Rand barked a shallow laugh. “A poor joke, Selene. I'd as soon make jests about the Dark One as one of the Forsaken. And my name is Rand.”
“We call ourselves the Chosen,” she said calmly. “Chosen to rule the world forever. We will live forever. You can, also.”
He frowned at her worriedly. She actually thought she was... Her travails in reaching Tear must have unhinged her. But she did not look mad. She was calm, cool, certain. Without thinking, he found himself reaching for saidin. He reached for it — and struck a wall he could not see or feel, except that it kept him from the Source. “You can't be.” She smiled. “Light,” he breathed. “You are one of them.”
Slowly, he backed away. If he reached Callandor, at least he would have a weapon. Perhaps it could not work as a sa'angreal, but it would do for a sword. Could he use a sword against a woman, against Selene? No, against Lanfear, against one of the Forsaken.
His back came up hard against something, and he looked around to see what it was. There was nothing there. A wall of nothing, with his back pressed against it. Callandor glittered not three paces away — on the other side. He thumped a fist against the barrier in frustration; it was as unyielding as rock.
“I cannot trust you fully, Lews Therin. Not yet.” She came closer, and he considered simply seizing her. He was bigger and stronger by far — and blocked as he was, she could wrap him up with the Power like a kitten tangled in a ball of string. “Not with that, certainly,” she added, grimacing at Callandor. “There are only two more powerful that a man can use. One at least, I know, still exists. No, Lews Therin. I will not trust you yet with that.”
“Stop calling me that,” he growled. “My name is Rand. Rand al'Thor.”
“You are Lews Therin Telamon. Oh, physically, nothing is the same except your height, but I would know who is behind those eyes even if I'd found you in your cradle.” She laughed suddenly. “How much easier everything would be if I had found you then. If I had been free to...” Laughter faded into an angry stare. “Do you wish to see my true appearance? You can't remember that, either, can you?”
He tried to say no, but his tongue would not work. Once he had seen two of the Forsaken together, Aginor and Balthamel, the first two loosed, after three thousand years trapped just beneath the seal on the Dark One's prison. The one had been more withered than anything could be and still live; the other hid his face behind a mask, hid every bit of his flesh as though he could not bear to see it or have it seen.
The air rippled around Lanfear, and she changed. She was — older than he, certainly, but older was not the right word. More mature. Riper. Even more beautiful, if that was possible. A lush blossom in full flower compared to a bud. Even knowing what she was, she made his mouth go dry, his throat tighten.
Her dark eyes examined his face, full of confidence yet with a hint of questioning, as if wondering what he saw. Whatever she perceived seemed to satisfy her. She smiled again. “I was buried deeply, in a dreamless sleep where time did not flow. The turnings of the Wheel passed me by. Now you see me as I am, and I have you in my hands.” She drew a fingernail along his jaw hard enough to make him flinch. “The time for games and subterfuge is past, Lews Therin. Long past.”
His stomach lurched. “Do you mean to kill me, then? The Light burn you, I —”
“Kill you?” she spat incredulously. “Kill you! I mean to have you, forever. You were mine long before that palehaired milksop stole you. Before she ever saw you. You loved me!”
“And you loved power!” For a moment he felt dazed. The words sounded true — he knew they were true — but where had they come from?
Selene — Lanfear — seemed as startled as he, but she recovered quickly. “You've learned much — you have done much I'd not have believed you could, unaided — but you are still, fumbling your way through a maze in the dark, and your ignorance may kill you. Some of the others fear you too much to wait. Sammael, Rahvin, Moghedien. Others, perhaps, but those of a certainty. They will come after you. They will not try to turn your heart. They will come at you by stealth, destroy you while you sleep. Because of their fear. But there are those who could teach you, show you what you once knew. None would dare oppose you then.”
“Teach me? You want me to let one of the Forsaken teach me?” One of the Forsaken. A male Forsaken. A man who had been Aes Sedai in the Age of Legends, who knew the ways of channeling, knew how to avoid the pitfalls, knew — As much had been offered him before. “No! Even if it was offered, I'd refuse, and why should it be? I oppose them — and you! I hate everything you've done, everything you stand for.” Fool! he thought. Trapped here, and I spout defiance like some idiot in a story who never suspects he might make his captor angry enough to do something about it. But he could not force himself to take the words back. Stubbornly, he plowed ahead and made it worse. “I'll destroy you, if I can. You, and the Dark One, and every last Forsaken!”
A dangerous gleam flashed in her eyes and was gone. “Do you know why some of us fear you? Do you have any idea? Because they are afraid the Great Lord of the Dark will give you a place above them.”
Rand surprised himself by managing a laugh. “Great Lord of the Dark? Can't you say his true name, either? Surely you don't fear to attract his attention, as decent people do. Or do you?”
