The Aiel have the merchants follow them to Cold Rocks Hold.Īt Al'cair Dal, both Rand al'Thor and Couladin of the Shaido Aiel declare themselves to be He Who Comes With the Dawn. On the way to Cold Rocks Hold they come across a group of merchants. The Wise Ones assign Aviendha the task of teaching Rand Aiel customs as they travel to Cold Rocks Hold. Rand finds that Mat had been hanged from the Tree of Life, but Rand was able to revive Mat.

He was also gifted with a spear called an ashandarei and a medallion ter'angreal that protects against the One Power. He comes out with the gaps in his memory filled with those of men long dead, which also grant him fluency in the Old Tongue. Mat goes into a doorway ter'angreal which leads him to the land of the Eelfinn. Rand comes out with dragon markings on both arms, proving him to be He Who Comes With the Dawn, the Car'a'carn, the Chief of Chiefs of all the Aiel. When Moiraine comes out, she has some knowledge of the future. The Aiel Wise Ones have Moiraine, Aviendha, and Rand enter Rhuidean, and allow Mat to go with Rand. Rand uses a Portal Stone to transport Mat, Egwene, Moiraine, and the Aiel at the Stone of Tear from Tear to the Aiel Waste, where Taardad and Shaido Aiel are waiting for them. Thus, The Shadow Rising follows four groups of characters in four main plotlines. Also Min Farshaw arrives in Tar Valon to report to the Amyrlin Siuan Sanche, inadvertently setting off a chain of events that will lead to a Tower split. Elayne, Nynaeve al'Meara, Juilin Sandar, and Thom Merrilin decide to go to Tanchico to hunt the Black Ajah. Perrin Aybara, after hearing rumors of trouble back home in the Two Rivers, chooses to return to the Two Rivers, and Faile Bashere goes with him. Mat Cauthon, unsure of what to do, finds answers within the Stone of Tear's Aelfinn ter'angreal, and is prompted to follow Rand to the Aiel Waste. Egwene and Moiraine Damodred resolve to accompany him. Rand declares his intention to go follow the People of the Dragon, the Aiel, into their home, the Aiel Waste. After being thrown out, he learns that Rand and Moiraine passed the doorframe as well, however, they refuse to reveal their questions and answers. When protesting that the answers were unclear, he manages to get some additional answers saying his fate is to marry the Daughter of the Nine Moons, to die and live again and to give up half the light of the world to save the world. He learns that he has to go to Rhuidean to survive and meet his fate. Mat passes through the Twisted redstone doorframe in the Stone to get the answers for his three questions. Finally, Rand uses Callandor to send a lightning storm to kill all of the Trollocs and Fades, leaving some believing Rand has gone mad.

Another Forsaken, Semirhage, also sent Shadowspawn to oppose Sammael's forces into the Stone of Tear. As Rand furiously rejects her, the Stone of Tear is suddenly stormed by Trollocs and Fades, which are sent by the other Forsaken Sammael (though Lanfear did not have anything to do with this). Overwhelmed with jealousy against Ilyena (going so far as to call her a 'pale-haired milksop', misinterpreted by Rand as jealousy against Elayne), she desperately pleads with him to join the forces of the Shadow, even stating her willingness to defy the Dark One if only he would be with her. Rand is surprised, however, when his previous traveling companion, Selene, reveals herself to be Lanfear, one of the Forsaken, and tells Rand to join her.

Elayne, overjoyed by her friend's sacrifice, allows Egwene to declare the end of her assumed betrothal to Rand before admitting her love for him and starting a romantic relationship. Faced with the tension of sharing Rand with others, as well as coming to understand their similar stubbornness and devotion towards him, Egwene al'Vere 'steps aside', formally inviting her close friend and Daughter-Heir of Andor, Elayne Trakand, to take Rand as her own. At the beginning of this book, all major protagonists are together at the Stone of Tear, where Rand al'Thor had recently, at the end of The Dragon Reborn, shown to the world that he was the Dragon Reborn by wielding Callandor.ĭuring the lull that occurs between the Dragon's taking of the Stone and the coming separation of the characters once more, several changes manifest within the social order of the protagonists.

Beyond the shadow you settle for