An Ending: Androl & Pevara

This post contains spoilers for A Memory of Light. 

Read at your own peril.  

Androl & Pevara, I have one question for the two of you:

Where have you been all my life?

Seriously, I love these two. I want an entire series that is just the adventures of Androl and Pevara. I can see the tagline now. "He was destined to go insane. She was destined to hunt him down. Together they will stop the forces of darkness."

Something like that. Something that says "these shouldn't be friend, but they are, and they're pure awesome."

Yep. Androl + Pevara = Awesome.

That being said, it's time for a disclaimer:

Bonding People Against Their Will is Bad  

Part of me feels like Pevara should have had more self control. After all, she's been in Circles before. Heck, I'm sure she's been in Circles with another Aes Sedai leading and that Aes Sedai got a bee in her bonnet and refused to let Pevara get out. On the other hand, I also recognize that Pevara has been indoctrinated her entire life to fear men like Androl, because they are going to go mad. She dedicated her life to hunting men like Androl down and taking their power away from them. I can get that. Androl on the other hand has no excuse. Just because Androl bonded him doesn't me he should have bonded her. Even if it did have awesome side effects.

Honestly, I'm surprised that mind reading hasn't been developed already by the Aes Sedai. We clearly saw how useful it was throughout A Memory of Light, and the Warder weave is so close as it is. So I can only guess that the only reason why such a weave hasn't been developed is because the Aes Sedai don't want anyone reading their minds.

Androl & Jain Farstrider

There have been a lot of rumors that Androl is Jain Farstrider's son. I want to go on the record as saying that I don't believe this. Androl talks about his father and how his father killed himself. What I think is more likely is that Androl met Jain when he was young, and like a certain other fatherless child we know (Olver), Jain took him under his wing and became a mentor/father figure to him. I think Androl went on adventures with Jain. But I do not think Jain is his father.

Fun with Gateways

Androl is the man. Making a cup of tea with Gateways? That was amazing! And perfect. Lava Gateway? Beautiful! That was fantastic!

I've read a lot of comments on other sites complaining that if things like lava gateways could be made they should have been used way more often in the Last Battle. I would like to point out that as far as we know Androl is the only person, Aes Sedai or Asha'man, with a Talent for Gateways. As Pevara points out at one point in A Memory of Light, most people need to be incredibly familiar with the locations on both sides of the Gateway. How many people are very familiar with the inside of the Dragonmount? None. Absolutely none. Androl's Talent is different. He doesn't need to be familar with it. He just has to know it exists, that it's there. He is the only one who can do this. He's also incredibly weak in the power. Yes, he can make larger Gateways than one would expect with his power level, but he needed a circle to have enough power to make lava gateways. So without Androl no lava gateways and without a circle no lava gateways. You can see why they didn't use them every five minutes.

Androl as...Androl

Taim disguising Androl as Androl was one of the funniest and most awesome moments of the book. There can be no disagreement on this matter. 

Red Ajah, Asha'man, Is This The Future?  

At one point Androl tells Pevara her Ajah is stupid and without purpose and should completely die. (Except in more Androl like words). Pevara politely disagrees. She clearly thinks that the future of the Red Ajah is to bond Asha'man and to help them. After all, the Red Ajah has always been about helping men...right? (I'll pause while you contain your uncontrollable laughter.)

Pevara's dream for the Red Ajah is nice, but I see two problems. (1) Most Red Ajah completely hate men. That's why they become Red Ajah, so they can take out all their anger and angst against men on the few poor souls who can channel. This certainly isn't true of all the Red Ajah, but it's true of enough that this future could never be anything but a dream. (2) Not all Asha'man want to be warders. Not all Asha'man want to be attached to Aes Sedai. Under no circumstances will be Black Tower bow to the White Tower and let the Aes Sedai control them.

And according to Brandon Sanderson, the Asha'man and Aes Sedai are going to stay separate in the Fourth Age.

But I could see there being an Ajah among the White Tower and an Ajah (or the equivalent) among the Black Tower that do bond to each other, making a pairs of awesome power couples. And that is what Pevara and Androl, as well as the other bonded Asha'man and Aes Sedai are founding.

Also, am I the only one who wants to pluralize Asha'man as Asha'men?

Power Levels

There has been a lot in the Wheel of Time about the unfairness of the Aes Sedai system: how it's not fair that a newly raised Aes Sedai with a lot of power gets higher precedence than an Aes Sedai who has been around for a long but has little power. The Wise Women, the Kin, and so many others have brought the unfairness of this system to light. What I think is going to be interesting is how the Black Tower ends up organizing itself. Logain, despite his lesser power upon being stilled, is still very powerful, and he's the leader of the Black Tower. But Androl is the man who fought for the Black Tower, who saved the Black Tower, and who those loyal to Logain and the Dragon followed, and he basically has no power.

I don't know how the cards will fall out at the Black Tower and I don't know if the White Tower will re-organize itself (I doubt it), but it's certainly interesting to think about. Androl sets an interesting precedent for the Black Tower.

Edit: As my lovely commenters have pointed out, Logain has the same power level because he was healed by a female. Men should be healed of stilling by females and females by men to maintain power level. So someone teach Flinn how to heal stilling so he can get on that!