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The days passed slowly, agonizingly, and still Rand did not appear. The Emond's Fielders were stiff with anticipation, and even in the face of Lanfear's reassurances that Demandred could not have defeated the Dragon, the worry persisted. In the meantime, Tam, staying at the Winespring in the meantime, waiting for his son to find him there, grew to know his daughter-in-law, finding her surprisingly interesting despite his disapproval of her, morally. Egwene sulked and lurched about, increasingly edgy and moody. Nynaeve spent her time interacting with the old Women's Circle, catching up upon the Two River's business, settling in, as it were, for the long haul. Though she was now Aes Sedai, she was home for the time in the midst of a crisis, and the former Wisdom would not leave her people to twist in the wind, even if they knew nothing of the troubles.
On a bright morning some four weeks after the return of Rand, Egwene, and Nynaeve, a peddler came to town. Not Padan Fain, who had disappeared years ago, known by but few now, through the information that the two Emond's Field Aes Sedai had provided, as a foul Darkfriend, and likely long dead. No, this peddler was a tight faced woman, who's purse strings were even tighter. Her dress was good, stout travelling wool, and her wagon, though loaded with the usual pots and pan and pins, was of a fine quality. Marin, Bran and Tam went out amidst the calls for goods to observe, the men separating from the innkeeper's wife, to join the Village Council, who, as with all visits to the village, were observing the peddler.
"What's going on?" cried out a young man who'd just recently come of age and was eager for news of the world.
"Yes, what's happening Outside?" cried a woman of middle age.
Tam, standing with his fellows, reflected that the three staying at the Inn could likely tell far more of what was happening than this woman could, but to announce that would be to invite questioning that they simply could not afford, under the circumstances. But, perhaps the woman could tell of very recent news.
The woman looked even more pinched, even as she handed out a tin full of pin, and took some coins in return. She held up a hand and said sharply, "Quiet!"
Silence slowly fell upon the gathering after several further urgings, and the woman finally spoke,
"Well, it's no good, that's for sure. The people called the Seanchan, from over the Ocean, are Artur Hawkwing's children's children, so many generations over. They've come to conquer us, and they're doing a pretty good job at it, let me tell you. Already taken Tarabon and Arad Domain, settled the fighting there real good," she sneered at the absent conquerors.
Gasps echoed through the crowd, and the woman held up her hand, again gesturing for silence, "But it's worse than that. There are Darkfriends all across the land, I tell you. Why, even your neighbour or your best friend could be swearing allegiance under the Dragon's Fang," she scowled.
Chaos erupted at those words, shouts and demands and anger, and the woman mutter to herself, something about wondering why she'd ever 'come to this backwater hole to begin with.'
"Mistress," Tam spoke firmly above the noise as the Council moved amongst the crowd, attempting to calm them down. "Please tell us what you know."
The woman glared for a moment, as surly as any drunkard, before she huffed in exasperation. "Oh, fine. As far as I know, the Dark One's breaking free, and the Darkfriends as massing to serve their master. They'll be competing the Seanchan, but trouble for Hawkwing's legacy is that there are Darkfriends in every place, in every nation, in every people, no doubt their own as well. The Dark One is coming, and there's no stopping it unless every nation of the world bands together, and they'll never do that. They think that their infighting is of more importance than the Last Battle, but how can the Last Battle happen when there's no Dragon Reborn?" the woman was snarling then, more to herself than to the crowd.
Tam, listening, felt his face cloud over with worry and fear at once. His son. She was talking about Tam's son, though she did not know it. The man who had broken the world, an Age ago, taken once more to flesh. The man who was intended to save the world. Remembering his conversation with his son some one month ago, Tam worried that the world would not be saved from the Dark One at all, and realized with a faint bitterness and empathy that were he in Rand's position, he may have done the same thing. But he was not. Again, Tam wondered where Rand was.
"The Dark One will devour us all!" a woman was wailing in horror.
A man cried out cynically, "The Dragon save us! The Dragon is the Dark One, if you ask me!"
