“The Ways were made by men wielding Power fouled by the Dark One. About a thousand years ago, during what you humans call the War of the Hundred Years, the Ways began to change. So slowly in the beginning that none really noticed, they grew dank and dim. Then darkness fell along the bridges. Some who went in were never seen again. Travelers spoke of being watched from the dark. The numbers who vanished grew, and some who came out had gone mad, raving about Machin Shin, the Black Wind. Aes Sedai Healers could aid some, but even with Aes Sedai help they were never the same. And they never remembered anything of what had occurred. Yet it was as if the darkness had sunken into their bones. They never laughed again, and they feared the sound of the wind.”
For a moment there was silence but for the cat purring beside Moiraine’s chair, and the snap and crackle of the fire, popping out sparks. Then Nynaeve burst out angrily, “And you expect us to follow you into that? You must be mad!”
“Which would you choose instead?” Moiraine asked quietly. “The Whitecloaks within Caemlyn, or the Trollocs without? Remember that my presence in itself gives some protection from the Dark One’s works.”
Nynaeve settled back with an exasperated sigh.
“You still have not explained to me,” Loial said, “why I should break the edict of the Elders. And I have no desire to enter the Ways. Muddy as they often are, the roads men make have served me well enough since I left Stedding Shangtai.”
“Humankind and Ogier, everything that lives, we are at war with the Dark One,” Moiraine said. “The greater part of the world does not even know it yet, and most of the few who do fight skirmishes and believe they are battles. While the world refuses to believe, the Dark One may be at the brink of victory. There is enough power in the Eye of the World to undo his prison. If the Dark One has found some way to bend the Eye of the World to his use . . . ”
Rand wished the lamps in the room were lit. Evening was creeping over Caemlyn, and the fire in the fireplace did not give enough light. He wanted no shadows in the room.
“What can we do?” Mat burst out. “Why are we so important? Why do we have to go to the Blight? The Blight!”
Moiraine did not raise her voice, but it filled the room, compelling. Her chair by the fire suddenly seemed like a throne. Suddenly even Morgase would have paled in her presence. “One thing we can do. We can try. What seems like chance is often the Pattern. Three threads have come together here, each giving a warning: the Eye. It cannot be chance; it is the Pattern. You three did not choose; you were chosen by the Pattern. And you are here, where the danger is known. You can step aside, and perhaps doom the world. Running, hiding, will not save you from the weaving of the Pattern. Or you can try. You can go to the Eye of the World, three ta’veren, three centerpoints of the Web, placed where the danger lies. Let the Pattern be woven around you there, and you may save the world from the Shadow. The choice is yours. I cannot make you go.”
“I’ll go,” Rand said, trying to sound resolute. However hard he sought the void, images kept flashing through his head. Tam, and the farmhouse, and the flock in the pasture. It had been a good life; he had never really wanted anything more. There was comfort—a small comfort—hearing Perrin and Mat add their agreement to his. They sounded as dry-mouthed as he.
“I suppose there isn’t any choice for Egwene or me, either,” Nynaeve said.
Moiraine nodded. “You are part of the Pattern, too, both of you, in some fashion. Perhaps not ta’veren—perhaps—but strong even so. I have known it since Baerlon. And no doubt by this time the Fades know it, too. And Ba’alzamon. Yet you have as much choice as the young men. You could remain here, proceed to Tar Valon once the rest of us have gone.”
“Stay behind!” Egwene exclaimed. “Let the rest of you go off into danger while we hide under the covers? I won’t do it!” She caught the Aes Sedai’s eye and drew back a little, but not all of her defiance vanished. “I won’t do it,” she muttered stubbornly.
“I suppose that means both of us will accompany you.” Nynaeve sounded resigned, but her eyes flashed when she added, “You still need my herbs, Aes Sedai, unless you’ve suddenly gained some ability I don’t know about.” Her voice held a challenge Rand did not understand, but Moiraine merely nodded and turned to the Ogier.
“Well, Loial, son of Arent son of Halan?”
Loial opened his mouth twice, his tufted ears twitching, before he spoke. “Yes, well. The Green Man. The Eye of the World. They’re mentioned in the books, of course, but I don’t think any Ogier has actually seen them in, oh, quite a long time. I suppose . . . But must it be the Ways?” Moiraine nodded, and his long eyebrows sagged till the ends brushed his cheeks. “Very well, then. I suppose I must guide you. Elder Haman would say it’s no less than I deserve for being so hasty all the time.”
“Our choices are made, then,” Moiraine said. “And now that they are made, we must decide what to do about them, and how.”
Long into the night they planned. Moiraine did most of it, with Loial’s advice concerning the Ways, but she listened to questions and suggestions from everyone. Once dark fell Lan joined them, adding his comments in that iron-cored drawl. Nynaeve made a list of what supplies they needed, dipping her pen in the inkwell with a steady hand despite the way she kept muttering under her breath.
Rand wished he could be as matter-of-fact as the Wisdom. He could not stop pacing up and down, as if he had energy to burn or burst from it. He knew his decision was made, knew it was the only one he could make with the knowledge he had, but that did not make him like it. The Blight. Shayol Ghul was somewhere in the Blight, beyond the Blasted Lands.
He could see the same worry in Mat’s eyes, the same fear he knew was in his own. Mat sat with his hands clasped, knuckles white. If he let go, Rand thought, he would be clutching the dagger from Shadar Logoth instead.
There was no worry on Perrin’s face at all, but what was there was worse: a mask of weary resignation. Perrin looked as though he had fought something until he could fight it no longer and was waiting for it to finish him. Yet sometimes . . .
“We do what we must, Rand,” he said. “The Blight . . . ” For an instant those yellow eyes lit with eagerness, flashing in the fixed tiredness of his face, as if they had a life of their own apart from the big blacksmith’s apprentice. “There’s good hunting along the Blight,” he whispered. Then he shuddered, as if he had just heard what he had said, and once more his face was resigned.
And Egwene. Rand drew her apart at one point, over by the fireplace where those planning around the table could not hear. “Egwene, I . . . ” Her eyes, like big dark pools drawing him in, made him stop and swallow. “It’s me the Dark One’s after, Egwene. Me, and Mat, and Perrin. I don’t care what Moiraine Sedai says. In the morning you and Nynaeve could start for home, or Tar Valon, or anywhere you want to go, and nobody will try to stop you. Not the Trollocs, not the Fades, not anybody. As long as you aren’t with us. Go home, Egwene. Or go to Tar Valon. But go.”
He waited for her to tell him she had as much right to go where she wanted as he did, that he had no right to tell her what to do. To his surprise, she smiled and touched his cheek.
“Thank you, Rand,” she said softly. He blinked, and closed his mouth as she went on. “You know I can’t, though. Moiraine Sedai told us what Min saw, in Baerlon. You should have told me who Min was. I thought . . . Well, Min says I am part of this, too. And Nynaeve. Maybe I’m not ta’veren,” she stumbled over the word, “but the Pattern sends me to the Eye of the World, too, it seems. Whatever involves you, involves me.”