A Crown of Swords Read Through #4: Enter Death

By Linda


Ishamael, the man who knows “the paths to greater power” (The Great Hunt, Kinslayer) - True Power – returns in a new body as Moridin. When, exactly, we don’t know. By January 5th 1000 NE, when Moghedien was sent to him, Moridin already possessed two mindtraps - hers and Cyndane’s - and had developed the saa from frequent use of the True Power. These things take time to acquire. (Note also that he might have lied to Moghedien about her being delivered to him in a vacuole to frighten Moghedien and make her more malleable). Which brings us to the question of how long had Moridin been around before we saw him? Was he reincarnated before Aran’gar and Osan’gar were at the beginning of Lord of Chaos? Surely the Dark One would bend his energies to restore Ishamael before those two if at all possible? Why get a pawn to the end of the chessboard and ask for a knight or even two instead of a queen, when a queen offers far more possibilities?

Moridin is named ‘death’ to emphasise that he appears to be the only one of the Forsaken whose philosophy coincides with the aims of the Dark One; the only one of them who hasn’t blinded himself to the Dark One’s aim to kill Time. Soon he will be anointed Naeblis, the Lord of the Grave’s regent on earth. Being a follower out of personal conviction, he hasn’t needed bribes of power or riches, and has shown far less interest in them than any other dark character and most not-so-dark characters, just as Death, who spares no one says:

“For God’s commandment is
That all to me must be obedient…
I heed neither gold, silver nor riches,
Nor pope, Emperor, King, Duke, nor Princes,
For if I were to receive great gifts,
I might gain the world…”

- Everyman

With his anointing and gift of access to the True Power by the Dark One, the dark deity opposing the Creator, Moridin demands obedience from all other Forsaken. And as for gaining the world, Ishamael told Rand that:

The death of time will bring me power such as you could not dream of, worm."

- The Eye of the World, The Stag and Lion

So Ishamael thinks his payoff comes at the end, as though he would attain godhood through being freed of the Wheel and the eternal cycle of reincarnation and become a dark Ubermensch eternally existing free of the Pattern. (Unlike Rand, who might now be an Ubermensch within the Pattern.) Reincarnation and liberation from the reincarnation cycle, moksha, are concepts of eastern philosophy/religion. Buddhists, Jains and Hindus believe that people can liberate themselves from the endless cycle of reincarnation by meditation, virtue and distancing themselves from the material world, but certainly not in the ruthless and violent manner Ishamael prefers or expects. Ishamael’s monstrous ‘liberation’ will come about when the Dark One breaks the Pattern, and at a cost of the destruction of Creation.

This nihilism first appeared in his writings in the Age of Legends. In The Gathering Storm, Moridin’s nihilism increased, as though he was perhaps infected with the same despair that so plagued Rand in that book, the despair Moridin instituted by inflicting great emotional pain and suffering on Rand, and which ironically leaked into Moridin as well through their link, to the extent that Moridin was looking forward to annihilation – nothingness.

The greatest irony of the series would be if Moridin discovers at the last that the Dark One doesn’t intend to end the world the way Moridin expects, freeing him from the cycle of reincarnation he loathes and allowing Moridin to gain god-like freedom from rebirth, or the nothingness that he currently craves:

The others are fools. They look for grand rewards in the eternities, but there will be no eternities.

- The Gathering Storm, A Place to Begin

Having spent most of Time completely locked away, one would think the Dark One would find nothingness a tad boring and crave a little tyranny…instituting a dark world, an evil paradise ruled eternally by his Chosen. Would Moridin feel betrayed by the Dark One he has served so faithfully for thousands of years if he discovered that the Dark One intends a steady state Hell of indefinite duration in which Moridin is to participate? If so, what would he do?

Moridin’s current desire for nothingness upon the Dark One breaking the Wheel is symbolically right: Death can’t exist outside of Time.

Naturally Death is a major figure in real world myth and legend, just as he is important in the Wheel of Time world. In the Middle Ages, the precariousness of life, as the horrors of natural disasters and pandemics such as the Black Death made all too plain, inspired the motif of the Dance of Death, Danse Macabre.

Death was depicted as a skeleton in art and literature playing the tune while:

members of all social classes – from pope and emperor down to beggar, fool and hermit – engaged in a stately dance with skeletons and corpses, the dead escorting the living to the tomb.

