#jolien

This chapter starts with the Wheel-and-serpent icon because this is an important chance meeting.

Men were sometimes silly enough to think a woman was harmless merely because she was a woman; Egwene had no such illusions.

I assume these silly men are not counting women with ageless faces among the harmless but purely the average, non-channeling woman because otherwise they'd be jumping far past "silly" and into "suicidal".

Except maybe a fully trained sister, she admitted. But certainly not one woman, even if she is Aiel.

Egwene betrays her ignorance here. As her story goes on, she spends very little time being actually thwarted by any fully trained sisters and has a lot more difficulties with virtually everyone else.

“You have not the look in your faces, but we saw the rings. In your lands, you have women much like our Wise Ones, the women called Aes Sedai. Are you women of the White Tower, or not?”

Note that TECHNICALLY Aviendha isn't committing the same ageless face continuity error as in book 2. Not sure if that means it's already resolved or what.

“We are women of the White Tower,” Nynaeve said calmly. She was very obvious in not looking around for other Aiel. Even Elayne was peering about. “Whether you would consider any of us wise is another matter,” Nynaeve went on.

Nynaeve's statement wouldn't trigger the Oath Rod if she were already sworn to it, so good job! Also it's really quite impressive that she's so good at dealing with the Aiel. Unlike the other gals, she already knows that if they're surrounded, they're fucked, so why worry about an additional ambush when there seems to be a way to leave the conversation peaceably?

A friend of hers is dying? She sounds as if she is asking if we’ll lend her a cup of barley flour!

Egwene grows up a LOT, doesn't she?

And what if Nynaeve can’t Heal their friend? I wish she would ask before she makes these decisions that involve all of us!

I think Egwene is probably the last member of the party to come to the conclusion that the Aiel have no interest in fucking with them, and looks particularly immature to worry that the Aiel might kill them for honest failure but not for uncharitable refusal to help.

“I am Egwene al’Vere,” she told them. They seemed to expect more, so she added, “Daughter of Marin al’Vere, of Emond’s Field, in the Two Rivers.” That seemed to satisfy them, in a way, but she would have bet they understood it no more than she did all these septs and clans.

Egwene, it's obvious what being the daughter of someone means, and context explains the rest, though almost no one knows where the Two Rivers is.

“Then why do you not speak the words before your Wise Ones?” Chiad asked. “Bain and I became first-sisters.”

Because Elayne's saving herself for the right sister and she's right there, you homewreckers!

Bain knotted her brow in thought. “What you say comes near truth, yet misses it completely. When we wed the spear, we pledge to be bound to no man or child. Some do give up the spear, for a man or a child”—her expression said she herself did not understand this—“but once given up, the spear cannot be taken back.”

So obviously trying to apply modern labels of sexuality to people who don't exist in modern western culture is usually a mistake, even if their culture only exists in the fiction of western culture, but... Bain's a lesbian, right? I legit don't believe her when she says she doesn't NOT like men, she seems to be mostly in denial. (Also it's great getting to watch the Aiel go, "Holy shit you wetlanders are dumb." I look forward to this coming up more and more.)

“Yes, they do.” Chiad sounded as though she and Bain were sharing something between them.

They're laughing at Aviendha.

“Yes,” Egwene said faintly. She glanced at Elayne and saw the bewilderment in her blue eyes she knew must be in her own.

Egwene is so deeply into the White Tower that she can't even conceptualize organizations of people outside it anymore. That's deeply worrying.

But we do not share him, Elayne. We can neither of us have him.

Is this a Perrin chapter? Because I am just non-stop dunking on the stupidity of the POV character. EGWENE. Wake. the. fuck. up.

“Some of those fools that the oath-breaking treekillers call soldiers thought we were another handful of the bandits who infest this land. We had to kill them to convince them otherwise, but Dailin. . . . Can you heal her, Aes Sedai?”

That's... that's not how you convince people of facts, Aviendha. That's just how you stop them from harassing you.

Chiad and Bain stepped to the river’s edge and returned together. Their faces never changed, but Egwene thought they had almost expected the river to reach up and grab them.

Again we can see how our characters are very early on their personal journeys because even the random NPCs have better emotional and facial control than they do.

“She truly does sound like a Wise One,” Chiad told Bain softly, and the other woman gave a tight nod.

I'd like to see Nynaeve go to Rhuidean and probably break the initial ter'angreal because she's so fucking constant it can't come up with any alternate futures based on other things she could have done.

The Stones River. . . . Some claim it had water in it once, but that is only boasting. There are only the stones. The oldest records of the Wise Ones and the clan chief say there was never anything but stones since the first day our sept broke off from the High Plain sept and claimed that land.

Probably the initial Aiel who discovered the area still had remnant knowledge from the AoL and thus the ability to recognize the signs of a river destroyed by climate change.

“I would never harm an Aes Sedai,” Aviendha said abruptly. “I would have you know that. Whether Dailin lives or dies, it makes no difference in that. I would never use this”—she lifted one short spear a trifle—“against any woman. And you are Aes Sedai.”

Aviendha is of course concerned that Egwene is grabbing the One Power out of nowhere. Egwene can't even conceive of Aiel channelers and again she's barely spent any time with the White Tower.

Just because Elayne had been taught something did not mean it was true, even if the Aiel said the same thing.

This isn't a bad instinct to have, but Egwene only has it when it comes to her two equals in the party, not when it comes to the knowledge she's been taught at home and the Tower.

“Balefire,” Egwene said. “Aviendha, what is balefire?”

It's a good thing that these Aiel are on the up and up or Egwene would have just blabbed on herself in an incredibly stupid way. Also, I guess the Aiel have a better cultural memory of balefire than westerners because of Rhuidean. I don't remember if it's explicitly used in Rand's genetic memories though.

She was not sure she had even been able to make out all the many flows, much less the way Nynaeve had woven them together. What Nynaeve had done in those few seconds had seemed like weaving four carpets at once while blindfolded.

Egwene won't admit it even to herself, but she is deeply concerned with how ahead of her in channeling Nynaeve is.