The Fires of Heaven (The Wheel of Time, #5)

by Robert Jordan

The amount of saidin you drew did not matter. The One Power had little to do with gateways, really; only the making. Beyond, was something else. A dream of a dream, Asmodean called it.

Nothing, forever. It was not like night. He could see himself and the stone perfectly. But everything else, everywhere else, was blackness.

Rand felt himself shiver. In the Void, it seemed like feeling someone else shiver. It was well to be reminded that Lews Therin was still inside him.

Pevin would carry that banner wherever Rand went, even the Pit of Doom, and never blink.

Sometimes women were stranger than anything else the Creator could possibly have made.

Rand moved to the far side of the platform from the gateway. There was no need to see where he was going, really, but he wanted to. In truth, he could have remained at the other end, or gone to one side; direction here was mutable; whatever way he chose to move would take him to Caemlyn if done properly. And to the endless black of nowhere if done wrong.

“Enough!” Rand shouted. “No more! Clear the gateway! Everyone stand well clear!” He did not want what had happened to the Seanchan spear to happen here to living flesh.

The gateway seemed to turn sideways, thinning until it vanished with one final flash of light.

“Blood and ashes!” Mat muttered, leaning disgustedly on his spear. “This is worse than the flaming Ways!”

“I know where I am going,” Rand said. Not too close. But not too far. He remembered the spot well. No movement. Endless black, and them hanging in it. Motionless. Half an hour passed perhaps.

On the other side of that wall was the garden where he had first met Elayne.

Blue eyes floated accusingly outside the Void, the darting memory of kisses stolen in Tear, the memory of a letter laying her heart and soul at his feet, of messages borne by Egwene professing love.

But he wanted . . . What? Who? Blue eyes, and green, and dark brown. Elayne, who maybe loved him and maybe could not make up her mind? Aviendha, who taunted him with what she would not let him touch? Min, who laughed at him, thought him a wool-headed fool? All that flashed along the boundaries of the Void.

It was his presence that maintained the platform; it would vanish as soon as he stepped through the gateway.

Asmodean fingered his sword and breathed too quickly; Rand wondered whether the man knew how to use the thing. Not that he would have to. Mat stared up the wall as though at a bad remembrance. He had entered the Palace this way once, too.

“RAAAAHVIIIIN!” It startled him a little, that sound coming from his throat. He seemed to be sitting somewhere deep in the back of his own head, the Void around him vaster, emptier, than it had ever been before.

Saidin raged through him. He did not care if it scoured him away. The taint seeped through everything, tarnished everything. He did not care.

Rand felt himself smile. Fire burst from the two Trollocs, a flame at every pore, bursting through black mail.

“Rahvin,” he said. Or someone did. He was not sure who. Sending fire and lightning ahead of him, he stepped through and let the gateway close behind him. He was death.

Logain was more cooperative than Siuan and Leane in any case, or at least more eager. Thank the Light he understood about keeping it secret.

“Lanfear, Graendal, Rahvin and Sammael are plotting together.”

“Do you know they are drawing Rand al’Thor to attack Sammael? But when he does, he will find the others as well, waiting to trap him between them. At least, he will find Graendal and Rahvin. I think Lanfear plays another game, one the others know nothing about.”

“Now if you know of some threat to Rand, something ahead of Sammael and the others, you tell me. Now!”

“Al’Thor means to go after Rahvin. Today. This morning. Because he thinks Rahvin killed Morgase. I don’t know whether he did or not, but al’Thor believes it. But Rahvin never trusted Lanfear. He never trusted any of them. Why should he? He thought it all might be some trap set for him, so he has laid a trap of his own. He has set Wards through Caemlyn so if a man channels a spark he will know. Al’Thor will walk right into it. He almost certainly already has.

Another deep breath, and Nynaeve began forming the image of the one place in Caemlyn she knew well enough to remember. The Royal Palace, where Elayne had taken her. Rahvin must be there.

But in the waking world, not the World of Dreams. Still, she had to do something. Tel’aran’rhiod changed around her.