Who's Voice was In Rand's Head End of Eye of the World?

[garfoofafuffel]

Hey doing a readthrough in preparation for MoL. At the end of EotW, Rand has just found out he can channel at Tarwin's Gap, and after he kills that Fade and Trolloc army....

 

The wind died. The screams died. The earth was still. Dust and smoke swirled back down the pass to

surround him.

"The Light blind you, Ba'alzamon! This has to end!"

IT IS NOT HERE.

It was not Rand's thought, making his skull vibrate.

I WILL TAKE NO PART. ONLY THE CHOSEN ONE CAN DO WHAT MUST BE DONE, IF HE WILL.

"Where?" He did not want to say it, but he could not stop himself. "Where?"

The haze surrounding him parted, leaving a dome of clear, clean air ten spans high, walled by billowing

smoke and dust. Steps rose before him, each standing alone and unsupported, stretching up into the murk that

obscured the sun.

NOT HERE.

Through the mist, as from the far end of the earth, came a cry. "The Light wills it!" The ground rumbled

with the thunder of hooves as the forces of humankind launched their last charge.

 

Who's voice is that in his head??? Lews Therin? Dark One? Creator? I'm totally lost.

[Suttree]

This one is steal debated pretty fiercely. Most think it is the Creator but I have seen decent arguments for it be the DO as well.

[slatanic1]

I had no clue my first time reading it, but on subsequent re-reads I always assumed it was Lews Therin. Now that I read the quote, though, I have to wonder. We do know that LTT is not exactly sane as the voice in Rand's head, so it could be that he didn't realize he was addressing the chosen one. I'll be interested to see what the experts have to say.

[Whizbang]

I just chalk it up to RJ still being unclear one the direction he wanted to take with the series. Could be LTT, but that doesn't seem to fit with the voice. The whole ending to tEotW just doesn't jive with the rest of the series. I think it comes down to RJ and the publisher being unsure if the series would become popular enough to warrant a second book, so they made it as complete unto itself as possible.

 

You just have to accept the inconsistencies and move on, is how I see it. I like to say that tEotW is another reality from the portal stones, not the reality from the rest of the books. It is very close, but has some differences.

[Suttree]

Well the all caps is pretty suggestive. The only other person we have seen use it is the DO, it stands to reason the Creator would use the same. Add to that what he says about "I will take no part" which just happens to match exactly with quotes from RJ about the CReator's stance and I htink its pretty obvious, for all that it is just an early bookism.

[Whizbang]

So, the Eye of the World allows the Chosen One (maybe anyone?) to hear the voice of the Creator? I will say that, on the first read, I assumed it was the Creator's voice. Later reads, however, I revised my interpretations to that stated in my previous post.

 

Is tEotW actually the Creator's equivalent to the TP, rather than distilled Saidin? That would make sense as to why Rand didn’t burn himself out from using it, and was able to cause so much damage (He killed legions of trollocs and fades by himself. He couldn’t even do that at the Battle at Lord Algarin’s Manor). It only makes sense that The Eye of the World was special. I wonder if it’s true purpose, aside from wiping out an army of shadowspawn, was to link Rand directly to the creator/pattern (hence the golden light protecting him from the taint that Nyn sensed when she delved him much later on).

[herid]

As Suttree said this is still being fiercely debated and you may want to look up the old threads about it. Personally, I believe it was the DO. It has to be either the DO or the creator. There aren't any other reasonable possibilities. But the following RJ quote rules out the Creator.

 

Robert Jordan

 

Rand has no direct connection with the Creator. The Creator is completely removed from the world; aside from...creating...the Pattern, he does nothing else whatsoever to influence anything.

I don't see how this can possibly be reconciled with the creator directly speaking to Rand. So this quote alone is sufficient IMO. But there are a couple of other clues pointing in the same direction

• The description of the voice is extremely similar to the description of the voice speaking to Demandred in LOC.
  
• The word "chosen" is used which is the term used by the DO for the Forsaken. It's never used by the lightsiders anywhere in the series with regards to Rand. Not in the prophecies nor by individuals.
  

