The Wheel of Time: Book Fourteen, A Memory of Light – Summary Part 1

Hi – I’m Luke and today, at long last, we’re talking about A Memory of Light, last book of The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson. It’s been quite a journey getting here and, since this is the end, I’m going all-out. In fact, we’re going to get so deep into things here that I’m splitting this video into two parts to keep things reasonably sized. You can’t tell me that’s not on theme.

Before I go any further, I need to warn you: I’m about to thoroughly spoil this book. If you somehow found yourself watching this video without having read all of The Wheel of Time, I strongly recommend that you stop watching right now and go read it. This is a fantastic series and you really don’t want to spoil it for yourself.

This time around, I’m happy to say that – since we’re at the end – there’s no need to keep spoilers out of the comments, so have at it!

Today, in part one, I’m going to cover the summary. A Memory of Light is pretty complicated, so I’m going to add some additional structure this time around, using map annotations to keep things geographically rooted and splitting the book into phases. I’ll add chapters to the video so you can skip around if you’d like: I’m splitting the book into the prologue, the meeting at the Field of Merrilor, the Four Fronts, and, finally, the Last Battle through to the end.

In part two, I’ll get into discussion and analysis. I haven’t actually written the script for the second video yet, but I have a pretty good idea of how it’ll all fit together. In particular, I want to spend a good chunk of time talking about what’s awesome about the ending we got, the vision or worldview espoused, and how perfectly some of the character arcs came together. A Memory of Light really is a great book and there’s a lot to get into here.

But, though I’m still holding off on reading other fan responses so I can present you all with my sincere thoughts, undiluted by others’, I have to imagine that I’m not the only person who felt that there were some… missed opportunities in here. So, after we finish analyzing the ending we got, I want to dedicate some time to discussing what could’ve been while speculating on why we got what we got. But, until we get to that section, we’re going to be optimistic. As Tam says to Galad in the aftermath of the fighting at Cairhien: “We must look and see Light, not Shadow, or we’ll all be pulled under.”

I’m actually really curious what the telemetry is going to show me for these two parts. As I’ve said before, I’m really here for the analysis; the summary is just something I do to collect my own thoughts and to ensure that we’re all on the same page. I pretty much always feel as though I spent too much time on summary and that most people watching are just going to skip past it… but much of the feedback I’ve received has actually called out how useful the summaries are and even asked if I could go into a bit more depth. A number of people have specifically asked if I could use some maps to help make sense of A Memory of Light. Well, for those of you who asked for it, here it is! For those of you who just want the discussion, sorry to disappoint you today, but I’ll do my best to make it up to you in part two!

With that out of the way, let’s get into it!

Summary

By Grace and Banners Fallen

• Everyone
  • The book opens with a scene from Jarid Sarand’s camp. Despite Elayne’s succession, he still opposes her. We see, from the perspective of his men, that morale is low and they’re very close to mutiny. A bubble of evil softened all of their metal, including coins and weapons. Bayrd, our perspective character, notes that he can’t really blame Jarid for wanting the throne for his wife – what lord wouldn’t? – but Jarid just isn’t understanding what’s happening in the world. “You shouldn’t have stood in the way. Everyone seems to know what is coming but you. The Dragon is reborn, old bonds are broken, old oaths done away with… and I’ll be hanged before I let Andor march to the Last Battle without me.” The mutiny comes quietly, with little real planning. Bayrd leaves Jarid tied to a tree with a water skin as the soldiers walk away to face the end of the world.
• Isam and the Forsaken
  • Our first scene with Isam offers us a bit of worldbuilding and some of his background. He’s in a place only known as the “Town”, a shanty town constructed near Thakan’dar that’s been built and rebuilt by prisoners for thousands of years. Alongside the prisoners, this is where the Samma N’Sei, the Eye Blinders live. This is the fate of the Aiel men who learn they can channel and run into the Blight to face Sightblinder. They are caught and either join willingly or are Turned. All wear red veils which they seem to lower when they kill, but those Turned also file their teeth to points. Being “Talentless,” or unable to channel, makes a person vulnerable here. This is where Isam grew up, powerless, without friends, and surrounded by predators. Yet, his abilities in Tel’aran’rhiod give him powers that even the channelers don’t have. In particular, Isam can step directly into the dream in the flesh, even near Shayol Ghul, where gateways do not work (note that gateways will begin to function near Shayol Ghul later in the book, as the boundaries between worlds weaken.) Isam wasn’t born with these abilities as Perrin was. The ability to walk freely within the dream comes from having one’s soul bound to something else. While Perrin’s soul is naturally split between being a man and being a wolf, Shai’tan bound Isam’s soul to Luc’s to achieve a similar effect. Isam sees that Morridin is in the town, but he’s here to meet someone else. He goes to something like an inn where he meets with one of the Forsaken in black and red trim (I’m pretty sure this is Cyndane/Lanfear.) She wants Isam to kill Rand and sends a group of Samma N’Sei with. Luc would prefer to hunt Perrin, but Isam just wants to hunt… though neither are happy with being forced to work with the the Eye Blinders.
  • The remaining Forsaken meet in Moridin’s dreamshard, which we see from Moghedien’s perspective. She has her own cour’souvra around her neck now as a form of probation, but if she fails Moridin, he’s threatened to give it to Demandred. She notes that Moridin seems changed recently, having lost interest in things he used to enjoy (like torturing her.) It’s hard to tell from her description whether Moridin is focused, distracted, or depressed. Moghedien recognizes a new-comer, a horribly ugly woman named Hessalam, by her voice as Graendal, warped into an ugly form as punishment. Cyndane – Lanfear – does not attend, as she currently stands lowest among the Forsaken. As their numbers are low, Moridin introduces a new member of the Chosen: Taim, taking the name M’Hael. Moghedien notes that Demandred and M’Hael know each other (it seems obvious to me that Robert Jordan changed his mind about Demandred and Taim being the same person, probably because it was too obvious, but neither he nor Sanderson could think of any interesting relationship between them, so Demandred is just the person who recruited Taim and taught him what he needed for his work in the Black Tower.) Moghedien also notes that, while Demandred always wanted Lews Therin dead, he’s now focused on killing Rand personally. Moghedien is ordered to assist Demandred in the coming war. We don’t actually learn what Demandred has been secretly working on since Lord of Chaos yet, but we’ll later learn that he’s mobilized Shara under his command.
• Talmanes and the Band of the Red Hand
  • Throughout the prologue, we see the fall of Caemlyn from Talmanes’ perspective. Recall that we left off last book learning that Verin’s letter to Mat was a warning that Trollocs were going to invade Caemlyn through the Ways, which we only learned because Olver opened the letter and showed it to Talmanes, but it was too late: Talmanes and Olver left Towers of Midnight preparing to protect Caemlyn and, perhaps more importantly, to keep the dragons from being taken by the Shadow. Note that Verin wasn’t just playing games there, she was prevented from outright telling anyone until the hour of her death; she merely miscalculated Mat’s ability to not open a letter. Though, it really does seem like she could have planned that better, or just told Egwene as an extra precaution.
  • In A Memory of Light, Talmanes and the Band arrive to find the city burning and the people trying to escape the slaughter. Elayne took most of her forces, including half the Band, to the Field of Merrilor, and the remaining guard are completely unprepared for an attack of this magnitude, particularly considering that they came from the Ways, within the city, bypassing Caemlyn’s formidable walls entirely. The Trollocs are working to seize the gates, not to get more forces in, but to prevent the people from escaping and to prevent other armies from seizing the city back from them. Talmanes realizes early on that this isn’t a simple raid: the Shadow aims to claim Caemlyn, its supplies (including the meat provided by its people,) and to potentially use the fortified city as a base to launch more attacks. If the Trollocs manage to seize all five gates then the people will, to the last, be slaughtered and eaten, and any attempt to retake the city will require attacking its impressive walls: siege will not be an option, as the Ways can be used to bring in more supplies and to move soldiers in and out of the city.
  • Here, we get to see Talmanes in action, and he quickly demonstrates that he’s an excellent leader even when Mat isn’t around. Moreover, Talmanes himself notes that Mat’s feelings towards common people, the lives of his men, and his sense of duty have rubbed off on him: though he should, perhaps, focus solely on retaking or destroying the dragons, he cannot abandon the common people – the “peasants” – of the city. Talmanes goes about conscripting guards into his forces, convincing the mercenary bands outside the city to help even without guarantee of payment, and on keeping at least one gate open at all costs. Though the battle has only just begun, Talmanes has already taken a wound from a Myrddraal’s Thakan’dar blade in his side and it’s begun to go black, which is certain death unless he finds an Aes Sedai for Healing in the next few hours: something Talmanes doesn’t expect to happen with most of the channelers at the Field of Merrilor. He’s also already lost a hundred men. Speaking partially to a reluctant mercenary leader and partially to us, the readers, Talmanes tells it straight: “Do you know what this is? This is the beginning of the end. This is the fall of nations and the unification of humankind. This is the Last Battle, you bloody fool.”
  • The mercenaries manage to hold the western gate and the Band fights to hold the southern one. With that taken care of, Talmanes moves to reach the palace, as he knows that any remaining resistance from the guards will be there. From there, he could try to get to the dragons. Melten, a Borderlander, stays by Talmanes’ side, ready to grant him death when the pain grows too great.
  • Trollocs stop them just short of reaching the palace, but then Charlz Guybon and the Queen’s Guard come out to meet them, narrowly avoiding disaster. Guybon explains that Elayne only left four channelers and they were very weak, only able to open a Gateway when working together. As two of them were assassinated just as the attack began, the remaining two cannot create a Gateway, even a small one to send a message, and they don’t have much skill with Healing; certainly not enough to save Talmanes at this point. Guybon wants to hold the palace, but word arrives that the western gate is falling and Talmanes convinces him to dedicate the Guard to holding the west gate and evacuating the people. Guybon agrees, but insists on personally accompanying the Band to secure the dragons.
  • As they near the dragons, Jesamyn is the only channeler left, and all she can really provide is the knowledge that there are female channelers among the Trollocs. The Trollocs are beginning to pull back toward the walls, letting the city burn through the night. Talmanes takes a second wound from a Myrddraal, but kills it in the process. Though his wound has spread terribly across his body he’s learned that Myrddraal aren’t prepared to fight a person who has embraced their death (a theme we’ll see paralleled in Rand’s struggle with Shai’tan throughout this book. The Shadow’s greatest powers are fear and despair.)
  • The Band finds that Aludra already moved the dragons and organized a small resistance, but there’s only enough powder and dragon eggs left for a couple of shots per dragon. Talmanes is very close to death, having trouble focusing, and what’s left of the Band struggle to protect the couple thousand people who are with them. There’s no clear path to any gate out of the city, if any of them are even open to them. With their backs to the city’s walls and a mass of Trollocs slowly preparing to charge them, Talmanes refuses to give in to death, ordering the dragoneers to fire on the walls to create an opening. He passes out as he gives the signal, which ends our perspective here.
• The White Tower
  • Leilwin Shipless (Egeanin), at the Field of Merrilor, wants to find Nynaeve or Elayne. She’s lost, unsure what the meeting here is about, despairing that she’ll never have a ship again, and unsure of what to do about the Seanchan. She’s still loyal to the Empress, but she also knows that, though the damane are foundational to Empire, they are a lie. Nynaeve sets Leilwin’s priorities in order by furiously explaining that Leilwin surrendering the domination band to Suroth very nearly ended the world. Privately, Leilwin understands that she surrendered the band to save her own life. Realizing that this sin outstrips everything else that has happened to her, Leilwin decides that she must make herself da’covale to the Amyrlin and live in service to the White Tower (a position that may also give her the chance to help the Seanchan survive learning of the lies they’ve been telling themselves.)
• Aviendha
  • Aviendha tells the Wise Ones of her bleak vision of the Aiel’s future (that they will return to war, sacrifice their honor, and succumb to genocide.) Sorilea comes to the same conclusion as Aviendha: it doesn’t matter whether the vision is preventable, as they’ll work to prevent it regardless. Aviendha notes that her vision has something to do with Rand’s plan for tomorrow, when he addresses the leaders at the Field of Merrilor, and whatever the “Dragon’s Peace” is. She must go to Rand. The Wise Ones inform her that Rand has changed. “He has embraced death. He may still carry a sword and wear the clothing of a wetlander, but he is ours now, finally and truly.” Bair will go to Rhuidean to see if she has the same vision as Aviendha. Bair also mentions that Aviendha should try changing one of the names of her children, never telling anyone the original name, to see if even a small part of the vision can be changed as a result of having seen the vision. Aviendha also mentions Nakomi, the mysterious Aiel woman she met in the Three-fold Land, but no one has heard of her.
• The Black Tower
  • Androl and Pevara are trying to figure out what to do in the Black Tower. They know that people are being Turned (recall that this is a process where a group of 13 Myrddraal and 13 channelers forcibly Turn someone who can channel to the Shadow.) Due to the severity of the situation, Pevara is willing to work with some of the men. She approaches the issue practically, wanting a small group to escape and send word of what’s happening. Androl takes a broader perspective, likening it to a rebellion he took part in. “This is our time of proving, the test of the Black Tower. If we have to run to the Aes Sedai to protect us from our own, we subject ourselves to their authority. If we have to run to the Lord Dragon, then we will be nothing once he is gone.” Though Androl is the weakest man in the Black Tower, only useful for his Talent for creating gateways (which don’t work right now due to a dreamspike in any case,) Pevara – and us, as readers – are given several small glimpses into his modest yet inspiring character. He may be very young compared to Pevara, but the wisdom he’s gathered across his many jobs and journeys is impressive. In a sense, he’s like Rand, Mat, and Birgitte in that he benefits from the knowledge of many lives, though he’s lived all of them in the same lifetime. There aren’t many men remaining who, like Androl, support Logain and oppose Taim, but there are a few. Note that there are also many men who belong to neither faction: they won’t be of any help right now, but if the Tower is cleansed, there will be a non-trivial number of Asha’man remaining.

We end the prologue knowing that the Shadow has appointed Demandred general of the war and tasked Isam with killing Rand. Caemlyn has fallen but the dragons were preserved, though at great cost to the Band. The last few good men in the Black Tower will try to save themselves, much as the White Tower had to purge itself of the Shadow. The various peoples of the world shed the barriers keeping them apart and unite, all feeling the same pull toward the Last Battle. As Lan and the Borderlanders charge to their certain deaths in Tarwin’s Gap, the armies of Light are gathered on the Field of Merrilor awaiting Rand’s mysterious “terms” and a debate over the fate of the seals on Shai’tan’s prison.

