the true Eye of the World passed over my house.
—Robert Jordan
Charleston, SC
February 1990
CONTENTS
MAP
PROLOGUE: In the Shadow
1 The Flame of Tar Valon
2 The Welcome
3 Friends and Enemies
4 Summoned
5 The Shadow in Shienar
6 Dark Prophecy
7 Blood Calls Blood
8 The Dragon Reborn
9 Leavetakings
10 The Hunt Begins
11 Glimmers of the Pattern
12 Woven in the Pattern
13 From Stone to Stone
14 Wolfbrother
15 Kinslayer
16 In the Mirror of Darkness
17 Choices
18 To the White Tower
19 Beneath the Dagger
20 Saidin
21 The Nine Rings
22 Watchers
23 The Testing
24 New Friends and Old Enemies
25 Cairhien
26 Discord
27 The Shadow in the Night.
28 A New Thread in the Pattern.
29 Seanchan
30 Daes Dae’mar
31 On the Scent
32 Dangerous Words
33 A Message from the Dark
34 The Wheel Weaves
35 Stedding Tsofu
36 Among the Elders
37 What Might Be
38 Practice
39 Flight from the White Tower
40 Damane
41 Disagreements
42 Falme
43 A Plan
44 Five Will Ride Forth
45 Blademaster
46 To Come Out of the Shadow
47 The Grave Is No Bar to My Call
48 First Claiming
49 What Was Meant to Be
50 After
GLOSSARY
And 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. Women shall weep and men quail as the nations of the earth are rent like rotting cloth. Neither shall anything stand nor abide . . .
Yet one shall be born to face the Shadow, born once more as he was born before and shall be born again, time without end. The Dragon shall be Reborn, and there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth at his rebirth. In sackcloth and ashes shall he clothe the people, and he shall break the world again by his coming, tearing apart all ties that bind. Like the unfettered dawn shall he blind us, and burn us, yet shall the Dragon Reborn confront the Shadow at the Last Battle, and his blood shall give us the Light. Let tears flow, O ye people of the world. Weep for your salvation.
—from The Karaethon Cycle:
The Prophecies of the Dragon,
as translated by Ellaine Marise’idin Alshinn,
Chief Librarian at the Court of Arafel,
in the Year of Grace 231
of the New Era, the Third Age
PROLOGUE
In the Shadow
The man who called himself Bors, at least in this place, sneered at the low murmuring that rolled around the vaulted chamber like the soft gabble of geese. His grimace was hidden by the black silk mask that covered his face, though, just like the masks that covered the hundred other faces in the chamber. A hundred black masks, and a hundred pairs of eyes trying to see what lay behind them.
If one did not look too closely, the huge room could have been in a palace, with its tall marble fireplaces and its golden lamps hanging from the domed ceiling, its colorful tapestries and intricately patterned mosaic floor. If one did not look too closely. The fireplaces were cold, for one thing. Flames danced on logs as thick as a man’s leg, but gave no heat. The walls behind the tapestries, the ceiling high above the lamps, were undressed stone, almost black. There were no windows, and only two doorways, one at either end of the room. It was as if someone had intended to give the semblance of a palace reception chamber but had not cared enough to bother with more than the outline and a few touches for detail.
Where the chamber was, the man who called himself Bors did not know, nor did he think any of the others knew. He did not like to think about where it might be. It was enough that he had been summoned. He did not like to think about that, either, but for such a summons, even he came.
He shifted his cloak, thankful that the fires were cold, else it would have been too hot for the black wool draping him to the floor. All his clothes were black. The bulky folds of the cloak hid the stoop he used to disguise his height, and bred confusion as to whether he was thin or thick. He was not the only one there enveloped in a tailor’s span of cloth.
Silently he watched his companions. Patience had marked much of his life. Always, if he waited and watched long enough, someone made a mistake. Most of the men and women here might have had the same philosophy; they watched, and listened silently to those who had to speak. Some people could not bear waiting, or silence, and so gave away more