A Memory of Light

She was right. Burn her, she was. Elayne hung on as Birgitte galloped across the battlefield, her horse churning clods of dirt behind them in a flight toward safety.

At least he’s making it easy to find him, Galad thought as he rode, watching the lines of fire streak from the enemy position toward Elayne’s army.

Galad’s heels dug into the flanks of his stolen horse, tearing across the Heights toward its eastern edge. Over and over, he saw Gawyn’s dying body in his arms.

“Face me, Lews Therin!” The thunder of Demandred’s shout shook the ground from up ahead. He had taken Galad’s brother. Now the monster hunted Galad’s sister.

The right thing had always seemed clear to Galad before, but never had it felt as right as this.

Those streaks of light were like indicators on a map, arrows pointing his way. The Light itself guided him. It had prepared him, placed him here at this moment.

He ripped through the back lines of the Sharan force to where Demandred stood, just above the riverbed looking down on Elayne’s troops. Arrows sank into the earth around him, archers firing, heedless of the risk of hitting their own men. Sword out, Galad pulled his leg from the stirrup, preparing to leap free.

An arrow struck the horse. Galad threw himself from the animal. He hit hard, skidding to a stop, and sliced the hand from a crossbowman nearby. A growling male channeler came for him, and the foxhead medallion grew cold against Galad’s chest.

Galad rammed his blade through the man’s neck. The man raved, blood spurting from his neck with each beat of his heart. He didn’t seem surprised as he died, just angry. His howls drew more attention.

“Demandred!” Galad yelled. “Demandred, you call for the Dragon Reborn! You demand to fight him! He is not here, but his brother is! Wil you stand against me?”

Dozens of crossbows were raised. Behind Galad, his horse collapsed, expelling a bloody froth from its nostrils.

Rand al’Thor. His brother. The shock of Gawyn’s death had numbed Galad to this revelation.

He would have to deal with it eventual y, if he survived. He stil did not know if he would be proud or ashamed.

A figure in strange, coin-link armor stepped through the Sharan ranks here. Demandred was a proud man; one needed see only his face to know that. He looked like al’Thor, actual y.

They had a similar sense about them.

Demandred inspected Galad, who stood with bloody sword out. The dying channeler scraped the ground with clawed fingers before him.

“His brother?” Demandred said.

“Son of Tigraine,” Galad said, “who became a Maiden of the Spear. Who gave birth to my brother on Dragonmount, the tomb of Lews Therin. I had two brothers. You kil ed the other on this battlefield.”

“You have an interesting artifact, I see,” Demandred said as the medallion grew cold again.

“Surely you don’t think that is going to keep you from meeting the same fate as your pathetic brother? The dead one, I mean.”

“Do we fight, son of Shadows? Or do we talk?”

Demandred unsheathed his sword, herons on the blade and hilt. “May you give me a better match than your brother, little man. I grow displeased. Lews Therin can hate me or rail against me, but he should not ignore me.”

Galad stepped forward into the ring of crossbowmen and channelers. If he won, he would stil die. But Light, let him take one of the Forsaken with him. It would be a fitting end.

Demandred came at him, and the contest began.

Her back pressed against a stalagmite, seeing only by the light of Callandor reflected against the walls of the cavern, Nynaeve worked to save Alanna’s life.

There were those who, in the White Tower, had mocked her reliance on ordinary healing techniques. What could two hands and thread do that the One Power could not?

If any of those women had been here instead of Nynaeve, the world would have ended.

The conditions were horrible. Little light, no tools besides the implements she kept in her pouch. Still, Nynaeve sewed, using the needle and thread she always carried. She had mixed a draught of herbs for Alanna and forced it through her lips. It wouldn’t do much, but every little bit might help. It would keep Alanna’s strength up, help her with the pain, keep her heart from giving out as Nynaeve worked.

The wound was messy, but she had sewn messy wounds before. Though she trembled inside, Nynaeve’s hands were steady as she sewed up the wound and coaxed the woman back from the very precipice of death.

Rand and Moridin did not move. But she felt something thrumming from them. Rand was fighting. Fighting a fight she could not see.

“Matrim Cauthon, you bloody fool. You’re still alive?”

Mat glanced over as Davram Bashere rode up beside him in the early evening darkness. Mat had moved with the Deathwatch Guard to the back of the Andoran lines fighting at the river.