The biggest argument against this being the DO is that he can seemingly only talk to people when they visit Shayol Ghul. But this might not actually be the case. He seems to talk to Moridin directly in TOM, ch 5.

Also, Rand is the Dragon Reborn. He is a ta'veren and all kinds of special in other ways so the DO might be able to reach him even if he can't normally reach others. In fact, we know for sure the the DO can talk to Rand outside of Shayol Ghul because of "I have won again, Lews Therin". That was surely him in Rand's alternate lives and in most of them it happened quite far away from Shayol Ghul.

Next, the first seal was just broken. This could have allowed the DO greater access to the world at least temporarily (we know it waxes and wanes).

Lastly, something really weird is going on right at that moment apart from the voice speaking.

Right before it happens

Dust and smoke swirled back down the pass to

surround him.

and later

The haze surrounding him parted, leaving a dome of clear, clean air ten spans high, walled by billowing smoke and dust. Steps rose before him, each standing alone and unsupported, stretching up into the murk that obscured the sun.

Rand is channeling unconsciously in this scene so he might have done something there. This could be an early bookism or it might be a gateway for skimming or something like. It's also similar to Falme. So it's possible that whatever it was allowed the DO to speak to Rand.

[Asmodeanisdemandread]

I always thought it was the first time he dealt with LTT but LTT wouldn't say 'only the chosen one' he would've said 'only you' that leads he to think its the DO plus the description of the voice is eerily familiar to Demandred in SG at the beginning LoC.

[Whizbang]

If it is the DO, which seems like a safe bet, then he obviously wants Rand to drain the Eye. I wonder if Rand hand't drained the Eye, if the seal would have broken? I wonder if that was actually a more of a win than a loss for the DO. Win, because a seal was broken, loss because his legion of shadowspawn was destroyed and his hold on the weather was broken.

 

I also wonder if the Eye was supposed to be used to reseal the bore (or at least that was the intention), and so now (at the end of tEotW), the DO believes that he will win because now the Dragon has no distilled Saidin to use to repair the patch. It makes sense. If he used the Eye, which was somehow seperated from the original pool of Saidin, there would be no taint on Saidin anymore. The bit that is holding the DO back is not connected to the rest of it. So, the DO is all, "you have won the battle, LTT, but not the war!", thinking that now it is ensured that Rand cannot fix the patch. Little does he know that Rand will clense Saidin, opeining up another possibility for fixing the patch. Maybe Rand has to re-fill the Eye using a circle of men and women, with Callandor, to distill out another measure of Saidin seperated from the rest. And THAT is how he saves the world. Everything comes full circle, back to the Eye. A "memory" of light, meaning Rand remembers what it was like when he was, essentially, the light made flesh (glowing figure that floated down between the Borderland and Shadow armies).

[Darksmoon]

I believe it is the Creator.

[Amandera]

Both RJ and BS RAFO'd this multiple times. Look for 'THE VOICE' tag in the interview database.

 

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php

[driedraspberry]

Both RJ and BS RAFO'd this multiple times. Look for 'THE VOICE' tag in the interview database.

 

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php

 

Have they? Super. I wondered if it was an inconsistency in the Eye since that whole bit seemed a bit vague and odd with traveling and what not.

 

My vote goes to DO. I like LTT's notions on the Creator keeping its distance.

[Asmodeanisdemandread]

I think whizbang is on the right track

[Amandera]

Both RJ and BS RAFO'd this multiple times. Look for 'THE VOICE' tag in the interview database.

 

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php

 

Have they? Super. I wondered if it was an inconsistency in the Eye since that whole bit seemed a bit vague and odd with traveling and what not.

 

My vote goes to DO. I like LTT's notions on the Creator keeping its distance.

I wouldn't get too excited. They even RAFO whether it should be RAFO'd. It seems to be some sort of taboo. We might see it in aMoL or we might not.

[DaoineSidhe]

I tend to think that this Voice is the Creator, given that it seems to be helping Rand along his path to fulfill his destiny. The Dark also needs Rand for ultimate win, but at that point in time, the DO has no real reason to help Rand fight against his primary and#1 Servant, Ishamael.