- Paul Huson, Mystical Origins of the Tarot

Of all the Forsaken, Moridin/Ishamael has made the most use of corpse-like beings: Grey Men and zomaran. In the Last Days characters have witnessed both the living being dragged alive underground by the dead and the tribulations of the living dead. (Dance of death photo by Toffel.) Moridin has people of all classes, high and low, dancing to his tune and is convinced that all will serve him in one way or another before the end.

Death’s traditional colour is the blackness of extinction. Black Death. Moridin’s colours are red as well as black. In Edgar Allan Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death, Death mingles in disguise with the noble guests who have sheltered from a plague in a nobleman’s mansion and are whiling away the time with a masked ball. When the host, Prince Prospero confronts the unknown stranger, disguised Death, the prince falls down dead.

Is Moridin disguised as one of the other players/dancers in the Wheel of Time series?

No respecter of persons, Death is inevitable and inescapable as this painting entitled The Gaming Table; Whene’er Death plays, He’s sure to win; He’ll take each knowing Gamester in shows.

Moridin is an expert player of complex games, a gamemaster, and has boasted that

On the board, the Fisher stood waiting, but in the greater game, al'Thor moved already to his wishes. And soon, now. ... It was very hard to lose a game when you played both sides of the board.

- The Path of Daggers, Deceptive Appearances

Some characters serve Moridin unknowingly:

In all three places he had eyes, some that did not know they served him.

- The Path of Daggers, Unwittingly)

having been ‘taken in’ by Death’s strategies and manipulations.

Moridin as Death has made his entrance late in the series and has not truly unmasked himself or his plans because Death, along with War, Pestilence and Famine, is one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse of Revelation. The last of the four to appear, Death rides a pale, corpse-coloured horse:

Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth

- Revelation 6:7-8

The role of the Four Horsemen is to wreak havoc upon the world when the first four of the seven Seals are broken at the end of days. In the Wheel of Time world, famine and pestilence and war are rife and Trollocs, wild beasts, are being massed for the Last Battle. Moridin’s advent soon before the Last Days presages the imminent freeing of the Dark One, Hades. It would be symbolically appropriate if Moridin had been transmigrated into his new body about the time, or better still slightly before, the order was given at the beginning of Lord of Chaos to ‘let the Lord of Chaos rule’ and wreak havoc upon the Pattern. Four of the seven Seals were broken by September 999 NE, late in The Fires of Heaven, which may indicate that Moridin was transmigrated about this time, since Death, the fourth Horseman, appears when the fourth Seal is broken. As far as we know, three Seals of the Dark One's prison are still whole.

Death features in the Tarot cards; in fact the Dance of Death morality play is postulated as one of their main inspirations. The high-ranking Tarot trumps Death, the Devil, Judgement and the World [heaven] are

a depiction of those four most important events in a believing Roman Catholic’s spiritual life, known as the Four Last Things – important because nobody can escape death or judgement, and the choice of heaven or hell is one each soul must make.

- Paul Huson, Mystical Origins of the Tarot

In The Gathering Storm, Rand arguably made such a choice.

His relationship with Moridin has become increasingly intimate and more equal than with other Forsaken. While Moridin did not want to fight Rand when they encountered each other and had a Fireside Chat in The Gathering Storm, they will soon face off in a final battle.

By confronting and then trumping Death, the hero learns what part of himself is truly immortal.

- Robert Place, Annotated Tarot of the Sevenfold Mystery

As will Rand.

A Crown of Swords Read Through#3: Shadowy Shaido

By Linda

It is no coincidence that the name Shaido sounds like Shadow. They were directly manipulated by two Forsaken: Asmodean and then Sammael (with Graendal aiding him).

Sevanna tossed aside custom and tradition, but the Shaido’s honour went with it. She had thirteen Wise Ones, her own coven, execute a fellow Wise One to provide cause for the clan to attack the Aes Sedai holding Rand and capture him for themselves. It is likely that some of these Wise Ones are Darkfriends, and helped Sevanna persuade the others to do something so dishonourable, indeed criminal, as killing a Wise One, just as Black sisters helped depose Siuan and raise Egwene and Elaida.

