At the base of the foothills, the wind turned eastward, passing an open plain kept free of trees and scrub by the soldier's axe. The killing field surrounded thirteen fortresses, tall and cut entirely from unpolished black marble, their blocks left rough-hewn to give them a primal feeling of unformed strength. These were towers meant for war. By tradition they were unoccupied. How long that would last—how long tradition itself would be remembered in a continent in chaos—remained to be seen.
Chapter 1 of this entry in The Wheel of Time series begins like the opening chapter of every volume which preceded. The ritualistic opening paragraph of the first chapters all contain almost the exact same words in almost the exact same order with the major alteration being location. The location in this place is identified as “the misty peaks of Imfaral.” What follows this ritualistic opening paragraph is imagery describing those peaks, but it is here—the fourth paragraph of Chapter 1—that things become significant. Pay close attention to mention of those thirteen fortresses. For they are the titular towers of midnight.
“I caught a badger. Want to let it go on the village green?”
In a series spanning more than a dozen volumes most of which clock it between 700 and 900 pages each, it is inevitable that a certain sort of meta component will start to kick in. Nobody in their right mind would ever seriously describe this fantasy series as postmodern, but much was composed during that transitional era when postmodernism charted its path from obscurity literary term to wrongly overused meaninglessness. Part of the postmodern zeitgeist that seeps into The Wheel of Time is self-referential stuff that can only be appreciated by not only reading the entire series, but remembering small details. This particular quote is a favorite of many fans as it is a comedically sly callback to one of the most popular locations in the books: an inn called Easing the Badger that pops up in Chapter 42 way back in the third book of the series, The Dragon Reborn. It’s not exactly The Simpsons or Twin Peaks-level postmodern self-referential meta-humor, but among fans the line is more than enough to produce a chuckle along with Perrin’s as he reacts to Mat’s sudden appearance.
The end had come. They would meet it with swords raised.
These are the final lines of the narrative portion of the book. As usual there is a quote from one of the invented ancient texts of the world in which the story takes place. After that comes a glossary of terms. But this is technically the final concluding word of the book. This knowledge comes with the realization that it means there is but one more volume left to go before the entire series concludes. That knowledge will, of course, go a long way toward explaining the curious structure of these parting words of narration. It is not usual for an assertion of the end having already arrived—notice the verb tense here—to be followed by, well, pretty much anything. Usually if the end has come in a complex long-distance epic such as this it means it for real. This is the end. But, as indicated, the reader knows this is not really the end. That is the only explanation for this bizarre structuring of the final words that, out of context, are almost nonsensical. If the end had already come—as opposed to having just arrive—why would there be any need to meet it with swords? Curious linguistic choice that.
