Shanna’har & Partings, and a Meeting - Towers of Midnight chapters 16 & 17 - EP554 - WoT Spoilers

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:12):
This is the Wheel of Time spoilers.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Bloodcast, chapter sixteenth, Chapter sixteen, the symbol being the Blacksmith
puzzle because Paren and his puzzles.

Speaker 1 (00:32):
Right, right, It's the anniversary, right, this is this is
shannahar means not necessarily the anniversary of your wedding, because
everybody celebrates it at the same time on the in
the same time of year.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
But it also is a celebration of your marriage. Yes,
more of the marriage than of the wedding, if that
makes sense, of course, But yeah, it's the annual celebration
of the fact that you're alive and married and it's great,
and I mean it makes sense in a world where
like we've had I don't remember if it's yeah, it's
earlier in this series, we have a Gwain talking about

(01:05):
how dates are pretty imprecise for daily usage, like you
actually have to like really sit down and think about
it to get down to the precise day that people know.
The calendar exists, but people don't use the day of
the year as like a guiding light for their like
regular lives. It's more of a vibe. It's a seasonal
you know, they're they're agrarian, they have a very agrarian

(01:25):
sense of time, and they have a calendar if they
need it, So it makes sense that you know, broadly
speakers like, yeah know, like this certain part of the
year is when we all celebrate another year coming around. Okay,
that makes sense.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
And this is kind of like Mother's Day except for marriage,
where it's like you only celebrate it if you're married,
but everybody celebrates it on the same day of the year.

Speaker 2 (01:46):
Yeah, totally.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
Whereas you know, Mother's Day you only celebrate for your mother,
right right, I mean we all celebrate it, but because
we all have mothers hopefully yes.

Speaker 2 (01:55):
Well, at some point we all came from someone.

Speaker 1 (02:00):
I heard they just did a thing where they took
a skin cell DNA and was able to recreate an
embryo with skin cells as opposed to using actual So
possibility that someone could grow up without having a mother.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
We will cross that bridge when we come to it.
For now, I don't really have a read in this
is a very sure what it is on the tin.
This literally is just shan Nahar. The chapter, like Fayel
does some administrative stuff and then she has a lovely
picnic with paren where they have a very important, deep conversation, like,
I don't there's not much of a read into that

(02:36):
because we just cut to Fayeel like having a nice
day before the plant picnic. By nice day, I mean
doing admin And.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
I think there's line. Paren was trying to maneuver for
a second, more formal parlay while the White Cloaks insisted
on a battle. So they've been exchanging letters, right. I
think that's the piece of what's been going on between
the two armies and why they're not fighting it out
right now and why we have this time to do.
This is sort of the calumn before the storm of
the battle between Paren and the White Cloaks, where they're

(03:04):
writing each other fancy letters instead of going to war.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
Apparently, yeah, well, because Gallad won't engage in the war
he wants in the battle that he wants until they've
agreed on a time and place, right, there is a
negotiation to going into battle the way that he wants
to do it, and Paren keeps saying I want to parlay.
So they're in this really hilarious impasse where Parent can

(03:27):
just delay more or less indefinitely on administrative reasons because
Gallad won't just attack them. He wants to wait for
like a clerk to manage an agreement before they attack.
It's very weird.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
And then there's some recap, right, there's some people who
have been kidnapped. Paren was thinking about stealing them, but
that doesn't make sense because there's too many.

Speaker 2 (03:50):
It's not book four anymore.

Speaker 1 (03:51):
Yeah, it's not book for anymore. Thinks about Berline, how
I'm gonna have to deal with her, which we see
that happen not yet but later on in this book
where she they make a deal.

Speaker 2 (04:00):
And then she thinks about her origin story, basically kind
of reflecting on what we know of her backstory that
we've inferred, but looking at it as like a much
more mature person. Right, we don't get just more details
about her life than we've ever heard before. We get
her going huh, that's a bit of a spoiled breath.
That made no sense, and really have grown up a
lot since book four. It really isn't book four anymore, right.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
And it does. It kind of feels like Sanderson also
like again because he has to tell you everything, right,
we know all this, there's nothing here that we don't
know from the rest of the book, but he's writing
it all down in one place as a summary from
the notes, so that you have it.

Speaker 2 (04:38):
I like the part where she reflects on that time
she made pair and travel alone through the ways and
she doesn't even remember what he had done to set
her off. I like that piece of reflection that felt
necessary to show her growth.

Speaker 1 (04:51):
Yes, I like the reflection. I don't necessarily like the
summary of everything she's ever done.

Speaker 2 (04:55):
Yeah, yeah, it's again Sanderson. It's so Sanderson. And he
describes the whole concept of camp followers and how they're
setting up a village around the thing, because we've seen
that before with the Isidie camp, so we have to
reiterate it here.

Speaker 1 (05:09):
And then we get the quartermaster.

Speaker 2 (05:11):
The quartermaster scene is pretty fun. I kind of like
the this is the Sanderson showing, not telling that I
enjoy where he actually writes this extremely granular, high fidelity
day in the life moment that is just so tactile
and visceral, and I actually enjoy it as like a
it's not all just handwaving. He's not YadA yadaing how

(05:34):
camps work.

Speaker 1 (05:35):
You know. It reminds me of when he wrote was
it Suan who went around and like checked one thing? Yeah? Yeah,
that tick, like totally you know, you don't have to
check everything every day, but you do want to check
one thing every day and just sort of never let
people know what you're checking on because it helps with
the corruption and it keeps people honest and it makes
sure that like they never know when you're gonna come

(05:57):
and double check that they're not oh, you know, getting
paid to give people supplies sooner, especially the nobles.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
Right. Yeah, it totally reminded me of that, which felt
like an awesome callback because that lesson has also been
passed on to Agwayne. And yeah, so this this part
was very Sanderson and also very satisfying, and this.

Speaker 1 (06:15):
Was basically, yeah, this Bevin is cooking the books. She's
not really sure how because he's very good at it,
but basically she figured out that he's supplying one group
too early and like basically controlling who gets the supplies.

Speaker 2 (06:29):
When he's giving people preferential treatment based on their wealth
and status, and that's not the socialism that The Two
Rivers is known for. So you know, Fayla has to
put keep it to a dull roar. But then she
has you know, this whole thing. It's like, well, Bavin
is very good at his job. He's doing this without

(06:49):
causing much of an issue or a ripple, Like I
can't see how he's managing it. He's very very good
at managing resources. So I don't want to get rid
of him. I just want him to understand and how
fettered his corruption needs to be.

Speaker 1 (07:04):
Right, Yeah, He's like, you're pushing the bounds of your corruption,
braining in just a little bit, just a little.

Speaker 2 (07:10):
Bit, letting you know where the line is. I will
not notice anything behind that line, but if you cross
the line, it's gonna be a problem. And Bevin's like, yes,
ma'am right. He wants his job, he wants to balance
all of that, and we never hear from him again
because he's just a nice day in the life piece
of furniture rather than some sort of character being set
up for something later. He is, in fact, a sexy lamp.

Speaker 1 (07:34):
On the way out, she sees some scallions have gone
bad that she noticed on her way in. Right, So
there's like the dark one is rotting food right in
front of them. Even Paren's presence, which was enough to
stop it from happening as much, is not stopping it
completely anymore.

Speaker 2 (07:49):
And we get the note here that it's been happening
far more, far longer out in the countryside and in
parents camp. This is sort of a new development that
this is happening more regularly. It's still remarking on in
a way that it isn't to the people who are,
you know, flocking to his army saying please, if you
feed me non rotten food, I will be so happy.

(08:10):
We were starting to see the rots following.

Speaker 1 (08:12):
Them timeline wise, this is Darth rand timeline, right, parent,
So this is why food's rotten.

Speaker 2 (08:17):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, because this is.

Speaker 1 (08:18):
Before Banes of Gold in Parents' timeline. God, these timelines
are so fucked.

Speaker 2 (08:23):
I like tracking the food rot as part of the
uh ARC though, I think that's helpful.

Speaker 1 (08:28):
Yeah, yeah, but that is helpful. So that's that's partially
how you can tell that Rand hasn't had his little
bans of Gold moment. Is like, because parents protection kind
of comes from the dragon reborn and he's been corrupted.
Like all of a sudden, we're seeing more of that
corruption in parents camp.

Speaker 2 (08:43):
Yeah, totally. Plus, the more people that get gathered under
parents banner, the more effective it is for the dark
One to cause harm to them. Right, putting more and
more of your eggs in one basket. That's the double
edged sword of parents' popularity.

Speaker 1 (08:58):
And then I like this last line, fail is talking
about how she feels thought she would feel trapped by
this life of managing a house, right, and she said,
but what Deidre her mother hadn't mentioned was how fulfilling
it would be. Parent made the difference. It was no
trap at all to be caught with him, And as
someone who's recently married, I'm like, yeah, I'm all romance,
I'm feeling romantic, and I'm like, yeah, it's you find

(09:19):
the right person. You find the right person, and it
doesn't feel like a trap.

Speaker 2 (09:23):
Yeah, exactly exactly, because yeah, that was kind of the
through line. We didn't really talk about it, but that
was the through line of Faya's reflection on her life,
was that it had all felt so predictable that it
felt like it was going to be a trap. And
then yeah, the reality is it's not a trap. And yeah,
I as someone who's been married for a lot of years, yes,
twenty years, it's.

Speaker 1 (09:45):
Years, I'm like, I'm a newlywed, you are the Yeah.

Speaker 2 (09:48):
Yeah, as someone who's been doing that for a very
long time, Like, yeah, it is. It should not be
a burden to have someone that you were sharing your
life administrative stuff with. It should be your parts add
up to a greater hole that make it easier to
live life. Like it should not be a burden to
have to think about another person's needs because they're also

(10:08):
thinking about your needs and it works out. And like, yes,
we don't have an army camp, neither of us are
in military general with camp followers situations, but like we
both have homes. You know, we're still stuff to manage,
and it's it's yeah, teamwork does in fact make the
dream work.

Speaker 1 (10:26):
And if you think managing life in the modern economy
doesn't feel like fucking war.

Speaker 2 (10:30):
Well and then there's that tell people And.

Speaker 1 (10:33):
For me, you know, for me, I'm like I didn't
get married until I was in my forties, and I
don't have a first wife. I don't have a first marriage.
I don't have a first set of kids. Like there
was all I knew, every relationship I was in before
never was not right, you know, like there was just
they were hard, Yeah, and I was better off single

(10:54):
and I stayed you know, that's one of the things
I would stay single for years in between my relationships
because I'd be looking or someone who I thought was
the right person. I wasn't just dating casually, and took
me forever to find the right person. But now I like,
am I absolutely sure that I found the right person? Yes?

Speaker 2 (11:09):
Mm hmm yeah. And for me that was like I
knew I was going to marry Brandon very early.

Speaker 1 (11:16):
On, early on, and you just found that person right away,
so early.

Speaker 2 (11:21):
Because it was so easy. It was just so he
is my first marriage obviously because math, but.

Speaker 1 (11:32):
This isn't game of Roads.

Speaker 2 (11:33):
Yeah yeah, yeah exactly, But it was just so easy.
It was just so like from my first terrible relationship
that was very very hard into just oh this is easy.
I think this must be like I can't imagine seeking
something better than this. This is peak. And then you know,
live together for a couple of years was like this
continues to be easy in all of the important ways.

(11:54):
So now we'll make it legally binding. But like I
knew really early on because of that easy.

Speaker 3 (12:00):
So yeah, romance yay ah yeah, real love, not lust,
not unrequested pining, but like, oh, working together to build
a life together is satisfying and fulfilling.

Speaker 2 (12:14):
And ease making is. Yeah, it's nice. It's nice to.

