, but her anxiety over that weight keeps overruling her ability to hide it. I don’t know how anyone would figure out who she is even with the blurted half-clues, though, considering that she was snatched out of the Dream World and somehow made human in the flesh. That’s not exactly how reincarnation is supposed to work. But I can also imagine that Birgitte is becoming more and more standardly human, as it were, the longer she spends existing as this version of herself in the real world. As a spirit in Tel’aran’rhiod or called by the Horn, she was something more than human, aware of all her past lives and of many other things that a human born in the usual way, even if they are a reincarnated hero, never would be. Now Birgitte is human, if not ordinary, and the weight of human concerns, and human fears, and human frailties, will weigh on her as they would weigh on any other living person. For that matter, it must be difficult to have memories of all her lives in her head, since that’s definitely not normal. We see how confusing it is for Mat just having pieces of other lives in his mind, after all. And Birgitte was not a general—I really loved the distinction made between facing an army and leading one.

Is it weird that I kind of want Dyelin and Birgitte to become BFFs? As the two advisors to Elayne (not counting her hopes for Nynaeve), they’ll be working closely together for a while, and they both are such interesting personalities who respect many of the same traits, like straightforwardness and emotional strength. They may not agree on most things, but they both have a no-nonsense approach that I really like, and I feel like they are perfect for a good enemies-to-friends journey.

Also I just love that Elayne is already surrounding herself with other women to be her advisors. I don’t have that much to say about the discussion they had before Taim’s arrival, or the interaction between Elayne and Renaile and Zaida, but it was all very interesting to read, and I particularly appreciated the fact that the Game of Houses was never played in Andor, but that maneuvering and machinations have become a part of Elayne’s life to the point where she is very grateful for her Aes Sedai training and how it prepared her for Daes Dae’mar. It will be particularly interesting to see if she can make this second mini bargain work out slightly better for her than the first one she and Nynaeve negotiated for.

I’m so curious about how the Warder bond is affecting the two of them. It seems to be a little different than what we’ve seen from other Aes Sedai/Warder pairs, although we haven’t spent nearly as much time in the head of any other Aes Sedai with a close Warder bond, even Moiraine. I did catch that their periods have synced up, which I guess makes sense but feels like a weird detail to include.

Next week we’ll cover the Aiel first sister ceremony which is really interesting and also a little off-putting, but also cool? In the meantime, I’ll leave you with a few last thoughts.

• What is the present that Taim brought from Rand? Is it a real present actually from Rand? Or is Taim up to something?

• It’s interesting that Seaine learned a sort of eavesdropping weave from a friend when she was a novice. Presumably this friend was a wilder—the ability to listen in on conversations seems to be a common one developed by wilders, including Moiraine. But they mostly kept them to themselves, we know, since the weave was a bit of a revelation in Salidar.

• The way Elayne was both affected and not affected by the cold didn’t make sense to me. “Refusing to let the cold touch her did not mean she was unaware.” What does that mean, exactly? That she is only stopping the body’s reaction to the cold, maybe? It feels unclear.

• I keep forgetting about Gawyn! Given his hatred of Rand and his feelings for Egwene, it will be interesting to see how that shakes out for Gawyn. Egwene wants him for a Warder, I believe, and it would be pretty hard to be Warder to the Amyrlin and the First Prince of the Sword leading Elayne’s army.

• Sometimes the simplest answers are the right ones. I had always assumed that the Dark One had some magical way of breaking the bindings of the Oath Rod, and maybe he does. But it’s pretty unlikely that all the Black Ajah members made individual treks to Shayol Ghul to have that binding broken or removed, and much more likely that they were all just snitching the oath rod and having secret ceremonies in the bowels of the White Tower, not unlike what Seaine and her new allies are doing now.

• And finally, thank you Elayne for asking the same question I’ve been asking about Taim:

Light! Maybe Rand had needed this man once, but why would he keep him now, and in a position of such authority?

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Seaine Finds a Traitor, and Elayne Finds a Sister in <i>Winter’s Heart</i> (Part 1) appeared first on Reactor.

Leaving Dyelin, Birgitte, the Sea Folk, and the Asha’man behind, Elayne follows Nandera down the hall, wrapped only in the cloak. She has realized the timing of all this was intentional, to make sure that adopting Aviendha was important enough to Elayne. Nandera remarks that Elayne is sharp to see it, and that she almost put a stop to the men turning their backs except that Taim kept sneaking glances and it was clear that Elayne felt them. Elayne is furious at the revelation, but Nandera doesn’t see the big deal and suggests that Elayne focus on the woman she wants for a sister instead of thinking about men.

Elayne is taken to a room where Aviendha, also naked, is waiting with over a dozen Wise Ones. Elayne is surprised to see that Amys has Traveled from Cairhien, and expresses a wish that Melaine were in attendance as well. But she is told that the weaves used in the ceremony could touch Melaine’s unborn children, making them part of Aviendha and Elayne’s bond, or possibly even killing them. Elayne hadn’t realized that the One Power would be part of the ceremony, but is assured that nothing that happens will affect anyone outside of the room—at most, Birgitte will be dimly aware of some of Elayne’s experiences.

Elayne and Aviendha sit in the circle of Wise Ones. Two of them, Viendre and Tamela, symbolically stand in for their mothers, while Amys offers herself to “suffer the pangs of birth” for them. Next, Aviendha and Elayne are asked intimate questions about how they view each other; what the other’s best and worst qualities are; what is the most childish thing about the other; and what about the other woman makes them the most jealous. As they answer, weaves of saidar capture their voices, releasing the answers at the same time after both have finished speaking.

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When Elayne hears good things about herself from Aviendha, Viendre cuts Elayne down, countering the positive narrative. When Elayne’s answers criticize Aviendha. Viendre points out the ways in which Elayne is no better, just as guilty of the same flaws. Tamela does the same for Aviendha. When that exercise is over, the two prospective sisters are told to slap each other as hard as they can, first with one hand, and then the other, knocking each other down.

Monaelle, who is leading the ceremony, tells them that they may leave now, if they wish, but if they still love each other enough to go on then they should embrace, which they both do, both apologizing profusely.

Monaelle was standing over them, now. “You will know anger at one another again, you will speak harsh words, but you will always remember that you have already struck her. And for no better reason than you were told to. Let those blows pass for all you might wish to give. You have toh toward one another, toh you cannot repay and will not try to, for every woman is always in her first-sister’s debt. You will be born again.”

Elayne can feel the weaves of saidar changing, and the room grows darker. Everything fades, including her sense of herself as Elayne.

She experiences being in the womb, aware of another in there with her, and experiences birth. When she eventually comes back to herself and recalls who she is, she finds herself and Aviendha both being cradled by Amys.

“This is my daughter Aviendha,” Amys said, “and this is my daughter Elayne, born on the same day, within the same hour. May they always guard one another, support one another, love one another.” She laughed softly, tiredly, fondly. “And now will someone bring us garments before my new daughters and I all freeze to death?”

Elayne did not care at that moment if she did freeze to death. She clung to Aviendha in laughter and tears. She had found her sister. Light, she had found her sister!”

Does anyone else remember when that study from BYU came out in 2010 that said having a sister makes you a happier and better person? As someone with two sisters of my own, and who once considered myself a sister in turn, I was more than a little tickled by the study’s claims. And as I was reading this section of the prologue, I kept thinking about the conversations I saw online for weeks after, as people told their own stories about growing up with sisters and siblings.

You all know how I feel about defining people by applying binary gender rules. Jordan does it a lot, and often in silly or egregious ways, but it’s not always wrong. In the modern US, for example, the cultural expectations of women (that they should be kind and caring, that they are gentle, that they should be protected, that they are good mediators) can result in women having a certain kind of close and intimate bond with each other that men are often not able to achieve, because men are not encouraged or allowed that when they are young and developing. We’ve increasingly seen in online conversation that many adult men feel isolated as a result, and that people in heterosexual relationships often experience communication issues because of the way men and women can feel like they come from different cultures. (Men are from Mars, etc. etc.)

The problem, of course, comes when society asserts that these differences are innate and immutable, rather than the results of rules that culture created and that are enforced on children more or less from the moment of their birth. Jordan also makes this mistake, building gendered stereotypes into the very fabric of creation with saidin and saidar and failing to create more than minor differences in how different cultures identify and define gendered norms. That being said, however, throughout the series you can see Jordan’s curiosity around—and perhaps even jealousy of—the communication and connection that women have with each other. Although Perrin, Rand, and Mat are good friends, I think it’s very relevant that none of them have found anyone with whom they share the kind of deep friendship that Elayne and Aviendha have with each other, or even that the two of them have with Nynaeve and Elayne has with Min.

(Perrin has probably gotten the closest with Gaul and Elyas. Mat is good with people, but his are casual relationships with fellow soldiers and gamblers. Rand is, of course, aloof with everyone—the closest he gets is with Bashere and Lan, men who don’t exhibit fear of him, and who take on slightly mentor-y roles towards him. I would guess that both Lan and Bashere probably remind Rand of Tam a little, which helps him be less suspicious of them.)

So while I dislike the assertion that women are better able to connect with each other because of some innate biological reality, I do think that Jordan’s exploration of these connections is interesting, and can be very insightful. The Wheel of Time is very much about how secrecy, shame, and fear continually interfere with the forces of good (both for men and women) when it comes to working together and communicating effectively. Sometimes this is the result of interference by Dark Forces, while other times the main problem might be one or more individuals’ own personal flaws—but either way, the results are very significant, and can often be frustrating for the reader, who has a much clearer picture of what’s happening than any single character in the story.

This week, however, we have the exact opposite of that situation. Aviendha and Elayne were initially unsure how they would build a relationship together, and were dealing with the complications of already knowing, before they even met, that they were destined to share the same man. They were both very understandably nervous and guarded about it, but they still went into their prospective friendship with openness and a desire to trust. Now, not only have they become very close and very secure with each other, they have actively chosen to undergo a ritual that tests that security and demands even more honesty and vulnerability than that which they already share. And although the first-sister relationship is required under Aiel law for them to eventually be sister-wives, it is made very clear that this is a relationship they both want, independently of any connection to or for Rand.

Like Elayne, I assumed that the first-sisters ceremony was just a regular type of commitment ceremony, and I was surprised by the fact that there was so much saidar, and a whole simulated (re)birth, involved. But my favorite part of the process is the requirement of being so honest with each other, that each had to say out loud not only what she loves and respects her soon-to-be sister, but also what she sees as the other’s flaws, what about the other each might be jealous or resentful of. Even the requirement to physically strike each other is designed to increase trust and intimacy between the two. As Monaelle points out, they will have fights and disagreements in the future. But each woman has now affirmed, for the other and most importantly for herself, that she loves her sister more than she might resent a slight or be angered by a confrontation. She has now forgiven insults and blows, and asked forgiveness in turn, and when they argue in the future, they will be able to look back on this argument, simulated just as the birth is simulated, and yet made real through being experienced, just as the shared experience of being in the womb is made real.

And if you think about it, what the Wise Ones have given Aviendha and Elayne’s friendship is quite a gift. Even the closest and most loving relationship will experience conflict many times over the span of its existence. People hurt each other, both intentionally and unintentionally, because human beings are messy and imperfect. The truest relationships survive these conflicts because the people in them choose to work on them, to forgive each other, to recommit to the relationship. Love, platonic, romantic, sisterly, is a choice we make, and one we must constantly affirm.

Usually, very deep relationships are either forged over a good deal of time or because the people involved go through an intense experience together. And often “intense” means “traumatic.” It’s really incredible that the Aiel have a way to create a sort of crucible for these first-sibling relationships that is intense but also joyful and ultimately very positive. (I might ask why there isn’t actually a first-sibling option for people of different genders who want to become siblings this way, but I mean… I know why.) It feels very, very special, particularly in this series, and it got me thinking about how some of the Forsaken have been baffled by the existence of weaves that were not known in their day, like the Warder bond. I wonder how what the Wise Ones do in the first-sisters ceremony evolved, and whether the extreme loss that they experienced during the breaking might have something to do with the development of a ​​type of channeling that allows one to have a new sibling, and also a new mother, as it turns out.

I had such a pang in my heart for Elayne when Monaelle asked if their mothers were present. It’s easy to forget that Elayne (and everyone else) still thinks that Morgase is dead. I feel like Jordan is going to keep that secret going for a very long time, and I am definitely side-eying him about it.

I’m also looking a little askance at the term sister-wives. Jordan didn’t come up with it of course—it’s used in Mormon polyamory to describe women married to the same man, and possibly elsewhere. But the term has never sat right with me, in part because it makes the whole thing sound a little incest-y, and in part because it seems like the term is designed to make if very and aggressively clear that there there is nothing remotely sexual or romantic about the relationship between the women. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with an arrangement like that, but the insistence on polyamory as only being patriarchal and heteronormative is. You can almost feel the “no-homo” in the term “sister-wives,” both in our culture and in the Aiel’s.

And then there is the fact that the first-sister ceremony has the participants experiencing being together in the womb as twins and being born to the same mother, which does increase the incesty-feeling a bit for me. Maybe that’s a smidge nit-picky, but I feel like it would have been easy enough to choose a different term other than sister-wives for women.

I do, however, really understand now why Aiel culture requires women to become first-sisters before they can be married to the same man. What the Wise Ones are essentially doing is requiring such women to learn how to work together, face conflict, and manage their relationship effectively. Communication, trust, and teamwork is necessary in any relationship, of course, and the more people are involved in the dynamic, the more those things become essential for everyone to function within the group. In any polyamourous configuration.

Like Elayne, I wonder what kind of uncomfortable situation Aviendha was put into when she was called to the ceremony. Perhaps she was interrupted fulfilling some other duty of hers, something she would feel shame leaving undone, or would incur toh for. I didn’t much care for Nandera’s choice to interrupt Elayne while there were Asha’man there. I guess the point is that the Aiel don’t have the same kind of predation of men against women that the wetland cultures do, but it always twinges me the wrong way whenever a Wise One or Maiden is like “of course men like to look at naked women, why are you being weird?” If Nandera had any idea who Taim was, or suspected that he was a Darkfriend, she might have viewed things differently. Then again, maybe that would have been an even better test? But from a narrative standpoint it did make me a little uncomfortable.

I mean, it kind of makes sense that they have to get naked to be born, but also it kind of doesn’t? And once again we’re looking at a female channelers having to get naked for some sort of logical but also kind of silly reason. At least Nandera didn’t make Elayne walk the whole way without the blanket. Although if she had, it would have been an echo of the old Aes Sedai tradition of walking from your raising to your Ajah quarters “clad only in the Light,” which amused me a little. But I don’t think walking around naked for secret Aiel ceremonies would be a great impression for Elayne to leave on people. At least until she’s actually been crowned.

My final thought was about Melaine. I know Melaine has a strong connection with Min since Min had a viewing of Melaine’s future children. But I don’t remember when Elayne got to know her. Maybe that happened off screen, so to speak, but it did feel symbolically relevant that Elayne has that connection to Melaine, since Min is going to be the third partner to Rand. Also the fact that Melaine is going to have twins parallels the fact that the first-sister bond is also a twin bond.

Twins are always important and symbolic in fantasy and science fiction, as they often are in mythology and folklore as well. I like the idea of giving two people who are so dedicated to each other a bit of that fabled “twin-connection.”

Next week we’ll finish up the prologue, catching up with Toveine and then with Rand and Min. Rand has some momentous plans, and I can’t wait to see how they unfold.

Happy Turkey Day to those who are taking part in that, and I hope you all have a wonderful week.

Sylas K Barrett would like to shout out his own two sisters, for whom he is continually grateful, now and in childhood. I don’t know who I would be without them.

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Elayne Finds Her Sister in Winter’s Heart (Part 2) appeared first on Reactor.

Toveine Gazal wakes from a dream of throttling Elaida to find herself in the cot she’s been given in the Asha’man encampment. The bond Logain put on her compels her obedience, but she promises herself she will find a way out, and one day will put her real hands on Elaida’s throat.

She gets dressed and cleaned up, then hurries out into the main area of the building, where other captured Aes Sedai are staying. Every one of them blames Toveine for their capture. Outside the makeshift dormitory she finds the wide streets and buildings, many of which are newly built or currently under construction. As she walks the streets she notes the strangeness of seeing men using the Power alongside women going about their day and children playing.

She’s surprised to see an escort of guards with visitors: two golden-haired women, one of whom is dressed as the Captain-General of the Guards, and even more shocked when she hears the other woman addressed as “Lady Elayne.” She tries to think of how she can gain advantage from this discovery.

Realizing she is going to be late, Toveine starts to run, but she is attacked by a group of dogs, biting at her skirts and chasing her. Toveine has been forbidden to channel so she can’t use the One Power to fight them off. She’s starting to panic when a group of women come to her rescue, beating the dogs off with baskets and buckets, urging her to get away.

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She composes herself just before reaching Logain’s large house, where some of the Asha’man are standing guard. Gabrelle, the other Aes Sedai Logain has bonded, comes out. Toveine realizes that the intimate activity Logain was getting up to the night before—which she had been aware of through the link between them—was with Gabrelle, who doesn’t seem in the least embarrassed about it.

Toveine tells Gabrelle off for “surrendering to Ablar’s vile lusts,” only to learn that Gabrelle was the one to convince him, and that she’s doing it to spy on Logain. Men love to talk, she tells Toveine, all you need to do is listen.

Toveine does indeed listen as men make their daily reports to Logain. There is mention of trying to figure out the Healing that Nynaeve did to Logain, some trouble with two young Two Rivers men, and a report that someone named Mishraile is having private lessons from the M’Hael.

A new man arrives to report that there is a new list of deserters. The men are surprised that there are full Asha’man on this list, while an Asha’man named Sandomere expresses surprise that Flinn, Hopwil, Narishma, personally chosen to serve with Rand, would ever desert.

Logain sends the women inside to wait for him. Toveine listens to Gabrelle talk about everything she has learned from Logain, like how he is the only Asha’man who lives in the Town, while every other one lives in Taim’s palace, waited on by servants. She also learns that Logain found her lapdesk, and that he burned the contents after reading them, and informs Gabrelle about Elaida’s orders to gentle and hang every man found in the Black Tower.

Gabrelle points out that all the captured Aes Sedai have been kept alive at least in part because of the danger of angering the White Tower. With fifty one captive Aes Sedai in their encampment, even Elaida will have to be cautious, though the Asha’man must worry that the sisters might find a way around the control the Asha’man have over them. Gabrelle informs Toveine that there are many factions in the Black Tower, including one that follows Taim and another that follows Logain. They could perhaps exploit this division, but worry that breaking up the Black Tower would only result in setting different groups of Asha’man loose on the rest of the world. It might take a lifetime to capture them all, and Tarmon Gai’don is coming.

Gabrelle brings up an even more important point: The captive Aes Sedai must unite under a single leader. Otherwise, once the shock wears off, they are going to fall back into being allied only to their separate Ajahs. She suggests that she and Toveine should publicly submit themselves to Desandre, the highest ranking Aes Sedai. Toveine agrees, but she has her own plans brewing in the back of her mind, and is determined to use Logain and Taim in her revenge against Elaida.

At the Academy in Cairhien, Rand catches up with Dobraine while Min hunts for some books she wants from Master Fel’s library. Rand learns that some people believe him captured by Elaida or the Forsaken, others that he was killed, and still others that he may himself have gone mad and destroyed part of the Sun Palace. Dobraine himself seems a little uncertain, but Rand trusts him because of Dumai’s Wells. Rand also learns that Ailil and Shalon have gone missing. Rand left the two tied up under a bed, but knows the shield he put on Shalon would have worn off a long time ago, allowing them to free themselves even if they weren’t found by servants first. He suspects that Cadsuane probably took Ailil as a political move, and Shalon was taken to keep the secret.

He is distracted when he sees one of the inventions being tested in the courtyard below, a “steam wagon” which doesn’t need horses to pull it. Mistress Idrien is dismissive of the notion, but reports on some of the other inventions, including a huge kite you can ride, called a glider; a boat that moves under the power of a waterwheel; and a man who traps lightning in jars. Rand is briefly alarmed that this could mean channeling, but is reassured that it is very different. Rand reflects on his desire to leave something behind, besides destruction, and his desire to live, even though he knows he will die.

I thought I could build, Lews Therin murmured in his head. I was wrong. We are not builders, not you, or I, or the other one. We are destroyers. Destroyers.

Rand gives Dobraine sealed orders, naming him Rand’s Steward in Cairhien and giving Dobraine certain orders to be carried out. He urges Dobraine to throw his full support behind Elayne when she makes her claim to the Sun Throne. He tells Dobraine he’ll know when, or if, to deliver the other, and to continue supporting the Academy, as well as the school in Tear, during Rand’s absence.

Min finally finds the books he wants and Rand sends the other two away. He prepares to seize saidin and manages not to sway or fall down. He makes a gateway to the clearing outside the city where they left their horses. He declares his intention to tell Min his plan, but she has already figured out some of it. Rand has been traveling around, asking questions and leaving clues to suggest that he has gone to one place or another. He is deliberately trying to confuse anyone about where he is going next, and Min wants to know why. She is aware that he has a plan, and wonders why he wouldn’t just do that first, and then bother about his tricky false trails and laying traps for whoever might follow them.

Rand admits that his plan is to cleanse saidin.

“I don’t know how long it will take, and once I start, I think everyone within a thousand miles of me who can channel will know something is happening. I doubt I’ll be able to just stop if Dashiva and the rest, or the Forsaken, suddenly appear to see what it is. The Forsaken, I can’t do anything about, but with luck, I can finish the others.” Maybe being ta’veren would give him the edge he needed so desperately.

Min remarks that if he depends on luck, Dashiva or the Forsaken “will have [Rand] for breakfast, and that maybe she can think of a better way.” Rand is dumbfounded by her casual attitude to such an intense and dangerous problem, and privately reflects that dealing with Dashiva and the others first will give him time to get over the sickness he experiences whenever he channels.

If he can’t recover, then he isn’t sure even the two ter’angreal he’s carrying will be enough to do what he has planned.

This is it, we’re finally getting to the cleansing of saidin! We knew it had to happen, of course. Narratively it’s a necessary part of the journey, and also, as Herid Fel would explain, because of the cyclical nature of time  the taint has to be removed from saidin so that it can be untainted in the future, which is also the past.

I’m guessing he plans to do something with Shadar Logoth. The idea came to me when he was Healed by Flinn, and expected Rand might come to the same conclusion about the two evils consuming each other, and thereby canceling each other out. Or at least being confined to one space to battle each other to eventual extinction. Like the half-healed wounds in Rand’s side, cordoned off from the rest of his body and forced to turn most of their evil on each other.

I believe when Rand first collected the two ter’angreal from his hiding place behind the wall in his room, he was thinking about how he needed to find Nynaeve. The two ter’angreal are the ones that connects to the giant statue sa’angreal, I believe, which are so powerful Lanfear thought she and Rand would be able to use them to overthrow the Creator himself. Rand fears them, and was hoping to be able to use Callandor instead—that’s how powerful they are. Nynaeve is one of the most powerful female channelers alive, so it makes sense that she would be his chosen partner in this… except I’m not sure that Rand knows this about her.

I honestly can’t remember when was the last time Rand and Nynaeve saw each other, or how much he knows about her power as a channeler. And the more I think about it, the more certain I am that he thought of her not because of her power as an Aes Sedai, but because of her ability as a healer. That is, after all, what Rand is attempting to do. He’s trying to heal saidin. To heal every channeler who has touched, or will touch, the True Source and experience the Dark One’s taint.

What will happen to the men whose minds are already on their way to madness, I wonder? Does the damage reverse itself if one is no longer exposed to the taint? Or will it merely halt wherever it is, leaving the channeler half corrupted, but not quite mad?

For that matter, I’m starting to wonder if Rand’s sickness is more than just the result of his saidin-made balefire crashing into Moridin’s anti-saidin balefire. Could it be another side effect of the corruption of the taint? If it is, I don’t think Rand is going to just get over it the way he hopes. Another job for Nynaeve, maybe? They say the best works done in the Age of Legends were through male and female channelers working together. I’d love to see her hang out with Flinn for a while and swap notes.

And I can’t wait to see Nynaeve and Rand work together to cleanse saidin. I have a feeling it’s going to be a little while yet, however. After all, Rand wants to deal with Dashiva and the deserters first, and I have a feeling that’s not going to be an easy task. None of the Forsaken encounters have really gone to plan lately. But maybe, as she said, Min will come up with something.

I will say, Toveine is a pretty repellent person, but I was moved by the way the women of the Black Tower came to her rescue against the dogs. The men vs women/dog vs cat binary is a bit ridiculous, but the idea that the women who have followed their men to the Black Tower are still empathetic and allied to the Aes Sedai in some way is still moving. They won’t betray their men, I don’t think, not in the way Toveine is hoping. But in a moment when Toveine is basically enslaved to a man who can channel, that bit of care from other women means a lot.

It’s interesting to see her and Gabrelle discuss the fractured nature of the Black Tower and then immediately turn their minds towards how to keep the Aes Sedai from fracturing similarly.

We have seen how Aes Sedai sometimes struggle to think of themselves as a single group. When facing outsiders, anyone who isn’t an Aes Sedai, they are all easily defined by their sisterhood. But inside the White Tower, or even when interacting as a smaller group, they define themselves first and foremost by their Ajah, and even go so far as to think of their Ajah’s focus as being the most important focus in any given situation. Really, I can’t help thinking that the creation of the Ajahs was a mistake. They keep secrets from each other, they draw political lines around their Ajahs more often than around their own beliefs, and the bonds are so strong that it can be very difficult for an Amyrlin to keep at bay the preference for her former Ajah and the accusations (valid or imagined) of favoritism. What’s more, the choice of Ajah is made by Accepted who have never been a part of an Ajah before, who are basing their choice on what they have seen at a distance, from the outside. You can’t change your mind or get a do-over, either.

This isn’t to say that there are no benefits to the Ajah system, of course, or that there would be harmony in the White Tower without them. Politics are still going to politic, and the Black Ajah would still be at work undermining the cohesion of the White Tower. It’s just that the Ajahs make it easier for them.

Siuan recently explained to Egwene that the Three Oaths were important to who the Aes Sedai are, and that she would never want to be rid of them. At the time, it felt to me more like brainwashing than a reasoned, unemotional belief. But I think I can see how important it is for the Aes Sedai to have clear delineations around what and who they are. I imagine that, especially with the stigma surrounding the One Power and the cultural memory of the Breaking, it would be easy for the Aes Sedai to be defined by what they are not. Not ordinary people, not male channelers, not wilders. You can see the way they tend to other the rest of the world, and the way they tend to other even their fellow sisters from other Ajahs. Friendship across Ajahs used to be more common, of course, but there are so many stereotypes within the Tower around the other Ajahs. Everyone thinks Browns are completely impractical, distracted, and incapable of paying attention to the real world. The Reds are all single minded, man-hating jerks, etc.

I like Gabrelle. I think I’ve liked all the Browns we’ve met so far, except maybe Danelle, since she was part of Elaida’s coup. I do remember that she, like the other Browns we have met, used the stereotype of having her head in the clouds to cover up that she was bringing mercenaries into the White Tower. None of them actually seem to be that air-headed and distractible, and I find myself wondering if the Ajah isn’t secretly encouraging its members to put on this front before the other sisters. Interestingly, all the Browns we’ve met seem to like people a lot, despite their reputation for caring only about books and history. Which makes sense, really, because what is the true point of caring about history? History is, after all, about people. How they work, how they think, why they think and act as they do. What mistakes they made, and what can be done differently in the future. If anything, you might argue that the Browns are second only to the Blues in their dedication to caring for the people of the world.

Toveine, on the other hand, is pretty irrational in her thinking. I can understand that she’s in a bizarre position she could never have imagined being in, and would understandably struggle to adapt to, but throughout her section she jumps from thought to thought, often contradicting herself, considering Gabrelle to be a silly woman one moment, then reminding herself that it is a mistake to consider Browns to be unworldly or too absorbed in their books to notice what was going on, then falling back a moment later into thinking that Gabrelle is foolish and that Browns are always better at reading books that people.

Actually, Gabrelle reminds me a little of Verin’s outward personality, while Toveine reminds me a lot of Elaida. Throughout this section, Toveine bounces from despair to visions of revenge, just as Elaida does under Alviarin’s control. She has moments of insight and thoughtfulness, but seems much less in control of herself than Gabrelle seems to be. She wants to believe that she has a great destiny, but I find myself wondering how much actual effect she will have on the story, in the long run.

We get some interesting tidbits of information from Logain’s reporters, which we have more context for than Toveine does. The “secret lessons” from the M’Hael seems very important, given my own suspicions about Taim. Suspicions I think Logain might share, as he seems to be keeping himself apart from the other full-fledge Asha’man and having his loyalists keep an eye on Taim’s doings. He also appears protective of the men from the Two Rivers, which is interesting. I can’t think why Logain would have a particular interest in them… but I can imagine that Taim might be aware that controlling Two Rivers men gives him an edge, a weapon to use against Rand if he ever wants to.

Toveine isn’t sure if Logain is resigned or regretful that there are fourteen year olds in the Black Tower. But while he seems to couch his concern for them in terms of Rand possibly being angered by Two Rivers deaths (a wise concern) I found myself wondering if this was just Logain being a good person. Gabrelle tells Toveine that Logain isn’t a villian, and if he is suspicious of Taim’s doings he might be trying to provide balance in the Black Tower, to protect the Two Rivers men because they are unduly in danger. One of the reporters responds to Logain’s assertions that Rand might be angry if they kill too many of his men with the following statement;

“I was hearing it was the Lord Dragon himself told the M’Hael to pluck up anything male in this Two Rivers that could channel, down to the roosters. With the number he brought back, I’m just surprised he didn’t bring the chicks and lambs, as well.”

I find it difficult to believe that Rand would have given such an order. He’s protective of his home, and while he certainly wouldn’t turn away prospective Asha’man from anywhere, I don’t think he’d want Taim doing special recruiting there. He certainly wouldn’t want fourteen year old boys being sought out and brought to the Black Tower. He might not fight it if it happened, sure. But he wouldn’t order it.

Taim would, though, and he’d happily lie about it too, as he did when he named Flinn, Hopwil, and Narishma among the deserters. He was probably covering his tracks, since four of the other five were known to be his men. Or maybe trying to rob Rand of the few men we know support the Dragon fully—if any of the other Asha’man run into those three, they will try to kill them as per Black Tower Law.

Next week is Chapter One and Two of Winter’s Heart. That’s not going to be easy, since it’s Perrin finding out about Faile’s capture. In the meantime, I leave you with one final thought.

When Lews Therin is doing his maudlin moaning in Rand’s head, talking about how they’re destroyers, he specifically says to Rand that they are not builders. “[N]ot you, or I, or the other one,” he says. Other one? Is there someone else in Rand’s head now? What does this mean?

Thank you, and I will see y’all next week!

Sylas K Barrett is already ready for the holidays to be over. However, despite how miserable the winter is for everyone in the story, reading Winter’s Heart has him wishing for snow.

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Taim Tells Lies and Rand Shares His Plan in Winter’s Heart (Part 3) appeared first on Reactor.

It’s been over two years since we heard anything about this trilogy; back in 2021, it was announced that Zack Stentz (Thor, X-Men: First Class) was writing the screenplay for The Age of Legends. Stentz is still attached, and Deadline has a slightly different description of the film:

Set several millennia before the timeline of the books, The Age of Legends will chart the emergence of ‘the Dark One’, when the world descended into darkness and war. The film will delve into the corrosive nature of power and pride, as seen through the tragic tales of the Forsaken – once honored leaders who fell victim to the Dark One’s seduction, each personifying distinct elements of human weakness and ambition. The story will also portray the valorous sacrifices of unexpected heroes who rise against the Dark One to defend humanity in the face of overwhelming odds.

Two of the producers on this trilogy, Rick Selvage and Larry Mondragon, are also producers on Prime Video’s The Wheel of Time. (Unexpectedly, Eva Longoria is also one of the producers.) In a statement, Selvage said, “This film is not just an adaptation; it’s an exploration of an original world that blends fantasy with elements of science fiction, and Kari’s mastery in storytelling is crucial for bringing Jordan’s vision to life.”

Skogland directed all six episodes of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and has a few other SFF and/or actiony TV episodes under her belt, including episodes of The Handmaid’s Tale, The Walking Dead, and The Punisher.  She has directed feature-length projects before, but her recent work has mostly been episodic.

No casting or production timeline has been announced.

The post Three Wheel of Time Prequel Films Are Coming — And the First One Has Found Its Director appeared first on Reactor.

A wind rises and crosses the land, over Tanchico and Amadicia, now ruled by the Seanchan. The common people are content enough, with peace in the land and mostly left alone, except for having some new customs to follow. In Amador, however, former Whitecloacks are forced to do hard labor and endure the winter chill.

The wind flows further over Amadicia until it reaches Abila, where Perrin is just leaving the house of the Prophet, Masema. Perrin is angry after his meeting with Masema; the stubborn man refuses to Travel to visit Rand, and Perrin had to spend a long time arguing and arranging for Masema and a guard of one hundred of the Prophet’s men to ride back with Perrin, over four hundred leagues or more. And somehow Perrin has to keep their identity secret, per Rand’s orders.

Elyas points out that they might have a better chance knocking Masema on the head and fighting their way out. Perrin thinks privately that with the Aes Sedai, Wise Ones, and Asha’man they might succeed, but his mind is full of the images of Dumai’s Wells, and he can’t bear the thought of turning Abila into a slaughteryard as well. As they leave, with Masema set to meet them at their camp by nightfall, Perrin considers the problem of Aram.

In Masema, Aram had met a man who had given his life and heart and soul to the Dragon Reborn. In Aram’s view, the Dragon Reborn ranked close behind Perrin and Faile.

You did the boy no favor, Elyas had told Perrin. You helped him let go of what he believed, and now all he has to believe in is you and that sword. It’s not enough, not for any man. Elyas had known Aram when Aram was still a Tinker, before he picked up the sword.

Balwer rejoins the group, and reports two important pieces of information to Perrin. The first is that King Ailron and the Amadicia army have been soundly defeated by the Seanchan. The Whitecloaks also took part in the battle, but Valda managed to retreat with many of them. The other news is also of a Seanchan battle, this one in Southern Altara. The Seanchan were defeated, with rumors of both Aes Sedai and men who could channel taking part, and retreated back into Ebou Dar. Perrin remarks that this is good news, and his mind turns once again to thoughts of Faile, who he is more than ready to be reunited with.

When they arrive back at the camp, however, they find the Mayener guards facing off with the Ghealdanin soldiers. Behind the Mayeners, up on a hill, all the Two Rivers men are arranged around the crest, with bows nocked and ready. Perrin hurries up to where Berelain, along with Gallenne and Annoura, is arguing with Gerard Arganda, the First Captain of Alliandre’s soldiers. Before Perrin can say anything, Berelain, in a formal voice, informs him of the details of Faile’s capture. When Perrin, in shock, demands to know why they aren’t out looking for her, Berelain reminds him that there could easily be many bands of Aiel about in the countryside, and that they must first ascertain which band has Faile and form a plan. Elyas agrees that blundering about will only get them killed.

Perrin struggles to hold back the rage he feels, towards the Aiel but also towards everyone there. He sends Elyas to scout, and Aram follows.

It would do no good to founder the animals, Perrin told himself, frowning at their retreating backs. He wanted them to run. He wanted to run with them. Fine cracks seemed to be spidering through him. If they returned with the wrong news, he would shatter. To his surprise, the three Warders trotted their mounts through the trees after Elyas and Aram in splashes of snow, plain woolen cloaks streaming behind, then matched speed when they caught up.

Perrin sends a grateful glance towards the Aes Sedai and Wise Ones, then reaches out with his mind to the wolves, even though he knows Elyas must have already tried this.  The wolves express sympathy, and advise him to mourn her and then move on, knowing he will meet her again in the dream.

He’s drawn back eventually by Arganda, who is angrily demanding to put the Aiel in Perrin’s camp to the question. Perrin angrily reminds Arganda that Alliandre swore fealty to Perrin, which makes Perrin Arganda’s lord.

“I said I’ll find Alliandre when I find Faile.” The edge of an axe. She was alive. “You question no one, touch no one, unless I say. What you will do is take your men back to your camp, now, and be ready to ride when I give the order. If you’re not ready when I call, you will be left behind.”

Berelain praises Perrin’s handling of the situation and he tells her off for playing her “childish games” after his wife has been taken. Berelain responds by pointing out that he should be flattered by two women contesting over him, then rides off. Annoura tells Perrin that sometimes he is a very large fool. Perrin doesn’t understand what she is talking about, and doesn’t care.

Perrin rides up the hill to join the Two Rivers men and the rest of the Aiel. The Wise Ones and gai’shain show no sign of disturbance, but Gaul and the Maidens are veiled and poised for battle. Dannil Lewin reports that when the trouble with the Ghealdanin started, he ordered Perrin’s servants and Faile’s followers to make a circle with the carts and stay inside it, and then brought everyone else up to the defensible position on top of the hill. Perrin tells him that he did the right thing, and starts giving orders to prepare for travel. He goes to Gaul next, and for some reason he and the maidens tense up until Perrin asks Gaul to find Faile. The Aiel set off, with each Maiden pressing a finger to her veiled lips and then to Perrin’s shoulder as they pass. Perrin thinks Faile would know the meaning behind the gesture. Perrin also realizes that the Maidens are allowing Gaul to lead, something they would normally never do, and wonders if it has something to do with Gaul’s desire to marry Chiad.

Perrin tries to go talk to the Wise Ones, but they are in council. One of them, Nevarin, comes out of the tent to ask him what he wants, but she can’t tell him how Faile will be treated by the Aiel—taking wetlanders prisoner is against custom, so who can say what other customs the Shaido will break. When Perrin grows upset, she tells him not to become irrational, as men often do.

There is nothing else for Perrin to do, waiting on the scouts and having issued all the orders to prepare to depart. Lini urges him to take care of himself, and Perrin deduces from her drawn expression that Maighdin was with Faile. He ends up hiking to the top of a ridge where he can watch for the scouts’ return, and finds Tallanvor already up there. Knowing that Tallanvor is in love with Maighdin and likely to marry her, he decides the man has a right to keep watch.

They stay up there as night falls, with no sign of the scouts returning. There is also no sign of Masema and his party, but Perrin doesn’t care about that.

Snow began to fall with a dry rustling. Snow that would bury traces and tracks. Silent in the cold, the two men stood there, watching into the snowfall, waiting, hoping.

You know, a few books ago I was getting a little annoyed with the windy openings, but I’ve come back around to liking them again. It’s kind of nostalgic for me now, if that’s a thing I’m allowed to say about a series I started reading a mere six-ish years ago. In my defense, that was pre-pandemic, so it feels like it has been a lot longer. I’m just like the Two Rivers kids, looking back on the me of a few years ago, thinking about how young and innocent I was. Now I’m old and hard and far from home—well, I’m actually at home a lot more, but that’s basically the same right?

I jest, but in all seriousness, I’ve been thinking a lot the past few weeks about how much our heroes have been through. The end of The Path of Daggers felt a little bit like the end of a second act, to me. There’s a sense of anticipation, with the discovery of a way to fight back against the Dark One climate change problem, and because both Egwene and Rand poised to make huge changes to the landscape of the world. There have been moments in which one or more of our heroes went on the defensive against the Dark, but never has it been at such a scale. At about halfway through the series, that feels relevant. Poignant.

