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apocalypticavolition · 4 months

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Let's (re)Read The Great Hunt! Chapter 34: The Wheel Weaves

What's in the box? Some people already know and some people don't. As a general rule, if you're in the "don't" category and you hate spoilers, you shouldn't keep reading. If you only know cause you're reading The Great Hunt or you've seen season 2 of the show but you don't want spoilers past that point, you also shouldn't keep reading. I spoil everything.

This chapter begins with the Wheel icon because big things are happening, like assassinations and discovery of the Horn.

He had meant the choices to be a private comment on their stupidity, never dreaming any of them might listen, much less be intrigued. Intrigued in a way. They had demanded more of the same, but they had laughed in the wrong places, at the wrong things. They had laughed at him, too, apparently thinking he would not notice, or else that a full purse stuffed in his pocket would heal any wounds.

Another sign of how divorced the nobility in this country is from the commonfolk and by extension reality. They have two very different storytelling cultures and little overlap on anything. And yet Thom's bitterness about this has a hint of hypocrisy - he complains they thought he wouldn't notice their mockery even as he had thought they wouldn't notice his.

He was still not sure what he had intended to say. Rand was gone with his friends, and the Aes Sedai. It left a feeling of something not done.

The important thing is that you tried, and of course that now you can be extra angry at yourself for what happened because you delayed.

She rolled limply onto her back, staring up at him, glazed eyes open wide above the gash across her throat. The side of the bed that had been hidden by her body was dark and sodden.

I mean, what is there to say? Girl had great potential as a person and as a character and all that matters, to the point where she certainly stops getting mentioned after only a book or two, is that she spurs Thom to act now.

“The Game? I’m not mixed up in Daes Dae’mar! Who would want to kill me for the Great Game?”

Thom's protestations ring even more hollow. Where Rand's naivety is excusable, Thom's speaks only to how out of practice he is. Dude met with someone everyone thought was a lord, is performing for other lords, and thinks he's out of the Game? He basically chose to keep playing.

And there has been a woman, a lady, I have seen more than once while asking after him.

Lanfear meanwhile is so contemptuous of the Third Agers that she doesn't even care to disguise herself properly among them, I guess. I'm surprised she doesn't just spy herself though.

“If you mean Barthanes, you’re too late. Everybody’s talking about it already. He is dead. His servants found him this morning, torn to pieces in his bedchamber. The only way they knew it was him was his head stuck on a spike over the fireplace.”

Forget who killed Asmodean, who the heck killed Barthanes? It probably wasn't Galldrian; killing a random is one thing but having his rival brutally eviscerated is another. It couldn't have been Fain, he was already gone. Ishamael or Lanfear might have done it by way of the gholam, but what would piss either of them off enough? The Horn going to Toman Head is hardly Barthanes' mistake and doesn't really interfere with Lanfear's desired outcomes at all. Plus if they did use the gholam, what did it get up to all this time between now and its first appearance?

“These aren’t Barthanes’s men, Thom. At least, that one isn’t.” She nodded toward the fat man. “It’s the worst kept secret in Cairhien that he works for House Riatin. For Galldrian.”

This vaguely points at Galldrian being responsible for Barthanes' death as well I suppose, but like I said the method seems entirely out of character.

“Perhaps you had better think about leaving, too. It looks as if someone is firing the granaries.”

I'm also going to rule out the rioters as an unlikely suspect on the grounds that Barthanes' death is probably the inciting incident for them, not the first, implausbly well-hidden step. But seriously. Who did it?

*considers Verin for a moment*

Nah. She's the least suspicious person alive.

The pack horse bearing his precious burden bumped his leg, and he kicked it in the ribs without looking; the animal snorted and jerked back to the end of the lead he had tied to his saddle.

So obviously the part that immediately follows this about how Fain fed the horse's previous owner to the Trollocs is way, way eviler, but let's just appreciate exactly how dedicated to unpleasantness Fain has become.

Men gathered more information on the invaders, as if they actually believed they would eventually do something with what they knew, but they sometimes tried to hold back. Women, by and large, seemed interested in going on with their lives whoever their rulers were, yet they noted details men did not, and they talked more quickly once they stopped screaming.