Meeting on the Field of Merrilor

• Everyone
  • The wind, beginning the first chapter as it always does, this time follows the same path it did in The Eye of the World, moving eastward from the Mountains of Mist, into the Two Rivers, and continuing on to follow the path Rand first took to Caemlyn. Only, now, the land is diseased and the towns are destroyed. The world we’ve come to dwell in throughout the series of books is all but gone. From Caemlyn, the wind turns northward, passing the people as they trudge toward the Last Battle. “The Last Battle was not hope. The Last Battle was death. But it was a place to be, a place to go.” “Men and women whispered the truth into the night. The end has come. The end has come. All will fall. The end has come.” This despair is broken for us – for the world – by the heartfelt laughter of Rand, catching up with Perrin. I’d normally put this into a more specific section, but it feels significant, thematically, for the world as a whole. Rand sees, with wonder, that though Perrin has become strong and hard, he hasn’t lost his innocence or his sense of self, as Rand did for a time. Perrin notes that Rand still smells – I mean seems – like himself. Though Rand gives the order to tell the people that there will be an unavoidable Breaking – earthquakes and storms – as Shai’tan tries to grind the world to dust, just moments later he reflects on the news that Elayne is pregnant and he will soon be a father. Lews Therin had been a father, too, but that doesn’t stop Rand from seeing this as him becoming a father. In this scene, we’re shown that the story we’re about to experience is going to be rough and much will be lost, but there’s hope and life, too.
• The Black Tower
  • We see, from Pevara’s perspective, that although she appears calm, she’s actually terrified. She was already terrified just being among men who can channel, but now she knows that her sisters are being Turned to the Shadow and her time will probably come soon. She talks with Androl about the Red Ajah. Androl feels that it’s doomed, now that saidin is clean, but Pevara asserts that they still have a role. “We exist to make certain that men who can channel do not accidentally hurt themselves or those around them. Would you not agree that is a purpose of the Black Tower as well?” Androl doesn’t agree. “I won’t believe you’re here to help us. No more than I believed that the Aes Sedai who hunted down male channelers really thought they were helping the men. No more than I believe a headsman thinks he’s doing a criminal a favor by killing him. Just because a thing needs to be done doesn’t make the one doing it a friend.” She’s still skeptical that saidin really is clean. They form a circle so Androl can prove it to her. In the circle, Androl is struck by how powerful she is. He becomes a bit drunk with it, causing things to levitate just to flex the power, and Pevara grows terrified, as she’s powerless until he releases her. She asks him to stop and at first he doesn’t notice. When he notices how scared she is, he drops it immediately, and Pevera, working on fear and instinct, bonds him. Realizing what she’s done, Androl bonds her back. The double-bond is much more intimate than the usual one, even more intimate that Elayne’s same-sex bond with Birgitte. They experience much of each other’s lives and have a deep understanding of the others’ thoughts. Androl doesn’t know how to release a bond, so they’ll just have to live with it for now.
  • Taim continues to Turn Logain’s dwindling supporters. The remaining few think that Taim might have Logain himself. Welyn, one of those Turned, explains that Logain and Taim have patched up their differences; the obvious implication is that Logain will be Turned.
  • A group of Taim’s supporters bully Androl, stripping him of his pin and demoting him to soldier. We see how much this pains Androl from his thoughts: he understands that this is just a factional dispute and a pin, and it shouldn’t matter to him… but he’s been searching his whole life for a place to fit in and the Black Tower had finally been it. It nearly comes to a fight, but Androl can’t even make a Gateway right now – due to the dreamspike – so he leaves the pin and walks out, bearing the humiliation. But, he’s not giving up. A fight won’t achieve anything, but saving Logain – right now, tonight – would make a real difference.
  • Androl and Pevara chat as they wait for the right time to act. She still sees their double-bond as something unnatural that she wants to be rid of, but her short time with Androl has proven to her that, despite his lack of power, he’s actually an impressive man that she wouldn’t mind having properly bonded. She’s also stunned to hear that, when there isn’t a ter’angreal blocking him, Androl’s talent with Gateways allows him to create them up to 30 feet across unaided. She also notes that Androl is impressed with her, particularly with her ability to manipulate conversations, though he’s not too bad at this himself, considering how young he is relative to herself. They can sense one another’s thoughts so deeply that it’s basically a form of telepathy, though they’re still learning to interpret each other, and Androl is currently much better at parsing Pevara’s thoughts.
  • Androl and Pevara jump Dobser, one of Taim’s Turned, to question him. Androl has noted that the process of Turning someone flips their morality, keeping the original intensity, just in the opposite direction. A person filled with Light will be similarly filled with Shadow after being Turned. So, they chose Dobser, who was relatively apathetic… and not particularly clever. Two more of Taim’s men show up while they’re subduing Dobser but Pevara manages to overcome them both (though Androl does hit one of them over the head.) She notes, with some pride, that the Red Ajah doesn’t just sit around complaining about men: they’re very good at fighting other channelers. Seeing it for the first time in the last book of the series, I’m a bit more inclined to think that Pevara might just be a badass. Androl, surprisingly, apprenticed with a Wise Woman once and is able to help Pevara with her wounds after the fight. The two continue to bond, Pevara even telling Androl how Darkfriends killed her family. Androl confides in her that his father had also been able to channel and killed himself to protect his loved ones. Pevara notes, repeatedly, how much pain Androl feels in seeing the men who have been Turned. He would prefer to believe that they’re just dead with something else animating their bodies than to think that it’s truly them, just… worse.
  • Emarin, one of Logain’s supporters, leads the interrogation. He pretends to be a High Lord of Tear with plans to start a new “Grey Tower.” Dobser is easily tricked, letting it slip that Logain is currently being Turned, but he has a strong will and the process will likely take another day or two. Surprisingly, even Dobser – who has been Turned – shudders at the though of it. Dobser also gives away where Logain is being held, at which point Pevara ties him back up and they begin planning Logain’s rescue.
  • They move on the place where Logain is being held, some secret rooms built into the foundation of the Black Tower. Pevara and Androl have learned to use their bond fairly reliably for telepathy. She’s surprised that the men, who aren’t bound by Aes Sedai oaths, lead with lethal attacks, though Androl notes that gentling is just as lethal, only slower. They find Logain – exhausted and tortured but still himself. As they turn to leave, they’re caught. Androl tries – again – to create a Gateway, but he fails, and the ceiling collapses in on them.
• The Field of Merrilor
  • Elayne and Egwene meet in secret the night before Rand’s meeting. Egwene remains convinced that the seals must be protected. Even in the unlikely event that they must be broken, they should at least wait for the last possible moment, rather than granting Shai’tan additional strength during the coming war. Egwene is also furious at Elayne’s deal with the Kin (that they will stay in Caemlyn, working to provide free Healing to all who need it and also to provide gateways for the good of Andor, receiving half of the payment themselves,) but she doesn’t really get into it here (or ever.) Their discussion is interrupted by news of Caemlyn’s fall. Egwene links up with Nynaeve to assist with the Healing. Talmanes, despite all reason, is still alive, and Nynaeve is able to Heal him. Note that this is another parallel with The Eye of the World, as Tam was also thought to be dead but then miraculously Healed by Moiraine… though this does also set up a bit of an expectation that who lives and dies will be more based on dramatic tension than what actually happens. Leilwin also shows up with Domon, asking to serve Egwene, but Egwene has them taken away to be dealt with later, irrationally fearful that Leilwin might be a sul’dam, showing that she continues to suffer from the trauma of being made damane. Though she comes off as paranoid here, we can hardly blame her.
  • Rand and Perrin discuss the war and Rand’s plans. Perrin will support Rand, but on the condition that he swears not to let it come to violence. Rand asserts that Elayne needs to be there for the meeting or it won’t work: he hopes that she’ll still attend, despite the fall of Caemlyn. Perrin states that they can’t leave the Trollocs in Andor as they could use that position to attack from their rear when they move north to Shayol Ghul. Moreover, if they target the Waygate – where the invasion is coming from – they may be able to disrupt the whole invasion plan. Rand also explains that he is, in fact, mad: it’s just as Semirhage said. Yet, he needed these memories: he needed to learn from his past mistakes that he can’t go rushing off alone. Ironically, if he succeeds in defeating Shai’tan, it will be due to his madness, which comes from the taint; the Pattern seems to weave even Shai’tan’s outside influence into its web. Note that, despite explicitly stating that he’s learned not to do everything himself or rush off alone, his plans for tomorrow are to take personal command of all the armies while also fighting Shai’tan. The lesson still comes in handy in how quickly he’s talked out of this, but Rand’s definitely not infallible even in his current state.
  • Aviendha sneaks into Elayne’s tent. From her thoughts, we see that she has accepted that the Aiel cannot return to their way of life in the Three-fold Land. She also knows that Rand’s announcement is related to her vision of the future and she needs to meet with him first, to prevent it. There’s a good chance that this will be her last meeting with Rand before he dies… so, she goes to meet with Elayne and Min first, wanting to do things properly this time. She sneaks into Elayne’s tent and eavesdrops on a meeting about Caemlyn in which Elayne states that it would be too costly to attack the city directly. She hopes that she can get the Aiel to help retake the Waygate and encourage the Trollocs to leave, not by defeating them in combat, but by removing their supply line. Trolloc armies generally plan on gathering supplies as they pillage, both from food stores and corpses, so with no new supply of either, they will eventually abandon what’s left of the burned city without a fight. Elayne, by the way, has reached the stage in her pregnancy where she can reliably channel once more. She receives a letter from Rand insisting that she goes to Caemlyn, which she recognizes as a clever ploy to bully her into staying. “I am proud. And angry at him. But proud because he knew to make me angry like that. Light! We’ll make a king out of you yet, Rand.” With little time remaining, Elayne sends for Min. A short while later, Aviendha arrives in Rand’s tent, awkwardly demanding that he “bed” her. He notes that the three of them decided which of them would visit him and asks, rhetorically, whether he’ll ever get to choose. It’s around this time that we learn that Alanna is somewhere far to the north, still missing since Towers of Midnight. Also, if Aviendha’s four children with Rand are biologically his, then this is when they’re all conceived… but given that Min’s viewing saw something strange about the children, it’s also possible that they’re conceived later, not sharing Rand’s genes, but those of whoever Moridin got his body from, assuming that procreation works the way I think it does in this age.
  • Asleep in bed with Aviendha, Rand visits Moridin’s dreamshard. Rand understands that Moridin is mad, and has been for a long time. He just wants to stop existing. Being reborn as Moridin was, itself, a punishment and Moridin hopes that Shai’tan will grant him true oblivion as a reward… but Rand knows that Shai’tan will never let him go. Moridin sees the battle to come as something between himself and Rand, but Rand asserts that he’s done with Moridin: he’s moving on to confront Shai’tan. “Tell him this fight is not like the others. Tell him I’ve tired of minions, that I’m finished with his petty movement of pawns. Tell him that I’m coming for HIM!” As he makes this declaration, Rand spreads his arms and changes Moridin’s dreamshard, bringing out the sun and causing life to grow. Moridin is shaken and flees.
  • Rand wakes early in the morning, like he did as a farmer. He can feel the land itself as though through a Warder bond now. He uses the One Power to give himself and Aviendha a shower from a bucket of water and some soap, explaining that in the Age of Legends they didn’t study war or violence, but little things, like taking an efficient shower. “We believed that we were living in paradise. Perhaps that was our downfall. We wanted our lives to be perfect, so we ignored imperfections. Problems were magnified through inattention, and war might have become inevitable if the ore hadn’t ever been made.” Aviendha points out that even the belief that they had “eliminated” war was a faulty assumption that left them weak to it. With the meeting just an hour away, Aviendha tells Rand that she will require a boon of him before the day is through. She doesn’t yet know what it will be, but it will change his plans and it will be important.
  • We see the first part of the meeting from Egwene’s perspective (before switching to Perrin), starting in the White Tower, where Gawyn had convinced her to get a proper night’s sleep beforehand. We’re given an early taste of Egwene and Rand’s childishness when dealing with each other right away, when Egwene smugly notes that she paid her respects to the Ogier at the nearby stedding but Rand didn’t even invite them, then, just moments later, she sees that, although she didn’t invite the Windfinders because she wasn’t sure that they’d side with her, Rand did invite them. There’s… some balance to this, as Rand is also easily riled by Egwene, but it’s hard not to notice that Egwene continually tries to goad Rand and take over the meeting, snatching up documents before anyone else can see them and preemptively calling Rand a tyrant before even knowing what he’s asking.
  • With the great political powers all gathered, Rand reminds them all that both Kandor and Caemlyn have fallen. During the Age of Legends, they fought the Shadow using all the wonders of their age, and they barely won. “We face the Shadow in much the same state as it was then, with Forsaken who have not aged. But we are not the same people, not by far.” As Rand sees it, the greatest mistake they made last time was that they lacked unity. “An army of generals. That is why we nearly lost.” He’s not just talking about the battle itself, but the plotting between monarchs. “I will not die for the nations of humanity, only to have them turn upon one another the moment the last Trolloc falls. You’re planning it. Light burn me, I know that you are!” With that in mind, Rand presents his three terms: “Your payment, to me, in exchange for my life.” Note that making this agreement a transaction, dependent on his death, might have repercussions if he happens to survive.
  • First, he presents the “Dragon’s Peace,” a meticulously crafted treaty that locks the borders of each nation, mandates the creation of a school in each capital open to anyone who wants to learn, sets tariff restrictions to prevent the strangling of economies, blocks marriage between rulers of nations unless the two lines of rule are clearly divided, and more. Most significantly, it mandates that all participants help defend any member who is attacked. The rulers, particularly Elayne (who, as a powerful monarch of two kingdoms, will be restricted by this far more than weaker members,) are shocked. The Atha’an Miere are impressed by the contract and, seeing that it doesn’t really restrict them much, are fine with it. Rand also notes that, though Egwene doesn’t say it herself, this agreement actually benefits the White Tower, as the Aes Sedai are well practiced with manipulation within legal constraints and they are already prevented from attacking others without provocation.
  • Rand’s second term is that he’s going to break the seals, which will be the White Tower’s payment to him. Egwene is furious and threatens stopping Rand. In frustration, he accuses Egwene of wanting saidin to be tainted again to keep men from being able to channel as they can… which, yeah, this isn’t really fair, Egwene is being really annoying, and she’s definitely not a friend to men who can channel, but she doesn’t want to taint saidin again. It’s… probably a good thing that Rand and Egwene never really dated.
  • The third term is that Rand will command the armies of the Last Battle, utterly and completely, in order to force unity. Here, the fighting between Rand and Egwene meets a head, as they both have good points: Rand will be too busy dealing with Shai’tan to lead armies, but the White Tower has not proven itself capable of leadership lately. “I’ve known the white Tower’s guidance, Egwene. In a box, beaten each day.”
  • Most of those in attendance give in to Rand’s demands, but Egwene calls his bluff: he’s not actually going to abandon the world. Rand starts to storm out, losing his composure and yelling at Egwene, but is stopped by Moiraine’s arrival.
  • Moiraine serves as the voice of reason. First, she quotes prophecy to remind everyone, but particularly Egwene, that this was all foretold. “You cannot fight this. None of you can. I am sorry. You think he came to this on his own? The Pattern is balance. It is not good nor evil, not wisdom nor foolishness. To the Pattern, these things matter not, yet it will find balance. The last Age ended with a Breaking, and so the next one will begin with peace-even if it must be shoved down your throats like medicine given to a screaming babe.” Better than simply coercing anyone to sign, this kicks off some actual discussion. Rand will need to make peace with the Seanchan: if he can’t, then the agreement is voided. Aviendha mentions that the Aiel are missing from in. Rand meant this respectfully, as the Aiel have already given him more than enough, but they will need a purpose after the Last Battle, something greater than war. Rhuarc and the Wise Ones agree with Aviendha: they must be part of the Dragon’s Peace and they must not return to war for its own sake; the Aiel are not merely weapons. Perrin speaks privately with Rand, explaining that the Aiel will need a new purpose after they’ve met their toh in the Last Battle. Ultimately, Rand appoints the Aiel as peacekeepers between the various powers. This way, nations who feel that they’ve been abused can call for the Aiel to dispense justice, and the Aiel will judge the matter for themselves, working above the law of each individual group but for the peace of them all. “This will mean an end to the Aiel.” “A beginning as well.” Perrin notes that even Cadsuane smells immensely proud here.
  • With the Dragon’s Peace settled, Moiraine moves on to the other two terms. It just doesn’t make sense for Rand to lead the armies personally, given that he’ll be preoccupied with Shai’tan. Rand was just talking about this with Perrin the night before: he can’t do everything himself. His call for unity is good, but why him? He is firm that the White Tower is not a force for war, but he concedes that the various powers can pick a single leader for themselves. He proposes Elayne and the others begrudgingly agree. As for the seals, Moiraine asserts that they will be broken, but by Egwene. “It shall come to pass that what men made shall be shattered, and the Shadow shall lie across the Pattern of the Age, and the Dark One shall once more lay his hand upon the world of man.” She believes that Egwene will know when to break them. Egwene doesn’t seem to fully believe her, but she does want those seals, so it’s settled. Everyone signs, contingent on Rand dealing with the Seanchan, either by convincing them to sign or by destroying their ability to make war in the near future.
  • That business concluded, Moiraine has a request for Rand: finally help Lan. By this time, only six thousand of Lan’s forces remain. They actually did manage to seize and hold the gap for some time, but they’ve been pushed to within a hundred feet of the mouth. The Malkieri prepare one final, glorious charge, but just as they’re about to die, Gateways open all around, bringing in a massive number of reinforcements (Lan estimates it at one hundred thousand.) “Malkier lives on this day!”
  • Back in the Field, the leaders leave the meeting tent to find that, while they were meeting, a forest of giant trees – like those in a stedding – grew up from nothing around them. Rand walks out among the trees while Elayne discusses the war with the Great Captains: Bryne, Bashere, Ituralde, and Agelmar. Seeing that they have four obvious fronts and four living Great Captains, they decide to assign one to each front (though it’s hard not to be reminded of Conway’s Law here.)
    • Agelmar will go to lead the Borderlanders with Lan at Tarwin’s Gap, preventing the armies from spilling south into populated lands (this isn’t just to protect noncombatants, but to deprive the Trollocs of supplies.) The Asha’man already there will remain to reinforce the men and to counter the Dreadlords.
    • Bashere will lead the effort to deal with the Waygate at Caemlyn to prevent the Trollocs from striking at their backs. Bryne would have been a natural choice, as he’s more familiar with the terrain, but he will remain with the White Tower, not wanting to muddle things by returning to where Morgase had him exiled. Bashere has been camped near Caemlyn for some time now anyways, so he’s had some time to become familiar with the region. Bryne does, however, find a moment to praise Elayne for her leadership and remind her that her role isn’t to be a general but to use her generals well, showing that, though he will not return to Andor, he’s still proud of her and supports her.
    • Ethenielle still fights in Kandor, but the country has already fallen. Still, she’s currently holding the Trollocs back from invading further south. Bryne will take the White Tower to hold Kandor where it is, blocking the Shadow from pushing east into Arafel.
    • Shayol Ghul is the most important front, and it’s where the Aiel have been preparing to fight for all these millennia. Iturlade will lead, which the Aiel don’t like, but they did agree on unity. They will Travel as close to the Pit of Doom as possible, then hold for as long as Rand needs to battle Shai’tan.
  • The Ogier from the nearby stedding come out, awed to see the new grove of Great Trees, and comforted that they made the right decision: Loial’s speech won the debate and the Ogier will stand with humanity.
  • Elayne plans to have the Horn of Valere taken from the White Tower to Mat, hidden among the supply caravans. Though she doesn’t really know Faile personally, Perrin convinces her to trust Faile with delivering the Horn.