It’s important to remember that not much time has passed since the story began. Maybe two years or so? I have a hard time keeping track of that sort of thing, but it certainly hasn’t been much longer than that. Which is really wild, considering how much has happened. It really puts in perspective how many characters are struggling to understand and accept how much their world is changing, and how quickly. It’s taken me three times as long to read the stories as it has for the stories to occur, so they way things have evolved and changed have gone at rather a reasonable pace. But in universe, Egwene and Rand were peasant children just about two years ago, and now they have risen to the two highest positions of power in their continent. It kind of makes more sense that everyone is resistant to Egwene as Amyrlin, when I look at it that way. And it makes more sense, too, that Rand has no idea how to emotionally handle anything.

I’m kind of curious why Jordan made the timeline so tight. There are in-universe reasons that explain how our heroes have “leveled up” so quickly. Being ta’veren counts for a lot here, and Rand seems to have incredible natural instincts as well as Lews Therin’s memories, prompting him to “discover” new weaves with a rapidity no other channeler could probably manage. Egwene’s forcing is another, and although it’s not stated, I’d think that Nynaeve and Elayne have also experienced some degree of being pushed, or pushing themselves, faster than they would have been had they been normal Tower initiates during a normal time. Mat’s skills as a military tactician were basically downloaded into his brain, and Perrin’s wolfbrother abilities aren’t so much learned as unlocked. Even so, thinking about how powerful they have become in such a short span of time kind of reminds me of how in every training montage in action films it only takes a few months for people to go from absolutely green to a trim and mean fighting team.

(Yeah, I don’t know why I’m phrasing things the way I am today. It’s December. Just go with it.)

It just feels unrealistic, even for super powers and magic. It’s a book, you can have things take as long as you want, skipping ahead months or even years if you like. Our main protagonists are all so young, too. Is it only going to take two more years for them to be ready to fight the Last Battle? That’s wild to me.

On the other hand , it’s possible that Robert Jordan wanted them to face Tarmon Gai’don while they were still quite young because of his own experience fighting in Vietnam. He was quite young, as most soldiers are, and that’s where his perspective on battle and war are coming from. So it makes sense that he would want to explore the subject with characters around that same age. And as I mentioned above, this section really struck me with the specifically wartime PTSD, and got me thinking a lot about which parts of his own experience Jordan might be drawing on when he writes paragraphs like:

Dumai’s Wells flashed into his head again, stronger than before. For a moment, he was back-to-back with Loial again, fighting desperately, sure that every breath would be his last. For the first time that day, he shivered.

It’s a quick moment. Perrin doesn’t become lost in the memory, which is how flashback moments are usually portrayed in story and media. But not every experience of PTSD involves a prolonged experience in which the sufferer believes themselves to be back in the original experience. Sometimes it can be a quick reminder, a flash of anxiety, or paralysis. In Perrin’s case he has a few moments when the spectre of Dumai’s Wells looms up for him in this section. Earlier in chapter one he considers Elyas’s point that it might be easier to try to capture Masema and take him with them, but the idea of instigating a battle in which the One Power would be used is too much for Perrin. After seeing what happened at Dumai’s Wells, he is certain that “Abila would have been a butcher’s yard before they were done,” and determined that such a thing won’t happen again if he at all avoid it.

The decision makes sense. Time will tell if it was the right one, though. I can’t help wondering if Perrin’s ta’veren powers were working on Masema while they were talking. I’m sure Masema truly does worship Rand and believe that he’s following the path the Dragon wants him to, but all those ideas have clearly come from somewhere other than reality. Maybe a Darkfriend whispering in his ear, maybe Rand’s ta’vereness balancing some good it did elsewhere, or maybe it’s just Masema’s own mind gone sideways, but I could definitely imagine Masema deciding that Perrin wasn’t really who he said he was just about as soon as Perrin was out the door. Even without knowing that he’s talking to the Seanchan, I’d be suspicious of Masema’s ability to hold to a promise he made, and Perrin would have done better to insist that Masema come with him—although he probably couldn’t have done that without attracting the attention Rand told him to avoid.

But yeah, I wonder if Masema was as reasonable as he was because Perrin’s ta’veren powers were working on him, and Perrin leaving him to follow behind is going to be just like Rand leaving the negotiations with the Sea Folk—as soon as the ta’veren is out of the room, people stop being so easily led. And Masema’s brain in particular seems like it’s not going to stay going in any direction but its own. Given that he’s late for the arranged rendezvous, I’m guessing that theory is a good one.

Dumai’s Wells was also referenced several times in the prologue of Winter’s Heart, with Rand measuring the mettle and loyalty of Dobraine by his performance in that battle. Perrin also notes Dannil’s strength and ability by that metric in chapter two. You can see both Perrin and Rand feel a kind of kinship to those who experienced that battle with them, even with Rand’s ongoing and growing paranoia in play. It’s also notable, I think, to compare Perrin’s reaction to Dumai’s Wells and his reaction to the battle he led in the Two Rivers. The latter involved more deaths to people he knew and loved, but it was a defensive action against invading Shadowspawn. Dumai’s Wells, however necessary, involved leading people into a battle they could have avoided, leading people to their probably deaths in a desperate attempt to save the Dragon Reborn from captivity by the White Tower. And it ended with the Dragon’s own men, the Asha’man, destroying their opposition in a way that no one had ever seen before. They didn’t cook or eat any of their enemies, but by every other metric what the Asha’man did to the Shaido and the Aes Sedai’s soldiers was just as brutal and violent as the ways in which the Trollocs kill their victims in battle. And yet, the Asha’man are “the good guys.” On Rand’s side, so ultimately on Perrin’s side. On the side of the Light. This isn’t to say that one type of battle is necessarily more scarring or harder to recover from than the other, but they are very different.

And now Perrin is responsible for some of those Asha’man, and for Aes Sedai and Aiel, too. He knows his choices could lead to another Dumai’s Wells, and that is a much heavier responsibility than those he’s carried before. In many ways, the choices he made in the Two Rivers were the only ones he could make. But now, he has the ability to say they aren’t going to fight Masema, to try to avoid using the heaviest weapons in his arsenal as long as he can.

Of course, all that goes out the window once he finds out that Faile is missing. Jordan’s descriptions are on point again this week—I could feel Perrin’s distress in my own body as I read, like my own ears were ringing at hearing the news. Even knowing it was coming because I got to read the chapter in which she, Morgase, and Alliandre were captured, I felt unprepared for the revelation.

One of the most fascinating things about Perrin, for me, is that his emotional journey is the closest to Rand’s, but in a more relatable way. Sure, we don’t have wolfbrothers in our world, but it’s easier to imagine what that would be like than to imagine you were the Dragon Reborn. And while Rand’s anger is enhanced and warped by the taint on saidin, Perrin’s has nothing to do with the supernatural aspects of his nature. His anger is his, pure and human, and actually runs contrary to the way the wolves experience emotion.

I have so many thoughts and musings about how this next stage in his journey is going to go for Perrin. He’s already having a difficult time restraining his anger when interacting with his friends and allies, how much worse will it be if he encounters an enemy. And if, the Light forbid, Faile doesn’t survive her captivity, what will Perrin do then? Elyas once told him to keep the axe until he stopped hating it. It was hard to imagine Perrin ever enjoying violence, but if he lost Faile, I could see, possibly, him turning to violence and revenge as an answer to his pain.

Which brings us to Aram. Elyas has good observations about him, too. I was on Perrin’s side when he allowed Aram to join him, to pick up a sword and abandon the Way of the Leaf. Perrin’s argument was that he had no right to tell a man he can’t defend himself and his people if he chooses to, and you can’t really argue with that logic. But it is still true that Perrin made it easier for Aram to leave behind what he believed in, and Elyas’s point that a man need something more to believe in than fighting and hero worship of a few other fighters. I hadn’t quite been able to put my finger on this exact point until Elyas said it, but now it feels so obvious. Aram’s hunger for a fight makes more sense when you consider that it’s less about a love of battle than it is about filling a void. A man like that could easily fall prey to a cultist like Masema.

Despite all the harm he has caused and all the deprivation experienced by the Prophet’s followers, one thing Masema is giving to people is a faith, with clear rules to follow and which gives a sense of purpose to those who do. With so many people displaced from their old ways of life, be it through political or social upheaval, famine and climate problems, or Rand’s ta’veren “breaking of all bonds,” there are so many people in the land who are at loose ends, desperate for some sense of direction and belonging. It makes sense that Masema can attract followers, despite everything.

And finally, I still don’t get Berelain. Perrin is married, how can she claim that she and Faile are both trying to win him? I mean, I guess there’s divorce, or maybe Berelain’s happy being a mistress? But as the First you would think she would feel disrespected if she wasn’t, you know, first in her relationship. And there’s not really been any mention of divorce existing in any of the cultures we’ve met, as far as I can recall. So if that’s the endgame for her, someone should say. And why exactly does Annoura think Perrin is a fool for telling Berelain off? She was being annoying.

Next week we’ll continue on to Chapters Three and Four, which are also very intensely descriptive, a little scary, and full of little half-nuggets of information. I’ll be touching on the Aiel/Wetlander culture clash, as well, and how, in a way, it compares to the Faile/Perrin culture clash.

In the meantime, I leave you with my favorite quote of the section.

If he was going to get her back, he needed to strangle fear and see. But it was like trying to strangle a tree.

Sylas K Barrett wouldn’t mind some snow, really. But maybe after next week’s reading he’ll be happy enough with the usual December rain.

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Perrin Loses His Falcon in Winter’s Heart (Part 4) appeared first on Reactor.

Walking and jogging naked through the falling snow with her captors, Faile mostly focuses on not freezing to death, and not falling down. She tries to notice everything, knowing that any detail might aid in her escape, but worries increasingly about frostbite, and over the way her feet are starting to bleed in the snow. She tries to work her fingers and toes as she goes, welcoming the pain because she knows that once she stops having feeling, that’s when she’s really in trouble.

Eventually the Shaido come to a halt, and start examining the feet of their prisoners. Rolan, Faile’s captor, is even bigger than Perrin, and lifts her effortlessly to throw her over his shoulder. Lacile and Arrela, two members of Cha Faile, submit to being similarly carried, once they see Bain and Chiad do the same, but Alliandre and Maighdin begin fighting their captors. Maighdin even bites the hand of the Aiel trying to lift her. Both Maighdin and Alliandre receive a whipping for their trouble and Faile doesn’t feel bad for them—their efforts were obviously useless and in addition to being wasted effort, meant keeping everyone out in the cold longer. But being carried makes it harder to stay warm and aware, and although Faile does her best to keep flexing her muscles and using her mind, she slowly loses her battle against the cold, finally falling asleep to nightmares of being chased by an angry Perrin through icy landscapes.

When she eventually wakes, she’s cold but not so deathly cold. A tall, green-eyed gai’shain serves her hot tea, warning her not to spill any. Faile is relieved to see that all her companions are there as well. Their captors have joined a large encampment of Shaido. She learns that their captors eventually wrapped them in blankets, fearing that they would freeze to death; the gai’shain says that it was a a dishonor, but Faile reminds him that she is not Aiel, and does not follow ji’e’toh. She points out that it is against custom to take wetlander prisoners, and wonders if the Shaido will let this man go once his time in white is up. But he doesn’t rise to her bait.

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Two Wise ones approach, along with a very strange gai’shain adorned in robes of white silk and a bejeweled gold belt and collar. One of the Wise Ones, Someryn, jokes that Sevanna will never rest until all the world is made gai’shain, while the other, Therava, remarks that they have too many gai’shain and that it is hampering their progress.

All of Faile’s instincts tell her not to draw Therava’s attention, and she tries to hide her face in her cup of tea, to come off as meek and unimportant. Alliandre spoils this, however, by loudly announcing who she is and that their captors can get a large ransom for them. She even refers to Faile as her liege lady, and demands accommodations and apologies for their mistreatment.

They are overheard by Sevanna, who has just arrived on horseback, wearing an enormous amount of jewelry and wetlander-style skirts. The gai’shain, who she names Galina, eagerly confirms that Alliandre is a wetlander queen, and that her liege-lady must be very powerful woman—Galina has never heard of a queen swearing fealty in such a way. For Faile, it is a bit like seeing Logain or Mazrim Taim, and she has a personal grudge against Sevanna since Perrin was at Dumai’s Wells.

Sevanna orders Galina to Heal them, then leaves after a brief argument with Therava. Faile is shocked to see a Great Serpent ring on Galina as she reaches out to perform the Healing.

More gai’shain, many of them wetlanders, bring food and clothes. Faile tries to refuse being given a belt and collar, but is told that she serves “the Lady Sevanna” now. She must do as she’s told or be punished until she sees the error of her ways. Maighdin and Alliandre are also given the belt and collar.

The camp is soon on the move, and they soon lose track of Bain and Chiad, Lacile and Arrela. Maighdin and Alliandre refuse to take any chance of escape unless Faile can come with them, despite Faile’s orders. Then Therava joins them.

Therava is briefly surprised when Faile knows the appropriate way to speak to a Wise One. She promises that they will not succeed in any escape attempts, and because they are wetlanders, they will not be released after a year and a day. She tells them all to watch and listen to everything Sevanna does and says, and to report it all back to Therava. If they please Therava, she will make sure they are left behind.

Faile doesn’t want any part of this scheme, but she knows that they can’t refuse—she’s confident that Therava could and would have them killed. Carefully, she asks if Therava will protect them if they are caught, but Therava promises to cook them herself if they are.

When Therava leaves, Alliandre tries to find an out, but Maighdin is confident that every one of Sevanna’s servants has been given the same mission, and the same threat; if they don’t do as they are told, those other servants will report on them. Alliandre tells Maighdin off for the way she has been behaving and speaking to them as an equal.

“Until we escape,” Maighdin replied, “you are Sevanna’s servant. If you don’t think of yourself as a servant every minute, then you might as well climb onto that spit. And leave room for the rest of us, because you will put us on it, as well.”

Faile intercedes, making Maighdin apologize but also ordering both of them to behave as good servants, keep their heads down, and report absolutely everything to Therava. They all have a good idea what Therava will do to them if they don’t.

But soon they are approached again, this time by Galina, who claims to be on an important mission for the White Tower. Galina tells them what will happen to them as Sevanna’s servants, that every one of those made gai’shain to her is either a noble, a rich merchant, or someone who knows how to serve nobility. Every day, Sevanna has five of her servants beaten, to encourage the rest. Galina describes the punishment for the first time they try to escape, and how much worse it is the second, and the third.

Maighdin and Alliandre bristle at the tirade, with Maighdin going so far as to point out that Galina seems to be in the exact same position. Galina snaps, calling her a wilder, and Faile has to intervene again. Faile gives her name as “the Lady Faile t’Aybara.” But she regrets it immediately when Galina recognizes Perrin’s last name, and gloats over the fact that Sevanna has plans for Rand al’Thor and would love to know she has someone so closely connected to al’Thor.

Galina tells them about an object Therava keeps in her tent, a smooth white rod kept in a red chest with brass binding. If they bring it to her, then she will take them with her when she leaves the Shaido. She becomes irate when Alliandre asks why Galina doesn’t just retrieve it herself, and tells them that if they don’t get it, she will leave them there until they are old, and tell Sevanna about Perrin Aybara.

As she leaves, Faile feels a little desperate about all the traps surrounding them. But she is still determined to escape, and falls back into planning as they walk.

I’m not sure I understand what Therava’s deal is. I mean, obviously she’s a horrible, sadistic person, and part of her conflict with Sevanna is over the fact they are both selfish, cruel, and power-hungry. But Sevanna has done a terrible job at leading the Shaido every step of the way for as long as she’s been in power, and she hasn’t even been able to cover it up effectively. It’s pretty obvious that her choices have been a disaster from the start, even if the majority of the Shaido still agree that Rand is not the car’a’carn and they do not want to follow him.

Of course, Sevanna does have the whole “you all murdered Desaine on my orders” thing she’s holding over some of the Wise Ones’ heads, Therava included. At the time, Sevanna believed that this would bind the Wise Ones to her, not only because it served as blackmail but also because they had all made the decision to commit murder against one of their own, and use it as a lie to convince the rest of the Shaido to do what they wanted. Committing such an act together still created a bond that perhaps isn’t easy to ignore, even though it’s between people who hate each other.

Still, at this point it’s kind of hard for me to understand why Therava isn’t just taking Sevanna out already. It really seems like the rest of the Wise Ones are more on Therava’s side than Sevanna’s, and Wise Ones really have the most power and authority in Aiel culture, even if their strict customs dictate when and how that authority is exercised. After all, the Shaido have largely abandoned Aiel tradition and dictates, and no one more fully than Sevanna has. So it’s hard to imagine that Therava is either personally attached to Aiel customs or worried that the Shaido would rebel at having a Wise One acting as clan chief. I mean, Sevanna is already kind of doing that, even though she’s never been an apprentice or traveled to Rhuidean.

I really don’t like Therava but I do want to understand her motivations, and she would almost definitely be better for the Shaido than Sevanna is, and even better for the wetlander “gai’shain” prisoners—I think she might be even more sadistic than Sevanna, but she doesn’t want as many gai’shain and servants, so, on balance, more people would be better off.

Maybe Faile will discover some of the answers to these questions while she and Alliandre and Morgase are caught between Therava and Sevanna. Faile’s a perfect character to have in this position, narratively speaking, because she’s very smart and already understands something of Aiel custom. She’ll be able to understand more of what she sees and learns than your average wetlander, but she’s still an outsider to their culture, which means that everything she encounters will be filtered through that perspective, a perspective the reader, also an outsider to the Aiel world, shares.

I was so grateful to have the POV from Maeric, back in Chapter 40 of A Crown of Swords, because it actually showed us a Shaido Aiel who felt like a real, ordinary person. Before then, we really only had Sevanna, Couladin, and Therava—not to mention a bunch of Wise Ones who were willing to murder one of their own in order to influence the loyalty of the Shaido following them. Very early on we were told by a member of one of the other Aiel clans (I can’t remember which character, exactly) that the Shaido are tricky and lack the honor that is so important to Aiel culture. So far, most of what we have seen fits that description, but even if the culture of this clan dominates much of their upbringing and perspective, no people is a monolith, and it’s not like the Shaido are all Darkfrie​​nds or Evil-capital-E. There are mothers and children and ordinary craftsmen who are not algai’d’siswai, who are following their leaders and living their lives as best they can. As with all the Aiel, the Shaido’s entire worldview was recently shattered, and when they looked for guidance they got Couladin and Sevanna. And for that, they have my sympathy.

Not to be reading ahead or anything, but there’s a poignant little moment in Chapter Five in which Perrin looks at an Aiel doll found lost in the snow and wonders if somewhere a little Shaido child is crying for her missing toy.

So yeah, I’m hoping we’ll learn more about why the Shaido, and especially the Shaido Wise Ones, are still following Sevanna. Perhaps Faile and the others spying for Therava will give the narrative an opportunity to explain this for us. Of course, in a series that is so expansive, with so very many cultures and characters, we’re not necessarily going to be able to get into the nuances of every culture. The Seanchan have the same problem—so far, Egeanin is the only Seanchan character who has really been humanized for us. Still, I’m always hoping for more.

Robert Jordan’s descriptive skills are on display again this week, as they have been in every chapter of Winter’s Heart. I’ve never been in high-key danger of frostbite or death the way Faile and her companions are in chapter three, but I have done enough outdoor hiking and skiing to have a little taste of what it’s like to reach that point where you’ve gotten too cold and not going to warm up again without help. I really enjoyed how smart and educated Faile was about the dangers of frostbite and hypothermia. As per usual, I could have done without some of the gratuitous descriptions of bare hips and bottoms and spanking, but the rest of the descriptions were so powerful that I actually felt cold myself while I was reading.

I had a moment where I thought it was unrealistic that the Aiel, who come from a land that is always hot, were able to endure the weather so much better than someone like Faile, who comes from a cold climate. But between the nakedness and the lack of movement once they are being carried, that would definitely make a huge difference. The narration didn’t make it clear to me whether or not Bain and Chiad were also in danger of dying, though, and if they also had their honor “offended” the way Faile did. The Aiel are a strong, hardy people, but faced with something so different from their natural environment, one wonders how far such hardiness would translate, especially when they weren’t able to do any of the things you’re supposed to do to keep themselves warm and alert.

In any case, it’s interesting to see where the Shaido have adapted and where they struggle to change their thinking. Of course there are some practical changes, like adding green to the cadin’sor, but I’m most interested in the cultural changes. The Shaido don’t appear to have much of an objection to taking wetlander prisoners. Nor have we really heard anyone object to the way Sevanna adorns her personal gai’shain in gold, or chooses to wear wetlander-style jewelry and clothing, or to ride a horse. I mean, she’s even named herself a Wise One, despite already speaking as clan chief and never having apprenticed or gone to Rhuidean. Sure, there’s been some grumbling and derision from the Wise Ones, but on the whole, Rand—who is the car’a’carn and wasn’t even raised as an Aiel—has gotten more flack for not behaving according to the dictates of ji’e’toh than Sevanna appears to have.

Perhaps that’s just because Sevanna has a good sense of which tenets of jie’e’toh will be considered the most inviolate by her people—I doubt she’d ever pick up a sword, for example. Or, maybe the Shaido are breaking under the same weight that the rest of the world seems to feel, the sense that the Dragon Reborn is breaking all bonds. They don’t have a prophecy that says such a thing will happen, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t real ta’veren effects working on them.

When Galina was captured, I couldn’t help but think about the similarities between her situation and that of the damane. Bound by the One Power to obey Therava and Sevanna, beaten down physically and spiritually until she is becoming very obsequious and fawning—Faile even mentally compares her behavior to that of an obedient dog. It’s difficult to read, even knowing that Galina is a darkfriend, just as it is difficult to read about the interactions between sul’dam and damane. And Galina is not the only Aes Sedai bound to obedience by an Oath Rod, either—there are also the Salidar spies, uncovered and bound by Seaine and the rest. I imagine they won’t be treated like animals, but no one involved seemed to have much of an objection to enslaving the women in such a way, either.

And I know that this sort of thing was common in the epic fantasy of the time, but for me, these really intense subjects aren’t really being given their thematic due in most of the Wheel of Time books. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that Robert Jordan is only including them for shock value. Rather, I think he does have some really interesting ideas about violence, including sexual violence, war, and trauma that he is trying to bring into his work, sometimes very effectively, but other times less so. The slavery thing, and a lot of the torture as well, isn’t thematically explored very often, not with any depth. Even Rand’s post-kidnapping PTSD, which receives more attention from the narration, feels like a really interesting thought, left unfinished. (Though it may be that the plotline with Cadsuane will address if further. And often when I’m reading, I get the sense that Jordan is poking at something deeper, something more profound than violence for violence’s sake, or as an excuse to describe a woman being naked again, but that he either can’t get the thought onto the page effectively or maybe didn’t even have a clear sense of it in his own mind.

As a result, much of the more graphic aspects of torture and exploitation, including sexual exploitation, often come off as though they are mostly intended to be titillating. And I do think that is sometimes true—the way grown women are always experiencing spanking and corporeal punishment on their derrieres, for example. But other times, I think Jordan is just missing whatever thematic exploration he is aiming at. And this has me thinking about his own history and experience of war, and what he might have been carrying with him as he wrote.

I really enjoyed Faile’s confusion over Maighdin’s attitude, and how similar it is to Alliandre’s. More than once the narration makes the point that Alliandre is a smart woman, but that she has a queen’s attitude and temperament. It is hard for her to adapt, even briefly, to the situation she finds herself in as a gai’shain captive of the Aiel. Faile, though a lady, is much more flexible, but for Alliandre, and for Morgase, it is difficult to change how a Queen thinks of herself, and the behavior she learned in order to be successful in her role as the leader of a country. Morgase is better at it than Alliandre, perhaps because she’s had more practice, but also because she is just that good, and that smart. I love the character, and I wish (again, so difficult with such an expansive story) that we could have more time in her POV, that she could become a slightly more significant part of our reading. I just feel like she has so much potential, and that it’s underused as long as her main function in this part of the story is to be a piece of dramatic irony—as much as I love dramatic irony.

Still, I’m fascinated to see where the story goes with Faile, Alliandre, and Morgase navigating the political intrigue of Sevanna vs Therava, with a side of Galina wanting them to steal the other Oath Rod for her. It would be really cool if they succeeded, and although Galina is fully capable of lying, since she’s Black Ajah, she still might end up taking them with her. On the other hand, there are lots of opportunities for Therava and Sevanna to be played against each other, a bit like how Egwene and Siuan manipulated Lelaine and Romanda. The dangers are even greater for Faile and co. than they were for Egwene and Siuan, but the need for success is even more important, at least from a personal standpoint.

And while I’m rooting for Faile, Morgase, and Alliandre to effect their own escape, there’s always a chance that the wolf will find his falcon after all. We’ll be checking back in with Perrin, who is not handling his wife’s kidnapping very well, next week.

It’s Sylas K Barrett’s birthday this week. Despite these chapters, he would kind of like a little bit of snow.

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Faile Faces a Snowstorm and Three Deadly Snares in Winter’s Heart (Part 5) appeared first on Reactor.

Young Bull is running in the wolf dream, looking for Faile. He remembers finding her there before. Hopper appears, warning him that he has come to the dream too strongly and urging him to hunt for Faile in the waking world. Lost to fear, Young Bull tries to fight Hopper, but Hopper evades him easily, and commands Young Bull to go back.

Perrin wakes to find himself naked in Berelain’s bed, with Berelain keeping watch over him. She tells him that both he and Tallanvor would have frozen to death if Berelain hadn’t come looking for Perrin. Tallanvor just needed warm blankets and hot soup, but Perrin was in more danger, so Berelain had him brought to her tent to be Healed by Annoura.

Perrin’s scouts haven’t returned yet, but the men Berelain sent out were found killed in an ambush. Perrin asks for his clothes, and ignores Berelain when she insists he needs rest. She leaves, and Perrin gets dressed, but when she comes back she offers him a shoulder to cry on, saying that they can call a truce until Faile is found. Perrin asks why they would need a truce.

“Very well, Perrin. If that is how you want it.” Whatever that was supposed to mean, she sounded very determined. Suddenly he wondered whether his nose had failed him. Her scent was affronted, of all things! When he looked at her, though, she wore a faint smile. On the other hand, those big eyes held a glint of anger.

She tells him that the Prophet’s men have been arriving since before daybreak, and that Masema has brought a good deal more than the agreed-upon one hundred men. Perrin is stuck by the news that Masema has been talking with the Seanchan, but much more surprised by the revelation that his wife has been using Cha Faile as spies. Berelain assumes that Perrin already knew this, and mistakes his surprise as being about the Seanchan. She tells him that she is glad he can be discreet, and tells him that her scouts were not killed by Aiel but by men with crossbows. Perrin is angry that she waited to reveal that information.

Berelain starts flirting in earnest. Perrin’s meal is brought in at that moment, but he is too busy getting away from Berelain to eat it. He goes to find Dannil, who informs him of the location of Masema’s followers. Perrin reminds Dannil of the danger posed by the Prophet’s zealots, mentioning the death of Berelain’s men. Perrin can tell that more snow is coming, but still gives the order to prepare for travel, and for his horse to be saddled.

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Master Gill approaches Perrin to report that Tallanvor has ridden off. The young man claimed to have Perrin’s permission—Perrin knows that he’ll have to punish Tallavor if he calls out the lie, and so confirms that he did, in fact, give permission. Perrin promises Gill that he will deliver any news of Maighdin as soon as he hears it, then asks Lini if there is anything to eat. She snipes at him, surprising Perrin, who then presses Gill for an explanation.

Perrin is horrified to realize that Berelain’s maids have been spreading rumors about what Perrin was up to in her tent. Furious, Perrin orders Gill to make sure Lini knows that the only thing Perrin did in Berelain’s tent was sleep, then stalks off, worrying about the impression such a rumor would have on the men from the Two Rivers.

He’s approached next by some of Faile’s followers, and he angrily asks them about the spying they have been doing on Faile’s behalf. Selande, the leader of the group, holds her own against Perrin’s anger, assuring him that they would die for Faile. They come to a truce, with the group agreeing that they will obey Perrin until Faile’s return.

As Perrin is mounting, Sulin and the Maidens return, along with the three Warders. They have found Alliandre’s horse as well as some clothing.

“All of the men were killed,” the wiry woman said, “but by the garments we found, Alliandre Kigarin, Maighdin Dorlain, Lacile Aldorwin, Arrela Shiego, and two more also were made gai’shain.” The other two must have been Bain and Chiad; mentioning them by name, that they had been taken, would have shamed them. He had learned a little about Aiel. “This goes against custom, but it protects them.”

Sulin also shows Perrin a doll that Elyas found beneath the snow, and explains that they saw evidence of carts. She believes it may be a whole sept, which means a thousand spears, or more. There is also evidence of other large groups, perhaps Whitecloaks or Seanchan, and of strange Seanchan creatures.

Perrin decides they will travel forty miles due south, and sends Neald to go find Elyas and Jondyn and fill them in. He is about to go find Masema when the man arrives, having come to Perrin. Perrin wonders if the timing has to do with being ta’veren.

Masema claims that every follower of the Dragon demanded to come, and that he could not refuse those who serve the Lord Dragon. Perrin gives Masema orders to head east, but when Masema learns that Faile was kidnapped, he wants to come with them. Perrin warns him that they are going to Travel, and after musing aloud that “he” would be grieved if harm came to Perrin’s wife, Masema decides that there will be a dispensation, just this once, to find Perrin’s wife because Perrin is the Dragon’s friend.

Perrin opened his mouth, then closed it without speaking. The sun might as well rise in the west as Masema say what he just had. Suddenly Perrin thought that Faile might be safer with the Shaido than he was here and now.

I’m really glad for Perrin that Berelain didn’t guess that Faile was keeping him in the dark about using Cha Faile as spies. I think she could have used that knowledge to hurt him, deeply, and right now I don’t think he can rationally handle that sort of thing. I mean, the man stood in the snow until he got hypothermia and passed out—he’s clearly not functioning well. Unfortunately, rationality and perspective is something he really needs for the quest he’s about to undertake, what with the Aiel, the Seanchan, and Masema to worry about—and I don’t know how well he’s going to be able to scrape that together.

I think I made a comment a few weeks ago that Perrin is slightly better than Mat and Rand when it comes to having friends he relies on, and even when it comes to being emotionally vulnerable. I mean, he’s not amazing at it, but he is a bit more outwardly honest about his feelings, and he confides more in his friends, like Gaul and Elyas, and in Faile of course. Unfortunately Faile isn’t there to counsel him on the best way to handle his fear of losing her, or to wife-bully him into at least eating food before he sets out on a twenty mile ride through the snow, after having been recently Healed of hypothermia and frostbite.

Someone really needs to point out to Perrin that nearly freezing to death, being overcome with worry to the point of not eating or resting, and letting his desire to find Faile blind him to the potential pitfalls of trying to find her are not serving his goal of, you know, finding Faile. He can’t find her if he’s dead or too weak to function. But instead of something practical like that, he gets advice like “go drink yourself to sleep” from the Wise Ones and a lot of flack from Lini and the folks who think he’s sleeping around with Berelain. I can’t really blame Lini, since she’s just met him, but I’m wondering how accurate Perrin is in suspecting that the Two Rivers folk also believe the stories. They all hail from a small town, where rumor can be a killer, but they also know and respect Perrin. You’d hope that they’d view such unsubstantiated rumors with at least a little bit of skepticism.

Perrin is worried that he might lose the respect of his men, and probably more so because they are no longer his peers. He is getting better at allowing his men to do their jobs for him, because he has to, but it still pains him so much. I’ve observed several times over the course of the read how the transition from peasant (or farmer or shepherd or blacksmith) to noble is perhaps even more of a culture shock than going from one country to another, but there is a section in chapter six that reminded me of something. For Perrin, this transition isn’t only about having to learn a different language and manner, or even about learning to define himself and his worth in a different way. It’s also a profound loss.

Faile said he had to live with all the Lord Perrining and bowing and scraping, and most of the time he managed to ignore it, but today it was another drop of bile. He could feel a chasm growing wider between him and the other men from home, and he seemed to be the only one who wanted to bridge it.

Again we see the parallels to Rand, here. The chasm between the Dragon Reborn and other people is of course much larger than the chasm between a peasant and even the highest noble in the land, but Perrin is basically experiencing the same distancing and isolation that Rand has been forced to endure. I was just observing above that Perrin is more likely to confide in his friends, but here we have a reminder that he is actually in the process of losing, or perhaps has already lost, most of the people he would call friends. And that loss is entirely down to the fact that his former peers now see him as something different from themselves. Something they admire and respect (as long as Berelain doesn’t ruin it for him) but not someone they can connect with the way they could with Perrin the blacksmith. And we can see from the above quoted that Perrin does experience this as a painful rejection, and can’t understand why his former friends would want to draw this line between them.

Perhaps this is why he is so careful to lie and say that he gave Tallanvor permission to leave in search of Morgase. Perrin wouldn’t have wanted to discipline Tallanvor at any rate, and although he considers Tallanvor’s actions to be foolish, he also relates to them, having nearly made the same decision. More than that, though, he might very well see Tallanvor as more of a peer than anyone else around him at the moment. Tallanvor loves passionately and deeply and wholeheartedly, as Perrin does, and he is possibly the only person who can understand what Perrin is going through. Plus, although Perrin doesn’t know it, Tallanvor also loves a woman who is of a much higher station in life than he is. Perhaps some part of Perrin recognizes that kinship, even without being aware of why.

All that being said, Perrin needs more friends to stand by him, and right now he has fewer available than ever. Berelain certainly hasn’t done Perrin any favors, either in spreading that rumor or in the advice she’s giving him. Or not giving him. Obviously she doesn’t care about Perrin as a person. She sees him as a prize to be won, a toy, and probably also a political chip to gain favor with Rand for herself and Mayene. She is, however, very intelligent and capable in a strategic and political sense, so much so that Faile thinks that under different circumstances they would have been friends! You would think that she would realize that this is the wrong time to sow doubt about Perrin’s integrity as a person; even if such rumors wouldn’t faze Mayeners, she surely knows enough about the world to understand that other cultures take a harsher view of infidelity.

And maybe Berelain doesn’t actually care about getting to marry Perrin. I’ve been assuming that becoming his wife is part of her political maneuvering, but maybe she thinks that being his mistress will be enough to make Perrin care about her, which in turn will prompt him to fight for Mayene’s interests on her behalf. Or maybe she just doesn’t view Perrin and Faile’s marriage as legally binding? Perhaps for Berelain, a ceremony conducted in the backwoods of Andor doesn’t matter much in comparison to the formal Saldaean one that someone of Faile’s status would otherwise have had.

But even for those who don’t personally care what Perrin was doing in Berelain’s bed, a sense among the troops that he lacks integrity could result in doubt around his trustworthiness in other matters, and even in his ability to lead. There is already strife around his friendship with Aiel, and now we’re adding the Prophet’s men to the mix. In this situation, with Aiel, Seanchan, and Masema to contend with, even a slight hesitation in following Perrin’s orders could be disastrous.

Berelain even tries again to convince Perrin that the Wise Ones and Aes Sedai are right about Masema during their conversation, but she hasn’t done anything to gain his trust, or his respect for her advice. Instead she just starts flirting again, a thing she knows he hates and goes out of his way to avoid. And what happens? The leader of this entire group, who already doesn’t have his full wits about him, goes without food after nearly freezing to death and being Healed by an Aes Sedai. There’s no way he’s going to be functioning as well as he needs to be, given what they are likely to be riding into.

Berelain may think that Perrin’s reactions to her are misguided, silly, or certain to change if she just sexually harasses him enough, but she has proven that she knows that there are moments when she needs to put this behavior aside. It seems like she offered the truce for this reason, but because she was offended when Perrin didn’t take her up on it, she decided to double down instead. Regardless of what she thinks of Perrin, for her own sake and for the sake of everyone in the camp, she should be doing her best to keep him as calm and rational as she can. She should have gone with the truce regardless of his reaction.

Actually, now that I think about it, Berelain was probably offended by Perrin’s reaction, or lack thereof, to her offer because it was the exact thing Faile wants and expects him to do. By appearing not to know or care why they might need a truce, Perrin showed that Berelain’s actions didn’t mean anything to him. I don’t think that was even his intent, but she probably assumed he was playing the game, just as she assumes that he knew about Faile’s spies and purposefully misled her about it. As we’ve seen before, those who play games always assume everyone else is playing, too.

Still, it’s too bad Perrin didn’t think to accept the truce, for whatever reason. Perhaps he doesn’t believe Berelain would keep her word. After all, he doesn’t believe her when she says she hopes Faile is found alive, even though she smells honest. In his position I probably wouldn’t either. Or maybe he’s just too busy trying to act like he doesn’t care that she came back in to pay much attention to what she’s saying.

“A truce?” he said, carefully bending to tug on a boot. Carefully so he did not fall over. Stout wool stockings and thick leather soles would have his feet warm soon enough. “Why do we need a truce?”

There’s no observation, there or elsewhere, about whether he thinks she’s lying or wondering why she would make such an offer. Then the subject of Masema comes up, she dials up the harassment flirting, and he has to run away. But I do think that she meant it, and that her offer to be a shoulder to cry on was also genuine. She’s a weird sexual harasser whose motivations and goals still don’t make sense to me, but she smells honest when she says it and is then affronted when he (seemingly) pretends not to know what she means by a truce. And there is a difference between having a bitchy rivalry with Faile in which she tries to steal Perrin and wanting to see the woman murdered by Aiel.

I don’t blame Perrin for needing to get away from Berelain, but, again, he’s not going to be very effective in his single-minded goal of rescuing Faile from the Shaido if he doesn’t eat something, and rest too. He’s gotten himself into a very bad position, and I feel like it’s going to have some consequences for him, and possibly for the people following him. We can see in the end of chapter six that he’s struggling to think through what to do about Masema, and what it means that there are Seanchan out there somewhere. Personally, knowing that Masema has been talking with the Wise Ones, I am guessing that Perrin could find himself in an ambush, caught between Masema’s followers and whatever forces the Seanchan have been able to send to intercept them.

I really didn’t expect Masema to show up at all, and I’m very curious about his decision to allow Traveling “just this once.” That he finds it justified in this one instance because Rand would want Faile found doesn’t make much sense. Rand gave a direct order for Masema to be brought to see him via a Gateway, and I would think that would strike the zealot as more important than the wife of a friend of the Dragon. On the other hand, it is possible that he has decided, as many of his followers have, that Perrin is some kind of darkfriend or shadowspawn. He may believe that Perrin’s claim to be sent by the Dragon is a lie, and could be laying a trap for Perrin and everyone who follows him.

We see Perrin trying to put together the puzzle of Masema and the Seanchan at the end of chapter six. He might be on the verge of coming up with a similar theory, but is too exhausted and faint to get there. He does, however, clock how very surprising and out of character Masema’s decision is, and knows that it means trouble. I’m not sure if Faile is safer with the Aiel than Perrin is with Masema, not with the likes of Sevanna and Therava, but it’s probably a near thing. And at least Faile has eaten something recently.