Speaker 1 (12:18):
See, and I feel like Parent and Fayil have earned
it as characters, right, Like the things they've gone through,
the life they've built, right, might not always be the
most entertaining to read about, but they have gone through
it and come out the other side, and there is
a very real love and affection. They've never wavered from
each other. And all that time, like there's never been

(12:40):
a question of like, do they love each other? No
one's ever asked that question.

Speaker 2 (12:43):
I mean, I've often asked what the hell they see
in each other, sure.

Speaker 1 (12:49):
But not whether or not they do see it in
each other?

Speaker 2 (12:51):
Right, Yeah, yeah, I don't get it, but I see
that it's happening for sure, for sure. And then yeah,
the only real thing lying between them is the weird,
awkward nonsense that gets resolved in this chapter because Sanderson
just sits them down like a marriage counselor and just
makes them talk finally.

Speaker 1 (13:07):
Jesus' good. Yeah, there's a little bit of that that
I can thank Sanderson for. Is like the number of
times he has two characters just sit down and actually
say what they think, as opposed to not talking and
that's the reason for the conflict. There's a lot of
that in Jordan's Wheel of Time is people just not
talking to each other, started by Moraine, right, she's the

(13:28):
one who like sort of set that precedent by like
keeping her secrets.

Speaker 2 (13:32):
So then we switch PAVs to Parin, where we will
remain for the rest of the chapter.

Speaker 1 (13:37):
And he's like, I don't know what we're doing, and
she's basically explaining this concept of the room spring a
I'm sorry the Shanahar.

Speaker 2 (13:46):
Shanahar very different concept. Yeah, he's waiting on the hilltop
for her for the picnic. He doesn't know what the
picnic's all about, but he's waiting for her at the
date location because he is a good husband and shows
up when his wife says, I want to have a date.

Speaker 1 (14:03):
But he starts that date and what I know is
the wrong way by saying I suck at my job.
Let's talk about my job.

Speaker 2 (14:10):
Yet not the most romantic opener y Daran.

Speaker 1 (14:14):
And he's explaining how, like, you know, God, I feel
like such a bad leader because like I wouldn't give
myself up for these people anymore, Like back I used
to be willing to do that I'd give myself up
for just a couple of people, and now I won't
do it no matter how many people it is. And
she's like, yeah, you can't be held ransom like that.
That's a good leader. Shouldn't be able to be held ransom.

(14:35):
Like that makes sense, right right?

Speaker 2 (14:38):
Yeah, he has this extremely perfectionistic, godlike idea of what
a leader has to be. Yes, like, leaders are just people. Actually,
there's nothing divine or superhuman about leaders. They just lead
that that's it. They're people.

Speaker 1 (14:57):
And he's like, but but I have weaknesses and she's like, yeah,
well you're not a drunk. Well you're not, you know, yeah,
basically you have a lot of strengths and yeah, everybody
has some weaknesses. You're not superhuman. And by the way,
if you resigned, who do you think would be the
you know, do you think they just go back to
not having a leader? Well no, do you think they'd
elect the right person? Well maybe not. Do you think

(15:20):
you should probably do it instead? Well? Maybe? Okay? Do
you think you maybe should have thought of this at
some fucking point? Parent? Ah uh? This is yeah. It's
like she takes him through that logic that we've all
been through about why parent should still be the leader
and shouldn't give it up that he's gone through.

Speaker 2 (15:36):
Before, right, right, And then also the whole thing where
he's like, I just want to go back to the
way the way life was before and just be a
simple blacksmith and she's like, do I look like a
simple blacksmiths wife?

Speaker 1 (15:49):
Do you?

Speaker 2 (15:50):
Because I'll pretend for a little bit, but let's be real,
that's not the life I want. And you really should
have cognated that at this point, that you know I'm
not going to do that.

Speaker 1 (16:04):
It feels a little bit like The Green Acres if
you guys get that reference. That was on late night
TV back when I was a kid. But it was
the woman from the city who married the farmer and
they stay on the farmer's estate, and so all the
humor is that this is this high class city lady
stuck on the farm who doesn't want to do any
of the farming tasks.

Speaker 2 (16:21):
That's the plot of like a third of rom coms
around Christmas, Okay, weird Christmas movies. Relationships, that's like one
of the three things it can be Hallmark Classic.

Speaker 1 (16:35):
So are you saying, Pail Fayel and Paren's relationship is
a hallmark classic.

Speaker 2 (16:40):
No, I'm saying that paren keeps imagining it's going to
be and Fayo has to slap him and be like, no,
we're in an HBO mini series.

Speaker 1 (16:49):
We're going to go to the city. Although I do,
I kind of hate this. At first, I thought you
had something special plan for our Shanahar. I grew nervous
when you didn't mention it, Like why what do you
know about Shanahar?

Speaker 2 (17:01):
You know that's a local, like I know, I know,
it's it's a very eye of the world level. Not
everyone has the same culture as me. What Like, again,
we are on book thirteen. We know that people have
different cultures.

Speaker 1 (17:15):
You just talked about how mature you were and how
much you've come far you've come and then this, this
feels very out of place.

Speaker 2 (17:21):
You've seen two years in the world outside of the borderlands.
You know that Shannahar is not a thing couples. Do
you know that?

Speaker 1 (17:30):
Right? Right? You were like last year you were like,
why isn't anybody selling celebrating Shannahar? Like exactly. Also, No,
I couldn't find any translation for Shanahar. It's like there's
no old tongue that it seems to the old tongue,
but there's no.

Speaker 2 (17:45):
Like really, yeah, what huh weird?

Speaker 1 (17:51):
I will try again, because you seem astounded.

Speaker 2 (17:54):
I am astounded.

Speaker 1 (17:55):
I mean, I think it just means marriage celebration, right,
because that's that it's the context.

Speaker 2 (18:00):
But I'm just surprised that Sanderson would would introduce an
old tongue word and not give it a definition that
that's just weird, not.

Speaker 1 (18:07):
Have like two different words, you know, hard day, Shauna,
marriage day. I'm going to go with marriage.

Speaker 2 (18:13):
Day, fine.

Speaker 1 (18:15):
Whatever.

Speaker 2 (18:17):
The other interesting thing I think here in the sort
of build up to their meal is when parent says,
how can I feast while my people are being held
under the threat of execution and while the world itself
may die? You know, like, how can I possibly have
a good time while the world is on fire? And
Fao says Yolo basically right, Like if the world's gonna end,

(18:38):
like smoke them while you.

Speaker 1 (18:39):
Got it right, right, you can't take it with you.

Speaker 2 (18:42):
Yeah, exactly. And you know, maybe we die tomorrow, but
we're you know, alive, gloriously alive today.

Speaker 1 (18:49):
Right.

Speaker 2 (18:49):
It's a very important conversation to have as you face
down an apocalypse or three in our case. And then
part of course is just like do she want me
to yell?

Speaker 1 (19:00):
It?

Speaker 2 (19:00):
It's like, God, damn it, paren No, Obviously she doesn't
want you to fucking yell. She's trying to have a
serious conversation. How are you so dense?

Speaker 1 (19:09):
Ugh? This is the one time she's trying to meet
you on your level, not have you meet her on hers. Right,
So of course she doesn't want you to yell because
she's going to the calm place to have serious discussion
instead of sparking an argument to get your emotions out right.

Speaker 2 (19:23):
Yeah, and you're not even listening to her, You're busy
wondering if you should yell. And it's oh, nonetheless, I yell.
Had a very mature take that, like, if the world's
gonna end tomorrow, we should probably have a good time today,
Like not to the point of making the world tomorrow
end for sure, but like we can't be mired in
gloom and doom all the time. We have to live life.

Speaker 1 (19:44):
Also, so she asked Tam what the two Rivers traditions was,
and TAM's like, I don't know. I took my wife
on the picnic.

Speaker 2 (19:49):
And Tam is, you know everyone's dad, so that basically
is as good as a time on her tradition, right.

Speaker 1 (19:57):
It's like, of course it's an old saying I'm old,
and I said it.

Speaker 2 (20:00):
Uh uh huh very much so, but it's still a
cute tradition. I mean, going on a very nice picnic
is very romantic. So whatever. It's like when when Ninieve
was like, well Land gave me a ring once and
I read in a story that that means you're engaged
to be married now, right, right, even though no one
has that tradition, right, It's kind of one of those moments,
like the concept of a picnic legends, phantom.

Speaker 1 (20:23):
Myth also the concept of like a circus, right, the
big big circus that vow looks like, I wonder if
I just made it one big ten, you know, the
cont like that, all of that stuff where it's like, oh, yeah,
our modern culture is being invented here, which is in
some ways weird, right, because how would that survive another
turning of.

Speaker 2 (20:39):
The wheel, And I don't buy that. No one else
ever thought of going on a romantic two person picnic
to celebrate something like I'm sorry, but like wine and
a blanket in a beautiful field alone, with your partner, Like,
how is it people think of this? People will independently
evolve this idea.

Speaker 1 (20:54):
Right, because, like, going for a walk is a very
simple concept. But then you get hungry, so of course
you're going to bring food. And if you're gonna bring food,
you need a place to sit, so of course you
bring a blanket to sit on, right, Like it's all
very and then of course, like then you're sitting romantically
in a field on a blanket eating food. That's a picnic.
Uh huh, Like it takes about three seconds of planning
to know that, like, oh, the picnics are okay. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (21:17):
The next gem from Fayel is when she tells parent
that he's very wolf like and he goes sorry, and
she says, no, I mean that is a compliment. It's
a good thing. It's it's actually really awesome that you
have this fierce, protective loyalty and focus. And this was
not a you know, barbed comment about your table manners.
This is like an intrinsic thing about you that I

(21:39):
think is hot and is helpful as a leader.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
And then what follows is him basically saying from his perspective,
how he did everything wrong and from her perspective, how
he did what he needed to do, which was the
right thing, which is the only thing that could have
rescued her and brought like She's like, Okay, I know
you said you did everything wrong, but you rescued me.
You have an army that's bigger, that's loyal to you,
that's a unification of lots of different people. So okay,

(22:05):
maybe from the inside you didn't think you were doing
the right thing, but from the outside everything worked out.
So you did exactly what you needed to do.

Speaker 2 (22:13):
Yeah, the fake until you make it seems to have worked,
So maybe you know, get rid of the impostor syndrome
at this point.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
Maybe these last few weeks you kept saying you led
poorly during my captivity. You'd have me believe that you
led the entire camp to ruin and dust, But that's
not true at all. You kept them focused, you inspired them,
maintained a strong presence, and kept the air of a lord.
And then he's like, well, Beryline, and she's like, a huh,
stop bringing up Barrelane, Stop bringing up Berline.

Speaker 2 (22:41):
Probably stop deflecting from your success. That cand of all,
do not say that woman's name on our animals. This
is not a work meeting. Hello, observe the neckline of
my dress is not a business neckline.

Speaker 1 (22:57):
Not a business neckline.

Speaker 2 (22:58):
I'm sure she's where I addressed as are more seductive
than it is practical, you know.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
And so then he goes to reference that rumor about
him sleeping in her tent, and then File's like all
the author and He's like, but but no, shut up
all the author like, which we do see later where
she comes. They become friends essentially against their will, almost.

Speaker 2 (23:16):
Because they're very similar people, and that.

Speaker 1 (23:19):
Does fulfill the falcon and hawk on his shoulder of prophecy.

Speaker 2 (23:23):
It's the least satisfying way that prophecy could be fulfilled,
but it is fulfilled. It should have been a power
Threutle agreed.

Speaker 1 (23:34):
File is like, you can fuck him as long as
you know I'm there too, exactly because that's how they lead, right,
is like they take turns supporting him when the other
one can't.