I kind of don't buy this? Random women from every village are being taken away and never seen again. I'm not a woman myself but I don't think it's a stretch to say that such actions would put most women on edge for fear of the Seanchan coming back and taking more tribute, since they don't know about the damane selection process yet.

The people hurried about their business with eyes down, bowing whenever soldiers passed, but the Seanchan paid them no mind. It all seemed peaceful on the surface, despite the armored Seanchan in the streets and the ships in the harbor, but Fain could sense the tension underneath. He always did well where men were tense and afraid.

1) I'm very sad that this element of the occupation disappears in later books it rings a lot truer; everyone should be afraid.

2) Is Fain saying thinking this in the sense of looking back over his career as a Darkfriend and how he always did better scaring them with peddler's tales, or is this the sum total of his evil reflecting on Aridhol, the Ways, and more? Both?

Women went in and out of a house across the street, women linked by silver leashes, but he ignored them. He knew about damane from the villagers. They might be of some use later, but not now.

Seriously: what use can Fain be imagining for damane, considering his current power set?

He was always confident, but never more than where lords feared an assassin’s knife from their own followers.

This is definitely more all of the evil within Fain than his own experiences, as we have no reason to think he was ever an assassin in his backstory.

“I have seen chests such as this, chests from the Age of Legends,” the High Lord said, “though none so fine. They are meant to be opened only by those who know the pattern, but I—ah!”

Major points to Turak who easily sidesteps Fain's plans entirely by accident. As much as I loathe the Seanchan, I despise Fain more.

Still holding the Horn and the dagger, Turak looked at the cabinet, then away. He said nothing, but the other Seanchan snapped quick orders, and in moments men in plain woolen robes appeared through a door behind the screens bearing another small table.

For all the shit I've given the Cairhienien nobility, I suppose I also need to offer them some credit for at least not expecting their servants to interpret their every facial gesture. Rich people on every continent desperately need to get over themselves.

Fain could stand it no longer. He reached for the dagger.

Fain isn't anywhere near as slick as he thinks he is, considering he went about thirty seconds without trying to nab his precious. Fucking Gollum does better about this stuff bro, learn from him.

“I am to sound it.” Turak’s tone was flat. “And break the White Tower. Again, why? You claim to obey, await, and serve, but this is a land of oath-breakers. Why do you give your land to me? Do you have some private quarrel with these . . . women?”

And again, we see that Fain's schemes immediately crash and burn when given the briefest exposure to people who know what schemes are. He's just like all these nobles in his own twisted way: he's gotten so used to having the Darkfriends jump when he says jump (or die) that he doesn't understand why no one else will willingly be his puppets.

Turak was silent so long that Fain began to wonder if he needed further convincing; he was ready with more, as much as was required.

Pro-tip for those of you who find themselves in situations where you need to lie: less is actually much better than more. We can thus conclude that Fain isn't even good at lying, despite the fact that he's spent his whole career as a liar!

“But, High Lord,” Fain protested, “you must—” He found himself lying on his side, his head ringing. Only when his eyes cleared did he see the man with the pale braid rubbing his knuckles and realize what had happened. “Some words,” the fellow said softly, “are never used to the High Lord.” Fain decided how the man was going to die.

I myself am rooting for neither of these fellows, both so awful in their own right. And note again how the Seanchan veneer of civility disappears at a moment's notice without warning. There's no way a populace can happily adopt the Seanchan customs as a whole, not without rebellion after rebellion breaking out.

He had not even known of the existence of an Empress until Turak mentioned her, but access to a ruler again . . . that opened new paths, new plans. Access to a ruler with the might of the Seanchan beneath her and the Horn of Valere in her hands. Much better than making this Turak a Great King.

It's funny that he thinks this is an option for him, when his best case scenario is that he ends up doing exactly what Semirhage will do and thus completely destroys his advantage and his worst case scenario is that Semirhage shows up and starts experimenting with an absolutely fascinating case study.

If I kept the Horn of Valere, all between myself and the throne would think I meant to be first hereafter, and while the Empress, of course, wishes that we contend with one another so that the strongest and most cunning will follow her, she currently favors her second daughter, and she would not look well on any threat to Tuon.

