Theoryland of the Wheel of Time

The roofmistress of a clan hold is always the wife of the clan chief, if he is married. If he is unmarried, his eldest first-sister would be the roofmistress until he did marry. If he didn't have a first-sister, then it would be his eldest living sister-mother, his mother's sister, who is considered more closely related to him than his father's sisters are. After that, there is a whole set of complexities involving blood-relationships that make sure that the woman is who is both the eldest and the most closely related to the clan chief has the position. This is a situation that seldom develops, however, and seldom lasts long if it does. The Wise Ones believe that a clan chief should be married, as a stabilizing influence if for no other reason, and they will arrange the matter one way or another if he himself does not. And since Aiel women in general also believe that a clan chief should be married, in most cases the woman who is temporarily roofmistress will work toward the same end as well.

The roofmistress of a hold that is not the home of a clan chief or a sept chief has the same status as the roofmistress of a clan chief or sept chief, at least inside her own hold. She would gain that position by being the wife of the man who leads the algai'd'siswai of that hold, though her authority in some ways outstrips his inside the hold, just as the authority of clan or sept roofmistresses in some ways outstrips that of the clan or sept chiefs inside the hold. There are certain decisions that are hers alone and in which he has no say at all.

There is a hierarchy of roofmistresses within a clan, with the roofmistress of the clan chief at the top, roofmistress of sept chiefs next, and other roofmistresses ranked below according to the size of the holds of which they are roofmistresses. Roofmistresses of other clans are considered to have comparable status in any inter-clan dealings, though without the authority in any clan save their own.

Don Harlow

I introduced myself as an internet user. I told him that some on the net seemed to think that every other person was a Darkfriend. He replied, "I've heard". I told him that my feeling was that the number of Darkfriends in Randland were probably between 1 in 10,000 to 1 in 100,000.

Tom Burke

Robert Jordan

I asked if the Aiel attacks were done by the Shaido and their allies.

He responded, "If someone thinks otherwise, they should read the books."

I stated that twenty Darkfriends would be a heavy investment to lose all at once. Jordan replied, "Not at all. It's very easy for me to make some more. It is their trustworthiness that is more of a problem."

We talked a bit about the Aiel culture. Robert constantly referred to the Amer-Indian, Arab, and African cultures. In particular, how come they don't show signs of being malnourished? "Belly dancers live in the desert and yet, have been known to be full bodied. It is the people who have had their fields burned that might be a little malnourished."

SHIVAM BHATT

BRANDON SANDERSON

Matthew Hunter

Question

Robert Jordan

Question

Robert Jordan

(Later) Robert Jordan

SFBC

ROBERT JORDAN

SFBC

ROBERT JORDAN

SFBC

ROBERT JORDAN

Why have we not seen any Aiel Asha'man?

The Aiel have a different tradition, as I have mentioned in the books. When a young Aiel man learns that he is beginning to channel, or thinks that he is, that is taken as sign that he has been marked out to try to kill the Dark One, and he sets out for the Blight in an attempt to do so. And given that any Black Tower recruiting party that showed up in the Waste would very likely find itself in a fight to the death fairly soon after arrival, it isn't a spot that anyone would pick for recruiting. Now, it may be that some Aiel may finally join the Asha'man (I'm not saying they will!) but traditions are hard to change, especially when they have religious overtones and have lasted a few thousand years.

Are there particular historical eras that influence your stories?

Well, to give you an example of the way these things work... the Aiel. They have some bits of Japanese in them. Also some bits of the Zulu, the Berbers, the Bedouin, the Northern Cheyenne, the Apache, and some things that I added in myself. They are in no way a copy of any of these cultures, because what I do is say, "If A is true, what else has to be true about this culture? If B is true, what else has to be true?" And so forth.

In this way I begin to construct a logic tree, and I begin to get out of this first set of maybe 10, maybe 30 things that I want to be true about this culture. I begin to get around an image of this culture, out of just this set of things, because these other things have to be true. Then you reach the interesting part, because this thing right here has to be true, because of these things up here. But, this thing right here has to be false, because of those things up there. Now, which way does it go, and why? You've just gotten one of the interesting things about the culture, one of the really interesting little quirks.

