#captain jaim adarra

[iviarellereads]

The Dragon Reborn, Chapter 41 - A Hunter's Oath

(THIS PROJECT IS SPOILER FREE! No spoilers past the chapter you click on. Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Wheel of Time, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

(Wolf icon) In which an eye for an eye will leave the world blind, but some things should be returned to sender exactly as they arrived.

PERSPECTIVE: Perrin watches stuff from the ship. Anything's better than looking behind him. Moiraine hadn't been pleased at all that Faile knew she was Aes Sedai (Perrin refuses to call her Faile because of Min's vision and its implications),(1) and once she learned that Perrin knew the girl thought they'd lead her to the Horn of Valere, Moiraine was angry at Perrin for not telling her any of this himself.(2)

Moiraine is shooting dirty looks at Perrin and Faile, and Lan is sitting near her, examining his sword, vaguely amused. Perrin overheard Mo asking Lan if he found something funny, a few days before, and Lan said he'd never laugh at her, but if she intends to send him to Myrelle, he's heard she tells her Warders jokes, and they must smile at their bond holder's quips. The look she gave him would have nailed any other man to the mast, but Lan didn't flinch.(3)

Perrin wonders, if this infuriating girl is the falcon, what's the hawk supposed to be? Is he going to have two women like her? They dock in Illian, and as they disembark, Faile teases Perrin, sneaking up behind him and touching his neck lightly. Mo interrupts before Faile can tease him further and says perhaps she'll find better Hunting elsewhere. When Faile refuses, Mo says if she follows, she must swear by her hunter's oath to do as Mo says, heed her, and not leave them. Once she knows too much, Mo will not let her fall into the wrong hands to share the info.

Faile so swears,(4) and M says Perrin seems to have found Min's falcon, calling him ta'veren, and she will perch on his shoulder no matter what M does, it seems. She mounts her horse and Faile is skeptical that he's really ta'veren, but asks, who's Min? What does she mean about his shoulder? and she'll carve his ears if he tries to make her his responsibility. Perrin is grumpy that Min told Moiraine about the visions, but...

Grumbling to himself, he reached down and took Zarine by an arm; she gave a squawk and nearly dropped her bundle as he hoisted her up behind his saddle. Those divided skirts of hers made it easy for her to straddle Stepper. “Moiraine will have to buy you a horse,” he muttered. “You cannot walk the whole way.” “You are strong, blacksmith,” Zarine said, rubbing her arm, “but I am not a piece of iron.” She shifted around, stuffing her bundle and her cloak between them. “I can buy my own horse, if I need one. The whole way where?” Lan was already riding off the dock into the city, with Moiraine and Loial behind him. The Ogier looked back at Perrin. “No questions, remember? And my name is Perrin, Zarine. Not ‘big man,’ or ‘blacksmith,’ or anything else. Perrin. Perrin Aybara.” “And mine is Faile, shaggy-hair.”(5) With something close to a snarl, he booted Stepper after the others. Zarine had to throw her arms around his waist to keep from being tossed over the dun’s crupper. He thought she was laughing.

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(1) Like, okay, but you don't know who the falcon and the hawk are supposed to be to you, only that they fight, and she gets to be called whatever name she chooses. (2) It's interesting to see the famed Aes Sedai calm breaking down under scrutiny. Moiraine does not have all the answers and she does not have a perfect plan, and having her nose rubbed in either of those is an affront to everything she's ever grown up to become. (3) And Lan knows it. New Spring is safe to read pretty much anytime after book 1 or 2, I won't give anything away except that I'll be covering it after book 10 aka in publishing order still, but if you want to know why he might be a little bit smug about Mo losing her cool, can recommend it. (4) If Mo knows enough to make her swear such, Faile must guess that she has something VERY lucrative indeed. It's unfortunate for her quest that the answer is "we already found the Horn and it's been blown", but isn't it fun to see Faile so close to the answers she doesn't know she's looking for? (5) Fair's fair, Perrin.

[iviarellereads]

The Dragon Reborn, Chapter 35 - The Falcon

(THIS PROJECT IS SPOILER FREE! No spoilers past the chapter you click on. Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Wheel of Time, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

(Waves icon) In which Perrin makes a new... acquaintance.

