a mysterious beggar

[Caelan Arendor]

Who is the beggar, clad in rags and hiding his face beneath a hood, who pursues Rand in Caemlyn and forces him to vanish into the crowd? Is it Padan Fain?

On the other hand, it is unclear—indeed even unlikely—that Padan Fain could have entered into a symbiosis with Mordeth AND the Dark Lord in such a relatively short time (since the boys had left the Two Rivers), and thus present himself in such a degraded appearance.

[Mailman]

9 hours ago, Caelan Arendor said:

Who is the beggar, clad in rags and hiding his face beneath a hood, who pursues Rand in Caemlyn and forces him to vanish into the crowd? Is it Padan Fain?

On the other hand, it is unclear—indeed even unlikely—that Padan Fain could have entered into a symbiosis with Mordeth AND the Dark Lord in such a relatively short time (since the boys had left the Two Rivers), and thus present himself in such a degraded appearance.

It is the Fain. Rand confirms it in Fal Dara when they capture him.

[Caelan Arendor]

Thank you for your comment, I must have forgotten this detail, for its already quite a while, when I finished reading the whole epos. 

Padan Fain must have shed his outward semblance and all trace of ordinary human bearing with dreadful haste, descending into the pitiful shadow of a form he now parades before the world.