Chapter 24: Flight Down the Arinelle

Rand endures another nightmare in which Ba'alzamon pursues him through shifting mazes—a stone labyrinth, a hedge of thorns paved with skulls, and a hall of mirrors where their faces merge into one. He wakes aboard the Spray with a bleeding thorn-prick on his finger.

As the boat creeps down the Arinelle against contrary winds, Captain Domon drives the crew relentlessly while Gelb is ostracized for blaming the passengers for the Trolloc attack. Thom teaches Rand and Mat gleeman skills to maintain their cover and keep the crew entertained, while quietly watching for signs of mutiny. Domon tells of wonders he has seen—a two-hundred-foot tower of shining steel on the riverbank, a stone hand clutching a crystal sphere on Tremalking, and relics from the Age of Legends in Tanchico.

Four days in, Rand recklessly climbs to the masthead and slides down the forestay, shocking everyone including himself once the exhilaration fades. He discovers that Mat secretly took a ruby-hilted dagger from Shadar Logoth's treasure room, and Mat admits he too has been having Ba'alzamon's dreams. Shaken by his own inexplicable behavior atop the mast, Rand fears he is going mad and resolves to reach Tar Valon before it is too late.