His eyes searched among the other mounted women, stopped on Katerine, wheeling her long-legged bay gelding back and forth, fire blazing wherever she looked among the Aiel. Spirit and Air, and she fell limply, one foot tangled in a stirrup.

Yes, Lews Therin laughed. And now Galina. Her I want especially.

Rand squeezed his eyes shut. What was he doing? It was Lews Therin who wanted those three so badly he could think of nothing else. Rand wanted to repay them for what they had done to him, but there was battle going on, men dying while he hunted for particular Aes Sedai. Maidens dying too, no doubt.

He took the next Aes Sedai, twenty paces to Katerine’s left, with Spirit and Air, then moved to another tree and put Sarene Nemdahl on the ground, unconscious and shielded. Slowly he staggered along the edge of the thicket, striking like a cutpurse time and again. Min stopped trying to hold him up, though her hands hovered, ready to catch him.

“They’re going to see us,” she muttered. “One of them is going to look around and see us.”

Galina, Lews Therin growled. Where is she?

Rand ignored him, and Min. Coiren fell, and two more whose names he did not know. He had to do what he could.

The Aes Sedai had no way of telling what was happening. Steadily along the ringwall of wagons, sisters toppled from their horses. Those still conscious spread themselves out more, trying to cover the whole perimeter, an air of anxiety suddenly in the way they handled their horses, the redoubled fury with which fire blazed into the Aiel and lightning struck from the sky. It had to be something from outside, but Aes Sedai fell, and they did not know how or why.

Their numbers dwindled, and the effects began to tell. Fewer lightning bolts fizzled abruptly in midair, and more struck among the Warders and soldiers. Fewer balls of fire suddenly vanished or exploded before reaching the wagons. Aiel began pressing through the gaps between wagons; wagons were heaved over. In moments there were black-veiled Aiel everywhere, and chaos. Rand stared in amazement.

Warders and green-coated soldiers fought in clumps against Aiel, and Aes Sedai surrounded themselves with rains of fire. But there were Aiel fighting Aiel as well; men with the scarlet siswai’aman headband and Maidens with red strips tied to their arms fighting Aiel without. And Cairhienin lancers in their bell-shaped helmets and Mayeners in red breastplates were suddenly among the wagons too, striking at Aiel as well as Warders. Had he finally gone mad? He was conscious of Min, pressed against his back and trembling. She was real. What he was seeing must be real.