I'm sure that name won't be relevant later!

“The Empress’s Listeners may be anywhere,” Turak continued. “They may be anyone. Huan was born and raised in the House of Aladon, and his family for eleven generations before him, yet even he could be a Listener.”

Secret police: a surefire sign that your civilization is doing just great for itself and won't collapse under its own bloodlust in fifty years or less.

At the Court of the Nine Moons, in Seandar, one such as you could be given to the Seekers for a shift of your eye, for a misspoken word, for a whim. Are you still eager?

I'm sure that Nine Moons thing won't come up again anytime soon either.

And again we see more evidence that the only reason the Empire is holding itself up is its consistent expansionary policies that consistently deliver it new victims to burn through. If the Empire's borders were ever truly stable it would collapse immediately under the tyranny of Seandar.

A young man, but vile in the Shadow beyond belief, with a lying, devious tongue. In many places he has claimed to be many things, but always the Trollocs come when he is there, High Lord. Always the Trollocs come . . . and kill.

Fain is not even a good Aes Sedai liar, since Caemlyn is still doing just great for itself at the moment, as are a variety of the places he passed on the road to it.

Fain let the grimacing Huan pull him out of the room, hardly even listening to the snarled lecture on what would happen if he ever again failed to leave Lord Turak’s presence when given permission to do so.

Considering that Fain was allegedly giving good information about a coming threat, this seems like another really shitty policy on the part of the Seanchan. The illusion of order that is easily cleared away by chaos.

Sadly, the illusion of time is less easily cleared away and ours is up because the chapter is done. Next time: Steddings!

#let's read #wheel of time #wot #robert jordan #wheel of time spoilers #wot spoilers #thom merrilin #dena #zera #padan fain #turak aladon #huan

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wot-tidbits · 4 months

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Padan Fain by artbygosch

#wheel of time #padan fain #artwork #fanart

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spectrum-color · 1 year

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#wheel of time #wot #wot book spoilers #elaida do avriny a'roihan #the forsaken #seanchan #mazrim taim #padan fain #slayer #I know some people may object to the seanchan being here as villains #but they ultimately are an antagonistic invading force #who take one of the protagonists as a slave #also there are so many villains in this series #it def does not lack for antagonists

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wotconfessions · 9 months

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#wotconfessions #wheel of time confessions #wheel of time #wot #the wheel of time #wot book spoilers #padan fain

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butterflydm · 7 months

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do you think we'll ever find out what happened with the fade that padan fain? or why he took that little girl and she was in the dream world in the season premier?

I suspect that Fain is probably going to be in the Two Rivers in Perrin's storyline next season and both of those plot-points were related to Perrin's journey across the continent, so it's very possible that the details might come out next season, yeah!

My main hope for Fain is that he stays a more focused character the show and doesn't bounce around all over the place like he does in the books, lol. But we'll see!

#wot replies to anon #wot book spoilers #um hmm through...#the shadow rising #wot wheel of time wot on prime #wot 2x2 spoilers wot s2 spoilers wheel of time s2 spoilers #wot show spoilers wot prime spoilers #padan fain

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xillionart · 1 year

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Wheel of Time, but made anime by NovelAI ^q^

Part 4 / Elan Morin Tedronai Ishamael - Lews Therin Telamon - Latra Posae Decume - Padan Fain

#wheel of time #wot prime #wot on prime #lews therin telamon #ishamael #elan morin tedronai #latra posae decume #padan fain #novel ai #wot ai art

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ofthebrownajah · 2 years

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Much to think about

#that behind the scenes video was a lot #so much happening #rand on the run #novice egwene!#padan fain #whitecloaks!#ahhhhh #wheel of time #wot on prime #sdcc #wheel of time spoilers

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asha-mage · 7 months

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Padan fain/ishamael. Redemption

[Send me a character or pairing, and a one word prompt, and I'll write you a drabble!]

Ishamael’s fingers where like a corpse’s: cold and stiff with faint discoloration at the nails and the tips. It made Padan want to snarl. It made him want to bite into the flesh of them and drink in the man’s accursed blessed blood.

