Book 1: Ripples from a mountain

Chapter 3: A thorn in the Dark Ones foot

"How do you know it's impossible when you have never tried?"


As the three women left the room, Rand looked over at Tam and wondered how he was taking the news. Letting him think about everything Rand started to think about the journey and everything that would change, one thing he would make sure to do was to meet Min in Baerlon, there was no reason why they would go to different inn so that should be fine. But would he still meet Elayne in Caemlyn, would Perrin meet Elyas. He would try to make these events happen of course but you could never be sure. One thing he was sure of was that Mat would not touch that dagger, not if he could help it. He sincerely hoped that Mat and Perrin would be mature enough soon to tell them about his trip, it was gonna be hard to spend time with them hiding it from them. Apart from that he did really miss his friends.

He was shook out of his musings by Tam's voice "Rand?"
"Yes?" He replied
"I have some more questions for you" Tam went on
"Of course, what do you want to know" Rand said, making an effort to not let his nerves show
"The first thing i want to know is what happened to the Rand from this time" Tam asked sounding apprehensive "Did you replace him, or is he somewhere else"
Pondering the question, Rand answered after a minute "I am still him, just from the future. It´s like I wove my thread back on itself, I didn't retrace my thread"
"Good, good, that is good" Tam said clearly looking relieved, after a while his face got a teasing smirk and he asked "Any ladies I should know about?"
"Yes, I was in a relationship with three women. An Aiel Wise One, a woman that can see the future and the Queen of Andor and Cairhien" Rand replied flatly
"And they all knew about each other?" Tam said disbelievingly
"Oh yes, it was their idea to share" Rand said, thoroughly enjoying Tam's expression
After a moment Tam barked out a small laugh "Well lad, it sounds like you had your hands full" Getting up he continued "I think we spent enough time here to not make Bran suspicious, lets enjoy the day while we still can"

After walking out of the inn the first thing Rand did was look for Perrin and Mat. It did not take long to find them, he spotted them standing behind a house talking. Walking up to them he asked "What are you talking about?"
Mat jumped and scowled at him "Light Rand don't sneak up on me like that, you nearly gave me a heart attack"
"We were talking about the noblewomen staying here" Perrin said "She gave us a silver crown"
"Can you believe it, a noblewomen in the Two Rivers" Mat interrupted "And then giving us money, weird lot those nobles I tell you. Have you seen her yet?"
"Yes I have" Rand replied "I was talking to my da when Egwene came and dragged Nynaeve and a stranger with her. They looked pretty angry at first but they left calm enough after a while"
"You talked with her?" Mat asked with awe
"Not really, I was mostly watching from the side. She also didn't give me a silver crown" Rand said feeling faintly amused, after a moments consideration Rand went on "You know, there was something weird that happened to me on the way here"

Gathering his equilibrium and drawing on Thom's lessons in storytelling Rand took a deep breath and continued "On the way here I got the sense that someone was watching me. Tam noticed nothing and I could not see anything myself. But then, after many attempts to subtly look around I decided to look more boldly. And when I swung my head I noticed something, just out of the corner of my eye I saw it. A flash of a black cloak with nothing else in sight" Slowly gathering his breath he internally grinned at the intrigue on his friends faces, after one more moment he went on "Now knowing there was something out there I stopped looking for a minute to give whoever was following us the idea that I hadn't seen anything. Mere minutes later I felt my neck prickle once more, looking one way and then quickly the other I saw him. In the middle of the road was a black rider, making no sound even as he was riding a horse. But that wasn't the worst part, oh no no, the worst part was that his cloak wasn't moving in the wind while he stared at met with a faceless face"

Mat and Perrin shared an uneasy look, it didn't take a genius to work out that they were thinking about their own encounter. After realising Rand had no intention of continuing Mat asked "What happened after that"
Trying his best to look nonchalant Rand said "Nothing"
"Nothing" Mat repeated incredulously
"Oh yes" Rand said "The moment I spotted him he vanished and I have seen and felt absolutely nothing weird since then"
After a moment Perrin said "I saw it too on the edges of the village, looking and not doing anything else. And Mat has seen it too, but no one else. We don't know what to make of it"
"Best I can think it looks like a fade" Mat jumped in "But there is no reason why one would be here let alone deciding to be creepy and not doing anything"
"Well something weird is going on in any case and it's probably best to be careful" Rand said being careful to not reveal anything while preparing his friends.
"That is probably smart" Perrin nodded
Before the conversation could continue they suddenly heard a commotion. Sharing a quick look among themselves the three ran off to find the source.

