"Release him", Demandred said, allowing the True Power shield to unravel.
M’Hael stumbled back, keeping his feet, sweat dripping from his face. He gasped, hand raised to his chest.
"Stay alive through this battle", Demandred said to him, turning away and beginning a weave to summon his falcon back. "If you do so, perhaps I will show you how to do as I just did. You may think you wish to kill me now, but know that the Great Lord watches. Beyond that, consider this. You may have a hundred pet Asha’man. I have over four hundred of my Ayyad. I am this world’s savior".
When he looked back, M’Hael was gone, having Traveled away with the True Power. It was amazing that he could summon the strength, after what Demandred had just done. He hoped he wouldn’t have to kill the man. He should prove useful.
I WILL WIN EVENTUALLY.
Rand stood before the blowing winds, stood strong, though his eyes watered as he stared into the darkness. How long had he been in this place? A thousand years? Ten thousand?
For the moment, he concerned himself only with defiance. He would not bend before this wind. He could not give in for a fraction of a heartbeat. THE TIME HAS COME, FINALLY.
"Time is nothing to you", Rand said.
It was true, and it was not. Rand could see the threads swirling around him, forming the Pattern. As it formed, he saw the battlefields below him. Those he loved fighting for their lives. These were not possibilities; this was the truth, what was actually happening.
The Dark One wrapped around the Pattern, unable to take it and destroy it, but able to touch it. Tendrils of darkness, spines, touched the world at points all along its length. The Dark One lay like shadow upon the Pattern.
When the Dark One touched the Pattern, time existed for him. And so, while time was nothing to the Dark One, he—or it, as the Dark One had no gender—could only work within its bounds. Like . . . like a sculptor who had marvelous visions and dreams but was still bound by the reality of the materials he worked with.
Rand stared at the Pattern, resisting the Dark Ones attack. He did not move or breathe. Breath wasn’t needed here.
People died below. Rand heard their screams. So many fell.
I WILL WIN EVENTUALLY, ADVERSARY. WATCH THEM SCREAM. WATCH THEM DIE.
THE DEAD ARE MINE.
"Lies", Rand said.
NO. I WILL SHOW YOU.
The Dark One spun possibility again, gathering up what could be, and thrust Rand into another vision.
Juilin Sandar was not a commander. He was a thief-catcher, not some nobleman. Certainly not a nobleman. He worked on his own.
Except, apparently, when he ended up on a battlefield, put in charge of a squad of men because he had successfully captured dangerous men as a thief-catcher. The Sharans pressed against his men, aiming for the Aes Sedai. They fought on the western side of the Heights, and his squad’s job was to protect the Aes Sedai from Sharan infantry.
Aes Sedai. How had he ever gotten tangled up with Aes Sedai? Him, a good Tairen.
"Hold!" Juilin yelled to his men. "Hold!" He yelled it for his own benefit, too. His squad held to their spears and pikes, forcing the Sharan infantry backward up the slope. He wasn’t sure why he was here, or why they were fighting in this sector. He just wanted to stay alive!
The Sharans shouted and cursed in an unfamiliar tongue. They had a lot of those channelers, but the outfit he faced was made up of regular troops who used a variety of hand weapons, mostly swords and shields. Corpses littered the ground, and that made it difficult for both sides as Juilin and his men followed orders, pushing against the Sharan troops while the Aes Sedai and enemy channelers traded weaves.
Juilin wielded a spear, a weapon he was only mildly familiar with. An armored Sharan squad forced its way between Myk and Charn’s pikes. The officers wore breastplates, strangely wrapped in cloth of a variety of colors, while the common rank and file wore leather fitted with strips of metal. They all had their backs painted with strange patterns.
The leader of the Sharan troop wielded a wicked mace, smashing one pikeman, then the other. The man shouted at Juilin, curses he didn’t understand.
Juilin feinted, and the Sharan raised his shield, so Juilin rammed his spear into the man’s armor at the gap between breastplate and arm. Light, he didn’t even flinch! He smashed his shield into Juilin, forcing him back.
The spear slipped from Juilin’s sweaty fingers. He cursed, reaching for his sword breaker, a weapon he knew well. Myk and the others fought nearby, engaging the rest of this Sharan squad. Charn tried to help Juilin, but the crazed Sharan brought his mace down on Charn’s head—splitting it in two like a cracked walnut.
"Die, you bloody monster!" Juilin cried, leaping forward and ramming his sword breaker into the man’s neck just above the gorget. Other Sharans were moving quickly toward his position. Juilin fell back as the man in front of him collapsed and died. Just in time, as a Sharan to his left tried to take his head off with a broad swing of his sword. The tip of the sword went by his ear, and Juilin instinctively raised his own blade. His opponent’s weapon broke in two, and he quickly dispatched the man with a backhand slice to the man’s throat.
Juilin scrambled to pick up his spear. Fireballs fell nearby, attacks from the Aes Sedai behind and the Sharans on the Heights ahead. Soil coated Juilin’s hair, and stuck in clumps to the blood on his arms.
"Hold!" Juilin shouted to his men. "Burn you, we need to hold!"