Speaker 2 (23:45):
Uh huh uh huh. It's fine anyway. So yeah, Paren
basically decides he needs to unburden himself of all of
his anxieties about wolfy things, and Fyle you know, does
the appropriate thing, which is listen, and it's great that
he just says the things and she gets to hear them.

(24:07):
And there's no like other plots like coming through and
cutting up the conversation. It's just a solid info.

Speaker 1 (24:12):
Dump, right, It's basically his entire story. He tells her
from start to finish without leaving out any of the details,
which assuming she knows a lot of those, He's told
her about the Wolf before on some level, like she
knows he's contact with him, she knows about the dream world, but.

Speaker 2 (24:26):
He's putting it into a new context or a deeper context.

Speaker 1 (24:30):
Yeah, right, And I feel like he does get at
the root of his insecurity, which is I cannot lead them,
not until I know if I can master the wolf. Right.
He has this fear that the wolf is going to
consume him, and that, more than anything else, is why
he can't lead the people, right. And I wish that
we had leaned into that more as opposed to the no,
I don't I don't know if I'm ready. The more

(24:51):
I don't feel like I can master the wolf, and
I don't know if I will turn into a beast
and lead these people into disaster. Like I feel like
if he talked about that more and thought about that more,
I would be more convinced about his like uncertainty about
being a leader.

Speaker 2 (25:07):
Yeah. Well, but remember he's making a mountain out of
a wolf hill, right, because he's like the whole struggle
that he's worried about is just an absolute figment of
his imagination and has nothing to do with actual wolf mechanics.

Speaker 1 (25:21):
And kind of blame it on Moraine for not knowing
the truth. Right. I feel like Moraine was fed misinformation
by the White Tower and spread that to parn Yeah exactly.

Speaker 2 (25:31):
It's he's misinformed and didn't know how to ask all
I ask the right questions and is just yeah, running
from a complete figment of his own imagination and Fouji
I think, does he talk about smelling emotions in this?

Speaker 1 (25:48):
I feel like there's a point where she says it's
not fair that you can smell my emotions or something
like that. I feel like we've gone past that already.

Speaker 2 (25:55):
But yeah, yeah, I think she kind of had an
idea that he can like smell at least generally like
people and their vibe of like anxiety or tension, I think.
But for some reason, she never really calls him out
on being inconsistent about that with respect to.

Speaker 1 (26:10):
Her, right right. I just I think it's one of
those things where like you can intellectually know somebody's doing it,
but you can't really understand how it affects their ability
to understand what's going on in your head and how
they're reacting to it. Right, Like, if you're blind, it's
very hard to understand how someone can see and how
that affects you know, I feel like, yeah, that's probably
not a good analogy.

Speaker 2 (26:30):
But well, I was just relistening to a project tail Mary,
where it's not just a character is blind, it's that
they never evolved site in the first place.

Speaker 1 (26:39):
Right, Right, that's probably a better analogy.

Speaker 2 (26:41):
Yeah, yeah, it's. I mean, also, i've been still I'm
still working my way slowly through An Immense World again,
And man, that's a good book. If you want to
get try to get into the head of an animal
with a different sense of senses than you, you really
got to check that book out.

Speaker 1 (26:55):
An Immense World.

Speaker 2 (26:56):
I've told you about it umpteen times.

Speaker 1 (26:57):
Yeah, I'm sure like it.

Speaker 2 (26:59):
I'm sure it's good science. It's not science fiction. It's
it sounds like science fiction sometimes, but it does in
fact science.

Speaker 1 (27:05):
Sometimes it doesn't matter how many times someone tells you
about something. It's like you just need the right moment
or the right mood.

Speaker 2 (27:12):
So, yeah, Paren gets to the end of telling her
about all the things, and she says, I want to
tell you about Malden, which he immediately tries to shut down,
and she's like, no, I was quite what you talked,
and he shut the fuck up. And then she tells
him all about Malden and it allows her to still
keep roll on a secret, but otherwise unburden herself of

(27:32):
just the entire story, and like it sets a lot
of parent's mind at ease to just like know more
of the details of like what happened and be like, okay,
so there's something about that guy and this is how
she was mistreated by Savanna, Like it just kind of
I don't know. I think it helps him stop ruminating
a little bit because now he knows some stuff. And
so it's again it's an infodump we as the audience

(27:53):
don't need, but they as characters need.

Speaker 1 (27:56):
And I think it's also helps him to be like, oh,
she was going to escape on her own, like I
wouldn't you know.

Speaker 2 (28:02):
She's not a damsel in distress like she was herself.

Speaker 1 (28:07):
Yeah, and I do also like he kind of realizes that,
like she may have felt something for Oland, but like
he's like, honestly, at this point, he deserved to die.
He killed my people. He was with people who kill
my people. They're the enemy. Were at war, Like I
don't feel bad for fighting the enemy soldier in war
and winning, right, Like you can't make like there's there's
zero guilt there, Like even if she did care for him,

(28:29):
which I like.

Speaker 2 (28:30):
To see that, I'm really glad that he's just like, yeah,
no feelings there, no fucks given, led to the feet
old in which I've grown mind fucks and behold that
it is barren, but that it does. That line of reasoning,
though valid, does get him to think about the White
Cloaks and be like, huh, seems like everyone can.

Speaker 1 (28:49):
Have empathy for them.

Speaker 2 (28:50):
Yeah, people can have very radically different opinions about the
same events, and that doesn't mean that either perspective is
inherently incorrect. They're just different.

Speaker 1 (29:00):
And he also goes that reasoning they attacked first, right,
but they attacked the wolves first, they didn't attack the
humans first, So there is that little bit of like
that's where legally he gets into trouble.

Speaker 2 (29:11):
Right, and you know, I mean in fairness, that was
a moment in which a lot of his connection to
the wolves was manifesting. He truly did not have control
over his definition of person versus wolf and parsing it
out after the fact and trying to put it into
a legal proceeding is just not going to fit well,
it's not going to fit neatly. And then yeah, Fayla
says more about how I thought I should try to

(29:32):
adapt to your ways, and he thinks that's really sweet,
and then we have a nice fade to black on
them doing marital things.

Speaker 1 (29:42):
Which I'm glad that Sanderson didn't try and include any
sexy scenes in respect that Jordan wasn't doing that in
any of his Very okay with yeah, very okay with that,
especially having read a sanctions all this stuff. He's never
tried to do a sexy scene, which is fine. I
don't believe he would be good at it.

Speaker 2 (30:00):
Yeah, And with that, in under an hour, despite all
that meandering, we have completed the chapter.

Speaker 1 (30:07):
And this is yeah, it ends with he had fail back,
truly and completely right, this is there. You know, they've
they're done with this. Back will they won't they? Back
and forth like they're just loyal to each other. There's
no doubts, there's no anxiety about their relationship. We're done
writing about them. Will they won't they?

Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah. Again, Sometimes when Sanderson tells us things directly, I
don't mind. I'm okay with being told that. That is
in fact the end of that.

Speaker 1 (30:36):
So yeah, that's that's the parent fayl arc Yayhorn. We're done.
We get a little more. I do like the resolution
of the parent fayle. I think that's actually well done.
I don't like that it was a problem in the
first place, but I like the resolution of it.

Speaker 2 (30:55):
You know, sometimes you can stick the landing on even
a very ugly flight path.

Speaker 1 (31:12):
So now we are jumping over to Elaine.

Speaker 2 (31:16):
Well, technically Matt. This it is chapter seventeen, Matt and
Elaine Carting's and a meeting. The symbol is the lion
of Ander. But we open with Matt.

Speaker 1 (31:26):
Now in timeline wise, this is a little more in
sync with Rand, right, well or no, this is still
a little bit earlier in Rand's timeline because we get
to see him and he's probably in Eradomon in Lady
shade Maar's palace.

Speaker 2 (31:42):
Yeah, I assumed that this was chronologically ordered with respect
to Elaine's other scenes, which would mean that it is
after Veins of Gold, because last time we saw her
on page she was talking with a GWayne about how
he feels warm.

Speaker 1 (32:00):
Now, right, Okay.

Speaker 2 (32:03):
So if a lanes scenes are being arranged chronologically, then
this has to be post Veins of Gold. But I
guess this scene doesn't actually include a lane. I mean
this this POV of Matts, So I guess there's no
reason for the different povs in one chapter to be
at the same time in the timeline. Why would we
do that? That's silly. Yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (32:24):
Actually, So, yeah, I'm having a little of a harder
time placing Matt's timeline. And you know, I know where
parents timeline is because he's witnesses Veins of Gold, right,
so we can work backwards from there.

Speaker 2 (32:33):
Well, we know that we're at the point at which
news of the reconciliation has arrived, because that's why the
Isyedai are leaving, is to go back to a unified tower.

Speaker 1 (32:42):
Okay, right, and that happens doesn't that happen the same
day as Veins of Gold?

Speaker 2 (32:47):
No?

Speaker 1 (32:48):
No, because doesn't she look up and go like she
sees the warmth? Or is that that's later? You're right,
that is late.

Speaker 2 (32:53):
That's not the same day as the reconciliation. You're right
close to it.

Speaker 1 (32:57):
Because we get a flashy color swirls image from Matt's
he's Rand and he's shaving in a fine bath chamber.

Speaker 2 (33:05):
Honestly, the fact that Rand is doing his own shaving
and that scene makes me feel like it must be
post Fans of Gold, because now he's taking care of
himself and like doing his own grooming.

Speaker 1 (33:13):
Agreed, And this is so he's probably in air domon
for the second time.

Speaker 2 (33:17):
Yeah, that's what I would assume he's doing the whole Oh,
by the way, I just fixed all your grain slash.
You only opened the bad grain sax situation.

Speaker 1 (33:26):
So this is the morning after the goal. I'm attack
right right right.

Speaker 2 (33:29):
Matt rolls out from under a wagon where he was
sure that the gol I wouldn't find him because it
was so random.

Speaker 1 (33:33):
And I feel like, when was the last time we
actually saw him that. I feel like it's been a while.

Speaker 2 (33:37):
Last time was an unexpected letter, which was chapter eleven,
and we are now in chapter seventeen, so six chapters ago,
not that LONGO. Yeah, Matt's in a bad mood because
he slept poorly and his survey man got killed. So
he's grumpy.

Speaker 1 (33:55):
Okay, So this is the day after even though, so
that we saw him Chapter eight and nine is when
that happened, when the golm attacked anyway, okay, and so
he slept under a Ludra's wagon. It basically under the
chemical wagon that he was chose by rolling dice, right,
So he's being lucky. I guess I should read us
in on this one.

Speaker 2 (34:16):
Sure.

Speaker 1 (34:16):
Partings in a meeting. The morning after the gol attack.
Matt woke from dreams rotten his last month's eggs, feeling
stiff and aching. He had spent the night sleeping in
a hollow he'd found beneath the Ludra's supply wagon. He
had chosen the location by random chance using his dice.
He climbed out from under the wagon, standing and rolling

(34:37):
his shoulder, feeling it pop bloody ashes. One of the
best things about having money was not having to sleep
in ditches. There were beggars who spent nights better than this.
The wagon smelled of sulfur and powders. He was tempted
to peek under the oil tarp that stretched over the
back of it, but there would be no point. Eludra
and her powders were incomprehensible. So long as the dragons performed,

(35:00):
Matt did not mind not knowing how they worked well.
He did not mind it much, not enough to reskiritating her.
She was not there at the wagon. Fortunately for Matt,
she would complain at him again for not having gotten
her a bell founder. She seemed to think him her
own personal messenger boy, an unruly one who refused to
do his job properly. Most women had moments like that.

(35:22):
He walked through camp, brushing bits of straw from his hair.
He almost went searching for Lopan to have him draw
a bath, until he remembered that Lopan was dead. Bloody ashes,
poor man.

