The Wheel of Time

by Robert Jordan

  Women and children began to pick arrows out from among the fallen. That would be helpful. Very helpful. With surprise, Tam saw hundreds of Tinkers pour out of one gateway. They went searching for the wounded under the direction of several Yellow sisters.

  Tam found himself nodding. It still worried him, allowing the children to see such sights. Well, he thought, they’ll see a worse sight if we fail here. If they wanted to be of use, they should be allowed.

  “Tell me, Tam al’Thor,” Berelain asked, “is … Galad Damodred well? I see his men here, but not his banner.”

  “He was called to other duties, my Lady First,” Tam said. “Downriver. I haven’t heard from him in hours, I’m afraid.”

  “Ah. Well, let’s Heal and feed your men. Perhaps word of Lord Damodred will be forthcoming.”

  * * *

  Elayne touched Gareth Bryne’s cheek softly. She closed his eyes, one, then the other, before nodding to the soldiers who had found his body. They carried Bryne away, legs dangling over the edge of his shield, head hanging down on the other side.

  “He just went riding off, screaming,” Birgitte said. “Right into the enemy lines. There was no stopping him.”

  “Siuan is dead,” Elayne said, feeling an almost overpowering sense of loss. Siuan.… Siuan had always been so strong. With effort, Elayne stilled her emotions. She had to keep her attention on the battle. “Is there word from the command post?”

  “The camp at Dashar Knob has been abandoned,” Birgitte said. “I don’t know where Cauthon is. The Seanchan have forsaken us.”

  “Raise my banner high,” Elayne said. “Until we hear from Mat, I’m taking command of this battlefield. Bring forward my advisors.”

  Birgitte moved to give the orders. Elayne’s Guardswomen watched, shuffling nervously, as the Trollocs pushed against the Andorans at the river. They’d totally filled the corridor between Heights and bogs, and threatened to spill out on to Shienaran soil. Part of Egwene’s army had hit the Trollocs from the other side of the corridor, which had taken some pressure off her own troops for a time; but more Trollocs had attacked from above, and it looked as if Egwene’s men were getting the worst of it.

  Elayne had had solid lessons in battlefield tactics, though little experience on the field, and she could see how badly things were going. Yes, she had received news that the Trollocs’ position upriver had been destroyed by the arrival of Lan and the Borderlanders. But that brought scant relief with the situation here at the ford.

  The sun began to slip beneath the horizon. The Trollocs made no sign of pulling back, and her soldiers reluctantly began to light bonfires and torches. Organizing her men into square formations made for better defense, but it meant giving up any hope of pushing forward. The Aiel fought here as well, as did the Cairhienin. But those pike squares were the core of their battle plan.

  They’re slowly surrounding us, she thought. If the Trollocs did so, they could squeeze until the Andorans popped. Light, this is bad.

  The sun made a sudden blazing fire behind the horizon clouds. With night, the Trollocs gained another advantage. The air had grown cold in the advent of darkness. Her early assumptions that this battle would last days now seemed silly. The Shadow pushed with all of its might. Humankind did not have days remaining, but hours.

  “Majesty,” Captain Guybon said, riding up with her commanders. Their dented armor and bloodied tabards proved that nobody, not even the senior officers, could be spared from direct fighting.

  “Advice,” Elayne said, looking at him, Theodohr—commander of the cavalry—and Birgitte, who was Captain-General.

  “Retreat?” Guybon asked.

  “Do you really think we could disengage?” Birgitte replied.

  Guybon hesitated, then shook his head.

  “Right, then,” Elayne said. “How do we win?”

  “We hold,” said Theodohr. “We hope the White Tower can win their fight against the Sharan channelers and come to our aid.”

  “I don’t like just sitting here,” Birgitte said. “It—”

  A blazing beam of white-hot fire sliced through Elayne’s guards, vaporizing dozens of them. Guybon’s horse vanished beneath him, though he narrowly missed being hit himself. Elayne’s horse reared.

  Swearing, she wrestled her mount under control. That had been balefire!

  “Lews Therin!” A power-enhanced voice rang over the field. “I hunt a woman you love! Come to me, coward! Fight!”

  The earth exploded near Elayne, heaving her standard-bearer into the air, the flag bursting into flames. This time Elayne was thrown from horseback, and she hit hard, grunting.

