The Amyrlin's Anger

[Durinax]

 

Pretty sure that Taim only has a little more than 100 guys out of like 4-500. They do have the advantage of Taim's extra lessons though.

 

Those 100 are full asha'man and (IMO) confirmed darkfriends.  The rest will have to choose whether to follow the Dragon or their Leader.  No doubt many will choose Rand, I expect others will "defend the Black Tower" and some just won't know what to do.  Logain must have a good reason to seek out Rand and warn him about Taim.  As you said, Taim's AM are better trained and I doubt Rand/Logain wants to fight the BT on even terms.

but if logain wanted to he could go to his faction and train them all the special weaves from the attack on the manor house with trollocs, that would give them a definate edge

[Barid Bel Medar]

Somehow i dont think it will be as simple as the 100 DF AM v the rest, after all, Logain says most of them know Taim as their M'Hael, and havent even seen Rand. Likely Taim will use his influence to get the non-DF AM to side with him against Logain's people.

 

I think its like Novice's and Accepted (alright so not really that extreme) being told AS are DF and to fight the Amyrlin. Some would join up against the amyrlin true, but a large majority would play it safe and stick with what they know to be the power.

 

IN any case, theres going to be a damn lot of bloodshed and destruction going on in the BT, unless Logain goes stealth and assassinates Taim and his btches.

 

My opinion of the fight will be Logain is outnumbered at the start with only his Loyal people, then uncovers Taim's DFness and alot of the soldiers and dedicated come to and trash Taim.

[farthammer]

OK but they are still men afterall.  Do you think that many AM are going to want to hang out with an asshole like Taim when there is a big White Tower full of potential 'pillow friends' down the road?

[Barid Bel Medar]

OK but they are still men afterall.  Do you think that many AM are going to want to hang out with an asshole like Taim when there is a big White Tower full of potential 'pillow friends' down the road?

 

When they want to Bond and control them little short of compulsion, some might ahve a few problems with that. AM distrust AS. they try to gentle them, and even if they ahve been told about the cleansing, we know that msot AS dont actually believe it. Plus, Taim is their leader, just like a soldier is loyal to his country, it doesnt matter if the king is a prick, its the BT they fight for. Im not saying your wrong, im just saying its not as simple as "OH, Taim is really an asshole, Lets go to the Tower where there are women."

 

Also note that even "regular" men are weary of AS, few actually think of them as "women", and im sure that the AS wouldnt just become "pillow friends" with AM, they are too arrogant and self possessed to do it.

[Durinax]

OK but they are still men afterall.  Do you think that many AM are going to want to hang out with an asshole like Taim when there is a big White Tower full of potential 'pillow friends' down the road?

once the battle for the black tower has started a rumor started among the men, that tar valon was full of 'pillow friends', once the first man reasoned out what that meant there was a mass exodus with every man in the White tower searching for these friends, the only ones left where logain and taim

[farthammer]

Well the AM that have voluntarily bonded AS have done well.  The ball is really in the AS court as far as how open they are to burying their prejudices and fears in regards to male channelers, because they could really be quite effective in defusing the situation.

[Barid Bel Medar]

Well the AM that have voluntarily bonded AS have done well.  The ball is really in the AS court as far as how open they are to burying their prejudices and fears in regards to male channelers, because they could really be quite effective in defusing the situation.

 

in regards to this, again i do not say you are wrong, in fact i agree with the statement, but i doubt it will really happen.

1) Logain's Glory (which i admit could be referring to something else,  but all evidence points to taim v Logain)

2) The Conflict between logain and Taim factions has been built up through sevral books, i doubt it will end peacefully.

3) the foretelling about the tower being "rent in fire and blood" and the AS walk the grounds freely. along those lines. That suggests that there will be a conflict, and this conflict has been built up as said in points 1+2.

So i think there will be some kind of fight (whether this will be a full scale massacre or a small battle between the loyal people to both factions i dont know)

[DemandredFO]

we know or strongly suspect that the relationships between the volunteers like Corelle and Damar etc. are real but how many of the others are.  We know the command went out for the bonded AS to get "close" to their AM so they can do an et tu brute at the right moment so how many of them are real.  I think ironically the reds will be more of a help to Logain than the rebels.  Pevara, Tarna and rest, minus Javindra who was sent there, just seem more open-minded.