Also, Faile isn’t blinded by her fear, the way Perrin is. I think it’s really relevant that Perrin’s worry is primarily expressing itself in anger, too. He’s losing perspective, lashing out at the wrong people or in unhelpful ways, and he’s willing to prioritize Faile’s safety over that of everyone else, to a degree that’s actually pretty horrifying. Just a few chapters ago we saw Perrin thinking back on the horrors of Dumai’s Wells, determined to do everything in his power to prevent such a thing from happening again. And now, we get this:

That was changed, now, and he knew the price of changing. A very large price. He was prepared to pay, only it would not be he who paid. He would have nightmares about it, though.

And also this:

Perrin saw a tide of flame rolling across Amadicia into Altara and perhaps beyond, leaving death and devastation behind. He took a deep breath, sucking cold into his lungs. Faile was more important than anything. Anything! If he burned for it, then he burned.

In both cases, Perrin is thinking about the fact that he is planning to abandon his job of escorting Masema to Rand in favor of chasing after Faile. He knows about the looting and murder that have been committed by the Prophet’s followers, about the murder and torture that Masema himself has ordered. He knows that anywhere they go they will behave the same, and countless people will suffer for it. Remember how angry Perrin was when they rescued Morgase and encountered the man with the necklace of ears? He knows if he lets Masema and his men travel on their own, there will be more ears taken. But for him, only Faile matters. He’s willing to let other people pay the price, and to burn for it one day himself.

And you know, I get it. I’m married to someone I love more than I am able to express. It’s real. But this story is all about the cost of becoming a hero, of being a chosen one, and Perrin is a chosen one, though he’s not the Dragon Reborn. He is tied to Rand and to the fate of the Wheel; his choices may very well affect almost as much as Rand’s do. For all he knows, this choice to follow Faile could cost Rand dearly, even cost him the Last Battle itself. In his position, I might very well make the same choice, but it is, at its heart, a selfish one.

Chapter five opens with Perrin lost in the wolf dream, caught up in his pain and in the memory of that time Faile’s mind was trapped in Tel’aran’rhiod. When Hopper comes to help him, to remind him of reality, Perrin attacks him. When he wakes, he’s horrified at the realization of what he’s done; if he had succeeded in killing Hopper in the Dream, Hopper would have been lost permanently.

On my first pass through the chapter, I originally assumed that Perrin passed out from the cold and then went to the wolf dream, and that he lost himself to the wolf once he was in Tel’aran’rhiod. But Berelain tells him that everyone was afraid to go near him because he would snarl like a wolf at anyone who did. This makes me think that, in his pain, Perrin might have been slipping a little closer to losing himself to the wolf, like Noam from The Dragon Reborn. Some of the ways Perrin is handling losing Faile are very human, but much of his pain is expressing itself in an animalistic way, as well. It’s possible he might find himself in danger of losing himself again, in the future.

However, I think there is a danger Perrin is facing right now that is greater than losing himself to the wolf. And I think this experience with Hopper needs to serve as a warning. Yes, he was dreaming and not aware of himself in the same way, but if he is so lost as to attempt to do such a thing to Hopper, it’s possible he may do other dangerous things to the people he cares about. He may cross lines he shouldn’t cross.

Thematically, I think Faile’s capture is going to be the next step in Perrin’s journey of relating to his inner capacity for violence. Ever since he found out she’s been taken, he has been filled with rage, not only at his enemies, but also at his friends, and those who are trying to help him. I can’t help but wonder what he will do if and when he catches up with the Shaido. If he’s willing to leave innocents in Masema’s path, what will he be willing to do to his enemies?

That rather ominous thought concludes this week’s read! Next week we will be heading back to Caemlyn to catch up with Elayne and Birgitte, who are dealing with some transitions of their own. But in the meantime, can I just say how much I loved the absolutely perfect shade that Perrin threw at Selande and the rest when they demanded their horses? “Aiel walk.” BURN. Thank you very much, Mister Sassy-Wolf-Pants.

Sylas K Barrett would like to give a very special shout-out this week to the six-toed cats of the Two Rivers. He loves each and every one so very much.

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Young Bull Dreams, and Perrin Makes a Choice in Winter’s Heart (Part 6) appeared first on Reactor.

Elayne rides through the streets of Caemlyn with a small entourage, including the Aes Sedai Sareitha and her Warder. Elayne thinks about the ancient saying that who holds Caemlyn holds Andor—she hasn’t yet won the heart of Caemlyn, even though her banners are flying on the outer walls.

Sareitha warns Elayne about the dangers of coming out into the streets so lightly protected—there are many Aes Sedai in the city, some of whom may be Elaida’s, and there is always the danger of being kidnapped by a rival claimant to the throne. Elayne studies how many people fill the streets, including many from countries outside of Andor, including mercenaries and swords for hire, and refugees scattered from their homes by the revelation of the Dragon Reborn. Many are so lost that they don’t even make it to the kitchens where the Palace provides free food, but others have begun to settle down in the city, and Caemlyn has seen an explosion of new businesses and crafts being practiced.

Elayne senses Birgitte suddenly. The Warder is on her way to Elayne, and full of anger. Elayne orders a return to the Palace and meets Birgitte on the way. Naean and Elenia, formerly imprisoned by Deylin, have been rescued while being escorted to Aringill, and their escorts were killed. This means that there is a spy in Caemlyn who knew that the two women were being moved. They return to the Palace, and Elayne dislikes the way she now considers all the guards, servants, and passersby with suspicion. She refuses to have bodyguards inside the Palace, however.

Elayne and Birgitte quarrel, after which Birgitte leaves to go work on reports and Elayne meets up with Mistress Harfor on her way to her apartments. The First Maid reports on her search for spies, and that despite the cold weather there has been a lot of spoilage in the winter food stores. Mistress Corly has also asked for a meeting with Elayne.

On her way to see the Kin, Elayne runs into Vandene, Kirstian and Zarya. The former Kinswomen are trying to behave as novices should after being found out as runaways, but Vandene informs Elayne that the two have been puzzling over the question of who murdered Ispan and Adeleas, and have decided it could only have been Merilille, Sareitha or Careane. Vandene reluctantly admits that it was good thinking, but as novices the two shouldn’t have been thinking about such matters at all, never mind discussing them or bringing their conclusions to Vandene.

Nynaeve arrives, and listens to the revelation with interest. She points out that they can hardly expected these women to behave like ordinary novices, and adds that the Kin have much experience in going undetected by Aes Sedai—they are perfectly poised to work as spies under Vandene’s direction. Vandene reluctantly accepts Nynaeve’s authority on the matter.

Nynaeve accompanies Elayne to see Reanne, along with Lan. Nynaeve and Alise have sent eighteen of the Kinswomen into Altara and Amadicia and Tarabon to search for any other members of the Kin who have not been captured by the Seanchan and help them escape to Caemlyn. Elayne wishes she had been informed ahead of time, and remarks that the women were are brave to take such a risk. Nynaeve admits that they weren’t chosen for their bravery, but because they were the most likely to run if they weren’t given something to do.

They find Reanne and Alise sitting with one of the captured sul’dam sent to Elayne by Rand. Alise feels like the sul’dam are poised right at the brink of being able to channel, similar to but not quite like the feeling of a woman born with the spark. Reanne adds that the sul’dam also deny being able to see the flows, claiming that the Aes Sedai are tricking them somehow. She is confident, however, that they will eventually run out of lies to tell themselves and be forced to acknowledge the truth.

The news Reanne has is actually about the damane. Three of the five sent to Caemlyn seem to be ready to be let out of their collars: Lemore, a young noblewoman who was captured in Tanchico; Kara, a Wise Woman from Toman Head; and Alivia, a Seanchan woman who has been a damane for four hundred years.
Reanne has some concerns about Kara and Lemore and the way they still behave towards the sul’dam—she worries that neither one would put up much resistance if a sul’dam asked for their help escaping. Alivia, on the other hand, seems to hate the sul’dam, and claims to have always wanted to be free, but given that she has been collared almost all of her long life, Reanne isn’t sure about trusting her, and asks if they dare release her from the a’dam.

Alise tells Lan off for talking out of turn and instructs Nynaeve to give him a good talking to. But as highest-ranking Aes Sedai, the decision falls to Nynaeve, who agrees that they must take precautions, but that the a’dam comes off. Reanne and Alise react to the decision with pride and pleasure, making Nynaeve blush.

Elyane notices that the sul’dam, imprisoned by binding weaves and a ward against hearing, is staring at those weaves and weeping silently. When she observes that the woman can’t deny being able to see them now, Reanne answers that they all weep when forced to look at weaves for very long, but they deny the truth once the weaves are gone.

Elayne wonders how much bad news can stack up before the pile collapses, and hopes that she will get some good news soon.

It’s difficult news, and news that means more work for Elayne, but Alivia wanting to be free is good news. The information about the sul’dam is more neutral than anything else, but it does seem that the Kin are making a little bit of progress towards the goal of making them recognize the truth about their channeling abilities. The plan to send them back to the Seanchan is brutal, but it does seem like it would be effective, so from Elayne’s point of view I do think that also should be good, if difficult, news.

It’s interesting to note, in the beginning of Chapter 7, that Rand’s “breaking of all bonds” hasn’t only had a negative effect on the world. Yes, some people seem to have become completely unmoored from life, like the young mother Elayne saw in the crowd, and are left as hollow, desperate refugees. But we also see how many have settled down again, bringing their culture and skills from whatever place they left to the new place in which they have found themselves. We saw this first in the Two Rivers, with all the refugees who were ending up there, and now we see that Caemlyn, too, is changing, with new trades and goods to export.

And I can’t help thinking that the Dragon Reborn is prophesied to Break the World again, but that doesn’t necessarily have to be in the same way it was Broken last time. One of the results of the physical upheaval and changes made to the land by the male channelers who had gone mad was that the people of the current nations were flung all over the world, and after the dust settled, the survivors ended up making new cultures and nations wherever they found themselves. Which is what is happening now, because of Rand’s influence, because of the coming of the Seanchan, and because of the turmoil in other nations, most of which is at least indirectly related to the fact that the Dragon Reborn has been declared and the Last Battle is near. Just as I hypothesized that the Aiel prophecy that Rand will destroy them might be more figurative than literal—perhaps he will just change them so much that they end up unrecognizable as the culture they have been since the Breaking—the prophecy that the Dragon will break the World might be more about the influence of his coming than a reference to another literal upheaval of the land itself.

Obviously all this change is coming with a heavy price in death and suffering, and much of it is due to war and other disasters. But we can see that there is good to be had as well, and perhaps the nations will become less stagnant as a result. Rand’s school is another example of good change that he is bringing, and suggests that, should the world survive the Last Battle, they might find themselves at the beginning of an industrial age.

I’m not sure I understand the reasoning that led everyone to believe that the only possible candidates for Adeleas’s murder are Merilille, Sareitha or Careane. I can understand the thinking around the fact that the Windfinders probably wouldn’t know about crimsonthorn because the plant doesn’t grow near enough to the shore, but neither the Aes Sedai nor the Kin actually know very much about the Sea Folk themselves, and it’s likely a pretty dangerous assumption to make, given the consequences of being wrong.

For that matter, even if the Sea Folk as a whole don’t know about crimsonthorn, who’s to say that the Dark doesn’t? Especially now that the Aes Sedai know about it, and therefore the Black Ajah almost certainly does too. And even before Elayne and Nynaeve were dosed that first time, some random darkfriend might have known about the plant for ages. It could be common knowledge among the ranks of the Dark, for all Vandene, Elayne, and Nynaeve know.

Even more ridiculous is the assumption that there can’t be any Darkfriends among the Kin just because Ispan didn’t seem to know anything about the Kin. It sounds like Vandene and Adeleas were very thorough in their questioning, but Ispan managed to not give them any useful information on the Black Ajah, so they know she was capable of holding something back. More significantly, why should the Black Ajah necessarily know anything about what other groups of Darkfriends are up to? Our heroes seem to be making some pretty big assumptions about how much knowledge the Black Ajah has about other ranks of Darkfriends.

I suppose that Vandene, Elayne, and Nynaeve are accustomed to thinking of the Aes Sedai as the most powerful and influential institution in the land, and they have recently learned that the Black Ajah was able to exist in secret right under the noses of those oh-so-impressive Aes Sedai. They may have a bit of an inflated idea about the reach and influence of the Black Ajah as a result and might be assuming that the Black Ajah are running most things or at least involved. But again, even if there are reasons behind these assumptions, they’re still just guessing. The Kin were secret from the Aes Sedai—why not from the Black Ajah? It doesn’t make a lot of sense for all darkfriends to know each other, or for secrets to be passed easily from group to group. Also, the Dark as a rule is sort of anti-Creation, so the Aes Sedai members in its ranks might not be viewed with as much favor as they are (sometimes) viewed by the part of the world that walks in the Light.

One argument that isn’t mentioned here but which I think is actually the one that suggests that the killer is an Aes Sedai/Black Ajah is the fact that Ispan was murdered at all. The most likely reason for her to be killed is that someone in Elayne’s party could possibly be exposed by something Ispan knew, which suggests a fellow member of the Black Ajah. Then again, the prejudice with which Ispan was murdered could suggest some other, possibly more personal, reason as well. I just think there isn’t enough information to know for sure, but perhaps I am missing something.

Speaking of missing something, why didn’t Elayne just have Naean and Elenia transported to Caemlyn via Gateway? When she learns that the two have been taken and the escorts killed, she laments not going herself and Birgitte reminds her that queens don’t go running off to do everything themselves. Which is true, but Elayne has a bunch of channelers at her disposal, including members of the Kin and Aes Sedai who are supposed to defer to her and Nynaeve. Many of whom are sitting around in the palace with nothing to do, as Nynaeve mentions when talking about the scouts they sent into Seanchan territory. Elayne sent the messenger through a gateway, but she could easily have had another woman weave it. That Aes Sedai or Kin member could have sat for a few hours to get to know the place where Naean and Elenia were staying, then just woven a gateway back to a room in Caemlyn designated for that purpose, just like Rand does. Seems like a no-brainer to me?

I kind of love how nosy Elayne is about Nynaeve’s love life. I mean, it makes sense that Elayne would have Lan on her mind anyway—he kind of demands everyone’s notice with his cold, imposing, seeking-death presence. And also Nynaeve likes to talk about it, so of course Elayne would have some opinions about what she says. But more than that, Elayne’s just a bit of a gossip, and I think she’s particularly so whenever she encounters something that she doesn’t know a lot about.  She’s a very curious person, and she wants to learn more whenever she’s confronted with something foreign or something she doesn’t understand. The way in which she was preoccupied by the Sea Folk’s piercings, for example, or her desire to learn to swear.

Birgitte and Elayne’s little fight in the hallway was a nice bit of comedy to lighten the mood of, well, all the chapters so far. I’ve always thought that Elayne’s interest in swearing was really cute, and I definitely laughed out loud when Birgitte called her out for not always understanding what the words meant, or how to use them in a sentence. And Elayne’s response (in her head) about how she does know. Most of the time. Often, anyway.

There haven’t been a lot of light moments in Winter’s Heart, and I suspect there won’t be, going forward. The name itself brings a chilliness to mind, not just in temperature but in attitude. And given how things have been progressing in the story, I have a feeling that events are going to get darker before they get lighter, with the possible exception of Rand managing to get rid of the taint on saidin. Which would be a pretty big deal! But I digress.

I feel bad for Birgitte. Since she’s been made Captain-General she hasn’t seemed herself. She’s been off-balance, cranky, and even bordering on whiny. But all this is because she’s been asked to do a job she doesn’t want to do, and more importantly, doesn’t feel capable of doing. She tells Elayne that she has been a general before, but only in battle—none of her past lives have prepared her for this and she’s losing access to them, in any case.

How destabilizing must that be? Birgitte doesn’t even have a past to go with the life she is living now, and the memories she has of the others have served her in a variety of capacities, even though this also meant occasionally getting confused or referencing the wrong things. How much will she lose, and how quickly? What would it feel like to have only scraps of those memories left, and then feel as though her current life began abruptly only… months ago? A year? Sorry I can’t keep track of the passage of time in these stories, but it certainly hasn’t been very long.

So Birgitte is being asked to do a very high-pressure and demanding job she has never done before, in a world she did not grow up in, while also being Elayne’s Warder. A job she also didn’t ask for, by the way. I don’t disagree with Elayne’s choice to save Birgitte by bonding her, especially given that Birgitte dying outside of Tel’aran’rhiod might have resulted in her not being reborn again, but technically this is still a bonding that was done without permission, the sort of thing that under ordinary circumstances the Aes Sedai would view as an intense violation. Birgitte doesn’t see it that way, of course, and was grateful her life was saved. But I don’t think Elayne gives the woman enough credit, or enough space, given everything that she’s had to adapt to. She’s always frustrated with Birgitte for not acting as a Warder should, for example.

Part of this is because Elayne actually doesn’t know that much about how Warders and their Aes Sedai interact, especially when they are alone. Birgitte is more outspoken and willing to argue with Elayne in front of other people, certainly, and it’s understandable that Elayne wants to look like a proper Aes Sedai in front of others, especially since she is also trying to present as a future queen. But Elayne may also be underestimating how much a Warder might argue with their Aes Sedai in private, especially when it comes to protecting her. A Warder’s main concern is their Aes Sedai’s safety, after all, and if an Aes Sedai won’t listen to her Warder’s advice in this regard, said Warder is likely to push back.

And again, Birgitte never asked to be a Warder. I don’t know if Elayne is aware that the Warder bond can be dissolved—perhaps she doesn’t know about that yet—and Birgitte seems genuinely dedicated to Elayne. But it’s still true that, for all intents and purposes, Birgitte is trapped. Unless Elayne offers to dissolve the bond, she cannot choose not to be a Warder. And it doesn’t seem like Elayne has any empathy for the fact that Birgitte might not want to behave as a typical Warder. Even if Elayne decides such behavior is necessary, and wants to work with Birgitte on improving their image as Warder and Aes Sedai, Birgitte still deserves a level of empathy and care around the subject that Elayne hasn’t really shown her.

It’s the same with the Captain-General position. Birgitte didn’t want it, she’s not confident in her skills, and she has expressed both to Elayne. It does make sense that Elayne feels that this is the best place for Birgitte now that they’re in Caemlyn and trying to get the whole who-will-be-the-next-queen thing sorted out. Elayne has a lot of roles to fill and few trusted friends to fill them with, after all, and Birgitte does love Elayne and does want to support her. However, Elayne behaves as though Birgitte’s feelings are nonsensical, as though giving Birgitte titles and responsibilities that she doesn’t want were a reward.

Back in the Prologue we learned that Elayne granted Birgitte her title and estate as soon as they reached Caemlyn, and that Birgitte didn’t like that change to her life any more than she liked being made Captain-General. Elayne’s narration adds that Birgitte was welcome to grumble as much as she liked, as long as she did it in private. Perhaps part of the problem is that said grumbling isn’t being kept private, but it really does seem like Elayne has decided that Birgitte’s dislike for her situation is unreasonable and frustrating. More than once since the prologue she has been annoyed that Birgitte doesn’t act like she has been given a well-deserved reward. And I wonder if Elayne is unable to see things from Birgitte’s perspective, or if on some level she does, and is actually frustrated because she doesn’t know how to handle the problem any other way.

I’m so interested to see what happens with Alivia. I wasn’t sure how much time the narrative was going to spend on the issue of enslavement of the damane, and I’m really pleased that we’re getting to it so quickly. Alivia has been a damane for four hundred years, too, so it’s pretty impressive that she apparently never fully succumbed to the torture-brainwashing that all the damane are subject to. It’s hard to imagine surviving for so long under those conditions and still holding on to a part of yourself—Alivia must be a very impressive and special person.

It did occur to me to wonder if a sul’dam might have ordered her to put on a pretense in order to be free from the Aes Sedai and Kin’s control so that she can help the captured sul’dam escape, but I don’t think that’s going to turn out to be the case. Spying and subterfuge isn’t exactly something damane are trained on. They aren’t even trained on how to use their abilities without wearing the a’dam. So it’s actually much more likely that Alivia is telling the truth than that this is some kind of trick. And Alivia could end up being quite an asset to the Aes Sedai in the fight against the Seanchan, given how little anyone understands of Seanchan culture or history. Even a damane who, one presumes, isn’t given much education, would know a lot more about how the Seanchan think than anyone on this continent does, and that could be really useful. She is also trained purely for fighting and war, which will make her quite an asset against the Dark, and in the Last Battle. She probably could show even full Green sisters a few things, if they could stand to have yet another non-Aes Sedai teaching them.

I can understand Nynaeve and Elayne’s frustration at having yet another problem to deal with in the form of the captured sul’dam and damane, but it shouldn’t come as a surprise to them that Rand sent his prisoners to Elayne. What other options did he have, really? As Men, he and the Asha’man would be very limited in what they could do for the damane, or even for the sul’dam. They can’t interact very much with the a’dam, and of course as male channelers they would be very terrifying to the captured women. Egwene is about to go to war, and the Wise Ones are already keeping a bunch of prisoners and technically-not-prisoner Aes Sedai apprentices for him. Elayne is already too busy, but so is everyone else, and Rand only has a few women channelers he can really trust.

Lan’s contribution to the question of whether or not to free Alivia was really moving. It reminded me that he, too, has been, technically, linked with against his will. Not in the beginning, but Moiraine arranged for his bond to transfer to Myrelle without his permission, after having promised never to do such a thing. Yes, she did it to save his life, but the damane are also bonded by the a’dam “for their own good” and for the good of the world, just as Lan was sent to Myrelle so that he wouldn’t die trying to avenge Moiraine, and she said this was because he was too important in the fight against the Dark to waste his life. Not that I’m by any means putting Moiraine’s actions on par with the way the damane are treated, but thematically the two situations are similar.

I can imagine that Lan would feel very personally connected to anyone who was linked with against their will and controlled by someone wielding saidar. He’s also a very noble man, and one who is unafraid to face hard choices, so even without that personal connection I think he would still have given the counsel he gave, and felt it necessary to speak up even though the Aes Sedai didn’t consider it his place. And I found the fact that Lan was willing to speak up and advise the Aes Sedai without invitation interesting, especially in a chapter in which Elayne was also grousing about Birgitte’s un-Warder-like behavior.

Personally, I think there’s room for the Aes Sedai to listen to the Warders a little more. It’s suggested, and certainly true in Moiraine and Lan’s case, that Aes Sedai do rely on their Warders for council, but the Aes Sedai are very, very attached to their image of power and near-infallibility, and I think a lot of them project this image even towards their Warders. But we’ve seen how this mystique has backfired against them, over the years, and how people have less confidence and faith in them because of the way they hide the truth of their humanity. Perhaps in the future, being just a little more open and connected to the people around them will serve the future Aes Sedai, the ones Egwene is trying to build, much better than their current image. And where better to start with that new attitude than with those they trust most after (and sometimes more than) the sisters of their own Ajah?

Given the powerful mystique around the Warders, most regular people could probably absorb the idea that these men are privileged to speak to and advise their Aes Sedai in a way that no one else would be, so it wouldn’t even warp the current image of the Aes Sedai that much. But of course, the Aes Sedai themselves would need to acknowledge the need for such counsel in a way they don’t really like to—it’s not just about image, it’s also about actual power, and the strict hierarchy of channeling power that the White Tower clings too. Hopefully Egwene’s going to be changing, or at least adjusting, that hierarchy eventually, but it is so deeply ingrained in the Aes Sedai that it’s a much more long-term project. Possibly one that will need to wait until after the Last Battle, even.

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Elayne Deals With Traitors, Warders, and <i>Damane</i> in <i>Winter’s Heart</i> (Part 7) appeared first on Reactor.

Rereads and Rewatches The Wheel of Time

Reading The Wheel of Time: Elayne Encounters Men Who Are Not Who They Seem in Winter’s Heart (Part 8)

Sylas Barrett rereads chapter 9 and part of chapter 10 of Winter’s Heart

By Sylas K Barrett

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Published on February 6, 2024

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Once again we are back with the next installment of Reading the Wheel of Time! This week we are covering Chapters 9 and part of 10, up through the end of Elayne’s section. In these pages, Elayne survives an assassination attempt… or does she? Plus, she and Nynaeve meet with Egwene in Tel’aran’rhiod, and a few mystery guests end up crashing the party.

Elayne finds Halwin Norry, the First Clerk, waiting for her in her sitting room. He reports that alum deposits have been discovered on her estates. Elayne is elated, especially when Norry confirms that obtaining loans from the banks will be possible now, and that even with the expense of mining and transportation, Elayne will have plenty of funds for her Guards and for taking over and running the Academy Rand founded in Caemlyn.

Norry also reports that the White Tower has issued a proclamation acknowledging Rand’s identity as the Dragon Reborn, offering him protection and guidance, and forbidding anyone to approach him except through the White Tower. He tells Elayne of the attack on the Sun Palace and Rand’s subsequent disappearance. Many believe he has gone to Tar Valon, though some people think he is dead.

Elayne worries briefly over the possible identity of Rand’s attackers, then reminds herself that there is nothing she can do to protect him and turns her attention back to Norry. Elyane impresses Norry with her knowledge and handling of political situations, and she wonders if she can count him as being in her camp.

Her lunch arrives. Mistress Harfor has sent up options, but Elayne opts for the same thing she always has for lunch: clear broth, bread, and tea. Dyelin comes in to report that there is a large army in Braem Wood, composed of tens of thousands of Arafellin, Kandori, and Shienarans. Elayne supposes that it must be Rand. Feeling suddenly drowsy, she realizes that the minty taste in her tea is from forkroot.

She manages to warn Dyelin that she has been poisoned, but a few men armed with daggers come into the room. Dyelin shouts for help and throws a chair at the men, knocking one of them down. She attacks another with her knife but he stabs her instead, advancing on Elayne. Suddenly there’s a sword sticking out of his chest. As Elayne falls she sees that another of the attackers has been taken down, and there is a new man fighting with the remaining attacker.

Elayne wakes in a panic, but is instantly aware of the presence of both Aviendha and Birgitte, and she finds she is able to embrace saidar again. Nynaeve reports that the guardsman was uninjured and that she was able to Heal Dyelin. Birgitte and Aviendha inform Elayne that the men had four almost identical daggers between them but that this one was laced with poison.

Aviendha remarks that Wetlanders like complicated plans, while Birgitte suggests that it was simple in its way. Elayne reluctantly agrees to a small bodyguard, and suggests promoting Doilin Mellar, the Guardsman who rescued her, to Captain of the bodyguard.

Birgitte remarks that Mellar is a “coldhearted fellow” who chases women too much. An Andoran, he claims to have fought for Morgase in the Succession, and his answers to Birgitte’s questions seemed to check out.

Nynaeve suggests that she go alone to the scheduled meeting with Egwene in Tel’aran’rhiod, but Elayne insists that she will come along, and drinks the wine Nynaeve brought, which is laced with something to make her sleep. She wakes in the Tel’aran’rhiod reflection of the Great Hall. She briefly addresses the former Queens depicted in the colored windows on the ceiling, promising that she will be a good queen.

Nynaeve arrives, struggling with the concentration needed to maintain control over her appearance. She tells Elayne to let Nynaeve do all the talking, warning that Egwene will “be all over the both of [them] if she finds out” about what happened to Elayne. Egwene arrives just in time to overhear Nynaeve, and Elayne resignedly tells the entire story of the attempted murder.

Egwene admits that she’d have both women join her in Murandy immediately if she wasn’t worried about the Sitters’ reaction to the Kin. She compares her control over the Hall to having a ferret under her thumb, and explains that the increased number of novices has frustrated her Aes Sedai. She also mentions one of the new novices, a grandmother, named Sharina Melloy, and Nynaeve is so startled that her clothes change to a style Elayne doesn’t recognize.

Nynaeve refuses to explain her reaction, mentioning only that it has something to do with her Accepted Trials, and conversation moves to Egwene’s determination that they all must take the Three Oaths. Elayne and Nynaeve are shocked, reminding Egwene of the way the Oath Rod shortens a woman’s lifespan.

Egwene reminds them that she isn’t asking; she is the Amyrlin, and any woman who wants to be Aes Sedai will swear. She adds that she intends for every Aes Sedai to eventually retire and be released from the Oaths, becoming part of the Kin instead. This will tie the Kin to the White Tower, though it will also require former sisters to take orders where before they would have led, since hierarchy in the Kin is based on age.

Nynaeve is asking about Egwene’s headaches when suddenly they see something in the doorway of the Hall.

Egwene remarks that the man could have been Rand’s uncle, which Elayne thinks might be true, if Rand had a mean uncle. They hear a door close on the opposite side of the Great Hall, and realize that there is someone else besides the man also eavesdropping on them.

Egwene points out that the man was wearing a Shienaran coat, which reminds Elayne of Dyelin’s news about an army in Braem Wood, as well as some of the rumors Halwin Norry reported. She tells the others, surmising that the army belongs to the borderland rulers.

I guess I’m becoming as paranoid as Rand is, these days, because all my alarm bells were ringing as the information around the attack was being relayed to Elayne. At the point where there was only one poison dagger among four, at the point where they all acknowledge that it was a complicated plan, I expected at least for Birgitte and Nynaeve to be skeptical about how perfectly fortuitously everything worked out. Even before I got to the end of Chapter 10, it had already struck me that if the Dark wanted to get some random (or not so random) guardsman promoted to Elayne’s inner circle of bodyguards, this plan is exactly how they would do it.

Even Birgitte suggests that Elayne is “lucky enough for a ta’veren” that the one man with the poisoned dagger wasn’t the one to reach her first, and that Mellar “happened to be walking by and heard a man cursing” in Elayne’s rooms. But Elayne isn’t a ta’veren, and I expected Birgitte to be a bit more suspicious of this sort of luck, or coincidence, or whatever you want to call it.

Of note: There were three men attacking Elayne, but four daggers. But only one was poisoned. Why not poison all the daggers, to make sure whoever reached her had the blade in question. And for that matter, why not just put the poison in her tea? They had enough access to put the forkroot in, so they could just as easily have put some kind of deadly poison in it. Fennel and peach pit both have good food tastes, after all. Also, I find it odd that nobody in this section brings up the question of who had access to the preparation and delivery of Elayne’s meal!

Of course, they don’t have the outside perspective that I do; when you consider how much they all have on their plates, my complaints seem a little less fair. Elayne and her friends have the Kin, the Windfinders, the hunt for the Black Ajah murderer, Elayne’s bid for the throne, the danger of kidnapping and murder because of that bid for the throne, Birgitte’s new job, Nynaeve’s new marriage, and, oh yes, the fact that they’re about to free some of the damane… well, I can see how the threat of regular old Darkfriends isn’t really at the front of their minds. If this plot seemed more like something a channeler would do, it might get them thinking of Adeleas’s murderer or even of Moghedien, but ordinary-seeming men with knives are just too, well, ordinary, for them to consider the possibility of Darkfriend involvement.

Although again, everyone seems to know about forkroot at this point, so why Elayne and Vandene and Nynaeve are still assuming most people don’t is beyond me. Nynaeve is derisive of Elayne’s cleverness in how she intends to handle sharing the news of the attempt on her life, which is mostly because Nynaeve is worried and therefore getting acerbic. But she is right to be thinking about the fact that the more clever you think you are being, the more likely you are to overlook something. As we the readers know, the fact that Mellar’s rescue makes a good story is precisely what is being used to manipulate Elayne.

The discovery of the alum on Elayne’s estates reminded me of how Rand’s twisting of chance sometimes results in such finds—I have a vague memory of a town having trouble with their well but also finding a chest of gold buried somewhere. It certainly seems plausible that this discovery may have been made possible by Rand’s ta’veren nature. And that has me wondering more about how, exactly, the ta’veren power works.

I don’t think the abilities of a ta’veren, even one as powerful as Rand, could change the pattern enough to put a deposit of minerals or chemical compounds where there wasn’t one before. Manipulating people, whose lives are the threads of the Pattern, is very different from manipulating the solid world around you, I should think. Though I suppose I don’t know that for a fact. The Pattern does make up all things, lives and objects and everything in between—we know that if the Dark One had unrestricted access to the Pattern he could remake all of Creation, which presumes also changing the land itself to suit his whims.

Perhaps it works the way Tel’aran’rhiod works. Objects in the World of Dreams aren’t very stable unless their counterparts in the waking world remain stationary for long periods of time. Thus, landscapes and buildings are more or less fixed, but smaller objects and items, even things like chairs or carts, tend to change position or flicker in and out. Maybe Rand’s ta’veren powers can work easily on something like the weather, or the path of the water that feeds a village well, or on the microbiome of a field, because these things change easily and frequently for many other reasons. After all, channelers can also influence the Pattern in similar ways—windfinding, manipulating tides, or the behavior of insects, even Healing, in a way.

Egwene can find minerals in the ground and manipulate them, but she can’t cause some to be where none existed before. In the same way, Rand’s ta’veren power didn’t create the chest of old coins that was found in that village, wherever it was. But it did manipulate the finding of the thing, and probably that’s what happened with Elayne’s estates as well—unless it was just ordinary luck, anyway. I doubt anyone was going around the grounds looking for some useful mining spots, at any rate.

Anyway, I’ve always really liked Dyelin as character and I’m glad she’s not dead, both for my own sake and for Elayne’s. Her throwing a chair at the attackers was a perfect moment. And it feels right that Elayne should have someone like Dyelin in her corner, advising and supporting her. Almost like a stand-in for her mother. At least one good thing has come from the fake murder attempt—Elayne will be able to relax a little and actually trust that Dyelin is on her side and telling the truth about supporting her.

I was really intrigued by the passage around Elayne’s investment in taking over Rand’s Academy.

Elayne assumes that the Academies Rand has started are only to preserve what he can when he breaks the world again, but I think that’s a mistake. Like her, he wants to influence the future, wants to plan for something more than war and death and destruction. Just as Elayne looks to those images of the Queens and hopes to make them proud, Rand hopes that his life might have a legacy, something he could leave behind. He is also trying to believe in a future after the Last Battle, even though he doesn’t have much hope that he himself will see it.

It’s fascinating to see in this section how much both Nynaeve and Egwene have changed since we met them, and since Elayne met them. She observes how much more like an Aes Sedai Nynaeve seems now, and wonders if Lan is giving her lessons, an idea I find endlessly charming. I’m still annoyed that we haven’t been in Nynaeve’s pov for a while, and I really really want to know how her relationship with Lan is going. Not the sordid details like Elayne is wondering about, but the emotional ones. How is that relationship evolving? What do they say to each other, and how are they helping each other grow? Does Lan resist her care, since part of him still wants or intends to die? How will their relationship change when his Warder bond is passed to her?

Speaking of their relationship, I certainly did not remember Sharina’s name from reading it, all those books ago, but I went back and reread the section of Nynaeve’s Accepted Test when the name is mentioned. When she goes through the arches for the third time she finds herself in a Malkier undamaged by the blight, wife to Lan, King of Malkier. When Nynaeve expresses distress at having to face this future and give it up, Lan worries about her and suggests taking her to Sharina Sedai.

It’s a really interesting detail. No last name is mentioned for Sharina so it could be someone else with the same name, as Nynaeve suggests, but I doubt it. That’s not really how the Arches seem to work—their reality seems to be built out of many reflections, as though you took several portal stone realities and smashed them into one. Both Nynaeve and Egwene’s experiences through the arches showed futures that they had imagined for themselves, or ones they had dreamed of, mixed with things they feared. But they also contained glimpses of the future that seem to have come to pass, like Egwene discovering herself as an Amyrlin who hasn’t sworn the Three Oaths. This name probably came to Nyaneve in the same way—the future in Malkier wasn’t a real one, but there were aspects of it that connected to Nynaeve’s actual future. She is married to Lan, after all.

The way Nynaeve was suddenly dressed in Tel’aran’rhiod the way she was dressed in the arch dream, or vision, or whatever it was, was an interesting touch. The narrative states that Nynaeve doesn’t have the concentration to keep her appearance—and any other modifications she makes to the Dream—stable, but I actually don’t think concentration is quite the right word. I think when it comes to manipulating the dream in external ways, such as making a chair to sit on, Nynaeve can’t quite commit to the idea that the thing is real. In a way, she needs more concentration than someone like Egwene, or even Elayne. As a dreamwalker, I don’t think Egwene is spending every moment holding the chair she is sitting on in her mind to make sure it stays there. I think she forms the idea, it becomes real for her, and then it’s just background noise. Just like the idea of suddenly being somewhere else is real for her.

Elayne isn’t as naturally gifted as Egwene, but she can understand the concept of seeing herself somewhere else when she sees Egwene do it. But for Nynaeve, her specific brand of practicality makes it difficult to grapple with the ephemeral. Her block around channeling had to do with her fear of the one power, but I think her attitude towards life, her desire for things to be straightforward, sensible, and easy to explain made channeling a little less accessible to her at first, when she was still thinking of it as strange and otherworldly. Now she approaches it as a practical science, but you can’t really apply that approach to Tel’aran’rhiod, even when you learn the rules.

An unguarded appearance in the World of Dreams shows what and how the dreamer is thinking of themselves. And Nynaeve has a hard time with sense of self. I think it’s very relevant that her Aes Sedai ring and her ki’sain stayed permanently even when everything else changed. It’s also significant that her wardrobe reverted exactly to the one she was wearing in the dream-vision, or whatever it was. I suppose it hasn’t exactly been very long since Nynaeve had that experience, but you wouldn’t expect the outfit to register so specifically when there was so much else going on.

I also noted the way Nynaeve started to look like an older Aes Sedai when she was trying to act authoritatively towards Egwene. I don’t remember exactly when it happened, but there was a point in one of the last few books when Nynaeve was lamenting not having gray hair yet, because she associates age and graying with authority and wisdom, and wants people to regard her with those associations. She may be Aes Sedai now, but her raising is barely considered official by most Aes Sedai, and she still looks very young, especially since she slowed early. And I must say, I appreciate the creation of a female character who wants to look older, rather than focusing on youth as being the more valuable commodity for women.

Egwene’s plan for the Aes Sedai is a fascinating one. I think in the long term it would be good for the Aes Sedai to move away from using the Oath Rod, but it wouldn’t be easy to just abandon the use of the Three Oaths all of a sudden, especially since there has been so much change to the White Tower already, what with the division and looming civil war, and Egwene’s desire to open the possibility of becoming Aes Sedai, regardless of age or having been formerly put out of the Tower. The use of the Oaths is partly responsible for the way the Aes Sedai have had to become so skilled at working around what they say, which has contributed to their reputation as being devious and untrustworthy. But it is also true that the promise of the Oaths gains them a certain level of trust from certain kinds of people, especially rulers and those in power. And Siuan’s explanation to Egwene that the Three Oaths make the Aes Sedai what they are makes sense.

Yes, Siuan, and all the Aes Sedai, are a bit too entrenched in the mystique the Aes Sedai have built around themselves, especially where history and tradition are concerned. However, Siuan made a point that the power of the Aes Sedai should be checked, that it’s important for them to be reminded that they are not gods, and that they are servants of the people. Her argument that the Three Oaths serve this function is not without merit, I think. Egwene’s compromise that the Aes Sedai will swear the oaths while they serve but that they will eventually be required to retire and be freed of the Oaths seems like a pretty good plan. It also serves as another check on Aes Sedai power: The Kin will be required to obey Aes Sedai, but the Aes Sedai also know that one day they will join the ranks of the Kin and women they once commanded will then outrank them. They will have to keep that in mind during their time as sisters.

