Crossroads of Twilight

mouth. Darkness.

Egwene felt hardness beneath her. She heard women’s voices. Excited voices.

“Do you know who this is?”

“Well, well. We certainly got better than we bargained for tonight.”

Something was pressed to her mouth, and warmth trickled in, tasting faintly of mint. She swallowed convulsively, suddenly aware of how cold she was, shivering. Her eyes flickered open. And fastened on the face of the woman holding her head and the cup. Lanterns held by soldiers crowding around gave light enough for her to make out the face clearly. An ageless face. She was inside Northharbor.

“That’s it, girl,” the Aes Sedai said encouragingly. “Drink it all down. A strong dose, for now.”

Egwene tried to push the cup away, tried to embrace saidar, but she could feel herself sliding back down into darkness. They had been waiting for her. She had been betrayed. But by whom?

EPILOGUE An Answer

Rand stared out of the window at the steady rain falling out of a gray sky. Another storm down out of the Spine of the World. The Dragonwall. He thought spring must be coming soon. Spring always came, eventually. Earlier here in Tear than back home, it should be, though there seemed little sign of it. Lightning forked silver-blue across the sky, and long moments passed before the peal of thunder. Distant lightning. The wounds in his side ached. Light, the herons branded into his palms ached, after all this time.

Sometimes, pain is all that lets you know you’re alive. Lews Therin whispered, but Rand ignored the voice in his head.

The door creaked open behind him, and he looked over his shoulder at the man who came into the sitting room. Bashere was wearing a short, gray silk coat, a rich shimmering coat, and he had the baton of the Marshal- General of Saldaea, an ivory rod tipped with a golden wolf’s head, tucked behind his belt next to his scab-barded sword. His turned-down boots had been waxed till they shone. Rand tried not to let his relief show. They had been gone long enough.

“Well?” he said.

“The Seanchan are amenable,” Bashere replied. “Crazy as loons, but amenable. They require a meeting with you in person, though. The Marshal-General of Saldaea isn’t the Dragon Reborn.”

“With this Lady Suroth?”

Bashere shook his head. “Apparently a member of their royal family has arrived. Suroth wants you to meet someone called the Daughter of the Nine Moons.”

Thunder rolled again for distant lightning.

We rode on the winds of the rising storm,

We ran to the sounds of the thunder.

We danced among the lightning bolts,

and tore the world asunder.

Anonymous fragment of a poem believed written near the end of the previous Age, known by some as the Third Age. Sometimes attributed to the Dragon Reborn.

The End of the Tenth Book of

The Wheel of Time

GLOSSARY

A Note on Dates in This Glossary. The Toman Calendar (devised by Toma dur Ahmid) was adopted approximately two centuries after the death of the last male Aes Sedai, recording years After the Breaking of the World (AB). So many records were destroyed in the Trolloc Wars that at their end there was argument about the exact year under the old system. A new calendar, proposed by Tiam of Gazar, celebrated freedom from the Trolloc threat and recorded each year as a Free Year (FY). The Gazaran Calendar gained wide acceptance within twenty years after the Wars’ end. Artur Hawkwing attempted to establish a new calendar based on the founding of his empire (FF, From the Founding), but only historians now refer to it. After the death and destruction of the War of the Hundred Years, a third calendar was devised by Uren din Jubai Soaring Gull, a scholar of the Sea Folk, and promulgated by the Panarch Farede of Tarabon. The Farede Calendar, dating from the arbitrarily decided end of the War of the Hundred Years and recording years of the New Era (NE), is currently in use.

Arad Doman: A nation on the Aryth Ocean, currently racked by civil war and by wars against those who have declared for the Dragon Reborn. Its capital is Bandar Eban. In Arad Doman, the ruler (king or queen) is elected by a council of the heads of merchant guilds (the Council of Merchants), who are almost always women He or she must be from the noble class, not the merchant, and is elected for life Legally the king or queen has absolute authority, except that he or she can be deposed by three-quarter vote of the Council The current ruler is King Alsalam Saeed Almadar, Lord of Almadar, High Seat of House Almadar His present whereabouts are much shrouded in mystery armsmen: Soldiers who owe allegiance or fealty to a particular lord or lady Asha’man: (1) In the Old Tongue, “Guardian” or “Guardians,” but the word always meant a guardian of justice and truth (2) The name given, both collectively and as a rank, to the men who have come to the Black Tower, near Caemlyn in Andor, in order to learn to channel Their training concentrates largely on the ways in which the One Power can be used as a weapon, and in another departure from the usages of the White Tower, once they learn to seize saidin, the male half of the Power, they are required to perform all chores and labors with the Power When newly enrolled, a man is termed a Soldier, he wears a plain black coat with a high collar, in the Andoran fashion Being raised to Dedicated brings the right to wear a silver pin, called the Sword, on the collar of his coat Promotion to Asha’man brings the right to wear a Dragon pin, in gold and red enamel, on the collar opposite the Sword Although many women, including wives, flee when they learn that their men actually can channel, a fair number of men at the Black Tower are married, and they use a version of the Warder bond to create a link with their wives This same bond, altered to compel obedience, has recently been used to bond captured Aes Sedai as well.

Balwer, Sebban: Formerly secretary to Pedron Niall (the Lord Captain Commander of the Children of the Light) in public, and secretly Niall’s spymaster After Niall’s death, Balwer aided the escape of Morgase (once Queen of Andor) from the Seanchan in Amador for his own reasons, and now is employed as secretary to Perrin t’Bashere Aybara and Faile m Bashere t’Aybara Perrin is beginning to suspect that there is more to Balwer than at first appeared Band of the Red Hand: see Shen an Calhar Blood, the: Term used by the Seanchan to designate the nobility There are degrees of nobility The High Blood shave the sides of their heads and paint multiple fingernails — the higher the rank, the more nails painted — but a member of the lesser Blood, the low Blood, may have only the nails of the little fingers painted One can be raised to the Blood as well as born to it, and this is frequently a reward for outstanding accomplishment or service to the Empire.

calendar: There are 10 days to the week, 28 days to the month, and 13 months to the year Several feastdays are not part of any month, these include Sunday (the longest day of the year), the Feast of Thanksgiving (once every four years at the spring equinox), and the Feast of All Souls Salvation, also called All Souls Day (once every ten years at the autumn equinox) While the months have names — Taisham, Jumara, Saban, Aine, Adar, Saven, Amadame, Tammaz, Maigdhal, Choren, Shaldme, Nesan, and Danu — these are seldom used except in official documents and by officials For most people, using the seasons is good enough.