We end the meeting at the Field of Merrilor heading into chapter 8 with our four fronts defined. In this next phase, I’ll go into the war, which – spoiler alert – doesn’t go well for the Armies of the Light, mostly due to Hessalam’s (that is, Graendal’s) Compulsion on the generals. We’ll continue to use the Field of Merrilor, located very roughly in the center of the fronts, as a supply dump right up until the Last Battle at the same location. Also note that time is going to get kind of screwy for the rest of the book, as time moves slower near Shayol Ghul. So, the minutes or hours Rand spends with Shai’tan are days for Ituralde’s forces just outside, which are weeks for the armies at Tarwin’s Gap, Kandor, and Caemlyn.

This sounds really complicated, but for most of this phase we’ll focus on the fronts outside of Thakan’dar. The eclipse serves, roughly, as a synchronizing event, marking when Rand steps on the ground at Shayol Ghul, then passing through every other perspective. Note that a region this large would be too big for an eclipse to cover all at once, so this moment wouldn’t be at exactly the same time for each perspective, but it’s probably less than an hour apart. Until this moment, Ituralde and Aviendha’s forces are just preparing, then they hold at Thakan’dar for the rest of this phase.

The fronts at Kandor, Tarwin’s Gap, and Caemlyn are much more active, and they run in parallel for this phase. By the end of this part, we’ll go to the Last Battle at the Field of Merrilor, which will simply things by combining the three fronts outside of Thakan’dar into a single battle for most the rest of the book.

If you just follow each thread separately, as my summary will, then I think you’ll get the big picture just fine. Just bear in mind that everything is happening simultaneously, which is why no one has any reinforcements to spare, even when things go wrong. The armies of the Light are spread thin, which doesn’t give anyone much time for rest.

Which brings me to what I really want to emphasize here: the strategic objectives for each side.

The armies of the Light have two strategic objectives. First, Rand must be allowed the time he needs to deal with Shai’tan at all costs. The forces at Thakan’dar have to hold at literally all costs: withdrawal is not an option. Losing every single person at Thakan’dar is an acceptable cost for protecting Rand. The last person standing would do well to hold position, giving Rand just a few more seconds.

The second objective is the preservation of the nations of this continent. The Blight is out of food and, though the Trollocs do have supply wagons full of arrows and equipment, they aren’t carrying enough food to eat. So long as the Trollocs are kept engaged with armies, the damage they can cause is limited and they’ll slowly starve. If they’re allowed to break past the defenders and spread into the undefended southlands, they’ll eat everything: both food stores and people. They’ll spread out, making it difficult to hunt them all down. The nations aren’t holding back many defenders, as we saw in Caemlyn. Just a handful of Dreadlords could easily Travel around breaking hole in walls for Trollocs to invade. Eventually the people will need to return to their fields, which they won’t be able to do if the countryside is infested with Trollocs long term.

It seems unlikely to me that the Trollocs would literally exterminate all human life this way. Exterminating an entire continent is just a lot of work. The Seanchan still hold most of the west and are reasonably well prepared to fend off invaders. There are island nations and the continent to the west as well. Still, the armies of the Light aren’t just defending humanity, but their nationalities, their cultures. Even if humans remain as a species, they might do so without silver bells in their hair and beards, without good Two Rivers bows, without ji’e’toh.

At this point, you should be asking yourself why the Trollocs don’t just split off an raid the countryside at the first opportunity. They continually choose to engage with armies when possible: they could choose to break off. The defenders actually kind of take it for granted that the enemy will engage them so long as they continue to provide targets.

This brings us to the Shadow’s strategy.

The Shadow isn’t just mindlessly invading: this isn’t a leaderless horde simply let loose to wreak havoc wherever they can. As Rand figures out later in the book, Shai’tan can only win if humanity gives up. Everything the Shadow does here is an attempt to force – really, to trick – the defenders into giving up.

The criminal tragedy of the Vietnam War has a lot to teach us, but one takeaway is that attacking undefended populations is not an effective means of crushing their spirit. To the contrary, the greater the injustice and terror of an attack, the greater the resistance to it. If the Trollocs break free to attack the countryside it would mean a massive loss of life, but we’ve already seen how the Malkieri responded to their people being destroyed. Though the loss of noncombatant life and ancestral home would be unimaginable for the Light, it doesn’t actually do much for the Shadow. As we’ll see much later in the book, Shai’tan’s preferred outcome is one where people don’t even realize that they’ve lost and don’t remember having anything to fight for.

No, what the Shadow aims for here is to crush the defenders decisively, army to army, sending the survivors back to their homes defeated and hopeless, waiting for either the pattern to end entirely or for one of the Dreadlords to come and enslave them. Recall that Rand is going to watch the war from his perspective just outside the pattern. Shai’tan doesn’t need to break all of the defenders, it just needs to prove to Rand that a compromise is better than continuing to fight.

Yeah, it’s pretty much Luke in the Emperor’s throne room in The Return of the Jedi, only there’s literally no chance for the defenders to take the fight to Shai’tan if Rand fails, and Rand isn’t just fighting for his own salvation, but for the world’s.

If Rand can’t be broken, then the Shadow can still resort to giving the Dreadlords the opportunity to conquer. If the alliance is broken with each country’s soldiers returning home, then the Dreadlords can continue to build power and Turn other powerful channelers to their side. Without a strong alliance to oppose them, perhaps the Dreadlords could even reopen the Bore.

So, while the armies of the Light have two strategic objectives that are both critical, the Shadow has multiple possible victory conditions. Killing Rand before he can seal Shai’tan will result in victory. Convincing Rand to accept a compromise is a victory. Dissolving the alliance, allowing the Dreadlords to conquer without opposition is a victory.

The Shadow’s best chance of achieving these goals is to convince the defenders that they’ve lost.

In Tarwin’s Gap, this is accomplished by meeting the Borderlanders in combat and killing them, which is why Hessalam used Compulsion to force Agelmar to aggressively engage. The Borderlanders should have continued to withdraw and eventually abandoned the front once it became clear that Elayne wasn’t going to be able to support them. Yes, the Trollocs would have burst through, but that front is pretty far north and it would’ve taken the Trollocs a lot of time to actually push past to the southlands. The Borderlanders could have joined with Elayne to help secure Andor and Cairhien, then pushed north to stop the Trollocs from invading further south. They would have sacrificed Arafel and Shienar, but that pretty much happened anyways.

In Caemlyn, the Shadow does the opposite, Compelling Bashere to continually give up ground, wasting time so Elayne and Bashere couldn’t aid the other fronts. This continual retreat also hurts morale. Morale was high when they were fighting in the Braem Wood. They would have taken losses, yes, but crushing the Trollocs there quickly would have not only allowed them to support the other fronts but it would have sent the message throughout the alliance: the Shadow can be beaten.

In Kandor, the Shadow’s goals are accomplished by defeat, particularly by killing Aes Sedai. This should have been the strongest front in the alliance, with the might of the White Tower unleashed for the first time in living memory. Each dead Aes Sedai deprives the Light of power. Each defeat for this side sends the message: even the Aes Sedai cannot win. The Borderlanders at Tarwin’s Gap never expected to win, so their retreat doesn’t really mean much. But what is a soldier to think if they hear that the Aes Sedai have been beaten? What can a man with a pike do against an army capable of toppling the White Tower?

In Thakan’dar, the Shadow just needs to get to Rand. To prevent this, Ituralde only needs to hold. Retreat is obviously not an option, but it’s not the only mistake Ituralde could make. In Caemlyn, Elayne and Bashere’s goal is to kill the Trollocs quickly, even if it’s risky or costly, but Ituralde doesn’t actually need to break the Trollocs at Thakan’dar: his strategic objective is best accomplished by just holding. This is why Hessalam tries to make him angry and terrified enough to get reckless and forget that killing Trollocs isn’t the point for his front. Bear in mind that even if Ituralde somehow routes the Trollocs at Thakan’dar, he still couldn’t leave to secure another front, as they’d need to leave Rand defenders in case new enemies appeared.

Also note that the Shadow knows that the Seanchan aren’t committed to the war yet, which likely explains why the Trollocs in Kandor are invading to the east. Fortuona believes that the Seanchan can defeat the Shadow alone, which is very stupid, and serves the Shadow perfectly. So long as the Seanchan remain uncommitted, the Shadow is best served by leaving them be, or perhaps by hitting them closer to home. It seems to me that the Seanchan’s reluctance to enter the war is a reference to the United States’ reluctance to join World War II, but there won’t be any Pacific theater if Shai’tan wins.

We’ll also see the struggle in the Black Tower and Perrin and Gaul’s fight against Slayer in this phase, but those are pretty straightforward.

Alright, with that interlude out of the way, let’s get back into it.