P.S.  Barid Bel I believe the foretelling says ...and Aes Sedai will walk its grounds...  Could be wrong but I don't think it says anything about freely

[farthammer]

Well they are still bonds, that's something a little more personal than receiving an order.  That doesn't mean they completely switch allegiances, but what we see elsewhere in the story line with other forms of bonds, there's a lot of potential to build a genuine relationship there if not a romantic one, whatever their original intentions were.

 

I do agree there will have to be a larger conflict involving the BT that we have not seen yet.  One thing I think that all the Egwene haters overlook is this foretelling might be true on the surface, but there's no reason for Rand and Egwene not to have cooked it up together.  Rand lacks the loyalty of the AM that Logain and Taim have, and he knows he has a big problem there.  Egwene has similar problems being the new leader of AS who are either completely hostile towards AM or completely terrified.  Both Rand and Egwene really should have both matured as characters past the point of petty bickering.  I say Rand ultimately goes along with a plan involving her and Logain, where Egwene puts on a show publicly chewing out Rand to give the AS a little backbone and gain support for a plan to get control of all the renegades.  With Logain they have someone they can be a little more comfortable allying with as he has already been defeated by the Red Ajah, and most likely saved the lives of that disastrous expedition by bonding those sisters before Taim got to them.  And has also built real loyalty amongst the AM.

 

Really see Rand as a lame duck in this situation.

[DemandredFO]

Rand matured to a point but took the wrong fork in the road and almost ended up Darth Rand but was saved in the end.  One of the biggest problems I have with Egwene is she appeared learn nothing from her time spent observing Moraine and appears to have learned nothing from the wise ones.  She's also reversed herself quite a few times most notably the binder even though she know what it does.  A final point, I know Moraine isn't the most talkative person in the world but Egwene should have learned something

 

P.S. I wonder if Birgitte and Egwene will encounter each other and Birgitte will make her apologize to Mat for treating him badly after he sprung them.

[farthammer]

Rand and Egwene have both progressed past the point of some of their earlier failures/flaws by the end of TGS, that was my point.  They have made some stupid moves in the past but eventually just because they did something 2, 3, or 4 books ago doesn't mean they're making the same decisions at this point in the series.

[azrael.1289]

[rant]

The problem I have with Egwene's character is her obsession with AS and the white tower. You can understand Elayne's loyalty to Andor(she grew up thinking she'll be the queen), Aviendha's loyalty to the WO(she grew up as an Aiel), to a lesser extent Perrin's obsession to Faile(she is his wife afterall) etc. Egwene grew up basically completely ignorant of AS and WT, and I don't understand where her reverence to AS/WT has suddenly seeped in from.

I mean all the motivational speeches, speeches about the importance of WT and AS seem a little strange coming from her. I can see it coming from someone like Siuan who has been AS for years but coming from Egwene it was just a tad silly IMO.

And why does every AS think the Dragon shouldn't be left free when they know(better than most) that he is the pattern appointed savior of mankind?

[/rant]  :P

 

As for Amrylin's anger, I was kind of expecting it to happen before the disappearance of Dark Rand. I mean Rand post VoG is a much more powerful force to reckon with.

 

[farthammer]

How is any of that different from Rand acting like an Aiel clan chief when he first got to the Waste?  The Amyrlin is as much a politician as anything else, the state of the AS in general was many times worse than any of the annoying aspects to Egwene's personality.  It was hers for the taking because after all, who else?  There was no one.

[azrael.1289]

How is any of that different from Rand acting like an Aiel clan chief when he first got to the Waste?  The Amyrlin is as much a politician as anything else, the state of the AS in general was many times worse than any of the annoying aspects to Egwene's personality.  It was hers for the taking because after all, who else?  There was no one.

My question is what convinced Egwene that AS/WT is all the wonderful things that she says it is? All she has seen from AS is their over-inflated ego, in-fighting, screw-ups, cover-ups etc. etc.

 

[farthammer]

Because the AS/WT didn't stand for any particular thing at the time, there was really no leadership or direction.  The point is the WT needed someone like Egwene to make it those things.  Belief and order give strength and all that.