Sevanna believes that getting her Wise Ones to take part in battle was the biggest change in custom that she made. And it was a very big change. Dumai’s Wells may be the only time that Wise Ones fought in battle in the entire Third Age – until the Last Days and perhaps the Last Battle. (Although I have a theory that at least some Aiel will adopt the Way of the Leaf before the Last Battle). Apart from rescuing Rand, Perrin’s group of Wise Ones battling Elaida’s embassy could be seen as participating in a police action to punish the Aes Sedai for violating the rules of embassies and kidnapping their chief, Rand, under a parley, just as the Aiel regarded the Aiel War as a punitive action against Laman Damodred. This would have been validated in Aiel minds when Rand assigned the Aes Sedai to the Wise Ones. Rand probably doesn’t realise how important that action was for quelling the Aiel’s mutterings against Wise Ones in battle.

Wise Ones fighting Wise Ones was a different matter, and it may be that neither side did much of that with good reason. We know some on Sevanna’s side were reluctant, even those she corrupted most:

"They are Wise Ones," the other woman said in a flat tone, and Sevanna understood bitterly. Joining the dance of spears was bad enough, but Wise One attacking Wise One was more than even Rhiale would countenance.

- A Crown of Swords, Prologue

Since Wise Ones take no part in battle, and are not touched by blood feud, they have some similarities with gai’shain and hence to the Da’shain in the Age of Legends. However, Wise Ones do punish violently, so they fall quite short of the Way of the Leaf.

But was Aiel fighting Aes Sedai actually an even bigger change still? Interestingly, Therava had no qualms about killing the Shaido Wise One Desaine but was worried about the prophecy warning against failing the Aes Sedai:

As though Desaine's doubts had infected Therava, she began muttering, only half to herself. "What is ill done is going against Aes Sedai. We served them before the Breaking, and failed them; that is why we were sent to the Three-fold Land. If we fail them again, we will be destroyed."

- Lord of Chaos, Prologue

This fear soon wore off as the Shaido easily looted where and as they willed. After the battle of Malden Therava realised what a high price the Shaido paid for their actions in following Sevanna. Some Shaido early on wondered if Sevanna was ill-fated because she was the widow of two chiefs:

And let those who muttered that she carried bad luck choke on it.

- A Crown of Swords, Prologue

They were right. And some might well have choked on it too. The ‘bad luck’ Sevanna brought the clan includes:

• no clan chief,


• septs dispersed,


• social order destroyed,


• warriors of some septs wiped out and most non-combatants made gai’shain, and


• many of the channelling Wise Ones made damane.

Even if the Shaido make it back to the Waste what will they find there? Will the place be as it was? Rhuidean certainly isn’t. What of the Shaido’s own lands? The Shaido are regarded as having dishonoured themselves:

"Are we Shaido, expected to make gai'shain from wetlanders?" Her [Amys’] tone left little doubt as to what she thought of both Shaido and the idea of making wetlanders gai'shain.

- The Gathering Storm, The Ways of Honour

and violated custom to the extent they are barely Aiel. How will this affect their trek through the lands of other clans to their own? No sept except the Jumai has a channelling Wise One until they meet up with Therava’s group.

For all the Aiel pride themselves on how carefully their leaders are chosen, with testing of vetted candidates at Rhuidean after long years of experience for men and apprenticeship for women, Sevanna managed to circumvent the system easily in a very ‘conventional’ manner. At sixteen she married power in the form of a much older man:

Suladric, clan chief of the Shaido, fell to her at sixteen, and when he died, she chose out those most likely to succeed…

As wife of a clan chief she had been wielding power at an age when a Maiden was barely trusted to carry a spear or a Wise One's apprentice to fetch water. And now she had it all, Wise One and clan chief, though it would take some doing yet to have that last title in truth.

- A Crown of Swords, Prologue

She is now in her mid to late twenties; still “well short of her middle years” (The Shadow Rising, A Breaking in the Three-fold Land); a classic example of too much power unearned. Once the Car’a’carn was declared, it was her ambition to marry him and found the first Aiel dynasty.

Women as well as men were manipulated by Sevanna. Even before convincing thirteen Wise Ones to dishonour themselves by killing a fellow Wise One, she was able to get them to declare her a Wise One. It might have seemed to the Wise Ones merely a convenient step at the time, but without that declaration, giving her the roles of clan chief and Wise One, and therefore more power and influence than either role alone has, Sevanna could not have forced such changes and decisions on the clan. Therava’s group later realised their error, and tried to claw back power by no longer referring to Sevanna as a Wise One and treating her as proxy chief only so they could have meetings without her, but it was too little too late.