The Four Fronts

• Everyone
  • In each perspective, the dark clouds overhead slowly press in more and more as time goes on and Shai’tan continues to squeeze the world. On battlefields with Dreadlords we see dark cracks in the ground caused by repeated use of balefire which is beginning to unravel the world. As Lan puts it: “It is not men alone who grow tired. The mother is weakening.”
• Agelmar and Lan
  • The reinforcements helped, but it’s clear from that start that this front isn’t going to hold indefinitely. The hope is that Bashere and Elayne will be able to support them once they kick the Trollocs out of Caemlyn and secure the Waygate. The soldiers work in 1-hour shifts with multiple shifts per day. Each night, the Trollocs eat the dead. Bulen, the first Malkieri to approach Lan on the road to the Gap, dies in his saddle, having hidden a wound so as to not leave Lan’s side. Lan tries to raise morale. “I will not mourn! Mourning is for those who regret, and I do not regret what we do here! Bulen could not have died a better death. I do not cry for him, I cheer!” Though Lan is forcing this, it catches among the men, who start something of a tradition of responding to death with stories of glory, laughing and toasting over the most insane deaths they’ve seen. Privately, Lan takes Bulen’s hadori, a Malkieri tradition, so Bulen can keep fighting. “You did well, Bulen. Thank you for not giving up on me.”
  • Tenobia wants them to push forward to reach the Trolloc spawning grounds but Agelmar thinks this is too bold. Lan thinks she’s being foolish, thinking of glory rather than duty, but then he argues that they should hold at all costs, not giving up any ground. Agelmar chastises him: “You came to throw your life away for Malkier. That, in itself, is noble. However, with the Last Battle upon us, it’s also stupid. We need you. Men will die because of your stubbornness.” Lan finally accepts that he should think beyond his own death and actually try to help. The plan is to hold as long as they can, then slowly retreat to the south, giving up land to buy time until Bashere and Elayne can come to their aid. Note Agelmar’s wisdom here, as he’ll lose it once Hessalam gets to him.
  • The Dreadlords join the battle, quickly forcing the retreat. There are more than 20 Dreadlords on this front. Elayne orders Fal Dara, Ankor Dail, Fal Moran, and villages like Medo evacuated and burned in preparation for the retreat, as there’s no way to prevent the Trollocs from splitting away to pillage and kill undefended settlements and the Dreadlords make city walls useless.
  • Rand and Moiraine visit Lan in his command tent. Lan’s been burning the fields as they retreat, depriving the Trollocs of any food. Rand gives Lan a recreation of the crown of Malkier and Moiraine a Tar Valon mark – not the same one she originally used to track him, but one he’d been holding on to as a token all the same. Moiraine urges Rand to stop wasting his time taking part in the battles and to head to Shayol Ghul… but he ignores her, going out to confront the Dreadlords personally. His mere presence causes a storm as light and dark clouds clash in the skies and Rand does that thing he does where he gets exactly as arrogant and angry as Egwene is always accusing him of being. “The Dark One thought to rule here? He would see that this land already had a king!” He recognizes Taim. “This was the fight that Lews Therin had constantly demanded of him, a fight Rand hadn’t dared begin. Not until now, not until he had control.” Then… the three dozen Dreadlords, including at least one circle of thirteen, nearly succeed in shielding him, forcing him to withdraw, impotently shouting threats at Taim as he slips through a Gateway and back into the command tent, where he begrudgingly admits that he can’t fight the war personally, something he already said to Perrin much earlier, but it seems to actually sink in this time.
  • Some time later, we see that the retreat has been long and difficult. Lan takes it personally: “They had taken Malkier from him twice now.” The good news is that burning the fields, as well as the corpses after each battle, has had the desired effect: the Trollocs are starving. The Borderlanders try to use this, grimly, to their advantage by having a brief fight, pulling back to allow the Trollocs to rush out to gather the corpses, then sweep back in to kill them. Really note how far the honorable Borderlanders have been pushed here to willingly allow their corpses to be desecrated like this as bait: a sacrifice they’re willing to make, but a sacrifice nonetheless. The plan goes well at first, but then the Dreadlords appear, lead by Taim. Deepe overreaches, trying to get Taim, and is killed. Recall that, though Deepe is a relatively new character, he led the Asha’man Rand sent to Saldaea, fought at Maradon, and even lost a leg at Ituralde’s side.
  • The Borderlanders see the Asha’man mourning Deepe and include them in their nightly toasting of the fallen. Deepe died because he ignored orders… but he was trying to get Taim. Lan might have done the same in his position. Lan talks to Mandarb (at this point I don’t need to specify that Mandarb is Lan’s horse, right?), who was wounded, thinking aloud about how Rand and Nynaeve had changed him. “Lan knew what it was like to be chosen, from childhood, to die. He knew what it was like to be pointed toward the Blight and told he would sacrifice his life there. Light, but he did. Rand al’Thor would probably never know how similar the two of them were.” For perhaps the first time in his life, Lan thinks of a peaceful future. “We’ll rest soon, my friend, I promise. We’ll make a home. The Shadow defeated, Nynaeve and I will reclaim Malkier. We’ll make the fields bloom again, cleanse the lakes. Green pastures. No more Trollocs to fight. Children to ride on your back, old friend. You can spend your days in peace, eating apples and having your pick of mares.” Baldhere, Ethenielle’s swordbearer, meets with Lan in the stable and expresses concern that Agelmar is being too aggressive and is causing unnecessary losses. Lan asserts that it’s just a mistake, but Baldhere insists that Agelmar is pushing himself too hard and is too tired. Lan confronts Agelmar. “Relieve me or let me be. I will listen to advice – I am not a fool – but I will not be second-guessed.” Lan lets it go, but we can note that Agelmar is likely touched by Hessalam’s Compulsion by this point.
  • Some time later, Lan sees that, though they held off the Trollocs for a while, it wasn’t long enough, and they’re nearly defeated. A solar eclipse, the same one that occurs when Rand steps up to Shayol Ghul, emphasizes the defeat. They continue to fight, exhausted, and Lan sees two reserves riding to plug the same gap: an obvious mistake and another sign that Agelmar is losing it.
  • Back at the camp, Lan investigates Agelmar’s behavior and Baldhere reaffirms that there’s something wrong with him, though it may just be exhaustion. Lan intercepts a messenger relaying orders from Agelmar for archers to come forward and fire at the Dreadlords, but Lan knows that the archers wouldn’t be aware that there were also orders to pull the light cavalry back, leaving them exposed. He stops the order and has them scout the forest to the east instead, as an attack would come from there if Agelmar was a traitor, then he goes to confront Agelmar directly.
  • Agelmar insists that they’re about to break the enemy, despite how bad it looks. Lan truly wants to trust in Agelmar’s judgement and tries to rationalize some way for this to make sense, but he also spots that the light cavalry that had been ordered away are still present on the map. While they’re talking, word arrives of a massive army of Shadowspawn coming from the east, only spotted in advance because Lan ordered the archers to scout. Lan orders Agelmar arrested. Though Agelmar begins to argue, when Lan asks him if his orders have made sense recently, Agelmar seems truly shocked and horrified by it. “Oh, Light! What have I done?” Agelmar immediately tries to commit suicide with his short sword but Lan stops him, asserting that he’s not a Darkfriend: someone has clearly tampered with his mind. Lan admits that they’ve lost the battle, but not the war, and they need to withdraw from this front. Agelmar warns Lan that he sent Tenobia into danger, as whoever tampered with his mind wants her dead. Lan runs out just in time to see Tenobia’s fall.
• Bryne and Egwene
  • The Trollocs have already razed Chachin and are moving toward the border with Arafel. Egwene organizes the Aes Sedai to have a dedicated Healing camp, rather than risking themselves on the battlefield. She’s married to Gawyn now. Egwene also continues to play political games with Elayne, happily noting that Silviana refers to Elayne as “Elayne Sedai” rather than using her civil title. Egwene finds time to speak with Leilwin. She still doesn’t trust her, but Egwene is surprised when Leilwin makes a serious vow to serve and protect Egwene as the Amylin Seat, a vow only a Darkfriend would make. “Of course, every Seanchan was close to being a Darkfriend” in Egwene’s view. I guess Egwene forgot about her dream in Crossroads of Twilight of a woman with a Seanchan accent saying “We can reach the top together.”
  • Bryne and Yukiri have worked out a way to use horizontal Gateways to look down on the battlefield from high up in the sky. The Grey Ajah has taken it upon themselves to focus on Traveling weaves in the same way that the Green focuses on battle and the Yellow on Healing. Egwene notes that, although the Aes Sedai are providing benefits like this, Bryne hasn’t actually been deploying them in combat, keeping them as a reserve force, but these are Shadowspawn and Darkfriends: the three oaths don’t prevent the Aes Sedai for striking at them without reservation. Bryne has thoughts on how they could be used in battle.
  • Egwene, with Vora’s sa’angreal in hand, leads the first Aes Sedai assault. It’s an absolutely one-sided massacre, stunning the soldiers, and even Gawyn, who has worked with Aes Sedai for some time now. Yet, Egwene knows that the enemy will adjust their tactics accordingly, and they still have vastly superior numbers.
  • The Aes Sedai hold position against the Trollocs for more than a week, inflicting heavy casualties. Myrddraal sneak into the camp at night to assassinate Aes Sedai. Gawyn is exhausted, staying awake at night to guard Egwene and fighting during the day. The Trollocs have been stockpiling corpses lately, but Bryne doesn’t seem to respond to this. Gawyn still has the three bloodknives’ rings.. “That ring, and its brothers, represented soemthing. They weren’t the way of the Warder. Standing beside Egwene, watching for danger to her… that was the way of the Warder. He would make a difference on the battlefield by serving her, not by riding out like some hero.” In fairness, he does keep this promise for almost 20 chapters.
  • Egwene visits the Wise Ones in Tel’aran’rhiod. She notes that the dream is dying. Tear’s walls are now just ten feet high, the rest blown away by the wind. She eavesdrops on the Wise Ones, hearing that Bair saw the same vision as Aviendha, though through the eyes of her own descendants. They feel that Rand is delaying the confrontation unnecessarily. Egwene and the Wise Ones say farewell, as the dream has become too dangerous to traverse (except for Perrin and Gaul, as we’ll discuss in a bit.)
  • Rand visits Egwene, bringing her a ribbon for her hair as a gift. She takes offense at it, but he’s just trying to make up. “You always looked forward so to being able to braid your hair.” He explains that she’s the closest thing he has to a sibling, at least, a sibling he knows. Gawyn picks up on the qualification there and Rand explains that Galad is his half-brother through Tigraine. Rand asks to see the seals and finds that they’re fake: someone stole them, either from him or from Egwene. We know at this point in the book that Taim has them.
  • The Myrddraal adapt their tactics, disguising themselves while linking to Trollocs so they can force them into suicidal charges without being sniped.
  • The Aes Sedai start taking the hilltops the Trollocs have been holding, blasting them from a distance and then Traveling to them. Too late, Gawyn notices that it doesn’t make sense for the Trollocs to fight so hard to hold the hills. The biggest gateway Egwene has ever seen – and recall that she opened a very large Gateway herself when moving the rebels to Tar Valon – opens, nearly as wide as their entire camp. Thousands of banners of soldiers and hundreds of women channeling ride out: the women have tattooed faces and stiff black silk dresses pulled tight around the shoulders and flared wide toward the bottom. Lelaine recognizes them as Sharans. The Aes Sedai forward camp is quickly destroyed; we see Romanda burned to death instantly when she embraces saidar. Gawyn hides Egwene under his Warder cloak.
  • We see, from Siuan’s perspective, that Siuan, Yukiri, and Bryne only survived because Yukiri happened to have a gateway open for sending messages when the Sharans attacked and Yukiri also has a weave to survive a fall from a great height, which came in handy when they were forced to leap through the horizontal gateway in the sky. They lost roughly half of their soldiers and about 120 Aes Sedai in the attack, leaving them with about 250, but many of the survivors now mourn lost Warders. Bryne blames himself for not seeing the attack, given that he now has the same realization that Gawyn had about the Trollocs defending those positions too fervently – another sign of Hessalam’s Compulsion.
  • Egwene and Gawyn hide under Gawyn’s cloak until night. From there, they can see that the Sharans are marking prisoners with a sort of tattoo or brand on their backs. Every Sharan wears clothing with a diamond shape cut out in the back to show their tattoos, and Egwene notes that those in charge have the fewest tattoos on them, indicating that, in Sharan culture, falling in society is permanent. Male channelers are beastlike and entirely covered in tattoos. Egwene feels that she can partially understand their language, but not completely. A very tall man appears without a gateway, using the True Power, wearing glistening, scaled armor like coins. Egwene can understand him fully. He introduces himself as Bao the Wyld. He spots Leane, who was also hiding. Bao burns the other captives, then gives Leane a message for the Dragon. “Tell him that I have come to slay him, and in so doing, I will claim this world. I will take what originally should have been mine.” “He is false and I am true.” “Tell him I will finally have my satisfaction. He is to come to me, so that we may face one another. If he does not, I will slaughter and destroy.” “Tell him that an old friend awaits. I am Bao, the Wyld. He Who Is Owned Only by the Land. The dragonslayer. He knew me once by a name I have scorned, the name Barid Bel.” Egwene recognizes the name: this, finally, is Demandred.
  • Egwene and Gawyn start sneaking away. Gawyn doesn’t mention it to Egwene, but he uses one of the rings. Egwene is captured by a woman who can channel and Leilwin saves her. Egwene, Gawyn, Leilwin, and Domon skim back to the Aes Sedai camp.
  • The Aes Sedai continue to hold with their backs to the Erinin, along the border of Kandor and Arafel. They receive word that the Seanchan will fight the Shadow.
  • The Seanchan arrive to help in the fighting, but neither side likes it. Egwene is particularly disgusted by sending damane to fight the beastlike Sharan channelers, as neither side has any choice in it. Egwene and Fortuona meet face-to-face. Fortuona deigns to speak directly to Egwene, treating her like a queen rather than marath’damane. “No. You will see me for what I am, woman. I demand it.” Egwene tells Fortuona that she once wore an a’dam and was trained as a damane. It’s only when Fortuona turns to ask Knotai why he didn’t tell her this that Egwene sees Mat there and laughs, seeing Fortuona caught up in a ta’veren’s web. Egwene argues with Fortuona, asserting that Tremalking and the Sea Folk Islands are not part of Seanchan’s current borders and are thus not the Seanchan’s per the treaty. Fortuona concedes this, but wants Egwene to proclaim that anyone who wishes to be collared may choose to go to Ebou Dar if they chose. Egwene will agree with this if Fortuona concedes the opposite: any damane who wishes to be free may leave Seanchan territory. Of course, Fortuona won’t agree to this. Egwene literally dares Fortuona to put on an a’dam to prove it has no power over her. They part aggressively, both swearing that they will see the other’s failure before Mat steps between them. As she leaves, Egwene whispers to Mat that she can help him escape but he says he can handle it on his own. Egwene, hilariously, thinks to herself “That was what he always said. She’d find some way to help him.”
