The Ways, the Wind, and the Wheel
THE WHEEL OF TIME – Season 1 Episode 7 – SPOILERS
Magdalena ล ittovรก in her TV acting debut as Tigraine Mantea. Sittova was stunt double for Rebecca Fergusen in DUNE.
The episode’s best scene is at its very beginning, when we see the last minutes of the life of Tigraine Mantear (Magdalena ล ittovรก). The woman manages to defeat a platoon of swordsmen who are actively trying to kill her, is wounded severely in the process, and manages (with the assistance of one lone knight) to give birth to a baby boy before she dies. All this takes place on the slopes of Dragonmount, the mountain near Tar Valor that Rand (Josha Stradowski) inexplicably recognized earlier in the story.
Everyone wants to go back and get Mat (Barney Harris), but Loial (Hammad Aminashaun) explains that the portal through which they entered The Ways cannot be reopened because the One Power can’t be used in there without awakening the Machin Shin, which he later translates as “the black wind”. Loial also says that The Ways were once green pastures, but now they are pockmarked stone paths where one false step could send one plunging into a bottomless abyss, or worse. (Rand stops him before he can describe what might be worse.)
Padan Fain, another survivor of the Two Rivers Trolloc attack, seen walking in Fal Dara.
Perrin (Marcus Rutherford) sees very well in the dark (like a wolf) and spots a guiding stone before anyone else does. It has been defaced, but not so much that it can’t be read. Loial puzzles over who might deface such a signpost, but later that question is answered as they are attacked by a lone Trolloc, apparently forcing Egwene (Madeleine Madden) to use the One Power to push it into one of the aforementioned bottomless pits. Then the black wind rises, and it is a swarm of small creatures that whisper in each person’s ear causing them to fixate on their individual sources of self-doubt (sort of like Jolene in WYNONNA EARP Episode 3.5, but more like The Furies in Greek mythology.)
They reach their point of exit, and Moiraine (Rosamund Pike) works on opening it. Nynaeve (Zoรซ Robins) gets tired of listing to the Machin Shin and somehow blocks it out with a scream just before they all exit The Ways near the city of Fal Dara, which Moiraine describes as “the last bastion against The Blight.“. Lan (Daniel Henney) has people in Fal Dara, but he began life as heir to the throne of a place called Malkier. He was smuggled out of the palace at a young age while the city was being destroyed.
Later, while walking through Fal Dara‘s streets, Perrin spots Padan Fain (Johann Myers), but Egwene tells him that cannot be, since the peddler must have been killed at Two Rivers when the Trollocs attacked.
Moiraine asks Lady Amalisa to send a message to the Red Ajah (whose job is to prevent the wrong and dangerous use of the One Power) about the need to locate Mat Cauthon.
After asking Lady Amalisa (Sandra Yi Sencindiver) to secretly send a message to the Red Ajah to locate Mat, Moiraine makes a show of talking to a seer (Min Farshaw, played by Kae Alexander). Knowing that the Machin Shin has made everyone aware of their own inner conflicts, she explains to the Four from Two Rivers that when they reach the Eye of the World those who are not the Dragon Reborn will certainly die, giving them ample incentive to decide for themselves whether or not they will accompany her there.
This strategy achieves the desired result. The Four promptly deal with unresolved issues, and each is made to actively wonder if he or she might be the dragon. Rand wakes during the night and remembers many things that make him suspect he is the one. He (predictably) consults the seer, who (indirectly) confirms his suspicions. (She does not tell him this, but earlier, she had a vision of Rand holding a baby, so she knows he will return.) Though his conversation with the seer makes it seem otherwise, Rand becomes certain he is the Dragon Reborn. He tells Moiraine, and the two of them head to the Eye of the World, leaving the others safely behind. (Moiraine has blocked her bond with Lan, and has managed to distract him from that by encouraging his relationship with Nynaeve.)
Rand al’Thor enters The Blight
It is clear that Rand is the child born to Tigraine Mantea on Dragonmount, and that he remembers using the One Power on a couple of occasions, but even with all that evidence supporting the notion that Rand is the new Dragon, it may not be exactly so. The Eye is a days walk from Fal Dara, and Moiraine and Rand have a few hours head start. The others could decide to follow them, but can Nynaeve track someone through The Blight?
Besides pointing out that the Four from Two Rivers are all connected somehow, Min Farshaw predicts Moiraine’s future: “I see the Amyrlin Seat,” she says, “and she’s wearing full regalia, and she’s going to be your downfall.”
The show has been renewed for a third season.