To me, that in itself is a fascinating thing—the design of a culture. So that's how the Aiel came about. There are no cultures that are a simple lift of Renaissance Italy or 9th-century Persia or anything else. All of them are constructs.

Question

Robert Jordan

To: Les Dabel
Sent: Wednesday, March 24, 2004 2:55 PM
Subject: Re: Fw: New Spring Script

Dear Les,

I decided to look beyond the first few pages and found that this is indeed a new script. I'm sending you a copy of it with my comments. Chuck took my comments to heart in many places and occasionally bettered them, but in others, which are very important, he seemed to ignore them altogether. There are mentions of Aiel riding horses, wearing armor, carrying pikes; all of these things that the Aiel don't do. And he still has Moiraine, Siuan, Tamra and Gitara wearing robes instead of dresses. I hope he will take to heart the comments I have put into the script.

Take care, Les. All my best.

Jim

To: Les Dabel
Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 3:03 PM
Subject: Re: Characters

Dear Les,

I'll get onto the additional characters ASAP.

Here are my comments on the new images.

The Aiel is very good except for the boots, which still need to look more like Apache moccasins. That is how they are described in the main sequence books, a soft, laced boots. The coat is much better. As a note, remember that the Aiel average about 6'2" for a man, about the same as the Masai. There are plenty of them as tall as Lan and Bukama, and a few taller. An Aiel man who is 5'10" tall would be considered short by himself and by other Aiel.

The eagle-beak Trolloc is very good. It was a small thing, but the devil is in the details, and Trollocs just don't get ornamentation on their weapons. Plain—so to speak, despite all the hooks, etc—functional, and not a lot of effort into making them look good. They aren't exactly crude—crudely made weapons just don't usually function as well as well-made ones—but they are never fancy.

Cadsuane. This is not so good. She looks too old and too thin, almost gaunt. Her dress is way too frilly for Cadsuane, and it shows way too much cleavage. Her garments are silk, but cut simply. When she has lace, it's just a touch, perhaps at the neck and cuffs, but she more likely doesn't have any lace at all. She's a woman who does a lot of traveling, and she wants clothes that are easy to care for and can be tended by a poorly trained maid at some country inn. The cross-lacing is off. Dresses in this world almost always button up the back. And Cadsuane is more likely to have a high neckline than not. She makes no efforts to appear in the highest or latest fashion, nor does she try to impress other women with her clothes or jewelry, or to attract men; she's too busy for such foolishness, as she sees it. She is quite impressive enough being who she is, thank you very much. The hair ornaments also appear to be attached to one another, which they aren't. Each one of the ten ornaments hangs from its own individual hairpin. The bun should be right on top of her head, not toward the back.

As a note on her character. Cadsuane was born in the city-state of Far Madding, which is an out-and-out matriarchy. Far Madding has no hereditary nobility, but its politicians and wealthy merchants are all women. There are men who are craftsmen, but a wealthy man in Far Madding is one whose wife or mother gives him an over-generous allowance. The only men allowed to carry weapons of the usual sort are the Wall Guard, and then only when on duty. The Street Guard is limited to truncheons, sword-breakers and catchpoles. Men visiting from other places must either leave their weapons at checkpoints coming into the city or have them peace-bonded, with severe punishments for being found with the wires of the peace-bond broken. Very few of the city's men seem to be unhappy with the way things are. Far Madding is a prosperous trade center. The usual form of address by a woman to man whose name she doesn't know, or sometimes to one whose name she does, is "boy." None of this has any bearing on NEW SPRING, but it gives some insight into Cadsuane, because the city shaped her early years. Quite aside from being the most powerful Aes Sedai living at the time of NEW SPRING, Cadsuane is a formidable woman.

Gitara Moroso. I like this very much, though the dress would not be off-the-shoulder. That strapless look isn't used in this world. Most Aes Sedai wouldn't show that much bosom, but Gitara would. And I like the face, too. Very good!