  • Back on the front, Bryne notes that the battle is actually going to plan, which is surprising considering that he’s facing Demandred. Bryne needs to constantly move around to avoid being attacked by gateway. Despite Bryne’s optimism, things are in chaos, with people dying constantly even within the camp. He sends a messenger to Fortuona but they’re crushed by a slain raken falling out of the sky. Min volunteers to run the message and he agrees. “I’ll count the day’s work toward what you owe me.” The messenger gateways are being made so small that they need to crawl through, to conserve power. Min finds Mat there, and in a scene I’ll cover in Mat and Fortuona’s section, Min winds up becoming Fortuona’s Doomseer, telling Fortuona about her visions.
  • While fighting Trollocs, Egwene sees that Bryne sent the elite heavy calvary – formerly led by Joni but now by Uno – to support her position, but from her vantage point, Egwene can see that this leaves the army’s left flank completely unprotected. Worse, the Sharans and Trollocs spin on the new cavalry in a trap, clearly aware that it was coming. Egwene needs to confront Bryne about this.
  • Egwene arrives at the command tent to find it empty except for Uno, who just barely survived Bryne’s sabotage and is certain that, though Bryne himself couldn’t be a Darkfriend, there’s a traitor to blame somewhere. Min arrives with her messages: both that Mat thinks Bryne is a Darkfriend and that Mat wants full command over the armies. Egwene scoffs at both, asserting that Mat isn’t good enough to lead the Aes Sedai’s armies (and that the decision isn’t hers anyways, as the Hall has authority over the armies.) Though she privately wants to confront Bryne, she won’t accept that he’s a Darkfriend.
  • Note that Gawyn is pale but doesn’t seem tired; the ring is affecting him, but Egwene doesn’t know about it.
  • Waiting to speak to Bryne, Egwene thinks about Mat. She recalls a time from when she was around 13 when Mat jumped into a river to save a girl from drowning… but she hadn’t been drowning, and everyone made fun of Mat for it all winter. Mat had grumbled all the while that next time he saw someone drowning he’d just let them drown. That spring, Mat saved a boy from drowning in the same river, saving his life. “Egwene had never realized that could happen. People who started to drown didn’t yell, or sputter, or call for help. They just slipped under the water, when everything seemed fine and peaceful. Unless Mat was watching.” She remembers that Mat came for her in the Stone of Tear, but he also tried to save her from being Amyrlin. “So which was this? Was she drowning or not? How much do you trust Matrim Cauthon? Min had asked. Light. I do trust him. Fool that I am, I do. Mat could be wrong. He often was wrong. But when he was right, he saved lives.” Egwene summons the Hall. Before they can meet, word arrives from Cairhien that Bashere betrayed Elayne. When confronted, Bryne admits that he’s been making mistakes but he doesn’t know why. Egwene, familiar with the techniques of the Forsaken, figures out that it’s Compulsion and that the Forsaken are attacking all of the Great Captains. Bryne is actually relieved and grateful for the news. “I feared I was losing my mind, Mother. I kept seeing what I’d done… I left thousands of men to die… but it wasn’t me. It wasn’t me.” With the Great Captains all twisted and no quick way to determine if others have been Compelled as well, Egwene knows of only one man with the talent to lead armies and a ter’angreal that protects him from Compulsion. “We will have to put our armies under the command of Matrim Cauthon. May the Light watch over us.” As I’ll cover more thoroughly in Mat and Fortuona’s section, Mat quickly decides that the four fronts have failed and they need to regroup for a last stand on favorable terrain, at the Field of Merrilor.
• The Black Tower
  • We left off earlier with Logain’s rescue failing and the ceiling collapsing. When we see Androl, Pevara, Jonneth, Emarin, Evin, Nalaam, and Logain again, Nalaam is dead – from the collapse – and the others are tied up. Evin is sobbing, as he’s the reason they were caught. He didn’t willingly betray them, but he broke quickly to questioning. Note that Evin is very young, nobody really blames him but himself. Taim’s still trying to Turn Logain, but it’s taking too long and he’s getting frustrated that he hasn’t been able to deliver any results, so he orders Evin Turned next for an easy win. Androl begs to be taken first, but he’s so weak that Taim doesn’t even care. Evin is turned very quickly. “I feel great. No more fear, no more worry. We shouldn’t have been fighting all of this time. We are the Black Tower. We need to work together.” (Go watch the 1978 version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers if you’ve never seen it.) Evin tries to comfort Androl, telling him that he’s trying to convince them to Turn Androl rather than killing him. Note that, even Turned, Evin is empathetic and kind; don’t let yourself grow desensitized to all of the tragedies in this book; this scene should be nauseating. Bear in mind that we met Evin at the same time as Androl, back in Winter’s Heart. We met Arlen Nalaam even earlier, in The Path of Daggers, fighting the Seanchan under Rand’s increasingly paranoid command. Taim’s going to Turn Emarin next.
  • Some time later, Androl and Pevara have been given forkroot. Taim wants Pevara Turned soon, as she’ll be able to help with Logain as the Turning process works better on the opposite gender… but he has to wait for her forkroot to wear off first, as you need to be able to channel to be Turned. Emarin is still holding out, but he’s getting close to breaking, weeping in his bonds. Fortunately, the thirteen Taim has been using to Turn people are growing exhausted. He brings in Toveine, one of Logain’s bonded Aes Sedai, to have her Turned so she can help with him. Androl notes that Taim has a disc of some kind that he seems to be focused on, but he’s not sure what it is. We’ll later learn that Taim has the seals.
  • Toveine is quickly turned and joins the effort to Turn Logain. Frankly, I’m a little surprised that Toveine even had to be Turned. Recall that, though Toveine wasn’t Black Ajah, she was still pretty terrible. I would’ve thought that she’d be happy for a chance to torture a man, but I suppose Logain is far too old for her. Hessalam (Graendal) is also here now, helping with the process. Emarin still resists, but he’s been reduced to a wreck after just two sessions. Logain has withstood nearly a dozen. Androl is no longer being given forkroot and is now shielded, indicating that Evin may have succeeded in convincing them to Turn Androl. Androl notes that Evin’s madness is still present. He uses it to manipulate Evin, warning him that Abors might be trying to kill him, jealous of his place. “That is a mistake, Taim. You use our own friends against us, but we know them better than you do.” (I really like this spin on winning through the “power of friendship.”) The scheme works: Evin strikes Abors, who drops the shield on Androl. Taim kills Evin, Hessalam tries to use the moment to seize control from Taim, and Taim weaves balefire at Androl… who manages to create a gateway the width of a coin, (I think he made it through the dreamspike, but it’s a little ambiguous, as Lanfear disables it at around the same time), to swallow it. At that moment, the door explodes in: Canler, one of Logain’s supporters, brought twenty or so of the Two Rivers boys. They heard Androl begging from a room above and decided they couldn’t wait to attack. Taim’s followers fire on Logain’s supporters, but with the dreamspike gone, Androl uses a gateway to redirect their attacks at them, killing several. Hessalam and Taim flee. “The Black Tower belonged to the Asha’man, not this man. It was time for the Asha’man to reclaim it.”
  • After things have settled, we see some of Lyrelle’s perspective, still waiting outside the Black Tower for a chance to bond some Warders. An Asha’man tries to explain that the danger is past and those who remain walk in the Light. Lyrelle notes that the White Tower also had to purse itself of the Shadow… but she also doesn’t believe that the taint has been cleansed and she plans to bond all of the strongest Asha’man by bonding one and then forcing them to tell her who all the strongest are. Lyrelle is frustrated that she’s here, missing the opportunity to demonstrate leadership and build reputation back at the White Tower. Really, from the short bit of Lyrelle’s thoughts that we see, it’s made abundantly clear that she’s focused entirely on personal gain and hardly even sees the Asha’man as human. Pevara meets with Lyrelle and tries to gently explain that matters aren’t as they expected. “I was once where you are. Ready to bond all of the Asha’man in an attempt to control them. But would you ride into another city and select fifty men there, at a whim, and bond them as Warders? Bonding the Asha’man just to bond them is foolish. I do think that some Asha’man will make excellent Warders, but – like many men – others will not. I suggest that you abandon your plan to bond exactly forty-seven and take those who are most willing. You will gain better Warders.” Lyrelle ignores her, intending to take the 47 strongest, disappointed that Pevara has learned that you can’t compel them. Seriously, I’m not sure whether to compare Lyrelle to a sul’dam or a Myrddraal. Just in case this happened, Androl gathered exactly 46 volunteers: the others are all either full Asha’man or are away from the Tower. “The Dragon Reborn sent a message to us, just earlier today. He instructed us to learn one last lesson: that we’re not to think of ourselves as weapons, but as men. Well, men have a choice in their fate, and weapons do not. Here are your men, Aes Sedai. Respect them.” The Aes Sedai each take two Asha’man Warders, except Faolain and Theodrin, who take one each. Away from Lyrelle, Pevara wonders at how “cold” the Aes Sedai could be at times.
  • Emarin and Logain both have emotional scars from the Turning process. Logain never gave in, but he’s darker now and doesn’t speak much. Still, he’s alive and un-Turned and the Black Tower is free under his leadership.
  • Logain goes through Taim’s notes and discovers the Shadow’s plot to sabotage the Armies of the Light by twisting the Great Captains. Logain gathers the Asha’man and brings them to Elayne’s stand at Cairhien just in time to save them.
• Bashere and Elayne
  • Bashere’s plan to get the Trollocs out of Caemlyn is to bait them out into the Braem Wood where they can’t hide behind Caemlyn’s walls. His hope is that the Trollocs will be so desperate for food and for action that they’ll fall for it, abandoning the walls. To keep morale up, he convinces Elayne to tell everyone that the Dragon is the father of her children, rather than continuing to let them think that it’s Mellar. As the High Commander of the Armies of the Light, she’s already one of the most important targets in the world, so the ruse really doesn’t do any more good. The hope is that this front won’t take too long so Bashere’s forces can move to support Agelmar and Lan before they’re broken completely.
  • Bashere and Elayne use oil to burn the city, driving many of the Trollocs out, but not those holding the walls. Light cavalry trade arrows with them, trying to bait them out, toward the wood. Elayne is frustrated to learn that Agelmar was forced to begin a controlled retreat almost immediately after arriving, when she had hoped that he would be able to hold at the Gap longer, though she does understand that plans in war only last until the first lance is raised. If the attempt to lure out the Trollocs with archers doesn’t work she’ll need to use the dragons to level the city: they need to finish up here quickly to support Agelmar. Uno is serving as the Amyrlin’s messenger (and of course Birgitte thinks he’s hot.) Elayne and Birgitte continue to argue over the relationship between Aes Sedai and Warder, as Elayne wants to see the battlefield personally and Birgitte pushes back. Birgitte is equipped with one of the foxhead ter’angreal copies. Recall that Mat has the original and two copies while Mellar also has a copy. Birgitte’s memories at this point are almost all gone. She is aware that she is forgetting something and feels that pain of loss, but she no longer has any clear memories from before being spun out of the dream.
  • The Trollocs finally take the bait and charge into the wood. Perrin’s archers strike first, then the Legion of the Dragon crossbowmen. Alliandre’s Ghealdanin move in with pikes and halberds. Finally, when the Trollocs have been positioned correctly, Talmanes and the Band open up with the dragons. The initial fighting is entirely one-sided in favor of Bashere and Elayne. Seeing the dragons in action, Elayne decides that they will put an end to war via mutually ensured destruction. Birgitte doesn’t buy it. “Don’t you see? There won’t be war any more. We win this, and there will be peace, as Rand intends. Nobody but Trollocs would go into battle, knowing they face weapons like these!” “Perhaps. Maybe I have less faith in the wisdom of people than you do.”
  • Though the early battles went well, the Trollocs quickly adapt to fighting in the woods. Bashere plans to fall back in a controlled manner, similar to Agelmar. They’ll build raft bridges to cross the Erinin to the east then keep moving and cross the Alguenya as well, killing Trollocs as they go. (If you’re looking at the map, these are the two dotted lines between the Braem Wood and Cairhien.) They’ll make their stand with Cairhien to their backs. Elayne notes that this plan will take a long time, perhaps too long for them to support Lan and Agelmar, but she ultimately trusts in Bashere’s judgement. Knowing what’s to come, it seems that this is the first indication that Graendal is using Compulsion on Bashere, as this plan doesn’t really make much sense: they’re really doing pretty well in the woods, even with the Trollocs adapting, and the whole alliance’s plan relies on deciding things on this front quickly.
  • It’s at about this point that Perrin names Tam a lord and makes him Steward of the Two Rivers, gives him command over his forces, and heads out to battle Slayer. I’ll pick this thread up in Perrin’s section, as Perrin doesn’t really rejoin any of the fronts until the final stand at Shayol Ghul much later.
  • Loial and the Ogier continue to fight viciously against the Shadowspawn. Erith fights at Loial’s side. This isn’t just a duty for them. “Thoughts left him as he found himself angry, furious, at the Trollocs. They didn’t just kill the trees. They took the peace from the trees.” Loial notes that the trees are silent. “A silence like screaming.” The Ogier sing a war song as they fight. “The call to blood, to death. Let them hear! Let them hear! Swing after swing. Chopping dead wood, that was all this was. Dead, rotting, horrible wood.” Perrin had a similar thought when fighting at Loial’s side at Dumai’s Wells, though they fought humans then, and the dispassionate feeling was forced, not natural, as it is for Loial now. “He saw terror in their beady eyes, and he loved it. They were used to fighting men.” “Well, let the Trollocs fight someone their own size.” “They forced Ogier and humans to be like themselves. The call to blood, to death. Well, the Shadow would see just how dangerous the Ogier could be. They would fight, and they would kill. And they would do it better than any human, Trolloc or Myrddraal could imagine. By the fear Loial saw in the Trollocs – but their terrified eyes – they were beginning to understand.” I want to emphasize how sad and awful this scene is. These are Loial’s thoughts! The Ogier are useful soldiers, but don’t let yourself get swept up in how badass Loial sounds here. Something beautiful has been taken from the world and there’s no guarantee that it will ever return. “They took the peace from the trees” might be literally true, but here, Loial is projecting his own loss, too angry and too profoundly wounded to feel it in himself.