  My babes! She groaned, rolling over as hands grabbed her. Birgitte. The woman hauled Elayne into the saddle behind her, helped by several Guardswomen.

  “Can you channel?” Birgitte asked. “No. Never mind. They’ll be watching for that. Celebrain, raise another banner! Ride downriver with a squadron of Guards. I will take the Queen the other way!”

  The woman standing beside Birgitte’s horse saluted. It was a death sentence! “Birgitte, no,” Elayne said.

  “Demandred has decided you’ll draw out the Dragon Reborn for him,” Birgitte said, turning her horse. “I’m not about to let that happen. Hya!” She pushed her horse into a gallop as lightning struck Elayne’s guards, blowing bodies into the air.

  Elayne ground her teeth. Her armies were in danger of being overwhelmed, surrounded—all while Demandred laid down blast after blast of balefire, lightning and weaves of Earth. That man was as dangerous as an army himself.

  “I can’t leave,” Elayne said from behind Birgitte.

  “Yes you can, and you are,” she replied gruffly as their horse galloped on. “If Mat has fallen—Light send that isn’t the case—then we’ll need to set up a new command post. There’s a reason Demandred struck at Dashar Knob and then directly at you. He’s trying to destroy our command structure. Your duty is to assume command from someplace safe and secret. Once we’re far enough away that Demandred’s scouts can’t sense you channeling, we’ll make a gateway and you will be back in control. Right now though, Elayne, you need to shut your mouth and let me protect you.”

  She was right. Burn her, she was. Elayne hung on as Birgitte galloped across the battlefield, her horse churning clods of dirt behind them in a flight toward safety.

  * * *

  At least he’s making it easy to find him, Galad thought as he rode, watching the lines of fire streak from the enemy position toward Elayne’s army.

  Galad’s heels dug into the flanks of his stolen horse, tearing across the Heights toward its eastern edge. Over and over, he saw Gawyn’s dying body in his arms.

  “Face me, Lews Therin!” The thunder of Demandred’s shout shook the ground from up ahead. He had taken Galad’s brother. Now the monster hunted Galad’s sister.

  The right thing had always seemed clear to Galad before, but never had it felt as right as this. Those streaks of light were like indicators on a map, arrows pointing his way. The Light itself guided him. It had prepared him, placed him here at this moment.

  He ripped through the back lines of the Sharan force to where Demandred stood, just above the riverbed looking down on Elayne’s troops. Arrows sank into the earth around him, archers firing, heedless of the risk of hitting their own men. Sword out, Galad pulled his leg from the stirrup, preparing to leap free.

  An arrow struck the horse. Galad threw himself from the animal. He hit hard, skidding to a stop, and sliced the hand from a crossbowman nearby. A growling male channeler came for him, and the foxhead medallion grew cold against Galad’s chest.

  Galad rammed his blade through the man’s neck. The man raved, blood spurting from his neck with each beat of his heart. He didn’t seem surprised as he died, just angry. His howls drew more attention.

  “Demandred!” Galad yelled. “Demandred, you call for the Dragon Reborn! You demand to fight him! He is not here, but his brother is! Will you stand against me?”

  Doze
ns of crossbows were raised. Behind Galad, his horse collapsed, expelling a bloody froth from its nostrils.

  Rand al’Thor. His brother. The shock of Gawyn’s death had numbed Galad to this revelation. He would have to deal with it eventually, if he survived. He still did not know if he would be proud or ashamed.

  A figure in strange, coin-link armor stepped through the Sharan ranks here. Demandred was a proud man; one needed see only his face to know that. He looked like al’Thor, actually. They had a similar sense about them.

  Demandred inspected Galad, who stood with bloody sword out. The dying channeler scraped the ground with clawed fingers before him.

  “His brother?” Demandred said.

  “Son of Tigraine,” Galad said, “who became a Maiden of the Spear. Who gave birth to my brother on Dragonmount, the tomb of Lews Therin. I had two brothers. You killed the other on this battlefield.”

  “You have an interesting artifact, I see,” Demandred said as the medallion grew cold again. “Surely you don’t think that is going to keep you from meeting the same fate as your pathetic brother? The dead one, I mean.”

