Can Perrin Channel?

[udpaco13]

I, like so many others, am in the midst of my final reread. I am on TSR and just got to the part where Perrin gets hit with a trolloc arrow. They take him back to EF and Alanna heals him. Here is the quote:

 

Perrin felt the tingle of the one power before Alanna's hand replaced Fail's, ...

 

I know she may have been probing his illness, but at the time she is not toching him yet, and is still speaking with fail after coming into the room. She doesnt actually heal or check his wounds until he is moved to the table.

 

Just seems odd that Perrin was able to feel the tingle of the Power. I seem to remember this happening in one of the earlier books as well but cant seem to find it now. Any thoughts?

[Durinax]

I think it would have to do with the wolfbrotherness on the following counts

1) it is established certain animals have an affinity towards detecting channelling/the ability to channel

2) he has much heightened senses (much like when a person holds the power but it is 24 hrs)

[Gabriel Kross]

no, he cannot, she does not have to touch him techically to touch him with the power, I'm pretty sure she reached out with the power before actually checking him

[Gabriel Kross]

Durin that could be a possibility as well it's not much touched on but the wolves do know rand

[rand4747]

the wolves can tell channellers somehow just like dogs can and cats, they know who they are, but for perrin hes just feeling being touched with healing I think. Hes not feeling their channelling but that its a side effect of the healing.

[FarShainMael]

My first thought on seeing this thread was, 'just what was going on during the forging of Mah'alleinir? Certainly, Neald was in a circle with the Wise Ones and Grady, controlling the flows to Power-forge the weapon; but in some way, Perrin was deeply involved:

 

"Neald," Grady's voice said. It was urgent, but distant to Perrin. "Neald, what are you doing?"

 

"I don't know," Neald replied. "It feels right."

 

...

 

The metal seemed to flow, almost as if shaped by his will alone..

 

He breathed in and out, his lungs working like bellows. His sweat was like the quenching waters. His arms were like the anvil. He was the forge.

 

"Wise Ones, I need a circle," Neald said urgently. "Now. Don't argue! I need it!"

 

Then there was the incident in ToM37, the T'A'R battle for the WT, when Perrin thinks to himself that weaves in T'A'R were meaningless, and stops a shaft of balefire with his hand.

 

He does seem to be aware of the OP, and somehow to connect himself with it, even if he can't channel it.

[Gabriel Kross]

the taveren mixed with Neald having probable Talent in power wrought capabilities is the cause of the hammer,

 

I'm pretty sure balefire is visible hence why he was able to stop it, but any weave he is aware of he can negate with his control of TAR so any weave that touches him (if he cant see it to stop it before that) or he can see he can negate

[FarShainMael]

Neald certainly has that talent; but I'm not sure Perrin's ta'veren status is enough to account for his oown involvement. Ta'verens only alter chance, they don't create new things. So Perrin must have had a basic ability for ta'verenism to emphasise.

 

Certainly balefire is visible, so yes he can see it, but to be able to negate it (even in T'A'R) he needs something more detailed than just seeing a bar of light.

[TristanWebb]

Ta'veren also follow the path the pattern set them on. It could just be the pattern saying 'you need to make a big hammer now' so he did.

[boli]

Weaving in TAR is pretty much useless against someone strong in dreamwalking; in fact the "weaves" that are used are not really true weaves - given as you can only channel spirit in your dreams. The weaves the channelers both see and use are just extentions of their will, a will which can be contested,

 

example: Egwene could "weave" a fireball and it will act exactly how she thinks it will in the RL Perin could simply imagine that the fire does not touch him - and if he wanted throw his own fireball of his own. Because he doesn't have the experiance of channeling it is unlikly his mind can force a reality foreign to him to make him "weave" a fireball... but he can certainly create a ball of fire to throw or appear. Likewise he can just think "bar of light: don't hit me" and it will not.

 

Egwene shows this perfectly with the adam contest of wills in TAR with mensa - she simply refuses the adam to work and it does not. moggy accepted the power of the adam over her and the sleeping draft to put her to sleep - so the body reacted and the result was the end of TFoH. With injuries it is a bit different - Perin believes he is injured and loosing blood so he decides he is not doing; unfortunatly his body at that point is already injured so he does weaken; but he does "heal" somewhat

 

You can get around this with using "invisible" weaves such as illusions and compulsion but even then you can deny the false reality and impose your own or feel you are being compulsed and simply stop it. In the world of TAR your mind and will are the greatest weapon; the easier it is for your mind to accept the new reality the easier it would be to impose your will on the world. For example Elayne could not imagine herself a blademaster within the dream - she coudl imagine a sword, armour, even a face of a bladesmaster but if her mind does not understand how to BE a blademaster she will not me one - only a person with a sword.

 

In short: Perin cannot currently channel - and if he was a sparker he would have sparked already. And you don't have to be a channeler to feel the effects of weaving on you.

 

The exception to this is entering TAR in the flesh... something not entirely explained but I'll wager the weaves are more real than imagined weaves.

[TristanWebb]

Not entirely true. With the training ter'angreal you can hardly channel, with the twisted ring you can channel as well as you can waking. The 'you can only channel spirit while asleep' doesn't count in TAR, because as mentioned many times in the series you aren't really asleep.

 

TAR is just infinitly malliable, so that even though the weave are as real as a wall, they can be made to vanish just as the wall can. If Egwene shot balefire at Perrin and had the presence of mine to fix the weaves in TAR like you are supposed to, he would of had to overcome her and the weaves, which it is unlikey to happen in the instant it takes for balefire to reach it's target. Channelling in TAR needs the same concentration anything else does, and if someone wants you not to channel you have to want to do it more, though Saidar atleast can be used to fortify your control over TAR, as Egwene showed when she first met Amys.