“The Shienaran has left us.” Ishamael mused as he stroked Padan’s neck, almost scratching it. “It seems he craves redemption.”

Padan Fain couldn’t help but snort. Redemption? After all they had sworn? All they had done? It was no easy thing, being a Friend of the Dark, and no clean thing either. Not for Queens or beggars. Better to embrace it.

“His hunger for more died then?” Fain murmured. He could not imagine it. His own hunger had burned so long, so hot, deep in his belly- for more, for what he was owed, for what he deserved, that only the promises made by the Great Lord could dull the pain of it, even a little.

Ishamael laughed, a dark, terrible sound and for a moment his hands closed around Fain’s neck. Fain expected the life to be choked out of him in the next second. The whims of the Chosen where like that. But instead finger nails only dug lightly into his skin.

“No. But it was overcome. By hope.” Ishamael’s soft voice turned hard at the last word, almost spitting it with disgust. “That vicious lie, the one that keeps the Wheel grinding.”

Padan felt the urge to cackle. “Not a defect I share, I promise you Great Master.”

Ishamael’s nail dug deeper. “No. There is no redemption for you, Padan Fain, is there?” There was amusement in that voice now, and something else- respect. “You crave to deeply for that.”

In answer, Padan nipped at the edge of Ishamael’s palm, a shiver running through his body as he tasted skin. Even the Chosen where just flesh, in the end.

Ishamael laughed and then the lights started to dim of their own accord, before winking out.

#WoT #Wheel of Time #WoT on Prime #Wheel of Time on Prime #Padan FAin #Ishamael #Ishadan #sure lets go with that #not a pairing in my typical fleet #but sure why not #Drabble Challenge #This is show verse specific

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anira-naeg · 2 months

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Art by @wern1c

#padan fain #Alviarin Freidhen #wot art #wheel of time art #wheel of time

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an-s-sedai · 10 months

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The peddler, Padan Fain

#padan fain #wot on prime #graysedai gif

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apocalypticavolition · 3 months

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Let's (re)Read The Great Hunt! Chapter 42: Falme

Spoiler alert: I hate the Seanchan. Hate, hate, hate, hate, hate them. Also I guess this post spoils the whole book series or something? You probably don't want to keep reading if that's going to bother you. If instead my hatred of the Seanchan bothers you, please immediately jump in a lake and stay there the rest of your life.

This chapter has a Seanchan helmet because we're in Seanchan territory. Have I mentioned lately that the Seanchan suck?

She could not imagine doing that to any woman, not even Moiraine or Liandrin. Well, maybe Liandrin, she admitted sourly.

Dramatic irony re: Moghedien getting leashed, though as Nynaeve's thought process shows it's a small step for her at this point.

That looked like Padan Fain, she thought incredulously. It couldn’t be. Not here.

Get used to running into randoms you last saw halfway across the continent, Nynaeve. It's going to happen A LOT.

Nynaeve had combed out her braid, and her gold ring, the serpent eating its own tail, now nestled under her dress beside Lan’s heavy ring on the leather cord around her neck.

Ah the symbolism. Nynaeve is hiding her agency from the oppressive Seanchan, pretending as she is in Emond's Field terms not to be an adult. And though she may not like the Aes Sedai, the tower and the power are close to her heart now - and everything is all tangled up with the relationship she wants but cannot have with Lan.

“No? How much money do we have left? You have been ‘not hungry’ very often at mealtimes the last few days.”

Elayne reminds us here that she's sheltered, not stupid.

“If I were being held prisoner, I would not help my captors find other women to enslave. Although, the way these Falmen behave, you would think they were lifelong servants of those who should be their enemies to the death.”

Of course sometimes the difference is a very thin line. Elayne really has no idea about the pressures the Falmen (especially the damane!) are under.

Still, two leashed creatures trotted along with the patrol, like wingless birds with coarse leather skin, and sharp beaks higher above the cobblestones than the helmeted heads of the soldier. Their long, sinewy legs looked as if they could run faster than any horse.

*I* think they're cute, but I'm insane. (And anyway it's not their fault they're Seanchan.)

