Re-Reading "The Shadow Rising": "Chapter 22: Out of the STone" and "Chapter 23: Beyond the Stone"
Rand and Egwene go to the Aiel Waste, where each will find that matters are much more perilous than either of them might have imagined.
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We resume Wheel of Time Wednesday with our continued reading of The Shadow Rising. We’re only doing a pair of chapters this week, since a lot happens in these two chapters. Rand not only manages to use one of the Portal Stones to transport himself and everyone else to the Aiel Waste; he also departs for Rhuidean with Mat. As if all of that weren’t enough, we also get to see Egwene officially enter her training to become a Dreamwalker, a decision that will change the trajectory of her life, forever.
For once, I actually found spending time in Rand’s hand bearable. In large part this is because his chapter doesn’t spend too much time in hand-wringing over the differences between men and women (except for a little bit about Elayne). Instead, we are led to see Rand as a canny strategist, someone who is able to plan ahead, to not only figure out how to find and use a Portal Stone but also keep several steps ahead of Moiraine. He has certainly come a long way since he was just a simple farm boy from Emond’s Field and, while this transformation is obviously necessary if he is to have any chance of making it to the Last Battle–let alone win it–it’s also hard not to feel at least a bit of sorrow at how much he has had to sacrifice in order to take this path.
It’s clear that Moiraine, for one, is rapidly losing patience with Rand and his headstrong approach to everything. We’ve already seen just how irritated she can get when Rand continues to take his own path, resisting the guidance that she tries to give him, and that irritation is only growing the further down this path Rand goes. One can hardly blame her for feeling this way, given how much she has also sacrificed in order to make sure that he is able to take up the mantle of the Dragon Reborn. Add to that the fact that Lan is already chafing at the Bond, and it’s easy to see why she would sometimes want to strangle Rand.
These chapters also reveal the extent to which Egwene is becoming ever more headstrong. As I’ve written here before, her time with the Seanchan has changed her in ways that will only become more apparent as time passes. She is no longer willing to just do what others say because they happen to be authority over her, and it’s very clear that she is going to have no small amount of difficulty in surrendering her agency into the hands of the Wise Ones, however much it might be necessary to do so in order to get the knowledge that she needs.
And, while Aviendha is not a viewpoint character here, we also get some insight into who she is and why she resents Rand. It’s hard to blame her in that regard. Not only has he had a contentious relationship with Elayne, he’s also a wetlander whose mere existence threatens to upend everything that she thought she knew about the world and her place in it. Combined with her own deep ambivalence about becoming a Wise One, it’s easy to see why she would harbor such conflict inside of her.
Speaking of the Wise Ones…I love them. While I do get a bit impatient with the overly ornate social conventions of the Aiel–I love Robert Jordan, but he really did have a bad habit of making literally everything, from the smallest detail to the largest plot point, much more complicated and convoluted than it strictly needed to be–I do enjoy getting to spend time with characters like Amys and the other. These women are quite formidable in ways that are both like and unlike the Aes Sedai. They are used to being obeyed, and they do not take kindly to having their authority questioned, whether by a young woman like Egwene or a more authoritative figure like Moiraine.
Just as fascinating, though, is their approach to life and their place in the Pattern. In one of those deliciously philosophical conversations that pops up every now and again in The Wheel of Time, they make the point that part of being human is dealing with chance and contingency, with suffering and with pain. To try to take that away by peering too deeply at the pattern or trying to predetermine the outcome is to reduce oneself to an animal, to take away that fundamental thing that makes a person into a person. It’s really quite a profound point, and I love when this series really digs deep into the vexing moral and ethical and philosophical questions that fantasy as a genre is so great at exploring.
Even as all of this is happening, there are also rumblings that not all is well within the ranks of the Aiel. The Shaido are an ever-present threat, and it’s very clear that we are going to hear more of them before this is all over. Not everyone is as prepared to accept Rand’s presence as the Wise Ones, and still less are able to believe that he is the one who will change their entire lives forever. Rand might have thought that he was escaping the morass of Tairen politics and the threat of the Forsaken, but he has stepped out of the proverbial frying pan and right into the fire.
By the time the novel has come to a close everyone is poised on the brink of great change. One of the things that I continue to love about The Shadow Rising is the extent to which it manages to be quite expertly and tightly paced, despite the fact that it’s far longer than any of the other books thus far in the series. The past and the future loom large in this part of the book, as both Rand and Moiraine will discover that there is far more to Rhuidean, and to the Aiel, than they could ever have imagined.