He attacked another Sharan who came at him. One of the pikemen raised his weapon in time to pin the man on the shoulder, and Juilin speared him through his leather-clad chest.
The air trembled. His ears rang faintly from all of the explosions. Juilin pulled back, yelling orders to his men.
He wasn’t supposed to be here. He was supposed to be someplace warm, with Amathera, thinking about the next criminal he needed to catch.
He figured that every man on the field felt they should be someplace else. The only thing to do was keep on fighting.
You look good in black, Androl sent to Pevara as they moved through the enemy army on top of the Heights.
That, she replied back, is something one should never, never say to an Aes Sedai. Ever.
His only response was a sense of nervousness through the bond. Pevara understood. They—wearing inverted weaves of the Mask of Mirrors—walked among Darkfriends, Shadowspawn and Sharans. And it was working. Pevara wore a white dress and a black cloak over it—those weren’t part of a weave—but anyone looking into her cloak’s hood would see the face of Alviarin, a member of the Black Ajah. Theodrin wore the face of Rianna.
Androl and Emarin wore weaves that gave them the faces of Nensen and Kash, two of Taim’s cronies. Jonneth looked very unlike himself, wearing the face of a nondescript Darkfriend, and he played the part well, skulking behind and carrying their gear. One would never have seen the good-natured Two Rivers man in that hawk-faced man with the greasy hair and nervous manner.
They moved at a brisk pace along the back lines of the Shadow’s army on the Heights. Trollocs hauled bundles of arrows forward; others left the lines to feast on piles of corpses. Cookpots boiled here. That shocked Pevara. They were stopping to eat? Now?
Only some of them, Androl sent. It’s common for human armies too, though these moments don’t make it into the ballads. The fighting has lasted all day, and soldiers need energy while fighting. Usually, you rotate in three batches. Your front lines, your reserves, and your off-duty—troops who will trudge away from the fight and eat as quickly as they can before grabbing a little sleep. Then back to the front lines.
She’d once seen war differently. She’d imagined every man committed every moment of the day. A true battle, however, was not a sprint; it was an extended, soul-grinding trudge.
It was late afternoon already, approaching evening. To the east, below the Heights, battle lines extended far in both directions along the dry riverbed. Many thousands of men and Trollocs fought back and forth there. Large numbers of Trollocs fought there, but others were rotated back up the Heights to either eat or collapse into unconsciousness for a time.
She did not look too closely at the cookpots, though Jonneth fell to his knees and sicked up beside the path. He had noticed the body parts floating in the thick stew. As he emptied his stomach onto the ground, a passing group of Trollocs snorted and hooted in mockery.
Why are they pushing off the Heights to take the river? she sent to Androl. It seems to be a better position up here.
Maybe it is, Androl sent. But the Shadow is the aggressor. If they stay in this position, it serves Cauthon's army. Demandred needs to keep pressing him. That means crossing the river.
So Androl understood tactics, too. Interesting.
I've picked up a few things, he sent. I wont be leading a battle any time soon.
Just curious how many lives you’ve led, Androl.
An odd statement, coming from a woman who is old enough to be my grandmother’s grandmother.
They continued along the eastern side of the Heights. Distant, on the far western side, the Aes Sedai were battling their way up to the top—but for now, the Heights were held by Demandred’s forces. This area Pevara walked through was full of Trollocs. Some bowed in a lumbering way as Pevara and the others passed, others curled up on the stones to sleep, with no cushions or blankets. Each one kept its weapon at hand.
"This does not look promising", Emarin said softly from behind his mask. "I do not see Taim associating with Trollocs any more than he has to".
"Ahead", Androl said. "Look there".
The Trollocs were separated from a group of Sharans who could be seen up ahead, wearing unfamiliar uniforms. They wore armor that was wrapped in cloth, so none of the metal showed except on the very back, though the shape of the breastplates was still obvious. Pevara looked to the others.
"I could see Taim being part of that group", Emarin said. "It’s likely to smell far less putrid than over here among the Trollocs, for one thing".
Pevara had been ignoring the stench—she had learned to do that years ago, snuffing out powerful scents in the same way she ignored heat and cold. As Emarin said it, however, a hint of what the others were smelling seeped through her defenses. She quickly regained control. It was awful.
"Will the Sharans let us pass?" Jonneth asked.
"We shall see", Pevara said, setting off toward the Sharans; their group fell in around her. The Sharan guards maintained an uneasy line against the Trollocs, watching them as they would enemies. This alliance, or whatever it was, did not sit terribly well with the Sharan soldiers. They didn’t try to mask their looks of disgust, and many had tied cloths around their faces to mask the odors.
As Pevara passed their line, a nobleman—or such she assumed him to be, from his armor of brazen rings—moved to confront her. A well-practiced Aes Sedai look staved him off. I am far too important for you to bother, that look said. It worked beautifully, and they were in.
The Sharan reserve camp was orderly as men rotated in from the west, where they fought the White Tower forces. The fierce channeling from that direction kept drawing Pevara’s attention, like a bright light.
What do you think? Androl sent to her.