Following the noise the three boys came to the inn where Padan Fain stood upon his wagon talking to the people of Emonds Field. They came in hearing distance just as the peddler told his spiel about Logain. As Bran was leading Fain to the Inn to discuss the news the crowd began to disperse. As soon as they were by themselves again Mat burst out "A false Dragon! Can you believe it, good thing he's nowhere close to here. Although I suppose there would be some adventure" he mused
Perrin snorted "A false Dragon is not the sort of adventure you want, just hope he stays away"
"Well he has no reason to be here, I mean Two Rivers is days from any city. We should be fine here, no army is coming to conquer us" Rand replied
"I suppose that is true" Perrin nodded
"Well if we are done with that, I did trap a badger earlier today" Mat said smirking "I think a good place for him would be the village green, don't you lads agree?"
"It seems very fitting" Rand laughed "Let's make sure he feels welcomed alright"

As the three of them were busy wrangling a badger Rand heard some footsteps behind him. Whirling around he saw Egwene walking up to them. The moment she realized what they were doing her lips went flat and she put her hands on her hips.
"Good morning Egwene" Rand said brightly
"Honestly Rand, what are you thinking. Setting a badger loose at a time like this" Egwene huffed in response
"What do you mean, this is the perfect time to set a badger loose. A lot of people, just waiting to jump at some commotion." Rand replied keeping his face straight
"And you think a loose badger is gonna do what exactly. Run across the field and scare everyone witless so that they will jump at every shadow for weeks" Egwene said sarcastically. Rand knew she understood though. He saw the surprise in her eyes. He fought a grin that was threatening to break out on face, she was never good at separating who people were and who they are.
"If you have a better idea you are welcome to tell me" Rand said cutting across Mat. After a moment of scrutiny she spun around and stalked off while muttering under her breath.

As Rand turned around he was met with the sight of four eyes staring incredulously at him. After a moment of silence Mat spoke up "Did Egwene just tell us off for setting a badger loose at the wrong time. And what in the Light's name were you two doing. It sounded like you were having two separate conversations."
Cursing himself for forgetting that his two friends were in fact, not idiots but rather clever even at this point in time he quickly said "We already talked this morning, you know after she dragged that noblewomen to Tam."
Both of them looked at him suspiciously but not having a better explanation than what his empty answer gave them they accepted it for the time being. After a moment Mat grinned and hefted a squirming bag "Well when you two were bickering, me and Perrin got the badger nice and ready"

During the rest of the day Rand tried his hardest to make himself act like the farm-boy he used to be and enjoy the calm before the storm. Sometimes it came easily, he didn't have to fake the laughter that came when Mat set the badger loose scaring the Coplins half out of their wits. Other times it was a lot harder, he had to consciously make an effort to not shoot perfectly in the longbow tournament. And while it would be good to see Thom he wanted to delay meeting him as long as possible. He might not know him but Rand knew Thom would smell something was amiss as sure as wool had to be shorn. The man was unrivalled in the game of Houses and he had seen Kings and Queens play. But just as he knew it would, the calm came crashing down. Just before evening fell and people would start to go home Lan galloped into town while shouting of Trollocs.

As could be expected mayhem broke out, while Trollocs in the Two Rivers would be regarded as an ill thought prank this came from a man who looked like he had not a bone with humour in his body. Through the commotion Tam walked towards Lan.
"SILENCE" Tam shouted making himself heard over the crowd "Trollocs in Two Rivers? You realize how unbelievable that is Warder?"
"I know Trolloc tracks when i see them" Lan replied stiffly
Tam scrutinized him for a few seconds before he said "They'll find that they got a harder bargain then they came for then. How many?"
"One fist, now if you will excuse me I need to inform Moiraine" Lan replied already walking to the inn
"An Aes Sedai would be useful" Tam muttered
Looking back to the crowd staring back at him in amazement Tam shouted "Well are we gonna let them burn this village down or not! Grab your bows and go to the inn, we'll prepare there."
After a bit of scuttling everyone was moving, either towards the inn or towards their bows.