  • Bashere and Elayne’s forces retreat across the Erinin and make it to the Alguenya. Scouts spot a second army of Trollocs that likely broke off from the main group pursuing them and are marching east toward Cairhien, which is stripped of defenders and full of refugees. Bashere notes that he should have seen it, but he had been thinking like a human and didn’t consider that the Myrddraal would be willing to push the Trollocs until they start dying from exhaustion in order to get that second army ahead of them, ready to not only threaten Cairhien but also to pincer their armies when they cross the Alguenya. Bashere’s response is to continue marching east and try to hit the Trollocs at Cairhien as quickly as they can, defeat them, then turn to face the second army. I’m actually not sure what he could do differently at this point, other than to abandon Cairhien, or to turn to fight the first army now, then race to meet the second army before they consume Cairhien, which doesn’t seem possible as Dreadlords can destroy the walls in minutes. Still, the original choice to leave the Braem Wood was probably the first sign of Graendal’s Compulsion, and Bashere certainly doesn’t come up with anything clever or unexpected here.
  • Elayne and Bashere’s forces reach Cairhien. They position themselves on the northern side to face the Trolloc army coming from that direction (the one that split off.) They’ll need to defeat it quickly, then turn and defeat the one pursuing them across the Alguenya. The channelers are exhausted from making Gateways and won’t be able to participate in the fight. The soldiers are exhausted from the forced march. They slightly outnumber the Shadowspawn, who are also exhausted, but Myrddraal can drive Trollocs through exhaustion better than humans can shake it off. Just as Elayne is about to give her prepared pre-battle speech, the eclipse marking the moment when Rand steps on Shayol Ghul passes over them. She improvises a fantastic speech, acknowledging the stakes at hand, the difficulty of their task, but also their strength and an assertion that they will win. “If we are to have the Light again, we must make it ours!” She gives the speech in the dark, weaving a light above herself, and the eclipse ends when she finishes. Elayne gets into position: as one of the only channelers with any strength left, she will take part in the battle.
  • As the battle progresses and Elayne is growing exhausted, the plan to encircle the first Trolloc army is working, but the second army is approaching sooner than expected. They’re out of options: no channelers can make a gateway and a retreat into the city would just give the Trollocs time to regroup until the Dreadlords knock down the walls. Tam confronts Bashere, accusing him of knowing that the Trolloc army was arriving sooner than expected: Bashere hasn’t been using the Aiel to scout and has been fabricating the reports. They decide that Bashere is a Darkfriend, not aware of Hessalam’s Compulsion, and relieve him of duty: Elayne takes charge. They’ll form up the dragons against the second army and just try to finish the first quickly, though there’s little chance of success.
  • Loial doesn’t know much about warfare, but he knows that they’re losing. The Ogier sing a song of mourning. Loial looks down at the dead humans all around him. “He knew they thought of themselves as bigger than they were, but here on the battlefield – with Ogier and Trollocs – they seemed like children running around underfoot. No. He would not see them that way. The men and women fought with bravery and passion. Not children, but heroes.”
  • They really did come close to winning, despite everything, but Elayne sees that they’ve lost. She has a circle of twelve but they’re so exhausted that, together, they’re only as strong as a single Aes Sedai. Gallene, the Lord Captain of Berelain’s Winged Guards who always butted heads with Arganda, fell in battle. Arganda, First Captain of Ghealdan, is wounded and, despite his constant bickering with Arganda, he now wears a plume from his helmet on his own. The Ogier are being wiped out. Just as it seems all is finally lost, Logain and the Asha’man arrive. “The Shadow has been planning this trap for a long time, according to notes in Taim’s study. I only just managed to decipher them. We came to you first. The Black Tower stands with the Lion of Andor.” Still, Elayne sees that even a hundred Asha’man can’t stop a hundred thousand Trollocs. That’s where Androl comes in. He leads a circle of 14 women and 12 men. “Three thousand years ago the Lord Dragon created Dragonmount to hide his shame. His rage still burns hot. Today… I bring it to you, Your Majesty.” He opens a gateway a hundred feet tall into the magma within Dragonmount, which explodes out in a torrent. Asha’man use wind to direct the flow and to keep the Shadowspawn from escaping it. Androl does this three times, each time killing thousands if not tens of thousands of Trollocs and creating a barrier of lava. The battle isn’t over, but it gives Elayne time to regroup and get reinforcements.
  • With the battle done, Elayne meets with Mat and the other leaders to discuss what to do now that the Great Captains have been sabotaged. She grants Mat authority to lead the combined armies of everyone not at Thakan’dar and permits Mat’s plan for a last stand at the Field of Merrilor.
  • We see, from Galad’s perspective, how the survivors try to pick themselves back up. Elayne and Tam assert that they must all see this as a victory, even though they lost fully half of their people from this front. Galad sees this as a lie, but Tam argues with him. “We must look and see Light, not Shadow, or we’ll all be pulled under.” Galad’s spirits are faltering. “Merrilor will be worse. Light help us… it’s going to get worse.” Also note that Galad has come to see Perrin as one of the only leaders he’s ever met who he can actually speak to plainly, without worrying about him taking offense. “Perhaps the Two Rivers would be a good place for the Whitecloaks to settle.”
• Rand
  • Rand doesn’t intend to merely seal Shai’tan back up in the prison: he means to kill him altogether, though he’s not sure whether this is actually possible. He finds time to eat dinner with Elayne, considering that he’ll likely never meet his children, but he never met Janduin and he turned out alright. The two enjoy an intimate meal, with Rand confiding in her about his experience on Dragonmount and that he’s realized that he always was both Lews Therin and Rand. He’s pleased that Elayne’s first response, alone among people he’s discussed this with, is to marvel at the advantage of having those memories. Rand wonders, yet again, as to why anyone but him has to suffer, as this battle is all really about him, and Elayne asks him if he’d deny them the right to fight, which is a parallel with Lan’s journey with Bulen. Rand explains that Shai’tan exists outside the pattern, influencing it by force. This is why Rand’s presence now brings so much good. Being ta’veren used to be a balance: for every miracle, a tragedy. But, with Shai’tan pushing so hard against the Pattern, Rand has become the Pattern’s means of balancing out Shai’tan. Elayne asks whether there can ever truly be good, as the Pattern will always balance it out. “So long as we care, there can be good.” Keep this conversation in mind as it’ll become relevant when Rand wrestles with Shai’tan. Before he leaves, he gives her a gift: an angreal seed in the shape of a small wise woman. Creating an angreal is different from a ter’angreal, she’ll need to infuse it with her Power repeatedly, over a period of time, and it’ll leave her weak. It’s something for her to focus on after the Last Battle is won.. and Rand is dead. She gives him a gift as well: the dagger ter’angreal from Aviendha that makes a person invisible to the Shadow.
  • The night after Rand is forced to flee the Dreadlords in Shienar, Rand walks in his dreamshard of a peaceful valley. In it, he finds a cave that he did not create, and at the end of it is a pool of water where Mierin (Lanfear) struggles to stay afloat. Though he’s wary, he finds that seeing her makes him feel like a child again, like the boy who thought Baerlon was the grandest city ever built. He remembers walking into grand parties with Mierin on his arm and their steamy nights together as these memories mix and merge with those of lusting for Selene. She begs him for help, saying that he can save her. Something dark, beneath the water, pulls her down into the abyss. Rand considers that he, too, made mistakes, and even fell to the Shadow, accepting the True Power, so maybe she deserves another chance too. But, ultimately, he decides that she’s lying. The game up, she allows the pool of water to disappear and Rand speaks plainly. “The past is done. I care nothing for it, and would gladly give you a second chance at the Light. Unfortunately, I know you. You’re just doing it again. Playing us all, including the Dark One himself. You care nothing for the Light. You care only for power, Mierin. You honestly want me to believe that you’ve changed?” Rand asks her to open her mind to him completely to prove it. She won’t, so he opens his heart to her. He already showed his heart to Shai’tan when he embraced the True Power, so there’s no additional disclosure here. She’s surprised to see that it’s not Lews Therin who makes up Rand’s core, but the sheepherder, raised by Tam. “I really did mean it. I am finished with you, Mierin. Keep your head down during the storm to come. If I win this fight, you will no longer have reason to fear for your soul. There will be no one left to torment you.”
  • Rand tests the dagger ter’angreal at Shayol Ghul and finds that Shai’tan really can’t sense him while he’s carrying it.
  • Rand visits Elayne in her camp at the eastern edge of the Braem Wood. She asks Rand not to hide himself when he arrives, as the armies gathered for him and will take heart from seeing him. Rand goes to Tam with a gift: Hawkwing’s sword, Justice. “Think of it as a thank-you, from all the world to you. If you had not taught me of the flame and the void all those years ago… Light, Father. I wouldn’t be here right now.” Tam explains that the flame and the void aren’t about archery or swordsmanship: “The flame and the void are about center. And about peace. I would teach it to each and every person in this land, soldier or not, if I could.” Tam wants to try it out at the practice grounds. Rand’s never seen Tam fight, ever, and would have had trouble imaging his gentle father as a blademaster… but just seeing him slip into the forms, he immediately sees it. Tam sees that Rand is worried and that he’s pained, jealous, that he can no longer use a sword with just one hand. So, Tam asks him to spar with him: he’ll limit himself to one hand as well, to keep it fair. Rand struggles to take it seriously, wanting to give up before it even starts because he only has one hand. “What would Lan say if he’d seen this shoddy performance by one of his students? What would he say? He’d say, ‘Rand, don’t get into swordfights. You can’t win them. Not any longer.’ But… Tam is doing it, and unlike most people who Rand has sparred with as the Dragon Reborn, Tam isn’t coddling him. Rand and Tam lose themselves in the match. “‘It has been quite a weight, hasn’t it?’ Tam asked. ‘What weight?’ ‘That lost hand you’ve been carrying.’ ‘Yes. I believe it has been at that.'”
  • Rand still needs to go to Mat and the Seanchan, but he’s nearly prepared for the final confrontation. He wears Callandor on his back, which turns out to be a sa’angreal for the True Power as well as the One Power. Moiraine notes, privately, that Rand is no longer a youth, though she wouldn’t say this out loud. She also notes the strange mix of self-effacement and pride: he’s humble, and yet he thinks that he can kill Shai’tan.
  • Rand meets with Mat and Fortuona (which I’ll describe in their section. Basically, he gets the Seanchan to accept the Dragon’s Peace, allowing them to keep the lands they’ve fully claimed and the damane they’ve already taken.)
  • Rand spends some time rotating through the fronts and fighting in disguise. He always lifts the disguise as he leaves, both to encourage the armies and to keep the Shadow confused as to where he is, which seems to mess with Demandred’s head far more than Rand could’ve possibly guessed. Cadsuane informs Rand that the Black Tower freed themselves: they don’t need his help.
  • Finally, Rand, Ituralde’s forces, and Aviendha’s channelers invade Thakan’dar. While Ituralde and Aviendha secure the valley, Rand heads up to the Pit of Doom with Moiraine, Aviendha, and Thom. A total solar eclipse occurs as he approaches. Thom stays at the entrance as a final defense. “Remember. This is not the Bore, this is not the Dark One’s prison. This is merely the place where his touch is strongest upon the world.” As they walk, Rand’s wound splits open and blood runs down to pool at his feet: “Blood on the rocks.” Rand makes a circle with Moiraine and Nynaeve as they walk into the Pit.
  • Shai’tan doesn’t notice Rand until he’s well into the tunnel. The toothed cavern starts to close on them but Rand pushes back, refusing to come to it on his knees. “His adversary was caught up in this inevitability as much as he was. The Dark One didn’t exist within the Pattern, but the Pattern still affected him.” The cavern opens for them, but Rand leaves a pool of blood where he stopped. He feels that one of the women he’s bonded to is in trouble but he can’t tell who, due to the warping of spacetime in the cavern. The fires in the Pit of Doom have gone out, consumed. Ahead stands Moridin with a sword. Behind him lies Shaidar Haran’s empty husk of a body, then… nothing, an utter darkness: Shai’tan’s event horizon (alright, I really want to call this an event horizon, but given that much of the rest of this book is specifically about Shai’tan trying to affect the world from within it, I think this would more technically be an “apparent horizon,” but if we consider that Shai’tan might be able to magically bend spacetime, then maybe this still counts as an absolute or event horizon? If anyone watching learned about black holes from somewhere other than playing Steins;Gate, please explain this for me in a comment.) Moridin demands a duel. Rand asks him to step aside. “If my victory is not assured, neither is your fall. Let me pass. For once, make the choice you know you should.” Moridin responds with laughter. “Now? Now you beg me to return to the Light? I have been promised oblivion. Finally, nothing, a destruction of my entire being. An end. You will not steal that from me, Lews Therin! By my grave, you will not!” Moridin comes on swinging. Note that everyone is too polite to suggest that he just go balefire himself.
  • Rand fights Moridin, wielding Callandor as a sword, thankful for the practice in fighting one-handed with Tam; he was always better with a sword than Elan in the Age of Legends and now he’s actually holding his own one-handed. Moiraine and Nynaeve can only cling to stalagmites to keep from being sucked into the void. Rand notes that the world around them is constantly shifting, humid one moment, dry the next, rocks shifting. “Time slipped around them like a stream. Rand felt as if he could see it. Each blow here took moments, yet hours passed outside.” Eventually, Rand slips just a bit and brushes the void. As he does, everything goes black for him: both he and Moridin freeze. Note that Nynaeve will observe them standing perfectly still for some time, so – cool as it would be – we can’t say that this is a trick of relativity: Rand and Moridin are magically in stasis.
  • “Rand stood in a place that was not. A place outside of time, outside of the Pattern itself.” He can actually see the Pattern from here, or at least an interpretation of it built by his mind. That’s right, for most the rest of the book, we’re going to see Rand and Shai’tan in an abstract battle of wills where most of what we see is just Rand’s interpretation of a process beyond human understanding. “None of this had happened the last time, when Rand had worn the name of Lews Therin. He could only interpret that as a good sign. Now the battle truly began. He looked into the nothingness and felt it welling up. Then, like a sudden storm, the Dark One brought all of his force against Rand.”
  • Though Rand and Moridin are frozen, Nynaeve and Moiraine are clinging to stalagmites in the tunnel, trying not to be swept into the vacuum. Nynaeve notices that Alanna is in the tunnel, hidden, bleeding to death from a knife wound: a trap for Rand. Rand is still bonded to Alanna as a Warder, so if she dies, he’ll be driven mad with rage through the bond, distracting him from Shai’tan. Though Nynaeve and Moiraine are still in a circle with Rand, the world is extremely lucky that Nynaeve learned to Heal with herbs, and though she no longer needs them, she still travels with a traditional healing kit. The world now hinges on Nynaeve’s ability to keep Alanna alive without channeling.
