I’m currently re-reading scenes set in the White Tower for my fanart project, picking up little bits of information I missed initially, and I’m starting to get the picture that from The Great Hunt to The Shadow Rising, Galad is going through his “Gone Wild” phase mostly off screen.
Indulge me for a moment. I think I can make a case for this.
Galad is a guy whose lived most of his life being a good son to his step mother and following all the rules, so he’s primed for rebellion against that life and just needs a change of circumstances and a little freedom to facilitate that rebellion.
He gets to go to the White Tower with his half brother and sister, two kids who sound like they’ve been muck ups their whole lives, and finally, he’s off Morgase’s apron strings, and doing the right thing doesn't seem like so much fun anymore.
At the White Tower, Galad isn’t there to fuck spiders. No, he’s there to try fucking Egwene. He hits on Egwene as soon as he meets her. Like, literally on their first meeting. She’s just hanging out with Elayne, and Galad thinks it’s cool to hit on his little sister’s friends while mogging his bro Gawyn. Wtf dude.
Later, and arguably, he shows interest in Nynaeve too, since later Elayne has a thought wondering if Galad was still interested in everyone’s favourite walking Braid Tugger™. Did something happen off camera? I think we see a bit of attempted flirtation from him when Nynaeve turfs G&G out of her room in the Accepted’s quarters, because he’s trying to turn the charm on her after he hits on Egwene again, right in front of Nynaeve. Also infront of his little sister again. Fkn shameless.
I bet if Tinder existed in Tar Valon, Galad would be the guy swiping right on all the girls to see who he matches with, and then copy/pasting “sup” to every one of them to find out who has low enough self esteem to reply to his lazy text. A looksmaxxing is fuckboi is still a fuckboi, Galad.
Then, after the girls are gone from the Tower in The Shadow Rising, we hear from Gawyn that Galad is heartsick Egwene is gone (she left him on read when he texted her “wyd” actually), and that he’s not coming to Warder training as often.
“...the last time he bothered to come to the yard.” (TSR, Chapter 17, Deceptions) Gawyn tells Min, so we know Galad is slacking off which is not doing the right thing at all.
THEN Galad goes and hits on Min, offering to take her to a dance and smiling at her, and we all know that when Galad smiles, it has this CHA +100 effect. Min’s impression is that he’s unaware of what he’s doing, but I disagree with her. He’s tried that smile on Nynaeve, who withstood it because she is Nynaeve™, and I bet he’s been trying that smile on plenty of girls at the White Tower because it gets him further than “sup”.
And THEN we learn the reason Galad is slacking off training and allegedly ‘heartsick’.
He’s not. He’s drunk. Gawyn thinks that Galad doesn't even get smashed on his birthday, but I think Gawyn doesn't know shit about what Galad's really been getting up to.
Sure, Gawyn knows his brother has been going out into Tar Valon and drinking in taverns with Whitecloaks. WHITECLOAKS! But I’m going to assume our friend Dain Bornhald is there, and we all know he drinks like a high school English teacher on the weekends. So I bet he’s there just frat boying it up with Galad, and being a bad influence while Galad is ditching Warder school.
Valda, that predator epic level asshole, is there too and he’s busy grooming Galad to join his cult by giving him personally autographed propaganda and making him feel like a Special Boy, all while under the influence of alcohol, which Valda probably bought for him and got the bartender to serve doubles, but told Galad they were singles, so Galad gets white girl wasted.
And that’s how this all ends, like many average university experiences, with Galad joining a cult and running away from home.
So that’s my “Galad Gone Wild” hypothesis.
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