Something snapped, worry and pent up waiting and horror and shock and despair. Something snapped in the ever-unshakable Tam al'Thor, and he roared back at the last speaker, "No one asked you! What do you know of the Dragon?! What do we know of events that took place more than three thousand years ago? What do we know but rumours that were likely fostered by Darkfriends! He went mad with the taint, but he did not choose for the taint to be, and he did not choose to kill his family! What right have you to scream out to the world that the Dragon is the Dark One when you know neither, know nothing of either but folktales! And perhaps for the truth Dragon, belief in him will be a factor to decide the fate of the world," he was whispering harshly by the end, but the people had stopped speaking, were leaning forward intently, eyes wide in shock, some mouths hanging open in sheer incredulity.
"What are you talking about, Tam al'Thor?" Cenn Bieu demanded in the midst of a heavy silence. Tam could feel the many eyes upon him, particularly the eyes of Bran and Marin, knowing, compassionate, and worried in their intensity.
"I'm talking about assumptions," Tam replied coldly, eyeing the man. "We assume that the Dragon is the bane of us all, when perhaps he may be our only hope. Matters may turn out far differently than we expect..." he trailed off, thinking of Rand's eyes, filled with a desperation that bordered on madness, thinking of his son, falling down to the floor, of the rot all up Rand's side, of seeing a living man decaying like a corpse, of wondering just how strong the mind waiting for the madness was. Thinking of the philosophies that had no place in a farmer's straightforward existence, Tam said, "The world could be saved and damned at the same time, and none of the us may be able to tell the difference."
He shook his head and walked away then, leaving the merchant woman to mutter something about 'damn fool man,' and the Emond's Fielders to wonder what was coming of the world when one of their own would defend the Dragon. Several of the Coplins and Congars made to suggest that Tam was a Darkfriend. The others, caught up in their shock, perhaps, did not defend Tam nearly so stridently as they would have under other circumstances. Tam never looked back.
***
Lanfear smiled as she gazed at Tam with intelligent dark eyes over their mugs of honey spiced tea.
"You are commendable in your defence of Lews Therin," she said, "But you were right when you said that the world may be saved and damned both. It's always been his way," her perfect lips twisted.
"That's a leading statement," Tam observed. "What is it that you think about when you say such things?"
They were in the sitting room, before the fireplace, and it was night. The moon was full across the sky, streaming in the nearby window. The townsfolk had avoided the inn the whole day long, knowing that Tam had returned there after storming away from the town square. Marin and Bran had left him to collect himself whilst they made their purchases, and for some time afterward as well. He thought that, though they knew the truth of his position, they were somewhat wary as well.
"I think of when I was young," Lanfear said after a long pause. "I have been thinking of it for some time now. When I awoke from my Age long sleep, when I met Lews Therin again, when I found that I was with his child. It invokes what I thought long dead. I remember my days in the Academy, in the Hall, when I was learning to be Aes Sedai. I remember researching in the Sholam. I remember thinking that I had discovered a source from which both males and females could draw the Power, that we would no longer be separate in our might," she laughed harshly and the sound came out sounding like a silver bell. "That was how the Dark One's prison was bored into. I thought that I would live through the Ages as the heroine of all, as the one who had the genius to realize that equality. Instead, I awoke an ancient thing, and I was granted immortality. And now, the legends are that the Chosen, called the Forsaken, were sealed at the beginning of time in the bore with the Great Lord! What ludicrousness! We may be rather elderly by mortal standards, but we are but babes in swaddling cloth compared to our Lord."
"What was he like?" Tam asked, driven by an irresistible curiosity and ignoring the way in which she referred to the Dark One, as he had come to.
Lanfear did not need to ask to whom the man referred. She smiled and answered, "He was talented. Immensely talented. He was the first ta'veren in so long that the title was barely remembered. Whatever he tried, he excelled at. He didn't want it, or so he said. He said that he wanted to be 'normal,' that he did not the want to the world to worship and envy him. It turned his best friend against him. Do you know that Demandred was once Lews Therin's friend? That Demandred turned to the Shadow because of the depth and strength of his envy of Lews Therin? He made enemies quicker than your sheep make lambs. He would have been lost without his power, though, even though he did not want to admit it. He could never have been ordinary. He was a conservative man in personality, however, reserved for the most part. He liked his privacy, and he did not like to make a scene of himself. He was the most powerful Aes Sedai living, save for Elan Morin, who was equal to him, though just barely."