And then there’s the mysterious visitor Egwene spotted spying on their conversation. My first thought was that it was Rand himself, that perhaps he had accidentally or purposefully altered his features for some reason. We know he is capable of entering Tel’aran’rhiod in the flesh, but I would think the Dragon Reborn can probably Dreamwalk too, if he wants to. Perhaps he came to the space for his own reasons and accidentally encountered them, then lingered instead of retreating because he wanted to see Elayne. Because he missed all three women. Perhaps he appears older and meaner—Elayne thinks the man looks mean—because that is how he sees himself.

On the other hand, we haven’t seen Rand dreamwalk yet, as far as I can remember, and there are plenty of other possibilities for the identity of the strange man. Him looking so much like Rand must be a clue, in this case. Egwene and Elayne consider that he could be Rand’s uncle, and Tigraine did have a brother who went missing in the Blight. So he was presumed dead… but maybe he’s not dead? That would certainly be interesting.

Okay, so I just went and consulted my notes, and Tigraine’s brother was named Luc. Seeing that, I remembered that there was Lord Luc giving Perrin trouble in the Two Rivers, way back in The Shadow Rising. So I looked up those chapters, and Lord Luc is described as “a tall, broad-shouldered man in his middle years, with a hard, angular face and dark reddish hair white-winged at the temples,” which matches the description of the eavesdropper. Since Luc and Slayer appeared in Perrin’s life at the same time, and Luc seemed to recognize Perrin, I had hypothesized that they were the same person, and since Luc has now been seen wandering in Tel’aran’rhiod, that idea seems to have been borne out.

I suppose a lot of things can happen to someone in the Blight. Perhaps Luc was found and corrupted by the Dark in some way, or perhaps he was already a Darkfriend, or thinking of becoming one. I feel bad for Rand, though. He hasn’t had any living biological family so far, and now he’s got an evil uncle. Now that sounds like a gleeman’s tale.

As for the other eavesdroppers, we’ll be touching on that more next week when we finish chapter 10. We’ll also be covering chapter 11, which is a Rand chapter, so we may learn something there as well. Only time, and the turning of the Wheel, will tell.

In the meantime, I’m left thinking about the relationship between Birgitte and Aviendha. They are both linked to Elayne now, albeit in different ways, and that’s clearly formed a bond between them. I think it will be really interesting to see how that develops and changes as time goes on, especially as Aviendha gets used to the idea of Birgitte as a hero of legend. Perhaps it will help Birgitte cope with her new life and the fading of her old ones; the more connections she has to people the more stable she will probably feel, and she and Aviendha seem well suited for each other in terms of personality and sense of duty.

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Elayne Encounters Men Who Are Not Who They Seem in <i>Winter’s Heart</i> (Part 8) appeared first on Reactor.

Rereads and Rewatches The Wheel of Time

Reading The Wheel of Time: Everyone Wants a Piece of Nynaeve in Winter’s Heart (Part 9)

Sylas finishes up chapter 10 and 11 of Winter’s Heart.

By Sylas K Barrett

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Published on February 27, 2024

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This week on Reading The Wheel of Time, we’re checking in with what remains of Liandrin’s cohorts and catching up with the woman who calls herself Lady Shiaine as we finish up with Chapter 10, and then moving on to Chapter 11, in which Rand and Min arrive in Caemlyn and Nynaeve has an interesting time of it.

Asne and Chesmal wait in their house in Caemlyn for Eldrith to return. Asne is trying to avoid conversation with Chesmal, because all the other Black Sister wants to do is brag about how important she is, which Asne finds both annoying and dangerous.

When Eldrith arrives, Chesmal upbraids her for losing track of time, despite the fact that Eldrith stands highest among them and was left in charge by Moghedien. Asne finds herself wondering how much of Eldrith’s absent-mindedness is real, and how much is feigned. She doesn’t think someone so seemingly unaware could survive long as a member of the Black Ajah, but she also knows that Eldrith has more than once let the masking on her Warder bond slip, allowing her Warder, Kennit, to track her. Having been ordered by Moghedien to wait in Samara, they remained hidden until Kennit arrived; Eldrith was unwilling to let her sisters kill him, so they fled to Caemlyn. Asne wonders if it’s time for Eldrith to have an accident.

Temaile joins them. Everyone is a little afraid of Temaile after seeing her enthusiasm over Liandrin’s torture. Temaile reports that Elayne and Nynaeve have come back to Caemlyn and are currently in the Palace. They discuss whether or not they can get past the Kin to take Nynaeve, and perhaps Elayne too.

Temaile also reports that there were other spies besides herself—a man, and someone else she did not see.

Asne has let her own masking slip, and she can feel all four of her Warders coming to her. Only one is a Darkfriend, but she knows the others will believe whatever she tells them, and do as she commands.

Elsewhere, Lady Shiaine reflects that her former identity as Mili Skane is pretty much forgotten, and that she has now fully become Shiaine. She has Falion working as her servant. Marillin Gemalphin points out the danger of treating an Aes Sedai in such a way, but Shiaine counters that all of this is happening under Moridin’s orders, and asks if she should disobey one of the Chosen. Falion confirms that she is quite happy with her situation and has no desire to be returned to Moridin.

Marillin informs Shaine that there’s already a woman in place who can do what Shiaine requires, it will just take time to contact her. Shiaine realizes that this means there is a Black Ajah member in the Palace.

Daved Hanlon is shown in, and reports that everything went exactly as he planned, and that he is now Captain of the Queen’s Bodyguard.

Rand and Min emerge through a gateway in an old storeroom in the Royal Palace. As always, Rand struggles with the taint and the dizzying sickness he feels whenever he wields saidin. Rand has disguised himself using the One Power. Min tries to convince him to talk to Elayne and Aviendha but he refuses; they are there to see Nynaeve and Mat only, and to leave as quickly as possible.

They emerge into an empty corridor, but quickly run into Mistress Harfor. The First Maid recognizes Min, but is confused when Min asks to see Mat Cauthon and Nynaeve al’Meara. She doesn’t know who Mat is, and refers to Nynaeve as Nynaeve Sedai. Min asks Mistress Harfor to escort her companion to Nynaeve Sedai and hurries off; Rand is sure she’s going to try to find Elayne, but there’s nothing he can do in his disguise as a common workman, so he lets Mistress Harfor lead him. He can’t understand why Mat isn’t here, and is surprised to learn that there are only five Aes Sedai in the Palace, a count which includes Nynaeve and Elayne. Whenever he thinks of Mat he sees colors flashing before his eyes.

In another part of the Palace, Nynaeve is taking her turn teaching the Windfinders how to shield during a fight with saidar. Facing off against the apprentice Talaan, she shields the woman easily despite the fact that they are very closely matched in strength, but when one of the Windfinders points out to Talaan that the battle with channeling is much like wrestling, Talaan shields Nynaeve just as easily. Zaida commands her to try again, and this time Talaan is told to hold the shield on Nynaeve, so that the Windfinders can test Aes Sedai’s claim that it is impossible to break out of a shield.

She tells Talaan to prepare to turn Nynaeve upside down on the count of five, and Nynaeve, desperately, tries to assure them that she is telling the truth. But Zaida is unwilling to take the Aes Sedai’s words at face value. Panicked, Nynaeve tries to find a way out of the shield, but is unsuccessful. At the last moment the count is paused, and the Windfinders assure Zaida that Nynaeve’s efforts to break the shielding were genuine.

Nynaeve is released and attempts to regain her dignity as best she can; unfortunately the Sea Folk don’t respect her enough for this to be an easy feat. She is commanded to return the next day for more teaching, and has no choice but to follow the rules and customs of the Sea Folk, lest these women decide that she has broken the terms of the Bargain.

Once she has left, Nynaeve encounters Alivia in the hallway, with a message from Mistress Corly, who would like to see Nynaeve for dinner. Nynaeve demands to know why Alivia doesn’t have an escort—she isn’t supposed to go anywhere on her own.

Nynaeve considers that some of the weaves she learned from Moghedien might surprise Alivia, but is fairly sure that the woman could overpower her. She sends Alivia away, regretting her attempts to teach the Kin to show backbone against the Aes Sedai. She’s aware that they might come find her if she doesn’t make an appearance at dinner, and that they most likely want to take her to task for the way the Aes Sedai are allowing “Sea Folk wilders” to behave towards them.

Talaan surprises Nynaeve next, appearing in the hall to beg Nynaeve to take her to the White Tower as a novice. She explains that her family has many strong channelers in it who have risen high in the ranks, which brings honor to their clan but also means that they are sharply watched for signs of favoritism. Talaan’s apprenticeship is much harder and much longer than it should be just to avoid the appearance of favoritism, and she is desperate to become a novice instead. Nynaeve knows that it would be impossible for the White Tower to take Talaan from the Sea Folk, but Talaan is confident that if Nynaeve announces that Talaan is going to the Tower, the Sea Folk will not be able to deny an Aes Sedai. She runs off, headless of Nynaeve’s protests.

When Lan finds Nynaeve, she tells him that she would like him to keep him in their bedroom for a year.

They go back to Nynaeve’s quarters, where they find the First Maid waiting with a strange ugly man who claims to have something for Nynaeve. Nynaeve and Lan are instantly on guard, but the man speaks up, naming Mistress Thane, the Women’s Circle, and Cenn Buie. Nynaeve dismisses Mistress Harfor, and the man changes suddenly into Rand.

Wondering who taught Rand to disguise himself with the One Power, Nynaeve tells him that they heard about what happened in Cairhien, and that Egwene can help him. Rand is dismissive of the idea until he is informed that Elayne, Nynaeve, and Egwene are all full Aes Sedai now, and Egwene is the Amyrlin. Rand asks if Mat is with Egwene’s army and then staggers, putting a hand to his head. Nynaeve delves him, finding both the half-healed wound she expects and a new wound.

Nynaeve steps back, warily holding onto saidar, and Rand produces two ter’angreal from his bag. He asks Nynaeve to keep them safe until he sends for them, and for her. He explains that the ter’angreal will allow them to touch the greatest sa’angreal ever made. He tells Nynaeve that a man and woman using those sa’angreal might be able to challenge the Dark One, but in the meantime, he hopes to use them to cleanse the male half of the Source.

Lan asks why this wasn’t tried during the Age of Legends and points out that Rand could get Nynaeve killed. Rand answers, coldly, that he doesn’t know why and that it has to be tried. Nyneave, meanwhile, has already made her decision, but is uncertain how to implement it. She declares that she thinks that Rand’s idea is a wonderful one, but that she isn’t going to sit and wait for his summons. She is going with him now.

Back in chapter 8 there was some conversation between Elayne, Sareitha, and Birgitte about how many Aes Sedai were in Caemlyn. Sareitha was primarily worried about the threat of sisters working for Elaida, as was Elayne, although she downplayed Sareitha’s concerns. No one raised the specter of the Black Ajah, though it must have been on their minds, if only because they know there is one Black Ajah member in their own party. 

Elayne even spent part of her ride scanning the crowd for the ageless features that would betray a sister, and is secretly having all the Aes Sedai in Caemlyn watched as much as she can. It’s a wise precaution, but since the remainder of Liandrin’s crew (Asne, Eldrith, Chesmal, and Temaile) are already known to be Black, they will have kept themselves well hidden from anyone looking to identify Aes Sedai faces.

I hadn’t even thought about the possibility of a Black Ajah member having a Warder who wasn’t a Darkfriend alongside her. It seems like it would be a difficult secret to keep from someone with whom you share a warder bond. You can’t exactly read each other’s minds through the bond, of course, but I feel like the Black sister would have to keep a bond masked fairly often. But perhaps many of the Aes Sedai do that anyway—we know they all need to do it sometimes, and the only Warder and Aes Sedai pair we actually know well are Moiraine and Lan, who may not have been typical in this area.

I’d be very curious to see a confrontation between a Sister who was Black and a Warder who wasn’t, although I suppose it wouldn’t be very pleasant for the Warder. Kennit is apparently aware that Eldrith is a murderer and probably Black, and is prepared, according to Asne’s narrative, to kill his Aes Sedai, despite what that will do to him. It’s doubtful he could manage to do it on his own, though, especially since she would be able to sense him getting near to her. 

It is interesting that Eldrith refused to allow her sisters to kill Kennit. Of course the shock of his death would be unpleasant for her, but she could also dissolve the bond right before, couldn’t she? It makes me wonder if she actually let the mask on her bond with Kennit slip on purpose. After all, Asne unmasked her bonds on purpose because she feels she needs the services of the Warders, a fact that she is keeping secret from her cohorts. Eldrith may very well have made a similar choice. She is supposed to be in charge of the group both by Aes Sedai hierarchy rules and by Moghedien’s orders, but both Chesmal and Temaile seem to be running the show for the moment. Perhaps Eldrith used Kennit’s arrival to force the move to Caemlyn. There is a suggestion that the thought has crossed Asne’s mind as well: “Then again, Eldrith was the one who had pointed out Caemlyn as their only hope.”

This group of women has basically been abandoned, after all. They don’t know why Moghedien hasn’t come back for them, but since she decided the group was hers and now she is disgraced and working for Moridin, that leaves them basically discarded and forgotten about, unless another Forsaken appears to take them up again. Presumably Liandrin was getting her orders from someone high ranking, probably the Supreme Council. It’s not sure who was directing them; Alviarin is the head, but their orders would also ultimately have come from somewhere else. Perhaps it was the Supreme Council we saw at the gathering of Darkfriends back in The Great Hunt, whose serpent rings were spotted by Bors/Carridin.

It seems like most Darkfriends often don’t know who is issuing their orders, unless they received them from Ba’alzamon. Until recently the rest of the Forsaken weren’t revealing themselves to anyone. And now Liandrin is gone, and so is Moghedien, and this group has no orders coming from anywhere, unless you count Moghedien’s instruction to wait for her in Samara.

One can imagine how desperate they must feel at this point. They have no idea what’s going on with the Dark Lord or his plans, or what moves are being made by the other Darkfriends, or what the Forsaken are up to. All they know is that Moghedien really wanted to get her hands on Nynaeve. This doesn’t guarantee that any of the others will want her, but it’s not a bad guess, from this group’s point of view. And Shiaine’s section is an excellent reminder for the reader that every Darkfriend is always only one mistake away from some pretty horrible punishments.

All Liandrin’s followers could very easily end up in Falion’s positionn. It’s interesting to note that while Falion’s punishment is a rough one, it isn’t permanent—Moridin said that the shield on her will wear off, which implies that she’s eventually going to be released from servitude as well, though it’s possible she may still be expected to follow orders from “Lady Shiaine.” It’s hard to say who outranks whom at this point, especially where the Black Aes Sedai are concerned. And we can see that in the way the hierarchy is breaking down among the remnants of Liandrin’s crew, as well. 

Given the way the hierarchy is drilled into the Aes Sedai from the moment they’re raised to the shawl, it makes sense that the Black Ajah would hang onto that system. But being a Darkfriend is all about trying to rise to the top of the mire, so there’s no other reason for them to stick to the Aes Sedai systems other than habit. And it only matters who Moghedien left in charge if Moghedien were to come back, which they’re all confident won’t happen at this point. Chesmal seems to have a somewhat inflated opinion of herself, which is very like a Darkfriend, so of course she’ll push for that recognition. And Temaile is a true friend of the Dark, delighting in violence and cruelty in a way even many of her cohorts find distressing.

I had to check, but Sierin Vayu was the Amyrlin after Tamra, which means the Black Ajah is responsible for murdering two Amyrlins in a row. It’s less clear why, though, and also I’m curious why Chesmal was going to be arrested in the first place. Also she says she “induced the Reds” to murder Sierin, which makes me wonder if the killing was actually sanctioned by the Supreme Council, or if Chesmal went off on her own initiative. Perhaps Sierin was sniffing after Black sisters, since Chesmal claims to have single-handedly saved the Black Ajah by her actions?

Another big question I have is about how Shiaine refers to Moridin as one of the Chosen during her conversation with Marillin, and Marillin doesn’t seem startled or surprised. It’s clear that Moridin’s existence is slowly becoming more widely known now, at least among the higher-ranking Darkfriends, but there’s been no indication that he’s revealed himself as being one of the Forsaken reincarnated. I suppose that his status as Nae’blis might hint at the fact that he’s one of them, though I do wonder if that coveted title is even known to those who aren’t at least theoretically in contention for it.

Maybe people think Moridin is someone who has newly been appointed to the ranks of the Chosen, but we’ve never heard about anyone from this Age being given such a rank, and we saw how disbelieving, and then utterly shocked, Graendal was when she heard the news. Granted, Shiaine’s very much aware of the danger of speaking about the Chosen, so perhaps most Darkfriends just keep their curiosity to themselves.

My curiosity, however, would like to know very much more.

But in the meantime, I’ve finally gotten my wish to have a Nynaeve section. It wasn’t as much fun as I was hoping, though; in fact, it was kind of hard to read. Knowing Rand and Min were in Caemlyn to see her, I was already thinking about how perfect it was that she would soon have an important project that would take her away from Caemlyn and all these burdens that I honestly don’t think she should have to be subjected to.

When we first met the Aiel, their culture was so much harsher and more demanding than those our protagonists knew; even the discipline of the Aes Sedai couldn’t compare. But the Sea Folk are even stricter, and it seems they’ll happily bring on harsher punishments for smaller infractions. Nynaeve concludes that this is because of the danger of lax rules on a ship, which makes sense; one can’t help thinking of the English and European navies of our age when you read about sailors being flogged and the strict codes of behavior that must be followed by even the highest-ranking members.

It’s interesting to consider, too, that the Sea Folk living almost entirely on ships means that everyone, even cooks and clothing makers and blacksmiths and anyone else who holds a job that isn’t the actually handling of the ship is still a sailor, in the sense that they live and work on a ship, and are subject to the same rules and discipline as a result. The hanging by the ankles punishment isn’t described for us in detail, but it is bad enough that Nynaeve was flung into an absolute panic at the threat of it, and left enough of a physical impression that Nynaeve had to tell Lan that she tripped on the stairs. When Talaan was explaining how strict her training is and how she will be hung by her ankles for not being fast enough in her lessons, my mind kept flashing to one of my other favorite series, the Horatio Hornblower books, which spend a good deal of time on the discipline kept on British naval ships in the seventeen and eighteen hundreds, including the intense corporeal punishment used to keep sailors in line. The very strict discipline, coupled with the keeping of a very specific sense of duty, loyalty, and morale, was necessary because of the terrible conditions faced by these sailors and because many of those in the lower ranks were not there willingly; during times of war, press gangs were employed to take up any men with relevant skills and forcibly placed into service on the ships, often with no pay and always with no hope of returning home unless peace was declared. Convicts and other captives were also sometimes put to work as sailors.

Being born into Sea Folk culture wouldn’t be quite so bad as being a kidnapped English fisherman or someone facing imprisonment, but it is true that you wouldn’t be able to choose whether or not to be part of ship’s life and ship’s discipline. And of course, channelers in every culture are not afforded a choice in what they become. The Aes Sedai take all the potential novices they find, keeping everyone who is strong enough and ensuring that all those who aren’t are not allowed to be channelers outside the Tower. All Aiel women channelers are required to become Wise Ones, even if, like Aviendha, they don’t want to. We can infer that this is true, also, for Windfinders.

So Talaan is someone whose life path is incredibly prescribed for her, and who knows she will experience a great deal of suffering for no other reason than her family name. Until very recently, she probably would never have considered another option of herself. Even if she did dream of running away to become an Aes Sedai, it would have only been a daydream until the Aes Sedai learned the truth about the Windfinders, and the Sea Folk began interacting with them more regularly.

And of course, I should note that this analysis could be based on incomplete, or even faulty, information. We haven’t really seen any Sea Folk children or even, say, low ranking sailors, other than in passing, and we don’t know the culture of the Atha’an Miere that well yet, especially what might exist in private relationships outside of the discipline of the actual working of the ships. Talaan clocks this in Nynaeve when the latter is confused about Talaan’s relationship to her mother; she explains that they are very affectionate in private, but must maintain the expected discipline in public. The consequences for showing favoritism are clearly very severe.

The level of disdain the Sea Folk have towards the Aes Sedai confuses me a little. I can understand to a certain extent that they view the cultures of “the shorebound” as inferior to their own—less disciplined, less moral, etc. We see the same attitude from the Aiel, for example, though the occasional “wetlander” can measure up to their standards. But in the case of the Aes Sedai, both the Aiel/Wise Ones and the Kin had an almost mythic idea of who and what the Aes Sedai were, and part of their current attitude towards the Aes Sedai is about the fact that the Aes Sedai fell very short of that particular elevated idea they had of them.

In the case of the Sea Folk, however, it doesn’t appear that they ever held a particular reverence for the Aes Sedai. This means that the Aes Sedai never had a pedestal to fall from, but it also makes me wonder where their intense dislike of the Aes Sedai comes from. It seems like it is more intense than their feelings towards the shorebound in general.

Perhaps the hatred comes from having to hide from the Aes Sedai for so long. The Atha’an Miere clearly anticipated a conflict if Aes Sedai ever learned that they had their own powerful channelers, and perhaps they even feared that the Aes Sedai might choose, and be able, to take their girls by force.

I suppose there’s also the possibility that the Wavemistresses and Windfinders don’t hate the Aes Sedai as much as they seem to. After all, it doesn’t seem like they did anything to Nynaeve that they wouldn’t do to one of their own; they merely see her as being of very low rank in comparison to themselves. And although I’m sure they don’t have any great love for the Aes Sedai or the shorebound in general, part of the stiff attitude they present might be as much performance as anything, meant to keep everyone in their proper place. Just as Talaan and Caire act very differently towards each other in public from how they do in private, it may be that the Windfinders’ harsh attitude has to do with prescribed social rules and with keeping the power they gained in their Bargain with the Aes Sedai. Personally some of them may feel more neutrally towards Nynaeve, or even have some (very small) amount of respect for her. Zaida did say that Nynaeve’s instruction was more edifying than the other Aes Sedai’s, after all.

I was tickled by the metal image of Sea Folk luring people to come teach on ships with big purses of gold. You might be treated like the lowest ranking person on ship while you’re there, but if you’re paid well, you’re doing better than most of the teachers in the modern U.S., who get treated like that and get paid nothing at all. I’m really curious what skills the Sea Folk might look to “shorebound” teachers for, and how common such an occurrence is.

All this really adds up to me wanting to learn more about the Sea Folk and their culture. I’m not sure how much we will get to know them in the coming books, but perhaps Talaan will become a more regular character. She seems determined to become a novice, and as Nynaeve says, the Tower would certainly love to have her. I can’t see how that would come about, but stranger things have happened, and Rand is supposed to be breaking all bonds of fealty just by existing. Why not Talaan’s?

In any case, I really want Nynaeve to get out of there. I don’t particularly want Elayne to lose Nynaeve’s support, especially knowing that Daved Hanlon is now the captain of her bodyguards—nothing at all good is going to come of that. But other than Elayne needing all the allies and protection she can get, especially from skeptics like Nynaeve, it really does feel like she is wasted here teaching the Sea Folk and tangling with the Kin. I want more from her, and honestly, I think she deserves more respect than what she’s getting.

The power-based hierarchy of the Aes Sedai is very problematic, and while it’s served Nynaeve, Elayne, and Egwene well, I do think that they would do well to alter the system eventually. However, if Nynaeve helps Rand cleanse saidin, she will be due a great deal of respect. Not directly because of her power (although that will have been a factor) but because of what she has accomplished. Just as she was the first person to figure out how to heal stilling, she will be part of the team that accomplishes an even more impossible feat. And I can’t wait to see it.

I have more thoughts about Nynaeve and her journey, which I will talk about in an essay next week. In the meantime I hope all of you have a good week full of peace and rest. Our heroes need that, and so do I. [end-mark]

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Everyone Wants a Piece of Nynaeve in <em>Winter’s Heart</em> (Part 9) appeared first on Reactor.

“The Power inside you is the smallest part of your strength. It’s your mind, and how you use it, that will mean much more in the battles to come.”

—Moiraine to Egwene, S1E2, “Shadow’s Waiting”

In the finale of season two of The Wheel of Time, Egwene finally gets her opportunity to defy Renna and gain the upper hand. By refusing to fight for the Seanchan, she creates an opening that allows the Whitecloaks to take out the ranks of the sul’dam and damane. Only Renna and Egwene manage to survive, and Egwene is able to obtain an a’dam and put it on Renna. With each woman wearing the bracelet to the other’s collar, a battle of wills ensues as Egwene explains that Renna, too, is capable of channeling. Renna releases Egwene in the hope of being released in turn, but Egwene carries through on her earlier promise to kill her captor, and strangles Renna to death.

After two and a half episodes of watching Egwene being emotionally and physically brutalized, it was very satisfying to see Egwene get her revenge, especially because this is a revenge she doesn’t get in the books upon which the show is based. But something about the scene didn’t sit right for me, and that problem is also a result of changes the show has made from the source material.

[This essay contains minor spoilers for world-building aspects of the Wheel of Time novels, and spoilers for season two of the television show.]

Whenever I analyze the television series The Wheel of Time, I always feel like I have to reiterate one very important point: The greatest challenge to adapting Robert Jordan’s work is the absolute density of the source material. From the world building, to the plot, to the number of important secondary and even tertiary characters, this fifteen book series averages out to over 800 pages per novel, and is particularly loved for its complexity. Even if the show had more than an (in my opinion) measly eight episodes per season, the writers would still be constrained to streamline many of the world-building and plot elements, and to cut quite a few others in their entirety. The show has struggled somewhat to hit the right balance, especially in season two, but there are also a lot of elements that I have really enjoyed. One of these is how the One Power works.

The show hasn’t changed what the One Power is and what it can do, but slight shifts in nuance have allowed the show to bypass some of the more problematic aspects of the world building, and to streamline a very complicated system into something that is true to the heart of the story but not unnecessarily bogged down in facts that it doesn’t have time to adequately explore.

The way the show decided to present the One Power was especially important to me in season one, because the writers made a point of de-emphasizing the difference between the male and female halves of the One Power, which reduced some of the sexism inherent in Jordan’s very binary-driven magic system. In season two, however, the subtle changes the show made around how the ability to channel manifests itself ended up slightly altering the revelation that the sul’dam also posess this ability.

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In the novels of The Wheel of Time, there are two ways of becoming a channeler. One way is to be born with what the Aes Sedai call “the spark.” People born with the spark will at some point instinctively channel the One Power, even if they aren’t aware that they have the ability, and even if they don’t receive any training. However, not every channeler is born with the spark; in these cases, their potential has to be uncovered through testing by an Aes Sedai, or by an equivalently experienced channeler.

There is a lot of interesting and complicated world building around different ways people become channelers. The spark is particularly relevant because there are many dangers around touching the True Source—the well from which the One Power springs—without guidance. For example, drawing too much of the One Power can be deadly, and a channeler also risks burning themselves out—destroying the part of themselves that allows them to channel and rendering themselves unable to touch the True Source ever again. If someone born with the spark isn’t given proper training, they will either die or find a rough sort of control over their abilities, often by developing a block that stops or severely limits their ability to channel, and often without ever realizing what they have done. The Aes Sedai call these women wilders.

Nynaeve is one example of a wilder. She and Egwene were both born with the spark, although Egwene hadn’t yet touched the Source before she met Moiraine. Nynaeve first channeled some years before Moiraine came to the Two Rivers, instinctively using the One Power to help heal sick villagers and to predict the weather. But she doesn’t realize what she is doing until Moiraine teaches her, and for a long time experiences a block against channeling that she can’t overcome unless she is angry.

Women who have been trained to channel can also see—in a metaphysical sense—when another woman is holding the One Power, and they can see whatever weaves she constructs. They can also sense the ability to channel in any woman who is close to manifesting her spark, but other potential channelers can’t be detected without further testing. For example, Moiraine is immediately aware of Egwene’s potential and of the fact that Nynaeve has already begun to channel on her own.

While the show doesn’t seem to have a concept of those born with the spark and those without, it still keeps most of the trappings of the experience. In the second episode, Moiraine tells Egwene that touching the Source will come to her, whether she wants it to or not. She then leads Egwene through a meditative exercise, focusing on the blue stone of Moriaine’s hairpiece and imagining she is being carried by a river. Egwene is then able to channel for a brief moment, though she is unsure if she really did so until Moiraine confirms it.

In this scene, we learn that Egwene will instinctively channel at some point, regardless of Moiraine’s interference, and we also see how an Aes Sedai might test a girl’s ability, through the joint channeling around the stone. Moiraine even acknowledges the Wisdom skill of listening to the wind as being linked to channeling with the line; “You don’t listen to the wind, Egwene. It’s the wind that listens to you.” The viewer believes Nynaeve is dead at this point, but when she turns out to have survived being taken by the Trolloc, we can also guess that she, too, must be a future channeler.

Although the more intricate details of the One Power are very interesting, they aren’t strictly necessary for the story, and I think the show has given us all we need to understand the plot arc and the emotional underpinnings of what channeling means. The concept of a “block” hasn’t been brought up by any of the Aes Sedai, but we can see Nynaeve’s struggle with channeling, can understand her fear and distrust of the One Power, without that exact concept being present. Even if this phenomenon of channeling is never outlined and defined for us as such, it doesn’t change what it means for Nynaeve to go through such a struggle.

And then there’s Egwene, the Seanchan, and the a’dam.

In the season two finale, Egwene realizes that the a’dam is a device that creates a link between the woman wearing the collar and the woman wearing the bracelet. Like the audience, Egwene is still learning the basics of how the One Power works and what a woman can do with it, but she has learned enough to figure out this much about the a’dam. As has the viewer. The show has given us some examples of how linking works, such as when Moiraine and Alanna linked with Liandrin to stop Logain from escaping, and when Nynaeve and Egwene, along with a few others, were linked with Lady Amalisa during the fight at Fal Dara. In both cases we saw that only one person is in charge of channeling when women are linked—Liandrin in the first case, and Amalisa in the second—while the other or others become a vessel through which the leader draws the One Power. At Fal Dara we also saw that it is possible for the person in charge to force the other(s) to channel more of the One Power than they can actually handle, even to the point of killing them.

The clues about Renna and the truth about the sul’dam were there for us to figure out, as Egwene did. Of course, as a book fan, I already knew about the reveal that Renna and her cohorts were also (potential) channelers. But in the books the distinction between those women who are marked out as damane and those who become sul’dam is based on whether or not they are born with the spark. Just as Aes Sedai can recognize the ability in “sparkers” who are either close to touching, or have recently touched, the True Source, so can the damane, and any sul’dam linked to a damane. And just as Aes Sedai must test for those who have the potential to learn but will not channel without teaching, so must the Seanchan.

In chapter 38 of The Shadow Rising, the fourth book in the series, a Seanchan sea captain named Egeanin has recently learned that at least some of the sul’dam can be affected by the a’dam just as a damane would be. Egeanin is shocked at the discovery, and reflects on the process by which damane and sul’dam are discovered.

The yearly testings all across Seanchan found every girl who had the spark of channeling in her: each was struck from the rolls of citizens, struck from family records, taken away to become collared damane. The same testings found the girls who could learn to wear the bracelet of the sul’dam. No woman escaped being tested each year until she was old enough that she would have begun channeling if the spark was there. How could even one girl be taken for sul’dam when she was damane? Yet there Bethamin was in the basement, held by an a’dam as by an anchor.

Because channelers are enslaved by the Seanchan and used mostly for war, both the ordinary citizens and the channelers know very little about how the One Power actually works. They do not realize that there is any other way to become a channeler other than to manifest it instinctually, to have “the spark of channeling” in them. Not knowing how the a’dam works or what linking is means that they have no clues to understand why only certain women are able to become sul’dam and learn to control the a’dam—and because they despise the One Power, they don’t care enough to wonder about it.

An aside: One assumes that this fact about the sul’dam must have been known at the time the a’dam was invented. Perhaps during the early years of enslaving channelers, the Seanchan drew a distinction between those who would touch the True Source regardless of their intention and those who wouldn’t unless taught. Over time, the knowledge of the sul’dam’s potential was forgotten, perhaps even deliberately, and such a distinction was no longer needed. We can also conclude that directing a link is a form of channeling: The a’dam does the work for the sul’dam so she doesn’t learn how to do anything on her own, but she has opened up the ability in herself, which is why the collars will then work on any woman who has been a sul’dam.

The difference between having been born with the spark or discovered as a potential learner is, in many ways, one of semantics. Though sparkers tend to be very powerful once trained, there are plenty of strong Aes Sedai in both groups, and they channel the same way. The spark really only matters for an Aes Sedai in how her journey begins. But for the Seanchan, the differences are more important; a woman with the spark will end up enslaved and treated as sub-human, while a woman who can learn gains a decently important position in society… at least as long as she and everyone else remain ignorant of the truth.

But the show has not made this distinction between sparkers and those who can be taught. Instead, it tells us that the difference is one of degrees. Just as Ryma explained to Elayne and Nynaeve that small amounts of channeling are hard to detect but using large amounts of the One Power will result in being sensed by the damane, it turns out to be the same for those who are very weak in the One Power. Damane are those who are powerful enough to be detected by other channelers, while the sul’dam are those who are so weak they slip through the cracks. One assumes that in the show version of the world, the Seanchan rely on the damane to detect all the potential damane, and then the sul’dam are found by trying on the bracelet to see if they are able to use it. Indeed, this may also be the way it is done in the books; to the best of my knowledge we are never given exact specifics of how testing is done.

Egwene’s confrontation with Renna is a powerful moment. In the books she never has this opportunity, as she is rescued by Nynaeve, Elayne, and Min instead. I heartily approve of this change. Not only is it more thematically powerful—especially after we witnessed Renna’s casual dehumanization of the enslaved women and her belief that Egwene owed her not only obedience but loyalty and love—it also shows us Egwene’s inner strength. In the books, Egwene is revealed to be exceptionally strong-willed and determined; she is also quite ruthless when she believes she has to be. But much of her journey is an internal one, and between that and the need to streamline her story to fit into the limited space the show has for it, this part of the character could easily have been lost in translation.

There is something incredibly thematically satisfying about how Renna spent all this time trying to break Egwene, but despite having had all the power for most of their relationship, the moment the two were on an equal playing field there was no question as to whose will was stronger. Egwene must have been physically exhausted, undernourished, dehydrated, and aching from all she endured, and because Renna was still wearing the bracelet to Egwene’s collar, she would have felt twice what Renna was feeling as she suffocated. But I never doubted for a second that Egwene was willing to die and take Renna with her if that’s what she had to do. I never doubted that she could endure more than Renna, the woman who lashed out in pain and anger because the person she enslaved didn’t have warm feelings towards her. And I think, maybe, Renna knew it too. Whether or not Renna believed that Egwene would release her if she freed Egwene first, it was really her only option—she was certain to die either way.

It was, for me, one of the best moments of the season. Or it would have been. Except.

Except that before she hung Renna on that peg to suffocate to death, Egwene explained how the a’dam worked. She explained that Renna is also a channeler, and that the only difference between them is the difference in how strong they are—Renna, she says simply, is too weak. And thus, probably without even meaning to, the show has correlated strength in the One Power with personal strength. It has suggested that Egwene is better than Renna because she is a stronger channeler. And that, I think, steals the beauty from this moment.

I have a lot of issues with Jordan’s magical system, especially when it comes to how gender plays into being a channeler. However, one of the more interesting things he explores in the series is what it means to be able to wield the One Power. The Aes Sedai of Rand’s time have a hierarchical system that is very much reliant on strength in the One Power, and over the course of the series this supremecy based on channeling strength is examined, challenged, and even scorned, both by some of the Aes Sedai as well as by many other characters and societies. We meet groups of channelers who organize themselves very differently, including one culture where the Aes Sedai-equivalent group is made up both of women who can channel and women who cannot.

In a story that is literally about a chosen-one savior and his “chosen-one lite” friends, there is a lot of emphasis on strength, what it really means to be strong, and how responsible one is for the power one can wield. In some ways, Egwene’s journey even parallels Rand’s in this area. I think that this conflation of strength of will and strength in the One Power lessens the impact of that story, as it lessens the impact of Egwene’s triumph over Renna. If we were to take this connection seriously, it makes Egwene’s revenge feel smaller and meaner somehow. She should not be saying “You are less than me because you are weak in the One Power.” She should be saying “You thought that I was a subhuman being, but my will and inner strength is greater than yours.”

Renna is a slaver, someone who reduces human beings to something less than. The fact that she is also a potential channeler is relevant to that story, but only if she has time to reckon with the fact that she is the same as the people she tortured and dehumanized—only if she has time to realize that the joy she took in channeling, and in connecting with other channelers, could have been hers for real, rather than something stolen and tainted.

But Renna dies without having time to grapple with these themes, themes that the show doesn’t have time for anyway. The focus, instead, is on this battle of wills, and that is where the power of the scene lies.

Ironically enough, in a scene that never existed in the books, all that is missing to make it right is a little bit more of Robert Jordan’s worldbuilding.

Sylas K Barrett will always be grateful for the complexity of The Wheel if Time. Not only is fun to read, but it provides a wealth of information and themes for those of us who live and breathe deep dive analysis.

The post The Secret of the Sul’Dam: Subtle Changes to the Way the One Power Works in The Wheel of Time TV Series appeared first on Reactor.

Here’s the synopsis for the film, per Deadline:

The action-adventure movie will chart the story of a young girl with a special gift. Her life is forever changed when evil visits her remote mountain village. Finding herself alone in a dangerous world, she must go to The White Tower to learn how to use her magical powers to save her family and friends. Rebellious and mistrusting, she learns that there is something in this world that is as powerful a weapon in the fight against evil as any form of magic.

It’s that last sentence that raises at least one question: What in the world of The Wheel of Time is as powerful a weapon as magic to fight evil? Another question is how far back The Wheel of Time’s history the events of The White Tower take place. Knowing that would provide clues as to who was in the Amyrlin Seat, at the very least.

We’ll have to wait a bit to find out, though the good news is that along with an already-written script from Thor screenwriter Zack Stentz, the project also just snagged Jay Oliva (The Dark Knight Returns, Part 1 and 2) as director.

“I am so excited to be joining this amazing creative team,” Oliva said in a statement per Deadline. “Reading Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time inspired me to become a filmmaker, and having an opportunity to explore the world he created has been a lifelong dream of mine. The rich history of The White Tower has intrigued me, and the expansive backstory of the books gives the creative team the freedom to tell a fresh and imaginative story within the familiar world that was so meticulously crafted by Jordan in The Wheel of Time.”

No news on when The White Tower will be released, but the team is planning to start work in early 2024.

The post The Wheel of Time Animated Feature, The White Tower, Teases a Weapon as Powerful as Magic—But What Does That Mean? appeared first on Reactor.

Judkins mentioned a handful of locations that will appear in the next season, including Tanchico, Rhuidean, the Aiel Waste, and a return to Two Rivers. A ship of the Sea Folk has been built, which suggests the series will spend some time exploring their seafaring culture.

He also spoke about the Forsaken, saying he wants to make them more visible earlier than happens in the books: “We really felt like the Forsaken are such an incredible part of the books, and we wanted to bring them to the forefront in season two … I’ve seen some very serious commentary online about the Forsaken and who may not be in the show, but I can confirm that we have cast and put on set a Forsaken you have not seen in the show as of yet.”

