emandred's in Illian
by Mirtam Caulthon: 2003-12-28 | Not yet rated
I am pretty sure I know where, but not who, Demandred is. In Shadows Sleeping (TDR) Perrin has a dream where he sees three scenes and four people. The first is a man who offers him wine and the chance to be a blacksmith again, Ishamael. He then sees a woman in white, Lanfear.
The last part is the important one finally three men having a meeting. One's Ishmael. The second to arrive has white hair and wears a Tarien coat; no doubt about it he's Be'lal.
The third man is described as “tall and dark and slender,” He has dark hair streaked with grey, a dark green coat, and boots with golden fringe encircling them. The fringe is the important thing, boots fringed with gold or silver is an Illianer fashion.
This man is definitely a male forsaken but can't be Sammael even though he was in Illian at the time, he had blonde hair and was definitely not tall (BWB). Since it's not Sammael it has to be someone else.
Rhavin, Aginor, Bethamel, Be'lal and Ishamael can be discounted. Two of them are dead, Be'lal and Ishmael are already present and according to Alteima in Fanning the Sparks (TFoH) Rhavin had “massive sholders and a deep chest” the man in the dream was slender.
By process of elimination it has to be either Asmodean or Demandred they are the only remaining male forsaken and both can fit the description.
Asmodean is described by Mat in Misdirections and Imre Stand (TSR) as both “a dark haired man in his middle years” and “taller than most, somewhere in his middle years.”
Demandred has dark hair and is almost as tall as Lews Therin was. In Decisions (TSR) Lanfear tells Rand that he is Lews Therin though “physically nothing is the same except your height,” therefore Demandred is almost as tall as Rand. Demandred is about the same age as Lews Therin who in Dragonmount (TEotW) described himself as just into his middle years.
Choosing between these two is the difficult bit. I have found two points suggesting that it is not Asmodean.
1) Perrin described the man in the dream as tall. Asmodean is described as taller than most by Mat, who is shorter than Perrin. Asmodean is above average but not necessarily possible to describe simply as tall, the height indicates Demandred.
2) In Pale Shadows Asmodean mentioned a saying he came across in Arad Doman (what he was doing there is anyones guess) and its pretty hard to be further away from Illian than Arad Doman while still being in the Wetlands.
These are fairly shaky evidence but it does indicate that Asmodean was not in the dream or Illian.
Conclusion: Demandred is in Illian. The fringed boots are only worn by lords therefore he is disguised as an Illianer lord, which one I don't know, but this means he can't be Taim, Dorobaine, Banshere or Masema.
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1
Tamyrlin: 2004-01-02
(Frenzy for Tamyrlin)
I wouldn't discount Rahvin. Yes he's a large man, but he's "of a height or more" of Rand, and anyone that tall, even with a large build, could give the impression of being slender. And the wings of grey (or white, depending on which quote you use) in his dark hair match Perrin's description. I'd look up the description of Lord Gaebril in the search engine, but that'd use up one of Tamyrlin's searches, and that wouldn't be nice.
Demandred is almost as tall as Lews Therin was, and almost as handsome. i suppose the third man <I>could</I> have been Demandred, but considering that both Demandred and Sammael want Rand deader than a doornail, and to do it themselves, i doubt they'd cohabitate in Illian. Willingly, anyway.
2
WinespringBrother: 2004-01-02
I have a hunch, without much evidence to back it up, that Demandred is hiding in Murandy. This country has little attention paid to it, yet has been the least affected by chaos, and is the only southland to have it's original ruler in charge still (discounting city-states). Roedran is supposedly very weak, yet has managed to keep his nation from splitting. I think there is something to that. Also, Murandy is in a central position, between Andor, Cairhien, Tear, Altara and Illian, a very strategic location to set up base camp and watch your rivals.
3
Great Lord of the Dark: 2004-01-02
Nicely Done. I'm sure most everyone assumed as I did, that the man in Illianer clothes in Perrin's dream journey was Sammael. Your theory has made me consider otherwise, though I'll stick with Sammael for now. After all, as I am constantly reminded, anything seen in tel'aran'rhiod is probably just swamp gas summoned by Ishamael. :)
One thing you could do to improve your idea is to guess why Demandred would be in Illian, and whether he might still be there.
