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 27: The Bargain
NOTE: The following chapter summary comes from wot.fandom.com
Point of view: Min Farshaw
Min reads Herid Fel‘s books in Rand’s room in the Sun Palace, trying to figure out why he was killed. Rand finally enters after being absent for 6 days and wearing the Crown of Swords. She begins to dress him down but he lifts her with saidin and brings her over for a kiss. Dobraine enters and updates Rand. Toram Riatin and Padan Fain have disappeared. Caraline Damodred and Darlin Sisnera are “guests” of Cadsuane, but are not allowed to leave or receive visitors. Min shares her viewing that Caraline and Darlin will marry and he will be a king somewhere, eventually dying in bed.
Merana and Rafela enter to give the finalized terms of The Bargain.
- Rand gets access to the Sea Folk ships whenever, wherever, and for whatever purpose he needs.
- The Sea Folk get
- To keep their own laws. Rand cannot change any of their laws as he did to Tear and Cairhien.
- A square mile of land at every city on navigable water Rand controls now or in the future. Sea Folk law will supercede local laws within that square mile.
- A Sea Folk ambassador stays with Rand at all times. For the time being, it would be Harine din Togara Two Winds, her Windfinder, her Swordmaster, and her retinue.
- Rand must promptly answer a summons by the Mistress of Ships a maximum of 2 times in 3 consecutive years.
Rand fumes at the last 2 terms, which personally put him under the Sea Folk’s influence. Merana fires back that his ta’veren effect could have finalized The Bargain as he wished, but he left during negotiations. Annoyed at the manipulation, the Sea Folk shielded Merana and Rafela to avoid One Power influence and threatened to hang them by their toes. So, they finalized the terms as best they could. Merana adds that Harine formally acknowledged Rand as the Coramoor. Rand is furious, but calmly admits he left the negotiations in a mess and surprisingly compliments their work.
With great difficulty, Merana and Rafela kept the details from Cadsuane. Rand decides he must deal with Cadsuane. He firmly asks Min to have the Maidens send a message to Cadsuane to “attend the Dragon Reborn in all haste.” Many Maidens line the hallways outside and watch intently or play knife, paper, stone. Two Maidens trot away to deliver Rand’s message, but the others strangely ignore Min. Back in his bedroom, Min watches Rand undress. Rand asks again if he truly needs Cadsuane’s teaching. Min says her viewing shows Rand and the Asha’man both need her teaching. Rand bristles because revealing needs often lets others manipulate you, especially Aes Sedai. He clarifies, “You, I need, Min. […] Not for your viewings. I just need you.”
Three Maidens march in without shoufa or weapons, but suddenly beat Rand. Somara tangles him in his shirt and kicks him in the groin. Nesair punches him in the right side. When Min tries to intervene, Nandera disarms her and kicks her to the floor. All 3 beat him severely, but carefully avoid the wounds in his left side. Once Rand is beaten to the floor, they growl that they earned this right from among all the Maidens, explaining the many knife, paper, stone games in the hallway earlier. Rand had disrespected the honor of Far Dareis Mai yet again by leaving them out of the Illian and Seanchan campaigns. So, they punished him like a first-brother and warn him not to do it again, although there are hints of tenderness and sympathy. As Rand and Min recover on the bed, Daigian Moseneillin arrives to tell Rand that Cadsuane is too busy with her needlepoint and might come another day if she has time. As Daigian glides out, Rand shouts back that Cadsuane can rot!
Point of view: Rand al’Thor
Rand gingerly dresses for his visit to Cadsuane, seizing saidin in the bedroom where Min won’t see him stagger. He leaves Min behind but has an escort of Maidens and Asha’man. Rand and the Asha’man use the power to try to intimidate Cadsuane, but it has no apparent effect. Rand finally asks her to be his advisor, but she declines not wanting to take orders. Rand sweetens the offer by not requiring swearing of oaths and she reconsiders, but she has some promises from her and rules for him.
- He must listen to her, but she won’t force him to do what she wants.
- He must not lie, but she doesn’t need everything revealed.
- She will do what is best for him, not for her good or the White Tower’s good.
- He must be civil to her, her friends, and her guests. That includes not channeling at them.
- He must control his temper.
Cadsuane tells Rand that Callandor is flawed because it doesn’t have the safety buffer sa’angreal usually have. Also, it magnifies the madness from the taint. So, to use it safely he must be linked to two women with one of them guiding the flows. Rand hoped he would be strong enough to use Callandor, but is left with only one terrifying choice. He recalls Lanfear‘s temptation that he could challenge the Creator.
REACTION:
The timeline here is a little bit difficult to track, because it overlaps the end of the last book to this one… but it *appears to me* that Rand hasn’t seen Min since leaving Cairhein to spring his trap against Sammael. It also seems that from that moment to this one, only a short amount of time has passed – maybe a couple weeks. We know Rand beat Sammael the day he left, but then he stayed to round up the Forsaken’s armies and to then deal with the Seanchan. That effort took a couple weeks.
So in a short span of time, Rand met with the Seafolk (3 days before he fought Sammael), met with High Lord Darlin, got slashed by Fain, was healed, Traveled to Illian, became king, then waged a short border war with the Seanchan on the edges of Illian.