Speaker 2 (35:34):
It's so sad.

Speaker 1 (35:35):
His rumpled appearance feels like he's mourning Lopin. Like that's
like why he won't get cleaned up is because he's like,
my serving man is dead and I look like shit.
Like That's how he's sort of presenting his grief.

Speaker 2 (35:48):
You know, that makes a lot of sense. He won't
even like say it, but like that totally makes sense.
He's like, I can't I can't touch that. I have
to just leave it for a minute. This also reminds
me that we had some errata that Matt actually didn't
get Naram killed. He goes back to work for Telmnis
and has never mentioned again. We had that whole long
digression and then I still got corrected by Chat and

(36:10):
then I didn't mention it for episodes, and I'm sorry,
bit here. Now I've put my errata in because anyway, Yeah,
Matt and her serving man situation is a bit of
a disaster.

Speaker 1 (36:22):
Yeah. I saw that correction and I was like, oh, yeah,
I guess that, and I looked it up. I was like, yeah,
that's that's right. I didn't realize it. I just assumed
he was killed. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (36:30):
There's a lot about this podcast that's kind of starting
to wind out, the ability to comprehend all the things.

Speaker 1 (36:36):
Oh my god, there's so many details. I feel like, yeah,
I feel like I've forgotten so much.

Speaker 2 (36:40):
Yeah, I'm smoking around the ears. So yeah, Julian is
the first person to walk up we're sort of a
parade of characters in this chapter, but Juln's the first
one to show up, and it's like, so the Isidi
are leaving and me and Sarah are going with them,
So bye.

Speaker 1 (36:58):
This is the last we see of as far as
I'm aware.

Speaker 2 (37:01):
That bums me.

Speaker 1 (37:01):
He arrives in the White Tower, but we get a
letter that he and the party arrived in the White Tower,
but we never see him on screen again. So but
he and Thearah I assume have a nice, you know,
fun time in the White Tower and live without their
lives married.

Speaker 2 (37:17):
Yeah, I'm assuming they have an uneventful, happily ever after, right,
That's what I want for them.

Speaker 1 (37:22):
I feel like both characters were just like around and
nobody knew what to do them do with them for
the last few books, right, Like because Theara had a
couple of moments where like nine redeemed her for a
little while, and like I thought she was going to
have an arc where she comes out of her shell
a little bit and does something and it's like, Nope,
she's just still very timid. She's attached to Julian because

(37:44):
he's gonna protect her, right and that like that's as
far as her story ever goes, because she was traumatized twice.

Speaker 2 (37:49):
Yeah, yeah, she had a really tough time.

Speaker 1 (37:52):
And the shan chand did the worse. She came back
from the forsaken, but she didn't come back from what
the shawn Chan did to her.

Speaker 2 (37:59):
Yeah, yashan Chin have heavy arid haull energy.

Speaker 1 (38:03):
Yeah, interesting contrast to Aguain though, right, Like this person,
this queen who was supposed to be strong went through
it and so did Agwaine and it broke one of
them and not the other.

Speaker 2 (38:12):
Well, was she supposed to be strong or was she
supposed to be politically useful to the powers that be? Right?
This is the thing is Aguain was chosen for strength
and then hardened under pressure, whereas Theah was Amathra at
the time, was you know, playing politics like she wasn't hard.
She wasn't supposed to be hard. That wasn't strength. Wasn't

(38:33):
a qualifying feature of those kinds of politics. So but yes, yeah,
sometimes people don't come back from their trauma. Sometimes the
reality is that you just stay traumatized and that is
your new reality. And she found someone who wanted to
take care of her and have an uneventful life. So
I'm going to assume that that's what they have as
an extremely uneventful and content happily ever after. But Julan

(38:55):
deserved better. He did some cool shit before and he
deserved to have some kind of heroic but he survives
kind of role in the last battle that that would
have been cool.

Speaker 1 (39:06):
I feel like him and Nome almost right have the same,
Like he could have been the third that went with
Matt and.

Speaker 2 (39:14):
Tom Noel Nol not wolfboy.

Speaker 1 (39:17):
No, I'm sorry, I.

Speaker 2 (39:18):
Was like, what but juln is a wolf boy? I
don't get that at all. No.

Speaker 1 (39:22):
Yeah, Like I feel like he could have been the third, right,
he could have been the knowl if Noel hadn't been
Jane Farst Rider right, like right, and if that hadn't
been an epic ending to.

Speaker 2 (39:31):
His right, and then Matt could have done the cool
thing where like everyone lives because like he beats the
odds that hard kind of situation. Yeah, that would have
been cool.

Speaker 1 (39:40):
Be cool because I think because because Tom and Julin
spent so much time together, right that like him being
a friend to be like we've fought together side by side.

Speaker 2 (39:48):
We're not letting you go alone, Matt. We as a
team are not letting you go alone. Yeah, that would
have been cool.

Speaker 1 (39:55):
And I do like the animosity between Julan and Vanon
because Vanon's a thief and Julian's a cop. Right, we
have this tension where it's like, you break the law,
you enforce the law. But we're on the same side
right now.

Speaker 2 (40:10):
Because Matt is chaos.

Speaker 1 (40:11):
Yeah, Matt is chaos. And in fairness, Vannon hasn't broken
the law. He hasn't stolen a horse in a long time.
He's doing everything since he got recruited. He hasn't broken
the law since.

Speaker 2 (40:22):
Oh yeah, he's above board now, but he still doesn't
like cops. He's still team acab uh huh. So Matt
wanders off to the kitchen and gets buns that have
blue dye in them and then comes wandering over to
the ice to die, to prank Joelane and also say

(40:43):
goodbye to everybody else.

Speaker 1 (40:44):
Yeah, and it's sort of a braid of the women
who can channel who have been hanging out with them.
You know.

Speaker 2 (40:50):
Sanderson's like, I am jettisoning these characters as fast.

Speaker 1 (40:53):
As I He's like, goodbye Bethamn, goodbye Sida, goodbye Joe.

Speaker 2 (41:02):
He's like, I don't want to deal with this. I
don't want to write it, I don't want to remember,
I don't want to track it. They are all leaving,
they are all going to ride to the White Tower
and I will not have to think about it. And
Matt has an interesting interaction with the former schooldom right
because they have become, you know, de facto novices. They
want to go to the White Tower and learn now,

(41:22):
and they're kind of depressed and despondent and you know,
maybe we should just kill ourselves instead, YadA YadA. And
he says, go and learn how to channel and be
ready to help me deal with the empire. And yes,
rippling fallout that comes from the thing we all know,
which is that the Empress can channel. Like this is
going to be a problem for the Empire. It would

(41:43):
be very helpful if you knew what you were doing
and you were ready to help me deal with it.
And that like gives them a new thing to look
for it because they're, you know, empire oriented. They can't
stand the thought of being cast off from the empire.
He just threw them a lifeline to let them stay
connected to the empire.

Speaker 1 (42:00):
And I think that the lines like that is what
makes us really disappointed that there aren't going to be
any Outwrigger novels.

Speaker 2 (42:05):
Oh my god, Right, that's.

Speaker 1 (42:07):
The line that makes me go, oh, he knows, he
knows this is a problem, He is thinking about it.
He will fix it now. I thought there would be
more fixing of it in this book. I didn't realize
we weren't going to get to see any of that.
I thought that the fixing of it was what would
let the sean Chan enter the last battle. I am
disappointed that they didn't fix it to ender the last battle.
But this tells me that at least Matt is aware

(42:29):
of that, he's thinking about it. It's not going to
get left behind.

Speaker 2 (42:33):
Ultimately, Matt is going to get to it. It's on
his to do list. It's unfortunately low down, but it
is on the list.

Speaker 1 (42:40):
And he's got me in as an ally right mm hmm.

Speaker 2 (42:43):
And he's also setting these two up to be his
bridge Ally type people. The groundwork is laid, it truly
is being laid.

Speaker 1 (42:52):
So then he thinks about Rand, and we could see
Rand in the.

Speaker 2 (42:55):
Palace again, all of his closest friends, all of Rand's
closest are having these very Sandersonian on the page insights. Oh,
that's how Rand has been feeling. Right, Wayne understands his
sense of captivity, Paren understands being pulled in all directions.
Matt understands having people look up to him for things
he doesn't know if he can actually deliver on. Right,

(43:16):
They're all having these moments of empathy for Rand, right
as Rand is having empathy for himself. More or less.
It's all very neat and tidy and makes the plot
a lot more aerodynamic.

Speaker 1 (43:28):
And we're getting to the end of the series. You
need these characters to have these realizations to complete their arcs.

Speaker 2 (43:34):
And with how Fog of War Jordan was about some stuff.
I don't always hate Brandon Sanderson just blowing some of
the fog away and letting us actually see the architecture.

Speaker 1 (43:45):
And I remember the first time I read these, I
really did appreciate that he was spelling some of this
stuff out.

Speaker 2 (43:50):
Yeah, yeah, some of it's a little hand fisted, but
so much of it is a breath of fresh air.

Speaker 1 (43:56):
Then we deal with Bail Domon and Llewellyn, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (44:00):
Which is a cold, cold goodbye. They are not on
the best of terms.

Speaker 1 (44:06):
No, no, he does not like them at a whole.
But that's okay. But this is setting up Lluellyn to
go be Agwaine's warder. Yeah, you know, I always intended
to make my way to the White Tower. I set
my mind there on the day I left Ebudar because
she needs to go be you know one. She feels
like she needs to make up for some of the
things she does. She's done like she has a lot

(44:26):
of guilt over her actions in Ebudar.

Speaker 2 (44:29):
Right, and she has given up her connection to the Empire.
She has to find her own thing. Unlike the former
Suldom who can be toss that lifeline, there's no lifeline
for her. She has to find something new. And yeah,
the betrayed Igwaine is the best place she's got to start.
Is her biggest failure.

Speaker 1 (44:47):
So and I wish she'd become the warder much earlier
instead of gowing God.

Speaker 2 (44:51):
I freaking loved Agwaine with the surly Sean Shan ward
for her as her warder. It just the the contrasts there,
the enemies to friends dynamic that was being set up.
It was it went with her dream. I loved that
dynamic when she was like, actually, I'm gonna choose heartbreak instead.
I was very disappointed because I loved the brief moments

(45:14):
that they were a team. But yes, this is setting
up for that.

Speaker 1 (45:17):
She was never on bail domon ship, right.

Speaker 2 (45:20):
No, she almost was, right, bail Domont's ship was what
was set up to be the escape vessel when she
was gonna get broken out like she was very much
he was ready to be her ship. But then you
know the dragon reborn stuff, horna Valier, YadA, YadA, all
that happened. And I also love the idea that the
Omberlin's ward has a word right because bail Domon is

(45:41):
a bodyguard.

Speaker 1 (45:42):
Ye, not a true word right.

Speaker 2 (45:44):
So it's like the Auberlin is so important that her
warter needs a bodyguard, her get has a bodyguard. It's
very secure. It's very very secure. And then we go
and talk to the Isidi, including Joline, who gets given
the dosed buns, which is not with drugs or anything,
it's just with die but still they're crank buns.

