Welcome back to Reading The Wheel of Time! It’s been quite a week for me, and I imagine for most of you. And it’s also been quite a time for Alviarin, as it turns out—the best laid plans of Darkfriends and Black Ajah often go awry. Usually because someone more high-ranking messes things up for you, or because the Dark One really doesn’t care what you want—everyone’s just a tool to be discarded, although none of his followers seem to realize that. They all think they’re going to achieve glory and that immortality under the Dark One’s rule will be pleasant for them, even if it’s agony for everyone else. Silly, really.
Today we are covering Chapter 21, in which Alviarin comes back to Tar Valon to find things not quite as she left them, has a frightening encounter with Elaida, and then has a much more frightening encounter with someone else. That’s right, Shaidar Haran is back, and we have some interesting new information about him to explore. But first, the recap.
After about a month away from Tar Valon running errands for Mesaana, Alviarin returns to the White Tower via a gateway. She has been expressly forbidden by Mesaana from sharing the weave or even letting any Aes Sedai know she knows it, so Alviarin has to arrive via a disused storeroom and out through the least used of the twelve depositories of the Tower Library. She is in a foul mood, worried about leaving Elaida unsupervised for so long, and furious at being used as an errand girl by Mesaana, especially since the she was commanded to be polite to the other Darkfriends she interacted with, just in case any of them were working for one of the other members of the Chosen.
Trying to comfort herself with thoughts of the immortality she hopes to win and the knowledge that even Mesaana makes mistakes, Alviarin is careful not to be seen exiting into the main part of the library. She notices some rats, and is pleased at seeing the Great Lord’s eyes and ears in the White Tower.
The Great Lord’s eyes riddled the Tower, now, though no one seemed to have noticed that the wardings had failed. She did not think it was anything Mesaana had done; the wards simply no longer worked as they were supposed to. There were… gaps.
She is surprised to run into a few of the librarians where normally there wouldn’t be any—Zemaille offers her condolences which Alviarin doesn’t understand, but which fill her with alarm. Part of her worries that Elaida has died, which would mean the end of Alviarin’s term as Keeper. She hurries to Elaida’s quarters, annoyed at how long it takes. Now that she knows about Traveling, and has learned about other things from Mesaana like lifts, she finds the long distances she has to walk, and the amount of stairs she has to climb, incredibly irksome.
She’s surprised to find Elaida in a meeting with more than half the Sitters in the Hall, something that Alviarin has expressly forbidden Elaida from doing without Alviarin’s prior consent. She enters with the intention of sending the Sitters away and taking Elaida to task, and is shocked to find none of the brow-beaten obedience she expects. Instead, Elaida snaps at her to stand in a corner and wait until Elaida has time for her. When Alviarin hesitates, Elaida slams her hand on the table and threatens to call the Mistress of Novices, so that Alviarin can undergo “private” penance in front of the other sisters.
Akivarin is humiliated and furious, but also terrified—the only way she can think of Elaida getting out of Alviarin’s blackmailing is if she has discovered that Alviarin is Back Ajah. Still, she resolves to listen to the conversation in hopes of learning something that she can use to get out of this predicament.
Alviarin is surprised to learn that the rebels have rediscovered Traveling and are already outside Tar Valon. The Hall is informing Elaida of their intention to open negotiations with the rebels, although Alviarin detects some hesitancy from most of the sisters present. She alost notices that Talene seems to to be deferring to others, glancing at Yukiri and Doesine before dropping her eyes and leaving Rubinde to speak for the Green Ajah.
Elaida seems annoyed but not overly angered, and reminds the Hall of her edicts—the Blue Ajah no longer exists, and every one of the rebels must serve penance under her direction before she can be readmitted to any Ajah.