Sevanna wanted to remain apart and watch the battle at Dumai’s Wells like a clan chief but the other Shaido leaders insisted she participate in the battle herself and risk her life alongside them. She was nearly killed. Once the Shaido were routed, Sevanna worried about herself and her Wise Ones being chained outside Sorilea’s tent. By all accounts in The Gathering Storm, A Place To Begin, Shaido Wise Ones were ‘chained’ outside Seanchan tents – at least that is how it appeared to the Aiel. How ironic that about two hundred Shaido Wise Ones were collared, when Sevanna planned to put a collar on Rand al’Thor (Lord of Chaos, The Feast of Lights).

One can see why careful limits have been set on Aiel raids and fighting:

• No one who is vital to the future of a clan, such as mothers of the young, blacksmiths or Wise Ones, can be captured (made gai’shain);


• warriors usually don’t fight those of the same society,


• there is a firm time limit for captivity, and


• a conventional limit to the number of captives if only for practicality, since too many gai’shain leads to idleness and too great a population density.

This ensures the Aiel didn’t destroy any of the clans or the Aiel as a whole, and inadvertently prevent the fulfilment of the Prophecy of Rhuidean and the advent of the Car’a’carn, as well.

A Crown of Swords Read-through#2: Inns To Watch

By Linda

Several inns are mentioned in A Crown of Swords. and all bar one are located in Ebou Dar.

Setalle Anan took Nynaeve and Elayne on a humiliating reverse inn crawl ensuring that the girls could not hire lodgings anywhere decent in the city. Either the Kin would take them in, in which case she was making sure the girls did not run and hide from them, or if not, the girls would have to leave the city altogether lest they expose the Kin. Her explanation to the innkeepers of why she was leading two very well dressed women through the streets was that they had beggared themselves to buy finery to impress Mat. All the while, the girls were in vain trying to work out how they could avoid owing Mat anything. The one inn mentioned by name on this little jaunt, The Stranded Goose, refers to the situation of the hapless girls.

Mat, that connoisseur of down-market inns, hits the jackpot in Ebou Dar. He feels that The Rose of the Elbar is a particular penance set by Nynaeve and Elayne. It is the only suitable surveillance post for the Kin’s house and he was stuck there three days before his luck turned. Ah well, roses have thorns don’t they?

In Ebou Dar, the seedier the inn, the more grand and flattering its name, just as Ebou Daris offer flowery complements while being prepared to injure or kill even close acquaintances in duels.

The Silver Swan in Caemlyn is perhaps the most interesting of all the inns mentioned in A Crown of Swords because Cadsuane seems to have a surveillance team of up to ten Aes Sedai there since Lord of Chaos, before her entrance in the books. Well, presumably Cadsuane, since the sisters always have Warders, and one was heard mentioning Cadsuane’s name later, in Crossroads of Twilight at a time when most sisters believe Cadsuane is dead. Elayne realises they are sisters who have stood aside while the Tower was divided. The sisters are constantly changing and, while at this stage none of Cadsuane’s group knew how to Travel, they seem to have had no trouble keeping in touch with her (by pigeon probably). Cadsuane also has a surveillance team in Cairhien as well, but it is based at Lady Arilyn’s palace. Apparently none of her faction has an agent with a suitable house to commandeer in Caemlyn. Obviously Cadsuane set these groups up to watch Rand and Rand’s aides when he is not there; but surely the brief of those in Caemlyn has been extended to watching the Black Tower and the political situation in Andor. In Winter’s Heart when things started to become really tense in Caemlyn, there were ten sisters at the inn, the largest number mentioned. Probably not coincidence. It is well to remember that Cadsuane may know more about Elayne’s doings, and maybe the Black Tower’s, than we are aware. She is a keen gatherer of intelligence, and is aware that seeing Rand safely to the Last Battle will probably be her swan song - which is what the inn's name of The Silver Swan refers to.


In complement to this post the A Crown of Swords entry of the Dew Drop Inn: Wheel of Time Accommodation article is published on the blog.