 

However, I also think that this is one of the two biggest early book "mistakes" that RJ made due to him not having the metaphysics of his world fully worked out yet. The whole "I will take no part" in particular seems to point to the Creator. After all, the whole point of the LB is that the DO WANTS to take part in this world, ultimately destroying it. Would the DO ever willing say "I will take no part"? I bloody well don't think so! But, because it is the first book, this and his Traveling portrayal in the prologue are both given passes because he has since improved the nature of those things (Creator will do NOTHING in this story. We KNOW there will be no GOD coming down and saving the hero in his final moment, and the current weave of Traveling fits more into the metaphysics of the One Power than the whole vanishing and magically re-appearing somewhere else).

 

There are some valid arguments for it being the DO, especially if he is pretending to be the Creator to Rand, but if that is the case, it really makes the ending of the first book truly Dark, and sets a much darker tone to the series than RJ has portrayed since. I just don't buy RJ ending the first book in his series with such a dark twist, that Rand was actually doing the DO's will for the final climactic battle in tEotW. I can see why the DO would want to do that, and how it might help the DO's cause, to a certain extent, by starting him down a specific path, and having him use the Eye, but that just doesn't jive with RJ's writing, IMO.

 

However, given RJ's insistence that this is a RAFO, and his equal insistence in interview after tEotW that the Creator will take no part, the only way I can see this being definitively proven "in story" is for the voice to be the DO, because I think RJ spoke true when he said that the Creator is hand's off, and we won't see an appearance by the "Wizard behind the Curtain" in aMoL...

 

I'm even more confused now...

[Wool-headed lummox]

The only other instance we hear an ominous disembodied all-knowing voice speak in ALL CAPS, is when the DO converses with the Forsaken. And that can't be the Dark One, because Rand is nowhere near Shayol Ghul at that point. If it's not the DO, then it's the DO's light-side equivalent. The Creator.

 

Besides, why would LTT or the DO tell Rand that they will take "no part"? How this passage can create so many futile theories with the fans is beyond me. It's the Creator, and we're bound to get at least one other such instance in AMoL. The Forsaken talk to the DO, Rand talks to the Creator. Wonderful.

[FarShainMael]

Perhaps it's the VOICE of T'A'R, that 'third constant besides the Creator and the Dark One' that Verin tells Egwene about in TDR21.

[wotfan4472]

I believe it is the Creator, as the DO WOULD take a direct hand in events if he could.... just as the DO did when Moridin was ordered not to punish Graendal for what happened to Aran'gar in ToM. It shows how bad things are getting at this point in the series. In the TEoTW I got the sense that the Creator was worried that Rand could quite easily had ripped the bore open if He did not say something. This would mean that the DO would win by default as the other conditions would not have been met at this point.

[he who comes with a bong]

do you think it may have been the Eye talking to the dragon maybee?

[herid]

an interesting thought but the Eye is just a well of saidin. it's an inanimate object and such things don't talk in WOT. I reread the whole scene and as I mentioned earlier it's definitely clear that the VOICE speaks to Rand at the exact moment when Rand (I assume he is the one who does it) opens a gateway to TAR to go fight Ishy. I suspect this is important somehow. Perhaps that's what prompted the DO to speak to Rand for some reason and/or allowed him to do so.

The gateway looks somewhat different from the one he makes in TDR but that's likely an early bookism. Or it could be a different kind of gateway like the difference between skimming and Traveling. It's also not altogether clear if the actual fight between Rand and Ishy takes place in TAR or in Ishy's dream. It looks like the latter from description of the room but then how did Rand get in? this is way before the link between him and Ishy/Moridin is created. This is likely just an early bookism too. It's quite clear that RJ hasn't worked out the details of TAR yet when writing tEoTW.

[garfoofafuffel]

Wow didn't expect all these theories, this is great, thanks everyone. I am not sold that this is an early bookism, RJ always said that he thought of the final scene very early on and this might just be a seed for something we don't necessarily see coming. I'll trust RJ until I finish MoL.