Now that he’s back in Cairhien, the stuff he did before he left ha been wrapped up. An interesting theme in Rand’s life is that everyone around him wants him to be present, in person, for everything. The Aes Sedai wanted him to stay to negotiation with the Sea Folk. The Sea Folk negotiated to have someone at his side at all times, Min has pined for him, the Maidens just gave him a tender beatdown for leaving them behind (which was dishonoring to them), and Cadsuane is doing everything she can to make Rand come to her. Rand desperately wants to delegate and nobody will let him do so easily.
I enjoyed the way Jordan wrote the scene of the Maidens beating Rand up. It’s hard to explain “tenderly” beating someone down, but that’s what happened. It was a fight done with love (inasmuch as a fight that begins with a kick to the groin can be done in love.) They avoided his permanent wound. They didn’t bring any weapons with them to do the deed, so that nothing legitimately injurious happened by accident. They stopped punching him as soon as his knees touched the floor.
Their demand is also a problem, though. Their presence announced Rand’s presence – and tactically it is important that his presence is not always be so obvious. In this case, it probably wouldn’t have mattered, though, but it’s worth considering. Having to bring the Sea Folk with him, wherever he goes, is a similar problem. He could work that out through communication with the involved parties, BUT if you’re trying to keep a secret, the best way to do so is not to communicate. (The point is that I understand why Rand was so mad about having to have the Sea Folk with him at all times.)
Of course, that’s not the real reason he’s mad. He’s exhausted by having people in tow who question, second-guess, and generally make life difficult for him instead of helping him. Those people are almost always women. It’s also true that having women around him constantly means that in addition to giving him constant grief, they will be in constant danger. And his sanity can barely handle that.
I very much enjoyed his meeting with Cadsuane. When I read this series when I was young, I had a strong aversion to her. She came across as a bully. With older and wiser eyes, I have done a 180 and now very much appreciate what she’s doing here. She basically offered to be the exact thing he needs and wants – someone who is in his corner and serving only his interests (not her own, not an organization… his.) She’s also the most competent Aes Sedai we’ve met in the entire series, by a country mile, so he now has someone who can effectively intercede for him with both the Rebels and Elaida (and everyone else who is causing him so many problems in general.)
Her terms are also more than fair. “Don’t be a bully.” She doesn’t want him losing his temper, or treating her or her guests badly. This is good for Rand in the sense of him learning to be a leader, but it’s also good (I suspect) for his sanity to be forced to get a grip on his temper. Lews Therin seems to be louder the more he’s stressed out. She’s making him do that voluntarily.
If Rand is Will Hunting, from the movie Good Will Hunting, then Cadsuane is his Robin Williams. Rand has been so bullied and abused by Aes Sedai that she had to make him come to her and he had to want to do it. In this chapter, Rand finally does come to her. This is the only way she could ever earn his trust.
(this scene explains it – language warning)
Unfortunately we don’t get to see the sidebar scenes of Cads arguing with the other Aes Sedai about her approach with Rand and read her dropping f-bombs while she does so. But that’s definitely in my head canon. For clarity’s sake, in Randland, an “f-bomb” is the word “flaming.”
We learn in this chapter – from Cads – that Rand’s use of Callandor is dangerous. Using it causes a certain amount of madness if done by a man, solo. That fact is (presumably) at least some of the reason for why he went a little crazy trying to revive the dead girl in the Stone of Ter and why he had to be tackled by Bashere during the fight with the Seanchan. So… why is it that this sword is so important (prophetically tied to the Dragon Reborn) if he can’t actually use it safely? Hmm. Also… was it made that way on purpose? How did the Aes Sedai in the Age of Legends make this sa’angreal *after* the Breaking started. Were they getting help from men who could channel but weren’t yet insane? Is that how they know about its flaws? Hmm.
The chapter ends with Rand thinking through the fact he needs to use a different sa’angreal – though his thoughts don’t explain why. He concludes that if he can’t use Callandor, he will need to use the even-more-powerful sa’angreal Lanfear was always lusting over. “You could challenge the Creator.” So… that’s dangerous.
What is Rand planning? We don’t have many clues. On the big checklist of things that need to happen, that kind of fit, the only one I can think of is that the taint on saidin needs to be cleansed. If we assume “Time” really is circular, then that means that the last time there was a 3rd age someone then had to clean the taint from saidin. We have to assume that effort was successful at some point prior to the return of the Age of Legends (b/c it was clean during the time of Lews Therin.) Of course, it’s possible that what Rand is about to do makes things worse and that things aren’t really set right until the 7th age or something. But it seems unlikely the author would show us a huge problem and then kick the can on solving it for several ages after her series ends.
If we’re keeping track at home, I’m pretty sure the present age for the book readers is the “1st Age” within the WoT cosmology. By the time we get to the end of our Age, people will know how to use the One Power. Then comes the next Age of Legends.
Does this logic regarding the taint also imply that we know the good guys eventually win and that we don’t need to finish the story? Yes. But the point of the story is finding out how they do it, so we’ll charge on anyway.
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