Egwene also has a "kinslaying" moment, killing Sharans and her own people in her rage (and mirroring Rand in tPoD against the Seanchan), as does Eldrene, when she burns down the most beautiful city in the world (with people in it?) as she kills the enemies who took her husband.

No, the city of Manetheren was empty, she had evacuated everybody. Eldrene's action was also a last ditch rearguard action aimed at gaining time for her surviving subjects to escape as well as deny the city to the Shadow. And it was targeted specifically at the Dreadlords, IIRC, so that even those who were outside the radius of the actual blast were killed. So, there is a precedent for only Sharans being affected and massive numbers of them at once.

Of course, one thing I never understood about Eldrene's story was why such a powerful AS with such a powerful sa'angreal wasn't with the army in the first place. Her presence, clearly, may have made a difference.

 

One has to wonder, though, if Warders are really more a liability than they are worth, if their death can incapacitate their AS in battle like that. I remember that earlier in the series some AS managed to keep themselves together after losing a warder, at least until the immediate danger had passed. Love between Egwene and Gawyn never struck me as something out of this world, like Eldrene and Aemon's was supposed to be... and even Eldrene's sacrifice was calculated.

 

Also, this very much suggests that Rand's 3 women really shouldn't have been anywhere near a battlefield, as effects are much worse for a warder.

 

I agree about LTT's parallels... with the cave-out that Egwene doesn't die in despair and she does something constructive on the way out - shores up the Pattern that it is about to unravel. Which also creates a "thinness" through which the next Bore will be drilled, but at least there is still a Pattern for Rand to save.

 

 

Sorry for spam:

 

The ability of Warders to protect their respective Aes Sedai through these heightened abilities is paramount for them, for if she dies, he will most likely go insane with a sense of fatalistic vengeance. Most Warders do not survive their Aes Sedai by long if she dies, falling immediately after trying to avenge her, or going bleakly to their death in the Great Blight. Occasionally a sister will attempt to provide some sort of aid to the man's wounded psyche, as Myrelle Berengari attempts with Lan Mandragoran after Moiraine Damodred supposedly dies. Generally this only slows and blunts their death wish, not resolves it.

 

It is also possible to create a switch in bonding if an Aes Sedai knows she is going to die. In the case of Moiraine's death, Lan's bond immediately switched to Myrelle, which meant Lan could not waste his life on the spot.

 

If a Warder dies, his Aes Sedai grieves deeply but does not go insane. Some sisters resist bonding another after their initial choice dies of old age or falls in battle. Green Ajah sisters instead frequently choose to bond another as soon as possible, which led in part to Alanna Mosvani's impetuous decision to bond Rand al'Thor, with disastrous and unforeseen results.

 

Recently it has been proven that a single Warder can be bonded by more than one woman who can channel, but not without great consequence; when Elayne Trakand, Min Farshaw, and Aviendha jointly bonded Rand al'Thor, this caused Alanna to be rendered unconscious for three days.

 

Masking the bond

Both male and female channelers are able to 'mask' a bond they have instigated, cloaking it to avoid the emotional awareness in inopportune circumstances, and even muting the geographic awareness when necessary. The ability is somehow related to the ability to channel, as non-channelers are completely unable to avoid feeling what the other person feels, even when it is not desired.

 

Obedience

Even some Warders are unaware that their Aes Sedai can compel them to obey their wishes by manipulating their bond with Spirit. It is used rarely and only at great need in recent years, but is not forbidden by Tower law.*

Strangely, Rand seems to be able to resist this part of the bond, at least with regard to Alanna. The Green sister tried to force him to obey shortly after bonding him in Caemlyn, but was unable to have any effect on him whatsoever, much to her surprise. It has been theorized that Rand's ability to channel, or his holding saidin at the time, allowed him to resist her.

 

* what about this and Gawyn ?? 

it is his ability to channel in Rand and all the Ashaman's case, because they can use the OP. So we know the rings are Ter'angreal which cast a particular weave of the power, we know this from Demandred, so maybe this interferes with her ability to compel Gawyn in the same way she wouldn't be able to compel an Ashaman

 Ok, I just came up with a theory and I'll drop it here because ultimately it's about Egwene. I'm not saying it's right, and it's cobbled together and might be a stretch but tell me what you think.

We know Avi was going to the glass columns and we also know that they aren't regular Ter'angreal. She flat out says that they feel alive and her talent is reading ter'angreal.One point I should make here, is the breaking rearranged the landscape. We can assume it does this every breaking. So, where else in the series have we seen a tall glass column? When Egwayne uses the "Flame of Tar'valon". So if a balefire blast burns you out of the pattern forever, would a "Tar'valon" blast burn you into the pattern forever at the point you were hit with it? 

Who do we know that is near sister with Avi? Who has a vested interest in her adopted people's future success? Who would want to make sure that Rand was ok after his last struggle with the DO and say goodbye and admit that she was wrong. Egwene. We know Nakomi can't channel because Avi can't sense her ability to channel. Maybe this is because she burned herself out. So maybe now she's able to appear where she wants in the pattern or maybe she's tied to the glass columns, which all inevitably get shipped to Rhuidean.  And she ends up trying to help the Aiel, because they are like her second people. 

Why did Elayne/Bashere have people making bridges to cross the Erinin when they could have just used a gateway to get across either when they got to the river or before?  Their goal was to lure the trollocs there which they did even before the bridge was finished.  They planned to destroy the bridge anyway before the trollocs could use it so the bridge itself was not needed besides getting Elayne/Bashere's army across.

If they could have used gateways to cross a river they could have used them to pull out to somewhere safer.

I just finished the book this afternoon, and am still digesting it, so to speak.  As a whole, I enjoyed it.

 

I honestly expected a lot of the side characters to fade into the background in this book.  I love the rich world-building and character fleshing out that takes place in the heart of the series, but at some point, the focus had to come back to the core characters. Just because we weren't with much in this installment didn't really cheapen characters like Siuan, Thom, Juilin, Domon, et al. Their stories had been told....they are three dimensional...it was time to return to the characters we started with.

 

As for the ending, I get it.  I think I understand why Jordan left off where he did.  If he had answered every little thing we as a fandom wanted to know, wrapped everything up neat and pretty with a bow, we'd have no real reason to go further.  Oh sure, we'd do rereads and revisit favorite scenes now and then, but the story and world would just......end.  As it stands, there are still things that need to happen in this story, this world....so we imagine them, we create them ourselves, we still discuss them.  In doing this, we let the world keep breathing, the Pattern keep weaving in some ways, and the Wheel keep turning.  We get a world that lives on, beyond RJ, beyond Brandon, and even beyond us.  We get a world that never truly leaves us, and after reflection, I would not want it any other way.

 

Anyone has a perfectly valid right to disagree with me heartily, of course. 

I do, I understand where you're coming from. But just as there is a large amount of space between the Light and The Shadow, there is a large amount of space between having an overwrought ending and stifling your creation and just letting it die. I enjoyed the book as a whole, but this ending felt clumsy. Like someone trying to hit all the bases without really saying anything. It's one thing to leave Mat thinking about his new son or daughter and being a Prince, it's another to not anything or give cryptic tidbits for us to squabble over for years to come. There was no real mystery in this ending, it was a happily ever after "and the story continues!" type of cop out. And a Brick Wall. It didn't have any life because it was written outside the context of how the story grew and gained a life of it's own.