Speaker 1 (46:03):
It turns her mouth bluw. You know one of the
things people cite when they say, well, Matt Coffin feels
childish and it's like, Eh, that feels maybe a little pranky.
That's like old school Matt, and he's like trying to
bring that old Matt back a little bit. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (46:18):
I like that. Tom says what we're all thinking on
the page, and then Matt as Sanderson as Matt, says well,
I thought it was funny to try to do an
Eye of the World as so fuck off, right, It's like,
all right, I mean, that's your Arthur real choice to
get to do that. It's a fun fourth wall breaking

(46:39):
at the end of the chapter. But before we get
to that, he does have an actual message for them
to take to the White Tower, and he says, this
is going to be easy if Agwayne is Omalin, but
even if she's not Omerlin, you still have to tell
the Omerlin that I need the Horn of ful Ear.
He doesn't say it exactly in those terms, but essentially

(46:59):
he's says, I'm going to need the Horn of Valier
real soon, so the Omberland best get that on top
of the pile in the warehouse. I don't want to
be digging around underneath crates of taranngriol. I want that
up on top, ready to go with a note, so
the secretary doesn't need to call management. I want that ready.

Speaker 1 (47:15):
So Encyclopedia Watt says that in this timeline, Elida is
still in the White Tower.

Speaker 2 (47:21):
So why are they headed back?

Speaker 1 (47:22):
I mean they asked to leave last time, and he
said yes.

Speaker 2 (47:26):
I thought they did that because they heard a rumored
that the tower was reunified.

Speaker 1 (47:31):
Let's see Tire mid Night chapter eight. They're conflicting rumors
about the White Towers and the rebels, so let's see
Towers have mid Night chapter eight. Let me go by
there for a second. That's right at the end. You've
heard the news of the White Tower news. Some say
the White Tower is being reunified, which is what you're
probably talking about. But I've also heard just as many

(47:53):
say it's still at war and.

Speaker 2 (47:55):
That the Omberland fought the last battle in Rand's place,
which is the battle on the White Tower, which is
the day before the reunificate, for two days less than
forty eight hours before the reunification.

Speaker 1 (48:05):
So okay, Encyclopedia Watt has to be wrong about that.

Speaker 2 (48:07):
Then, Yeah, that that is empirically incorrect. Sorry, Encyclopedia Wat.

Speaker 1 (48:12):
Yeah, this definitely feels like it has to be after.

Speaker 2 (48:14):
Yeah, it's if there's news of a giant battle that
was fought at the White Tower. We know when we
are in the timeline, there's no way that a rumor
like that happened before the actual event, right.

Speaker 1 (48:26):
I like that he sends his soldiers with them so
that they can bring the horses back, and so he's like,
you don't get to keep the horses. I'm like gifting
you the horses and they're like, oh, oh, well we
thought we'd get to keep them.

Speaker 2 (48:36):
Yeah, He's like, that's that's an asshole, moved Joelane. Okay.

Speaker 1 (48:42):
It's also a sneaky way to give them a guard
the whole way though as well.

Speaker 2 (48:45):
It's also a sneaky way to get any intel that
they might be able to pick up along the way.
There's many many dips that he can do with that
single chip. I also love how he casually thinks that
maybe he should go get a going out of whatever
trouble she's in with the tower, Like he like assumes
that she is on top of his was like, yeah,
probably I should probably go rescue her from being on top.

Speaker 1 (49:03):
Which is consistent with his thinking, right. He's always thinks
the girls in trouble. They're into deep I need to
go get them out, and like, what are you doing
pretending to be isaid I, Matt, we are Isaidahi. No
you're not. There's no way still in that mindset.

Speaker 2 (49:16):
I love it. It's so he is still a little
bit childish and slow. Some of sometimes non growth is
the growth we want.

Speaker 1 (49:23):
Did we talk about his message about the horn of Velier?

Speaker 2 (49:26):
I did? Yeah, yeah, I was euphemizing a lot, but yes,
that was what I was saying. And then he asks
about Satala on On because he figured, you know, all
the isid eye women are going to go, but no,
she in fact feels weird around them and wants to
try to return to her life as a stilled woman
and is actively avoiding the whole proceeding and micromanaging the

(49:46):
men cooking because that gives her something to do. Well,
the party takes off, all right, Yeah, Vannin gets sent
along to gather information. The other soldiers are Reguard. VanIn
is the intel guy.

Speaker 1 (49:56):
Because you know now that Masana needs help in the
white so Vanon's headed in that direction because he's also forsaken, right, yeah, van.

Speaker 2 (50:04):
And Dreda is a very real theory that totally holds water,
and Jilene makes one more pass at Matt, one more pass, like,
I really want you to be my warder. I could
forespaud you right now. And he's like, you are giving
me tayland ick vibes. So how about you just skid
atle with your buns good?

Speaker 1 (50:20):
Please stop with the rap rap please.

Speaker 2 (50:22):
Yeah, just go away. I don't like feeling predated on,
thank you.

Speaker 1 (50:26):
I feel like Joline and Alana how lot in common.

Speaker 2 (50:29):
Yes, very much, very much, fiery greens with a flexible
concept of consent.

Speaker 1 (50:37):
Yeah. So, and then there's the thing about Tom. At
the very end, he talks about sprinkle Wart that'll turn
her mouth blue because she eats all the sweet buns.

Speaker 2 (50:45):
It's like blue Gentien or something like.

Speaker 1 (50:48):
And he's like, I'm trying to get back to my
basic roots, you know, recapture someone I lost youth. You're
barely twenty winters old, sure, but I did a lot
of living when I was younger.

Speaker 2 (50:56):
The fourth wall has been broken to the point that
it's it's a little bit like being ground into dust
under our feet at this point.

Speaker 1 (51:03):
That's yeah, pretty hard, And it's like, shouldn't he be
a little more mature with all the memories in his head.
I feel like he's been maturing more with those memories.

Speaker 2 (51:11):
He's trying to be less mature. He's been getting more
and more integrate those memories, and he's actively trying to
pull the average back down by being extra childish. That's
literally what he says he's doing. It's very silly and
weird and whatever. And then we hop over to like
ten minutes, where he finds Mistress Anna doing her aforementioned

(51:32):
busy work to keep herself from thinking about how she
could be going back to the White Tower, but she's
not going to because she's a married woman who can't
be healed from stilling now.

Speaker 1 (51:39):
And how her moves look great, But not that he
that he was not thinking about it, not that he noticed.

Speaker 2 (51:45):
Only Joline had a predatory light in her eyes. Matt
for sure, for sure. Okay, so yeah, she asks him
what's really going on, and he says, I need you
to look after Oliver because Golam Shenanigans basically, and you're,
you know, the closest thing we have to a maternal
figure in this army. So can you take the child please?

Speaker 1 (52:06):
She says fine, but you need to get cleaned up.
You look like a mess. Get a new serving man
or something.

Speaker 2 (52:11):
Yeah, which is why he tacks it on as an
addendum to his requests from Elaine once they finally have
their meeting, is because Stala puts it in his head that, like, you,
grieving is all well and good, but you need a
serving man. That is a part of your routine at
this point.

Speaker 1 (52:26):
And then he kind of apologizes like, I'm sorry you
were stilled, and she's like the passes the past. I
shouldn't have been poking at it. I'm sorry I asked
to see her tarranngri Al, but.

Speaker 2 (52:35):
I never know how I feel about her just really
refusing to consider getting healed, because I get it, she's
got a life now, spouse and children and a life
she might not want to, you know, somehow magically outlive.
But also like, but it could be healed. I don't know.

Speaker 1 (52:52):
Maybe my head canon is that severing right when you're
cut off, that can be healed because that's a clean cut.
But and you still yourself. The way she did, that
connection is so badly destroyed that there's nothing to well.

Speaker 2 (53:06):
Sure, but she doesn't even want to try, Like that's
you know, we don't even Yeah, I totally agree that
with her having learned to live around it, it makes
sense that it wouldn't work. But the fact she doesn't
want to try is like, oh, but I get it
because like, if it worked, then she might end up,
you know, vampire outliving her husband, which would suck.

Speaker 1 (53:24):
And don't forget and like I said, she was stilled
by an accident with Taran.

Speaker 2 (53:28):
Greal, right, she was burned out. Burned out, Yeah, because
still thing is when it's intentional in burning out.

Speaker 1 (53:36):
Yeah, but yeah, stilling, soevering, gentling. Yeah, there's a lot
of terms for it because it's so bad everyone, you know,
and also we I do like that we have Age
of Legends terms as well as modern terms for a
lot of things. Yeah, that's one of the things I
really like about when you'd see lewis theren creep into Rand.
And one of the things I didn't realize on my
first couple of rereads is some of the phrases that

(53:56):
are Age of Legends phrases about channeling that he uses.

Speaker 2 (54:13):
So now we puv switched to I'm assuming more or
less the same day, but now we're with a lane
and this is the vital PUV of the chapter, and
a lot of important negotiations for the short, medium and
long term are going to happen.

Speaker 1 (54:30):
I thought we got some confirmation on our progress in
terms of her pregnancy. She felt enormous. The pregnancy was
only just beginning to show.

Speaker 2 (54:38):
Like I said last time, nineve had to double take
to notice it. And she's a healer, so she's only
just starting to show.

Speaker 1 (54:44):
So the beginning of the second trimester.

Speaker 2 (54:46):
I think that's right. Yeah. She thinks about how much
of a pain in the acid is that she has
to order maternity gowns in different sizes. All I can
think of it as the fact that they don't have
sewing machines, so all of that is handsown, all of it.
It's just a lot of seemstress is keeping her in
maternity gowns when you.

Speaker 1 (55:02):
Know these are nice gowns too. These aren't just like robes.
You know, these are very nice gowns.

Speaker 2 (55:07):
These are not shapeless things you can let extra seam
space out of. These are like nice fitted queenly gowns
that have to be set to each month. More or
less of her pregnancy progression.

Speaker 1 (55:18):
She is the queen of a giant nation. It's okay
that she has nice clothes.

Speaker 2 (55:22):
I'm just it's okay. I'm just thinking it's a lot
of labor. There's a lot of needles flying down in
the lower city to make this work. That's a lot
of shopped out labor that her people are doing.

Speaker 1 (55:35):
The ice ad I wardrobe alone probably keeps armies of
seamstresses working.

Speaker 2 (55:41):
Yeah, As I do my sewing machine podcast and learned
that really all sewing machines do is they exist to
make the needle go faster. The more I look at
stuff where it's like, oh yeah, and then fantasy person,
medieval person, whatever, just threw away their clothes, let them
get torn, let them get ten Like, that's so much labor.
Sewing it on my machine is so much slaper So
I get on a treadle is about the same amount

(56:03):
of labors and with electricity, but neat hand sewing guys
hand sewing Like okay, So when Singer first had like
an awesome machine, he I think it was Singer, but
one of they were do like speed tests with like
how fast can a single steamstress with a sewing machine,
you know, put together this shirt versus someone with a needle,
and it was like an hour versus fifteen hours, right,

(56:25):
like early days of I finally have a prototype that
can make a whole shirt without breaking. It was instantly
like a fifteen hour reduction in time. It's just it's
totally reasonable that a queen have a great wardrobe. I'm
just saying, there's so many more people employed in the
textile industry of camelin than you think.

Speaker 1 (56:44):
I kind of feel the same way when I see
like superheroes or magic destroying like buildings and I'm like, oh,
like designing and putting that up and prepping the space
for it was like years and multiple people's lives go
into making like a single building.

Speaker 2 (56:59):
You know, you have to demo the whole thing just
in order to rebuild it. Yeah. Yeah, the city is flattened.
Thank you, Superman.

Speaker 1 (57:07):
Right, It's like, yes, you save lives, but you've literally
destroyed billions of dollars worth of infrastructure.

Speaker 2 (57:12):
Yeah, Like the trains won't be roading for another two
years with what you just did to that bridge.

Speaker 1 (57:17):
Like one of the things I really like about The
Incredibles they get that part right. Oh did She also
noticed how and when she visits the garden they literally
have to carry water up the stairs to pour it
so that she gets a little creek to sit by.

Speaker 2 (57:35):
Okay, now that's some one percent shit right there. Unnecessary.

