Welcome back to my re-read, recap, and reaction to Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series. This post will only have spoilers through the current chapter.
You can find my previous chapter recaps HERE.
Chapter 41: A Threat
NOTE: The following chapter summary comes from wot.fandom.com
Point of view: Min Farshaw
Min is heading to the Royal Palace of Andor to meet Rand before the Salidar Aes Sedai delegation arrives. She catches herself thinking maybe it would be nice to wear a dress for Rand, then decides he will just have to take her as she is. A Maiden named Enaila guides her to Rand. Min has a viewing of some kind of wreath. When Min arrives, she notes a new aura around Rand, yellow, brown, and purple that makes her stomach clench. Finally she is allowed to go in and she feels all giddy, as a woman in love.
Point of view: Rand al’Thor
Rand is overjoyed to see Min and twirls her around. They go to his rooms to get away from the nobles and have a private chat. Min gives him a letter where Elayne says her feelings for him haven’t changed. Rand starts in on his feelings for Elayne and the constant battle he had with Aviendha. This upsets Min, so she tells him to not talk about other women in front of her. She comes over and sits in his lap while berating him for treating her so impersonally. He admits that he loves Elayne and Aviendha but must keep them away to protect them from those wishing him harm.
Min tells him she arrived with the Salidar Aes Sedai embassy. She is the go-between for the Aes Sedai with Rand, although her loyalty lies with Rand. The Aes Sedai do not know that. Rand says he will allow three at a time to visit him but they are to stay away from the Inner City. They are not to channel around him, either. Sulin enters and drops the punch when she sees Min on Rand’s lap.
Melaine comes in and tells Rand about Egwene leaving for Salidar, where the rebel Aes Sedai are at. He tells her he already knows, while Min drowses on his lap. Melaine appears to disapprove of Min, but then Min murmurs that Melaine will have two daughters, twins like mirrors. Melaine is surprised because she only just became certain of her pregnancy that morning. She calls what Min can do “like interpreting the Dream“. Min then gives Rand a rundown of the Aes Sedai in the embassy, their personality, strengths, and weaknesses. She says that she thinks they can be trusted, but she admits that the viewing she had of him earlier means that Aes Sedai will hurt him. Perhaps more than once.
REACTION:
MIN! Finally! I almost reacted to her internally the way that Rand did outwardly. We needed her with Rand, just to get through his chapters, as much as he does. Rand finally has a person in his life that actually supports him (rather than someone who serves him, or tries to steer him.) He hasn’t really had that since Book 1. Min doesn’t follow him for his title. She doesn’t try to get him to do what she wants. She just… supports him. She’s there to help him. What a concept. Elayne – one of the other women who allegedly loves Rand – adamantly refuses to help him by claiming the throne she is angry with him for keeping for her. Aviendha might have been supportive of him, but her entire time with Rand was blocked by her sense of ji’e’toh toward Elayne. Sigh. Egwene could never stop telling Rand what to do, despite lear eveidence that he knows more of what he’s doing than she does. Moiraine was never really his friend. Mat can’t ever get away from Rand fast enough. Perrin is just sort of present for Rand, but not really friend-like. “You holdin’ up okay, bro?”
I do need to comment on one part of the Rand/Min greeting, though. Rand lifted Min up and spun her around and around? Do they have a history that justifies that? I don’t think anyone on earth would be okay with me doing that to her, Mrs. DustyReviews included. But for those people who are into that, do these two have that kind of history? I mean, yeah. She got into a bed with him, unclothed, to keep him from freezing to death back in Book 2. She was in that state when Lanfear showed up. But he doesn’t remember any of that, so it really only counts on Min’s end. Does his dreaming of swimming with her in the old fishin’ hole in the Two Rivers count? I guess so. She was into it, at least, even if she pretended not to be.
Min gives Rand another letter from Elayne. We get to that part of the chapter in Rand’s POV. In his mind, before he gets the letter, he and Elayne had made “a clean break.” I mean… yeah, she told him off before she left Tear. That had to be why Avi’s behavior toward him was extra-confusing and irritating. He spent months hearing about how he belonged to someone who literally told him off the last time she communicated with him.
What if at some point Rand had given Avi Elayne’s letter. She would have shown it to Eggy. They probably both would have agreed that Rand was single and then… one of them (probably Avi) gets together with Rand and dies at Lanfear’s hand in Cairhien. Lanfear held back a little when attacking the two of them due to some uncertainty over what Kadere told her. There would have been no uncertainty if Rand and whoever were in the open. Maybe Eggy doesn’t get injured at all though if Avi is *openly* in a relationship with Rand? Avi definitely doesn’t share Rand if she thinks she claimed him solely. So there’s that too. So no relationship with Elayne *or* Min for Rand if it goes the rational an well-communicated way.
There’s a bit of a continuity issue in Rand’s POV section. Yes, in person, Rand has never really looked at Min sexually. But in his dreams, he has. Repeatedly. So it doesn’t make any sense in this chapter for Rand to “really see her” as a woman for the first time. He’s clearly, uh, noticed her.
But all of that set up the “Min sits on Rand’s lap” scene so I guess it’s okay. Actually, it’s great. He unintentionally insults her. She knows he doesn’t mean it. She flirts back. But she also decides to show him immense compassion. She’s the only person in this whole friggin’ series who sees how obviously and incredibly lonely Rand is and how much weight he’s carrying.
I thought before that maybe Rand knew that what he told Mat about Salidar was wrong (i.e. I thought he lied about their numbers and situation to talk Mat into going), but this chapter confirms the opposite. He has absolutely misread the Tower split. He imagines the Salidar group a small, weak, desperate group – and he is reading the fact of their embassy in that context. He and Min don’t actually talk about the situation on the ground in Salidar, so Min doesn’t get a chance to correct him. Their conversation focuses on the Embassy itself.
Min drops the bombshell that women who can channel are going to hurt Rand… more than once. I’d guess that points to Elaida’s group. They were behaving suspiciously before.
Melaine gives a report that Egwene has gone from Cairhien to Salidar. Now that this has happened, she can tell Rand about the Salidar Aes Sedai. She insults them and complains about them, but again does not convey to Rand that he’s wildly mistaken about their numbers / situation. His big takeaway was that the Aiel / Aes Sedai relationship has changed. Even her advising Rand to be firm with them does not disabuse him of his misunderstanding.
Min accidentally reveals her abilities to Melaine. I feel like I know enough about the Aiel to know they’ll universally revere her now. She’ll probably have lots of Aiel asking her to read them. Melaine already does revere her after this. This will all in turn influence how the Aiel view her place on Rand’s lap and to help them accept it warmly (given that Avi just left.)
The chapter ends with Rand getting a lot of info about the Salidar Embassy, but (forgive my gender bias) all of it the kind of information women value, but less of the kind of information that Rand would have valued. It’s his fault for not asking, though. He knows about the Aes Sedai now, on an individual basis, and about them as a group of nine. That’s valuable and he probably would not have gotten as much from most men. But Rand’s entire approach to them, as a group, is different if he knows there are 300+ Aes Sedai in Salidar rather than 50 and that they have an army led by Gareth Bryne.
Mat would have given him that intel first thing. Ah well. My guess is that we have a rougher-than-expected confrontation ahead.