Not even fifteen minutes later all five-hundred inhabitants of Emonds Field were gathered before the inn. The ones that didn't hear the commotion were collected by those grabbing their bows. Rand himself stood close to his father wondering how Tam was gonna handle this. Seeing that no one was coming any more he nudged Tam who nodded absently and stepped into the torchlight. Clearing his throat Tam grabbed the attention of everyone there. "Listen up, we have around one hundred and eighty men with bows and an additional twenty boys. We are up against between one hundred and two hundred Trollocs. IF we do this properly they wont get within a hundred and fifty yards of the village. Every men that can shoot find a place on the roofs and shoot every Trolloc you see, every boy that can shoot pick a building, stay inside and guard that building if the Trollocs manage to close in, if you see a fade shoot it. Every man who can not find any more place on the roofs do the same. I will pick five men that will target the fade above all else. The women and children stay inside. If we are severely and I mean severely underestimating the numbers you might need to help but I do not expect that to be the case. Is all that clear?" Not seeing any questions or complaints Tam went on "Now we need light to shoot, ten of you gather some torches and prepare to set them up"
"I could help with that" Moiraine interrupted "If you just need light I can create that with no trouble."
Tam nodded resolutely "Then that is what we will do. To your positions now, we have no idea when they will come"

As the crowd dispersed Rand went up to the second floor of the inn so he would not set himself apart from the other village youth. Egwene clearly had the same idea because she followed him grim faced. He saw Perrin and Mat heading towards the smithy. As he grabbed a good viewpoint he saw Thom walking around the street presumably finding a defensible position, at the same time he saw Moiraine and Lan still in the town centre ready to go wherever they were needed. When he looked back into the inn he saw that there quite a few people here. Egwene was helping to calm the children who came here for safety and Ewin stood with his bow on the other side of the room. He was not exactly sure why everyone had gone along with Tam or believed Lan so quickly but he was certainly glad they did. Tam was respected and perhaps they could see he had experience and decided to trust him. It might also be his ta'veren nature acting up. After two hours of agonizing waiting he watched Lan turn and saw the first Trollocs emerge under Moiraine's light.

The Trollocs erupted all at once around the village. It took less than a second for the first twangs of the longbows to fill the air. While Rand could not see beyond his one sight line he knew that what he saw was happening around the village at every angle. As the arrows flew they cast fleeting shadows before hitting the Trollocs. Every Trolloc that stepped out of the wood fell no more than ten paces from the trees, not an arrow missing their mark. By the time thirty seconds had passed Rand had watched fifteen Trollocs die and was now watching the Myrddraal emerge seeing rage on its expressionless face. He too got no more than ten paces as a shout rang out on the rooftops and five of the best marksmen took aim and fired. One second after the fade had stepped out he had no arrows in him, one second later he had seven arrows in him, one more second and the amount of arrows had tripled. That seemed to finally be too much for the fade and it collapsed shrieking. Immediately the remaining Trollocs collapsed, their connection having been severed.

After a couple minutes of silence and peace the townsfolk gingerly made their way towards the streets again. Lan approached Tam as he was giving some instructions to the townsfolk "Gather the arrows in groups of twenty or more. I don't want anyone dying because one Trolloc is smart enough to play dead alright."
It was at this point that Lan had reached Tam "You did well sheepherder"
"I have some experience" Tam said wryly
"You did your ancestors proud" Lan nodded respectfully
"What is that supposed to mean" Mat piped in
"You don't know the tale of Manetheren?" Moiraine asked having arrived at Lan's side "Listen closely then, for this is your history"
Rand shook his head amused while Moiraine went to tell the story, just glad that everything turned out alright so far.


A/n
When I said irregular updates I did mean it, although this is quite a bit longer than I aim for. I did not have computer access for a week or two so that shouldn't happen again. Anyway I am quite happy with most of this chapter. I feel like most parts were told rather well even if the first draft was abysmal. Now we have one more chapter before the pace starts going up. I have no idea how long this book is going to be. My notes had it down for 15 chapter plus the prologue and semi epilogue. It has since expanded to 18 chapters and I will split it more probably. I do have this book planned out and parts of future books. I know roughly what I am going to do with Nynaeve for example but no idea what I am doing with Egwene past book 1. So I do have a plan just not a fully formed one.

Bright Omumuabuike, thanks.
1529, thank you for pointing my spelling errors out. I read book 1 for the first time in Dutch even though I have read all of them in English so maybe that's where Edmonds field comes from, I know Rand is spelled Rhand for example. I know the data dump was a bit much but I tried to condense it. I only touched on like 4 books of plot. I just didn't see any other way

Ithilion, yeah that is what i thought too. I hope this is a satisfying way to go forward.
Rhett1980, dont worry that is not going to happen. I have no desire to make Rand kneel to anyone.

Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed and please review
-Rallar