"The Aes Sedai who came to the tent each night were so mixed that they did not help at all in clearing her thoughts. Alviarin was as cool and businesslike as a merchant come to buy wool and tabac, surprised that Nynaeve was part of the lesson but accepting, sharp in her criticisms but always ready to try again. Alanna Mosvani laughed and spent as much time talking about the world, and men, as she did teaching. Alanna showed too much interest in Rand and Perrin and Mat for Egwene’s comfort, though. Especially Rand. Worst of all was Liandrin, the only one who wore her shawl; the others had all packed them away before leaving Fal Dara. Liandrin sat fingering her red fringe and taught little, and reluctantly at that. She questioned Egwene and Nynaeve as if they had been accused of a crime, and her questions were all about the three boys. She kept it up until Nynaeve threw her out—Egwene was not sure why Nynaeve did so—and then she left with a warning."
- First of all: Nynaeve, I love you. 😂
- Oh wow, Alanna's obsession started back in TGH, before she knew Rand was the DR, before she even knew he could channel. She possibly knew he and the other two were ta'veren (due to Siuan taking an interest in the boys), but not certainly so.
"Wrapped in emptiness, Rand kept moving. Almost forgotten in entering the camp, saidin pulsed at him.
“He cannot see us,” Loial whispered low. “Once we reach the horses—”
A Trolloc leaped out of the dark at them, cruel eagle’s beak in a man’s face where mouth and nose should have been, scythe-like sword already whistling through the air.
Rand moved without thought. He was one with the blade. Cat Dances on the Wall. The Trolloc screamed as it fell, screamed again as it died.
“Run, Loial!” Rand commanded. Saidin called to him. “Run!”
He was dimly aware of Loial lumbering to an awkward gallop, but another Trolloc loomed from the night, boar-snouted and tusked, spiked axe raised. Smoothly Rand glided between Trolloc and Ogier; Loial must get the Horn away. Head and shoulders taller than Rand, half again as wide, the Trolloc came at him with a silent snarl. The Courtier Taps His Fan. No scream, this time. He walked backwards after Loial, watching the night. Saidin sang to him, such a sweet song. The Power could burn them all, burn Fain and all the rest to cinders. No!
Two more Trollocs, wolf and ram, gleaming teeth and curling horns. Lizard in the Thornbush. He rose smoothly from one knee as the second toppled, horns almost brushing his shoulder. The song of saidin caressed him with seduction, pulled him with a thousand silken strings. Burn them all with the Power. No. No! Better dead than that. If I were dead, it would be done with.
A knot of Trollocs came into sight, hunting uncertainly. Three of them, four. Suddenly one pointed to Rand and raised a howl the rest answered as they charged.
“Let it be done with!” Rand shouted, and leaped to meet them.
For an instant surprise slowed them, then they came on with guttural cries gleeful, bloodthirsty, swords and axes raised. He danced among them to the song of saidin. Hummingbird Kisses the Honeyrose. So cunning that song, filling him. Cat on Hot Sand. The sword seemed alive in his hands as it had never been before, and he fought as if a heron-mark blade could keep saidin from him. The Heron Spreads Its Wings.
Rand stared at the motionless shapes on the ground around him. “Better to be dead,” he murmured. He raised his eyes, back up the hill toward where the camp lay. Fain was there, and Darkfriends, and more Trollocs. Too many to fight. Too many to face and live. He took a step that way. Another.
“Rand, come on!” Loial’s urgent, whispered call drifted through the emptiness to him. “For life and the Light, Rand, come on!”
Carefully, Rand bent to wipe his blade on a Trolloc’s coat. Then, as formally as if Lan were watching him train, he sheathed it.
“Rand!”
As though he knew of no urgency, Rand joined Loial by the horses. The Ogier was tying the golden chest atop his saddle with straps from his saddlebags. His cloak was stuffed underneath to help balance the chest on the rounded saddle seat.
Saidin sang no more. It was there, that stomach-turning glow, but it held back as if he truly had fought it off. Wonderingly, he let the void vanish. “I think I am going mad,” he said. Suddenly realizing where they were, he peered back the way they had come. Shouts and howls came from half a dozen different directions; signs of search, but none of pursuit. Yet. He swung up onto Red’s back.
“Sometimes I do not understand half of what you say,” Loial said. “If you must go mad, could it at least wait until we are back with the Lady Selene and Hurin?”"
This is so beautifully written.
This part of Chapter 19 in TGH is strongly paralleled in Chapter 19 of KoD (“Vows”). In TGH, we get our very first taste of saidin’s madness and LTT’s ghost pressing against the edges of Rand’s mind (or at least this is the first I noticed it). He isn't just fighting for his life, he’s fighting the sheer seductiveness of the Power and the dark temptation of thinking 'Better to be dead.'
Books later in KoD, that moment is directly mirrored during the Trolloc army attack on the manor in Tear. LTT takes over, refuses to release control, pulls in massive amounts of the Power, and contemplates suicide. Rand is forced to fight on several fronts all at once, while everyone around him has no idea what’s actually happening, only that something is deeply wrong.
I love this kind of multi-layered tension with external fight/internal struggle/isolation. These 19s are two of my favorite chapters in the series!