...if we are caught, I swear that before they kill us, or do whatever they do, I will beg them on bended knees to let me stripe you from top to bottom with the stoutest switch I can find!

I like to think they'd let her.

Actually if you think about it Tuon and early book Nynaeve could get along quite well if you could just get Nynaeve over the slavery thing (you couldn't, but maybe in a Mirror World where she has an aneurysm that changes exactly one part of her personality).

She had thought, like Elayne, that the damane must all be prisoners eager to escape, but it had been the woman in the collar who raised the pry.

It's crazy what you can make people do when you torture all the hope and joy out of them. I don't even think the damane loyalty is the least bit unrealistic.

At first she had thought some of the Falmen submission, at least, must be a pose, but she had found no evidence of any resistance at all.

Anyone who tried is probably long dead or at best fled.

Monsters and Aes Sedai. How can you fight monsters and Aes Sedai?

Better figure it out quick, Nynaeve. That's the assignment for Tarmon Gaidon.

Nynaeve had heard many tales of women and girls being seized on the streets or brought in from the villages; they all went into those houses, and if they were seen again, they wore a collar.

If. I'm not sure what possibility is sadder, that they resist until they die from the punishments or that they've been tossed onto the boats as part of the return haul.

The trees were all but leafless, but the damane were still taken out for air, whether they wanted it or not.

Another way they're treated like dogs.

Damane were possessions.

God I hate the Seanchan so much.

Though I'm starting to hate my ebook reader's note function more. Virtually none of these have been in order and I'm having to copy paste like crazy.

Lighting a candle beyond the reach of her arm would have made Egwene vomit. Once Renna had ordered her to juggle her tiny balls of light with the bracelet lying on the table. Remembering still made her shudder.

And I'm sure Renna sees it all as a kindness, as a way of letting Egwene feel the horror of the a'dam in controlled conditions so that she learns her "limitations" instinctively. It would be terrible to Renna if she'd worked out an escape plan that involved her channeling without realizing what the consequences were; she could hurt herself and then the Seanchan might have one less victim!

Her knife was still in its sheath at her waist, though. Egwene had been surprised when Min first showed up wearing it, but it seemed the Seanchan trusted everyone. Until they broke a rule.

An effective bit of fascism that, since complete restriction of everything would result in more rebellions (nothing to lose) and also make it impossible to get anything done (so many people needing knives for non-violent purposes that the Seanchan approve of).

‘Everyone has a place in the Pattern,’ ” she mimicked, “ ‘and the place of everyone must be readily apparent.’

Meanwhile, a young shepherd is taking his first steps towards becoming king of the world.

Overly stratified societies have so many issues. You can just tell that Seanchan must be much more repressive than the subcontinent on so many topics.

“I don’t think there will be any going back for me ever,” Egwene said, sighing, sinking down on her bed.

Poor Egwene. She's so strong and even she can barely hold up under this hell.

Earth is one of the Five Powers that was strongest in men. When I picked out those rocks, she took me outside the town, and I was able to point right to an abandoned iron mine. It was all overgrown, and there wasn’t any opening to be seen at all, but once I knew how, I could feel the iron ore still in the ground.

This is about the only time we don't see Egwene happy to be exceptional, even. That's how much they've hurt her.

“They can’t even help themselves, Min. I only talked to one—her name is Ryma; the sul’dam don’t call her that, but that’s her name; she wanted to make sure I knew it—and she told me there is another. She told me in between bouts of tears. She’s Aes Sedai, and she was crying, Min! She has a collar on her neck, they make her answer to Pura, and she can’t do anything more about it than I can. They captured her when Falme fell. She was crying because she’s beginning to stop fighting against it, because she cannot take being punished anymore. She was crying because she wants to take her own life, and she cannot even do that without permission. Light, I know how she feels!”

It is absolutely exceptional that they even drove an Aes Sedai to tears. She passed the same Accepted and shawl tests as all the other Aes Sedai and as brutally hellish and over the top as they are, they do produce strong and dedicated women. And in four months they Seanchan have all but broken her completely.

“Damane are not allowed to touch a weapon of any kind.”

