Robert Jordan - The Gathering Storm

• Название: The Gathering Storm
• Автор: Robert Jordan
• Издательство: Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
• Жанр: Фэнтези
• Год: 2009
• ISBN: 978-0-7653-0230-4

The final volume of the Wheel of Time, A Memory of Light, was partially written by Robert Jordan before his untimely passing in 2007. Brandon Sanderson, New York Times bestselling author of the Mistborn books, was chosen by Jordan’s editor—his wife, Harriet McDougal—to complete the final book. The scope and size of the volume was such that it could not be contained in a single book, and so Tor proudly presents The Gathering Storm as the first of three novels that will make up A Memory of Light. This short sequence will complete the struggle against the Shadow, bringing to a close a journey begun almost twenty years ago and marking the conclusion of the Wheel of Time, the preeminent fantasy epic of our era.

In this epic novel, Robert Jordan’s international bestselling series begins its dramatic conclusion. Rand al’Thor, the Dragon Reborn, struggles to unite a fractured network of kingdoms and alliances in preparation for the Last Battle. As he attempts to halt the Seanchan encroachment northward—wishing he could form at least a temporary truce with the invaders—his allies watch in terror the shadow that seems to be growing within the heart of the Dragon Reborn himself.

Egwene al’Vere, the Amyrlin Seat of the rebel Aes Sedai, is a captive of the White Tower and subject to the whims of their tyrannical leader. As days tick toward the Seanchan attack she knows is imminent, Egwene works to hold together the disparate factions of Aes Sedai while providing leadership in the face of increasing uncertainty and despair. Her fight will prove the mettle of the Aes Sedai, and her conflict will decide the future of the White Tower—and possibly the world itself.

The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass. What was, what will be, and what is, may yet fall under the Shadow.

---

Soon after that he'd begun visiting Master Luhhan's forge, eventually becoming his apprentice.

He was glad to have Faile back. He rejoiced. And yet, now what was there for him? These blasted men saw him as their leader. Some even thought of him as their king! He'd never asked for that. He'd had them put away the banners every time they put them out, up until Faile had persuaded him that using them would be an advantage. He still didn't believe that the wolfhead banner belonged there, flapping insolently above his camp.

But could he take it down? The men did look to it. He could smell pride on them every time they passed it. He couldn't turn them away. Rand would need their aid—he'd need everyone's aid—at the Last Battle.

The Last Battle. Could a man like him, a man who didn't want to be in charge, lead these forces to the most important moment in their lives?

The colors swirled, showing him Rand, sitting in what appeared to be a stone Tairen home. Perrin's old friend had a dark cast to his expression, like a man troubled by weighty thoughts. Even sitting like that, Rand looked regal. He was what a king was supposed to be, with that rich red coat, that noble bearing. Perrin was just a blacksmith.

He sighed, shaking his head and dispelling the image. He needed to seek out Rand. He could feel something tugging at him, pulling him.

Rand needed him. That had to be his focus now.

CHAPTER 10 The Last of the Tabac

Rodel Ituralde puffed quietly on his pipe, smoke curling from it like the sinuous coils of a snake. The smoke tendrils wrapped around themselves, pooling at the ceiling above him, then leaking out through cracks in the roof of the ramshackle shed. The boards in the walls were warped from age, opening slits to the outside, and the gray wood was cracked and splintering. A brazier burned in the corner and winds whistled through the cracks in the walls. Ituralde faintly worried those winds would blow over the entire building.

He sat on a stool, several maps on the table before him. At the corner of the table, his tabac pouch weighed down a wrinkled piece of paper. The small square was weathered and folded from being carried in his inside coat pocket.

"Well?" Rajabi asked. Thick of neck and determined of attitude, he was brown-eyed, with a wide nose and a bulbous chin. He was completely bald now, and faintly resembled a large boulder. He tended to act like a boulder, too. It could take a lot of work to get him rolling, but once you did, he was bloody hard to stop. He had been one of the first to join Ituralde's cause, for all the fact that he had been poised to rebel against the king just a short time before.

It had been nearly two weeks since Ituraldes victory at Darluna. He'd extended himself far for that victory. Perhaps too far. Ah, Alsalam, he thought. / hope this was all worth it, old friend. I hope you haven't just gone mad. Rajabi might be a boulder, but the Seanchan are an avalanche, and we've brought them thundering down upon us.

"What now?" Rajabi prodded.

"We wait," Ituralde said. Light, but he hated waiting. "Then we fight. Or maybe we run again. I haven't made up my mind yet."

"The Taraboners—"

"Won't come," Ituralde said.

"They promised!"

"They did." Ituralde had gone to them himself, had roused them, had asked them to fight the Seanchan just one more time. They'd yelled and cheered, but had not followed with any haste. They would drag their feet. He'd gotten them to fight "one last time" on half a dozen different occasions now. They could see where this war was going, and he could no longer depend on them. If he'd ever been able to in the first place.