[herid]

I don't absolutely insist that the things I mentioned as suspect are early bookisms but there are plenty of early bookisms in the series. Yes, RJ knew the final scene but it doesn't mean he knew everything in the middle. He invented a lot of stuff along the way. Some of it was retconned to fit what happened in the early books but it was not always completely successful and even when it was it's often easy to spot. It's very clear that the concept of TAR and its rules was not fully developed when he was writing tEoTW. There doesn't seem to be any distinction between TAR and ordinary dreams in tEoTW. The two seems the same even for dreamwalkers like Perrin. And some of the things that happen violate later established rules. For example, Rand wakes up in ch 43 with a splinter in his palm he got in a dream. This should not be possible by the later established rules of TAR and even BS could not come up with a reasonable explanation for it when asked.

 

Or take traveling. in the EoTW prologue LTT travels but there is no mentioning of a gateway and when Ishy travels he doesn't use a gateway either and instead sort of fades in and out. RJ later said that this was because Ishy was using TP to travel but that is an obvious retcon. He didn't invent the notion of TP until much later. This is especially obvious in the scene when Aran'gar frees Moggy in Salidar. Moggy sees a woman channel but can't see the weaves. Her immediate thought is that this woman must be channeling saidin which should be impossible. This makes no sense. She clearly never heard of any woman ever channeling saidin and didn't think it was possible. So her first thought should be that this woman channels TP, not saidin. Yet she never even considers the possibility. the reason is that Jordan hasn't invented TP yet when writing that scene.

[garfoofafuffel]

Oh for sure, I completely agree with the fact that there ARE bookisms. I just am not willing to put this magical capital letter voice down as one until I finish the next book, that's all. Additionally, Lanfear appears to Min at the end of TGH and just *poof* disappears like LTT in the prologue to EoTW; and there are others I'm sure. Either way, I intend to RaFO!

[Mr Ares]

Or take traveling. in the EoTW prologue LTT travels but there is no mentioning of a gateway and when Ishy travels he doesn't use a gateway either and instead sort of fades in and out. RJ later said that this was because Ishy was using TP to travel but that is an obvious retcon. He didn't invent the notion of TP until much later.

Not true. Ishy mentions following a different power in the prologue, and the first few books have several strong indications of a power being drawn from Shai'tan - it is merely not explicitly named at that point.

This is especially obvious in the scene when Aran'gar frees Moggy in Salidar. Moggy sees a woman channel but can't see the weaves. Her immediate thought is that this woman must be channeling saidin which should be impossible. This makes no sense. She clearly never heard of any woman ever channeling saidin and didn't think it was possible. So her first thought should be that this woman channels TP, not saidin. Yet she never even considers the possibility. the reason is that Jordan hasn't invented TP yet when writing that scene.

That is not the reason. That is a possibility, and not even the most likely one. Surely the absence of the aura of darkness seen in other TP users would be something of an indication that TP is not involved?

[Wool-headed lummox]

Moggy sees a woman channel but can't see the weaves. Her immediate thought is that this woman must be channeling saidin which should be impossible. This makes no sense. She clearly never heard of any woman ever channeling saidin and didn't think it was possible. So her first thought should be that this woman channels TP, not saidin

Actually, she didn't even need to think of anything as shocking as TP, let alone Saidin. She should have naturally assumed that the woman was inverting her weaves, like Mesaana with Alviarin later in the series. Or, failing that (although there's no way to discount inverted weaves), that she was using a ter'angreal (or several). People don't usually come to impossible conclusions just because the plot requires them, you see.

 

in the EoTW prologue LTT travels but there is no mentioning of a gateway and when Ishy travels he doesn't use a gateway either and instead sort of fades in and out. RJ later said that this was because Ishy was using TP to travel but that is an obvious retcon. He didn't invent the notion of TP until much later

I think you're half right. Travelling with OP originally worked as instant teleportation, shown several times (Rand teleporting to Tarvin's Gap at the end of EotW). He didn't introduce gateways until the Shadow Rising.

 

However, Ishamael does say "he's following a different power now", and that "Shaitan's healing will not be to Lews Therin's liking", with LTT experiencing immense agony at the use of this healing. Seems like RJ had the True Power in mind from the beginning.