Moiraine. The dress is excellent, though the sleeves are a bit too wide, I think—remember, Accepted's dresses are described as "simply cut"—but the face seems to have shifted again. I've attached the faces that I approved for Moiraine and Siuan. Also, she wouldn't have her hair in a bun. It would be worn loose. Her left hand also seems way too big; it's nearly half the width of her waist.

Ryne. This is very good except that his expression here seems on the sour side. That would be okay at the end, when he is unmasked as a Darkfriend, but the continuous view of Ryne until then is that he is charming and personable. He's much more likely to be smiling, especially if there is a pretty woman around. As a note, the dagger he is holding is too elaborate in the blade shape. I know there are a lot of fancy blade shapes out there today—Gil Hibben has much to answer for—but knives and daggers that are, or were historically, used by actual people had practical reasons for their blade shapes, even the yatagan and the falcata.

Tamra. Overall she looks very good. The only things I don't like are the off-the-shoulder dress, too much cleavage showing for her—her dresses would have high necklines, much like what you show on the Accepted's dress on the Moiraine image, or at least a neckline that showed no cleavage—and her hands both look much too large. The left hand is also oddly shaped.

Bukama. Yes. I like this one much better. Whatever Andrea did to the chin works just fine. And I like the armor. I hope this helps.

Take care, Les. All my best, Jim

Question

Brandon Sanderson

No, it was a surprise because I really pretty much had to have it that way. If he told me about it ahead of time, I would look at it on the page and think, "I've heard this stuff, before. This isn't fresh," forgetting that it was he who told me.

But we did go out for lunch once, towards the end of The Eye of the World, and he said, "I want to talk to you about some people who are turning up in the series," and I said OK. He wanted to discuss the Aiel and how it would happen if a Maiden had a child. Well, you know the Aiel don't even appear until book three except for the guy in the cage. So, he was planning that far ahead, and he wanted to bounce it off of me.

And at the end, he was concerned about a young woman's reaction to her mother's love affair, and did that read true to me as a woman. He would do that very occasionally; his women were great. In fact, in an early signing, there were some women in shawls who came up to him and said, "You're Robert Jordan? We were sure that was the pseudonym of a woman, 'cause your women are so well written." That pleased him to no end. He loved that.

I got a lovely smile from Harriet that told me she was pleased that someone had finally figured that out, and she said that she believes I am exactly right about that. She was a little sketchy on the details, though, and so was Brandon, so Brandon said it was essentially a MAFO. So I talked to Maria after that session, and she was taking a break so I didn't want to ask her about it just then, so I asked her if I could message her about it, and the other MAFO we got today, and she said yes, so I will hopefully be hearing more about that soon. Brandon asked me not to put that one in the interview database until I hear from Maria about it.

Maria Simons

Oops. I really have been terribly slow with these. I can’t find anything that says yea or nay on this one.

Terez

I think that Brandon got the impression Harriet was leaping on it too quick, and that's quite possible; I might have read too much into it.

Number one, let's talk about the blademaster issue. I'm not at liberty right now to say what's in the notes and what isn't, but I can tell you I'm drawing from the notes when I'm writing. I don't know why certain things weren't mentioned before in the series.

Maintaining the Wheel of Time continuity is an enormous task. There are so many questions like "What was Bryne's rank during the Aiel war?" where I ask Maria and Alan and just trust their instincts. There are other ones where they're not even sure.

Much of the time, when we run into issues like this, it's just me making a mistake. I do apologize for that. I promise you, I have read these books a number of times, but I don't have the type of mind that memorizes facts and repeats them back offhandedly. I have to do a lot of reading each time I write a chapter, and I often make mistakes. A lot of the time, these mistakes come because I HAVE been reading the series for so long. I've got these long-seated impressions of characters and events in my head that go back all the way to my teenage days. And they're not always right. (I didn't learn to pronounce some character names until I was well into my 20s.) Sometimes, I just assume I know something when I've been wrong about it all along. Those are the dangerous ones, since I don't think to look up items like that.

Anyway, with every printing of the books, Maria goes back in and fixes continuity. It happened when Robert Jordan was writing the books (though not nearly as often as it will when I'm writing them, I suspect). So what can I say about that? Well, Harriet is putting together a comprehensive encyclopedia that will become the definitive answer to these sorts of questions. Until then, I'm letting Team Jordan handle it.