• Perrin
  • Perrin begins this phase leading the Two Rivers soldiers with Elayne’s group at Caemlyn. However, he knows that he needs to stop Slayer, or else he’ll be able to strike at Rand while he’s dealing with Shai’tan from the dream, sneaking past the Aiel outside. Perrin suspects that the reason Slayer is so much stronger than him in the dream is because he’s been entering in the flesh. He asks the Wise Ones how to do this himself but they won’t tell him. When Elayne’s forces start retreating to the east, Perrin names Tam a lord and makes him Steward of the Two Rivers, giving him command over his forces. As he’s about to leave, Bornhald stops him to explain that Trollocs didn’t kill Perrin’s family, Ordeith – Fain – did. Perrin finds Rand – scouting in Shayol Ghul – and asks him to make a Gateway into the dream. An Asha’man will make a return portal at Merrilor once per day so he can return. Gaul sees what Perrin is doing and comes with. They bring supplies for a number of days, not sure what being in the flesh in the dream will entail, then step through the Gateway.
  • Perrin sees that Tel’aran’rhiod is dying, much worse than the waking world, and it’s worst near Rand. There’s a great storm consuming everything, drawing it into the sky. “Here, it was simply easier to see.”
  • Gaul handles himself shockingly well in the dream. “You act as if it is something new. Yet, in the first dream, wherever I go, I am surrounded by women and men who could tie me in the air with a thought and kill me at any time. I am accustomed to being powerless around some, Perrin Aybara. It is the way of the world in all things.” Seriously, this is going to continue throughout the book: Gaul is an absolute badass. Though he can’t manipulate the dream as thoroughly as Perrin and Slayer can, he adapts to the basics of fighting in the dream very quickly. As far as I can tell, he doesn’t have any innate gift for it, he just learns to see it as nothing but another battlefield.
  • Moonhunter – Lanfear/Mierin/Cyndane/Selene – appears before Perrin and speaks with him. “Moonhunter? Is that what the wolves call me? That’s not right, not at all. I don’t hunt the moon. The moon is mine already.” (Can we all agree that this means that Lews Therin once bought Mierin some lunar property as a terrible anniversary gift?) She explains that she wants vengeance against the one who caused her imprisonment and doesn’t oppose Perrin here. Perrin’s not as young or naïve as Rand was when Selene seduced him (plus, you know, he’s married, and Berelain gave him plenty of experience in dealing with trollops.) Still, he’s not about to attack a woman who hasn’t shown him hostility. He also learns some tricks watching her in the dream, as she’s very good here. She can shift soundlessly by changing the air around herself as she moves and she quickly learns to create a thin vacuum around herself to thwart Perrin’s sense of smell. While talking, she suddenly looks up, surprised, and vanishes. She’s hiding from someone.
  • Perrin goes to the Black Tower, both to remove the dreamspike and because this seems a logical place to find Slayer. There are Asha’man guarding it in the dream, in the flesh. Moonhunter slipped some forkroot into their wine, helping Perrin get past. Moonhunter claims to be fond of Perrin and to no longer be one of the Chosen, having been stripped of it by Shai’tan as punishment for intending to help Lews Therin win. Perrin doesn’t trust her at all, but she does seem sincerely terrified of being caught. She disables the dreamspike and shows Perrin how to use it (note that this scene happens at about the same time as Canler rushes in to save Logain in the Black Tower.) They also have a discussion about being Turned and fairness. Perrin feels that men should have a choice to be evil and Moonhunter asserts that they did have a choice: they could have chosen to been gentled. Perrin calls her out on this being really stupid, just a part of her web of rationalization for her own selfishness, and she vanishes. They part and Perrin returns to Gaul so they can find Slayer: if he doesn’t show up at the Black Tower soon, they’ll go to where there are wolves to hunt.
  • Many of the wolves Perrin and Gaul meet ask if Perrin will lead them in the Last Hunt, but he’s still busy hunting Slayer. They also warn him that Heartseeker and Moonhunter are in the dream. Perrin doesn’t know the name “Heartseeker,” but from context it must be Hessalam. Perrin finds Heartseeker in Ituralde’s tent. He could have killed her, but hesitated because she’s a woman, which Moonhunter chastises him for. Perrin imagines forkroot in Heartseeker’s mouth, forcing her to flee from the dream. Moonhunter explains that Heartseeker was invading dreams, which Perrin perceived in the same way as Egwene always does – as orbs of light in darkness – though he hasn’t ever gone snooping himself. Moonhunter comments that Perrin is much better in the dream than Lews Therin ever was. “I always thought I would rule at his side, that only a man who could channel would be worthy of me. But the power you display here… I think I may accept is as a substitute.” She also tells Perrin that he could learn to step in and out of the dream as Slayer does, though he can’t channel, as that’s something of the soul, rather than the mind. She won’t make a Gateway for him, as she wants him to learn to do it himself, but she warns him that he should be quick, as Heartseeker was invading Bashere’s dream as well as Ituralde’s. This is the first actual confirmation that Graendal is invading the Great Captains’ dreams and influencing their decisions.
  • As Rand and Moridin fight in Shayol Ghul, Perrin stands in Thakan’dar, in the dream. There are many wolves here, waiting for the Last Hunt. Sunrise sends that Slayer is there, going for Rand. Perrin narrowly stops Slayer from shooting Rand while he’s busy with Moridin and Slayer flees. Perrin follows him into a group of Samma N’Sei. Gaul and the wolves fight the red-veils while Perrin focuses on Slayer, drawing first blood. Slayer flees the dream and Perrin returns to help Gaul and the wolves. He tries to will the Turning away from the Samma N’Sei, but can’t: the Turning is beyond that, something of the soul. Gaul slits their throats to put them out of their misery. “You spat in his eye, and so he uses you, my brothers. Horrible.” The fight done, for now, Moonhunter heals Perrin and Gaul. Perrin approaches the tunnel. “It wasn’t a pit. Perrin gapes. The entire world seemed to end here, the cavern opening into a vast nothingness.” Wind blows into the tunnel, drawing everything into the void. “Other darkness was frightening because of what it might hide. This darkness was different; if this engulfed you, you would cease completely.” Here, the barrier between the dream and the waking world is so thin that Perrin can speak to Nynaeve: he explains that he’ll make it impossible to Travel here, then he sets up the dreamspike. Just outside the cavern, Perrin finds that the short time he was in there was two hours outside of it. As Slayer can no longer shift directly in, Perrin leaves the wolves outside to defend it. Perrin and Gaul need to leave to catch up with the rest of the war and to do something about Heartseeker.
  • Perrin and Gaul track Heartseeker to Egwene’s camp at around the same time that Mat notices that Bryne is sabotaging the front at the border of Kandor and Arafel. Perrin relies on a chain of wolves to almost instantly send and receive messages from Shayol Ghul: Slayer has attacked three times but left before Perrin arrived each time. Perrin recognizes that the wolves aren’t driving Slayer off. he’s just surveying the herd, like a hunting predator. Perrin and Gaul are becoming exhausted, having been in the dream for a long time now. Perrin receives a sending from a grizzled wolf he only vaguely recognizes (it’s obviously Elyas): Heartseeker is at Thakan’dar, in Ituralde’s tent. Perrin almost follows her back to the waking world, but can’t leave Rand undefended. But, Perrin realizes what Heartseeker is doing: twisting the minds of the Great Captains. He sends Elyas back: hopefully he can warn each front, but at the very least he can do something about Ituralde. Then, Slayer reappears. Perrin leaves Gaul with the wolves guarding Rand from the Samma N’Sei so he can go confront Slayer.
  • Perrin battles Slayer through the skies, fighting among the storm clouds. The dream is being scoured to nothing by the storm, returning it to a primal state of stone and crashing waves with no structures, vegetation, or even soil. The only sign of life is something dark in the water, similar in description to what Mierin conjured up beneath her in Rand’s dreamshard and the shape beneath the water in Moridin’s dreamshard. Slayer gives a really cliched villain speech during the duel just to make it clear that they’re foils: “I’m bold. And I’m tired of being afraid. In this life, there are predators and there are prey.” “The only way to survive is to move up the chain, become the hunter.” “Not all of us had the privilege of growing up in a comfortable home with a warm hearth and laughing siblings.” “If you knew my life, you’d howl. The hopelessness, the agony… I soon found my way. My power. In this place, I am king.” Slayer finally manages to hit Perrin, who shifts away, wounded and exhausted.
  • Perrin is so weak and tainted by Slayer’s poison that wolves don’t even recognize him. Moonhunter appears, disappointed with Perrin and unhappy that she’ll have to go with the “other one.” “I’ve learned the mistake of setting my heart on one who does not deserve it. Goodbye, wolf pup.” Perrin shifts to the Field of Merrilor, trying to find Faile, hoping that Gaul and the wolves can keep Rand safe. He’s so tired that he’s barely coherent, but he manages to wake up from the Wolf Dream, appearing near Master Luhhan, before passing out.
• Ituralde and Aviendha
  • Fairly late in this phase, just after the Sharan attack on the Aes Sedai, Aviendha, Rhuarc, Ituralde, Rand, Nynaeve, Moiraine, and Thom discuss the invasion of Thakan’dar. Rhuarc now wears the red siswai’aman headband (unless I’m forgetting, this is new for him.) Shayol Ghul is a very cold place and Thakan’dar contains a great forge, filling the valley with dark steam and creating a heavy layer of fog. No one knows how much time Rand will need, perhaps even years, so they plan to hold the valley for as long as they can. Rand will only take Nynaeve and Moiraine with him as the others will all be needed to guard the pass. Aviendha will command the channelers and Ituralde will command the soldiers. Nynaeve warns Rand that they haven’t found any way around the flaw with Callandor: “as long as you are channeling into that… thing, anyone can seize control of you.” Don’t worry, this is the last hugely important detail about Callandor that will get retconned in at the last second as a flimsy plot contrivance (in fairness, the bit about it being a sa’angreal for the True Power actually kind of followed from Cadsuane’s comment, much earlier in the series, that it’s somehow closer to the taint.) Do note, however, that Rand, Nynaeve, and Moiraine’s entire plan for the ending of the book – that they need to let Moridin take Callandor to use the True Power through him – apparently hasn’t been thought of yet, so I guess they work that out later that night or early the next morning, or else Nynaeve and Rand are just acting here. In any case, the invasion of Thakan’dar commences tomorrow.
  • The next day, the Aiel invade Thakan’dar through gateways. They quickly kill the shadow-forgers, who turn to stone and dust, and secure the valley. Aviendha sees Rand, Moiraine, Nynaeve, and Thom begin to walk up the path to the Pit of Doom. In this moment, there’s a brief total solar eclipse over Thakan’dar. “The light went out. The end of the world had come.” The other fronts see this eclipse as well: if it’s a natural eclipse that’s merely timed perfectly, then they’re far enough away that they wouldn’t see it at exactly the same time, but it still gives us a rough synchronizing event between the perspectives. Aviendha leads the channelers against the Forsaken and Dreadlords, including Hessalam. Aviendha leads with two circles, one to fight and the other to lie in ambush, just as Maidens fight.
  • Ituralde notes that, for the first time in a long while, he actually has well-rested men and a well-stocked camp… but he’s going to lose anyways, facing impossible odds. “It felt as if he’d been fighting losing battles his entire life. That took a toll. At night, he would hear Trollocs coming. Snorting, sniffing the air, hooves on the cobbles. Flashbacks from Maradon.” It’s ambiguous how much of this is from Hessalam’s Compulsion and how much is PTSD from Maradon; this might actually be his state before Hessalam gets to him, and she merely sees it and uses it to her advantage. He feels a satisfaction at seeing Trollocs die that he never felt with men, seeing soldiers on both sides as the same: he’d feel satisfaction at a well-executed battle, but not at the death itself. “Without [the Trollocs], his hand wouldn’t shake when the horns of war sounded. They’d ruined him. He would ruin them in return.” King Alsalam sees Ituralde’s fear and comforts him.
  • The Windfinders report that The Father of Storms has begun his attack, trying to wipe them out with a great tempest. The only reason the armies in Thakan’dar are still standing is because the Windfinders are fighting back with the Bowl of the Winds.
  • The path into Shayol Ghul is only wide enough for fifty men, shoulder to shoulder. Ituralde doesn’t have much time, but he prepares a series of traps through this pass. If Hessalam is attacking him, I can’t see evidence of it here. Burning logs and bulwarks of bramble stop the first attack, allowing people on the top to throw things down, slaughtering the first attack and breaking it. It takes them most of an hour just to get past the first abatis and there are seven in total, some higher than the first. “Ituralde found that his arm was no longer quivering.”
  • Some time later, after Perrin found Hessalam in Ituralde’s tent, Ituralde finds that he’s having a hard time shaking nightmares of Trollocs butchering his family as he sits down to join the feast. The Trollocs have finally pushed through thorns, but they bought Ituralde’s forces enough time to build earthen bulwarks and prepare ranks of crossbowmen, pikemen, and halberdiers. Three times now, he’s nearly given the order to send the armies in for a direct assault, abandoning the formations. The bloodlust he felt before has grown almost uncontrollable: he struggles to remember that their strategy, his purpose for holding here, is to give Rand time to deal with Shai’tan, not to kill Trollocs. An army of hundreds of Myrddraal cut through the bulwarks, causing chaos in the ranks. Ituralde fights the Compulsion, too good of a general to give in to it. “Pull back before the attack, a voice seemed to be saying to him. Pull back to the Aiel, then make a stand there. ‘Pull back…’ he whispered. ‘Pull…’ Something felt very, very wrong about doing that. Why was his mind insisting upon it? Captain Tiherra, Ituralde tried to whisper. You have command. It wouldn’t come out. Something physical seemed to be holding his mouth shut.” Wolves appear from the darkness to fight the Myrddraal and Elyas grabs Ituralde. “Ituralde did not fight back. Whoever this man was, Ituralde was grateful to him, feeling a moment of victory as he fell. He hadn’t given the order to retreat.”
  • Ituralde eventually wanders back into the camp with stories of being kidnapped by wolves. At this point, everyone knows that the Great Captains have had Compulsion on them, so Ituralde is arrested. He doesn’t complain. Darlin Sisnera is in command now.
  • Aviendha continues to lead the channelers. The camp is on channeling lockdown, so any channeling is a sign of attack. Aviendha senses channeling coming from Darlin’s tent. She investigates and is nearly killed by a group of Samma N’Sei, but Cadsuane steps in to save her. Hessalam manages to flee, folding away without a gateway. Then, the Samma N’Sei begin to attack in earnest. Aviendha meets with the Wise Ones and they figure out that these red-veiled Aiel are the men sent to kill Sightblinder. They see that they’ve incurred a great toh. When taken gai’shain, the Samma N’Sei don’t even go along willingly, proving that they’re no longer Aiel at all. The Aiel fight against them with a sad fury. “Somehow, the shadow had taken the bravest of the Aiel and made them into these… these things.”