Presumably, there’s a lot more coming in the third season that we haven’t seen in the show yet! With season two just over and season three in production, it’ll be a while before we get to see all these new places and faces.

The Wheel of Time is streaming on Prime Video.

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But the true pain of the scene is not what the other Aes Sedai perceive it to be.

Earlier in the same episode, Moiraine and Siuan sneak off to spend the night together, and the viewer learns that they have loved each other for a long time, that they once dreamed of having a life together. But when they were the sole witnesses to the in-real-time Foretelling of the Dragon’s birth, they gave up everything in order to find the world’s only hope of winning the battle against the Dark One. It is during that night together that they discuss the unfortunate necessity of this very public punishment; Moiraine tells Siuan that the only way for her to retain enough freedom to continue her quest is if Siuan’s judgment is exile. Wrapped in each other’s arms, the two women bemoan the fact that they never have more time together, even as they steel themselves to do what must be done.

And so, for Moiraine and Siuan, the scene in which Moiraine is exiled is also an intimate moment of profound connection. Before, Moiraine “orders” Siuan to her knees in a moment of sexual playfulness. Now, Moiraine kneels at the Amyrlin’s feet, and the two women each tenderly grip one end of the Oath Rod, staring into one another’s eyes—clearly sharing each other’s strength, just as they did when they were alone. And when Moiraine swears, she doesn’t swear to the Amyrlin Seat but to Siuan Sanche, whispering the names Siuan’s father used to call her as a girl, rather than the official titles that belong to the Amyrlin.

In some ways, the scene almost feels like a marriage, albeit one carried out in a secret code and hidden beneath the cover of White Tower ceremony and tradition. There is grief for what Moiraine and Siuan must sacrifice, but the viewer still feels safe in this moment, knowing that they have each other’s backs, knowing that Moiraine is not actually being chastened, and that the person who holds this binding oath over her would never use it to hurt her. For them, and thus for us, it is all just an act.

But in season two, all that changes.

In the seventh episode of season two, “Daes Dae’mar,” Siuan learns that the mission at the Eye of the World didn’t stop the Dark One but instead set loose the Forsaken Ishamael. She also learns that Moiraine has been hiding the fact that she was stilled at Ishamael’s hands, and thus is unable to shield or control Rand, the Dragon Reborn, should such a thing become necessary. Seeing their twenty year mission as a failure, Siuan decides that they have to change the way they are doing things, and that Rand must be given into the care, and thus the control, of the White Tower. Moiraine disagrees. Despite the mistakes made at the Eye of the World, despite the pain of her stilling, she believes that Rand must be protected from the control of the Aes Sedai and allowed to become who he was meant to be without their interference. They are left at an impasse, and the concordance between the two women fractures. Siuan decides to exercise her authority as the Amyrlin Seat to have things done as she decrees. Moiraine responds by going behind her back, working with her allies to trick the Aes Sedai and set Rand free.

It’s painful to see that Siuan isn’t able to be the ally Moiraine needs at this point—especially since the only reason she learned the truth about Moiraine and Rand is because Lan was trying to get Moiraine support from someone she loves and trusts. And although the viewer is of course going to side with Rand and Moiraine, we still experience a lot of empathy for Siuan. After all, she never wanted to become the Amyrlin Seat. She has no interest in political power and prestige, dreaming instead of life outside the Tower and the simple existence she had as a girl. But she sacrificed those dreams for duty, becoming the Amyrlin Seat in hopes of being able to prepare the White Tower for the coming of the Dragon Reborn and the Last Battle. The Amyrlin is a world leader, responsible not only for the women of the White Tower but also for the guidance and protection of the world at large, especially when it comes to matters of the One Power and the ongoing war of the Light against the Dark. When she tells Moiraine that it would be best for Rand to remain a prisoner of the Aes Sedai, she believes she is doing what is best, making sure Rand survives until the Last Battle, and protecting the world from him—and the taint on saidin—in the process.

Still, though we feel empathy and understanding for Siuan, the show makes it clear that her choice is the wrong one, and an amoral one at that. Episodes six and seven of season two juxtapose Rand’s interview with Siuan and brief imprisonment in the White Tower with Egwene’s experiences as a damane slave of the Seanchan. Renna tells Egwene that she has a great place in the Last Battle, but that place is to be controlled by Renna, who sees Egwene as a sentient weapon, or a pet, rather than as a person. Siuan doesn’t quite reduce Rand to that level, but she does tell him she intends for the Aes Sedai to keep him caged, and to use him as a weapon in the Last Battle, not as a general.

The lesson Moiraine has been learning throughout the season—that she isn’t always right and cannot continue to be the only person who makes choices about the Dragon Reborn and about the future of the world—is not one that Siuan has been taught. Moiraine is the woman Siuan loves, her only companion in the secret mission they have devoted twenty long years to, and yet Siuan is very quick to accuse Moiraine of acting out of selfish pride, very quick to jump from saying “we failed” to “you failed,” despite the fact that Siuan is the one who believed Moiraine had to take the Two Rivers kids to the Eye of the World in the first place. And when she sees that Moiraine has channeled to open the Waygate, she immediately accuses Moiraine of lying about her stilling, and remains unmoved when Moiraine answers that she has been more truthful to Siuan than anyone else.

Siuan’s confusion and fear is understandable, given the stakes at play, and especially since Moiraine is immediately on her guard in return, protective of Rand and hesitant to open up to Siuan about exactly what has changed in her views of their endeavor. But the moment Siuan feels as though the mission to find and prepare the Dragon Reborn hasn’t gone as they hoped and planned, she falls back into Tower Law and custom.

One wonders what those twenty years did to her, twenty years of navigating White Tower politics and pretending to believe in the establishment she once dreamed of escaping. She may have hoped for a different outcome once, but now believes that Tower Law should dictate her actions, and Moiraine’s, and Rand’s too.

And when Moiraine disagrees, and disobeys, Siuan doesn’t hesitate to invoke the power of the oath Moiraine swore the last time they saw each other. An oath that was made only as a cover, to allay any suspicion of their true intentions, an oath that felt safe, even romantic, because they were working together, and because they love each other so deeply. “If you have ever loved me,” Moiraine begs her, “don’t do this.” Siuan did love her, still does, and yet she forces Moiraine to obey, as surely as Egwene was forced by Renna and the a’dam.

What happens to Egwene is abhorrent, but it is relatively straightforward—the a’dam and what it can do is an unqualified evil. But it never occurred to me, in season one, to question whether there would be consequences to Moiraine giving Siuan a similar power over her. Now, looking back, I realize it should have. Because no one should have that power over another. Even if they love that person. Even if they believe that they would never use it.

I’m sure Siuan never believed that she would.

Like the source material before it, season two of The Wheel of Time asks us to consider what it means to act for the greater good. Where is the moral line, when you believe you are literally working to save the world? Can you justify any action, no matter how horrible, when you truly believe it is the only way to stop an apocalypse? Siuan is not the only person to make a questionable choice like this; Moiraine destroys several ships full of people without knowing for sure that they are her enemy, just on the chance that it might help Rand. Rand does even worse, siccing Lanfear on the city of Cairhien, resulting in the deaths of many innocent civilians. And while the question is a difficult one full of gray areas and philosophical pitfalls, in this, at least, the show has made it clear where its morality stands. The One Power, when used in certain ways with certain devices, can allow you to control another person absolutely, robbing them utterly of their free will, their ability to control their own body, and even to control their own mind. And that is wrong, for any person, and for any reason.

When Moiraine swore her oath on the Oath Rod, she and Siuan stared into each other’s faces and shared a look that the other Aes Sedai could not see. And when that oath was later used to force Moiraine to close the Waygate, it was only when her back was turned that grief showed on Siuan’s face.

The truth was still there, but now it wasn’t hidden from others; it was hidden from Moiraine. And that might be the most heartbreaking thing of all.

Sylas K Barrett was stunned by that final episode. You can find him on Bluesky and Instagram.

The post Why the Use of the Oath Rod Matters in The Wheel of Time TV Series appeared first on Reactor.

My soul is black with blood, and damned. It was not a hard thought, not biting or edged; a simple statement of fact. “A mercy any man might wish for, Torval.”

—Rand al’Thor, The Path of Daggers

We first learned that Mazrim Taim is performing mercy killings of Black Tower recruits in chapter 14 of The Path of Daggers. In this section, Peral Torval arrived with a letter for Rand from Mazrim Taim regarding the recruiting and loss numbers in the Black Tower. Torval also revealed, mostly in an attempt to unnerve Eben Hopwil and Jahar Narishma, that Taim was poisoning the wine of the men who went mad, causing them to pass away quietly in their sleep. At the time, I didn’t give much thought to the matter, mostly because there were a lot of other things to think about in that section, like the fact that Taim seems to be passing down his hatred of Rand to the men he’s training, or the way that Rand had to fight the urge to murder Torval. Plus, at the end of the chapter, Fedwin arrived to report the Seanchan advance and the strangeness of saidin around Ebou Dar. Rand’s attention turned to the Seanchan threat at once, and so did mine, as I also wondered what effects the Bowl of the Winds was having on the One Power.

But after Fedwin’s death at the end of The Path of Daggers, it felt worth revisiting the ever-looming danger of taint madness, and what that cup of sleep really means, both for the story at large, and for Rand personally.

Of course, the other reason I didn’t pay that much attention to the whole poison-cup-mercy-killing thing is because the story itself hasn’t paid much attention to it. In general, the doings of the Asha’man—including what Taim’s getting up to and the death/burn out/desertion rate among trainees—has mostly been going on in the background. I can understand why Rand felt like he needed to entrust the recruiting and training of the Black Tower to Taim—Rand always has too much to do and not enough time to do it, and Taim was the only other channeler capable of training the recruits. However, it’s significant that Rand—who has trust issues even with the people closest to him—is barely even checking up on Taim, as “the M’Hael” rapidly trains an entire army of powerful, dangerous male channelers.

I can’t help but think that part of Rand’s choice not to monitor the training or come by the Black Tower to check up on Taim is because he doesn’t really want to face the truth of the Asha’man. He hates and despise Taim, and of course he has Lews Therin in his mind all the time trying to get him to murder any man who can channel as soon as that man steps into Rand’s vicinity. But more than that, I think Rand is avoiding thinking about the fate he has condemned these men to. After all, he knew better than anyone what fate he was signing men up for when he declared his amnesty and offered training to any man who wanted to see if he could learn. This would have been a great gift to men born with the spark, of course, some of whom might have died from touching the source even before they had time to go mad from the taint, and the rest of whom faced the inevitable gentling and resulting despair and death. For them, the chance to learn and serve was the best possible outcome, even with the threat of the taint. But for the rest, Rand’s decision to found the Black Tower offered them a life, and a very dark fate, that they otherwise never would have faced.

Many of the men who came to the Black Tower would never have touched the source, never have been exposed to the taint, if Rand hadn’t created to opportunity for them to be tested. Some of them, like Hopwil and Fedwin, were barely more than children when they came to the Black Tower. By offering the testing and training, and by setting Taim to do active recruiting, Rand is directly responsible for the lives these men now lead. He’s also responsible for the deaths in training, since it was he who decided on the pace, and he’s also responsible for the fact that many of these men have come to think of themselves as little more than sentient weapons—that is, after all, how Rand chooses to think of them most of the time.

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I really wish we had a main character besides Rand who was a channeler of saidin. We see so many different reasons that women want to go to the White Tower, and I want that same understanding of the reasons that men might want to learn to channel. After all, becoming an Aes Sedai carries a long history, the weight of power and prestige. Being a man who can channel in this age only carries the stigma of madness and death, of being hunted down and gentled by the Red Ajah. Of being tainted by the touch of Darkness itself. We have seen so many people react in barely restrained terror at the mere thought of saidin and the corruption that lies upon it, after all. And yet many of the Black Tower recruits jumped at the chance to see if they could be taught to channel. Flinn, Hopwil, Narishma and Fedwin were all among the very first recruits, as well, which feels symbolically significant.

I do keep wondering why Rand chose the men he did to stay with him. I have some theories; Flinn, Narishma, Hopwil and Fedwin all feel a bit like Two Rivers’ men, even though they are not all Andoran. It makes sense to me that Rand would respond well to Flinn, whose soldierly competence is reminiscent of people like Bashere, and of the Shienarans Rand knew in The Great Hunt, and even of Tam al’Thor. It also makes sense to me that he would feel more comfortable around young men who remind him of himself and his friends, and who are less likely to have the kind of established ambitions that older men might—men who are more likely to look up to Rand, rather than see him as a rival, as Taim does. But these are all just theories, and I still have no idea why Rand chose Dashiva in that group.

Perhaps I’m just little too greedy when it comes to character work, but Jordan’s world is so rich I always feel the lack when it seems like a certain character, or certain theme, is undeveloped in comparison to the rest of the story. And I can’t stop thinking about how the men who came to the Black Tower knew they would face the effects of the Dark One’s touch, knew that that it would only be a question of when, not if, they would go mad. A lot of the male channelers we do meet are in search of personal glory, and I can imagine that some might have had lives that were so poor and hard that an escape to channeling seemed appealing—future pain often doesn’t seem as weighty as present suffering. But these two motivations can’t account for all of the men the Black Tower has managed to gather, especially knowing that some of them had families that they brought with them. We see how heavily Rand feels the isolation of being a channeler of saidin, the fear he experiences knowing that the madness could come for him at any time, and that the people he love will be in the greatest danger from that violent, angry insanity. Surely a man who was a husband and father would have thought twice before choosing to seek out such a fate.

In fact, Damer Flinn is the only Asha’man whose motivations we have actually gotten to learn about. When he Healed Rand’s injury from the Shadar Logoth dagger, he talked about himself and told everyone the story of why he went to the Black Tower.

“It was Healing made me go to the Black Tower, you might say. I was a soldier, till I took a lance in my thigh; couldn’t grip a saddle proper after that, or even walk far. That was the fifteenth wound I took in near forty years in the Queen’s Guards. Fifteen that counted, anyway; it don’t if you can walk or ride, after. I seen a lot of friends die in them forty years. So I went, and the M’Hael taught me Healing.”

I think this monologue, and a few other similar comments we get from Flinn throughout the book, is probably the reason he is my favorite Asha’man. I’m also very interested in the concept of Healing, and since learning to Heal was Nynaeve’s motivation for wanting to become an Aes Sedai, I’m predisposed to like anyone else who wants the same thing. Flinn is also an older man, which makes a difference—it doesn’t make the taint any less frightening, but it does mean that he’s not hugely shortening his lifespan if he does succumb to the madness quickly. Since he has been a soldier his whole life, becoming a different kind of soldier now and potentially finishing his career by fighting in the Last Battle was probably also an appealing idea. Maybe if he hadn’t had to retire from the Queen’s Guards he wouldn’t have felt as strong of a desire to become an Asha’man, though perhaps the desire to Heal would have been enough.

Hopwil, Fedwin and Narishma, on the other hand, are all quite young. Narishma is around Rand’s age, while Fedwin and Hopwil are still teenagers. Perhaps these men had a bit of the feeling of invincibility that often comes with youth—they may have come to the farm dreaming of glory or power, a dream that seemed more real and tangible than the threat of taint-madness. But again, I’m speculating, and I really wish we knew more about who these men are as people, not just Rand’s weapons.

But this brings us back to my point, which is that Rand doesn’t want to see the Asha’man as people, even the ones he trusts most. Because Rand regards the Asha’man the same way he regards himself—as tools fashioned for one singular purpose. As Rand himself was made by the Pattern, or perhaps by the Creator, so has he made the Asha’man in turn. He instructed Taim to make them into weapons, and although he uses some of them for other tasks, at the end of the day what he wants is an army of bombs to face the Shadowspawn, and Darkfriend channelers, at the Last Battle.

As a channeler of saidin himself, Rand understands the fate to which the Asha’man have consigned themselves better than anyone, and he has in many ways chosen to deny his own humanity because he knows he too is doomed to madness one day. Also because he is the Dragon Reborn, of course, but the Asha’man are soldiers of the Dragon Reborn, and in his mind they are basically just extensions of himself, doomed to the same fate, both in life and in their inevitable death.

Rand doesn’t consider their future after the Last Battle any more than he considers his own. It’s probably pretty difficult for him to imagine any future that might exist after the Last Battle, even if the Dark One is defeated. He doesn’t expect to survive it himself, but even if he does, his duty—his fate—will be completed. What happens to the world afterwards, what happens to any Asha’man who might survive the Last Battle, is no longer his responsibility.

I can understand that mentality, though I don’t necessarily agree. Most of Rand’s perspectives are pretty understandable, if you really put yourself in his shoes, even though some of them are grave mistakes. But it’s interesting to see how he either avoids thinking about, or is stoically resigned to, the situation with the Asha’man when you compare it to how he handles the Maidens. Rand did have some role in choosing to let the Maidens carry his honor, just as he chose to lead all the Aiel out of the Waste and use them in his battle to unite the world. But ultimately most of what happens to the Maidens is their own choice. They were warriors before they met Rand, and their culture and customs demand that he treat them the same as the male Aiel societies; none of that is of Rand’s doing, and indeed, letting them fight and die, letting them risk themselves for him, is something they demand, despite his discomfiture. It is not his fault the Maidens chose this life, but he takes each death as a switch with which to flog himself, and he keeps a list of the dead so he can use it to wallow in his guilt and shame.

This is an expression of Lews Therin’s madness, and I don’t mean to castigate Rand for it. But the Asha’man are Rand’s responsibility, and in a much more direct way. He shapes their lives, their culture, their view of themselves. If he is going to feel truly and almost solely responsible for anyone’s death, it should be the deaths of Asha’man. Rand’s sense of urgency may be understandable, but a whole ten percent of the recruits are either burning themselves out or killing themselves because Rand has ordered the training to proceed as quickly as possible. He has decided that one man in ten is an acceptable loss of life, an appalling high amount when you consider that the number could be close to zero if Rand and Taim chose to be careful and train at a safer rate.

This attitude is what Cadsuane and Sorilea are on about with their desire to teach Rand the difference between being strong and being hard, and how to be strong without reducing every human life to a piece on a chessboard. It’s a lesson all the Asha’man also have to learn, since their teaching has been in line with Rand’s thinking. Unfortunately, Fedwin won’t be there to learn the lesson, just as he won’t be there if Rand manages to cleanse saidin.

In the same way that we don’t know much about the motivations of the other Asha’man, we also don’t know much about what the effects of the taint look like for them. In Rand we have the symptoms of physical sickness, the amplification of his anger and any violent tendencies, and of course the presence of Lews Therin in his mind. All these conditions seem to fit with what we know was experienced by male Aes Sedai during the Breaking—they lashed out violently, and they seem to have hallucinated as well, and been unable to recognize reality.

But Fedwin didn’t seem to be experiencing any violent or angry impulses after his mind gave way to the taint. The narration describes him as “having the mind of a child,” which is a bit of a loaded term, but also not a very specific one. It certainly seems that he isn’t quite in touch with reality—he isn’t completely out of it the way Lews Therin was in the Prologue of The Eye of the World, but he doesn’t seem to comprehend the danger of pulling stones out of the wall of a building while you are currently standing in it. He is also entertained by simple toys when Min convinces him to build a tower with blocks instead of the real thing.

We have seen the edges of madness in Rand, and various characters have speculated on possible signs of madness in other male channelers at various times, but this is the first time we the reader have seen a man on the other side of the taint’s effects. And it’s interesting to see that Fedwin is still kind, still gentle—in thought, at least—and even loving. His desire and dedication to protecting Min never wavered. He trusted Rand to the end, even though his mind had been altered. We see no signs of violence or anger at all, which surprised me. Obviously I was aware that all the descriptions of what happened to the male Aes Sedai were second-hand; none of them survived to explain what they actually experienced. But the outward effects of what happened to the men who went mad were violent and destructive, and appeared to come at least partly out of anger—and I assumed that this reading was correct because it matches what Rand experiences. He feels anger, the desire to lash out, the desire to kill. He hears Lews Therin’s voice urging on those impulses. It sometimes feels as though Lews is trying to take control of saidin, or even replace Rand in his own mind, and Rand wonders if his grip on reality is still solid.

But while Fedwin wanted to tear stones from the walls of the palace, he wanted to do it to build, not to destroy; it just seems as though he didn’t have the capacity to understand the damage that he could do. And so I find myself wondering how many of the male Aes Sedai of the Age of Legends might have been in the same position as Fedwin. Perhaps the didn’t understand they were destroying and killing. Perhaps they believed they were acting out of a desire to protect and defend. Even with Lews Therin, we don’t know what he thought he was doing when he destroyed his home, killing Ilyena and everyone else in the building. Maybe he thought he was somewhere else, killing Shadowspawn or Darkfriends. Maybe he thought he was using the One Power to create a shield around his home, or to fortify the walls, or to redecorate.

We may never know about that. I do wish we knew more about the men in the Black Tower who went mad. Were all of them sedate enough to be taken out quietly with a poison cup? Did any suddenly lash out with the One Power before their madness was discovered, needing to be shielded or restrained? My assumption was always that the corruption of the taint caused violence in its victims because the Dark One is the opposite of Creation. His effects can only bring destruction and a disconnect from true reality. But seeing Fedwin’s gentleness, his peaceful calm, and the way he died smiling in Rand’s arms has made me question everything I thought I knew about what it means for a male channeler to go mad.

And Rand’s ability to face Fedwin’s fate, to administer the poison himself and to call Taim out for not using Fedwin’s name, makes me question my judgment of him as well. I do think it’s true that he’s been avoiding this pain, and that he’s making a grave mistake not keeping tabs on what goes on in the Black Tower. But there are moments when he does prove that he is willing to face the truth of what it means to be an Asha’man, even if he is too stoic and resigned to that truth.

Rand made a promise to Fedwin that the boy would be with Rand at the Last Battle. But it was a promise he could not make, because once Rand put Fedwin’s feet on the path of becoming an Asha’man, Fedwin’s fate was no longer one Rand could prevent. Only by cleansing saidin can he alter the doom his Asha’man are marching towards. Winter’s Heart may show us if Rand can succeed in such a monumental task. If he does, the other Asha’man will never have to go through what Fedwin went through. But Rand might always be left wondering how things could have been different, if he’d been able to cleanse saidin a little sooner, or if Fedwin had been able to hold out a little longer. He might find himself wondering if Fedwin saw the signs of madness in himself, if he tried to fight them off silently, in secret, just as Rand does. Or if the change came all at once, with no warning, and Fedwin was spared the pain of knowing that his doom was about to catch up with him.

Reading The Wheel of Time will resume on October 31st with the Prologue of Winter’s Heart. In the meantime, look for a few other essays coming soon about The Wheel of Time tv show.

Sylas K Barrett hates to end on such a downer note, but is excited for the new story Winter’s Heart may bring us.

The post Fedwin Morr and the Corruption of the Taint in The Wheel of Time appeared first on Reactor.

Recap

The episode opens with a flashback to 3,000 years ago. Lews Therin Telamon (Alexander Karim) tells Ishamael that he has captured all the Forsaken. He will never break the Wheel as Ishamael asks. Ishamael tells Lews to kill him, but instead Lews binds him in the seal.

The Whitecloaks are encamped outside Falme. Geofram Bornhald (Stuart Graham) tells his son why they must fight the Seanchan, despite being heavily outnumbered. Geofram doesn’t believe the prophecies about the Dragon Reborn.

Lanfear takes Rand, along with Moiraine and Lan, through the Ways to the gate to Falme. She casts them through the gate, keeping Rand with her. They travel another way.

Perrin, Aviendha, Bain, and Chiad arrive in Falme. Perrin instructs Hopper to stay safe outside the city.

Lanfear tells Ishamael that she has brought Rand to Falme. Ishamael says it is too soon, that Rand is not yet ready to be convinced to turn to the Dark. Ishamael has the other seals in his room.

The Whitecloaks attack Falme. Renna tells Egwene that a damane who disobeys an order during battle has her tongue cut out, then her hands cut off. When Egwene still shows defiance, Renna cuts off her braid.

Ishamael sends Padan Fain to give Mat the dagger from Shadar Logoth. Mat insists that he will not touch the dagger, but Fain is confident that he will.

Nynaeve uses the a’dam to get information from the captured sul’dam (Jade-Eleena Dregorius). Out on the walls, Rand is sneaking into the city and sees Egwene marching with the other damane.

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Walking along the beach where they were flung out of the Waygate, Lan begs Moiraine to restore their bond. He promises that he believes in what Moiraine does, even when he doesn’t understand it. They share a moment, and Moiraine restores their bond.

Perrin and the Aiel make their way through the fighting in the city. They find Loial and the Shienarans, who have recovered the Horn of Valere. They tell Perrin that Egwene is also a captive. Ingtar wants to leave with the Horn, but Loial insists that they stay and fight.

In the tower, the sul’dam and damane prepare for battle. Egwene resists until she sees Valda (Abdul Salis) among the Whitecloaks, who are coming to take the tower and kill the damane. She channels and attacks them.

Turok and some soldiers encounter Rand. Turok sees the heron mark on Rand’s sword and wants to fight him, but Rand kills everyone by channeling.

Ingtar sacrifices himself so that Perrin and the others can escape a group of Senachan soldiers.

Lanfear finds the ship captain, Bayle Domon (Julian Lewis Jones) who brought the poem to Moiraine. She tells him she will pay him to dump some pieces of cuendillar into the ocean.

Suroth tells Ishamael that Turak is dead and the Horn of Valere has been stolen. He sends her to take the reserve damane to a ship and wait for his signal.

Mat uses a pole from the bedpost and uses some torn fabric to turn the Shadar Logoth dagger into a spear without ever touching it, and uses the cursed object to burn through the lock on his door.

Seeing the injured civilians in the street, Egwene refuses to keep fighting. Renna is about to punish Egwene when a trebuchet attack from the Whitecloaks knocks everyone out. In the street, Nynaeve’s captured sul’dam is killed by a crossbow bolt. Elayne takes another one in the thigh. Elsewhere, Mat runs into Perrin.

On the top of the tower, Egwene and Renna are the only ones to have survived. Egwene obtains an a’dam and puts it on Renna. She explains to Renna that the connection that the a’dam makes between sul’dam and damane means that both women must be able to channel. She tells Renna that she will only let her out of the collar if Renna lets her out first, then tortures her. Even though Egwene feels what Renna does and will die if Renna dies, she holds out until Renna releases her. Egwene lets Renna die.

Rand finds Egwene and apologizes for letting her believe that he was dead, and for not coming sooner. They start to leave but Ishamael knocks them both down. Out on the ships, the damane channel, shielding Rand. Ishamael claims that if Rand keeps fighting, he will make them all turn to the Dark, just like he did in his last life.

Perrin tells Mat to take the Horn to Rand, and that they will buy him time. Perrin is attacked by Valda, who almost kills Perrin but is stopped by Hopper. Geofram Bornhald kills Hopper. Perrin kills Geofram and Dain witnesses it.

Facing a huge mass of Seanchan soldiers, Mat blows the Horn of Valere. He suddenly remembers that he is one of the Heroes of the Horn. The other heroes join him, one of whom is Uno. Mat shouts a charge in the Old Tongue. Uno joins Perrin and Loial, offering his shield to Perrin.

Nynaeve is unable to channel, and ends up pushing the arrow out of Elayne’s leg. She doesn’t know if she’ll be able to channel to help Egwene, either.

Rand tells Ishamael that he has never served the Dark One in any of his lives, and never will. Mat attacks Ishamael with the dagger, but he is an illusion, and Rand is struck instead. The real Ishamael is about to attack Rand but Egwene stops him. She creates a wall of air, stopping Ishamael’s attacks.

On the beach, Moiraine sees the Seanchan and suspects that they are shielding Rand. Lan protects her from attacking soldiers as she channels to sink the Seanchan fleet.

Egwene’s wall of air falters, but Perrin arrives in time to block the gap with Uno’s shield. Elayne channels to Heal Rand’s injury. The shield on Rand drops and he channels as he plunges his sword into Ishamael’s chest. The blade burns away, and the heron is branded into Rand’s palm. Ishamael dies.

Moiraine remembers that the Dragon is supposed to be declared over Falme, and channels to make a huge dragon of flame which curls around the tower. Rand and his friends look down on the cheering crowd below.

Lanfear goes to Ishamael’s room to find that all the seals are broken. Moghedien (Laia Costa) tells her that Ishamael let them out because he suspected that Lanfear was going to betray him. Moghedien tells Lanfear that she and Ishamael were always too close to the Dragon, and warns Lanfear to stay away from Rand and his friends. When she is gone, Lanfear whispers for the Light to help Rand.

Analysis

Okay, before I get into the meat of this review, I just need to point out one thing. Nynaeve is supposed to be this great wisdom and healer, so she should definitely know better than to push an entire arrow, including the fletching, through Elayne’s leg. Everyone knows you break it off as close to the skin as possible so you have to only push through a small amount! And you definitely don’t want little bits of feather or whatever is used on the fletching in the wound. After bloodloss, foreign material in the wound is the primary way someone is going to die in that situation.

And she didn’t even put a tourniquet on it! In real life you don’t want to pull something out of a wound (knife, arrow, whatever) because that object is basically acting as a stopper keeping the blood in the body, and if you just yank it out without a plan you’re going to lose so much blood. Granted, this lack of realism is pretty standard for all action movies and shows—most treat life-threatening wounds as temporary inconveniences that disappear as soon as the plot needs to move along—but Elayne makes a point of telling Nynaeve to act like a Wisdom and do what she knows best, so it’s really poor storytelling not to have her, you know, do it well.

I’m sure that Nyenave’s block against channeling is going to be explored in the next season, but I think we could have done with an extra sentence or two here to let us know what’s going on with her. While she was in the Tower the show made it seem like she was choosing not to channel because she feared it, then later it seemed like she was hiding the fact that she can’t channel at will most of the time. She does tell Egwene that “it either comes or it doesn’t,” but a little more explanation would have made what is happening much clearer and more interesting for the audience.

For me, this is another example of the show’s haphazard pacing. It spent arguably too much time on Nynaeve in the first half of the season, and then she suddenly became a character that doesn’t… do anything? I appreciate that there were other characters (especially Mat and Egwene) who were pretty sidelined in the first half of the show and got more to do here, which is good, but it felt really odd as a viewer to have so much of my attention directed into certain things and then abruptly have the pov shift so strongly. If a little more time had been devoted to letting us know what Nynaeve is struggling with internally, it would have helped the transition feel less jarring and strange.

I absolutely loved what Egwene got to do in this episode. I still think that the effects and experiences of being a damane could have been handled better in earlier episodes, but the way this part of her story comes to fruition in episode eight is really powerful. Renna cuts of Egwene’s braid to shame her, but the braid is only a symbol of Egwene’s strength and connection to her people, not the strength itself. The parallel between Egwene’s willingness to enact violence towards Valda and towards Renna was a good one. And from a technical standpoint, it was also a good way to time her eventual confrontation with Renna until it worked for the episode—contrasted, for example, with how many times we returned to Nynaeve sitting with Elayne and still nothing has changed.

Perhaps most moving of all is Egwene’s willingness to feel Renna’s pain, and even potentially to die, in her attempt to free herself of the a’dam. In the end, she proved herself stronger than Renna in every way, and that is even more justice than Renna’s death. Of course, Renna had to die—Egwene promised that she was going to kill her.

I was less impressed with the scene of Nynaeve torturing the sul’dam. Unlike with Egwene, we haven’t spent enough time with how Nynaeve feels about the a’dam to connect with her determination here, and the scene could have used a call back to Nynaeve’s feelings about Ryma’s capture, or perhaps to her feelings about the One Power in general, in order to ground us with her a little more. The line she delivers to the sul’dam about making her curse the first kiss her mother gave her father is actually pulled from the books, and is part of a larger monologue Nynaeve gives to the sul’dam in question that I really loved. But out of context the line doesn’t really have the same impact.

Of course, the episode doesn’t really have extra time to spend on this. But, again, this is a pacing issue. We spent so much time on the visual torture two episodes ago that could have been devoted to explorations of the themes around the a’dam instead, which would have improved the story that this episode is telling, and Nyneave and Elayne’s place in it.

I do think that the way the last two episodes have used flashbacks to set the scene for the themes each episode is exploring has worked very well—so well in fact that I almost wish they had been using the format in every episode. Last week was an exploration of what it means to sacrifice everything for the good of the world, and how to know if you are making the right decisions, how to tell good from evil, and when to allow your friends to help you. In this episode, we turn around themes of fate, and what it means to stand by your friends… or not.

In the flashback, Ishamael and Lews both tell each other that they don’t want to keep doing the same thing over and over. Ishamael believes that the only way to escape the cycle of their reincarnated lives is by breaking the Wheel and destroying everything. Lews decides to not allow Ishamael to be reborn by binding him into the cuendillar seal. Later, during their confrontation, Ishamael prepares to kill Rand in hope of being able to turn him to the Dark in Rand’s next lifetime. Rand counters by telling Ishamael that he is certain that he has never, not in a single lifetime, served the Dark. And that he never will.

In both instances, separated by 3,000 years, these two people are facing the idea of fate, of inevitability, and coming up with almost the same conclusion—that who they are is immutable and unchangeable, across all their lifetimes. Rand finds strength in this, while Ishamael finds despair, but what is interesting is that Ishamael is still trying to change Lews/Rand—he sees his own alignment as inevitable but not Rand’s, somehow. He sees the fate of Rand’s current friends as inevitable too—yes, convincing Rand that they will turn to the Dark is a ploy to manipulate Rand, but I think we can assume that Ishamael also truly believes what he is saying. He isn’t the kind of villain who makes up lies to get what he wants; he believes the truth supports what he wants, and only needs to push events and people in the right direction to make them see it, too.

But if Ishamael truly believes that every fate is fixed, how can he also believe that he can eventually convince Lews, or Rand, or some future incarnation of the Dragon, to side with him? And if he actually believes that the Dragon’s choices aren’t fixed, then who is to say that his own fate can’t change?

The answer, most likely, lies in what Siuan said to Rand in episode seven. The Dragon is not caught in the Pattern the way other people are—the Dragon is the water that drives, or breaks, the Wheel itself. This offers a very good explanation for the jealousy that is inherent in Ishamael’s friendship with, and hatred of, Lews/Rand. Not only is the Dragon the only one who can accomplish the breaking of the Wheel that Ishamael dreams of… they are also the only person who appears to exist outside of predestination.

That is, according to Ishamael’s philosophy. Not everyone in this world believes that being reborn means suffering the same fate as you did in previous lives. Tam, for example, told Rand that this is the comfort of the cycle of the Wheel—that you will always be reborn and given the chance to do better. And I wish the show had spent a little more time with Mat, because I think his journey this season is actually meant to be about this question.

We don’t know what the real deal is with the tea that Ishamael gave him. It’s possible that Ishamael lied to Mat about what it does, and then gave Mat specific visions, either via the tea or via other means, to make him believe he was a bad person in every life. It’s also possible that Ishamael believes the tea shows you all your lives but is incorrect about the details—maybe the tea only shows you the lives you fear, or maybe your intention shapes your results, or a thousand other options. Without any of this information, however, the viewer is left to guess, and I think the lack of clarity is hampering the message again.

Then, when Mat blows the Horn of Valere he suddenly remembers that he is one of the Heroes of the Horn. This is confirmed by another one of the Heroes, who tells Mat that they have fought side by side many times.  So we are left to wonder if the other visions Mat saw of his life were untrue, or if both the heroic lives and the bad ones were true. How much choice exists from life to life? Has Mat made the right choices sometimes, and fallen other times? And if so, what circumstances existed in each scenario to bring him in one direction or another?

Ishamael tells Rand that he made Egwene a killer by abandoning her, but that isn’t true. While Rand’s decision to fake his death did affect the trajectory of Egwene’s life, he is not responsible for her choices. It is, after all, Ishamael himself who arranged to have Egwene taken by the Seanchan—but more than that, Egwene’s choices are still her own, despite other people’s meddling in her circumstances. Ishamael is attempting to deny her agency as a person very much in the way that Renna and the a’dam tried to do. But Egwene is still herself, and her options being limited does not change the fact that she made her own choices. She chose to defy Renna, even knowing that Rennna might cut out her tongue or cut off her hands. She chose to let Renna die, even after Renna had freed her from the collar. The fact that Egwene’s choices were shaped by her captivity doesn’t mean that someone else made her who she is.

Mat also makes choices. Last season he abandoned his friends to the Ways and chose to go back to look for the Shadar Logoth dagger. But this time, even confronted with the dagger again and locked up with it, he still made the choice not to touch it. He relied on his ingenuity and allowed himself to believe in his ability to escape, and that choice not only led to him discovering his identity as a Hero of the Horn, but also was instrumental in the fate of his friends, and of Rand.—in both good and bad ways, as it turns out.

I am so excited to see where his story goes in the next season. Making Mat a Hero of the Horn is an alteration from the books, but it is very much in keeping with the type of character Mat is. This choice is a very good way to streamline Mat’s story and still achieve relatively the same character beats and development, and I couldn’t he happier with the change.

The mechanics of the dagger make no sense, though. It turns some people to ash, and it burns through metal, but when Rand is stabbed he stays alive for quite a bit, and although the Healing looks strange and incomplete, Elayne is able to save him despite being only a novice who’s been in the White Tower no more than… a few months? I’m not sure of the exact timeline, but it’s not long. This irked me almost as much as pushing the arrow through Elayne’s leg, almost as much as the fact that the show took eight episodes to actually remind the audience clearly and straightforwardly what the Horn of Valere is for.

I do, however, love that they made Uno a hero of the Horn. He doesn’t die in the books, and I was a little miffed at his fate in episode six. I take that back now—and I also think this is a point in favor of the suggestion that one’s lives are not always the same. Uno didn’t do anything wrong in this life, by he didn’t really get much of a chance to be heroic, either. And it’s nice to think that you’re always a hero of the Horn, even if some of your lives are less impressive than others, or if you get captured and killed early.

Ingtar’s death was less effective, for me. In the books he has a whole storyline which makes his choice to sacrifice himself a very important thematic moment, very much like Boromir’s death in The Lord of the Rings. It makes sense that the show didn’t use the storyline, but it was a bit clumsy the way it tried to set Ingtar’s sacrifice up at the last possible moment by giving Loial the speech about being the heroes of future legends. I did really like the speech, however; it was reminiscent of Sam’s speech at the end of The Two Towers film in a rather lovely way. Loial’s character hasn’t gotten much development in the show, but we know that he is a lover of books and stories and history, so this moment from him was very fitting.

Another change from the books is Rand’s confrontation with Turak. As I mentioned in last week’s review, Rand spends the beginning of The Great Hunt being trained by Lan in swordsmanship. When he faces Turak in the book he is able to defeat Turak in single combat and does not use the One Power. I had been wondering how this would be handled in the show, since Rand is not that skilled with his sword, and I thought the choice was very effective. As in the show, Turak’s slaves killed themselves when he died out of loyalty to their master.

I was very intrigued with the way the show positioned Geofram Bornhald. Last season he seemed like a pretty good guy, someone who didn’t agree with Valda’s extreme views, a Whitecloak who still advised Moiraine to see an Aes Sedai healer. Now in this episode we meet him again, a man who is willing to go fight for Falme when it seems like no one else cares, even though his forces are vastly outnumbered. He tells Dain that the Seanchan are slavers and murderers, and that the Whitecloaks will fight them because they must… and that all sounds pretty good.