As soon as the others have gone, Alviarin tries to establish her hold over Elaida, but it doesn’t work. Elaida believes that Alviarin must have been hiding in the city since the rebels arrived, and expresses her surprise that Alviarin didn’t flee the city by ship. Alviarin’s blackmail is no good anymore—if the rumors of sisters obeying Rand al’Thor are true, everyone blames Coiren for that. Similarly, discussions about the assault on the Black Tower have centered around Toveine, and Elaida has nothing left to fear from Alviarin exposing her.
“Since no one could find you when the rebels arrived, I asked the Hall to remove you as Keeper. Not the full Hall, of course. You may still have a little influence there. But it was surprisingly easy to gain the consensus from those who were sitting that day. A Keeper is supposed to be with her Amyrlin, not wandering off on her own. On second thought, you may not have any influence at all, since it turns out you were hiding in the city all along.”
Elaida slaps her, expresses her eagerness to see Alviarin executed for treason, and tells her to expect to be punished tenfold for every private penance she made Elaida take from Silviana until Elaida has the proof she needs. She sends Alviarin away, and the head of the Black Ajah races back to her room to find a device to summon Mesaana. It is meant to be used only in a dire emergency, and when Mesaana arrives, she accuses Alviarin of being upset at losing her position, dismissing Alviarin’s belief that Elaida knows about, and may be able to expose, the Black Ajah. She is confident that Elaida can’t even decide where or not the Black Ajah exists, and decides to punish Alviarin, even as Alviarin pleads for Mesaana to understand.
Suddenly there is a strange lurch, and the shadows jump. When things still again, Mesaana’s disguise is gone, though Alviarin can’t quite place the face she can now see. A Myrddraal is there as well, and although Alviarin has successfully faced Myrddraal before, this one terrifies her so much she crawls backwards until she runs into a table. The Myrddraal tells Mesaana that it doesn’t want the Black Ajah destroyed, and that Alviarin can still be useful.
“Who are you to challenge one of the Chosen?” Mesaana demanded contemptuously, then ruined the effect by licking her lips.
“Do you think Hand of the Shadow is just a name?” The Myrddraal’s voice no longer grated. Hollow, it seemed to boom down caverns from some unimaginable distance. The creature grew as it spoke, swelling in size till its head brushed the ceiling, over two spans up. “You were summoned, and you did not come. My hand reaches far, Mesaana.
Black fire burns away Mesaana’s clothes as she is wrapped in black bonds, with a gag in her mouth. The Myrddraal asks if Alviarin wants to know what one of the Chosen could do to be punished, and if she wants to watch. Alviarin does not, calling the Myrddraal Great Lord and knowing, somehow, that this is the Dark One clothed in the skin of a Myrddraal. It presses its fingers to her forehead, a burning touch like red-hot iron.
As it pulls away, the Myrddraal tells Alviarin that she is marked as his now, and instructs her to find out who threatens the Black Ajah and deliver them to him. Alviarin is so terrified she doesn’t even know how she gets out of the room, and she runs until she nearly falls down a staircase. But once she has calmed a little she begins to think. She can live if she carries out the Great Lord’s orders, and if she’s clever, she can include Elaida in those who are turned over as a threat to the Black Ajah. Thinking of Talene—who Alviarin knows is Black, though Talene doesn’t know Alviarin is—and how she looked at Yukiri and Doesine, and decides to start there. All the while, she can’t stop thinking about how the Great Lord has marked her.
Well, that was quite an adventure. It’s endlessly amusing to me that Elaida personal quest for vengeance against Alviarin has turned into a hunt for the Black Ajah, and now a race between the hunters and Alviarin, each trying to uncover the other. Shaidar Haran’s involvement certainly ups the stakes, though. And if Alviarin’s belief is correct, this revelation will have huge implications for what’s going on in the world right now, and the way the stakes are suddenly going to be raised for everyone.