  • As Darlin has also been potentially Compelled now; they really can’t trust any single person to lead. Fortunately, as Aviendha points out, the battle at Thakan’dar no longer requires much strategy. “What needs to be changed? We hold. With everything we have, we hold. We don’t pull back. We don’t try anything clever. We just hold.” Aviendha takes a circle to hunt the channelers in the camp. Hessalam proves capable in combat, killing Kiruna and Faeldrin and maiming Flinn. She’s also using Compulsion to gather new followers, building herself a circle of slaves to draw power from. Sarene is taken from Aviendha’s circle. Cadsuane and Sorilea tell Aviendha not to go after Graendal alone; the two of them will focus on hunting the Forsaken. Cadsuane came here specifically to hunt the Forsaken.
• Mat and Fortuona
  • Mat sneaks into Ebou Dar to find Tuon. Along the way, he thinks on his journey since Emond’s Field and realizes that his time in Ebou Dar was the happiest time of his life. “Strangely, this place felt more like home to him than the Two Rivers did.” He sees how the Seanchan have changed things, cleaning up crime. Tuon hasn’t banned duels altogether, but they must now be officially sanctioned, which gives everyone involves some time to cool down. At a tavern – The Yearly Brawl – Mat learns that General Lunal Galgan has been sending assassins after Tuon. He means to do something about it.
  • Mat scales the side of the Tarasin Palace. I can’t think of any way to work this quote into the summary naturally, so I’m just going to throw it in here because I like it: “Mat’s father had an adage: Always know which way you are going to ride.” His plan is to just sneak in, find Tuon, tell her that Galgan has betrayed her, then go find some games of dice, staying as far away from Rand as possible. Selucia finds him; Fortuona isn’t even there, she’s in the gardens. Selucia is surprised that Mat thinks anything of Galgan’s assassins, as this is entirely standard for the heights of Seanchan society (which are, after all, paved with daggers.) Besides, Galgan isn’t seriously trying to have Fortuona killed, as he’s too good of a soldier to jeopardize the stabilization efforts. Really, Mat – as Prince of Ravens – has more cause than Galgan to have Fortuona killed. Mat should also be the general of Seanchan’s armies, rather than Galgan. “There is only one way to stop being the Prince of the Ravens, and that is to find your neck in a cord.” (first time?)
  • Selucia shows Mat to Fortuona in the gardens, surrounded by Deathwatch Guard. Mat spots a gray man assassin and throws a knife just past Fortuona, hitting him, but the man gets away. When the attack is over, Mat comments that he knows how she feels for him even if she won’t say it. “You looked over your shoulder. When you saw me, with a dagger in hand – as if to throw at you – you didn’t call for your guards. You didn’t fear I was here to kill you. You looked over your shoulder to see what I was aiming at. That’s the most loving gesture I think a man could receive from a woman.” She seems cold, in response, but then she orders the guards to step back and form a perimeter. “I will be spending time with my consort, who has requested that I ‘make him feel loved.'” They have sex there, in the garden, and fall asleep on the ground. In the morning, she explains “An empress does not love. I am sorry. I am with you because the omens state it so, and so with you I will bring the Seanchan an heir. However. Perhaps I can admit that it is… good to see you.” (Do the Seanchan have a word for “tsundere,” or is it just their default?)
  • Rand arrives while they’re still in the garden. Mat notes that he hasn’t actually seen Rand in person since Mat went to Salidar after Elayne. The two have a boasting contest before turning to business (Rand is the Dragon Reborn, but Mat saved Moiraine, so I think I’ll give him the point.) Fortuona has Rand shielded and she slipped Mat’s foxhead medallion off him while he was asleep. She states that she’s going to bring him to Seanchan in chains as a ruler who resisted and that Rand delivering himself is an omen. He debates her claim to the lands. She holds that she is the only legitimate heir of Artur Hawkwing, but Rand explains that his claim is stronger. “I am Lews Therin Telamon, the Dragon. I ruled these lands, unified, during the Age of Legends. I was leader of all the armies of the Light, I wore the Ring of Tamyrlin. I stood first among the Servants, highest of the Aes Sedai, and I could summon the Nine Rods of Dominion. I held the loyalty and fealty of all seventeen Generals of Dawn’s Gate. Fortuona Athaem Devi Paendrag, my authority supersedes your own! My authority supersedes that of Hawkwing! If you claim rule by the name of he who conquered, then you must bow before my prior claim. I conquered before Hawkwing, though I needed no sword to do so. You are here on my land, Empress, at my sufferance!” Rand sings, quietly, to the plants around him, and the grow green, despite his being shielded. Mat steps in to help, stating that Tuon should accept the Dragon’s Peace and assert that the Seanchan’s borders here are secured by it. Fortuona and Rand haggle and she winds up with Altara, Amadicia, Tarabon, and half of Almoth Plain. The marath’damane are the most contentious. Rand doesn’t like it, but he allows them to keep the damane they have, though he forbids taking any more from lands the Seanchan don’t control.
  • Fortuona has Mat put into proper attire for his position. His fingernails are lacquered and his personal tailer gets started on his regalia, though Mat insists on only military garb until the Last Battle is won. His eyepatch is black with two thin-cut rubies and his colors are black and dark green. He’s given a ceremonial military uniform, heavy and with multiple layers of robe, and with large shoudlerpads that hang down the front and back like a tabard. He’s absolutely covered in gemstones, mostly rubies. “It sank in that he was rich. Really rich.” He insists on keeping his hat even though it looks absolutely ridiculous with the outfit.
  • Fortuona names Mat “Knotai” “For you are a bringer of destruction to the Empire’s enemies.” “I proclaim that Knotai, Prince of the Ravens, is to be given the rank of Rodhodler in our armies.” This rank sets him just below Galgan: Mat will take command if Galgan falls and Galgan must include him in all meetings and consider his advice.
  • Fortuona learns that the White Tower was hurt severely by the Sharan attack and considers seizing the opportunity to claim them as marath’damane. “The Empress cannot be constrained by words on a paper.” But, she instead orders Galgan to support the White Tower “as we will require their aid in fighting the Shadow.” It’s ambiguous whether Mat talked her out of it… or she just realized that they don’t have time to capture and train the Aes Sedai before the Last Battle.
  • As described in Egwene’s section, Fortuona meets with Egwene. The meeting doesn’t go well, though, for what it’s worth, Egwene definitely wins the argument.
  • Min comes to deliver a message from Bryne and finds Mat, making suggestions to Galgan, who – to his credit – is listening. Fortuona comes out in her elaborate regalia and Min mentions to Mat that there’s a death lily above her head, indicating that someone will try to kill her very soon. The guards grab Min and Fortuona calls her a Doomseer. “This is a great gift you have brought me, Knotai.” “Holy woman, she who may not be touched. We have been blessed. Let it be known. The Crystal Throne has not had a true reader of the omens for over three centuries!” Min wants to slip away, but Mat tells her that being in a position where she can influence the Seanchan Empress is something Rand would want, and it’s more useful than carrying messages.
  • Mat is frustrated with their maps so he decides that he needs to go into the fighting for a while to get a feel for the battle’s pulse. Fortuona will allow it, but only if she can come with.
  • On the battlefield, Demandred keeps shouting for Rand to come out and duel him. Mat finds Tylee, who Bryne ordered to simply hold position out of the fighting. Mat hears about the disaster with the heavy cavalry (which happened in Egwene’s perspective.) He orders Tylee’s forces split into three groups to clean up Bryne’s mess, taking one third himself. Mat’s attack is astoundingly effective: his light cavalry make quick work of the Sharan’s heavy and Mat, foxhead around his neck, manages to capture a Sharan channeler. The soldiers are stunned. “Great Lord, no man in the Empire’s service would ever dare question the Empress, may she live forever. But if a man had wondered about some of her choices, he would do so no longer. Prince of the Ravens!” Mat also accidentally raises the soldier to the blood by dropping a nail at his feet. Mat swaps back for his regalia and is back shortly. With the battle real in his mind now, he sees how it will progress ten steps ahead. “Huh. Gareth Bryne is a Darkfriend.” Mat sees that he can still fix things, but only if he moves fast and is given total control of the battlefield. Fortuona grants him control of the Seanchan from Galgan and he sends Min to tell Egwene that Bryne is trying to lose the battle.
  • As described in Egwene’s section, Mat is made commander of both the Seanchan and Aes Sedai’s armies. Most people still can’t see how bad their position is. “That’s how Mat had known. It had taken true military genius to put the army into such a bad situation without it looking like the army was in a bad situation.” Mat is quickly proving himself to be an incredible general, even Galgan has warmed up to him. It helps that Mat quotes Hawkwing without even thinking about it. “A pace given up now could earn us two at dawn.” Mat wants to withdraw from their position along the river.
  • Meanwhile, the sul’dam have found that the Sharan channeler Mat captured took to being a damane shockingly fast, just hours rather than the usual months. Fortuona uses Min’s viewings as only Elayne has thus far, determining that, for example, a viewing that a man will get married proves that he’ll survive until his marriage, and thus banning him from getting married and moving him to the front line to take advantage of his immortality. When Fortuona tries to have someone put to death because of a viewing, Min asserts that she’s not going to speak if it can be used to Minority Report people. “Let us see how the Pattern treats you, Empress, if you torture the bearer of omens.” Fortuona is impressed by how quickly Min took to her role as both Doomseer and Truthspeaker.
  • News arrives that all of the Great Captains have been Compelled and fully two-thirds of the Borderlanders have been lost. Note, by the way, that it’s absolutely shocking for an army to hold together after losing two-thirds of their people. The Great Captains have all been relieved of duty except for Ituralde who is considered lost in the Blight, kidnapped by wolves. Elayne plans to bring her forces to reinforce the Borderlanders. Mat sees that, except for the armies at Thakan’dar, the four fronts have failed. A protracted war will benefit the Trollocs and if they’re allowed to break free to the south then they’ll be able to sustain themselves on the undefended lands and peoples for a very long time, which will result in certain defeat for the Armies of the Light. The only option remaining is to make one last stand, on favorable terrain, and to make it so enticing that the Shadow will commit to it fully. The location is obvious, as you can see from the map: the Trollocs fighting the Borderlanders are pushing in from the north while the Trollocs and Sharans to the west are pushing in toward the east, they’ll soon reach the Field of Merrilor, which is already well stocked and will make a great defensive position. Elayne allows it and the dice start tumbling in Mat’s head.
  • Just an hour before the battle begins, Mat teaches a group of men how to make a simple stake for a palisade. Among the men there are Almen Bunt, the farmer who gave Rand and Mat a ride in his cart in The Eye of the World and later met Rand in the orchard on the slopes of Dragonmount, and Renald Fanwar, the Borderlands farmer we saw in the prologue to The Gathering Storm who turned his tools into weapons and headed for the Last Battle. Mat spares a few moments to help some boys learn to use quarterstaffs. He knows that Rand will need him soon and he knows that they’ll need the Horn of Valere, though Egwene doesn’t know where it is. He sends Grady to position the people of Hinderstap to defend the Mora from being blocked at a key point. The most recent reports say that the Light will be outnumbered four to one when the Trollocs arrive. Mat explains to Egwene that there can be no retreat from this battle. They’re nearly out of supplies, the alliance is here, together, as strong as it will ever be, and the Trollocs are contained, in one place. Egwene thinks they can just hold out until Rand wins but Mat knows better. “We can’t just survive… we have to win.” We’ll discuss this a bit more in just a minute. Mat realizes that their plans are already known to the enemy and they can’t win by doing what they planned. He’ll need to change it all. “Blood and bloody ashes… one last toss of the dice. Everything we have, piled into a heap.”
• Faile and the Horn of Valere
  • For the first 32 chapters, all we really hear about Faile is that she’s going to get the Horn of Valere to Mat, disguising it as a normal supply caravan. She has some of Cha Faile, Vanin, Harnan, Olver, Setalle, and some others with her. Note that, although we know Mat’s closest allies in the Band quite well, Faile only knows that they’re mercenaries with rough pasts: the kind of men who might want to steal the Horn if given the opportunity. She tells the group that the chest with the Horn in it is Mat’s personal stash of tabac. Not knowing Mat or the Band, she doesn’t know how bad of an idea this is.
  • Just as Faile is about to Travel to Merrilor for the last stand, a bubble of evil hits, with spikes shooting out of the ground. Berisha, the Aes Sedai on Travel duty, manages to make a gateway for them to escape through, but she’s killed: Faile sees that it wasn’t a spike but a knife. They rush through the gateway to get away from the bubble of evil only to find that the gateway empties out in the Blight, not the Field of Merrilor. Note that we never really find out for sure what happened here. It sure looks like intentional sabotage, but we also know, from Egwene’s perspective, that Berisha is easily scared and distracted. Egwene saw her being raised to Aes Sedai as a sign of how far the Tower had fallen, so she might have just messed up the portal, naturally thinking of the Blight during the bubble of evil and accidentally making it there, which is something we know can happen, and Faile really couldn’t investigate to see whether Berisha was stabbed or just hit with a spike. At least, that’s what we’re meant to think at this point: we’ll learn, much later, that Aravine is a Darkfriend. Regardless, Faile’s group is stuck, in the Blight, with the Horn of Valere, and no one knows where they are.
  • Setalle sees Shayol Ghul to the east. Though they don’t want to move into the battlefield, the Blight itself is killing them quickly, and they need to get the Horn back while it still matters. The Blasted Lands near Shayol Ghul are mostly empty of the monsters that live in the Blight, so it’s their best bet. Olver tries to keep a practiced grin on his face, but even he’s on the edge of despair, thinking on how everyone always dies and leaves him alone: his father was taken by Shaido, Noal was taken by the snakes and foxes, and now he expects even Mat to die. In just the first few days of travel toward Shayol Ghul, the caravan loses fifteen people to the Blight.
  • As they near Thakan’dar, Faile grows more and more paranoid that someone in the caravan sabotaged them and means to steal the Horn. She tries to lure the traitor out by hiding the Horn and leaving the chest seemingly unwatched. She hears a scream from where she hid the Horn and, when she arrives, she sees Vanin holding the Horn while Harnan fights a monster from the Blight. Faile calls out that Vanin and Harnan are traitors and the two of them panic, drop the horn, and run off into the Blight. Faile wants to track them down, but they don’t have the time: she orders a forced march toward Thakan’dar.

This post is getting too large for the WordPress editor, so I’m splitting it up into parts. Next up, we’ll continue the summary, moving on to the Last Battle. After that, we’ll move on to discussion and analysis! This is the last book, so I’m going all-out! (Note that I’m just splitting up the post here, the first video will still contain all of the summary.)