Lord of Chaos
Authors: Robert Jordan
Praise for The Wheel of Time®
“The Wheel of Time [is] rapidly becoming the definitive American fantasy saga. It is a fantasy tale seldom equaled and still less often surpassed in English.”
—
Chicago Sun-Times
“Jordan’s multivolume epic [is] a feast for fantasy aficionados.”
—
Library Journal
“The most ambitious American fantasy saga . . . [may] also be the finest.”
—
Booklist
“For those who like to keep themselves in a fantasy world, it’s hard to beat the complex, detailed world created here.”
—
Locus
Praise for
Lord of Chaos
“Jordan’s talent for sustaining the difficult combination of suspense and resolution, so necessary in a multivolume series such as this one, is nothing short of remarkable.”
—
Library Journal
“A great read . . . Some surprising new developments . . . A spectacular kidnapping and rescue bring this volume to a (temporarily) satisfying conclusion. This series is so complex, I can’t recommend starting anywhere but at the beginning, but the volumes only get richer as they go along.”
—
Locus
T
HE
W
HEEL OF
T
IME
®
by Robert Jordan
The Eye of the World
The Great Hunt
The Dragon Reborn
The Shadow Rising
The Fires of Heaven
Lord of Chaos
A Crown of Swords
The Path of Daggers
Winter’s Heart
Crossroads of Twilight
Knife of Dreams
by Robert Jordan
and Brandon Sanderson
The Gathering Storm
ORD
OF
C
HAOS
ROBERT JORDAN
A TOM DOHERTY ASSOCIATES BOOK
NEW YORK
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This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
LORD OF CHAOS
Copyright © 1994 by The Bandersnatch Group, Inc.
The phrases “The Wheel of Time
®
” and “The Dragon Reborn™,” and the snake-wheel symbol, are trademarks of Robert Jordan.
All rights reserved.
Frontispiece by Gregory Manchess
Maps by Ellisa Mitchell
Interior illustrations by Matthew C. Nielsen and Ellisa Mitchell
A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
Tor
®
is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.
ISBN 978-1-4299-6053-3
First Edition: November 1994
First E-book Edition: March 2010
Manufactured in the United States of America
For Betsy
10
A Saying in the Borderlands
The lions sing and the hills take flight.
The moon by day, and the sun by night.
Blind woman, deaf man, jackdaw fool.
Let the Lord of Chaos rule.
—chant from a children’s game
heard in Great Arvalon,
the Fourth Age
Demandred stepped out onto the black slopes of Shayol Ghul, and the gateway, a hole in reality’s fabric, winked out of existence. Above, roiling gray clouds hid the sky, an inverted sea of sluggish ashen waves crashing around the mountain’s hidden peak. Below, odd lights flashed across the barren valley, washed-out blues and reds, failing to dispel the dusky murk that shrouded their source. Lightning streaked
up
at the clouds, and slow thunder rolled. Across the slope steam and smoke rose from scattered vents, some holes as small as a man’s hand and some large enough to swallow ten men.
He released the One Power immediately, and with the vanished sweetness went the heightened senses that made everything sharper, clearer. The absence of
saidin
left him hollow, yet here only a fool would even appear ready to channel. Besides, here only a fool would want to see or smell or feel too clearly.
In what was now called the Age of Legends, this had been an idyllic island in a cool sea, a favorite of those who enjoyed the rustic. Despite the steam it was bitter cold, now; he did not allow himself to feel it, but instinct made him pull his fur-lined velvet cloak closer. Feathery mist marked his breath, barely visible before the air drank it. A few hundred leagues north the world was pure ice, but Thakan’dar was always dry as any desert, though always wrapped in winter.
There was water, of a sort, an inky rivulet oozing down the rocky slope beside a gray-roofed forge. Hammers rang inside, and with every ring, white light flared in the cramped windows. A ragged woman crouched in a hopeless heap against the forge’s rough stone wall, clutching a babe in her arms, and a spindly girl buried her face in the woman’s skirts. Prisoners from a raid down into the Borderlands, no doubt. But so few; the Myrddraal must be gnashing their teeth. Their blades failed after a time and had to be replaced, no matter that raids into the Borderlands had been curtailed.
One of the forgers emerged, a thick slow-moving man shape that seemed hacked out of the mountain. The forgers were not truly alive; carried any distance from Shayol Ghul, they turned to stone, or dust. Nor were they smiths as such; they made nothing but the swords. This one’s two hands held a sword blade in long tongs, a blade already quenched, pale like moonlit snow. Alive or not, the forger took care as it dipped the gleaming metal into the dark stream. Whatever semblance of life it had could be ended by the touch of that water. When the metal came out again, it was dead black. But the making was not done yet. The forger shuffled back inside, and suddenly a man’s voice raised a desperate shout.
“No? No! NO!” He shrieked then, the sound dwindling away without losing intensity, as though the screamer had been yanked into unimaginably far distance. Now the blade was done.