It’s been clear from the beginning that Shaidar Haran is something more than an ordinary Myrddraal, of course. When we first meet it in the Prologue of Lord of Chaos, Demandred observes the differences in this being, its extraordinary height being perhaps the least shocking thing about it. When entering Shayol Ghul, the stalactites give the Myrddraal’s head a lot of clearance, something Demandred hasn’t ever experienced when visiting the place that allows him to hear the Dark One’s voice directly. It’s hard to imagine the Great Lord offering such distinction to any of his servants, even one that has done something incredibly helpful or important in the advancement of the cause. Demandred knows that his master uses the dagger-like hangings to give his servants “reminders,” while Moghedien, during her visit to Shayol Ghul following her rescue from imprisonment in A Crown of Swords, thinks of them as “the Great Lord’s fangs” which “rend traitors and fools.”
When I first read Demandred’s section in the Lord of Chaos prologue, I assumed the display of giving Shaidar Haran so much clearance was done solely for Demandred’s benefit. To show the man that he is expected to obey Shaidar Haran, perhaps, or to spark his ambition to experience such preference himself—the Dark One also dangles the promise of Nae’blis in front of him during their conversation. It’s hard to imagine the Dark One giving even his best servants a lot of glory or special treatment for any other reason than manipulation—it’s always been clear to me, even if none of them seem to realize it, that even the highest ranking of the Dark One’s servants are nothing but tools to him, used only because he cannot touch creation himself, tolerated and appeased only because the imprisoned Dark One needs them to be able to influence the Pattern. If he grants distinction or praise, it is only as a means to an end, just as the threat of punishment is—though I imagine that’s the part he enjoys. If such a being has emotions like enjoyment, anyway.
All of this is to say that even if a Myrddraal was given authority over the highest ranking humans in the Dark One’s service, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to me that the Dark One would bother to treat it with prestige. It’s just a slave to do his bidding, and since it was created as part of the Shadow, he doesn’t have to worry about keeping it on his side—it couldn’t turn back to the light even if it wanted to, and it seems pretty clear that isn’t something Shadowspawn would be capable of wanting anyway. And it makes sense that the Dark One would prefer the tools that were made explicitly for his service. We’ve seen plenty of instances of Darkfriends looking for ways to subvert their orders, happy to let other agents of the Dark fail in their tasks, or even to cause those failures, as long as they themselves remain blameless in the eyes of the Great Lord. They’re also constantly trying to murder each other for personal advancement, which results in fewer people to do the work the Dark One needs done. See Mesaana’s reaction to Alviarin’s fears.
But while one of the Shadowspawn might lack the ambition of, and be more reliable than, a human being, they also aren’t fully people, and wouldn’t have the imagination and other necessary abilities to carry out all the Dark Ones needs. (Not to mention that they can’t pass in normal society, but that’s a separate issue to what we’re discussing here.) The idea of a sort of enhanced Myrddraal makes a lot of sense. If you could give one a mind equivalent to a very intelligent human being, maybe the powers of a channeler, you would have a very different kind of tool than the Dark One has so far had to work with.
And Shaidar Haran’s sense of humor shows, I think, a more human-like type of intelligence, even if it is a twisted and evil one. While she’s imprisoned in the vacuole in A Crown of Swords, Moghedien notes that the cruelty of ordinary Myrddraal is cold and dispassionate, but Shaidar Haran often displays amusement. We know that Trollocs were made with some kind of genetic engineering that combined human and animal traits, and that Myrddraal are what happens when the human side expresses more strongly than usual, resulting in a creature that is more intelligent, but also more evil, than its Trolloc counterparts. So Shaidar Haran could be the same thing but more so, an expression of even more human intelligence, and more of the human capacity for malice and evil, than is usually found even in Myrddraal.
Alviarin’s belief that Shaidar Haran is the Dark One himself “clothed in the skin of a Myrddraal,” hadn’t occurred to me, but the idea makes a lot of sense now that I am considering it. The concept suggests another reason for Shaidar Haran to be given prominence and authority over the human Dreadlords, and it also explains some of its abilities that the theory of it being just a more enhanced Myrddraal doesn’t. For example, it seems to be able to just show up wherever it wants—even channelers can’t do that.
And then there is its apparent ability to remove the presence of the True Source.
