Subject: WH: Girl Power (SPOILERS)

From: [email-masked] (P. Korda)
Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2000 06:14:28 GMT

Third in a series, this one concerning Elayne's story.

Spoilers.



THE CHICKS:

Even with the gratuitous nudity, the first-sister ceremony was really, 
really good.  It seems to be much more serious than the Aiel marriage 
ceremony, and the sister-bond is certainly beyond anything we know about 
husband-wife relations.  This, I suppose is in line with what we know of 
how the Aiel value marriage relations, compared to adopted first-sister 
relations.  (A man is expected to marry both first-sisters, even if he only 
likes one of them.)  I wonder the relationship between non-adopted 
first-sisters is considered to be nearly so important.

The Sea Folk are still annoying.  Elayne really needs a serious political 
advisor, like Thom, to help her negotiate with them, as well as with 
everybody else.

We know from two sources that there is one BA among the AS with Elayne. I 
would bet that this person is the one who killed Adeleas and Ispan. 

We can forget about Aviendha being pregnant.  For one thing, she would not 
have done the first-sister ceremony if she knew she was with child, since 
"the unborn are not strong enough for [the ceremony]."  If she was 
pregnant, she'd know, because Nynaeve Delved her at the beginning of TPOD. 
>From WH (p.  274), we see that Delving is a _very_ thorough examination, 
and surely it would detect something so significant as a second-trimester 
pregnancy.  Furthermore, any plot potential from having somebody be 
pregnant with Rand's kid will be fulfilled by Elayne, so there is no point 
in Avi being pregnant, too.

Having said that, Min's visions of Randspawn are a little disturbing.  
Firstly, holy multiple births, Batman!  Second, what's up with Avi's 
quadruplets? I really don't think Randland has the technology to deal with 
a quadruple pregnancy. Maybe two of them are Elayne's? Then we _would_ have 
two women pregnant with Rand's kids, which does seem rather redundant. 

Aviendha and Min seem to get along okay. Which, IMO, is too bad. I'd 
expect a little more animosity between two strangers who are both in love 
with the same guy. 

Tangentially related to this topic, there seems to be some disagreement on 
this newsgroup as to whether she is suspicious of Hanlon or not.  
Personally, I think that she is clueless.  The furthest her 'suspicion' 
goes is thinking that he's a little sleazy.  "Keeping an eye on spies" is 
one thing, but deliberately making one into the captain of your bodyguard, 
putting him in a postition to hire more spies, or even kill you at will, is 
just plain nuts. 

Birgitte: Min as a vision of an ugly older man, and then of an ugly younger 
man.  Obviously Gaidal Cain, in his archetypal form, and then in his recent 
incarnation, some years into the future.  Note that this doesn't tell us 
anything as to whether Olver is GC. We know that GC has been spun out, and 
when he grows up will be an ugly man, significantly younger than Birgitte.  
That will be true whether he is Olver, or Joe Al'Schmoe.  This vision does, 
however, settle the question of whether or not Birgitte is still bound to 
the wheel.  She is still tied to Gaidal Cain, which, IMO, says that she is 
still playing out her archetypal part.  As I have been saying for a long 
time, getting "ripped away" from TAR was just the Wheel's way of spinning 
her out, this time 'round.

Talene the Sea Folk Super-channeller wants to run away and be Aes Sedai, 
and she's under the impression that Nynaeve has said she could. 
Nynaeve, methinks, would do well to postpone returning to Caemlyn.

Wild-Assed guess on the eventual future of the White Tower: a place for 
all the different channelling societies to get together and learn from each 
other, in a non-confrontational manner.

The chapter prior to El's meeting with the BoTO army is one of the most 
boring things I have ever read. 

El's scheme regarding the BoTO army is actually not that shabby. Too bad 
about that OTHER army which is about to beseige Caemlyn, which the 
Borderlanders are now set to march right into. Will they think that Elayne 
deceived them? Where DID that extra army come from, anyway? They seem to 
have appeared awfully suddenly. Finally, is the Black Tower in the path of 
either of these armies?

-pam