Ted Herman

Brandon Sanderson

Ted Herman

Footnote

Tags

Aah. RAFO!

WETLANDERNW

(The exclamation point, and a smile, was clear in his voice and in his eyes. He liked that question and was pleased to have it asked. We will apparently find out soon! Loialson—I'm sorry, I should have gotten you a RAFO card too. I only actually asked the first question—since it got the RAFO, I figured there was no point in asking the rest.)

Seriously, though, any bets on whether the Tinkers will ever find the Song? I bet it's the harvest song from Rand's Aiel memories.

STEVEN COOPER

I asked RJ about this when he was in Melbourne last week, and (amazingly) got a straight answer.

The Song the Tinkers are seeking is the song Rand heard in Rhuidean—or, to be exact, the memories of that song and others like it have become merged, over the years, into the concept of one mystical Song.

STEVEN COOPER

As to whether the Tinkers will find "the Song", I suspect they will—at least, they will be brought to understand their true history just as the Aiel were. RJ seems to intend showing an upheaval affecting every nation and society in Randland during the course of the series. I doubt the Tinkers will survive unchanged into the next Age. Unless they all get wiped out, I think "the Song" will be found at some point.

No. Nice try! That's eliminating one theory, I'll give you that one.

LOIALSON

Was Aviendha in Tel'aran'rhiod or in a mirror/portal world when she met Nakomi?

BRANDON SANDERSON

RAFO.

LOIALSON

Is Nakomi Jenn Aiel?

BRANDON SANDERSON

[laughs and grins] I should RAFO that shouldn't I?

LOIALSON

I'd appreciate it if you didn't.

BRANDON SANDERSON

[laughs] I want Nakomi....We're gonna RAFO that for now. Nakomi needs...there's gotta be a few things I don't answer. I'm so bad, I answer everything Robert Jordan put an answer [for, to?] [bunch of people laugh]. Track me down another time, after A Memory of Light is out.

Ask him if the manner of the Aiel service to the Aes Sedai in the Age of Legends was just Singing, or if it was also domestic.

TEREZ

As a follow-up you could ask him if female Voices were also used in non-Earthy scenarios, i.e. to enhance saidar in particular?

TEREZ

And ask him if non-Aiel could really have the Voice (assuming the type that enhances channeling) or if Lews Therin was just confused.

PRK

Lews Therin was confused about time and place, but what he was saying was possible.

PRK

There was more than just singing, but Brandon wasn't willing to go into it. Unsure if that was RAFO or irrelevance.

PRK

Brandon said he wasn't willing to talk much about the Voice things. I got the sense it was a subtle RAFO.

(Laughs.) RAFO.

ELEANOR

Again, you ask a terrible question...BUT THERE IS MORE ON THIS.

I think he felt a little sad about my Sorilea attempt and his inevitable RAFO, and thus offered the following tidbit:

BRANDON SANDERSON

"At least one of the named characters is an unrevealed Darkfriend."

ELEANOR

I know that this is pretty much a given anyway, but the way he said it—the way he presented it (with this gleam in his eyes and an invisible flourish) it suggests it is...not any old named character, but one with some importance. Of course, that is just my opinion and as such is...debatable.

But have we a list of second- and third-tier named characters who could possibly be Darkfriends?

RAFO.

ELEANOR

Will there be fighting in the Waste? That is, Shadowspawn?

BRANDON SANDERSON

RAFO.

ELEANOR

For Shaido = remnant of a remnant. I think he knew EXACTLY what I was not asking.

If the end of the Aiel was the sacrifice required for Rand to win, she would make it. (p. 382)

I feel very satisfied that it’s complete; very sad that it is another occasion for me to say ‘goodbye’ to Robert Jordan. The last five years have been one goodbye after another, and none of them are easy. But I knew that he wanted the series finished, and it's done, and that's very satisfying, and also very sad. So it's sad, happy, bitter, sweet—a whole mix. It goes in and out of these things.

