Chapter 34: The Wheel Weaves

Thom returns to The Bunch of Grapes at dawn from Barthanes's feast, unsettled by the nobles' pointed questions about Rand.

Upstairs he finds Dena dead on the bed, throat cut. Two men wait in the wardrobes; he kills them both. The second, pressed for a name, claims Barthanes sent them to buy what Thom knew about Rand.

Zera comes up and recognises the dead man as an agent of King Galldrian. Barthanes, she adds, was found torn apart in his own bedchamber that morning. Smoke rises above Cairhien's walls—the granaries are burning. Thom presses his purse into Zera's hands to see to Dena, then leaves to kill the King.

On Toman Head, Fain rides into Falme, his surviving Darkfriends cowed by the journey through the Ways and by watching Trollocs cook the comrade he fed them.

Fain presents the golden chest to the Seanchan High Lord Turak. To Fain's private chagrin, Turak opens it himself and lifts out the Horn of Valere and the ruby-hilted dagger Fain cannot stop hungering for.

Fain spins a family legend of loyalty kept to Artur Hawkwing's blood across the Aryth Ocean. Turak refuses to sound the Horn: he is twelfth in line for the Crystal Throne, and will instead present it to the Empress when he returns to Seanchan. Hearing of a greater ruler, Fain hides his shift of plan.

He warns Turak that Darkfriends led by Rand al'Thor are a day or two behind with Trollocs. Turak, amused, says watch will be kept. Dismissed into the town, Fain savours the thought of Rand's death.