Asmodean (spoilers up to and including Book 12)

[Huon]

Perhaps we have not seen the last of Asmodean. Robert Jordan confirmed that Asmodean dies in the infamous, unfortunate visit to the kitchens, and we've all heard the familiar arguments that support Graendal as Asmodean's murderer.* We've seen Asmodean resurrected by balefire once.** Has he just been resurrected again? Graendal was blasted with a tremendous amount of balefire. Enough, perhaps, to burn her thread back in the pattern to her release from the Forsaken's prison. Both Alsalam and Asmodean might now be alive again. If you think about it, Graendal hasn't done much else other than (purportedly) kill Alsalam and (probably) kill Asmodean.

 

It would be a pretty cool way to find out Asmodean's true killer, eh? Arad Doman might still have hope for a ruler.

 

*I'm convinced that either Graendal or Slayer killed Asmodean. I confess I'm partial to the reasons for Graendal:

 

1. She and others of the Forsaken are eagar to have Rand dead, but the Dark One has ordered all of the Forsaken to keep Rand alive. "Rand al'Thor had to be removed but it would be Sammael who earned the blame." Asmodean being alive would increase al'Thor's chances of sucess.

 

2. Graendal certainly has the means at the time to kill Asmodean. A simple gateway opens up and she burns him into a crisp and slips away.

 

3. When Graendal subjugates herself to Sammael, she claims certainty that Lanfear and Asmodean are dead but only speculation that Moghedien is. The most certain you can be that something is done is if you've done it yourself.

 

**Rahvin kills Asmodean in the assault on Camlyn. Asmodean's death is reversed when Rand balefires Rahvin.

[Crael123]

idk he may have starved to death tho because he hadnt done anything in that limbo. and also as you recall there was that "warp" in the air after he balefired graendal? well there was a similar one in KoD, faile's perspective. that means rands BF prolly went back about what a few months at most?

[Dastion]

While I'm not sure it was powerful enough to reverse that much of her doings, it is an interesting note to think on what more recent actions Graendal did which may have been reversed.

 

But, going along the line of thought that it COULD have reversed back that far... Asmodean wouldn't have starved. That's not how it works.  Things become what they would have been had those actions not of been made, but the memory of those actions remain.

 

Meaning, it all depends on what would have happened to Asmodean had he not of been killed just then. For all we know, he might have escaped on his own a week later, and since no one has any memory of these events (since they remember the now burned out actions) they will have no knowledge he is once again alive and, really, Asmodean won't even know what's going on as he will suddenly find himself in the future without any knowledge of what he's been doing since then.

 

Things like this are the very reason why Balefire is 'banned'.  The sheer amount of confusing and paradoxal situations roused by a man thought dead suddenly having been alive all this time but with no one, not even himself, remembering what he's done is staggering.

[Durinax]

he's not dead, he was taken to a vacuole like Mogh was when she failed, and once Asmo revealed Lanfears betrayal the DO punished her by weakening her power, but he keeps asmo in a vacuole to punish him even more, or at least keep him until needed

[jemron]

This was discussed to death right after TGS came out, and BWS was asked point blank if Graendal's DBBF (death by balefire) would've potentially caused Asmodean to come back to life, assuming she was the murderer, and BWS denied that any balefire, no matter how powerful, could go back more than a few hours.

 

Case closed.

[Luckers]

Indeed. Lock.