There is still an Encyclopedia for me to do with Maria Simons and Alan Romanczuk; Maria worked with my husband, and now with me, for seventeen years, and Alan has been around for twelve, so they know the material very well and have been...I started the material that will be the Encyclopedia back with The Eye of the World, writing down proper nouns. Then it got to be The Great Hunt, and I said, "Oh Lord." [laughter] You get pages of the Aiel: who are in which sept, who are in which warrior society, who is married to whom—the whole thing. I think y'all will like it, and we will be turning it in perhaps some time next year...I mean this year. We're in '13 already. By its nature it couldn't be done until the series was complete. It may amuse you to know that in the contract it says it will be delivered in 2008. [laughter]

There is a deeper meaning. But it's philosophical more than anything else.

Brandon Sanderson

It is in reference, in part, to their changing purpose.

No.

Brandon Sanderson

No. Spoiler! No spoilers please.

Can you tell me more about the Jenn now, or do I have to wait for the encyclopedia? Will the encyclopedia tell what happened to them?

General refusal to answer: shrugging, changing the subject, etc. :)

Wetlander

(Yes, it was nearly a joke, because I've been pestering Brandon about the Jenn for over a year now, either in person or by proxy...)

Ok, I'm not sure I should give an answer to this one. Who do you think it is, what are you basing it on?

Freelancer

I'm pretty sure it's Lanfear. Several things. She's wearing red and black, and she doesn't have a Cour'souvra around her neck. Her appearance is unknown to Slayer, and she's pretty, though she isn't comfortable with her own reflection. She expresses disgust at having to use him. This eliminates Moghedien and Graendal.

Brandon Sanderson

But she's ordering Slayer to kill Rand.

Freelancer

This will lead into the next question, but I don't think she believes that Slayer can succeed, she's using him as a distraction, and to give her options, because she's playing a deep game.

Brandon Sanderson

Ok, here's your answer. Your case is very, very, very solid, and you can stand by it.

About—if you can estimate—how many Aiel were in the Town?

Oh, boy. I think there is an estimate in the notes.

Terez

There is?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, so ask Maria, and if I say it, I will get it wrong because Jim has an estimate of how many Sightblinders were going to be in the Last Battle.

Terez

Okay.

Brandon Sanderson

And that would include, you know, ones born there and ones captured, and...yeah.

What makes you like Aviendha so much?

It's hard to explain. Always as a reader, I thought she was awesome. She didn't take any nonsense, and put Rand in his place when he needed it. I liked reading about her. Her viewpoint was different. When I read the Aiel, I thought they were weird, and then reading Aviendha, I saw they were just different. It was something Robert Jordan did very well.

Do Jenn Aiel still exist at the time of the book?

There might be some Jenn Aiel still around.

Is the Town, the only human settlement in the Blight?

I believe so.

Question

And was the Town the same cluster of building that was seen by Graendal in Towers of Midnight from Moridin's...

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Do we know what Moridin was doing in the Town?

Umm, Define we.

Question

Will we know what Moridin was doing in the town?

QBrandon Sanderson

That depends on how good you are at guessing.

Harriet McDougal

I think he was building a new Westin Hotel.

QBrandon Sanderson

That's right.

(laughter)

Question

Sounds reasonable to me.

The week after my husband's funeral, a friend was staying with me. She'd come down for the service, and she, as so many people are, was both a fan of fantasy and heavily into the net. And she put a printout in front of me—the basic sort of semi-Luddite—and said, you need to read this. And it was the eulogy that Brandon had written and posted on his website. And I read it and thought, gosh, that's just beautiful. And it's also the feeling for my husband's work that I would love to see in whoever takes over to finish the series, because in his last weeks and months, my husband had made it very clear to me that he did want the series finished. I draw a distinction—he had a horror of sharecropping, the endless work of other writers in a world that someone has created. He really had a horror of that, so that's not going to happen. But he really did want the series finished.

He began one Saturday night. His cousin—a cousin named Wilson Grooms, who was as close to him as a brother—was visiting. And I had a friend there, thank God, who'd once been a court reporter. And I was scrabbling round in the kitchen making food or something, and Jim . . . who’s read the book? Who's not read the book?