A Crown of Swords Read Through#1: Not The Triumph of Logic

Alviarin and Elaida



by Linda

In the Prologue, there is an amusing scene of Alviarin mentally wrestling with Elaida – the cold and bloodless White versus the vengeful and engorged Red - in a lady-like fashion, of course. Definitely not The Triumph of Logic; that chapter comes later… Alviarin exposes Elaida’s blindness and in return, Elaida uncovers Alviarin’s possession of secret knowledge and fear of exposure:

The lack of curiosity on Alviarin's face made Elaida wonder again how much the woman knew that she was not supposed to…

But Alviarin.... Her eyes were wide as they could open, lips parted as if she had forgotten the words she meant to speak. A paper slid from the sheaf in her hands and almost fell before she could catch it.

- A Crown of Swords, Prologue

So much so that Alviarin wants Elaida dead and suggests it to Mesaana.

Nearly all of what Elaida knows is wrong. Only her Foretellings, arising from her subconscious, are true. On the other hand, what Alviarin knows is right.

Here is an impressively long list of Elaida’s erroneous deductions and beliefs that she expresses in this chapter:

• Nobody cared what happened in Ebou Dar, Elaida least of all; the capital of Altara could fall into the sea, and except for the merchants, not even the rest of Altara would notice.



• Vague rumors linking Morgase to the Whitecloaks were so much nonsense, for she would never have gone to the Children of the Light for help. She was dead, leaving not even a corpse behind.



• "Why under the Light would they [Elayne and Nynaeve] be in Ebou Dar?" Elaida said dismissively.



• Long ago she had Foretold that the Royal House of Andor held the key to winning the Last Battle. Twenty-five years gone and more, as soon as it became clear that Morgase Trakand would gain the throne in the Succession, Elaida had fastened herself to the girl, as she was then. How Elayne was crucial, Elaida did not know [The Foretelling is correct, but her interpretation wrong, apart from the one honest admission at the end!]



• The shepherd was on his way to her. [Rand escaped that day]



• The rebels would be crushed and the Hall cowed, Alviarin forced to her knees and every fractious ruler brought to heel.



• Elayne would be placed on the throne in Caemlyn [not exactly placed, and certainly not by Aes Sedai]



• Do you believe the tales of thousands flocking to Caemlyn in answer to that obscene amnesty?'' Not the least of what al'Thor had done, but hardly cause for worry.



• There could not be more than two or three men at this Black Tower actually able to channel, Elaida was certain. Fifty sisters could overwhelm them easily.



• He [Taim] is dead, Alviarin, else we would have heard from him long since. And not serving al'Thor. Can you think he went from claiming to be the Dragon Reborn to serving the Dragon Reborn? Can you think he could be in Caemlyn without Davram Bashere at least trying to kill him?"



• Ogier were a triviality. They had no part in the world beyond the cities they had built so long ago.



• Only sisters could be truly, trusted. Red sisters, anyway. Some of them. [The Red Ajah has a higher proportion of Blacks than in other Ajahs (see The Black Ajah article)].
  
  
• Who is going to impose a penance on me, and on what charge?" [She finds out soon enough]



• "Their army," Elaida sneered. Alviarin was such a fool; for all her cool exterior, she was a rabbit. Next she would be spouting the Sanche woman's nonsense about the Forsaken being loose… "Farmers carrying pikes, butchers with bows and tailors on horseback!... Every step of the way, they will lose a man, if not ten. I would not be surprised if our rebels appear with nothing more than their Warders." [All that time in Andor and she grossly underestimates Gareth Bryne].



• "I mean to break them [the rebels], daughter. They will split open like a rotten melon." [What she nearly broke was the White Tower].



• Her secret [her mole, Beonin working to undermine the rebels] will ensure the rebels break.



• Let her chew on the certain surety of Elaida's victory.



• Elaida do Ayriny a'Roihan, youngest daughter of a minor House in the north of Murandy, would go down in history as the greatest and most powerful Amyrlin Seat of all time. The most powerful woman in the history of the world. The woman who saved humankind. [Now a collared animal.]

Elaida’s attempts at logic (in front of a White!) are ludicrous. By not listening to what people say, even refusing to let them mention certain words, she pretty much becomes error personified. You just know she’s doomed.