Mogheiden experienced the same phenomenon as Alviarin does, and interpreted it in the same way. It is not like being shielded, where one can sense the True Source but is unable to reach it through the shield; even when channelers are shielded by someone of the opposite gender, they can still tell it’s a shield—it’s just “invisible” to them. When Rand is captured by Galina and the others, he can still feel his way along the “wall” of the shield, and sense the points where the weaves are being channeled in from the individual women creating the shields, around him. But in the case of whatever Shaidar Haran is doing, there is no sensation of the True Source at all, which is more alike to the sensation of being stilled.
When Nynaeve studied Siuan, Leane, and Logain in her attempt to learn how to heal stilling/gentling, she discovered a place like a hole inside of them.
It was not really a hole, more a feeling that what seemed continuous was not, that what seemed smooth and straight was really skirting around an absence. She knew that sensation well, from the early days, back when she thought she might really learn something. It still made her skin crawl.
She eventually bridged the gap or emptiness inside Logain with Fire and Spirit, restoring his ability to channel. It is possible that Shadar Haran has some ability to temporarily interfere with this place inside a channeler, perhaps turning it off and on like a switch, or putting something in the way, like sliding a piece of paper between two attracting magnets.
This can’t be something that people knew how to do in the Age of Legends or it would have been at least suspected by Moghedien, who is completely shocked and confused when she experiences it. (And of course, Myrddraal cannot channel.) However, if Alviarin is right that Shaidar Haran is the Dark One, he would ostensibly be able to control the True Power. We don’t know very much about the so-called True Power, but it would seem to be an absolute antithesis to the One Power in every way. Given that, it may be that you can do things with it that would be impossible to do with the One Power. It would also make a lot of sense if channelers of the One Power were unable to sense the True Power, and indeed, there is evidence to support this idea.
When the True Power was first detected during the Age of Legends, it was detected by scientists, who must have either invented a new weave or built some kind of device, otherwise the power’s existence of it would have been detectable the whole time. Demandred can sense the amount of the True Power that is in Shayol Ghul, but he has the permission of the Dark One to channel it, and has done so before; having access to it through the Dark One would have to come with the ability to sense it, but no one without access can.
If Shaidar Haran has the ability to use the True Power, it might not even need to do something as complicated as interfere directly with a channeler’s inner connection to the True Source. A shield made of the True Power might be plenty on its own; the shielded person would not be able to sense it in any way, but being surrounded by the antithesis of the One Power could well stop you from being able to sense the True Source at all, like a little cage made up of nothingness.
The True Power might also explain the failing of certain weaves, like the Keepings used by Egwene’s followers, and the ward against rats in the One Tower. The True Power seems to have a destructive effect on creation—it rips a hole in the Pattern when Moridin uses it to make a gateway, and it is probably responsible for the fiery, destroyed nature of his body back when he was being Ba’alzamon. We know that the Dark One is beginning to touch the world directly—he has affected the weather for several seasons at least, and Shaidar Haran might be the next step in that manipulation—his influence would almost certainly have a similar affect to Moridin’s use of the True Power, just bigger and worse. Individual weaves might be touched by that corrupting influence, and even the One Power itself might be affected, might be weakened in the same way the seals on the Dark One’s prison have begun to weaken and crumble.
After all, it has been implied since the beginning that the Dark One himself is the only thing that could be eating away the unbreakable strength of cuendillar.
When Mesaana mouths off to Shaidar Haran, he asks her if she thinks “Hand of the Shadow” is just a name. This seems to imply that the title is meant literally. Alviarin’s belief that Shaidar Haran is a skin the Dark Lord is wearing is probably correct, but the Myrddraal is more like a glove than a whole suit—the Dark One is no doubt too huge, in a metaphysical sense, to inhabit one mortal body, even a big supernatural one like Shaidar Haran. And of course, if all of him could get out of his prison, this story would be over. Perhaps what is happening here is more like a prisoner reaching through the bars of his cage, maybe using a stick or something to extend his reach farther than it would otherwise. We know the Dark One can take a human soul out of a body and put a different soul in there, and Myrddraal probably don’t even have souls, so it would probably be easy for him to construct a vessel out of one—the main problem in such a feat would probably be just keeping the body together, since even Shadowspawn are part of the pattern, and the Dark One’s very touch destroyed the Pattern.