Speaker 1 (57:41):
Well, the creek only flows when I visit because we
literally have to carry the water up some stairs.

Speaker 2 (57:45):
I mean, I guess it could probably just be part
of the watering system, right like where the thing flows
out to could imitate. It could just be part of
how the regular gardening is happening. They said a few
jugs aside for that, and it I just I don't
know if you need people to carry water to the
roof for a little tinkling stream, maybe you don't need
a little tinkling stream.

Speaker 1 (58:06):
Also, like this is camelin. Do we not have the
concept that there are very simple pumps, primitive pumps that
would bring water up like water wheels? Right Like, it
feels like there should be a way to have water elevated.

Speaker 2 (58:19):
Maybe it's because of the drought. Maybe normally the cistern
is like full with rain water and it's not an issue,
but because of the drought situation, it's not. Maybe I
don't know, I don't know. It feels like going from
oh bother I have to order new maternity gowns to
the stream only flows in my presence because you have
to carry the water upstairs. It just feels like Sanderson's

(58:42):
leaning hard on how one percent it is to be
the Queen of England, I mean and or yeah.

Speaker 1 (58:48):
And then we get the oh, I'm safe because of
my baby's argument between Burgida and a Lane, and it's
two pages of I'm gonna be fine. You might not
be fine. You could lose an arm, you could be
brain dead, you could be injured horribly, they could cut
the babies out of you. No, I'll be fine.

Speaker 2 (59:09):
It's one page in my book. But yeah, yeah, it's annoying.
It's ridiculous. It's annoying. And Elaine brushes all of those
concerns aside like they are nothing. She's like, nah, that
won't happen. It's like it literally almost happens. And the
only reason it doesn't happen is because ghost Brigida gets
summoned by the horn in the nick of time. That's
the only reason you don't get Caesarean on the freaking battlefield, which.

Speaker 1 (59:36):
I mean, god, as early as she is in the
pregnant sy do you think this anyway? The babies goes
survived or is there enough time passing because she's like
farther away from the battle.

Speaker 2 (59:44):
Oh, she's about ready to pop by the time that
that scene happens. Now, she is like, the babies are
going to be born any day now when that whole
scene happens.

Speaker 1 (59:54):
Okay, so there's a big chunk of time that passes
between now and then where she is.

Speaker 2 (59:59):
Oh yeah, because she is the head general of the
actual larger army battle thing, not at shale gool, the
battle everywhere else. Yeah, she's pretty far away. And yeah,
months go by, months upon months go by, obviously, because yeah,
she is far too pregnant to be on a horse
swinging a sword at a trollic at the time she is.

Speaker 1 (01:00:19):
That's kind of crazy. Where's your dad doing your pregnancy? Oh?
He was fighting a battle the whole time? Yeah, pretty much.

Speaker 2 (01:00:26):
Right, right, right, Yeah, totally for the entire second half
of my gestational period. He was fighting one battle, not
even a war, a single battle. It was a duel. Actually,
it wasn't even a battle. It was a duel.

Speaker 1 (01:00:41):
I mean there was like Morden and niney Eve and
Morain are in there too.

Speaker 2 (01:00:46):
He was dueling with more than one. Nine even Moraine
held the power for him.

Speaker 1 (01:00:50):
I was thinking the Dark One then, and while a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:00:52):
Of was bleeding out on the thing, but the Dark
One was working through Mordon. Whatever. Whatever, It's not a
battle proper. The battles are all happening outside right anyway.
Samiko and Elise of the Kin of the Wanna Be
Yellow and Wanna Be Blue, respectively, they show up to

(01:01:12):
have Elaine have a meeting with them about the future
of the Kin, because that's we have a lot of
ideas about what the Kin could be, but there's still
a lot of room to put more ideas on the board.

Speaker 1 (01:01:24):
We also put a nail in the who was killing
the Kin storyline? Right, No more killing have mysteriously disappeared
since Careene was killed.

Speaker 2 (01:01:34):
She was behind the killings all along and done. No
loose ends, no red herrings, nothing. We're done. We're done.
We're done. Thank you Sanderson. Love that clarity.

Speaker 1 (01:01:43):
These chapters do feel like Sanderson's like bringing dangling plot
lines out back and just capping them in the head.
One of the times, like don don.

Speaker 2 (01:01:53):
Don, I would describe it more like weeding, but.

Speaker 1 (01:01:58):
Yes, yeah, weeding is a good way to put it right.
He's clearing up the garden, so only the biggest, strongest
storyline spinning.

Speaker 2 (01:02:05):
Yeah, yeah, he's sinning down the starts and being like, no,
we can't have three tomato plants here. That's simply too
many tomato plants. One tomato plant will survive, the other
two need to go, thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:02:14):
The problem is these aren't starts though, These are giant,
viny tomatoes that are choking each other out because they've
been intertwined for fourteen books.

Speaker 2 (01:02:23):
Yeah, it's an abandoned garden being cleared out, and you
have to make some rough choices on an old, abandoned
garden in order to make it pretty and manageable again. Because,
as we've said many times, Jordan was a gardener as
a writer. That was his style. And yeah, this one
has been left to go wild at this point, and

(01:02:43):
like some of the grape plants have gotten into the
pathways and they are going to need to be extricated entirely. Yes,
you're a lovely grape plant, but I need that pathway,
thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:02:53):
And it's also it's not like he's pulling out these
healthy plants. They've lived their life span. They've told their
story right, these storylines are done, like, we don't need
to go back and talk about them again.

Speaker 2 (01:03:02):
Yeah, you just you need a rake, you need some loppers,
you need a brushwhacker. We just goett to clear this out.
It's too much. It's a fire hazard.

Speaker 1 (01:03:12):
And so there's this sort of back and forth between
the Kin and Elaine. Basically, but essentially, something comes to
Elaine being like, so where are you gonna live? You're
gonna live here in Camlan. Let's make a deal.

Speaker 2 (01:03:23):
Basically, she says, you're at a crossroads, and I am
almost also at a crossroads. Why don't we build a
very successful business together? And then she pitches the wildly
radical concept of imagine a city free of disease where
people can just get healing. Blah blah blah. I'm just like,
yelo aja, are you listening? Like the Yellow Wagia could

(01:03:45):
have been doing this in every capital city of the
known world. This could have been all of tarval and
and every capital city and it's.

Speaker 1 (01:03:53):
Just and how good of a recruiting tool would that
have been?

Speaker 2 (01:03:55):
Again, Sanderson, as a fan of the books, being like,
this should have been happening, and I'm gonna make it
happen now, and I love that for him and us.
And yeah, great recruitment tool. Here's a bunch of retired
eyes to die doing end of career stuff telling you
everything you need to know about your potential career in
the White Tower. Pretty good.

Speaker 1 (01:04:16):
And then you have people in cities who can identify
people who can channel, who come to them for healing
and send them off to the White Tower, right, Like
you have a local representative where you can be like,
I need healing, and while you're there, you're like, I
can channel, well me, you know, like that level of
like it's cover.

Speaker 2 (01:04:33):
So many less people would die or get other people
hurt in the process of learning how to channel. Right,
you have way higher retention rate of people instead of
people's burning out or going insane because.

Speaker 1 (01:04:43):
They you know, there's a reason every city needs a
planned parenthood. I mean, can location the free healthcare for
women is and then under the cover of bringing them
and recruiting them into and getting help from the whatever
situation they may be in.

Speaker 2 (01:04:59):
Yeah, exactly, And Camelin is a great place for that
model to start. If it's not going to start in Tarvalin,
then I guess Kamelin's going to step up to the
plate and get that ball rolling.

Speaker 1 (01:05:10):
How do you think the raising of Camlin affects this.

Speaker 2 (01:05:13):
I think they're one of the leaders in building back.

Speaker 1 (01:05:16):
Do you think after the last battle, Gamelin's just rebuilt
and basically everything. Yeah, it's been.

Speaker 2 (01:05:20):
Around since the end of Arda Hawking's empire. It's got
the love of the Dragon reborn living there. I foresee
the city being rebuilt and the Kin being a really
big part of it, and probably the Black Tower two
being a really big part of putting that city back together.

Speaker 1 (01:05:35):
I can actually see it be like the first city
rebuilt by male and female channelers and be like all
the beauty and like they can construct things that are
like supernatural. It's like the first city truly built with
the power. Like I could see that being really cool.

Speaker 2 (01:05:48):
Yeah, and then it would be not in a rivalry
with Tarvalin for being an epic city, but it would
be in the same league because it would be the
first city built with that collaboration since breaking and it
would be a center of power, but a different center
of power, not a competitive center of power, just a
different one.

Speaker 1 (01:06:06):
Probably built by the Ogear because they're back involved.

Speaker 2 (01:06:09):
Oh, they would be back for sure. Yeah, Loyal would
insist on making the very best memorial library wing to
rand ever.

Speaker 1 (01:06:17):
You know. Yeah, and so she makes the deal basically like,
I want gateways and healing healings for free, and you
can make some money off the gateways, and we'll all
get rich off the gateways basically.

Speaker 2 (01:06:29):
Right, because trade has always been the lifeblood of an
empire's economy. We're just tapping into that with new technology.

Speaker 1 (01:06:36):
No logistics, right, Like being able to supply your armies
that more than anything else. Is how like the US
is still winning across the world with our armies. Is
not necessarily the quality of our weapons or anything like that.
It's the fact that we can get food, weapons, and
troops pretty much anywhere we want within twenty four hours
and probably faster. We're talking about the US military.

Speaker 2 (01:06:58):
It's what made the Roman empires so effective at Roman
empiring was their ability to do logistics and build roads
and effectively move units of men and material around. Like
it's it's a really great way to be both militarily
and economically powerful.

Speaker 1 (01:07:16):
And yeah, and I don't believe the ogear would read
the Book of Translation right after the last battle. I
think they're going to be around for another age.

Speaker 2 (01:07:23):
Yeah, I don't see them taking off just as soon
as the world starts to get better. That seems like
an odd choice.

Speaker 1 (01:07:29):
Right, It's like, yes, they do need to do the
Book of Translation, but they have nothing. This is only
the Fourth Age, right, they have until the first they're
not in the first Age. But that's three more ages
they could be involved in. Right. We don't know what
the event is that has them actually read the Book
of Translation, but it's not the Last Battle, and it's
not the aftermath of the Last Battle.

Speaker 2 (01:07:46):
Yeah, I assume it's the end of the fourth or
maybe the fifth Age is like part of that conclusion
is the ending of the era of o Gear. But yeah,
not the Fourth Age. The fourth Age will still have
ogier masons because like Loyal's book existence stuff, and you
think he's not going on a book tour nah.

Speaker 1 (01:08:02):
Right, right, yeah, he'd have to be there, right his book, right,
all those quotes of the Fourth Age. Yeah, that's a
good point exactly.

Speaker 2 (01:08:09):
Elise and to Mako have a little bit of a
not exactly power struggle, but they have two different approaches
to how they want to deal with the White Tower, right,
Elise is very skeptical, whereas to Mako is gung ho
for the Tower. Right, she is the Elaine in this situation,
whereas Elise is more like the nine Eve, which makes
sense because they're both yellow. But it's like, if the
White Tower doesn't want me, I don't want the White Tower.

(01:08:31):
I'm not going to accept second class citizenship status in
that frame.

Speaker 1 (01:08:37):
Right well, And their difference in attitude is one of
them has the power to go become an ICID eye,
the other one doesn't. Right See, one of them is
going to stay in the cant one of them is
going to become an ICID eye. And so a lot
of ways they have different motivation.