But we also get a glimpse of another side of him, a man who refers to the Aes Sedai as witches and believes the prophecy of the Dragon to be lies they made up, a man who still keeps Valda by his side despite the horrors Valda has committed. And then there is the brutal way he kills Hopper. Now of course, if you saw a wild animal mauling someone you’d probably try to beat it off or kill it, too, but the scene is deliberately framed in a way that makes Bornhald’s actions seem cold and cruel. There is no shock or panic in his expression when he sees that Valda is being attacked, he almost looked bored. It’s like, oh, there’s that annoying coworker of mine getting mauled by wolves again, guess I have to do something about it. And the way he strides off afterwards makes it feel more like he just squashed a bug then that he was dealing with a unexpected wolf attack.

And then we have another thematic cycle as Perrin picks up an axe again, for the first time since the first episode, this time to avenge someone he loved. But Dain witnessing the death of his father, especially without even having the context of Valda’s attack and Hopper’s death, is no doubt going to have long term repercussions for Perrin. Just as Ila suggested to Perin in season one, picking up that weapon isn’t going to bring anything good into Perrin’s life.

And finally, we come to Lan and Moiraine. The quiet moments between them in season one, especially the first episode, were the first thing that I loved about the series. And the quiet moments, between Moiraine and Lan, or Moiraine and Siuan, or between various permutations of the Three Rivers kids, have always been where The Wheel of Time show has shone the brightest. I’m thinking of Moiraine teaching Egwene to channel for the first time, of Moiraine sneaking away to meet with Siuan, of Lan and Nynaeve’s conversations, of Perrin and Rand helping Mat out and buying him Beltine lanterns to give to his sisters, of Egwene and Perrin traveling with the Tuatha’an. All these moments are the heart of the series, and while the action and plotting can be confusingly executed, where the pacing of the series is hit or miss, the quiet moments continue to shine.

I was waiting all season to have this Moiraine and Lan back, just as the characters themselves have also been waiting. The conversation between them about their relationship and their respect for one another was perfect, and the restoration of the bond brought me almost to tears. There is something so beautiful about the connection between the two of them, one that is not sexual the way Alanna’s is with her Warders but which is so deeply loving, in a manner that transcends most other kinds of relationships. For the last several episodes we have been treated to Renna’s deeply disturbing idea of what it means to be connected to someone else through the One Power, but now we see what true connection between people really looks like. Not romantic in the sense of them being in love, but in the sense of being larger than life, heroic like the Heroes of the Horn are heroic, as strong and inexorable as the One Power. Though great in many other respects, the source material for this story is deeply, deeply heteronormative and very devoted to the idea that men and women are different and unknowable to each other, and that makes this connection the show has given us between Moiraine and Lan all the more special.

As the series ends, we’re left with a lot of questions about the future. What enemies will fill the void left by Ishamael? The Forsaken, surely, but Padan Fain is still out there, and Valda, and now Dain Bornhald as well. Liandrin, and plenty of other Darkfriends, too. What happened to Siuan? Will Nynaeve ever learn to channel at will? Will Rand’s injury fully heal?

And what does it mean for Lanfear to ask for something from the Light?

The Wheel of Time has already been greenlit for a third season, so all we have to do now is wait and see. Meanwhile, Rand has been officially proclaimed as the Dragon Reborn. As the books always say, its not the beginning, but it is a beginning.

Easter Eggs and Fun Facts

• I enjoy how much Artur Hawkwing’s armor looks like Gondor armor from The Lord of the Rings, and that he also a Rohirrim-looking guy beside him.
• The Whitecloak children bringing the smoke to hide the attacking soldiers was a nice touch, with the way it evoked altar boys bringing incense during Catholic services.
• When Ishamael tells Padan Fain that Lanfear has betrayed them, Fain counters with “But she is sworn to him.” Ishamael replies that there are many paths to walk through the night. “Him” in this context is the Dark One, and this conversation recalls the one that Lanfear had with Liandrin. Loyalty to the Dark One is not the same as loyalty to one of his followers, and as Moiraine tells us, the Forsaken often fight among themselves. This conversation also speaks to Ishamael’s fatalistic approach to life—he knew who Lanfear was and what she would do—they both did—and yet he released her anyway. Because he needed her, she says, and because she completes him. But also, perhaps, because Ishamael is one of those villains who is always the agent of his own destruction.
• The prophecy about the Dragon being proclaimed in Falme that is quoted by Moiraine and by Dain Bornhald has been altered slightly from the books. In the Karaethon Cycle, aka the Prophecies of the Dragon, the line runs “Above the Watchers Over the Waves shall he proclaim himself, bannered ‘cross the sky in fire.” This is changed to “Above the watchers shall the Dragon be proclaimed, bannered across the sky in fire,” since in the show it is Moiraine who puts up the image to show that Rand is the Dragon Reborn. In the books, Rand is actually seen fighting Ishamael in the sky.

Favorite Quote: “The only reason that I was able to say that you’re not my equal is that I’ve known one thing to be true since the first day we met. You have always been my better.”

Runner Up: “Kill me. And you and I can dance this dance again in our next lives.”

Sylas K Barrett really enjoys the philosophical elements of The Wheel of Time, and how the show plays with the books’ arcs and themes.

The post The Wheel of Time Confronts the Nature of Fate in “What Was Meant to Be” appeared first on Reactor.

Having heard that Elayne is in Caemlyn and that she has had all the Dragon Banners taken down, Rand is in a foul mood. Min encourages him to go to Elayne, and points out that Rand wanted her to have the Lion throne. Rand agrees that he did, and now she doesn’t want anything to do with him, and that’s good because it means she is safe from his enemies. Min tells Fedwin, who is on guard duty, that the Dragon Reborn is sulking because he thinks a woman doesn’t want to see him.

Sorilea comes in, brushing past Fedwin, with five Aes Sedai in black da’tsang robes. They are some of those who kidnapped and tortured Rand and who were taken prisoner at Dumai’s Wells—Elza Penfell, Nesune Bihara, Sarene Nemdahl, Beldeine Nyram, and Erian Boroleos. Sorilea explains that all five have asked to be beaten the same way Rand was while their prisoner, and all have asked for the chance to try to make up for their shame. Sorilea says that their toh cannot ever be met, but that she has decided to leave the choice to Rand.

Min sees this as very out of character for a Wise one, especially Sorilea, and notes that Sorilea seems to be watching Rand carefully while pretending not to be.

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Rand asks each Aes Sedai in turn one question: Why? Their answers vary. The Greens point out that Rand must fight in the Last Battle and the Battle Ajahs must follow him. Sarene, a White, says that it is only logical for her to follow Rand now. Nesune, a Brown, admits that she wants to study Rand.

Rand asks them if they would accept being confined to a box and they all answer that they would, though with varying degrees of enthusiasm. Min thinks that it is understandable that Rand would consider returning the treatment he got from them, but she knows he would regret it later and tries to think of what she could do to stop him from making this mistake. She is also seeing many auras around the women, including some that speak of glory and impressive deeds. Suddenly she sees one that encompasses all of them.

“They will serve you, each in her fashion, Rand,” she said hurriedly. “I saw it.” Sorilea would serve him? Suddenly Min wondered exactly what “in her fashion” meant. The words came with the knowing, but she did not always know what the words themselves meant. But they would serve; that much was plain.

Min sees Sorilea give her a small, approving nod. Rand’s fury seems to drain away, and he tells the five that they can swear to him as Kiruna and the others did. He tells Sorilea to put them with the rest of the “apprentices.”

On her way out, however, Sorilea remarks, seemingly casually, that Cadsuane is in the palace again, and that she seems to think that Rand is afraid of her. Rand almost immediately tells Min that he’s going to go see what Cadsuane wants, and asks Min to come with him. They have only gone a few steps down the hall when they are knocked down by a huge explosion from Rand’s apartments.

Rand immediately orders Fedwin not to channel unless he must, for fear of being detected, and to take Min down to the servants’ quarters. He tells Fedwin to kill anyone who gets in their way, and to guard Min with his life. As Rand runs off, Fedwin promises Min that he will take care of her.

Rand waits until Min is out of sight before he seizes saidin. For a moment he sees an image of Lews Therin in his mind’s eye, and tells the man in his head that he won’t let him win. Rand travels through the halls as quietly as he can, using a weave of fire and air to fold light around himself and render himself basically invisible, hiding from the Maidens and from Cadsuane leading a group of Aes Sedai.

But just as he lets the weave go, Ailil and Shalon, Harine’s Windfinder, peek out of a doorway and see him. Rand shields Shalon and ties it off with a knot that will unravel in a day or two, then leaves them tied up under Ailil’s bed. Then, coming around a corner, he sees Dashiva with Gedwyn and Rochaid, talking about whether or not Rand is dead. When Dashiva sees Rand he attacks with saidin. Rand channels a weave he doesn’t know, thinking maybe it’s one of Lews Therin’s, making a cocoon around himself that will keep out anything short of balefire. He bounces backwards before letting the weave go, then attacks Dashiva with red wires of fire and light.

He runs, not waiting to make himself a target, but when he eventually makes his way back to the spot he sees no sign of the three men. When he finally returns to Min, he learns that Fedwin now has “the mind of a small child,” and that Min had to keep him occupied and safe so that he didn’t use the One Power for anything. Rand has Fedwin shielded when Taim finds them. The way Rand and Taim look at one another makes Min think they are trying to decide whether or not to try to kill each other.

Taim explains that he only came by to report specific deserters—Gedwyn, Rochaid, Torval, and Kisman.

Taim offers to take Fedwin with him, but Rand tells him about Nynaeve and how she taught Rand what herbs were safe and which were not. He gives Fedwin  some wine to drink, then holds Fedwin to his chest, urging him to sleep. Fedwin dies quietly, smiling, and Taim remarks that Rand is harder than Taim realized. He seems surprised when Rand tells him to add Dashiva to the list of deserters. Once Taim has left, Min tries to tell Rand that it is okay to cry for Fedwin, but Rand counters that there’s no time. They have to go.

Perrin lead a group towards Abila, where Masema is staying. It includes Neald and Grady, Balwer, and some of the Aes Sedai and Wise Ones. Elyas is also with him, but Perrin has left Faile in the camp. Perrin has followed Elyas’s advice on how he should interact with Faile, and has to admit that it has helped their relationship.

In the city, Balwer rides off on his own to gather information. The Aes Sedai keep their faces hidden as they arrive at the house Masema has commandeered for himself. Speaking carefully, Perrin announces that he has come with a message from the Dragon Reborn, and that the Prophet knows him. They are taken to a large room with a roaring fire, where Maseema is waiting.

His deep-set eyes burned with a black fire, and his scent… The only name Perrin could give that smell, steel-hard and blade-sharp and quivering with wild intensity, was madness. And Rand thought he could put a leash on this?

Masema begins to upbraid Perrin, then breaks off when the Aes Sedai drop their cloaks and reveal themselves. Masema is incensed, but Perrin calmly tells him that these Aes Sedai have sworn to obey the Lord Dragon, and asks if Masema obeys him, too—the Dragon sent Perrin to stop the killing and bring Masema to him.

Masema answers that he will obey his summons, but recoils at the idea of being touched with the One Power, calling it blasphemy for mortals to touch it.

“Perrin came close to gaping. “The Dragon Reborn channels, man!”

“The blessed Lord Dragon is not as other men, Aybara!” Masema snarled. “He is the Light made flesh! I will obey his summons, but I will not be touched by the filth these women do!”

Perrin considers having Masema knocked out and taken by force, but fears violence if anyone realizes what he and the Aes Sedai are doing. Sourly, he agrees that they will ride to Cairhien, rather than Travel, and wonders how they will manage to keep that long journey a secret.

Faile and Alliandre are hawking together, with Bain and Chiad nearby, and forty guardsmen looking after them. Maighdin serves as Faile’s maid. Faile is pleased with the recent change in Perrin. Now he ignores Berelain for the most part, and Faile no longer feels like she needs to curb her temper around him, or worry that he sees her as too weak to stand up to him.

Some of her people arrive to report that Masema has been meeting with the Seanchan. Faile can’t believe that Masema would ally with them, but Berelain points out that Masema hates Aes Sedai—and the Seanchan keep women who can channel as prisoners.

Faile decides she needs to ride and warn Perrin. Then they are attacked by seemingly hundreds of Aiel. Faile nearly escapes herself before her horse is shot out from under her. She fights, but is overwhelmed by a huge Aielman. She is stripped and brought to kneel beside Bain and Chiad, who have also been captured. The two Maidens protest, saying that Faile does not follow ji’e’toh and so cannot be made gai’shain, but fall silent when ordered.

Faile can’t fathom how the Shaido could be here. Maighdin, Alliandre, Arrela, and Lacile are also captured. As they are forced to march, Faile realizes that Berelain is the only one who escaped.

Egwene rides beside the column of initiates, considering how, in the month since she opened the novice book to all interested women, the number of novices has risen to almost a thousand. Egwene is mostly uncomfortable because two sisters brought in a group of girls from Emond’s Field, who are having a very hard time accepting that Egwene, the innkeeper’s daughter, is the Amyrlin Seat.

Siuan and Bryne seem to be getting along now, which surprises Egwene, and Sheriam has been growing more and more diligent in her role as Keeper. The Hall has continued to give Egwene trouble in every area they can manage—but continues to obey in all matters concerning Elaida. Romanda and Lelaine’s animosity towards each other continues to be useful to Egwene.

On Egwene’s order, thirteen linked Aes Sedai open a gateway a hundred paces across in the field before them. On the other side of the gateway snow is falling too thickly for Egwene to see far, but she still imagines she can see Tar Valon in the distance.

“It has begun, Mother,” Sheriam said, sounding almost surprised.

“It has begun,” Egwene agreed. And the Light willing, soon Elaida would fall.

Many rumors cross the land, rumors that Elaida has crushed the rebels, rumors that the rebels have put her head on a pike. Rumors that the Dragon Reborn has been broken and bound to the Aes Sedai, rumors that the Aes Sedai have been bound to him, and to the Asha’man. Rumors that the Seanchan have allied with the Dragon Reborn, rumors that he has cast them into the sea.

Across the nations the stories spread like spiderweb laid upon spiderweb, and men and women planned the future, believing they knew truth. They planned, and the Pattern absorbed their plans, weaving toward the future foretold.

I love that chapter 31, which has the traditional little afterword about how the rumors of these events spread across the world, is titled “Beginnings.” The opening of every book in the series always reminds us that there isn’t one big Beginning but that there are many beginnings, and I did feel as though a certain chapter was closing at the end of The Path of Daggers, and a new chapter will begin with Winter’s Heart.

I have also now written the word beginning too many times, and it has lost all meaning.

Both Rand and Egwene have now established themselves in their respective roles, insofar as they have been recognized by a good many people as being the Dragon Reborn and the Amyrlin Seat. They have both established a base of power, and both have faced the first tests of that power. However, when it comes to actually hanging on to the titles that they have acquired, and using their power to further ends, they are both still somewhat untested. Rand’s methods of uniting people under him has mostly been through conquering places and using people’s fear of him, and I think it’s pretty clear that this strategy will only take him so far. He needs willing allies, and to be someone who people want to follow. Someone who people trust. That won’t be an easy feat to accomplish, given the preconceived notions that people have about the Dragon and the knowledge of the taint on saidin, of course, but as impossible as it probably seems to him, I am certain that it is necessary. I suspect this will also be part of Cadsuane’s lesson.

And if Rand’s alluded-to plan to cleanse saidin works, that would certainly be a big step in earning the world’s trust. People won’t just lose their fear of male channelers overnight, but such a feat would show Rand in a really positive light, not only as someone who is doing Good, but as someone who can achieve things that even other channelers would think impossible. The thinking might be, if the Dragon can get rid of the taint, maybe he can also actually win the Last Battle.

Egwene is still untried as Amyrlin. She’s achieved what she has so far through political maneuvering, but she hasn’t been the Amyrlin long enough for us to see the results of her decisions. This attack on Tar Valon will be the first test of those decisions, and the results will shape the future of the Aes Sedai in a number of ways that I imagine no one, not Egwene or Siuan or anybody, has yet anticipated. Hopefully, Egwene’s Aes Sedai will be able to reunify the Tower under their very new, very young Amyrlin, but I imagine there will be complications in that, even if their army is able to defeat Elaida’s.

And of course, the Black Ajah is still in the Tower, and Egwene still has “Halima” and Delana with her—probably some other Black Ajah members as well. (Sheriam? Maybe?)

Perrin is also at a turning point, I think. Although he’s still uncomfortable with the idea of being a lord, he’s starting to accept it as an unfortunate necessity. He’s coming to some kind of equilibrium with Faile, with his wolfbrother nature, and with his identity as someone who doesn’t like violence, but sometimes must participate in it. But at the same time, all these relative moments of balance are about to be challenged, with Faile’s kidnapping, with the return of Elyas, and with the question of what to do about Masema. I have a feeling that in the next book, Perrin is going to be forced to face his demons in a whole new way, and might come to some interesting and surprising realizations.

I think Rand will have a similar journey, and hopefully he and Cadsuane will come to some kind of understanding, some kind of truce, that Rand can live with and that can help take him and the Asha’man to a better place. If the taint can be cleansed and Rand’s personal fear of vulnerability be mitigated, both he and his Asha’man are going to look very different than they do now.

Speaking of Asha’man, Taim showing up to report that Gedwyn and Rochaid are deserters right after they tried to kill Rand seems incredibly suspicious to me. It’s like reporting your car stolen right after you committed a crime in it—the timing is just too on the nose. Not to mention the question of how Taim would even know that the two have gone AWOL—if they were with Rand in Cairhien, Taim would have no way of knowing that they weren’t where they were supposed to be until someone reported it to him, and I don’t think there has been enough time between the explosion and when Taim shows up for any of the other Asha’man to know for sure that everyone isn’t accounted for.

At this point I feel like Taim just about has to be a Darkfriend. But there’s always still a chance that he’s Rand’s enemy but not technically sworn to the Dark. Taim’s open hatred for Rand has been clear since day one, and he’s obviously tried to undermine Rand wherever he could, making the Black Tower his own and giving many of the other Asha’man the same disdain for Rand that he so clearly carries. It’s even possible that Taim has convinced himself that Rand isn’t really the Dragon, or that, Dragon or no, Taim himself could act in Rand’s stead during the Last Battle. Or something along those lines. He is a channeler of saidin, after all, which means that the taint is working upon his mind—some kind of extreme delusion of grandeur like this would make sense in that context.

The thing that is throwing me is how little Rand seems to suspect Taim. Most of my questions about Taim come from a narrative perspective. Could he be a red herring to distract us from some other Darkfriend in Rand’s periphery? Is it so obvious it’s too obvious? How much of Rand’s hatred of the man comes from Lews Therin? Etc. But if I were Rand, I feel like I’d be pretty certain Taim is a Darkfriend, especially after this. All four of these “deserters” seemed very loyal to Taim, and, again, the timing is so suspicious. As Taim’s timing always is. As is his obvious hatred of Rand, and the hatred he is clearly instilling in other Asha’man. Rand hates Taim, as well—though he may be putting that down to Lews Therin’s influence?

Taim being surprised that Dashiva is also among those who tried to kill Rand is interesting, but doesn’t really point one way or another. If Dashiva is Osan’gar, he might not choose to reveal his true identity to regular Darkfriends—even Asan’gar is keeping that a secret, using other methods to secure Delana’s cooperation and service. If Taim is a Darkfriend and ordered his men to kill Rand, it makes sense if he didn’t think Dashiva would be involved. On the other hand, if Dashiva was the one who orchestrated the attack, not Taim, then Taim’s surprise might just be because he had heard about the others but not Dashiva.

Only, again, how would he have heard about them? That’s the question that feels most important to me, and I also think that it makes narrative sense for Taim, Rand’s second, to be a Darkfriend. Jealousy of Lews Therin drove so many of his closest friends to swear to the Dark, after all. And the more I turn it over in my head, the more I think that Taim almost has to have been involved in orchestrating this attack on Rand, and that he’s either a Darkfriend or that his taint madness has taken a Padan Fain route and focused in specifically on Rand as an enemy that must be destroyed.

Meanwhile, Perrin is dealing with a very different kind of madman. I can’t help wondering if there’s more to Masema’s actions than we understand, possibly some kind of manipulation by the Forsaken. There isn’t really anything specific to indicate this, but given the Dark One’s directive to sow chaos in the land and how the Forsaken seem to have a hand in destabilizing every other major power in the story, it seems unlikely that they wouldn’t at least be monitoring what’s going on with the man, and possibly encouraging his more unhinged and violent tendencies. His hatred of Aes Sedai is pretty strong given that he doesn’t have any specific reason for it—he’s Shienaran, so would have been raised with respect for Aes Sedai, and hasn’t had any bad encounters with them as far as we’ve seen. Since he saw Rand fighting Ishamael in the sky over Falme, you can see how he got the idea that the Dragon Reborn is something more than a human being. But the idea that Rand is “the Light made flesh” comes a little too close to the idea that some of the Forsaken have that they have become something more than human.

Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but it feels like there’s probably something about Masema that we haven’t encountered yet. Maybe it has to do with these talks with the Seanchan. Berelain’s point that Masema might like the Seanchan because of their ability to enslave Aes Sedai makes sense, but I can’t really think what the Seanchan would want from him. He and his people are exactly what the Seanchan despise in a culture, and Masema doesn’t have enough power to be a real threat to the Seanchan, as far as I can tell. However, if he is being manipulated or used by the Dark, there might be a reason for Suroth, specifically, to be in contact with him.

And speaking of manipulation, I was curious if any of the da’tsang Aes Sedai who came to swear to Rand were under Verin’s pseudo-compulsion trick… and then I went back and checked the Prologue and sure enough, Beldeine was one of the women she worked with while in the Aiel camps. This is, no doubt, why each of these women had their own very different reasons for deciding to swear to Rand—Verin’s more convoluted, weaker version of compulsion requires the subject to find their own reasons to obey.

That might also explain Min’s viewing that each woman would serve Rand “in her fashion.” They have sworn to obey him so unless one of them is Black Ajah (which would raise some different questions about the power of Verin’s weave) they will have to stick to those oaths. But if their motivations to serve aren’t to actually help Rand, that might have some interesting results.

I found Rand’s upset over Elayne both amusing and heartbreaking. Amusing because, as Min points out, Rand is basically sulking because he thinks the woman he likes doesn’t like him, like a boy in a teen movie. There’s definitely some classic Robert Jordan-style “men and women communicate so differently they can’t understand each other” here, especially with the reference to the two different letters Elayne wrote to Rand, way back… whenever it was. I had forgotten all about them, but I think that was also the last time they saw each other in person. In my mind Rand took those letters far too seriously, and it’s interesting that he never guesses that Elayne might be nervous about the same thing that Rand is nervous about—giving someone else too much power over her heart.

We learn in chapter 29 that Perrin and Faile are communicating better because Elyas has been giving Perrin advice on handling Saldaean women. It’s nice to see that they’ve been able to bridge that gap between them—although again, I feel like Faile could have just been straight with her husband about the kind of behavior she expects from him. I did have a little more empathy for Faile when the narrative acknowledged that she was thinking about the fact that Perrin isn’t Saldaean, and that she was aware that her hurt and upset was emotional, not strictly logical.

I’m not really one for the old-school heteronormativity that’s written into the interactions between men and women in this story, regardless of their different cultural trappings, but I do appreciate how the Saldaean culture makes the power play between the genders overt, rather than covert. There’s an honesty there I can appreciate, though I suppose that it’s also part of the reason I’ve been so irked with Faile when she wouldn’t just spell out the dynamic for Perrin.

Rand, meanwhile, can’t seem to figure out why Elayne might want (and need) to make her claim to the Lion Throne without his help, or that her personal care for him might not be in play when she is working the political side of her life. On the one hand, that feels a little silly of him, and that’s where we get the sulky side that Min is so exasperated (and a little bit amused) by. But on the other hand, I think that this reaction speaks to how little Rand is able to separate the different aspects of his identities. He doesn’t really think of himself as a person anymore, doesn’t think of Rand al’Thor as being a man outside of the legendary, prophesied Dragon Reborn. For him, there is no difference between Elayne tearing down the Dragon Banners and Elayne telling him to his face that she doesn’t love him. I think this part of his and Min’s exchange really covers exactly how he’s thinking.

“Haven’t you twisted yourself into knots to make sure she got the throne of Andor? Which is hers by right, might I add. Didn’t you say you wanted her to have Andor whole, not ripped apart like Cairhien or Tear?”

“I did!” he roared. “And now it’s hers, and she wants me out of it! Good enough, I say!”

Even when Min points out that everything has worked out politically just as Rand wanted, and reassures him several times that she knows Elayne loves him and wants to see him, Rand doesn’t so much reject her words as seem unable to hear them.

Of course, Rand’s deep-seated self loathing is also a factor here; he thinks of himself as a monster whose soul is damned, and he anticipates rejection at every turn. No doubt part of the reason he is so worked up is that he really does believe that Elayne is safer if she doesn’t want to be with him, but also he still wants her to be with him. No doubt he feels terribly ashamed over that. We also know that he feels shame over the fact that he’s kind of in love with three different women, which further complicates his ability to engage sensibly with his own emotions.

I really, really appreciated Lews Therin’s comment (and there’s a sentence I didn’t anticipate writing) that “Eagles and women can only be kept safe in cages.” Rand and Perrin have both really struggled with their own fear of losing the women they love, which is of course understandable, but it does come with a desire to curtail their lovers’ freedom. Perrin has had to accept that Faile won’t always stay behind, that she is the kind of person who rides into danger and who will always insist on being included in important tasks and journeys (an acceptance that will no doubt be hard to hang onto now that she’s been captured). Rand has tried to take care of all of Elayne’s obstacles to obtaining the Lion Throne, to “gift” it to her, and is angry and hurt that she is rejecting his help, even after Min points out that Elayne has her own right to the throne, outside of Rand’s designs for it.

And yet he has also tried to run from all the women he loves, determined that he is too dangerous to allow any of them close to him, and has really struggled with their insistence that they get to make their own choices. This is the same problem he is having with the Maidens—Rand knows that he has promised to take them into battle, knows that they experience pain and shame when he doesn’t keep that promise. He knows that for the Maidens dying is considered part of life, that they have chosen the life of warriors and that they view dying as something to be embraced, when necessary, not feared or avoided. And yet still he tries to control something that is not his right to control. His pain is understandable (and amped to a fever pitch by Lews Therin’s pain regarding Ilyena), but rather than confront that pain, he chooses to let it fester, to wallow in it, and the Maidens continue to feel shamed by his actions. Not only that, his refusal to accept their agency, to accept Elayne’s agency, is leading to him losing the little emotional support he has left. Only Min remains, now, and she has been very careful in the ways she challenges him, backing down more often than not. I’m not sure what would happen if she were to be more forceful.

I suppose I should be a little more fair to Faile here, now that I think about it. Perrin’s desire not to yell at her, to treat her softly and with kindness is not about thinking her fragile, as Saldaean culture believes—that’s just the kind of person Perrin is. He doesn’t like yelling or being angry, even outside of the cultural context of how a Two Rivers woman would expect to be treated. But from a Saldaean point of view, part of a man arguing forcibly with, and even shouting at, his wife is to prove that he doesn’t believe he has to protect her from himself. Proving that he believes her strong enough to stand up to him, and to have a different opinion than him, and thus, to have her own overt agency in their relationship. I may quarrel with how this expression is made, but I have to respect Faile’s desire for it.

I haven’t touched on Fedwin’s death at all this week, but that’s because I’ve realized I had so much to say about it that it deserved its own essay. That will be next week’s post. In the meantime I’m left musing about the future, about how Mat is doing and if Rand’s defeat of the Seanchan is affecting him, and how long it will take Nynaeve to get Lan’s bond transferred to her. A while, maybe, since they’re in Caemlyn and Myrelle is with Egwene, about to take on the siege of Tar Valon.

That’s going to really be something, I think.

Sylas K Barrett is still quite ill, and would like a visit from the Yellow Ajah, please. Also, fantasy and historical books always make hawking sound so fun.

The post Reading The Wheel of Time: Not the Beginning, but a Beginning in Robert Jordan’s The Path of Daggers (Part 16) appeared first on Reactor.

“We try to use a lot of circular motifs, both visually and storytelling wise, where you see something and then you come back around to it at the beginning or end of an episode or season, or even sometimes across two seasons,” series showrunner Rafe Judkins told me in an interview that took place after the writers’ strike officially ended. “That feeling of repetition and the circular nature of time—I think it gives something subconscious to the audience that lets them get some of that Wheel of Time philosophy as they’re watching the show.”

Judkins and I talked about this and several other aspects of season two, including some things that happen in the finale. Read on for our full discussion, which touches on the expansion of Liandrin’s character, how he and his writing team created the story arc for Moiraine and Lan, and how the finale hints at what’s to come for certain characters.

And warning! Some spoilers for the season two finale of The Wheel of Time lie below.

This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.

I noticed with the finale, that it starts out with Ishamael in the past, but there’s also a circle motif similar to what we saw in the very beginning of the first episode with the Darkfriend social. Was that intentional, to have that circular wheel imagery, so to speak, at the beginning and end of the season?

We try to use a lot of circular motifs, both visually and storytelling-wise, where you see something and then you come back around to it at the beginning or end of an episode or season, or even sometimes across two seasons. That feeling of repetition and the circular nature of time—I think it gives something subconscious to the audience that lets them get some of that Wheel of Time philosophy as they’re watching the show.

Is there any particular use of that during season two that you were especially proud to get into the season? 

I like that we had those two scenes at the beginning. It was purposeful to have the cold opens of episode one and episode eight, and also to have the cold open of episode eight of season two be back to the Age of Legends the same way the cold open of episode eight of season one was—these are the two times we see Lews Therin, and we have this circularity continuing to come back to them.

Another character I am excited to talk to you about is Liandrin. I don’t know what it says about me but she’s one of my favorite characters in the season. Her character and what we know about her background has been expanded from the books. When you were creating season two, what was behind the decision to give her more of that depth in her background, including specifically the decision to give her a son?

There were a couple of things at play in expanding Liandrin’s character. First and foremost, she just has a lot of action in the books and when that comes to screen, she does a lot of the bad guy things that get done across these next few seasons. So really understanding who she is and why she’s doing the things she does was really important to us. We’re also building towards where, in the books, there’s a big confrontation between Nynaeve and Liandrin, in terms of Nynaeve spending an entire two books hunting for Liandrin and trying to find her. So we wanted to give emotional underpinning to that as well—what is the relationship between these two women before Nynaeve is sent to hunt her?  I see her as a mentor figure for Nynaeve within the Tower where we can learn a little bit about what she’s learning too.

And then the final piece we expanded with Liandrin was seeing her son. We tried a couple different times this season to give very clear visual storytelling to the idea that Aes Sedai age more slowly than other people, both with Liandrin and her son and Moiraine and her little sister. I think it’s really important when you’re adapting something like that—that’s something that you can say, but unless you see it and experience it emotionally through characters that are dealing with something because of this aging, that piece of mythology won’t really sink into the audience’s mind until they get a story about that. And it also simultaneously gives us more context on Liandrin and who she is and why she does what she does.

Another thing that we have in season two that’s new from the books, is Moiraine being stilled. What was the thought around having her go through that and also, how did you come up with the mechanism to do so?

In the books, Moiraine and Lan disappear for book two almost entirely. They have one chapter where they’re at Tifan’s Well with two retired Aes Sedai who are working on their history of the world since the breaking, and they’re struggling, with Moiraine trying to drive Lan away and him saying he’s not going to leave her, and they have a really big fight in that scene.

We tried to take all the seeds that were planted in that chapter in book two and figure out ways to expand them out to make a season two story, because you have Rosamund Pike and Daniel Henney, and you can’t really just drop them for a season, after the first season.

We really tried to look at what’s there in the books and take that and then expand outwards. And Moiraine is really feeling a sense of powerlessness in the face of what she’s up against. She’s feeling unprepared to take on the Dark One, unprepared for the Last Battle, she feels that she doesn’t have all the knowledge that she needs in that chapter in the book. And so what we really tried to do in season two was take that and make it even bigger in the show, to really understand that Moiraine is stripped of everything that we identify as who she is. She’s stripped out of being an Aes Sedai. She’s stripped of her power. She’s stripped of her relationship with Lan, her Warder. You really take the character down to bare bones, see what really exists there at the core, and then start to build her back up. And we’re lucky that we have an actress like Rosamund Pike, who can give you all those levels. And so when you see her restored to herself at the end of the season, you actually look at that character and understand her in a much deeper way than you did in season one.

In the finale, we see Rand use his powers with intent and with deadliness. I’m thinking of the scene where he goes to rescue Egwene and faces the Seanchan leader. It’s very ominous because he uses the One Power to kill them all except one. I would love to hear the thought behind creating that scene, because it is so ominous and impactful. And I also realized, a bit after watching, that it reminds me of the Indiana Jones scene where Indy is facing off a guy with a sword and he just shoots him. Was that in your head as well when you were creating that scene?

One of the most iconic scenes in book two is the face-off between Rand and Turak. But we haven’t done the storyline of Rand doing the sword forms with Lan… yet. It’s a story that’s coming. And so, in order to deliver on that scene, what we tried to do was find another scene to pair it up with and there’s this really great scene in book three.

Season two is a lot of books two and three combined. You have the iconic fight between Rand and Turak in book two and then—there’s not very many scenes of Rand in book three, but in one of them, he kills all these bandits, and they all bow to him at the end of the scene. And it’s quite disturbing in the books, and it’s quite unsettling. And so finding a way to put those two scenes together was what we intended at the beginning of the scene. It gives this dual life to Rand—we really need the audience to see the amount of power he has, even when he doesn’t really know how to use it, so that you can start to fear him as much as admire him. 

In season two, Elayne and Rand aren’t together until a little moment at the end of the finale. And just knowing what happens in the books, what was the thought of putting that little hint of what’s to come with those characters in there?

It was something that was really important to us to just connect those two characters. They obviously have a huge arc in the books coming in front of them, and so to give them a moment that really signals to the audience who doesn’t know the books: “Hey, watch the relationship between these two because there’s something going on here.” I think that we succeeded in that and we also did a little hint to their meeting in the first book because Elayne is actually helping Rand after he hurts himself in their very first meeting in The Eye of the World. And so having her help him after he’s been hurt in their first meeting here, we thought it was like a nice touchstone for that.

Seasons one and two of The Wheel of Time are now available on Prime Video. Season three of the show is currently in production, though there’s no news when it will make its way to the streaming platform.

The post The Wheel of Time Showrunner Rafe Judkins Talks Season 2 Finale, Among Other Things appeared first on Reactor.

(Note: The comments section for this piece will most likely contain spoilers for the Wheel of Time series.)

Way back in November, Variety reported that Peaky Blinders star Daryl McCormack had been cast in an undisclosed role. Now, it’s official: he’ll be playing the role of Aram. According to the show’s Twitter account, he’ll be joined by Maria Doyle Kennedy (whom you might recognize from Orphan Black, Outlander, and plenty of other genre hits) as Illa and Narinder Samra (next seen in Netflix’s forthcoming adaptation of Shadow and Bone) as Raen.

Please welcome the Tuatha'an, our newest cast members to the #WOTonPrime family:

Maria Doyle Kennedy @mariadkennedy as Illa
Narinder Samra @kalaiedoscopes as Raen
Daryl McCormack @DarylMcCormack as Aram pic.twitter.com/Liovbt42R9

— The Wheel Of Time (@TheWheelOfTime) July 22, 2020

Here are all the casting reveals so far:

• Moiraine and Lan
• Nynaeve, Egwene, Rand, Mat, and Perrin
• Thom Merrilin, Loial, Padan Fain, Logain
• Alanna Mosvani and her two warders, Ihvon and Maksim
• Tam al’Thor 
• Leane Sharif
• Liandrin Guirale
• Kerene Nagashi
• Egwene’s parents, Mat’s parents, amd more!
• Eamon and Geofram
• Gill the Inkeeper

We have no word on how the production delay will effect the show’s release date, but we’ll give you the updates as they come!

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The title of chapter one is “Seeds of Shadow” and it is so long that I had to break this post up into two and I am sorry but everything in the Min and Amyrlin section seemed so important and I had to cover it all. So this week will be “Min and the Amyrlin” and next week will be “What All of Rand’s Enemies Are Up To.”

But before that, we gotta have another beginning that isn’t the Beginning, and another wind springing up somewhere because that’s how these books roll.

This time, the wind rises over the plain called the Caralain Grass. It passes Dragonmount and flows down to Tar Valon, where the Ogier-made buildings seem to grow out of the ground, rather than having been built, and the White Tower gleams at the center of the square where crowds of people mill about their business and a few approach the broad stairs leading up to the open doors of the Tower. These are petitioners, those with problems or questions they hope the Aes Sedai can answer. And among them, her cloak drawn up to hide her face, is Min.

Uncomfortably disguised by wearing a dress, Min is doing her best to act and stand like the other women she sees as she climbs the stairs and steps into the entry hall, where all the petitioners—mostly women—huddle nervously, waiting to be spoken to by the Accepted traversing the hall.

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The Shadow Rising

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She wondered what these people would do if they knew what she knew. Run screaming, perhaps. And if they knew her reason for being here, she might not survive to be taken up by the Tower guards and thrown into a cell. She did have friends in the Tower, but none with power or influence. If her purpose was discovered, it was much less likely that they could help her than that she would pull them to the gallows or the headsman behind her. That was saying she lived to be tried, of course; more likely her mouth would be stopped permanently long before a trial.

She told herself to stop thinking like that. I’ll make it in, and I’ll make it out. The Light burn Rand al’Thor for getting me into this!

Min is approached by an Accepted who introduces herself as Faolain. Min has actually met her once before, briefly, but Faolain doesn’t recognize her as Min lowers her head and respectfully explains that she has a question for the Amyrlin Seat. Suddenly, however, she catches sight of three Aes Sedai entering the hall, startling all the petitioners. Many of the visitors look scared or in awe, clumsily bowing and curtsying, a few even falling to their knees, but Min is struck for a very different reason. Her ability to see images and auras around people always shows her things around Aes Sedai, but the things she sees now are particularly gruesome. Blood, a skull, and a sickly halo cover the women, and although Min doesn’t always know what her visions mean, she knows this time—all three Aes Sedai are going to die on the same day.

Faolain speaking draws Min’s attention back, as she explains that the Amyrlin cannot see everyone, and that her next public audience is not for ten days. She insists instead that if Min explains her problem, she will be brought to the sister who can best help her. But Min is adamant, invoking the right of every woman to speak to the Amyrlin Seat, despite Faolain’s continued insistence that the Amyrlin is far too busy to see everyone. She gives her full name, Elmindreda, knowing that the Amyrlin is one of the few people who has ever heard it, and so it will mean something to her and not to Faolain or any of the other Aes Sedai. Eventually Faolain relents, and sends word to the Keeper of the Chronicles.

As Min waits, she catches sight of Sheriam, the Mistress of Novices, who seems to have bars floating in front of her eyes, and her face looks battered and bruised. Min is careful not to be seen by the woman, who would surely recognize her. A novice named Sahra arrives to take her to the Amyrlin, and every Aes Sedai they pass, even some of the servants, show Min images of violence and death. Sahra takes her discomfort as nerves about meeting the Amyrlin, and tries to comfort her, as Min struggles to keep pretending to be a stranger and not run ahead.