4
timmah3209: 2004-01-03
Sure forsaken are sneaky plotting bastards, but even with all their wily tricks, short of compulsion I don't think two of them could be that close on a daily basis without realizing something was up. To what winespringbrother was saying about Murandy: I have not looked any of this up, but for some reason when I read that Murandy was affected little by chaos it sounded wrong to me. Didn't Murandy have some sort of problems? Civil war or something like that, false dragon maybe? Anyway, Demandred has to be in some other country for rand to continue his pattern of kill and conquer ;) jk about the last part
5
Mirtam Caulthon: 2004-01-04
Let me explain what I meant. By Illian I mean the country not the city, and Illian is a pretty big place. What I'm saying is Demandred was hiding somewhere in Illian miles away from the city and Sammael while he works through proxies. They are definitely not working together since Sammael didn't even know where Demandred was.
It is extremely unlikely that the man in the dream is Sammael. He may be in tel'aran'rhiod but the Forsaken have never changed the way they look when they met with each other. Read A Silver Arrow (LoC, pg 500), Nynaeve sees Rhavin, Graendal and Sammael and the back of Lanfear's chair, all of them look they do in the waking world. If Sammael changed the way he looked to meet with Ishmael Graendal would have done the same when she was nearby Lanfear.
Finally, Tamyrlin, the man in the dream can't be Rhavin. Rhavin was in Andor and wouldn't be wearing Illianer boots while impersonating an Andoran nobleman.
6
Anubis: 2004-01-04
they would need to be working together, and i doubt that they are. remember that sammael had illian warded to heck, so if demandred had been there, sammael would have known about it. and if they had been working together, then demandred would have likely helped sammael kill rand. which didnt happen.
7
free will: 2004-01-05
I didn't catch why Taim could be in Illian in tDR. First Taim was in Saldea, then he was MIA, and finally in LoC he appears in Camelyn. Bashere thinks Taim looks funny. Before Taim appears in Camelyn another Forsaken mentions that Demandred is "in the south" (sorry I lost the page number). Taim and Demandred are both jealous of Rand and would love to take his place. After being captured Taimandred could travel to Illian during Taim's MIA period and then mosey up to Camelyn when he hears about the amnesty. Taim says on page 215 "the so-called Aiel". Who but a forsaken would say so-called? And the instruction about letting the Lord of Chaos rule is clearly about prohibiting a first strike against Rand, because later in the book Graendal is telling Sammael that the DO is prohibiting first strikes as a part of relating the "Let the Lord of Chaos rule" instruction, and Graendal's POV is pretty clear that she isn't lying. And what does Taimandred do next? He "joins" Rand as a subject. That's pretty literal.
So I think Taimandred could have been in Illian because Taim was MIA, so I don't see why you excluded Taim. And that "so-called Aiel" makes Taim a forsaken totally obvious.
8
Anubis: 2004-01-05
you do realize that taimandred died a long time ago right?
9
Fade: 2004-01-07
Thanks for comin out Free Will...
taimandred is as dead as Asmodean
10
Elder Haman: 2004-01-12
I always thought the man was Rahvin, because Rahvin is mentioned as having gold lined boots, dark hair with wings of grey. Isn't he? Also, I always thought that the clothes the Forsaken wore in the World of Dreams was suppose to represent the styles they wore back in the Age of Legends.
11
free will: 2004-01-15
you do realize that taimandred died a long time ago right?
The "facts" people use to "disprove" Taimandred have consequences more unbelievable than Taimandred, so Ocam's razor. For instance, in the same quote where Demandred "fails" to recognize Flinn, he also fails to recognize AS agelessness yet knows what an AM is. The simplest explanation is that he was too far away to recognize either AS agelessness or Flinn. The unbelieveable alternative is that Demandred has never seen a modern (i.e. bound) AS and knows about AM. And for a POV including someone getting instructions from both Taim and Demandred, there's one word: proxies. I think RJ is toying with us.
taimandred is as dead as Asmodean
That's funny, because I think Asmodean is Shadar Haran.