Speaker 2 (01:08:48):
Yeah, And to Mako just can't imagine that someone doesn't
want to be a nice to die and doesn't want
to consider iside the best and like, no, there are
other people with different abilities out there who can't do
what you can do, and they actually would like to
be considered full human beings with full status and rights
and respectability in their own right, even if they can't

(01:09:08):
meet your standard. And also like so makeup will be
back in the kin someday if she becomes us to die,
I cantire.

Speaker 1 (01:09:20):
That is kind of funny. That would be an interesting
power dynamic because like for everybody else, right, it's kins
by age. Although Elaine does say she wants to push
them to restructure how they choose leaders.

Speaker 2 (01:09:30):
But like, I hope they do.

Speaker 1 (01:09:32):
Well, what structure are they going to use?

Speaker 2 (01:09:34):
Right, Like, we don't know at least is in charge,
but why that's the structure? These are nine of rules
because I said, so, okay, yeah, I don't know, but
I think that they'll figure out some sort of meritocracy
style thing where like the people who want to be
in charge have the ability to vote amongst themselves, like
who's going to be in charge for the next year

(01:09:56):
or something like that.

Speaker 1 (01:09:57):
I thought the age thing would be interesting because then
you always have the the oldest isid I are always
going to be the youngest kin, and so you all
have these I sid eye of no matter what power level,
they come in at the beginning, at the lowest level
of the kin because they're the youngest.

Speaker 2 (01:10:11):
I mean, that would be funny. That would be funny.
So I kind of like that, Yeah, who knows, who knows? Yeah,
the Ayeale system kind of works. You just kind of
declare your status and people affirm it or not.

Speaker 1 (01:10:26):
You have to have an internal sense of honor. And
they also have a hazing system, right, you have to
go through the tests. Yeah, and that does kind of
prevent anyone who doesn't follow your way from getting in.

Speaker 2 (01:10:38):
Well, maybe once they have the ideal exchange program at
the Sea Folk Exchange Program, we'll have a little more
of a diverse cultural stewpot from which to try to
draw ideas and build something that actually works for women
who are looking at their fourth century of life and
restructuring of how they've lived their whole lives up until
that point.

Speaker 1 (01:11:00):
Yeah, the fuckery from Savannah. Savannah did the same thing
Trump did, where she walked in and said, well, technically,
all these things you've been saying are just custom, and
I can ignore them because it's not law, and therefore
I get away with everything because no one has a
law to stand on. I'm just breaking custom and you
might not like that, but you can't legally stop me.

Speaker 2 (01:11:21):
You know, that's actually a really good comparison that we
as a phantom have not made enough. You know, there's
a lot of mileage in the Alida comparison, but there's
a lot of untapped mileage in a Savannah comparison, because yeah,
if you're willing to throw out custom you can get
away with a lot of stuff in a way that
someone who still feels obliged to follow the law, like Elida. Right,

(01:11:42):
Alida screams, I am tower law. It matters to her
that she is doing something legally, Savannah, it doesn't.

Speaker 1 (01:11:50):
Well, but she says her word makes it legal, so
that's kind of well.

Speaker 2 (01:11:54):
But still the delusion in her head is that the
law matters. Savannah's just like, but what if it didn't?

Speaker 1 (01:12:01):
And also just the incredible desire for wealth over everything
else and using her personal power to acquire wealth.

Speaker 2 (01:12:06):
Yeah, this is an underutilized comparison for sure. All right,
rob Weekly, we all news. This is your assignment maybe
Savannah Trump comparison that, yes, AND's what you've been doing
with Alida, that's your assignment.

Speaker 1 (01:12:21):
Does this creepy thing about bluebells that had flowered bread
and bled when someone cut them? And now there's like
an like again just the corruption, just more corruption. The
dark one is reaching out and touching the world.

Speaker 2 (01:12:32):
I like that. The corruption is getting weirder and more subtle.
It used tould just be a big binary something is
wrong now. It's like, oh, the flowers are flowering. They're
flowering blood, but they are flowering. It's not that they
won't grow it. I like that it's creeping into smaller

(01:12:52):
and smaller little pieces of reality. And yeah, Elaine sort
of reflects on why she's doing all of them, and
it's because after the last battle, the shawn Channer is
still going to be a problem and she needs to
be ready to deal with that because she is a
far seeing queen.

Speaker 1 (01:13:11):
Sooner or later, the shawn chann will be able to travel.
All they needed to do is capture Alia, I mean,
one woman who knew the weaves.

Speaker 2 (01:13:17):
So strategic thinking. She knows that their biggest asset is
incredibly weak to that human weakness, like if you get
one person, one is all it takes and it will
spread like a virus.

Speaker 1 (01:13:29):
And since we think this is after the battle, right,
because the rumors of the battle has spread to Matt
that this they've got her, right, it's too late, like
they have already got traveling.

Speaker 2 (01:13:39):
Elena is thinking about this as the problem is developing.
She's like, hmm, I should plan for that eventuality. We
know it is in the act of becoming no longer
an eventuality.

Speaker 1 (01:13:51):
And then she thinks about recruiting the Black Tower, right
because their ann on dooran soil, and like how they
could you know, if she's got the Black Tower and
the can that's a real edge against the shawn Chan.

Speaker 2 (01:14:01):
Which she's not wrong, and you know, the Black Tower
as it currently stands terrible idea, but the Black Tower
as it will exist after the last battle, it's going
to be well set up for that. Logan will have
had his whole epiphany about how helping people is going
to like keep him saying for the rest of his
life and fighting back against the shawn Chan, I think

(01:14:22):
will meet that criteria for his career.

Speaker 1 (01:14:25):
Well. And don't forget the shawn Chan now have copies
of the Mail Adam, so they are a real threat. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:14:31):
Yeah, so teaming up with and Or would be very
smart for the Black Tower in terms of the how
do we deal with the shan Chan and their belligerents
and slavery.

Speaker 1 (01:14:40):
You know, this kind of reminds me of like getting
ready to fight Russia after the World War Two, where
it's like, yes, the Germans are the enemy, but once
they're defeated Russia's going to be a problem. And like
how much brinksmanship and stuff was going on before the
end of the war, and that's what led to the
East West Germany or East West Berlin divide that like

(01:15:00):
a bunch of landies West Germany.

Speaker 2 (01:15:02):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Now that's a really good comparison. Like, yes,
obviously we have the one enemy, but that is the
only reason we're on the same team. We were enemies
before this third party showed up, and we will go
right back to being enemies as soon as they are
adult with That is a very realistic comparison, and it's

(01:15:23):
not bad. Yeah. If you don't, you're just asking to
be swallowed up. And it's depressing and stupid and realistic.

Speaker 1 (01:15:32):
And I think that brings us to the Renot.

Speaker 2 (01:15:35):
Yeah, I agree. She needed something, an edge against the
shan Chan, something to balance their channelers in combat. The
only thing she could think of was the Black Tower.
It was on and or soil. She'd told them that
she considered them part of her nation, but so far
she'd gone no further than sending inspection parties. What would

(01:15:55):
happen to them if France died? Dared she try to
claim them dared she wait for someone else to which
is a good question, because someone will.

Speaker 1 (01:16:07):
Someone will. But you know, white Towers. No one's claimed
the White Tower. They are nationalists. They exist in a
space between and Or Khyrien and the Borderlanders.

Speaker 2 (01:16:16):
But if she tries to insist on asserting power over
them and they don't like it, they will make alliance
with one of her enemies. So yeah, you can't put
that off forever. But yeah, there you go. There's two chapters.
First one didn't have much and the second one had
a lot of plot jettisoning. Yeah, a lot of characters
and plots.

Speaker 1 (01:16:37):
Being removed from weeding.

Speaker 2 (01:16:39):
Stage, lots of weeding, lots and lots of This was
a weeding chapter.

Speaker 1 (01:16:43):
It was a weeding chapter, a weed out chapter. But
it's had some fun, fun little stuff in it.

Speaker 2 (01:16:48):
But yeah, I enjoyed it. But that's really all I've got.
It was not a lot of large implications, just a
lot of plot purning and yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:16:58):
I hope, yes, a little bit of recap a little
more parent next chapter, Parent and fail, a little Rousla
Gialta And that's more Matt. So actually, very very similar.
Next week will be very similar. I feel like to
this these two chapters same same kind of like taking
these plot lines and we're in the stage now where

(01:17:19):
like we're not recapping anymore, but we are like he's
moving his pieces into place to get ready for the
sander lanch. But you got to set the sander lanch up,
and that's what There's a lot of sort of moving
pieces around the board where you're like, this doesn't feel
like a lot's happening, but pieces are moving and things
are getting set up for the end.

Speaker 2 (01:18:22):
Let's termed recording on before anymore of this good content
gets lost recording.

Speaker 1 (01:18:27):
So yeah, you're saying you going back and been listening
to early chapters of Real Time for sleep Aids.

Speaker 2 (01:18:32):
Yeah, it's really funny like having Paren now being like, oh,
there was this thing that happened to me, and then
I'm falling asleep to like the actual chapter where those
events happened. It's been a very interesting pairing of just
like oh, yeah, that is how that went down, and
Paren really doesn't ever let it go, like those are
such formative events anyway. Conking out now.

Speaker 4 (01:18:57):
It really helps because then when I wake up in
the middle of the night, I can tell that time
has passed I can even approximate how much time has
passed and anticipate potentially how much time is left.

Speaker 2 (01:19:09):
And if I can't fall back asleep, at least I'm
listening to something very very comforting and Man nineteen ninety
Michae Kramer and Kate reading like the recording is so
much warmer because it was analog and their voices are
so much younger, and it's just such a different experience
from now.

Speaker 1 (01:19:27):
Yes, no, I love listening to them. I especially like
it because when I wake up, if there's not something
to occupy my mind, my mind will find something to
occupy itself, and that's often something that will keep me awake.
And so having an audiobook on when I wake up
just lets me go, oh yeah, we have time right

(01:19:48):
back to sleep, you know.

Speaker 2 (01:19:50):
Uh. And if I don't fall back asleep, oh no,
I'm listening to my favorite books or listening to it
right right, yeah, right, like, because there's been times where
it's like, okay, that's a chapter, but whatever is fe.

Speaker 1 (01:20:00):
Then I'm reading right, which is not a bad thing.

Speaker 2 (01:20:02):
Exactly, and like, yeah, it's just it's been It's plus
my sleep aid is also blackout I Mask, which has
been amazing. It really, it's amazing. I live in a
dark place, but man, blackout glasses or blackout masks still
improves my sleep quality.

Speaker 1 (01:20:22):
You've sold me on one of those, and I keep
meaning to buy it and then I have not, so
keep bringing it up until I buy myself one, because.

Speaker 2 (01:20:29):
Yeah, it's it's awesome. The only struggle I'm having is
with the charging cable. It broke very quickly, and the
fix I have for it means that the little control
panel is not properly positioned like where it's supposed to be.
Got it because you can take the electronics out because
you have to wash it right. So but yeah, I

(01:20:49):
can show you in person. It's I'm a little annoyed
that the electronics were not so great, but I'm happy
that they had a spare port for charging to go
into that thing. So it was a simple enough little
cable fix. But it's the pain in the ass and
it should have been made better in the first place.

Speaker 1 (01:21:06):
But oh well, welcome to in shitification.

Speaker 2 (01:21:12):
Yeah, so, you know, I wanted to recommend the company
because they were one that I didn't get advertised by
because when I started looking them up, right, you get
advertisements and I sort of as I don't know if
it's like a PDA thing or just like an anti
capitalism thing, but I try really hard not to buy
the thing that gets advertised to me hardest, Like, if
someone wants to spend that much money advertising their product
to me, I'm going to spite them and not buy it, right,

(01:21:34):
So I try to like use advertisings to get an
idea of like what is the price and design feature
kind of spread amongst the big boys, and then I
go try to find, you know, a smaller boy to
actually buy it from. And yeah, this company's fine, I guess,
but the main electronic breaking like almost immediately is like, ah,

(01:21:55):
maybe try a different brand that isn't one of the
big boys.