  “Do we fight, son of Shadows? Or do we talk?”

  Demandred unsheathed his sword, herons on the blade and hilt. “May you give me a better match than your brother, little man. I grow displeased. Lews Therin can hate me or rail against me, but he should not ignore me.”

  Galad stepped forward into the ring of crossbowmen and channelers. If he won, he would still die. But Light, let him take one of the Forsaken with him. It would be a fitting end.

  Demandred came at him, and the contest began.

  * * *

  Her back pressed against a stalagmite, seeing only by the light of Callandor reflected against the walls of the cavern, Nynaeve worked to save Alanna’s life.

  There were those who, in the White Tower, had mocked her reliance on ordinary healing techniques. What could two hands and thread do that the One Power could not?

  If any of those women had been here instead of Nynaeve, the world would have ended.

  The conditions were horrible. Little light, no tools besides the implements she kept in her pouch. Still, Nynaeve sewed, using the needle and thread she always carried. She had mixed a draught of herbs for Alanna and forced it through her lips. It wouldn’t do much, but every little bit might help. It would keep Alanna’s strength up, help her with the pain, keep her heart from giving out as Nynaeve worked.

  The wound was messy, but she had sewn messy wounds before. Though she trembled inside, Nynaeve’s hands were steady as she sewed up the wound and coaxed the woman back from the very precipice of death.

  Rand and Moridin did not move. But she felt something thrumming from them. Rand was fighting. Fighting a fight she could not see.

  * * *

  “Matrim Cauthon, you bloody fool. You’re still alive?”

  Mat glanced over as Davram Bashere rode up beside him in the early evening darkness. Mat had moved with the Deathwatch Guard to the back of the Andoran lines fighting at the river.

  Bashere was accompanied by his wife and a guard of Saldaeans. Judging by the blood on her clothing, she had seen her share of fighting.

  “Yes, I’m alive,” Mat said. “I’m usually pretty good at staying alive. I’ve only failed one time that I remember, and it hardly counts. What are you doing here? Aren’t you…”

  “They dug into my bloody mind,” Bashere said, scowling. “That they did, man. Deira and I talked it over. I’m not going to lead, but why should that stop me from killing a few Trollocs?”

  Mat nodded. At Tenobia’s fall, this man had become king of Saldaea—but he had refused the crown, so far. The corruption in his mind had shaken him. All he had said was that Saldaea fights alongside Malkier, and told the troops to look toward Lan. The throne would be sorted out if they all survived the Last Battle.

  “What happened to you?” Bashere asked. “I heard the command post fell.”

  Mat nodded. “The Seanchan have abandoned us.”

  “Blood and ashes!” Bashere cried. “As if this weren’t bad enough. Bloody Seanchan dogs.”

  The Deathwatch Guards who stood around Mat made no response to that.

  Elayne’s forces held along the riverbank, just barely—but Trollocs were slowly working around them upriver. Elayne’s lines held only because of tenacity and careful training. Each huge square of men held pikes outward, bristling like a hedgehog.

  Those formations could be separated if Demandred drove wedges between them in the right way. Mat employed cavalry sweeps of his own, including Andoran cavalry and the Band—trying to keep the Trollocs from penetrating the pike squares or surrounding Elayne.

  The rhythm of the battle pulsed beneath Mat’s fingertips. He felt what Demandred was doing. To anyone else, the end of the battle probably seemed a simple matter now. Attack in force, break the pike formations, crack Mat’s defenses. It was so much more subtle.

  Lan’s Borderlanders had finished crushing the Trollocs upriver, and needed orders. Good. Mat needed those men for the next step in his plan.

  Three of the enormous pike formations were flagging, but if he could place a channeler or two in each center, he could shore them up. Light shelter whoever had distracted Demandred. The Forsaken’s attacks had destroyed entire pike formations. Demandred didn’t need to kill each man individually; he needed only to launch attacks of the One Power to shatter the square. That let the Trollocs overwhelm them.

  “Bashere,” Mat said, “please tell me that someone has heard from your daughter.”

  “Nobody has,” Deira said. “I’m sorry.”

  Bloody ashes, Mat thought. Poor Perrin.