Of course, it is possible that all my theories are wrong. That Alviarin herself is wrong. Perhaps she is so much less accustomed to even a whiff of Shayol Ghul compared to the Forsaken, who were imprisoned with the Dark One for a time, that she is overwhelmed to the point of thinking that he is the Great Lord himself—much like people and even Shadowspawn used to think Ba’alzamon was the Dark One. However, I find that I am more inclined to trust her instincts than those of the Forsaken. The Forsaken have an outsized idea of their own importance, and their own power, and I wonder if Alviarin, even though she is a Darkfriend, doesn’t have a lot more natural human instinct in her than Mesaana or any of her cohorts do.
Meanwhile Elaida is playing her silly little power games and thinking that she’s the person who is going to wield the weapon of the White Tower in Tarmon Gai’don. Although to be fair to her, blackmailing the Amyrlin probably would be considered treason by any other sister.
Alviarin’s pretty quick, though, with how she picked up on the little interaction between Talene, Yukiri and Doesine. I think a lot of people could have missed it, especially in the state of confusion and emotional turmoil Alviarin was in. Like most (possibly all) Darkfriends, she’s so tiresomely self-aggrandizing that my impulse has always been to dismiss her intelligence, but this race between her and the Ajah hunters might show us what she’s actually made of. And I kind of like the idea of someone from this Age possibly rising to the level of the Chosen, possibly supplanting them. I mean not really, because that’s bad for the world, but thematically it feels right. Yes the Forsaken come from a more advanced Age, but there have to be some more people in this one to give them a run for their money.
Also, the Forsaken keep getting killed. The Dark One might have to start getting some replacements. Not me glancing sideways at Taim at all!
Both Amyrlins have now authorized talks, while stipulating conditions that the other side will almost certainly never meet. Though I can’t help thinking about how much more reasonable Egwene’s are. Elaida’s been a poor Amyrlin for the start, and getting rid of her might not seem like the worst idea to a divided Tower staring down the barrel of the coming of Tarmon Gai’don. Not to mention the Black Tower, but we’ll get more on that next week. The disbanding of an entire Ajah is unprecedented; I’m really surprised more of the sisters who remained loyal to Elaida don’t worry about what seems to be a huge overstep in Amyrlin’s authority. And if she is willing to do that to one Ajah, why not another? What is sacred in the White Tower if she can destroy such a structural pillar as an entire Ajah?
I also enjoyed Alviarin’s observations about how slow things suddenly feel now that she knows about Traveling and lifts and flying machines. It’s not the first time we’ve had a sense within the series that the world is on the cusp of some kind of rapid enhancement, and possibly industrialization, but for some reason it is the moment that struck me the most forcefully. It’s also ironic that she was forbidden from revealing anything about Traveling but a whole bunch of sisters already know it, and the fact that they do is the reason for Alviarin’s downfall.
Finally, there’s a bit of a throwaway moment when Alviarin channels mud from Tremalking off her skirts, then later considers telling Zemaille what is happening on Tremalking “just to see whether the woman would flinch.” The last (and only) thing we saw of Tremalking was the activation of the female Choedan Kal, and the woman who sat down to witness it. She saw it as a fulfillment of prophecy, so I guess something has come of that, but I can’t imagine what. Alviarin’s thoughts make it sound bad, though.
Next week we’ll cover chapter 22, which is a quick little one, and then move on to finally catching up with Cadsuane, Rand, and the rest of them. We’ve been waiting to see the fallout of the revelation that saidin has been cleansed, but we’ve also been waiting a while to see how those who did the cleansing are holding up, so I’m excited to get to that.