Mind you, Elaida did get a few things right:

Some would be stilled, of course—Sheriam [because she was Black Ajah]

Cemaile's grand plans came to naught, however, as did Cemaile, and for three centuries the clock sat in a dusty storage room, an embarrassment no one dared display. Until Elaida.

Elaida’s prized information box is full of erroneous material. The outside of the box, depicting golden hawks among clouds, is far more informative. As has been noted by a few people, including Dominic, the hawks symbolise the Seanchan and are a warning of their aerial attack - yet another thing that Elaida will refuse to believe. She will depart with them.

How ironic then that Elaida behaves like some Seanchan High Lady, complaining about Alviarin looking her straight in the eyes, and toying with her ivory figurines (or netsukes!, reminding us of the strong Japanese influence in Seanchan culture) Elaida touches the cat first; it is a witch’s familiar and also symbolises clairvoyance, watchfulness and female malice (!) All very apt for this chapter. She moves her hand to a woman with an ape (or perhaps monkey) on her shoulder, which Dominic regards as a symbol of insanity, referring to Elaida’s megalomania and her coerced insane decrees. Another interpretation could be derived from the ape being a symbol of vice, lust, original sin and heresy. We soon see Elaida’s lust for power and grandeur, her judgement swayed by anger and pride. The Red Ajah hunts down male channellers, who are regarded as heretics/unbelievers or bearers of original sin, due to saidin being ‘tainted for men’s pride’. Elaida believes that fifty Aes Sedai will be ample to deal with those at the Black Tower.

The figurine Elaida actually picks up is a fish, symbolising knowledge and wisdom. At the climax of her erroneous statements, pronouncing that she is Tower law and questioning who would impose penance or charges on her, she breaks the fish. She Foretells in this same scene a little while after; a granting of true knowledge which she misinterprets. Elaida looks sourly at her broken fish then thinks of her palace and Rand’s capture and cheers up. Neither of these things comes off, though. Knowledge and wisdom in ruins.

I found Elaida’s mockery of Alviarin’s abilities as a Sitter hypocritical. Elaida made major mistakes during her deposition of Siuan due to her lack of knowledge. For instance she thought that the Tower always bowed to the will of the Hall and ended up splitting the Aes Sedai. Alviarin doesn’t need to be Sitter since she controlled at least five Black Sitters in Elaida’s Hall and four in Siuan’s skilfully enough that no suspicions were ever raised about them (see The Composition and Politics of the Halls 998-1000 NE).

Elaida’s thoughts on how she will punish the rebels:

The leaders might themselves escape that [stilling], most of them, if they submitted properly. The minimum penalty in law was to be birched in the Grand Hall before the assembled sisters, followed by at least a year and a day in public penance. Yet nothing said the penance must be served all at once; a month here, a month there, and they would still be atoning their crimes ten years from now, constant reminders of what came of resisting her. Some would be stilled, of course—Sheriam, a few of the more prominent so-called Sitters—but only sufficient to make the rest fear putting a foot wrong again; not enough to weaken the Tower.

concentrating on revenge and power, contrast markedly with what Egwene actually did when the Tower was reunited.

If knowledge is power as Alviarin says in this chapter, then false knowledge results in false, illusory power. Neither Elaida nor Alviarin holds true power (pun intended!) in Tar Valon as Alviarin freely acknowledges. Elaida is ignorant of this, the most important fact of all.

Which brings us to who is actually pulling the strings here: Mesaana.

Her strategy in the White Tower is to white-ant it; allow it to collapse itself with minimum obvious interference on her part. It’s a safe and not too demanding method. There are games that work this way, such as Pick Up Sticks where you have to remove the stick from the random pile without any of the others moving. Mesaana prides herself on her knowledge of stresses and leverage (Lord of Chaos, Prologue) and applies it to collapsing the White Tower just as she did to building a Tower out of ivory dominoes for amusement. Alviarin and Mesaana meet regularly, but it is not until this chapter that Alviarin deduces – correctly – that Mesaana is in the White Tower.

It is interesting that Alviarin’s question about the Black Tower triggers Mesaana to demonstrate the Travelling weave after a pause. Obviously Mesaana deliberated about her response to the question, so she knew at least something about what was happening there and what the Shadow’s plans for the Black Tower were at that stage.