[FarShainMael]

@boli and BC re T'A'R: ICWYM.

 

But:

 

Ta'veren also follow the path the pattern set them on. It could just be the pattern saying 'you need to make a big hammer now' so he did.

 

There's more to it than just making a big hammer. Mah'alleinir is a very special hammer: It burns Trollocs on contact though it feels only 'comfortably warm' to Perrin (ToM41), but it grows warmer in response to his feeings (ditto). It's as though Neald's weave bonded Perrin to the hammer in some way, a bit like a Warder bond. Of course, this doesn't require Perrin to be able to channel.

 

(It wouldn't surprise me to find that it can also 'fly', returning to Perrin's hand when thrown, like Mjöllnir ...)

[TristanWebb]

Yeah, I wasn't downplaying the importance of the hammer, more that the feeling of rightness seems to come to Perrin when he is doing something the Pattern wants him to do. Like the dice in Mat's head. He is required to have a badass hammer, so the Pattern goes 'it's time to make a hammer, Perrin' ans when he does the Pattern tells him he is doing the right thing by giving him warm feelings.

 

All of Perrin's ta'veran moments are him doing what feels right, kidnapping saga aside.

[Finnssss22]

I highly doubt Perrin can channel but as has already been mentioned, I wouldn't be surprised if he can sense the ability to channel in others as wolves can. He just needs to develop it further.

 

That said, I don't think the scene the OP presented is that ability being harnessed. I doubt he would feel a tingling like channeler men can feel with Saidar. More likely, he would simply just know or sense it without any physical sensations.

He would only be able to sense the actual ability to channel and not likely be able to sense Saidar or Saidin actually being used.

[Deadsy]

no.

[Randommer]

Hmm, interesting. Not sure about the Alanna thing, but there was definitely something odd going on with the hammer-forging (so not spelling that thing). It's struck me a few times that Perrin has a weird understanding of channeling for someone who can't actually channel. He understands gateways, circles, channeling-fatigue, weaves, etc better than any other non-channeler seems to. It's not impossible that he can channel (no one's ever checked, and there are a lot of channelers from the TR) but I would tend to think that it's a wolfbrother thing, purely from a plot point of view. Really, Perrin's had very little human guidance with his abilities, so vague things like power-awareness could have totally gone unnoticed by him.

[Aulduron]

Wouldn't any Ashaman be able to sense his ability to channel, if he had it?

[FarShainMael]

They would have to do an active test for resonance, as Taim showed Rand.

[TristanWebb]

From a literary perspective, it wouldn't make sense to reveal in the last book he can channel. From an in-world perspective, he has been around enough men channelling for someone to have noticed the resonance in him.

[FarShainMael]

Perhaps Neald did.. (o.5jk)

[Naggash]

I don't think he can channle, but also I don't doubt that being a Wolfbrother he has some kind of sensitivity for the OP, as dogs do but much more evolved.

[FarShainMael]

I don't think he can channle, but also I don't doubt that being a Wolfbrother he has some kind of sensitivity for the OP, as dogs do but much more evolved.

 

Very good point. There's a remark somewhere in the books about both dogs and cats being able to recognise women channellers. I think I've also seen something about cats preferring women channellers and dogs preferring men, but I can't pin that one down.

 

Additional: That first one is in TPoD12.

[rand4747]

you wont find cats in the back tower because they hate the men, that was mentioned in one of the books I think, one of the wives says she likes cats but they wont tolerate the husband. You will find any number of dogs but no cats. The dogs you see are agressive to aes sedai, in one book its mentioned they just give them a show and the dogs slink away, and in the black tower dogs attacked an aes sedai. I don't recall where theres a bit like witht he black tower but the opposite. But it is mentioned thatcats have an afinity for aes sedai and they are found wherever there are aes sedai. something like even the most feral cat is friendly to aes sedai or something. Also many take in strays even the BA do :P

[Wolf505]

I seem to recall a quote from RJ somewhere saying that neither Mat nor Perrin could channel, but I could be wrong. As for his deflecting Balefire in TAR, it's a simple matter of his strength in the dream and strength in TAR being unrelated to the One Power. He seems to develop his strength in TAR much quicker then Egwene does. Just another example of mistaken beliefs by characters, like Egwene, Nynaeve and others thinking Channeling is the best defense/offense in TAR. Clearly it isn't, just look at Bair. She can't channel at all and she's more powerful then any of them in TAR.

[Naggash]

I seem to recall a quote from RJ somewhere saying that neither Mat nor Perrin could channel, but I could be wrong. As for his deflecting Balefire in TAR, it's a simple matter of his strength in the dream and strength in TAR being unrelated to the One Power. He seems to develop his strength in TAR much quicker then Egwene does. Just another example of mistaken beliefs by characters, like Egwene, Nynaeve and others thinking Channeling is the best defense/offense in TAR. Clearly it isn't, just look at Bair. She can't channel at all and she's more powerful then any of them in TAR.

It's not that he develops his strength quicker than Egwene; Wolfbrothers are more strong than normal people in TAR. I don't know why, but it's clear that wolfs have a special conexion with the TAR and they are VERY strong there.

And Egwene, Nynaeve, etc don't think that channeling is the best offense/defens. Not at all. In fact if you read the Mesaana's fight chapters you'll see how Egwene thinks to herself that weaves are slower than thought, which is more powerful there, and that she needs to combinate both of them. For example she thinks that for her is easier to blow something big like a wall with a wave rather than thinking it because being such a big thing it's difficult to imagin it. That's her PoV, Perrin wouldn't have that problem, but if for her is easier that way, why not do it? That doesn't mean she isn't aware that thought is more powerful. In fact, a Dark surprises her and begins to weave a column of fire, and Egwene creates the fire with thought, outrunning the Dark and killing her.