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Rand picked up the access key--it too brought hi more and more like just another retainer or servant

"You have done a great service, Ta e The world owes you a debt I will see that you are cared for the rest of your life"

"I appreciate that, my Lord," Tam said "But it isn’t necessary I have what I need"

Was he hiding a grin? Perhaps it had been a po, and Rand turned, crossing the fine rug and throwing open the balcony doors again The sun had indeed set, and darkness had fallen on the city A crisp ocean breeze blew across hiht

Tam stepped up beside him

"I’ It felt foolish

"That’s all right," Ta anyway"

"Were you really a blademaster?"

Tam nodded "I suppose I killed a man as one, did it in front of witnesses, but I’ve never forgiven "

"The ones that need to be done often seem the ones that we least like to have to do"

"That’s the truth if I’ve ever heard it," Ta Lit ere beginning to shine in the darkness below "It’s so strange My boy, the Dragon Reborn All of those stories I heard when traveling the world, I’m part of them"

"Think how it feels for me," Rand said

Tam chuckled "Yes Yes, I suppose you understand exactly what I mean, don’t you? Funny, isn’t it?"

"Funny?" Rand shook his head "No Not, that My life isn’t my own I’m a puppet for the Pattern and the prophecies, s cut"

Tam frowned "That’s not true, son Er, my Lord"

"I can’t see it any other way"

Tauess I can understand I re the days when I was a soldier You know that I fought against Tear? You’d think I would have painfulhere But one enerudges"

Rand rested the access key on the railing, but held it tightly He did not lean down; he reht-backed

"A soldier doesn’t have a lot of choices for his own destiny either," Tarn said, tapping softly on the railing with an idle ringer "More iuess men like you"

"But my choices are made for me by the Pattern itself," Rand said "I have less freedom than the soldiers You could have run, deserted Or at least gotten out by legal means"

"And you can’t run?" Tarn asked

"I don’t think the Pattern would let me," Rand said "What I do is too important It would just force me back in line It has done so a dozen times already"

"And would you really want to run?" Tam asked

Rand didn’t reply

"I could have left those wars But, at the sa who I was I think it’s the same for you Does itto?"

"I’ to die at the end of this," Rand said "And I have no choice"

Ta In an instant, Rand felt that he elve years old again "I won’t have talk like that," Taon Reborn, I won’t listen to it You always have a choice Maybe you can’t pick where you are forced to go, but you still have a choice"

"But how?"

Tam laid a hand on Rand’s shoulder "The choice isn’t always about what you do, son, but why you do it When I was a soldier, there were soht siht for loyalty--loyalty to their comrades, or to the crown, or to whatever The soldier who dies for money and the soldier who dies for loyalty are both dead, but there’s a difference between the The other didn’t

"I don’t know if it’s true that you’ll need to die for this all to play out But we both know you aren’t going to run fros are the sa on the subject"

"I wasn’t whining--" Rand began

"I know," Tas don’t whine, they deliberate" He seeh Rand had no idea who Oddly, Taave a brief chuckle "It doesn’t matter," Tam continued "Rand, I think you can survive this I can’t iive you so for us all But you’re a soldier going to war, and the first thing a soldier learns is that you ht die You iven But you can choose why you fulfill theo to battle, Rand?"

"Because I h," Tarn said "To the croith that woman! I wish she’d come to me sooner If I’d known--"