Brandon Sanderson

The last one? Who hasn't finished the last one?

Harriet McDougal

Well, okay.

Brandon Sanderson

No spoilers, then.

Harriet McDougal

Well, okay. My husband, called Jim, began to talk and he said, there's a blank in the blank that nobody knows about, not even Harriet. And he was off and running. And the court reporter was there, fortunately, because I was trying to take notes, and instead I was just staring at him in rapture, kind of. And Wilson went out at midnight and bought a tape recorder, and that was the start of a real outpouring of what he wanted in the rest of the series. That's how I knew he wanted it finished. Otherwise, he'd have kept his mouth shut. Which was not very much in his nature.

[laughter]

And I . . . I tell this story a lot, but it's a fun story. I flew in. Harriet herself picked me up at the airport. I had been really nervous to meet Harriet—like, you know, really nervous. I knew Harriet . . . like, she was one of the big editors in the field, and authors have this kind of—even, you know, published authors—are sometimes kind of scared of editors, right? And Harriet . . . I don't know if you guys know . . . I mean, she edited Ender's Game, okay? She edited—and discovered—Robert Jordan, and she's behind the two biggest books in fantasy and science fiction of the last 30 years—Ender's Game and Eye of the World. So I was really nervous.

And so I'm like . . . and then I meet her, and as you can tell, she's like this wonderful, just so nice, awesome person. It was such a relief. I'm like, oh good. I actually called Emily that night and I'm like, ahh, I didn't need to be worried. Like, take your favorite grandmother and mix her with a southern gentlewoman and you have Harriet.

Harriet McDougal

I've hidden the whips.

[laughter]

Brandon Sanderson

And she drove me to the house there in Charleston, which is this wonderful house, built in the 1700s, right?

Harriet McDougal

Barely. 1798.

Brandon Sanderson

And we walk in the door, and Harriet had been cooking dinner, and it was a bean soup. I still remember all these things where she said, well I put some soup on, and I can warm it up, and would you like to have some food? And I said, I would like the ending, please.

[laughter] [applause]

Because I didn't know . . . You know, I just signed the contracts without knowing. You know, you guys work for Microsoft, NDA stuff, you got to say yes first, and then you get the NDA, and then you get to be a part of it.

And so, I knew that there was an ending, because Robert Jordan had talked about writing the ending. I knew, and Harriet had confirmed, the ending had been written. And so I walked in, and it was like ten o'clock at night. But I got that ending, and I sat down in the front room—sitting room—and I read what you now have as primarily the epilogue of A Memory of Light. Almost all the epilogue was in there.

Also contained in there were several big important scenes from the prologue, which we split among the three prologues. There were a couple of the really cool scenes in there. There was the Tower of Ghenjei. There was a place where Egwene gets a special visitor, and—I think it's called A Cup of Tea—that scene, but really it was the ending that I wanted to read.

Harriet McDougal

And there's the blank in the blank.

Brandon Sanderson

There's the blank in the blank, yes, which is in the prologue of A Memory of Light—one of the prologue sequences. And I read all of this and read his ending, which you now have in your hands.

And Harriet afterwards—she said, well what do you think? And I said, it was satisfying. That was my word for it. It was the right ending. I felt a huge sense of relief. In a lot of ways, there wasn't a lot there. There were 200 pages, and so it wasn't huge. But at the same time, it was a huge relief to me, because the ending had been done, and it had been done right. And my job, then, was not so impossible, because all I had to do was get from well-written book to well-written ending without screwing it up too much.

And having that ending in hand is really what has made this possible, and made me able to work on these books in a way that I really feel conformed to Robert Jordan's vision for them, because I knew where he was going. And I tend to work from an ending—that's how I write my books, is I always have the ending in mind first. And so, that is the story of how you came to get A Memory of Light. And it has been an awesome and daunting and horrifying and extremely hard and wonderful experience all in one.

Just finished the chapter "Older, More Weathered". Funniest chapter so far IMO, what are your most humorous scenes?

woodchuck_vomit

New Spring—Moiraine gets thrown into a pond.