As they reach the Amyrlin’s door, however, the run into Gawyn, who is just leaving her chambers. He recognizes Min instantly, of course, and through him she learns that Elayne, Egwene, and Nynaeve have gone missing again. The Amyrlin claims they have been sent to do work on a farm as punishment for running away, but Gawyn does not believe it. Min finds herself glad that her friends aren’t in the tower, as her vision shows her that Gawyn, too, is going to be injured on the same day as the others she’s seen visions of.

She tries to reassure Gawyn, pointing out that if Elayne really is on a farm, she wouldn’t want him to know about it, and that pestering the Amyrlin won’t help in any case. Gawyn insists that it doesn’t make sense for it to be so secret, and that he can’t protect Elayne if he doesn’t know where she is. He mentions her “playing” at being Aes Sedai, and that she is not just his sister but also his future Queen, and Andor needs her.

Playing at being Aes Sedai? Apparently he did not realize the extent of his sister’s talent. The Daughter-Heirs of Andor had been sent to the Tower to train for as long as there had been an Andor, but Elayne was the first to have enough talent to be raised to Aes Sedai, and a powerful Aes Sedai at that. Very likely he also did not know Egwene was just as strong.

“So you will protect her whether she wants it or not?” She said it in a flat voice meant to let him know he was making a mistake, but he missed the warning and nodded agreement.

“That has been my duty since the day she was born. My blood shed before hers; my life given before hers. I took that oath when I could barely see over the side of her cradle; Gareth Bryne had to explain to me what it meant. I won’t break it now. Andor needs her more than it needs me.”

She notes his particular interest in Egwene’s safety as well, which Gawyn tries unsuccessfully to brush off. He also mentions that Galad is heartsick that Egwene is gone. They arrange to meet later, after Min is done speaking with the Amyrlin, in the practice yards where Gawyn is every day, learning swordplay. Min reminds him again not to make the Amyrlin angry with him, but he will not promise it. There is too much trouble brewing in the world, wars and rumors of the Dragon’s return, and he suggests, although doesn’t say, that the Tower is involved.

He scowled, and for an instant his face was that bloody mask again. More: a sword floated above his head, and a banner waved behind it. The long-hilted sword, like those most Warders used, had a heron engraved on its slightly curved blade, symbol of a blademaster, and Min could not say whether it belonged to Gawyn or threatened him. The banner bore Gawyn’s sigil of the charging White Boar, but on a field of green rather than the red of Andor. Both sword and banner faded with the blood.

“Be careful, Gawyn.” She meant it two ways. Careful of what he said, and careful in a way she could not explain, even to herself. “You must be very careful.”

Gawyn leaves then, and Min notes that Sahra is quite smitten with him, and will no doubt gossip about this encounter to all of her friends. Still, there’s nothing to be done about it. Sahra takes her into the chambers and introduces her to Leane, who recognizes Min immediately despite her attempts to hide in her hood.

“So you are Elmindreda, are you?” Leane said briskly. She was always brisk. “I must say you look it more in that dress than in your usual … garb.”

“Just Min, Leane Sedai, if you please.” Min managed to keep her face straight, but it was difficult not to glare. The Keeper’s voice had held too much amusement. If her mother had had to name her after someone in a story, why did it have to be a woman who seemed to spend most of her time sighing at men, when she was not inspiring them to compose songs about her eyes, or her smile?

“Very well. Min. I’ll not ask where you’ve been, nor why you’ve come back in a dress, apparently wanting to ask a question of the Amyrlin. Not now, at least.” Her face said she meant to ask later, though, and get answers. “I suppose the Mother knows who Elmindreda is? Of course. I should have known that when she said to send you straight in, and alone. The Light alone knows why she puts up with you.” She broke off with a concerned frown. “What is the matter, girl? Are you ill?”

Min, who has just seen a transparent, screaming mask of Leane’s face over her real one, does her best to school her features and asks to go in. Leane tells her to go, and Min hurries into the inner chamber, where she sees the decadent architecture from days gone by and simple furnishings that Siuan Sanche uses. Min tries to curtsy, not knowing how since she would normally be wearing boys’ clothing and making a bow instead.

Halfway down, with her skirts already spread, she froze like a crouching toad. Siuan Sanche was standing there as regal as any queen, and for a moment she was also lying on the floor, naked. Aside from her being in only her skin, there was something odd about the image, but it vanished before Min could say what. It was as strong a viewing as she had ever seen, and she had no idea what it meant.

The Amyrlin observes that Min is seeing things, and has her explain everything. Min tries to impress upon the Amyrlin the inevitability of a battle in Tar Valon, but the Amyrlin counters that she is only guessing at this part, that she doesn’t even know when this event is going to take place. Min is frustrated that the Amyrlin doesn’t understand that her visions are inevitable, as Moiraine has come to understand, and warns that she saw one Aes Sedai wearing a collar like the ones the Seanchan use, but the Amyrlin isn’t concerned about the Seanchan—she suspects the danger comes from the Black Ajah.

Min is shocked; Aes Sedai never brook even the suggestion of a hidden Ajah devoted to serving the Dark One, but the Amyrlin continues on, asking for the reason behind Min’s return. Reeling from the terrifying news about the Black Ajah, Min delivers the news that Rand has left, without Moiraine’s permission, and is on his way to Tear to retrieve Callandor, may even already have done so. The Amyrlin is frustrated at the news, and she and Min discuss how prophecies work, and how they are not there to tell Rand what to do, but rather to prove to the world the identity of the Dragon Reborn. She admits that she and Moiraine intended to guide him to the prophecies that they could be sure of, and tells Min off for objecting to their intention to control him.

“… Do you think we could trust to the Pattern, to his destiny, to keep him alive, like some story? This isn’t a story, he isn’t some invincible hero, and if his thread is snipped out of the Pattern, the Wheel of Time won’t notice his going, and the Creator will produce no miracles to save us. If Moiraine cannot reef his sails, he very well may get himself killed, and where are we then? Where is the world? The Dark One’s prison is failing. He will touch the world again; it is only a matter of time. If Rand al’Thor is not there to face him in the Last Battle, if the headstrong young fool gets himself killed first, the world is doomed…”

The Amyrlin also picks up on Min’s feelings for Rand, and Min admits the vision she had the first time she saw Rand, three women’s face, one of which was her own, and she knew that she was going to fall in love with him—as would the other two, although their faces were too blurred for Min to know who they were.

Having delivered her message, Min asks if she can go, but the Amyrlin denies her. She has other plans for Min… or rather, for Elmindreda. She decides the dresses won’t be enough to disguise Min from those who may have seen her in the Tower before, and decides curled hair and makeup will complete the image of Elmindreda, a young woman seeking sanctuary while she decides between two suitors. Min is horrified, but of course she has no choice.

Unbeknownst to the Amyrlin, however, there is someone besides Sahra and Gawyn who know of Min’s arrival—Elaida. The red sister saw Min enter the Amyrlin’s chamber and recognized her, knows that she had spent much time with the Amyrlin in the past and that she is a friend of Egwene, Nyenave and Elayne. And Elaida is furious with the Amyrlin for sending Elayne away where Elaida cannot find her.

Elaida possesses the ability of Foretelling, and her very first foretelling had been that the royal line of Andor would be the key to defeating the Dark One in the Last Battle. She’d kept the information to herself, and attached herself to Morgase as soon as it became clear that Morgase would be the next to hold the throne, at the expense of all other ambitions. She thinks that she could have been Amyrlin herself if her focus had been elsewhere, and now all her sacrifices are in danger of meaning nothing because Elayne has disappeared.

But it is more than just Elayne, there is also they mysterious Rand al’Thor, the ta’veren man who had spurred Elaida’s foretelling again, showing her chaos and strife for Andor and maybe the world. She knows Moiraine, who spirited Rand away from Andor before Elaida could question him ,is close with the Amyrlin: no one else seems to remember their close friendship, and how they had suddenly walked away from each other after they were raised to Aes Sedai. Elaida also knows that Siuan has had contact with the other two rumored ta’veren, Matrim Cauthon and Perrin Aybara, and all these details prove to the red sister that the Amyrlin is up to something.

Whatever Siuan was up to, she had to be stopped. Turmoil and chaos multiplied on every side. The Dark One was sure to break free—the very thought made Elaida shiver and wrap her shawl around her more tightly—and the Tower had to be aloof from mundane struggles to face that. The Tower had to be free to pull the strings to make the nations stand together, free of the troubles Rand al’Thor would bring. Somehow, he had to be stopped from destroying Andor.

She had told no one what she knew of al’Thor. She meant to deal with him quietly, if possible. The Hall of the Tower already spoke of watching, even guiding, these ta’veren; they would never agree to dispose of them, of the one in particular, as he must be disposed of. For the good of the Tower. For the good of the world.

The sudden thought that perhaps Rand al’Thor could also be a man who could channel stops Elaida in her tracks, or even one of the other ta’veren. It’s hard to imagine that even Siuan could be capable of supporting such a thing, but then again, Elaida has no idea what the Amyrlin is capable of.

Another sister, Alviarin of the White Ajah, hears Elaida muttering to herself and interjects over the other’s thoughts. Elaida considers her, knowing that the White and Blue Ajah stand together, but also that the Whites pride themselves at being logical and dispassionate. She asks Alviarin to walk with her and tells her everything she suspects, and while Alviarin points out that Elaida has no proof, Elaida is confident that she has made a beginning.

Okay, the way Min sees the deaths of the Aes Sedai is deeply creepy. I suppose I’m not really that surprised by how coolly the Amyrlin responded—Siuan is plenty self-possessed, and she’s not going to let Min see her alarm even if she is alarmed—but I hope she is taking Min’s visions seriously. Tar Valon has withstood so many attacks, and no doubt feels impenetrable even with Min’s gruesome news. And while I’m fairly sure the Amyrlin is right about the Whitecloaks not being a threat, (at least not yet, not at their current level of power) I think she is gravely underestimating the Seanchan. Sure, Rand and co were able to defeat them, but even with the strength of the Heroes of the Horn, Rand still had to destroy Ishamael in order for his forces to be victorious. We know more about their strengths than any character in the story currently does, and of course, there is the last section of this chapter to put the reader on their guard again.

Add to that the fact that the Amyrlin appears to believe that Min’s visions can be averted, while Min knows that they cannot, and we can see that there are some blind spots in Siuan’s vision. There’s also the still unseen danger of Elaida and her suspicions, plus there’s always a good old fashioned attack by the Forsaken—which seems unlikely to come too soon, but certainly isn’t outside the realm of possibility.

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I have to wonder about the bars Min sees across Sheriam’s face. The bruises she also anything, really, but I wonder if the bars are less about the coming conflict in the White Tower and more about something Sheriam is currently involved in. I had some questions in The Dragon Reborn about Sheriam’s handling of Egwene and the others, about the way she reacted to the discovery of the Gray Man’s corpse and the reason another one was found in her bed—it feels like there is something else going on with the Mistress of Novices than what we have yet seen, although I don’t know what that would be. But perhaps she is trapped by something, or maybe the bars across her eyes signify blinders, that she cannot or will not see something important that she really needs to see.

And as for Siuan, it might be a bit of a stretch, but the image of her lying naked on the floor reminded me of Egwene’s last trip through the ter’angreal. She saw herself as Amyrlin, and found herself in conflict with Elaida when she refuses to order Rand’s gentling. Elaida orders that Egwene be taken, and then Egwene is struck on the head by Beldeine. When she comes to, she is laid out naked on a table, in preparation for having her will forcibly turned to the Shadow by the thirteen Black Ajah channeling through thirteen Myrddraal.

Although Egwene was certainly herself in this experience, the similarities feel significant to me, especially since this section ends with a bit about Elaida’s suspicions and resentments towards Siuan. Is it possible that this fate lies in store for Siuan? I’m also reminded of the first time we learned about Moiraine and Siuan’s secret plans to find and guide the Dragon Reborn, way back in The Great Hunt (Chapters 4 and 5) when they discussed it at Fal Dara. The Amyrlin mentioned the danger of discovery, especially to her, and that they will both be stilled if their plot is discovered. She then goes on to talk about how “[o]nly twice since the Breaking of the World has the Amyrlin Seat been stripped of stole and staff,” and how an Amyrlin once deposed and stilled is kept around as a servant in the White Tower, to be an example to others.

This shows us that, if Elaida were to decide to unseat Siuan, stilling is definitely a part of that process, and I could see Min’s vision being related to that. Not sure why people have to be naked for these things, but both stilling and the tampering the Black Ajah would do involve interacting with a channeler’s connection to the True Source—either exploiting it or cutting it off. Also, both require the same number of women, thirteen, as we see from the attempted gentling of Rand in Egwene’s ter’angreal experience. So the processes seem to be fairly similar, and Min’s vision might indicate either. That’s my theory, anyway.

It’s hard to imagine what could cause so much death and destruction within the White Tower that even servants, not to mention Warders and Aes Sedai, are going to die. Even Gawyn’s going to suffer injury in whatever happens. I really felt for him in this scene, and I think it’s easy to overlook him when you have Galad around doing his tall, serious, duty-at-all-costs thing. But Gawyn shows us here that his sense of duty is just as strong, even if it does have more room for interpretation and lighthearted moments that Galad’s does. I was really struck by Gawyn’s description of swearing the oath at Elayne’s cradle, even though he was so young himself. It reminded me of Lan, really, and the sense of duty that he carries with him for a kingdom that died when he was still an infant.

It’s interesting to see people like Elayne and her brothers, like Lan, juxtaposed with the Two Rivers folk. They have known who they are, who they were meant to be, for their whole lives. Like the people of Fal Dara, that sense of duty and purpose is woven into them from birth. Meanwhile we have Nynaeve and Egwene and Perrin and Mat, and of course/especially Rand, who find themselves possessed of incredible powers and playing important roles that they could never have dreamed of, and for which they are not at all mentally prepared. Moiraine and the Amyrlin’s frustrations with Rand are understandable, from their point of view, but how could they reasonably expect anything different? How could they think Rand would handle such a change to his sense of identity, the arrival of such a huge and terrifying burden?

Which, I suppose, is kind of the point of the story.

Still, one wonders at what point the new generation will begin to outstrip the plans and understanding of the current one. Moiraine and the Amyrlin still have more knowledge and understanding of the Shadow than Rand, more education and channeling experience than Nynaeve and Egwene and Elayne. But one day Rand will surpass them in knowledge, and of course figure out saidin on his own. Not to mention how to fight the Dark One. And Nynaeve, Elayne and Egwene are already known to be more powerful than any Aes Sedai living… as soon as they can master their potential, that is. But that day will come, and after so long working and planning for this, I think that will be a very strange day for Moiraine and the Amyrlin, and for a lot of other people who have ruled kingdoms or been at the front lines of the fight against the Shadow. Now that the Dragon has arrived, he will pick his own champions and generals, and although I’m sure the older guard will play an important role in everything that is to come, they will find the burden of being the only ones planning, the only ones who know what is going on, shifted from them.

I wonder a lot about what it means in the Prophecy that the Dragon will break the world again. Those who read or hear that prophecy see it as portending certain, inevitable destruction, the kind of Breaking that happened last time. But it doesn’t necessarily have to be the same as what happened after the taint was placed on saidin. Certainly there will be violence and destruction in the Last Battle, but the Dragon’s return may herald change that is just as profound and yet not as terrible for humanity as the last one was. Elayne and Egwene taking charge of Andor and the White Tower, nations abandoning old grudges and alliances alike to follow the Dragon, at least one person figuring out how to wield saidin without losing his mind—these things will change the world forever, without anyone needing to raise a mountain or tear a city down in a taint-blinded fury.

But I digress. Poor, poor Min thought she was going to just walk in, deliver some news to the Amyrlin, and be set free? Honey, you know how these Aes Sedai work.

When it comes to the romances blossoming, I am starting to see what some of the commenters (back when I was still reading the comments) have pointed out in previous weeks, and which has been suggested by the effects Rand left in his wake in Jarra—the role the Pattern may play in who falls in love with whom. Min talks about it here in this chapter, how she barely knows Rand, how she tries to treat the viewing as a joke but knows that it is inevitable. And somehow that knowledge has already bred love inside her, as much as she wanted to resist it. The Pattern, and ta’veren power, is the only thing that really makes sense of such a reaction.

It reminds me of how the novelization of Star Wars Episode III suggested that Anakin and Padme were drawn to each other because the Force pushed them together. And it’s certainly more interesting to have a reason behind these feelings besides a bad fiction trope. But I have to admit, it’s a bit squicky, the show characters having so little control in something so intimate and purpose. No means no, the Pattern. But I guess the Wheel of Time doesn’t operate on a basis of consent. That’s kind of what fate is, I suppose.

In this section, we also get the Amyrlin explaining a bit more about the Prophecies of the Dragon and their purpose. The point that the Prophecies are not meant as guides for the Dragon Reborn but rather as guides for others to identify him is an interesting one. I was kind of getting that impression already, from how Moiraine handled Rand’s decision to go after Callandor and how Rand formed the erroneous idea that claiming Callandor would somehow “end” his struggles. Perhaps he was too caught up in his own doubts over whether or not he actually is the Dragon Reborn, but it also did seem like he thought fulfilling a Prophecy would change something in a drastic way, and there’s no real reason to think so. The Shadow was already convinced of his identity; killing Ishamael may have brought a reprieve, but it’s hardly going to ease the pressure on Rand’s shoulders. Quite the opposite.

And lastly, we have Elaida. She’s worried me since we met her, and I’m really glad that we’ve learned more about her story. I was actually surprised by the revelation that she had a fortelling about Andor being important in the Last Battle, but explains a lot. And proves she’s not a Darkfriend, which had still been up in the air for me. Now that we know that the Black Ajah are real, we know it’s a good thing that Moiraine and Siuan kept their knowledge to themselves, even beyond the danger of some of the other “good” Aes Sedai thinking that even the Dragon must be gentled. However, I’ve been remembering my early comments about the rampant distrust that Aes Sedai have for each other that is due in part to how they are trained, and how that could lead to a lot of problems. Here we have Siuan and Moiraine working one prong of a campaign against the Shadow and Elaida working another, and yet they are also working at cross-purposes to each other, to the detriment of both, especially if Elaida decides that the Amyrlin must be unseated. Of course, she doesn’t know this now, but what the Amyrlin has Elayne doing in the fight against the Black Ajah, not to mention Elayne’s connection with Rand, are probably exactly the reason Andor and its rulers will be so important when Tarmon Gai’don comes. Still, even if she did know the full picture… well, I get the impression Elaida would want to have the Dragon gentled. She is Red Ajah, after all.

Next week we’re going to cover the latter half of chapter one, in which we will catch up with Bornhald Jr and Mordeth-Fain, aka Ordeith, as well as High Lady Suroth, the Seanchan, and a prisoner who was not always called Pura.

Sylas K Barrett struggles a lot with the concept of fate in fiction, but is intrigued to learn more about how the Pattern works.

The post Reading the Wheel of Time: Death, Love, and Fate in Robert Jordan’s The Shadow Rising (Part 1) appeared first on Reactor.

(Note: The comments section for this piece will most likely contain spoilers for the Wheel of Time series.)

The latest from WOTonPrime is that Basel Gill will be played by Darren Clarke (Da Vinci’s Demons, Ashes to Ashes). Gill is the innkeeper of The Queen’s Blessing—a loyalist to Queen Morgase, and a good friend of Thom Merrilin.

The Wednesday surprises keep coming! Darren Clarke joins the cast of #WOTonPrime as Basel Gill. pic.twitter.com/q0wuSjtbwh

— The Wheel Of Time (@TheWheelOfTime) July 15, 2020

Here are all the casting reveals so far:

• Moiraine and Lan
• Nynaeve, Egwene, Rand, Mat, and Perrin
• Thom Merrilin, Loial, Padan Fain, Logain
• Alanna Mosvani and her two warders, Ihvon and Maksim
• Tam al’Thor and Daryl McCormack in an undisclosed role
• Leane Sharif
• Liandrin Guirale
• Kerene Nagashi
• Egwene’s parents, Mat’s parents, amd more!
• Eamon and Geofram

We have no word on how the production delay will effect the show’s release date, but we’ll give you the updates as they come!

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The Eye of the World: Book One of The Wheel of Time

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The post The Wheel of Time Casts Everyone’s Favorite Innkeeper! appeared first on Reactor.

I really enjoyed this chapter, even though the Seanchan are back and Suroth makes my skin crawl. For one thing, the narration seems to have tightened up a little in comparison to The Dragon Reborn—the pacing of this first section is similar to that of The Eye of the World and The Great Hunt, which is great. Also, I feel like this chapter really hit the perfect balance between reminding the reader of relevant information while also giving us new and exciting scenes. Even though I’ve been reading the books straight through without a break, I never felt overburdened by repetition of things I remember perfectly well; instead, I was excited to learn what everyone was up to, and to see how these events were sort of concurrent timeline-wise with the end of The Dragon Reborn.

On the north bank the River Taren, Dain Bornhald stands and watches the village across the river, as its inhabitants stand around and listen to Jaret Byar speak. Bornhald feels satisfied that the Children of the Light won’t have any trouble with them, and remembers his father’s advice, that if you let people think there is a chance to fight back then then someone will try it, which will lead to more fighting and killing. But if you put the fear of the Light into people first, and then assure them that they will be safe if they do as they are told, you won’t have any trouble.

He is watching Byar return on the ferry when he approached by Ivon, who informs Bornhald that three of the Tinkers from the caravan they have secured are missing. With a curse, Bornhald follows him into the trees, past a pile of dead mastiffs, the Tinker’s guard dogs, which Bornhald had his men kill, even though Tinkers never participate in violence and the dogs had been “mostly for show.”

Six men were all he had thought necessary to watch Tinkers. Even with stiff faces, they looked embarrassed. None glanced at the seventh man sitting a horse near the wagons, a bony little man with a big nose, in a dark gray coat that looked too big for him despite the fineness of its cut. Farran, a bearded boulder of a man yet light on his feet for all his height and width, stood glaring at all seven equally. The hundredman pressed a gauntleted hand to his heart in salute but left all talking to Bornhald.

“A word with you, Master Ordeith,” Bornhald said quietly. The bony man cocked his head, looking at Bornhald for a long moment before dismounting. Farran growled, but Bornhald kept his voice low. “Three of the Tinkers cannot be found, Master Ordeith. Did you perhaps put your own suggestion into practice?” The first words out of Ordeith’s mouth when he saw the Tinkers had been “Kill them. They’re of no use.” Bornhald had killed his share of men, but he had never matched the casualness with which the little man had spoken.

Ordeith rubbed a finger along the side of his large nose. “Now, why would I be killing them? And after you ripped me so for just suggesting it.” His Lugarder accent was heavy today; it came and went without him seeming to notice, another thing about the man that disturbed Bornhald.

Ordeith does admit that he took three of the Tinkers off into the woods to “see what they knew,” and who would have thought they’d have the guts to sneak away after?

Bornhald struggles to keep his frustration in check. He’s been ordered to cooperate with Ordeith by Lord Captain Commander Pedron Niall, although the details of the man’s position, and even who he is, have been left vague, as have the reasons he’s been ordered to take half a legion onto Andoran soil without permission. Bornhald doesn’t like Ordeith, but since he has his own reasons—revenge against Perrin Aybara for the murder of his father—he will put up with the unpleasant, suspicious man and the surly group of Children he brought with him.

They argue a little about whether of not Caemlyn will care about this invasion of what is technically their borders, and then Byar arrives to announce that the village has been subdued, and Bornhald gives the order for the crossing.

“We will scour the Two Rivers,” Ordeith broke in. His narrow face was twisted; saliva bubbled at his lips. “We will flog them, and flay them, and sear their souls! I promised him! He’ll come to me, now! He will come!”

Bornhald nodded for Byar and Farran to carry out his commands. A madman, he thought. The Lord Captain Commander has tied me to a madman. But at least I will find my path to Perrin of the Two Rivers. Whatever it takes, I will avenge my father!

Quite far from there, the High Lady Suroth stands on a terrace and looks out across a harbor and the Aryth Ocean. Attended by servants in sheer robes as she taps her long nails on the balustrade, she doesn’t see them any more than she would see furniture, but she is more aware of the the six Deathwatch Guards nearby.

She had worked something of a miracle in rallying most of the Seanchan forces after the debacle the High Lord Turak had led them to. All but a handful of the vessels that had escaped from Falme lay under her control, and no one questioned her right to command the Hailene, the Forerunners. If her miracle held, no one on the mainland suspected they were here. Waiting to take back the lands the Empress had sent them to reclaim, waiting to achieve the Corenne, the Return. Her agents already scouted the way. There would be no need to return to the Court of the Nine Moons and apologize to the Empress for a failure not even hers.

Now, in control of the forces and a set of Sea Folk islands, Suroth must retake the lands that “had been lost a thousand years ago,” lest she face the consequences of that failure. And to do that, she must deal with the man who claims to be the Dragon Reborn. She goes back inside two find three women waiting where she had left them, two sul’dam kneeling, and one damane, prostrate on the floor. One of the sul’dam, Alwhin, Suroth has a particular distaste for. Alwhin, is the only sul’dam ever raised to a Voice of the Blood.

Suroth doesn’t trust any sul’dam anymore, but she has no choice, since only sul’dam can control damane, upon whose abilities the very power of the Seanchan is built. She turns her attention to the woman on the floor, who was once an Aes Sedai but is now a damane called Pura.

Suroth asks Pura, not for the first time, how the White Tower is controlling the false Dragon, and Pura nervously insists that the Tower would never do such a thing, that they would capture the man and gentle him. Suroth rephrases the question, asking what Pura knows of Aes Sedai aiding this man, reminding the former Aes Sedai that he can channel, and that women channeling the Power fought Seanchan soldiers at Falme. Pura, clearly terrified and desperate to be believed, replies that she does not know, even after the other sul’dam, Taisa, delivers a blow through the a’dam at her neck.

“P-Pura does not kn-know.” The damane stretched out a hesitant hand as though to touch Suroth’s foot. “Please. Pura has learned to obey. Pura speaks only the truth. Please do not punish Pura.”

Suroth stepped back smoothly, letting none of her irritation show. That she should be forced to move by a damane. That she could almost be touched by one who could channel. She felt a need to bathe, as if the touch had actually landed.

Taisa’s dark eyes bulged in outrage at the damane’s effrontery; her cheeks were scarlet with shame that this should happen while she wore the woman’s bracelet. She seemed torn between prostrating herself beside the damane to beg forgiveness and punishing the woman then and there. Alwhin stared a thin-lipped contempt, every line of her face saying that such things did not happen when she wore a bracelet.

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Warrior of the Altaii

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Suroth raises one finger in a small gesture. Anyone born so’jhin—a Hereditary servant of the Blood—would have been trained from birth to recognize such a gesture, but it takes Alwhin a moment. Then she rounds on Taisa and orders her to remove the “creature” from the High Lady’s presence, then starts giving instructions for Taisa to first punish the damane and then to go admit to her own shortcomings and receive punishment in return. But Suroth isn’t listening; such discussions are beneath her notice, and she’s too busy in any case, trying to decide whether or not Pura is lying to her. She has heard that the women of the White Tower cannot lie, and they have tested it and found that no amount of punishment could force Pura to tell an outright lie, such as to say that a white scarf is black. But Suroth knows that it is still possible that Pura is being clever, holding something back behind a feigned inability to lie. After all, none of the captured Aes Sedai are as trustworthy as the damane brought from Seanchan—they do not truly accept what they are.

Suroth wishes she had the other Aes Sedai who was captured on Toman Head to compare answers with, but she has no idea if that woman is even alive, or if she was taken back to Seanchan. A few of the ships she was unable to gather after Falme must have made it back across the ocean, perhaps carrying the other Aes Sedai. Perhaps carrying news, too.

Suroth has since sent her own ship, full of careful reports and sailors certain to be loyal to Suroth’s family, back to inform the Empress of her doings. So the Empress knows what happened at Falme and Suroth’s intentions to go on, but Suroth has no idea what the Empress might think of the information.

Yet the Empress did not know everything. The worst could not be entrusted to any messenger, no matter how loyal. It would only be passed from Suroth’s lips directly to the ear of the Empress, and Suroth had taken pains to keep it so. Only four still lived who knew the secret, and two of those would never speak of it to anyone, not of their own volition. Only three deaths can hold it more tightly.

Suroth did not realize she had murmured the last aloud until Alwhin said, “And yet the High Lady needs all three alive.” The woman had a properly humble suppleness to her stance, even to the trick of downcast eyes that still managed to watch for any sign from Suroth. Her voice was humble, too. “Who can say, High Lady, what the Empress—may she live forever!—might do if she learned of an attempt to keep such knowledge from her?”

Suroth makes the dismissing gesture again and Alwhin, visibly reluctant, departs. Suroth makes herself find calm—no member of the Blood survives long without patience, after all. She goes back out to the terrace, all the servants still waiting, and looks out over the sea again.

To be the one who successfully led the Forerunners, who began the Return, would bring much honor. Perhaps even adoption into the family of the Empress, though that was an honor not without complications. To also be the one who captured this Dragon, whether false or real, along with the means of controlling his incredible power ….

But if—when I take him, do I give him to the Empress? That is the question.

Her long nails began to click again on the wide stone rail.

There is a certain parallel between the section with the Whitecloaks and the section with Suroth and the Seanchan. In both cases, we are dealing with people who exist in a very regimented and hierarchical societies (well, the Whitecloaks are a military organization, but being Children of the Light is their whole life, they don’t belong to other nations or places outside of the organization.) Both Bornhald and Suroth reflect on bits of wisdom that they have gleaned from others on how to control people, with Bornhald remembering his father’s advice and Suroth focusing always on what people of her status—the Blood—must do to maintain their positions, such as have a great deal of patience, and be aware of the precariousness of their position. She even remembers the saying about it, “On the heights, the paths are paved with daggers.”

But while Suroth has an abundance of patience, Bornhald doesn’t seem to have as much, although he’s doing his best to accommodate Ordeith, as he was ordered. I suppose I might be being to hard on Bornhald because I know the whole story behind Bornhald Sr’s death, while Bornahld is relying on second-hand information from someone who didn’t understand most of what was going on. The real person who is causing problems, of course, is Byar. He’s the one who got obsessed with Perrin in the first place, and the one who brought the news of Bornhald Sr.’s death and claimed it was Perrin’s fault.

Putting myself in Byar’s shoes for a moment, I suppose it makes sense that he’d get a little amped up about the wolf attack, and Perrin did show his hand by responding so profoundly to Hopper’s death. That Byar would be convinced that Perrin is a Darkfriend makes sense, but he became so focused on it that he’s now decided that Bornhald Sr.’s death must have been specifically Perrin’s fault somehow, even though Bornhald Sr. had previously told Byar not to be so overzealous and jump to conclusions. Byar was very loyal to his Lord Captain, and I wonder if he isn’t deflecting some of his own anger and guilt at being sent away, unable to participate in the battle that killed Bornhald Sr. Focusing the blame onto the one man Byar already had a vendetta against is probably a great way of redirecting his feelings. And now he’s passed those feelings on to Dain.

All this would be bad enough for the Two Rivers, but of course we also have Ordeith and his vendetta against Rand for not showing up in Falme. That the two should come together in this way is not surprising, narratively speaking. Ordeith made this promise an entire book ago, and we readers have Egwene’s Dreams of Whitecloaks coming to her home to warn us, even if she dismissed them as ordinary nightmares. Perrin also had a few such glimpses, if memory serves.

What is interesting about these antagonists, though, is how personal their motivations are. In Bornhald’s case, it’s revenge for the death of a loved one, which is about as personal as motivations can be, and Ordeith hates Rand because the Shadow made him a Hound to hunt Rand. It’s not like he knows Rand is the Dragon Reborn, and he probably wouldn’t even care if he did. Ordeith is just bound up in his own Mordeth-born malice and the pain Fain experienced as a Darkfriend; he wants to hurt people and lash out, and maybe also manipulate himself into a position of power, somewhere in between murders.

I suppose the contrast between him and Bornhald is a good setup, and might be relevant going forward. Although Bornhald is brutal in his own way—as is the entire organization—he doesn’t go for completely senseless violence, as we see from his reflections on his father’s teachings as well as from his response to Ordeith’s suggestion to kill all the Tinkers. Still, how well will that slight reserve hold when faced with finding Perrin’s people and Perrin’s family… but no Perrin? Will he care about restraining Ordeith’s hand then? Will he be driven, either by Ordeith’s temptation or just his own hunger for revenge, into greater brutality? Only time will tell, but I don’t have a particular lot of hope for him, however reluctant he currently is to collaborate with Ordetih.

Although now that I think about it, Verin and the girls encountered Whitecloaks, including Bornhald Jr, on their way back to Tar Valon after Falme, and Bornhald claimed that Byar told him that the Aes Sedai killed his father. Wonder if the story has changed, or if the rationale is that the Aes Sedai who fought at Falme (Byar took the damane for Aes Sedai) are certainly Darkfriends, and there with one and the same as the mysterious blacksmith who talks to wolves.

And I mean, I said that thing about senseless violence but he did have all those dogs killed. And yes, killing animals is not the same as killing people, but it’s certainly not a narrative moment designed to endear us to him. He knew the dogs were basically just show! He knows, too, that the Tinkers are non-violent, and I think the slaughter of their pets shows just how much disdain the Whitecloaks have for them as a people.

As far as the plot goes, I wonder if the presence of the Tinker caravan in this section will be relevant to what happens in later chapters, or if they’re just here to be Ordeith and Bornhald’s “kick-the-dog” moment, so to speak—to remind us of how evil they both are. But the three Tinkers Ordeith questioned did escape (you know, unless he did something else with them and is lying about it) so maybe they’ll be important. Perhaps they will carry word to someone about what’s happening in this neglected part of the world? And it also makes sense to have Tinkers around when someone’s going after Perrin’s home, since there has been such an important thematic connection between them. The killing of the mastiffs even reminds me of the Whitecloaks killing Hopper, and it brings back that suggestion of how much disdain these so-called “Children of the Light” have for so many of the beings around them. It’s different than Perrin’s conflict with the Way of the Leaf, which is more about moral responsibility and the ways in which evil can or should be fought.

Not much else to say about Ordeith yet, but boy are there things to say about Suroth. She’s just cold as ice, that one, very much the same as my impression of her from The Great Hunt, when Liandrin attempted to deliver Nynaeve, Elayne, and Egwene into her hands. And of course that encounter told us that she is also a Darkfriend, although it doesn’t come up in this section.

What does come up is how much more the Seanchan were able to rally after Falme than was indicated in the description of that battle. I was expecting them to come back, of course, but no one else is, as we saw from Siuan’s dismissive comments after Min mentioned seeing a vision of the a’dam around the neck of one of the Aes Sedai in the Tower. And indeed, it seems like everyone has forgotten about those mysterious conquerors who showed up so unexpectedly, were involved in that crazy battle at Flame, and were possibly the armies of Artur Hawkwing returned from across the sea. But the Seanchan apparently have very long memories, and have never forgotten that there was a Return promised to their people. And now we know that the duty of leading that Return, both its honors and its dangers, have fallen on Suroth.

And then of course, there’s poor Ryma, who is now called Pura by her Seanchan captors, and whose real name Egwene once promised to remember back when she, too, was imprisoned by the collar. Although Suroth can’t be sure if Ryma has some bit of strength left to resist her, we the readers know that she’s not lying here, both because of the Three Oaths and because we know that most Aes Sedai also believe that the Tower would gentle Rand. Ryma doesn’t know that he’s the real Dragon, and even if he was most of the Tower would still want to gentle him. That’s why Siuan is on such thin ice.

Plus we know what Ryma said to Egwene, that she was so close to giving in completely. I don’t know if it’s too much to hope that she might get rescued at this point, but… yeah I really want her to get rescued.

I loved the little detail about Suroth’s love of animals, and the paintings she commissioned for her screens, despite the fact that they are considered vulgar. Most of the other information about her that we’ve been given teaches us about how Seanchan society works, but this is one little element that tells us who Suroth actually is, under all that Seanchan rigidity. I imagine it’s difficult to have much of a personality in Seanchan society—its extreme stratification and focus on one’s place and purpose makes your identity much more about what you are—damane or sul’dam, so’jhin or of the Blood—than who you are as a person.

I had forgotten that we met Alwhin before, although I was briefly confused when we met Ailhuin Guenna back in The Dragon Reborn, because I felt like I recognized the name. In any case, Alwhin was the sul’dam who taunted Egwene so viciously after she was first captured, who seemed irked that she had not been able to secure a prisoner of her own that day and seemed to think she could do a better job of Egwene’s training than Renna was. I suppose that’s the knowledge that Alwhin has, which gives her a little bit of control, or at least an edge, over Suroth. The narration doesn’t say who raised Alwhin to the so’jhin, but I assume it’s something Suroth just did post Falme. It will be interesting to see where Alwhin goes from here, and how their dynamic develops.

I had already gleaned that much of the power of the Seanchan is built on the fact that they have damane, that they have subjugated those women who were born with the spark , who started channeling on their own without being first prompted by teaching. And as we know from Nynaeve and Egwene turning the tables on Renna and Seta (and most or all of the Seanchan don’t realize) the sul’dam, women who can learn to control the a’dam from the other end, are women with the ability to channel but who would never touch the power on their own without instruction. Makes you wonder what would happen if that fact became commonly known, though.

And now Suroth’s attention has turned also to Rand, and to the question if he is really the Dragon Reborn or not. I have no idea how she would go about capturing such a man—I suppose a large group of powerful damane might be able to subdue him, just as a large group of Aes Sedai might—or what the Seanchan might do with the Dragon Reborn once they caught him. Suroth seems to be fantasizing about a way to control him, which seems silly but I guess makes sense for a Seanchan perspective. That’s what the Power in women is to them, and although they just kill those men who exhibit the spark, I’m sure they’d love a chance to put them to more constructive use.

Next week we move on to Chapter Two, which is really a fantastic chapter, and does some really cool stuff with the Pattern and the Power. We get to catch up with Perrin and Faile, Mat and his cards, and Thom. We may or may not make it to Rand and Berelain—the second chapter is almost as long as the first, and more dramatic.

Until then, I wish you all a very lovely week.

Sylas K Barret is on vacation this week, and will be soaking up the sun while he does his reading for the upcoming posts!

The post Reading the Wheel of Time: An Array of Familiar Foes in Robert Jordan’s The Shadow Rising (Part 2) appeared first on Reactor.

I loved this chapter. It might be one of my favorite chapters to date, in fact. Meeting up with Perrin, Mat, and Rand both serves to remind us where they are and also show us how they’ve grown since the end of The Dragon Reborn (looking at you, Perrin). And then of course there’s the attacks, which are beautifully imaginative and described in perfect, vivid detail. It’s very cinematic, this chapter, and I could picture everything as though I were watching it on a big screen.

I have a lot of feelings and compassion for all three of our Emond’s Field boys this week, and I am so curious as to what could have caused these strange occurrences. Perrin and Mat believe it was Rand, while Rand thinks it was an attack by one of the Forsaken. Perhaps one of them is right, or perhaps none of them, but in any case, we must first return to the nation of Tear to find out.