PERSPECTIVE: Perrin is several steps behind Lan as they enter the inn, but he goes and tells Loial they're leaving, now. Loial grumbles they've only just arrived, but gets up. Perrin's glad he didn't unpack much into the room. Not a wrinkle in the blanket, not a splash of water in the basin... he must have known he wouldn't be staying, on some level. He has some trouble with the stableman, until Lan comes behind him and tosses the man a coin. Loial says it's like old times, sneaking away in the night with enemies behind, enemies maybe ahead, danger in the air. Perrin asks what Loial is on about, and Loial says he's fixing the details in his head, for his book.(1)

They get to the dock, Lan locates the captain of the one ship that looks ready to sail and negotiates. The ship is made ready to sail, horses and all in short order. Just as they're casting off, a girl in divided skirts bursts out of the shadows and says she'll take passage downriver, oh, as far as he's going, and she gestures to Perrin without looking. No objections to sleeping on the deck, either. She negotiates with the captain and boards.

A little way down the river, she comes to stand next to Perrin, saying she never expected her travels to take her back to Illian so soon. That is where he's going, isn't it? His mouth tightens and she tells him not to sulk. He left quite a mess with the Aielman back there, didn't he? Perrin asks if she told anyone. Oh no, the town thinks the Aiel chewed through the chain. Orban was loud in his protests that his injuries should keep him from hunting the man down again. Perrin snorts that if he ever sees an Aiel again, he's more likely to soil himself.

The woman says she's not so sure, she saw Orban in Jehannah during winter, fought four men alone, killed two and made the other two yield. But he is a fool, and he had strange ideas about the Great Blackwood,(2) what some call the Forest of Shadows. Has he ever heard of it? He looks at her sideways. There's a Forest of Shadows south of the Two Rivers. He asks if she's following him, why she was staring at him, why didn't she tell the village what she saw?

She says an Ogier is obviously an Ogier, and she saw "Lady Alys"'s face better than Orban did, which makes the other man a Warder,(3) and what a scary stone face on him too... but she couldn't account for Perrin. He looks like a countryman, but he freed a caged Aielman, had a talk with him, and helped him cut up Whitecloaks, and none of it seemed out of the ordinary for him. It makes a strange trail, and that's what Hunters are supposed to look for.

He boggles that she's a Hunter, she's a girl! Her smile becomes so innocent he's almost scared into taking a step back. With a flourish as neat as Thom Merrilin's, she's holding two knives. As quickly again, they're gone. She says she took the oath in Illian, and she has her own idea about where the Horn is, but she can't afford to pass up such a trail as P's party is leaving.(4) He asks where she thinks the Horn is, thinking to himself that he hopes it's safe in Tar Valon by now. She says she thinks it's in Manetheren, and he says the city was destroyed when the last Queen drew too much Power to destroy the Dreadlords. She says not IN Manetheren, but someplace in the Mountains of Mist, then. Anyway, he's lucky the other two were injured fighting the Aielman or they'd be on the ship, too. She won't get in the way or try to take over or pick fights with the Warder. 

Perrin growls disgustedly, and asks what her name is, he can't just keep calling her "girl" for days. She says she calls herself Mandarb, and Perrin guffaws. She says angrily that it means "blade" in the Old Tongue, a name worthy of a Hunter. Perrin finally controls his laughter long enough to tell her the black horse (Lan's) is called Mandarb. She blushes, and says she was born Zarine Bashere, but Zarine is no name for a Hunter. He says he likes the name Zarine, it suits her.(5) Her eyes flash dangerously, but P says that it's late and he'd like to get some sleep.

He turns his back on her and walks toward the belowdeck hatch, his shoulders prickling. She calls out to him.

“Farmboy! Perhaps I will call myself Faile. My father used to call me that, when I was little. It means ‘falcon.’ ”(6) He stiffened and almost missed the first step of the ladder. Coincidence. He made himself go down without looking back toward her. It has to be. The passageway was dark, but enough moonlight filtered down behind him for him to make his way. Someone was snoring loudly in one of the cabins. Min, why did you have to go seeing things?

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(1) Yep, that's the throughline. It's cute, though. Going that level of author-insertion without going full Stephen King in the Dark Tower series seems like a hard line to walk. (2) Time being a flat sphere, and references abound, I'm pretty sure this is a gesture toward the Black Forest echoing through the Ages. Only, now I want cake. Dangit. (3) So, Faile is somewhat cultured. No backwater village raising for her. Who is she, in the world? Who is she, to Perrin's story? (4) Ironic, because he's leading her further away from the Horn… but, as we know, the Horn would be utterly useless to her anyway. (5) Perrin. Perrin! Dear, we respect people's choice of name in this household, or I'm gonna have to disown you. (6) WELL WELL WELL the female falcon from Min's visions arrives on the scene. Zarine Bashere, henceforth Faile. (Pronunciation note: Aiel is pronounced "eye-EEL" and Faile rhymes with that, despite them both coming from the Old Tongue and both being spelled entirely differently. Whee!)