Younglings, the: The first Younglings were young men studying under the Warders at the White Tower. They fought against their teachers who attempted to free Siuan Sanche after she was deposed from the Amyrlin Seat. Led by Gawyn Trakand, the Younglings remained loyal to the White Tower, and fought skirmishes against Whitecloaks under Eamon Valda. They accompanied Elaida’s embassy to the Dragon Reborn in Cairhien and saw action against the Aiel and Asha’man at Dumai’s Wells. On their return to Tar Valon, they found themselves barred from the city.

The Younglings wear green cloaks with Gawyn’s White Boar; those who fought against their teachers in Tar Valon wear a small silver tower on their collars. They accept recruits wherever they go, but they do not take veterans or older men. One requirement is that the recruit must be willing to put aside all loyalties except to the Younglings. Older members teach the new recruits Warder techniques since they have given over accepting instruction from Warders, and several have refused offers of bonding from Aes Sedai. In many ways they hardly seem attached to the Tower and Aes Sedai at all. This is a result in part of their suspicion that they were not meant to survive the expedition to Cairhien.

PROLOGUE

A preview of Knife of Dreams

Book Eleven of The Wheel of Time

Embers Falling on Dry Grass

The sun, climbing toward midmorning, stretched Galad’s shadow and those of his three armored companions ahead of them as they trotted their mounts down the road that ran straight through the forest, dense with oak and leatherleaf, pine and sourgum, most showing the red of spring growth. He tried to keep his mind empty, still, but small things kept intruding. The day was silent save for the thud of their horses’ hooves. No bird sang on a branch, no squirrel chittered. Too quiet for the time of year, as though the forest held its breath. This had been a major trade route once, long before Amadicia and Tarabon came into being, and bits of ancient paving stone sometimes studded the hard-packed surface of yellowish clay. A single farm cart far ahead behind a plodding ox was the only sign of human life now besides themselves. Trade had shifted far north, farms and villages in the region dwindled, and the fabled lost mines of Aelgar remained lost in the tangled mountain ranges that began only a few miles to the south. Dark clouds massing in that direction promised rain by afternoon if their slow advance continued. A red-winged hawk quartered back and forth along the border of the trees, hunting the fringes. As he himself was hunting. But at the heart, not on the fringes.