[Ala Rubra]

I'm not sure what the issue is.

 

Egwene is a conformer. She conforms to whatever institution she's currently a part of. When she was in the Two Rivers, she wanted to be a Wisdom, the best Wisdom ever, thought they were the best thing since the invention of shoes, etc. When she was with the Wise Ones, while she didn't necessarily want to be a Wise One, she certainly did her best to act like one, to be a good apprentice(at least on the outside), etc.

 

Now she's with the Aes Sedai. Naturally, she wants to be the best "Aes Sedai" she can, follow all the rules and traditions, etc.

 

It's just how she is.

[Cirin]

A random little question, that's probably not important but caught my eye, is at the beginning of TSR, when Egwene is looking at Tanchico in Tel'aran'rhiod.  While she's there, she saw a number of things (domination band, mercedes symbol, etc.)  One thing that catches her eye, though is a broken statue of a woman holding a crystal, that she interacts with a bit.  Now, I just checked, and although the access key breaks in book nine, it just says that the female Choedan Kal was glowing brightly.  Does it say later that the female Choedan Kal melted, or is that just assumed?

 

Because if the Female Choedan Kal is still out there, and they have a broken access key, it's possible Elayne could reverse engineer a working one from it again... and if not, the broken one in Tanchico seemed to be working at least somewhat.  Just made me curious, since Egwene is the one who found that broken Choedan Kal statue, and the Choedan Kal has been fairly significant since then.  What happened to that half access key?  Don't remember if they ever tell us.  Of course, if the sa'angreal DID actually melt at some point, then it doesn't matter.  Just thought it was curious.  If Egwene did somehow get a hold of that thing, though, I could see how Rand might feel her anger... especially if it was broken and kind of messed up.

[MikeRiley]

Since the cleansing of the taint the hand on Tremalking was destroyed. It marked a prophecy for the Amayar there and caused their mass suicide.

 

Towards the end of The Shadow Rising, Lanfear mentions to Rand that she saw a female access key in Tanchico but it was broken. She called it a fine trap for any unwary Aes Sedai - a good description of what almost happened to Egwene in TAR when she picked it up. I assume that because it's broken it'll lack a buffer to allow you to safely hold the power drawn through it (similar to callandor's flaw) and cause you to burn yourself out.

[tube_ee]

A general thought on interpretations of this particular Foretelling:

 

For every phrase in Elaida's little speech, the literal interpretation of the words is one that does not mean what she thinks it does. Interpreted strictly literally, the Foretelling doesn't actually say anything about her "inevitable victory"... which we knew even when she said it wasn't going to happen. Every part of it has a simple meaning that doesn't imply any benefit to Elaida.

 

I'd be careful about reading too much into this one... that's what Elaida does, and look where she ends up. It may be that this prophecy is supposed to be read more literally than the others.

 

--Shannon

[DemandredFO]

You're probably right it's just more fun to think of Egwene shouting herself hoarse and then Rand saying talk to the hand.

[Barid Bel Medar]

You're probably right it's just more fun to think of Egwene shouting herself hoarse and then Rand saying talk to the hand.

 

haha yea, it would be even better if she starts shouting at him, telling him he needs AS because they know better than he does and then he shuts her down with a speech that goes something like this,

 

"I have the memories of the commander of the forces of Light, the leader of the Hall of Servants from over 3000 years ago in the War of Shadow, in the age of Legends where modern AS are like children compared to those days. And you still say you know better than me?"

[gambril]

Naw, when Egwene cries to Rand over all the injustices...

 

Rand just calmly replies, "Look Egwene we can either work together or you can turn right around and go back to your tower.  I have more important matters to see to than listen to you pout."

[Hadilmir]

Rand just calmly replies, "Look Egwene we can either work together or you can turn right around and go back to your tower.  I have more important matters to see to than listen to you pout."

That would be followed, of course, by Egwene sitting on him. Foreshadowing from all the way back to tGH, ehh?

[farthammer]

What kind of crazy town did Rand grow up in to consider being sat on by one of the local hot chicks a bad thing

[Durinax]

What kind of crazy town did Rand grow up in to consider being sat on by one of the local hot chicks a bad thing

its a bad thing if min, elayne, or avi are there and become jealous