  Poor him. How was he going to do this without the Horn? Light. He was not certain he could do it with the bloody Horn.

  “Go,” Mat called as they rode. “Ride to Lan; he’s upriver. Tell him to engage those Trollocs trying to move around the Andorans’ right flank! And tell him I’ll have other orders for him coming soon.”

  “But I—”

  “I don’t care if you’ve bloody been touched by the Shadow!” Mat said. “Every man has had the Dark One’s fingers on his heart, and that’s the bloody truth. You can fight through it. Now ride to Lan and tell him what needs to be done!”

  Bashere stiffened at first; then—strangely—he smiled a broad smile beneath drooping mustaches. Bloody Saldaeans. They liked being yelled at. Mat’s words seemed to give him heart, and he galloped off, wife at his side. She threw Mat a fond look, which made him uncomfortable.

  Now … he needed an army. And a gateway. He needed a bloody gateway. Fool, he thought. He had sent the damane away. Could he not have at least kept one? Though they did make his skin crawl as if it were covered in spiders.

  Mat halted Pips, the Deathwatch Guards stopping with him. A few of them lit torches. They had certainly gotten the drubbing they had wanted, joining Mat in fighting the Sharans. They seemed to itch for more, though.

  There, Mat thought, heeling Pips toward a force of troops south of Elayne’s pike formations. The Dragonsworn. Before the Seanchan left Dashar Knob, Mat had sent this army to reinforce Elayne’s troops.

  He still did not know what to make of them. He had not been at the Field when they had gathered, but he had heard reports. People from all ranks and stations, all nationalities, who had joined together to fight in the Last Battle, heedless of loyalties or national borders. Rand broke all vows and all other bonds.

  Mat rode at a quick trot—the Deathwatch Guards jogging to keep up—around the back of the Andoran lines. Light, the lines were buckling. This was bad. Well, he’d made his bet. Now he could only ride the bloody battle and hope it did not buck too much.

  As he galloped for the Dragonsworn, he heard something incongruous. Singing? Mat pulled to a halt. The Ogier had been caught up fighting the Trollocs, and had pushed across the dry riverbed to help fight at Elayne’s left flank, across from the bogs, to keep Trollocs from coming around that way.

  They
stood their ground here, as immovable as oaks before a flood, hacking with axes as they sang. Trollocs lay in piles around them.

  “Loial!” Mat yelled, standing up in his stirrups. “Loial!”

  One of the Ogier stepped back from the fighting and turned. Mat was taken aback. His usually calm friend had ears laid low, teeth clenched in anger, and a blood-soaked axe in his fingers. Light, but that expression sent terror through Mat’s body. He would rather stare down ten men who thought he had been cheating than fight a single angry Ogier!

  Loial called something to the others, and then rejoined them in the fighting. They continued to lay into the Trollocs nearby, cutting them down. Trollocs and Ogier were near the same size, but the Ogier somehow seemed to tower over the Shadowspawn. They did not fight like soldiers, but like woodsmen felling trees. Chop one way, then the next, breaking Trollocs. But Mat knew that Ogier hated felling trees, while they seemed to relish felling Trollocs.

  The Ogier broke the Trolloc fist they’d been fighting, making them flee. Elayne’s soldiers moved in and blocked off the rest of the Trolloc army, and the several hundred Ogier pulled back to Mat. Among them, Mat noticed, were more than a few of the Seanchan Ogier—the Gardeners. He had not ordered that. The two groups fought together, but barely seemed to look at one another now.

  Every one of the Ogier, male and female, had numerous cuts on their arms and legs. They did not wear armor, but many of the cuts seemed trivial, as if their skin had the strength of bark.

  Loial walked up to Mat and the Deathwatch Guards, raising his axe to his shoulder. Loial’s trousers were dark up to the thighs, as if he had been wading in wine. “Mat,” Loial said, drawing a deep breath. “We have done as you asked, fighting here. No Trolloc got by us.”

  “You did well, Loial,” Mat said. “Thank you.”

  He waited for a reply. Something long-winded and eager, no doubt. Loial stood breathing in and out with lungs that could hold enough air to fill a room. No words. The others with him, though many were senior to Loial, offered no words either. Some lifted torches. The glow of the sun had vanished beneath the horizon. Night was fully upon them.