A Memory of Light

As evening settled onto the land, Tam looked up across what had once been the most

feared place of all. Shayol Ghul. The last flickers of light showed plants growing here, flowers blooming, grass growing up around fallen weapons and over corpses.

Is this your gift to us, son? he wondered. A final one?

Tam lit his torch from the small, flickering flame that crackled in the pit nearby. He went forward, passing lines of those who stood in the night. They had not told many of Rands funeral rites. All would have wanted to come. Perhaps all deserved to come. The Aes Sedai were planning an elaborate memorial for Egwene; Tam preferred a quiet affair for his son.

Rand could finally rest.

He walked past people standing with heads bowed. None carried light save Tam. The others waited in the dark, a smal crowd of perhaps two hundred encircling the bier. Tams torch flickered orange off solemn faces.

In the evening, even with his light, it was hard to tell Aiel from Aes Sedai, Two Rivers man from Tairen king. Al were shapes in the night, saluting the body of the Dragon Reborn.

Tam went up to the bier, beside Thom and Moiraine, who were holding hands, faces solemn. Moiraine reached over and gently squeezed Tam’s arm.

Tam looked at the corpse, gazing down into his son’s face by the fire’s light. He did not wipe the tears from his eyes.

You did wel . My boy . . . you did so wel .

He lit the pyre with a reverent hand.

Min stood at the front of the crowd. She watched Tam, with slumped shoulders, bow his head before the flames. Eventually the man walked back to join the Two Rivers folk. Abell Cauthon embraced him, whispering softly to his friend.

Heads in the night, shadows, turned toward Min, Aviendha and Elayne. They expected something from the three of them. A show of some sort.

Solemnly, Min stepped forward with the other two; Aviendha needed the help of two Maidens to walk, though she was able to stand by leaning on Elayne. The Maidens withdrew to leave the three of them alone before the pyre. Elayne and Min stood with her, watching the fire burn, consuming Rand’s corpse.

“I’ve seen this,” Min said. “I knew it would come the day I first met him. We three, together, here.”

Elayne nodded. “So now what?”

“Now . . .” Aviendha said. “Now we make sure that everyone well and truly believes he is gone.”

Min nodded, feeling the pulsing throb of the bond in the back of her mind. It grew stronger each moment.

Rand al’Thor—just Rand al’Thor—woke in a dark tent by himself. Someone had left a candle burning beside his pallet.

He breathed deeply, stretching. He felt as if he’d just slept long and deep. Shouldn’t he be hurting? Stiff? Aching? He felt none of that.

He reached to his side and felt no wounds there. No wounds. For the first time in a long while, there was no pain. He almost didn’t know what to make of it.

Then he looked down and saw that the hand prodding his side was his own left hand. He laughed, holding it up before him. A mirror, he thought.

I need a ynirror.

He found one beyond the next partition of the tent. Apparently, he’d been left completely alone. He held up the candle, looking into the small mirror. Moridin’s face looked back at him.

Rand touched his face, feeling it. In his right eye hung a single saa, black, shaped like the dragon’s fang. It didn’t move.

Rand slipped back into the portion of the tent where he’d awakened. Laman’s sword was there, sitting atop a neat pile of mixed clothing. Alivia apparently hadn’t known what he would want to wear. She had been the one to leave these things, of course, along with a bag of coins from a variety of nations. She hadn’t ever cared much for either clothing or coin, but she had known he’d need both.

She wil help you die. Rand shook his head, dressing and gathering the coins and the sword, then slipping out of the tent. Someone had left a good horse, a dappled gelding, tied not far away. That would do him well. From Dragon Reborn to horsethief. He chuckled to himself.

Bareback would have to do.

He hesitated. Nearby, in the darkness, people were singing. This was Shayol Ghul, but not as he remembered it. A blooming Shayol Ghul, full of life.

The song they sang was a Borderlander funeral song. Rand led the horse through the night to get a little closer. He peered between the tents to where three women stood around a funeral pyre.

Moridin, he thought. He’s being cremated with ful honors as the Dragon Reborn.

Rand backed away, then mounted the dapple. As he did so, he noticed one figure who was not standing by the fire. A solitary figure, who looked toward him when all other eyes were turned away.

Cadsuane. She looked him up and down, eyes reflecting firelight from the glow of Rand s pyre. Rand nodded, waited for a moment, then turned the horse and heeled it away.

Cadsuane watched him go.