Eye of the World—Min takes Rand aside when he re-enters the inn to tell him about Nynaeve, Thom immediately assumes they're gonna make out, Min says "Go juggle something."

The Great Hunt—Egwene smuggling Rand into the women's quarters to hide from the Amyrlin.

The Dragon Reborn—Moiraine catches some fish.

The Shadow Rising—Elayne gets drunk; Aviendha describes Elayne to Rand in detail.

The Fires of Heaven—The Aes Sedai in Salidar make Siuan and Leane go over every prank they played in the White Tower as novices and Accepted to prove they're really them; "It happened on the other side of the world and the Maidens still knew!"

Lord of Chaos—Aiel humor; Mat before he realizes Egwene really is the Amyrlin.

A Crown of Swords—Mat and Birgitte get drunk, Elayne gets bond-drunk; Min likes it rough.

The Path of Daggers—Aviendha describes some of her night with Rand to Elayne; Elayne and that mysterious red rod ter'angreal; the Maidens collect some toh from Rand.

Winter's Heart—Aviendha, Min, and Birgitte all feeling it in their heads.

Crossroads of Twilight—"She would bond him as her Warder one day, somehow, and she would marry him, and make love to him until he cried for mercy!" Whoa there Egwene.

Knife of Dreams—Tuon allows Mat to kiss her. "Do I remind you of your sister? Or perhaps your mother?"

The Gathering Storm—"Women are like goats..."

Towers of Midnight—"Your royal bloody pain in my back..."

A Memory of Light—Aviendha suggests that the most honorable way to win would be to take the Dark One gai'shain.

A note for those curious, but a spoiler for the ending. Regarding the AMOL one, have you noticed yet that Rand, to an extent, did this very thing?

Mithre

Is it just how he imprisoned the Dark One without killing him? Or did I miss something?

Brandon Sanderson

The usual way to take a person gai'shain is to touch them while they are holding a weapon. Rand seized and held the Dark One in his hand, then chose not to kill him, instead taking him prisoner.

AIEL EXPRESSIONS/LANGUAGE:

Aan'allein: One Man, etc; Lan's name among the Aiel.

algai'd'siswai: refers to those who carry the spears.

armcry, the: the cry rousing to fight or defend.

Car'a'carn: Aiel title meaning "chief of chiefs;" referred to in Prophecy of Rhuidean.

Rhuarc speaks of death as "she."

Eyeless: Aiel name for Myrddraal.

"I ask leave to defend your roof and hold." A formal Aiel way of accepting hospitality.

"I have toh." A straightforward acknowledgment.

"I hear the wind." What has been said is foolish or stupid.

"I hear you." "I do not hear you."

"I see you." A greeting/acknowledgement.

"If you plan for the worst, all surprises are pleasant."

Leafblighter: a term for the Dark One.

Leafblighter's get: Aiel term for Trollocs.

Maiden handtalk.

"May I never know shade if...."

"May you find shade this morning (or day)." An Aiel greeting.

"May you always find water and shade."

"My water is yours;" an Aiel ways of saying thanks.

"My water is yours, and the shade of my septhold will welcome you."
More formal than simply "my water is yours," and more binding to obligation.

Nightrunner: Aiel name for Myrddraal.

"Remember me."

"Shade of my life." "Shade of my heart."

Shadoweyes: Aiel name for animal spies.

Shadowman: Aiel name for Myrddraal.

Shadowrunners: used by three Maidens to mean Darkfriends. Amys also used it.

Shadowsouled: Aiel name for Forsaken.

Shadowtwisted: Aiel name for Trollocs.

siswai'aman: the Spear of the Dragon.

"Sleep well and wake." An Aiel way of saying goodnight.

"Some time again maybe, some day." Aiel way of saying never again when they don't want to say it right out.

"They/he hear(s) only the wind." They don't listen; don't see/hear what is important; a fool.

"to give a Maiden an interest gift." To do something reckless.

twitchskirt; flipskirt (Aiel): a flirt and a tease, maybe even an actual roundheels.

"Your honor is mine."

Wetlander.