The streets of the city, the taverns and inns, were all but empty in the muggy darkness, people keeping cautiously within their own walls. Who held the Stone was lord of Tear, city and nation. That was the way it had always been, and the people of Tear accepted it always. By daylight they would cheer their new lord with enthusiasm as they had cheered the old; by night they huddled together, shivering despite the heat when the wind howled across their rooftops like a thousand keening mourners. Strange new hopes danced in their heads, hopes none in Tear had dared for a hundred generations, hopes mixed with fears as old as the Breaking.

In his room in the stone, Perrin sits on the bed and watches Faile pace back and forth. He’s a little perplexed by her silence, and by the fear he can smell on her. She eventually stops when he scratches at the two weeks of beard growth on his cheeks, to remark that she thinks the beard looks good, looks right, on him, and although he complains that it itches, Perrin knows that he will still put of shaving it.

He asks her what’s wrong, and after a little prodding she admits that it seems like The Lord Dragon—Perrin tries to get her to call him Rand, but she responds that he is Perrin’s friend, not hers, if a man like that can even have friends—has lost interest in Perrin, and that Faile is considering leaving Tear. Since news of Rand’s arrival there is already starting to spread outside the city, Faile doesn’t think Moiriane will try to stop her.

Perrin agrees, annoying Faile, but he assures her that he would like for her to stay, but with the danger at hand, with the Dragon Reborn and the Forsaken about, perhaps it is better for her to leave. Faile explains that she doesn’t like sitting and waiting for one of the Forsaken to show up, or for the Dragon Reborn to kill everyone, the way he did in the Breaking. Perrin tries to assure her that Rand is not Lews Therin Telamon, though he also is, and trails off, wondering for himself whether Rand is doomed to Lews Therin’s fate.

Faile goes on to tell him that Bain and Chiad remarked that Moiraine sometimes asks where he or Mat is, which in Faile’s mind proves that Moiriane can’t watch him with the Power. Perrin doesn’t follow, and Faile accuses him of being trapped by Moiriane. They argue, but Perrin insists that he believes that he, as well as Mat, is part of Rand’s destiny somehow, and that he can’t leave if it means that Rand might fail.

“Might?” There was a hint of demand in her voice, but only a hint. He wondered if he could make himself shout at her more often. “Did Moiraine tell you this, Perrin? You should know by now to listen closely to what an Aes Sedai says.”

“I worked it out for myself. I think ta’veren are pulled toward each other. Or maybe Rand pulls us, Mat and me both. He’s supposed to be the strongest ta’veren since Artur Hawkwing, maybe since the Breaking. Mat won’t even admit he’s ta’veren, but however he tries to get away, he always ends up drawn back to Rand. Loial says he has never heard of three ta’veren, all the same age and all from the same place.”

Faile remarks that Loial is young for an Ogier, but Perrin stands fast in his assessment, that Loial thinks that Perrin is right about this and that Moiraine must to, given her need to keep an eye on him.

She was silent for a moment, and when she spoke it was in sympathetic tones. “Poor Perrin. I left Saldaea to find adventure, and now that I’m in the heart of one, the greatest since the Breaking, all I want is to go somewhere else. You just want to be a blacksmith, and you’re going to end up in the stories whether you want it or not.”

He looked away, though the scent of her still filled his head. He did not think he was likely to have any stories told about him, not unless his secret spread a long way beyond the few who knew already. Faile thought she knew everything about him, but she was wrong.

On the wall, Perrin’s axe and his blacksmith’s hammer hang next to each other, and Perrin thinks about how the hammer, designed to make things, actually weighs more but that when he holds them both, the axe, designed for war, feels much heavier. He wishes he could go back to being a blacksmith, go home to his family, but he knows he can’t. He takes the hammer down from the wall and brings it back to his seat, taking comfort in holding it as he explains how Master Lehhan always said that “you can’t walk away from what has to be done.” He asks Faile if she’s still going to leave, but she isn’t sure.

Outside in the darkness, a cock crowed.

Faile shivered and hugged herself. “My nurse used to say that meant a death coming. Not that I believe it, of course.”

He opened his mouth to agree it was foolishness, though he shivered, too, but his head whipped around at a grating sound and a thump. The axe had toppled to the floor. He only had time to frown, wondering what could have made it fall, when it shifted again, untouched, then leaped straight for him.

Perrin instinctively swings at it with the hammer in his hand, knocking the axe away, but it bounces off the wall and flies straight at him, blade first. Faile catches the handle, but the axe swings round in her grip and swings blade first towards her face, and Perrin is only barely able to knock it away with the hammer.

The weapon thrashed like a thing alive, a thing with a malevolent will. It wanted Perrin—he knew that as if it had shouted at him—but it fought with cunning. When he pulled the axe away from Faile, it used his own movement to hack at him; when he forced it from himself, it tried to reach her, as if it knew that would make him stop pushing. No matter how hard he held the haft, it spun in his hands, threatening with spike or curved blade. Already his hands ached from the effort, and his thick arms strained, muscles tight. Sweat rolled down his face. He was not sure how much longer it would be before the axe fought free of his grip. This was all madness, pure madness, with no time to think.

Perrin shouts for Faile to get out of the room, and when she refuses to leave him, he manages to grab the handle of the axe in one hand and hold it away from himself while he pushes her towards the door, managing to hold her and the axe long enough to get the door open and shove her outside. He continues to hold the axe away from his face, though just barely, as Faile beats at the closed door.

Just you and me, now,” he snarled at the axe. “Blood and ashes, how I hate you!” Inside, a part of him came close to hysterical laughter. Rand is the one who’s supposed to go mad, and here I am, talking to an axe! Rand! Burn him!

Perrin pushes the axe back, taking a full step from the door, then jerks the blade towards himself, adding his own force to the one driving the axe, and jumps out of the way. It buries itself deep in the wood of the door and instantly “the life goes out of it.” Still thinking of Rand and the madness that follows him, Perrin opens the door to find Faile on the other side, her hands frozen in mid-pound, having had the silver blade smash through the door only inches from her face. She throws herself on Perrin, kissing him and demanding to know if he’s okay, but once he assures her that he is unharmed, she reels back and slaps him so hard it makes his head ring.

They argue, she that he had no right not to allow her to help, he that he had every right, and although he acknowledges that she doesn’t like being treated as though she is fragile, Perrin assures her that if she asks him to watch her die, he “will tie [her] like a lamb for market and send [her] off to Mistress Luhhan.”

Faile laughed suddenly, a low, throaty laugh. “You would, too, wouldn’t you? Don’t think you would not dance with the Dark One if you tried, though.”

Perrin was so startled he let go of her. He could not see any real difference between what he had just said and what he had said before, but the one had made her blaze up, while this she took … fondly. Not that he was certain the threat to kill him was entirely a joke. Faile carried knives hidden about her person, and she knew how to use them.

She rubbed her wrist ostentatiously and muttered something under her breath. He caught the words “hairy ox,” and promised himself he would shave every last whisker of that fool beard. He would.

Faile turns the conversation to the axe must have been the Dragon Reborn trying to kill them. Perrin agrees that the attack must have been caused by Rand, but he doesn’t believe that Rand was trying to kill them. He decides to go talk to Rand about it at once, and Faile tucks her arm in his to accompany him, leaving the axe stuck fast in the door.

Meanwhile, Mat is holed up with a group of Tairen lords playing a game called chop with fancy, hand-lacquered cards. Mat would prefer dice, but the lords view it as a peasant’s pastime, so Mat has been compelled to learn.

Still, he had picked up the game quickly enough, and if his luck was not as good as it was with dice, it would do. A fat purse lay beside his cards, and another even fatter rested in his pocket. A fortune, he would have thought once, back in Emond’s Field, enough to live the rest of his life in luxury. His ideas of luxury had changed since leaving the Two Rivers. The young lords kept their coin in careless, shining piles, but some old habits he had no intention of changing. In the taverns and inns it was sometimes necessary to depart quickly. Especially if his luck was really with him.

When he had enough to keep himself as he wanted, he would leave the Stone just as quickly. Before Moiraine knew what he was thinking. He would have been days gone by now, if he had had his way. It was just that there was gold to be had here. One night at this table could earn him more than a week of dicing in taverns. If only his luck would catch.

The lords drink and smoke and discuss their relative luck at cards, as well as a lewd interest in Sea Folk women as they play. One of them, a man named Estean, is particularly drunk and goes on about how one would have better luck with the Aiel women in the tower, “like Mat here,” with all their spears and knives. It puts all the other lords off—the only more unsettling subject for the Lords of Tear would have been talking about the Aes Sedai. Mat does his best to ignore Estean and play the game. He adds an Andoran silver crown to the pot and is dealt another card.

Mat lifted it carefully with a thumbnail, and did not let himself so much as blink. The Ruler of Cups, a High Lord of Tear. The rulers in a deck varied according to the land where the cards were made, with the nation’s own ruler always as Ruler of Cups, the highest suit. These cards were old. He had already seen new decks with Rand’s face or something like it on the Ruler of Cups, complete with the Dragon banner. Rand the ruler of Tear; that still seemed ludicrous enough to make him want to pinch himself. Rand was a shepherd, a good fellow to have fun with when he was not going all over-serious and responsible. Rand the Dragon Reborn, now; that told him he was a stone fool to be sitting there, where Moiraine could put her hand on him whenever she wanted, waiting to see what Rand would do next. Maybe Thom Merrilin would go with him. Or Perrin. Only, Thom seemed to be settling into the Stone as if he never meant to leave, and Perrin was not going anywhere unless Faile crooked a finger. Well, Mat was ready to travel alone, if need be.

But Mat is also now one card away from having the best hand possible in the game, and he can feel his luck tickling in is mind. The other men have been betting furiously all night, but now most of them seem put off by the talk of the Aiel and disinterested in their cards. Wanting to get them back in the mood, Mat decides he needs to make them laugh at the Aiel.

“I might just try these Sea Folk women,” Mat said quickly, taking his pipe to gesture with. “Odd things happen when you chase Aiel girls. Very odd. Like the game they call Maidens’ Kiss.” He had their attention, but Baran had not put down the coins, and Carlomin still showed no sign of buying a card.

Estean gave a drunken guffaw. “Kiss you with steel in your ribs, I suppose. Maidens of the Spear, you see. Steel. Spear in your ribs. Burn my soul.” No one else laughed. But they were listening.

Mat continues his story, telling them how Rhuarc, Aiel clan chief, advised him that the best way to get to know the warrior women was to ask to play maiden’s kiss. So like a fool, Mat asked them to show him the game, and “[b]efore I knew what was happening, I had a fistful of spears around my neck like a collar. I could have shaved myself with one sneeze.”

The men at the table burst into laughter, and Mat lets them laugh, remembering the spear-points and the way Bain, also laughing, had told him that she’d never heard of a man actually asking to play Maiden’s Kiss before.

Carlomin stroked his beard and spoke into Mat’s hesitation. “You cannot stop there. Go on. When was this? Two nights ago, I’ll wager. When you didn’t come for the game, and no one knew where you were.”

“I was playing stones with Thom Merrilin that night,” Mat said quickly. “This was days ago.” He was glad he could lie with a straight face. “They each took a kiss. That’s all. If she thought it was a good kiss, they eased up with the spears. If not, they pushed a little harder; to encourage, you might say. That was all. I’ll tell you this; I got nicked less than I do shaving.”

He stuck his pipe back between his teeth. If they wanted to know more, they could go ask to play the game themselves. He almost hoped some of them were fool enough. Bloody Aiel women and their bloody spears. He had not made it to his own bed until daybreak.

But Mat’s story has done its job, and the lords start betting again as they comment on the tale and how, if the Aiel weren’t serving the Lord Dragon, they would take a hundred Defenders of the Stone and clear the Aiel out, which is a ridiculous claim, and then Estean tries to convince Mat should speak to “the Lord Dragon” about his most recent proclamation, which gave commoners had the right to call lords before a magistrate. His disdain, and the other’s, for the idea that a lord could ever be called in front of a magistrate, nevermind by a peasant, is clear enough.

Mat’s hand tightened on his purse until the coins inside grated together. “It would be a shame,” he said quietly, “if you were tried and judged just for having your way with a fisherman’s daughter whatever she wanted, or for having some farmer beaten for splashing mud on your cloak.”

The others shifted uneasily, catching his mood, but Estean nodded, head bobbing so it seemed about to fall off. “Exactly. Though it wouldn’t come to that, of course. A lord being tried before a magistrate? Of course not. Not really.” He laughed drunkenly at his cards. “No fishermen’s daughters. Smell of fish, you see, however you have them washed. A plump farm girl is best.”

Mat told himself he was there to gamble. He told himself to ignore the fool’s blather, reminded himself of how much gold he could take out of Estean’s purse. His tongue did not listen, though. “Who knows what it might come to? Hangings, maybe.”

Another lord, Edorion, cuts in, trying to steer Estean away from a conversation that is clearly angering Mat. They briefly discuss Estean’s marriage prospects in terms that set Mat’s teeth on edge just as much, to the point where he fantasizes about how he could easily hit Estean and none of them would stop him, since he is a friend of the Lord Dragon. Again Edorion steers the conversation, this time to the rumor that Rand is going to lead them to war against Illian. They are certain that the Illianers would surrender at once to the Dragon Reborn, and confident that Rand will then lead them to conquer the world in the name of the Dragon.

Mat is horrified at the idea of Rand starting a war, but when he demures the lords grow uncomfortable. Edorion even remarks that, while those in the city are of course loyal to the Dragon, it is rumored that some of the country lords are raising an army to take back the Stone. Of course, once Rand leads Tear to war all of that will go away.

Mat briefly feels like these men are vipers, whose loyalty to the Rand, the man who holds the Stone, won’t outlast their fear of the Dragon Reborn, and he has a brief moment of guilt over his plans to leave Rand here before remembering again what Rand is. Estean drunkenly mumbles again about fisherman’s daughters, and the lord Carlomin prompts Mat that it’s his turn to buy a card. Mat hadn’t been paying attention to the game anymore, but now he pretends to think for a moment and then tosses a coin into the pile.

He feels his luck click into place again, knows how the coin will land before it does, knows what his card will be before it’s dealt.

Sliding his cards together on the table, he fanned them in one hand. The Ruler of Flames stared at him alongside the other four, the Amyrlin Seat balancing a flame on her palm, though she looked nothing like Siuan Sanche. However the Tairens felt about Aes Sedai, they acknowledged the power of Tar Valon, even if Flames was the lowest suit.

What were the odds of being dealt all five? His luck was best with random things, like dice, but perhaps a little more was beginning to rub off on cards. “The Light burn my bones to ash if it is not so,” he muttered. Or that was what he meant to say.

“There,” Estean all but shouted. “You cannot deny it this time. That was the Old Tongue. Something about burning, and bones.” He grinned around the table. “My tutor would be proud. I ought to send him a gift. If I can find out where he went.”

Mat silently curses Moiraine for her part in this strange penchant Mat has found to speak in a language he doesn’t know, as well as the gaps in his memory, then draws the lord’s attention back to the game. It’s easy to forget the Old Tongue when he sees how much money he is about to make.

Outside in the darkness, a cock crowed. Mat shifted uneasily and told himself not to be foolish. No one was going to die.

His eyes dropped to his cards—and blinked. The Amyrlin’s flame had been replaced by a knife. While he was telling himself he was tired and seeing things, she plunged the tiny blade into the back of his hand.

With a hoarse yell, he flung the cards away and hurled himself backward, overturning his chair, kicking the table with both feet as he fell. The air seemed to thicken like honey. Everything moved as if time had slowed, but at the same time everything seemed to happen at once. Other cries echoed his, hollow shouts reverberating inside a cavern. He and the chair drifted back and down; the table floated upward.

Now life-sized, although still a painted, two-dimensional shape, the Ruler of Flame starts to step out of the card, blood on her knife and a cruel smile on her lips. The other cards also begin to grow and the figures to step out of their cards. Mat is still falling in slow motion but he is able to draw his knives seamlessly and hurl them at the figures, but then they, too, float slowly through the thickened air. Mat can see the Ruler of Rods, painted like the Queen of Andor, ready to crack his skull with her rod as surely as the dagger could cut him. Mat pulls two more daggers from his coat, managing to turn himself to throw it, and he’s looking around for the fourth card when suddenly the world lurches back into regular motion, and Mat lands on the floor.

For a moment he thought cards and figures had vanished. Or maybe he had imagined it all. Maybe he was the one going mad. Then he saw the cards, back to ordinary size, pinned to one of the dark wood panels by his still quivering knives. He took a deep, ragged breath.

The table lay on its side, coins still spinning across the floor where lordlings and servants crouched among scattered cards. They gaped at Mat and his knives, those in his hands and those in the wall, with equally wide eyes. Estean snatched a silver pitcher that had somehow escaped being overturned and began pouring wine down his throat, the excess spilling over his chin and down his chest.

“Just because you do not have the cards to win,” Edorion said hoarsely, “there is no need to—” He cut off with a shudder.

“You saw it, too.” Mat slipped the knives back into their sheaths. A thin trickle of blood ran down the back of his hand from the tiny wound. “Don’t pretend you went blind!”

Lord Reimon insists that he saw nothing, and all the lords scramble about collecting the coins, as Estean searches for more one and one of the servants prays. Mat strides to the wall to inspect the impaled cards, all back to ordinary paper again, but he can see before he pulls his knives free that the Ruler of Flame still has a tiny blade in her hand.

Mat tears each of the cards in two, then goes to find the other two that hadn’t had a chance to come to life and rips those up as well. The lords all avoid acknowledging him, and Mat knows there won’t be any more gambling in the near future, not with Mat, at whom the attack was so obviously aimed. He curses Rand’s madness under his breath and leaves the room.

In his bedchamber, Rand tosses uneasily in his sleep, moving from dreams of Moiraine and the Amyrlin trying to put him in a halter to a dream in which Min and Elayne try to get him to swim naked with them in a pond back home in the Two Rivers. Embarrassed at seeing them undressing, he turns and sees Egwene staring sadly at him. She turns and runs away, into the forest, but as Rand starts to follow Min and Elayne call out to stop him.

“Come back,” Elayne called, lifting a slim arm to beckon. “Do you not deserve what you want for a change?”

He shifted his feet, wanting to move but unable to decide which way. What he wanted. The words sounded strange. What did he want? He raised a hand to his face, to wipe away what felt like sweat. Festering flesh almost obliterated the heron branded on his palm; white bone showed through red-edged gaps.

Rand jerks awake, covered in sweat and aching in his side from the wound that Moiraine can’t fully heal, but relieved to see that he’s not yet rotting, and not yet mad. He feels foolish for having such a dream and is trying to put the thoughts out of his mind to go back to sleep when he realizes that he is not alone in the room. He can hear the small sounds of rustling movement in the darkness.

Callandor is across the room, too far for him to reach it, and Rand thinks that perhaps this person has come to steal it. Or come to kill the Dragon Reborn. Thom has warned him that he can’t trust the Lords of Tear, but it was a warning Rand didn’t need to know that the oaths of loyalty they swore were only because they had to.

Rand summons the Void and touches the True Source.

Saidin filled him like a torrent of white heat and light, exalting him with life, sickening him with the foulness of the Dark One’s taint, like a skim of sewage floating on pure, sweet water. The torrent threatened to wash him away, burn him up, engulf him.

Fighting the flood, he mastered it by bare effort of will and rolled from the bed, channeling the Power as he landed on his feet in the stance to begin the sword-form called Apple Blossoms in the Wind. His enemies could not be many or they would have made more noise; the gently named form was meant for use against more than one opponent.

He creates a sword in his hand, a sword of flame that doesn’t feel warm, and it has a heron on the blade just like the one that Tam had once given him. Callandor sits undisturbed where he left it, as does the ornate room with its porcelain and gold objects, ornate curtains, and the dusty books brought up from the Stone’s library.

“Now, where he had thought to see assassins, or thieves, one beautiful young woman stood hesitant and surprised in the middle of the carpet, black hair falling in shining waves to her shoulders. Her thin, white silk robe emphasized more than it hid. Berelain, ruler of the city-state of Mayene, was the last person he had expected.

After one wide-eyed start, she made a deep, graceful curtsy that drew her garments tight. “I am unarmed, my Lord Dragon. I submit myself to your search, if you doubt me.” Her smile suddenly made him uncomfortably aware that he wore nothing but his smallclothes.

Rand tells himself that he will not let her make him scramble to cover up, not after she snuck into his chambers in the middle of the night, but although his anger and embarrassment hovers outside the Void, he still feels his cheeks flush. He lets the sword vanish but holds onto a trickle of saidin.

He did not know much of this woman, except that she walked through the Stone as if it were her palace in Mayene. Thom said the First of Mayene asked questions constantly, of everyone. Questions about Rand. Which might have been natural, given what he was, but they made him no easier in his mind. And she had not returned to Mayene. That was not natural. She had been held captive in all but name for months, until his arrival, cut off from her throne and the ruling of her small nation. Most people would have taken the first opportunity to get away from a man who could channel.

“What are you doing here?” He knew he sounded harsh, and did not care. “There were Aiel guarding that door when I went to sleep. How did you come past them?”

Berelain’s lips curved up a trifle more; to Rand it seemed the room had gotten suddenly even hotter. “They passed me through immediately, when I said I had been summoned by the Lord Dragon.”

“Summoned? I didn’t summon anybody.” Stop this, he told himself. She’s a queen, or the next thing to it. You know as much about the ways of queens as you do about flying. He tried to make himself be civil, only he did not know what to call the First of Mayene. “My Lady …” That would have to do. “ … why would I summon you at this time of night?”

Berelain laughs, and Rand is suddenly very aware of her scanty clothing. She remarks that maybe she wants to talk, but drops her robe at the same time, leaving herself in only a very revealing nightgown. Rand struggles to be formal and polite as she insists that she must talk to him now, since during the day he is surrounded by Tairen lords and Aiel guards. She pushes back against his insistence, to the point where Rand even lies and claims to be promised to Egwene, but that only prompts her to insist that her aspirations are not to marry the Lord Dragon, and to insist that they are not so formal in Mayene. She asks if she can call him Rand.

“Rand surprised himself by sighing regretfully. There had been a glint in her eye, a slight shift of expression, gone quickly, when she mentioned marrying the Dragon Reborn. If she had not considered it before, she had now. The Dragon Reborn, not Rand al’Thor; the man of prophecy, not the shepherd from the Two Rivers. He was not shocked, exactly; some girls back home mooned over whoever proved himself fastest or strongest in the games at Bel Tine and Sunday, and now and again a woman set her eyes on the man with the richest fields or the largest flocks. It would have been good to think she wanted Rand al’Thor. “It is time for you to go, my Lady,” he said quietly.

She stepped closer. “I can feel your eyes on me, Rand.” Her voice was smoky heat. “I am no village girl tied to her mother’s apron, and I know you want—”

“Do you think I’m made of stone, woman?” She jumped at his roar, but the next instant she was crossing the carpet, reaching for him, her eyes dark pools that could pull a man into their depths.

“Your arms look as strong as stone. If you think you must be harsh with me, then be harsh, so long as you hold me.” Her hands touched his face; sparks seemed to leap from her fingers.

Rand channels suddenly, making a wall of air which pushes her back, as well as any of the objects on the floor of the room like her robe and one of his boots and some books and a footstool. Rand then ties off the flow, studies what he has done—he’s never channeled in this way before, but now that he’s done it he thinks he can understand how he did it.

He tells the frightened woman that she should arrange to travel back to Mayene as soon as possible, although he offers his promise to keep Tear from troubling her again as a sort of apology for wounding her pride and for frightening her. But Berelain has already regained her composure, and apologizes herself for handling things badly. She kneels, a picture of contrite and honest apology—although he notes that she somehow managed to tug her nightgown down even more—and begs him not to send her away. Rand is honestly impressed by her determination, but as he rebuffs her again gently a cock crows outside.

To Rand’s surprise, Berelain suddenly stared past him, eyes as big as teacups. Her mouth dropped open, and her slim throat corded with a scream that would not come. He spun, the yellow-red sword flashing back into his hands.

Across the room, one of the stand-mirrors threw his reflection back at him, a tall young man with reddish hair and gray eyes, wearing only white linen smallclothes and holding a sword carved from fire. The reflection stepped out onto the carpet, raising its sword.

I have gone mad. Thought drifted on the borders of the Void. No! She saw it. It’s real!

Rand slashes his fire-sword through the figure, which dissolves into nothing, but it only reappears in the mirror and begins to climb out again, and Rand is aware of movement in the other mirrors around the room as well.

Desperately, he stabbed at the mirror. Silvered glass shattered, yet it seemed that the image shattered first. He thought he heard a distant scream inside his head, his own voice screaming, fading. Even as shards of mirror fell, he lashed out with the One Power. Every mirror in the room exploded silently, fountaining glass across the carpet. The dying scream in his head echoed again and again, sending shivers down his back. It was his voice; he could hardly believe it was not himself who made the sounds.

But three figures of himself have still escaped the mirrors, and Rand is forced to defend against three perfect copies of himself, identical to him in every way except for their dead eyes and the hatred and hunger in their faces.

Rand only manages to hold them off because they attack separately and not together, but he is soon exhausted and bloody, and they each have the same skill that he does. Little cuts begin to add up and sap him of his strength, and he feels fear pressing at the Void, knowing that he can’t outlast them, and knowing that the walls are too thick for him to call to the Aiel for help.

Although the figures try to avoid his sword, they don’t seem to notice when his blows land, or to be slowed by any injuries. Rand leaps across the bed in an attempt to get a moment to breathe—the figures slash his mattress up and then one starts to climb over while the others circle around.

Rand shuddered as pain stabbed his hand on the table. An image of himself, no more than six inches tall, drew back its small sword. Instinctively, he grabbed the figure before it could stab again. It writhed in his grip, baring teeth at him. He became aware of small movements all around the room, of small reflections by the score stepping out of polished silver. His hand began to numb, to grow cold, as if the thing were sucking the warmth out of his flesh. The heat of saidin swelled inside him; a rushing filled his head, and the heat flowed into his icy hand.

Suddenly the small figure burst like a bubble, and he felt something flow into him—from the bursting—some little portion of his lost strength. He jerked as tiny jolts of vitality seemed to pelt him.

When he raised his head—wondering why he was not dead—the small reflections he had half-glimpsed were gone. The three larger stood wavering, as if his gain in strength had been their loss. Yet as he looked up, they steadied on their feet and came on, if more cautiously.

Rand knows that he can’t fight the reflection people forever, and as much as it disgusts him to imagine absorbing them, he feels like it’s his only chance. If only he can figure out how he did it the first time. On a hunch, and needing to get close to them, he vanishes his flaming sword and the three figures’ swords disappear as well. The appear momentarily confused, then all tackle him at once.

Rand feels himself growing cold as they suck the heat out of them, and he can even see their eyes begin to take on more life. He knows, somehow, that if they manage to destroy him they will then turn on and absorb each other until only one is left, and that that one will be Rand, with his life and his memories. Rand pulls on saidin to try to fill himself with its heat, even welcoming the taint, and the Power rages through him more and more as he struggles desperately to figure out how he pulled the small one into himself.

And then suddenly it happens, first one sliding into him, and then the other two together, with such force that it throws him onto his back, where he lays looking up at the ceiling.

The Power still swelled in every crevice of his being. He wanted to spew up every meal he had ever eaten. He felt so alive that, by comparison, life not soaked in saidin was living a shadow. He could smell the beeswax of the candles, and the oil in the lamps. He could feel every fiber of the carpet against his back. He could feel every gash in his flesh, every cut, every nick, every bruise. But he held on to saidin.

One of the Forsaken had tried to kill him. Or all of them had. It must have been that, unless the Dark One was free already, in which case he did not think he would have faced anything as easy or as simple as this. So he held his link to the True Source. Unless I did it myself. Can I hate what I am enough to try to kill myself? Without even knowing it? Light, I have to learn to control it. I have to!

He gets up and retrieves Callandor, the sa’angreal giving him the amplified strength to face even one of the Forsaken. And then he realizes that he hasn’t heard a sound from Berelain and turns to see her standing where she left him, with her robe back on and clutched around her. He assures her that he is the original Rand and not one of the copies, trying to be gentle, but she bows with her head to the floor and begs him to forgive her, promising, swearing, never to bother him again, in a voice terrified and humble and completely unlike herself. Rand realizes that she would now rather be in the room with a Myrddraal than the Dragon, and releases the wall of air, telling her that there is nothing to forgive.

Discovering herself free of the invisible barrier, Berelain hurries to leave, but stops at the door, offering to send in one of the Aiel or call an Aes Sedai. Rand thanks her but declines, and says that he will do what needs to be done, and she leaves.

Limping to the foot of the bed, he lowered himself into the chest there and laid Callandor across his knees, bloody hands resting on the glowing blade. With that in his hands, even one of the Forsaken would fear him. In a moment he would send for Moiraine to Heal his wounds. In a moment he would speak to the Aiel outside, and become the Dragon Reborn again. But for now, he only wanted to sit, and remember a shepherd named Rand al’Thor.

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Warrior of the Altaii

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I can’t decide if I like Faile and Perrin’s relationship or not. His loyalty to her through the ordeal with the hedgehog ter’angreal was touching in a knightly adventurer sort of way, and I can see how her fiery nature might be a good counterpoint to his slow and thoughtful one. But I still can’t quite see what this relationship is forged on, especially since Perrin doesn’t seem to understand much of what Faile says or thinks or wants. And like, Faile has done little besides get in Perrin’s way since they met. I’m open to seeing how the relationship develops, and how Faile’s character develops, but right now I see a lot of reasons why Perrin is irritated with her and not as many reasons why he would fall for her. And I’m honestly not sure what she wants out of the relationship either.

Still, I have to admit that there is something comforting in seeing them together in this little domestic way, sharing a bedroom and finding comfort in each other’s arms. In a story that is so much about strife and loss, in the beginning of a book that follows three others that spent a fair amount of time pointing out how Rand and Egwene’s relationship could never be, and Lan being all tragic about how he could only ever give Nynaeve a mourning veil for a wedding gift, or whatever.

And perhaps that is the point for them too, to find a bit of comfort in each other amidst all the chaos and oncoming darkness. A little light against the rising Shadow. I don’t love all gender essentialism of men and women being so unfathomable to each other, but I can get behind that kind of connection. The question now is if the comfort they provide each other can whether Faile’s desire to get away from Rand, and Perrin’s need to stay.

Speaking of that, I was proud of Perrin for figuring out the nature of ta’veren being drawn to each other. He’s always seemed the most pragmatic of the three about his destiny—he still resists certain things about being a wolfbrother, but he doesn’t think he can run away from it the way that Mat keeps telling himself he can, and he’s not as overwhelmed by his destiny as Rand is. (I mean, that’s because obviously Rand’s destiny is way more overwhelming, but the point still stands.) Perrin has recognized that he and Mat must know Rand for a reason, be from the same place and be drawn back to him again and again for a reason, and Perrin cares about protecting people. About the big picture stuff, like standing up to Whitecloaks or Darkfriends, about accepting violence when he must and recognizing that, like it or not, he is tied to the fate of the Dragon and therefore to the fate of the fight against the Dark One.

And Faile recognizes that much in him, the pain that it causes when all he wants is to go home and be a blacksmith, while the Wheel has chosen a very different fate for him.

I am dying to read ahead and find out what caused the attack from the axe, the cards, and the reflections. Right now both Perrin and Mat’s belief that Rand caused them and Rand’s belief that it was an attack by one of the Forsaken seem possible, but I’m not sure I think either is going to turn out to be the true explanation. I don’t have enough knowledge yet about the One Power to know how these things could be caused by channeling—the axe could be manipulated by someone controlling air, maybe, but I have no idea how the One Power could be used to make your reflection come out of the mirror and try to suck the life out of you. However, there are still clues to be examined in the structure of each attack.

What caught my attention most was Rand’s though immediately after he absorbs the reflections and is lying there recovering. He’s trying to decide if he thinks the assassins were created by one of the Forsaken, or by himself. Can I hate what I am enough to try to kill myself? he wonders. Without even knowing it?

It doesn’t really seem likely that Rand caused the attacks. I feel like he knows enough about his connection with saidin at the point to at least recognize when he’s touching it, although he was holding saidin at the time so it is possible he just wielded that Power without realizing. Still, it’s a rather complicated and complex thing to do, to bring an axe and some playing cards and a set of reflections to life all at the same time, in different places in the Stone, and target them at specific people with deliberate and malicious intent. Rand thinks it’s one of the Forsaken who tried to kill him, which is plausible, but it would have to be someone with a very specific sense of irony and a pretty good understanding of the three boys. And I mean, there must be better ways to kill people with the One Power than these complicated scenarios.

Rand may not have conjured the murder reflections (murdreflections? murderflections?) and probably doesn’t hate being the Dragon so much that he wants actively to die, but he does hate being the Dragon, and would very much like it to be over. Having his own image attack him with a blade wrought through channeling and try to suck out his life seems like a pretty specific metaphor, somehow brought to phsycial form.

And Rand isn’t the only one who notices that he is being attacked by something he hates. Once Perrin has Faile out of the room and it’s just him fighting the axe, he actually goes so far as to declare out loud how much he hates it. And we already knew exactly how Perrin felt about his weapon, anyway, and have since he first came up against the concept of using it to mercy-kill Egwene, back in The Eye of the World. For Perrin, the axe is a burden just like saidin is for Rand (although it lacks the One Power’s intoxicating effects) and a symbol of a fate that he would like very much to avoid and knows he can’t, just as Rand can’t avoid being the Dragon Reborn.

Mat’s experience threw me in my theory for a moment—he prefers dice but he doesn’t hate cards, and he loves winning any way it comes—until I thought to be a little more specific about it. It’s not the cards that attack him, but the images within them, which are specific representations of specific people. First, the Ruler of Flame, who is depicted as the Amyrlin. Mat has only recently escaped the Amyrlin, who wished to hold him against his will in the White Tower. Mat knows that she would like to keep him close because he is the one who blew the Horn of Valere, and someday she will either need him to blow it again or to die so that she can appoint a new person to do so. In a more general sense, Mat feels controlled and threatened by all Aes Sedai, blaming the Amyrlin and Moiriane for the fate that led him to be possessed by the dagger. Mat nearly died, has gaps in his memory, and finds himself speaking the Old Tongue without even realizing it, or understanding what he’s said. He has a lot to be angry at in the symbol of the Amyrlin.

The next figure to emerge from a card is the depiction of the former Tairen High Lord, and we’ve just had a whole scene to see that Mat despises the Tairen lords, and why. The way they talk about the lower classes, the way they talk about women, not to mention the fact that he’s very aware that they only treat him with respect because of his connection to the Dragon. And Edorion’s already showing his hand (heh) as to how far that loyalty will go.

And the third card that attacks him is Ruler of Rods, depicted as the Queen of Andor. While Mat has nothing against Morgase, exactly, the last time he was in her presence was incredibly dangerous for him, because of her new consort, lord Gaebril, who Mat overheard plotting to have Elayne (and Egwene and Nynaeve) killed, and who Mat nearly revealed himself to in an attempt to warn Morgase. Once again, the symbolism checks out.

I’d be more inclined to believe these attack might be something Rand did if he was more actively thinking about himself or his destiny in the moment before it happened, or if he had still been as heated at Berelain as he was when he shouted at her. And even still, it seems unlikely that anger towards himself would manifest against Mat and Perrin as well.

On the other hand, this chapter is entitled “Whirlpools in the Pattern” and although I’m not sure what a whirlpool in the pattern would look like, there isn’t anything else in this chapter that seems to relate to that. If the mention of the Pattern is a clue, and unless we later learn that other people also experienced an attack, I have to wonder if the fact that all three are ta’veren might have some bearing on what happened. I don’t know if Mat is more powerfully ta’veren than Perrin, but the fact that Perrin’s attack was less intense while Rand’s was by far the worst seems relevant, too. Mat’s luck was going full-force just before the attacks happened, and I have been wondering if perhaps he’s particularly keyd into the Patten (or the Pattern into him) in the moments when his luck is coming on the strongest.

It’s going to be a really uncomfortable conversation when Perrin and Faile and Mat show up to ask Rand what in the Light he thinks he’s doing, though, and find the wreckage of Rand’s own battle. I wonder if the fact that Rand was also attacked will make the suspect him less, or not.

And then there’s Berelain, confident and used to getting her own way, no doubt, but who bit off more than she could chew in this particular encounter. I have to wonder at her motivations here; as Rand observes, she has been basically a prisoner in the Stone for months, as Tear seems to be trying to absorb Mayene into its own borders. Obviously she sees value in endearing herself to the most powerful person in the word, the Dragon himself, and although she went about it in a way that would be more appropriate towards a lord of Tear, or Cairhien maybe, than towards a young man from Emond’s Field, if protection for Mayene is what she was after, she did achieve it. Rand promised to keep Tear from bother Mayene, just like that, because he felt bad for scaring her. He my or may not be able to keep it, of course, but that remains to be seen.

Also remaining to be seen is whether Berelain has some other objective in mind, and whether I was right when I called her as Perrin’s hawk. There’s nothing really to indicate that beside her crown, but having the hawk symbol there just seems to deliberate to be a coincidence. Maybe she’s going to try to get to Rand through Perrin, or maybe she’ll decide that the Dragon himself is too dangerous and one of his close companions is a better bet.

Moiriane will answer some of my questions next week as she and the Aiel learn of what happened, and Mat, as it turns out, is less interested in confronting Mat than he is in seeking comfort with Thom. Chapters 3 and 4 next week, and off we go!

Sylas K Barrett doesn’t know how he’s going to handle the Wheel of Time TV series when it comes out, but he is SO EXCITED about all the casting announcements. Daniel Henney as Lan? Be still, my heart.

The post Reading the Wheel of Time: The Boys Confront Themselves (Kind of) in Robert Jordan’s The Shadow Rising (Part 3) appeared first on Reactor.

(Note: The comments section for this piece will most likely contain spoilers for the Wheel of Time series.)

Eamon Valda will be played by Abdul Salis (Casualty) and Geofram Bornhald will be played by Stuart Graham (The Fall). For those who need a refresh, these are the fellas who imprison Perrin and Egwene in The Eye of the World, after the duo get lost and accidentally come across one of their patrols.

Surprise! We have another announcement. The Children of the Light have arrived. Let’s welcome the Whitecloaks to the #WOTonPrime family.

Abdul Salis @Abdulsalis13 is Eamon
Stuart Graham @stuartwgraham is Geofram pic.twitter.com/IOa3wWuwdX

— The Wheel Of Time (@TheWheelOfTime) July 1, 2020

Here are all the casting reveals so far:

• Moiraine and Lan
• Nynaeve, Egwene, Rand, Mat, and Perrin
• Thom Merrilin, Loial, Padan Fain, Logain
• Alanna Mosvani and her two warders, Ihvon and Maksim
• Tam al’Thor and Daryl McCormack in an undisclosed role
• Leane Sharif
• Liandrin Guirale
• Kerene Nagashi
• Egwene’s parents, Mat’s parents, amd more!

We have no word on how the production delay will effect the show’s release date, but we’ll give you the updates as they come!

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The Eye of the World: Book One of The Wheel of Time

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The post The Wheel of Time Has Cast Two Whitecloak Leaders appeared first on Reactor.