One wonders if Deira came up with this herself, or if it was added later as the a'dam design was refined. If it was added later, it suggests that either the damane brainwashing, powerful as it is, can't be trusted to fully overrule the suicidal despair these women must be left with OR that the Seanchan are so pointlessly cruel that even though they have nothing to lose they still must dehumanize their victims.

“Her name is Ryma. I have to remember her name, not the name they’ve put on her. She is Ryma, and she’s Yellow Ajah, and she has fought them as long and as hard as she could.

In a way this gives Egwene a parallel with Rand's future behavior, in that he too has names he must remember, but Egwene's reasoning is of course way more healthy and actually a kindness to an unfortunate soul to boot.

“Maybe they’re going to conquer the whole world, Min. If they conquer the world, there’s no reason Rand and Galad and the rest could not end up in Seanchan.”

Depressing that Egwene sees a way for Min's visions to plausibly come true without her safety.

“I am being practical,” Egwene said sharply. “I don’t intend to stop fighting, not as long as I can breathe, but I don’t see any hope that I’ll ever have the a’dam off me, either. Just as I don’t see any hope that anyone is going to stop the Seanchan. Min, if this ship captain will take you, go with him. At least then one of us will be free.”

And here of course she's quite right not to put her faith in what she can't count on and to keep fighting anyway, but damn it's sad she's in this position.

“I must punish you severely for this. We will both be called to the Court of the Nine Moons—you for what you can do; I as your sul’dam and trainer—and I will not allow you to disgrace me in the eyes of the Empress. I will stop when you tell me how much you love being damane and how obedient you will be after this. And, Tuli. Make me believe every word.”

Again we see how the Seanchan enforces its madness by ensuring that every level of its hierarchy is under threat of terrible violence, and we also see how it's probably inadvertently stumbled into another method of enforcing its ideology: if you repeat the same lie to yourself over and over, sooner or later you will start believing it. For as much effort as Egwene is going to have to put into convincing Renna, the real danger is how much progress she'll make convincing herself to try and make sense of the horrible circumstances she's in.

Let's give it a try! I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow. I'll post my notes on chapter 43 tomorrow.

Not sure it's working, but I am copy-pasting. In any event: next time - Bayle Domon meets Nynaeve!

#let's read #wheel of time #wot #robert jordan #wheel of time spoilers #wot spoilers #nynaeve al'meara #elayne trakand #padan fain #egwene al'vere #min farshaw #renna emain

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wot-tidbits · 11 months

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Myrddraal, Ba'alzamon, Draghkar, Trolloc, Padan Fain, Tam al'Thor, Min Farshaw, Elyas Machera and Gawyn Trakand by h.m.l_art using Midjourney Art

#wheel of time #myrddraal #artwork #fanart #draghkar #shadowspawn #trolloc #trollocs #min farshaw #elyas machera #gawyn trakand #padan fain #tam al'thor

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iviarellereads · 27 days

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The Great Hunt, Chapter 11 - Glimmers of the Pattern

(THIS PROJECT IS SPOILER FREE! No spoilers past the chapter you click on. Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Wheel of Time, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

(Wheel icon) In which I can once again say, that doesn't bode well at all.

PERSPECTIVE: Rand, as Ingtar calls for camp very early in a deep hollow that's easily defended if they're attacked in the night. Everyone's feeling the effects of the last village. Rand overhears Uno saying he saw the same woman in white in a window there, and anyone who wants to take issue with that can take issue with his knife.(1)

Ingtar commands no fires, and every man sleeps next to his horse. There's something even worse than Darkfriends, Trollocs, or even Myrddraal out there. Rand thinks about, and tries to forget, the vision he saw in the house.

Ingtar interrupts Rand's thoughts and gives him a package. Moiraine Sedai said to give it to him at the first camp south of the Erinin, though he has no idea what's in it. It feels soft, maybe just cloth, and Rand would suddenly rather think of the house and the Myrddraal than that cloth. Ingtar was also told to say that if anything happens to him, the lances will take Rand's commands.