Measures Mesaana might have considered would have included killing Alviarin – but time would be lost determining and establishing her successor. Alviarin is too valuable to kill without very good reason. If she punished Alviarin harshly, Alviarin would wonder what is going on at the Black Tower that has to be hidden. So Mesaana distracted her with knowledge, and therefore power, and the unspoken promise of more. As it was, Alviarin wasn’t entirely diverted and resolved not to send any Black sisters on the expedition to the Black Tower.

Moreover Alviarin learned something else from their conversation that surprised her greatly: that the Forsaken are not as unified as the Black Ajah are. Selfishness is allowed in the Black Ajah, but kept under tighter control than among the Forsaken, who had no official leadership at this time and openly undercut one another.

To complement this post, the essay on the real-world parallels I think were used to develop Mesaana is now re-published here in the Reference Library. Mesaana is not that powerful or awe-inspiring as some of the other Forsaken and this is reflected in her fewer mythological parallels.

A Vision of Tarmon Gai'don?

By Linda



In September last year Sydney had a fairly severe dust storm in the night. We awoke to a lurid red light which lasted a few hours. The two photos are taken from my house about an hour after sunrise, when the light should have been bright and clear and the sky blue. The pale blobs are the flash hitting the dust in the air.



While it looks rather apocalyptic, bushfires are worse than this - blacker and with vast heat and noise as well. And much more danger.

Still, it gives an idea of what the Blight could look like around Thakan’dar say, or the deep northeastern blight Graendal described, with its rust-coloured light, as Tarmon Gai’don approaches. Not that we have sweltering heat in early spring. Well, not usually!

New Article Released: Character Names Parallels - F

By Linda


The article on possible sources for character names starting with F has been published in the Reference Library. Two important characters are Faile and Fortuona.

Early next week I shall start the read-through of A Crown of Swords.

New Article Released: Character Names Parallels - E

By Linda

The article on possible sources for character names starting with E has been published in the Reference Library.

The Arthurian origins of Egwene's and Elayne's names is well known, but Elyas' name is also that of an Arthurian character.

Elaida's name is linked to an Irish legend - one which explains the coded message that Galina sent to Elaida when she captured Rand - and Eamon Valda's name to rather more recent Irish history.

Wheel Of Time Embroidery Collection #2 - Rand's Coat Sleeve Embroidery 1

By Linda

This post is part of a series on the Costume of The Wheel of Time world. A previous post was on embroidered Tairen Mazes and included a panel from one of Mat’s sleeves.

Now I’ve turned to embroidering sleeve panels from Rand’s coats in materials and colours consistent with what would have been available in Jordan’s world.

Moiraine had several coats made for Rand in Shienar including this one:

After a moment, he chose the black coat, to suit his mood. Silver herons stood on the high collar, and silver rapids ran down his sleeves, water battered to froth against jagged rocks.

- The Great Hunt, On the Scent

The heron (shown right, click to enlarge) is in thick silver thread sewn down (couched) onto black silk fabric with fine thread. Such thread consists of thin strips of silver wrapped around a core of silk (these days usually all synthetic). It is not drawn in and out of the fabric because it would damage the fabric and strip the silver from the thread. There would have been one heron on each side of the standing collar.




I sewed two designs for the sleeve panel. In the first (shown left, click to enlarge) the water was two strands of silver couched onto the black silk with fine silver thread. The water contours would continue around the bottom of the sleeve, encircling the cuff. Two strands of thick silver thread outlined the rocks and then one strand of silver thread in seeding stitch gave them texture.

Rand's coats are usually embroidered in metallic rather than in coloured silk threads. Such metalwork embroidery was common on the coats of nobility in Europe and even more so in China. Gold was the usual metal used, and in fact Rand has many more coats embroidered with gold than with silver.




In the second sleeve panel I emphasised the water frothing over the rocks. A detail is shown right; the fall of water is actually longer, but this is the limit of my scanner.

The curling pattern of the churned water is a traditional Chinese goldwork pattern, appropriate since the heron and the waterfall (and the dragon!) are motifs in Oriental embroidery. At the base of the sleeve the water pattern would continue around the cuff. The water was sewn in two strands of fine silver thread couched down with a strand of grey thread.

The rocks were couched with two strands of thick silver twist thread and filled in with two strand of thin silver thread.