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 25: Mindtrap
NOTE: The following chapter summary comes from wot.fandom.com
Point of view: Moghedien
Summary
Moghedien is awakened from her repeating nightmare of her escape from Salidar to Shayol Ghul. In the dream, she’s escorted to the Pit of Doom by Shaidar Haran to be received by the Dark One. Moghedien is forced down by Shaidar Haran and had her soul imprisoned in a mindtrap. After some painful lessons by Shaidar Haran to acclimate Moghedien to her new position, she is removed from the vacuole and then turned over to a young man with bright blue eyes and saa flecks in his eyes, suggesting that he’s used a lot of the True Power. Moghedien is rude to him until he shows her that he holds her mindtrap. She is still Chosen, but she can no longer scheme on her own—she must do the will of Moridin.
REACTION:
We’ll start at the end here and work backward. It seems likely that Moridin is Ishamael. The heavy use of the True Power is the biggest clue. His Age of Legends One Power Science knowledge, re: “vacuole” is another big clue. If it was someone from Rand’s own time, that person probably wouldn’t be allowed to use the True Power and he definitely wouldn’t know that terminology. If it was some new person, previously unmet and unmentioned from the Age of Legends… well, that would be bad writing to wait so long before bringing him forward. We’ve been on the lookout for Ishy since Aginor and Balthamel were brought back in new bodies. I think this is him. We should also probably assume that Lanfear is back as well.
So what is a mindtrap? It’s kind of like the horcrux concept from Harry Potter. Moggy’s soul is taken from her body and put into another object. The holder of the mindtrap can destroy her soul and turn her body into a soulless automaton, so the victim of the mindtrap is extremely motivated to do as told. Given that we know the Dark One can latch onto souls and move them into new bodies, after death, this isn’t a big step beyond that. I suppose it’s also true that if Moggy’s body dies, the Dark One could connect that soul to a new body.
All in all, this is a pretty efficient way for the Dark One to protect itself against one of his Chosen being captured in the future. If Nyn put another a’dam on Moggy, Moridin could just break her mindtrap and Nyn couldn’t control her anymore.
BTW… we are told Moridin has more than one mindtrap. Given that none of the other Chosen we’ve seen are trapped, our candidates are endless in one sense. It could be any other channeler in the world, with that story a “big reveal” in the making. If it’s one of the Chosen, though, it pretty much has to be either Lanfear or Asmodean, right? Assuming that one of them is back. Even though he died on the page, we don’t actually know the manner of Asmodean’s death (whether it was balefire or not.) It’s possible he’s gone for good. We also don’t know that Lanfear is even actually dead. Really the candidates for Mindtrap #2 are endless.
What is Shaidar Haran? He’s a Fade who is both more powerful than channelers and who has a personality. He kind of seems like the Dark One made flesh… or like some evil version of a messenger angel. It’s weird though that if this were a thing that was possible that it didn’t happen in the Age of Legends. Then again, maybe it did and nobody on the Light side knew about it.
The text doesn’t come right out and say it, but it’s definitely implied that Shaidar Haran *violated* Moghedien. That’s nightmare fuel. It’s been said throughout the series that the Halfmen “have their fun” with victims sometimes, and that most of those victims lose their minds after, but I don’t think we’ve come close to seeing that happen on the page. We don’t really see it here either thank the Light but Moggy is the first person we’ve seen after going through that type of ordeal. I’ll be watching to see how Jordan writes her mental state moving forward.
As an aside… Jordan wrote this series in a way where a lot of its horrors are hinted at, but not explicitly shown happening on the page. That was for the best, IMO. But good grief, there is potential for this series to be an absolutely super-dark horror fantasy live action series if the right wrong person was at the helm.
I guess we can discuss “what if this were made into a live action series” again now that the most recent attempt has been canceled. Hopefully the next person trying to adapt The Wheel of Time doesn’t repeat the Amazon Studios adaptation strategy of handing the IP to someone who isn’t a huge fan of the source material and then letting him Nerf every single male character. I know, I know, it’s a massive surprise that this approach didn’t work, but now that we know, we can try something else.
Anyway… Moggy’s back. Ishy is probably back. I’d guess this does not bode well for Nynaeve in particular.
I absolutely love this series.. I have read all the books..In this chapter Jordan is at his best, slowing the pace to show a gentler philosophy in the Way of the Leaf. The Prime show rushes past this depth; on the page it lingers, makes you think, and that’s exactly what’s missing on screen.
Hi! Thanks for your comment and sorry about my slow reply. I love the series, too, and it’s been really fun to read it slowly in this blog series, so that I can better notice the type of stuff you mention in your comment.