"Bloody cowards," Rajabi muttered. "Light burn them, then! We'll do it alone. We have before."

Ituralde took a long, contemplative puff on his pipe. He'd chosen to finally use the Two Rivers tabac. This pipeful was the last in his store; he'd been saving it for months, now. Good flavor. Best there was.

He studied his maps again, holding a smaller one up before him. He could use better maps, that was certain. "This new Seanchan general," Ituralde said, "is marshaling over three hundred thousand men, with a good two hundred damane."

"We've beat large forces before. Look what we did at Darluna! You crushed them, Rodel!"

And doing so had required every bit of craftiness, skill and luck Ituralde could muster. Even then, he'd lost well over half his men. Now he ran, limping, before this second, larger force of Seanchan.

This time, they weren't making any mistakes. The Seanchan didn't rely solely on their raken. His men had intercepted several foot scouts, and that meant dozens hadn't been caught. This time, the Seanchan knew Ituralde's true numbers and his true location.

His enemies were done being herded and goaded; instead they hunted him, relentlessly, avoiding his traps. Ituralde had planned to retreat deeper and deeper into Arad Doman; that would favor his forces and stretch the Seanchan supply lines. He'd figured he could keep it up for another four or five months. But those plans were useless now; they'd been made before Ituralde had discovered there was an entire bloody army of Aiel running about Arad Doman. If the reports were to be believed—and reports about Aiel were often exaggerations, so he wasn't sure how much to believe—there were upwards of a hundred thousand of them holding large sections of the north, Bandar Eban included.

A hundred thousand Aiel. That was as good as two hundred thousand Domani troops. Perhaps more. Ituralde well remembered the Blood Snow twenty years ago, when it had seemed he'd lost ten men for each Aiel who fell.

He was trapped, a walnut crushed between two stones. The best he'd been able to do was retreat here, to this abandoned stedding. That would give him an edge against the Seanchan. But only a small one. The Seanchan had a force six times the size of his own, and the greenest of commanders knew that fighting those odds was suicide.

"Have you ever seen a master juggler, Rajabi?" Ituralde asked, studying the map.

From the corner of his eye, Ituralde saw the bull-like man frown in confusion. "I've seen gleemen who—"

"No, not a gleeman. A master."

Rajabi shook his head.

Ituralde puffed in thought before speaking. "I did, once. He was the court bard of Caemlyn. Spry fellow, with a wit that might better have belonged in a common room, for all the way he was decorated. Bards don't often juggle; but this fellow didn't mind the request. He liked juggling to please the young Daughter-Heir, so I understand."

He removed the pipe from his mouth, tapping down the tabac.

"Rodel," Rajabi said. "The Seanchan. . . ."

Rodel held up a finger, situating his pipe before continuing. "The bard started by juggling three balls. Then he asked us if we thought he could do another. We cheered him on. He went to four, then five, then six. With each ball he added, our applause grew greater, and he always asked if we thought he could do another. Of course we said yes.

"Seven, eight, nine. Soon he had ten balls going in the air, flying in a pattern so complex that I couldn't track them. He had to strain to keep them going; he kept having to reach down and grab balls that he nearly missed. He was too lost in concentration to ask us if he should add another, but the crowd called for it. Eleven! Go for eleven! And so, his assistant tossed another ball into the mess."

Ituralde puffed.

"He dropped them?" Rajabi asked. Rodel shook his head. "That last 'ball' wasn't actually a ball at all. It was some kind of Illuminator's trick; once it got halfway to the bard, it flashed and gave off a sudden burst of light and smoke. By the time our vision cleared, the bard was gone, and ten balls were lined up on the floor. When I looked around, I found him sitting at one of the tables with the rest of the diners, drinking a cup of wine and flirting with Lord Finndal's wife."

Poor Rajabi looked completely dumbfounded. He liked his answers neat and straightforward. Ituralde usually felt the same way, but these days—with their unnaturally overcast skies and sense of perpetual gloom—made him philosophic.

He reached out and took the worn, folded sheet of paper off the table from beneath his tabac pouch. He handed it to Rajabi.

" 'Strike hard against the Seanchan,' " Rajabi read. " 'Push them away, force them into their boats and back across their bloody ocean. I'm counting on you, old friend. King Alsalam.' " Rajabi lowered the letter. "I know of his orders, Rodel. I didn't come into this because of him. I came because of you."

"Yes, but / fight because of him," Ituralde said. He was a king's man; he always would be. He stood up, tapping out his tabac and grinding the embers beneath the heel of his boot. He set the pipe aside and took the letter from Rajabi, then walked to the door.

He needed to make a decision. Stay and fight, or flee for a worse location, but gain a little more time?

The shack groaned and wind shook the trees as Ituralde stepped outside into the overcast morning. The shed wasn't Ogier-built, of course. It was too flimsy for that. This stedding had been abandoned for a long time. His men camped amid the trees. Hardly the best location for a war camp, but one made soup with the spices on hand; the stedding was far too useful to pass up. Another man might have fled to a city and hidden behind its walls, but here in these trees, the One Power was useless. Negating the Seanchan damane was better than walls, no matter how high.