“Me!” Rand gasped, forgetting the bundle and everything else. Ingtar met his incredulous stare with a calm nod. “That’s crazy! I’ve never led anything but a flock of sheep, Ingtar. They would not follow me anyway. Besides, Moiraine can’t tell you who your second is. It’s Uno.” “Uno and I were called to Lord Agelmar the morning we left. Moiraine Sedai was there, but it was Lord Agelmar who told me. You are second, Rand.”

Ingtar explains that there's a very clear chain of command, so that if any number of men fall, there's a clear commander, and if only one man is left standing, he's not a straggler, he has the command and must do the duty that they all set out to accomplish. Rand feels Moiraine tugging his leash from a hundred leagues away, and tries to refuse, but Ingtar says too much is already falling apart in the world, this mission can't afford to lose the chain of command. He walks away before Rand can protest further.(2)

Rand is left to find out what's in the package, though he thinks he already knows. He sneaks off into the trees, picks out the knots that speak of Moiraine's own precise handiwork, and finds just what he dreaded: the Dragon's banner.

“Look at that! Look what he’s got, now!” Mat burst into the clearing. Perrin came after him more slowly. “First fancy coats,” Mat snarled, “and now a banner! We’ll hear no end of lording it now, with—” Mat got close enough to see the banner clearly, and his jaw dropped. “Light!” He stumbled back a step. “Burn me!” He had been there, too, when Moiraine named the banner. So had Perrin. Anger boiled up in Rand, anger at Moiraine and the Amyrlin Seat, pushing him, pulling him. He snatched up the banner in both hands and shook it at Mat, words boiling out uncontrollably. “That’s right! The Dragon’s banner!” Mat took another step back. “Moiraine wants me to be a puppet on Tar Valon strings, a false Dragon for the Aes Sedai. She’s going to push it down my throat whatever I want. But—I—will—not—be—used!” Mat had backed up against a tree trunk. “A false Dragon?” He swallowed. “You? That . . . that’s crazy.”

Perrin reasons that if they want to make him a false Dragon, Rand must be able to channel. Rand admits, he doesn’t want to, but he doesn’t know how to stop it either. Mat's paranoid about Rand getting found out and all of them killed for knowing him so well, which goes on a bit. Perrin tells him to shut up, and asks why Rand came with them.

Rand shrugged. “I was going, but first the Amyrlin came, and then the Horn was stolen, and the dagger, and Moiraine said Mat was dying, and. . . . Light, I thought I could stay with you until we found the dagger, at least; I thought I could help with that. Maybe I was wrong.” “You came because of the dagger?” Mat said quietly. He rubbed his nose and grimaced. “I never thought of that. I never thought you wanted to. . . . Aaaah! Are you feeling all right? I mean, you aren’t going mad already, are you?” Rand dug a pebble out of the ground and threw it at him. “Ouch!” Mat rubbed his arm. “I was just asking. I mean, all those fancy clothes, and all that talk about being a lord. Well, that isn’t exactly right in the head.” “I was trying to get rid of you, fool! I was afraid I’d go mad and hurt you.” His eyes dropped to the banner, and his voice lowered. “I will, eventually, if I don’t stop it. Light, I don’t know how to stop it.”

Mat tells a story he heard from a merchant guard once, about a man who could channel who woke up one morning to find his whole village flattened, except his own bed. He says he plans to sleep as far away from Rand as he can in case of anything like that, though Perrin jokes that he should sleep cuddled up to Rand in that case.(3) Mat says he's grateful that Rand came to help him, but Rand isn't the same anymore. He waits a moment, as if expecting Rand to protest, then walks back into the camp. Rand asks Perrin what he thinks, and Perrin says he'd burn or bury the Dragon banner, if it were him, and run as far as he could go, but... maybe sometimes you can't run. Then he leaves, too.(4)

Rand knelt there, staring at the banner spread out on the ground. “Well, sometimes you can run,” he muttered. “Only, maybe she gave me this to make me run. Maybe she has something waiting for me, if I run. I won’t do what she wants. I won’t. I’ll bury it right here. But she said my life may depend on it, and Aes Sedai never lie so you can see it. . . .” Suddenly his shoulders shook with silent laughter. “Now I’m talking to myself. Maybe I am going mad already.” When he returned to the camp, he carried the banner wrapped in the canvas once more, tied with knots less neat than Moiraine’s had been.