Noting the confusion in Tam's eyes, Lanfear clarified, "Elan Morin was Ishamael's name before he became Chosen. Lews Therin was a politician. He was very skilled, very passionate in those causes that he took heart to, but when the Bore was created and the War of Power began, the arts of war were revived and he found his calling," she smiled ironically, "He wouldn't like it if I said that war was his calling, but it was. There was barely a battle he ever lost. He drove his enemies to the ends of the earth and back again. He harried us and slashed at us, and beat us, and drove us to death. But for the highest of us, it was to be the sleep. His plan was opposed in the Hall of Servants, but he gathered the Hundred Companions in any case and mounted an attack upon us. We did not know he was coming, and we were gathered right in the Pit of Doom. He sealed us in, and the Great Lord as well. But the Great Lord counterstroked and tainted the Source. The last thing I heard for more than thirty four hundred years was Lews Therin's scream as the madness took him. For he and the Companions both, it was instant. When I woke, it seemed as though but an instant had gone by, but even so, my body and spirit knew that the Wheel had turned. I felt older, even if I did not look it. I felt heavier in soul. I met Lews Therin in this Age, searching for him. It was no accident, but you know that," she smiled slightly.
"I think that it was only then, when I saw the soul of the man I loved in his eyes, but the unfamiliar face, that young face, of the Aiel race that had once been peaceful servants, but were now harsh warriors. Only then, did the passage of time truly become real. He was the same. Oh, there were differences, that is the truth, but his power was the same, though undiscovered, he was as strong a ta'veren as before, and he had the same potential, the same talented mind, though it remained undiscovered. It saddened me, in truth, that his potential had gone so undiscovered, so wasted in this Age. A man of such strength in the Power would have been long discovered in my Age, his talents developed. Such things are not so quickly discovered on a farm. Nor, for the Power, would you want them to be now. But one thing is exactly the same, not tainted or changed by the times at all. His duty, his honour, his stubbornness and determination. He does what he believes right, and nothing, no one, can stop him. No one. Not even the Great Lord himself. But as you say, it damns and saves. He puts forward such determination as to tear the world apart. If he had not been so determined, the taint would not exist. But the Great Lord would rule the world, giving me power, and though I found the prospect pleasing, he did not."
Tam leaned back in his chair, eyed her contemplatingly.
"What do you really want?" he asked finally.
She threw back her head and laughed, "Power. What I've always wanted. Power and Lews Therin. That's all I've ever wanted. It is better this way. The Great Lord plans to break the Wheel and remake the world in his image. We'd all die, if he remade the universe. This way, we will live, he will live, and the world will, perhaps, be salvaged a little. I wonder whether it was soon enough, though."
"What do you mean?" Tam suddenly demanded, sitting up straight.
"I am a Chosen, Tam al'Thor," she whispered, smiling darkly, beautifically. "I have contacted the others some time ago. They were quite clear upon a fact which they loathe. Lews Therin has gone over the Shadow. They are horrified, and fearful and full of hate and envy. Well, Ishamael is rather pleased, but Ishamael is walking on thin ice as it is. He is so mad as to believe himself the Great Lord at times, and so fills his head with contradictory nonsense. My husband, though, is organizing the forces he is now commander of, so as to save the world as he may. His duty, you see."
Tam was frozen. She had contacted others. Why had he not thought of that? Rand had travelled away in the blink of an eye, and Tam had not thought of her. The fact of it, Tam now thought, was that she had not demonstrated the One Power. In some remote manner, her powers were not real to him. Well, he had better believe that they were.
"Why are you still here then, Lanfear?" he asked now, voice suddenly hard as he eyed the young seeming woman.
"I have no where else to be. I'm waiting for something to happen, I'm waiting for him to act. And then, when he does, I shall join him. And, as I wait, I am getting to know my father-in-law. As I wished to," she leaned back in her chair, and smiled once more, satisfied at his expression of grim incredulity.
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