“It would be blasphemy,” she said simply. “They are right to be afraid, Sammael and the rest. The Great Lord does want you. He wants to exalt you above all other men. He told me.”
“That's ridiculous! The Dark One is still bound in Shayol Ghul, or I would be fighting Tarmon Gai'don right now. And if he knows I exist, he'd want me dead. I mean to fight him.”
“Oh, he knows. The Great Lord knows more than you would suspect. It is possible to talk with him. Go to Shayol Ghul, into the Pit of Doom, and you can... hear him. You can... bathe in his presence.” A different light shone on her face, now. Ecstasy. She breathed through parted lips, and for a moment seemed to stare at something distant and wondrous. “Words cannot even begin to describe it. You must experience it to know. You must.” She was seeing his face again, with eyes large and dark and insistent. “Kneel to the Great Lord, and he will set you above all others. He will leave you free to reign as you will, so long as you bend knee to him only once. To acknowledge him. No more than that. He told me this. Asmodean will teach you to wield the Power without it killing you, teach what you can do with it. Let me help you. We can destroy the others. The Great Lord will not care. We can destroy all of them, even Asmodean, once he has taught you all you need to know. You and I can rule the world together under the Great Lord, forever.” Her voice dropped to a whisper, equal parts eagerness and fear. “Two great sa'angreal were made just before the end, one that you can use, one that I can. Far greater than that sword. Their power is beyond imagining. With those, we could challenge even... the Great Lord himself. Even the Creator!”
“You are mad,” he said raggedly. “The Father of Lies says he will leave me free? I was born to fight him. That is why I am here, to fulfill the Prophecies. I'll fight him, and all of you, until the Last Battle! Until my last breath!”
“You do not have to. Prophecy is no more than the sign of what people hope for. Fulfilling the Prophecies will only bind you to a path leading to Tarmon Gai'don and your death. Moghedien or Sammael can destroy your body. The Great Lord of the Dark can destroy your soul. An end utter and complete. You will never be born again no matter how long the Wheel of Time turns!”
“No!”
For what seemed a long time she studied him; he could almost see the scales weighing alternatives. “I could take you with me,” she said finally. “I could have you turned to the Great Lord whatever you want or believe. There are ways.”
She paused, perhaps to see if her words had had any effect. Sweat rolled down his back, but he kept his face straight. He would have to do something, whether he had a chance or not. A second attempt to reach saidin battered vainly against that invisible barrier. He let his eyes wander as if he were thinking. Callandor was behind him, as far out of reach as the other side of the Aryth Ocean. His belt knife lay on a table by the bed, together with a halfmade fox he had been carving. The shapeless lumps of metal mocking him from above the fireplace, a drably clad man slipping in at the doors with a knife in his hand, the books lying everywhere. He turned back to Lanfear, tensing.
“You were always stubborn,” she muttered. “I won't take you, this time. I want you to come to me of your own will. And I will have it. What is the matter? You're frowning.”
A man slipping in at the doors with a knife; his eyes had slid past the fellow almost without seeing. Instinctively he pushed Lanfear out of the way and reached for the True Source; the shield blocking him vanished as he touched it, and his sword was in his hands like a redgold flame. The man rushed at him, knife held low and point up for a killing stroke. Even then it was difficult to keep his eyes on the fellow, but Rand pivoted smoothly, and The Wind Blows Over the Wall took off the hand holding the knife and finished by driving through his assailant's heart. For an instant he stared into dull eyes — lifeless while that heart still pumped — then pulled his blade free.
“A Gray Man.” Rand took what felt like his first breath in hours. The corpse at his feet was messy, bleeding onto the scrollworked carpet, but there was no difficulty in fixing an eye on him now. It was always that way with the Shadow's assassins; when they were noticed, it was usually too late. “This makes no sense. You could have killed me easily. Why distract me for a Gray Man to sneak up on me?”
Lanfear was watching him warily. “I make no use of the Soulless. I told you there are... differences among the Chosen. It seems I was a day late in my judgment, but there is still time for you to come with me. To learn. To live. That sword,” she all but sneered. “You do not do the tenth part of what you can. Come with me, and learn. Or do you mean to try to kill me, now? I loosed you to defend yourself.”
Her voice, her stance, said she expected an attack, or at the very least was ready to counter it, but that was not what stopped him, any more than her loosing the bonds in the first place. She was one of the Forsaken; she had served evil so long she made a Black sister look like a newborn babe. Yet he saw a woman. He called himself nine kinds of fool, but he could not do it. Maybe if she tried to kill him. Maybe. But all she did was stand there, watching, waiting. No doubt ready to do things with the Power he did not even know were possible, if he attempted to hold her. He had managed to block Elayne and Egwene, but that had been one of those things he did without thinking, the way of it buried somewhere in his head. He could only remember that he had done it, no how. At least he had a firm grip on saidin; she would not surprise him that way again. The stomachwrenching taint was nothing; saidin was life, perh