The light's beginning to fail, and Rand brings his horse over near Loial and Hurin, who stumbles over his words to say he hopes Rand doesn't mind him here, he was chatting with Loial. Loial points Rand at a stone column nearby, and says it looks like it was worked once, then left to the weather. There are markings that look familiar but strange. Rand says maybe Loial will be able to see better in the morning, and he's glad of Hurin's company, thinking to himself that he's glad of the company of anyone who isn't afraid of him.

He packs the banner in his saddle bags, so nobody else will touch it, and refuses any supper. He was too queasy for even the best meal he'd ever had, just then.

The camp was silent now, but Rand lay awake past the fall of full dark. His mind darted back and forth. The banner. What is she trying to make me do? The village. What could kill a Fade like that? Worst of all, the house in the village. Did it really happen? Am I going mad already? Do I run, or do I stay? I have to stay. I have to help Mat find the dagger. An exhausted sleep finally came, and with sleep, unbidden, the void surrounded him, flickering with an uneasy glow that disturbed his dreams.(5)

PERSPECTIVE: Padan Fain still thinks of himself as Padan Fain, that man is still the core of him, but he's been changed. First the things Baa did to him, to track down the boys in his hunt for the Dragon, and then in Shadar Logoth...

He touches the ruby-hilted dagger, feeling whole, and remembers how he nailed the Myrddraal to the door of the building himself, to establish true control over the pack, which the Myrddraal had kept trying to wrest away from him. He shouldn't have let the Trollocs take so many from the village to slow them down, but Trollocs are greedy, and he was overcome by such euphoria watching the Myrddraal die that he had a momentary soft spot.(6) He tells the Trollocs to kill them all, and leave the heads atop the pile of the bodies, for their pursuers to find. He ignores the pleas of the remaining Darkfriends to save some of the villagers, knowing they just don't want to be the next meal.

He kneels next to the box holding the Horn. He takes the dagger out and lays it on top the chest, to warn off anyone who might try to come near. They’ve all seen, by now, what happens when it’s touched.

Lying there in his blankets, he stared northward. He could not feel al’Thor, now; the distance between them was too great. Or perhaps al’Thor was doing his vanishing trick. Sometimes, in the keep, the boy had suddenly vanished from Fain’s senses. He did not know how, but always al’Thor came back, just as suddenly as he had gone.(7) He would come back this time, too. “This time you come to me, Rand al’Thor. Before, I followed you like a dog driven on the trail, but now you follow me.” His laughter was a cackle that even he knew was mad, but he did not care. Madness was a part of him, too. “Come to me, al’Thor. The dance is not even begun yet. We’ll dance on Toman Head, and I’ll be free of you. I’ll see you dead at last.”

=====

(1) I dunno about you, but I believe him. (2) So, Moiraine's definitely trying to force Rand to A) gain battle experience, B) find the truth within himself that he is the Dragon, and C) declare himself such. Poor Rand, but also, it super doesn't help that he's so, so resistant to feeling manipulated. Sorry, bud, you're fate's plaything for this and the next 12 remaining books. But, the complete chain of command is an interesting way for an army to work. (3) Pour one out for the Cauthor shippers. (4) At least he's starting to mend bridges with Mat and Perrin. Mat still isn't himself, right now, what with the Mashadar corruption in him, growing slowly at the edges. And, at least Perrin's more understanding and level-headed. (5) You caught Mat's story, right? The one about a male channeler folding a mountain over his village in his sleep, with only him and his bed untouched. And then Rand is surrounded by the void as he falls asleep, the same void that made him feel so sick before, now it's described as "an uneasy glow". OH YES, THIS WILL END EXTREMELY WELL! (6) So he's havin a real normal one. (7) What was Rand doing that he might disappear? All we know he did was a lot of sword training with Lan, which would have meant holding the flame and the void to concentrate… just as he's holding the void as he falls asleep and disappears again.

#wheel of time #wot #the wheel of time #twot #tgh #the great hunt #wot wheel icon #rand al'thor #lord ingtar shinowa #perrin aybara #mat cauthon #hurin (wot)#loial #padan fain

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