We have to stay, Ituralde thought, watching his men work, digging in, erecting a palisade. He hated the thought of cutting down trees in a stedding. He'd known a few Ogier in his time, and respected them. These massive oaks probably held some lingering strength from the days when the Ogier had lived here. Cutting them down was a crime. But you did what you had to. Running might gain him more time, but it might just as easily lose him time. He had a few days here before the Seanchan hit him. If he could dig in well, he might force them into a siege. The stedding would make them hesitant, and the forests would work to the advantage of Ituralde's smaller force.

He hated letting himself get pinned in. That was probably why he'd considered for so long, even though, deep down, he'd already known that it was time to stop running. The Seanchan had finally caught him.

He continued along the ranks, nodding to working men, letting himself be seen. He had forty thousand troops left, which was a marvel, considering the odds they had faced. These men should have deserted. But they'd seen him win impossible battle after impossible battle, tossing ball after ball into the air to greater and greater applause. They thought he was unstoppable. They didn't understand that when one tossed more balls into the air, it wasn't just the show that became more spectacular.

The fall at the end grew more spectacular as well.

He kept his dark thoughts to himself as he and Rajabi continued through the forested camp, inspecting the palisade. It was progressing nicely, the men setting thick tree trunks into freshly dug troughs. After his inspection, Ituralde nodded to himself. "We stay, Rajabi. Pass the word."

"Some of the others say that staying here means dying for sure," Rajabi responded.

"They're wrong," Ituralde said.

"But—"

"Nothing is sure, Rajabi," Ituralde said. "Fill these trees inside the palisade with archers; they'll be almost as effective as towers. We'll need to set up a killing field outside. Cut down as many trees around the palisade here as possible, then set the logs inside as barriers, a second line of retreat. We'll hold strong. Perhaps I'm wrong about those Taraboners, and they'll ride to aid us. Or maybe the king has a hidden army stashed away to defend us. Blood and ashes, maybe we'll fight them off here on our own. We'll see how much they like fighting without their damane. We'll survive."

Rajabi straightened visibly, growing confident. That was the kind of talk Ituralde knew he expected. Like the others, Rajabi trusted the Little Wolf. They didn't believe he could fail.

Ituralde knew better. But if you were going to die, you did it with dignity. The young Ituralde had often dreamed of wars, of the glory of battle. The old Ituralde knew there was no such thing as glory to be had in battle. But there was honor.

"My Lord Ituralde!" a runner called, trotting along the inside of the unfinished palisade wall. He was a boy, young enough that the Seanchan would probably let him live. Otherwise Ituralde would have sent the lad, and those like him, away.

"Yes?" Ituralde asked, turning. Rajabi stood like a small mountain at his side.

"A man," the boy said, puffing. "The scouts caught him walking into the sledding."

"Come to fight for us?" Ituralde said. It was not uncommon for an army to draw recruits. There were always those tempted by the lure of glory, or at least by the lure of steady meals.

"No, my Lord," the boy said, puffing. "He says he's come to see you."

"Seanchan?" Rajabi barked.

The boy shook his head. "No. But he's got nice clothes."

Some lord's messenger, then. Domani, or perhaps a Taraboner renegade. Whoever he was, he could hardly make their situation worse. "And he came alone?"

"Yes, sir."

Brave man. "Bring him, then," Ituralde said.

"Where will you receive him, my Lord?"

"What?" Ituralde snapped. "You think I'm some fancy merchant with a palace? The field here will do. Go get him, but take your time getting back. And make sure he's properly guarded."

The boy nodded and ran off. Ituralde waved over some soldiers and sent them running for Wakeda and the other officers. Shimron was dead, burned to char by a damane's fireball. Too bad, that. Ituralde would rather have kept him than many of the others.

Most of the officers arrived before the stranger. Lanky Ankaer. One-eyed Wakeda, who might otherwise have been a handsome man. Squat Melarned. Youthful Lidrin, who continued to follow Ituralde after his father's death.

"What is this I hear?" Wakeda asked, folding his arms as he strode up. "We're staying in this death trap? Rodel, we don't have the troops to resist. If they come, we'll be trapped here."

"You're right," Ituralde said simply.

Wakeda turned to the others, then back to Ituralde, a little of his irritation deflated in the face of Ituralde's frank answer. "Well . . . why don't we run, then?" He blustered a lot less now than he had just months ago, when Ituralde had first begun this campaign.

"I won't give you sugar and lies," Ituralde said, looking at them each in turn. "We're in a bad shape. But we'll be in a worse shape if we run. We've got no more holes to hide in. These trees will work to our advantage, and we can fortify. The stedding will negate the damam, and that alone is worth the price of staying. We fight here."

Ankaer nodded, seeming to understand the gravity of the situation. "We have to trust him, Wakeda. He's led us right so far."