Speaker 1 (01:21:58):
It tells me that the electronics are probably all made
cheaply by the same company and then bought by these
companies and repackaged and sold as their own sleep aid.

Speaker 2 (01:22:08):
I mean, I'm assuming that, yeah, they're buying the electronics
and then making the mask, because they were very proud
of the mask. The website spent a lot of time
talking about the construction of the masks. I think that's what.

Speaker 1 (01:22:18):
They made themselves.

Speaker 2 (01:22:20):
Then the electronics installed were yeah, and you know I
tried to buy not the cheapest ones out there, but
apparently I need a different one. Well, I don't need
a different one. I need to continue repairing the one
that I have. But if I'm going to give out
a recommendation, it would be to do your own research
and roll the dice on your own. I don't have
a strong recommendation.

Speaker 1 (01:22:41):
I had not invested in buying ten different masks and
trying them out over an extended period of time to
recommend the best. I've tried out one and it's kind
of been shitty.

Speaker 2 (01:22:48):
No, it's a comfortable mask. It's fine. But the charging
part breaking immediately is like, eh, you're not going to
get my word of mouth recommendation. Sorry, Like buy better
electronics and then charge more for them, and then I
might buy them or not because I was looking whatever.
It's fine. None of this is relevant to anything except

(01:23:10):
convincing you that you need some kind of blackout assistance
with your sleeping experience, which does not have to have
headphones installed. Right, the blackout part is not electronic. That
part is very mechanical.

Speaker 1 (01:23:21):
Yeah, I'm trying my sleep aids right now. I'm on
a rotation I was Dresden Files, Bob Averse, Dungeon Crawler Carl. Yeah,
I think there's a couple more, a little bit of
Andy Weirs thrown in there, a little of Alistair Reynolds. Yeah,
just some of the books I've been reading lately. A
lot of more sci fi in my mix than fantasy lately.

(01:23:43):
Is one thing I've noticed, very very little fantasy is
making it into my rotation. A lot more sci fi
has been falling in my lap. And depending on what
you call this, is also that overlap, right, like Dungeon
Crawler Carl, Aliens come to Earth, But it's real fantasy,
right because it's magic, But the magic is science.

Speaker 2 (01:24:00):
Is there technology or a chosen one? Is there a
chosen one? Because that's a distinguishing feature. You have taught
me this.

Speaker 1 (01:24:07):
Ah, he's yeah, you know this is he's not necessarily
the chosen one. He's he could have been anybody. It's
more of right place, right time.

Speaker 2 (01:24:17):
Then that makes it hi fi.

Speaker 1 (01:24:18):
So it feels more sci fi to me.

Speaker 2 (01:24:19):
Yeah, I'm sure there's other distinguishing features, but I'm pretty
sure that's the important one. Is is it the technology
and the accident of time and place or is it
that you were always destined to be this person? And
it's very cosmic.

Speaker 1 (01:24:32):
I mean, but no one has feet they're as pretty
as his, so that might have a lot to do
with it. Is the attractiveness of his feet?

Speaker 2 (01:24:40):
Well there it is. Then you don't even know what
to say to that.

Speaker 1 (01:24:43):
For those of you who have not read it, you're
very confused. For those so you had or nodding along
going yeah, of course, that makes total sense.

Speaker 2 (01:24:52):
I am getting convinced from many angles that I need
to try these books because you are, by no means
the only person who has been talking them up positively
in my digital earshot recently.

Speaker 1 (01:25:02):
Mm hmm and yeah. And and what I'll say is
I thought they were good books for the first three,
and then I thought they were great books for the
last three. So that's that's sort of my my baseline
of like, because I feel like he does a good
job in the first three. He sets up a lot
of things, but it is, you know, the first book
definitely feels like a tutorial, right, this is how you

(01:25:22):
play the game, you know, And for me that's that
was like middlely entertaining and also some of the more
my favorite characters don't get introduced to the last three books, right,
So it's like there's this sort of build up of
more and more characters that you like more and more
as well as you know, I feel like the plot
gets more complicated. It's less focused on this is how
you play the game and more focused on plot. And

(01:25:44):
then the thing that I love about it the audio. One,
the audiobooks are really good, but two, I feel like
it does something that I haven't seen since Wheel of Time,
which is create a rich story for background characters by
showing you what those characters are doing, doing little snippets
and forcing you to reconstruct what's actually happening with their lives.

(01:26:06):
It doesn't tell you what's going on with the background
characters' lives, but it's full and rich enough that you
kind of reconstruct it.

Speaker 2 (01:26:13):
So should we make that our first time read podcast?

Speaker 1 (01:26:16):
I think so, and honestly, and the two reasons one
because I do think you should read them, and two
because they are getting so popular so fast.

Speaker 2 (01:26:28):
We could write a popular way. We could try to
be with the cool kids.

Speaker 1 (01:26:31):
I think we might actually have a chance of making
it commercially successful, unlike some of our other you know,
there's a bunch of other books from the eighties. I
would love to go back and do. There's some of
my favorite series, you know, something like either Broken Earth
I thought was a great idea, but that's always going
to have a very niche market, something like Dungeon Crawler
Carl is currently exploding and can be. I feel like

(01:26:53):
it's one of those book series that is popular with
the jocks, it's popular with the nerds, it's popular with.

Speaker 2 (01:26:59):
The with girls. Is it popular with girls?

Speaker 1 (01:27:04):
It does seem to be. I think it is more
popular with men, like for sure. But I think and
you'll have this is one of those things where you'll
have to tell me because I'm a guy, and I
honestly haven't had a chance to talk to very many
people about this except you, and you haven't read it, right.

Speaker 2 (01:27:21):
That could be pretty fun.

Speaker 1 (01:27:22):
But here's what I'll say is I know at least
two people at work who've read it already, and the readers,
but still like it's that level of popularity where it's
it's impacted. They haven't read a lot of the other
series we're talking about. So okay, so athlon saying all
the women in these book club love it so well.

Speaker 2 (01:27:41):
I mean, I seriously, like, I mean that the chat
is proving my point that, like so many people across
all of Discord and even I think in other platforms
are like talking about this book series and I'm like,
I'm starting to feel left.

Speaker 1 (01:27:52):
Out, like so and I guess here's what I'll say
is I was like, hey, never, my wife like you
you should I keep talking about the series. So she's like,
should I listen to it? Because she's also been getting
into audiobooks a lot more recently, mostly into The Fairy
Smutt But I think that has then gotten her into

(01:28:12):
the habit of reading audiobooks, and there was only so
much of that to listen to, and now she's like, actually, oh,
I want to listen to an audiobook sometimes, And I'm like, well,
here's Dungeon Crawler Carl, and she blew through the book
first book. And I can always tell that she likes
it if she listens to it when I'm not around, right,
because we'll listen to books together and we'll get into
them for a little bit. But if she doesn't listen

(01:28:32):
to it when I'm not around, I'm like, okay, you don't,
You're not like that into it. You'll just like humoring me.
But if she starts being like, oh no, I got
I listen to a bunch of chapters while your work,
I'm like, all right, you're hooked. I gotcha, and Dungeon
Crawler Carl got her.

Speaker 2 (01:28:45):
Well, I am currently in the market for a new audiobook, so.

Speaker 1 (01:28:52):
Well, I mean, if you want to do try a
new reader podcast, we could we could talk about maybe
recording another like doing your ex for a long recording
session on Tuesdays and seeing if we want to put
something together.

Speaker 2 (01:29:05):
I'll give the audio book a spin, and if I
get a few chapters in and I like it enough,
like you know, the production, and can kind of imagine
myself podcasting enough, then we can then we can talk.

Speaker 1 (01:29:17):
And I feel like we can do it in bigger chunks,
like we don't have to do it by chapter by
chapter necessarily. Sure, especially in the beginning. I think later
on we'd want to go chapter by chapter, But in
the beginning, I think there's enough.

Speaker 2 (01:29:28):
Yeah, yeah, I'll give it a spin, and then if
I like it enough to try, we can make some content,
you know, without really getting too committed to a project.
And if that feels like it's a rhythm that we
can maintain. Then we can do the thing where we
actually set up a podcast and will already have some
recording exactly in the bag to get started with. I'm
learning how to launch podcast.

Speaker 1 (01:29:48):
I'm learning, and you and I at this point have
launched so many podcasts, some together, some not together, that
I feel like it should go very smoothly. Yeah. Yeah,
but it'll be a really interesting do the first time
reader podcast. I mean, try not to spoil everything for you.
That's gonna be the hardest part. Different dynamic, be a
very different dynamic because I'll have to go back and

(01:30:11):
listen to the wheel weaves in the podcast and like,
how how to do a first time reader podcast?

Speaker 2 (01:30:17):
Oh yeah, you'll have to talk to Brett and yeah,
and like form a little support group of Yeah, that's
I'm in the market for a new audiobook, so I
think I'll give that a spin and we will let
you dear listeners know how that goes. But in the meantime,
should we turn our attention to this podcast?

Speaker 1 (01:30:38):
Oh, we're only an hour late for a super double
long chapter. I don't see why we should get started.
I have no nowhere to be or anything to do
besides this.

Speaker 2 (01:30:48):
Yeah, that's why we get paid the big buck. The
big bucks. Having fallen to below seven hundred dollars a
month for the first time in my history of being
on the podcast in Patreon, I noticed that threshold got passed.
It's been on a slow, precipitous decline. This is not

(01:31:10):
like anything surprising, but it's like, ah, do we crossed
a arbitrary line that I'm assigning value to.

Speaker 1 (01:31:16):
Well, it's we're coming to the end of the series, right,
and I think you and I have both you know,
I don't know. I think that that there's a certain
drop off for people, like, Okay, they've gotten through the
Jordan stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:31:28):
Yeah, that's certainly how I feel about it. We're just
on mop up now.

Speaker 1 (01:31:34):
So there's a lot of reasons why we're talking about like, hey,
maybe we should try something different, right like r at
this point where it's like the money's dropping off, I'm
not sure the listenership hasn't really dropped that.

Speaker 2 (01:31:43):
Much, a very small amount, but that might also just
be a migration of people over to the Patreon sure method,
I have no way of seeing those numbers, right, so right,
but yeah, no, this thing is is running its course, right,
winding down on every.

Speaker 1 (01:31:58):
Level makes sense exactly, Like we.

Speaker 2 (01:32:00):
Still have a year and a half to go, but
like it is very much near the end compared to the.

Speaker 1 (01:32:07):
Beginning, right, Yes, yes, when you're on thirteen out of
fourteen books, you're closer to the end in the beginning
for sure, for sure. So yeah, I think that that's
I think trying something new like Dungeon Crawler Carl, which
is on this exploding pathway through the fandom, I think
it's a good time to maybe take advantage of that.
I think we have the chops to launch something pretty
quick and get on top of it. And it's on

(01:32:30):
book seven. There's three books left, you know. It's one
of those things where I think it could be finished
by the time we get caught up.

Speaker 2 (01:32:38):
Chapter sixteen shah Nahar, the symbol being the Blacksmith puzzle.
Thank you for listening to the Wheel of Time Spoilers podcast.
Please rate and review us on your podcast app and
consider supporting us on Patreon for ad free episodes. Watt
Spoilers is a production of Fox and Rape Media. For

(01:33:01):
more podcasts from Fox and Raven Media, visit our website
at Foxendravenmedia dot com.

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Shanna’har & Partings, and a Meeting - Towers of Midnight chapters 16 & 17 - EP554

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Shanna’har & Partings, and a Meeting - Towers of Midnight chapters 16 & 17 - EP554