The river appeared through a gap in the crumbling walls.
Spencer saw it as a thread of clean blue cutting through Shadar Logoth's corruption — the Arinelle, flowing south toward Whitebridge and eventually the sea. Behind them, Trollocs crashed through the city's ruins. Above them, Mashadar's silver tendrils reached for anything living.
"There!" Thom pointed toward the water. "A boat!"
The Spray sat at anchor near the riverbank, a riverboat with wide decks and a crew scrambling to cast off. Its captain — Bayle Domon, Spencer knew, though they hadn't been introduced — stood at the rail, watching the chaos in the city with the expression of a man who'd seen strange things before and intended to survive this one too.
"RUN!" Spencer grabbed Mat's arm and pulled him toward the water.
They ran. Down the slope, over stones slick with river spray, toward the ship that represented their only chance at survival. Behind them, Trollocs burst from the city's edge — a dozen of them, red construct-threads blazing with killing intent.
"JUMP!" Thom's shout came from ahead; the gleeman was already airborne, his patched cloak spreading like wings as he cleared the gap between shore and deck.
Rand jumped next, landing hard and rolling. Mat followed, his golden thread flickering with desperate luck as he somehow found the one spot on the deck that wasn't covered in rope coils.
Spencer was last.
The Trolloc reached for him as he leaped — claws scraping across his back, tearing fabric, missing flesh by inches. He hit the deck badly, shoulder first, and the impact drove the air from his lungs. But he was aboard. They were all aboard.
"Cast off!" Bayle Domon's voice boomed across the deck. "Move, you motherless dogs! Cast off NOW!"
The Spray lurched away from the shore as Trollocs crashed into the water behind them. The current caught the boat, pulling it downstream, away from the dead city and its silver death.
Spencer lay on the deck and watched Shadar Logoth burn.
---
The fire was visible for miles.
Mashadar and the Trollocs had found each other, and the collision was apocalyptic. Silver tendrils wrapped around red construct-threads, dissolving them into nothing. Trolloc howls mixed with something that might have been the city itself screaming. The ancient evil and the Shadow's servants tore each other apart while the boat drifted further and further downriver.
"Well," Thom said quietly. "That was unpleasant."
Mat laughed — the ragged, desperate laugh of someone who'd survived something that should have killed him. "Unpleasant. Light, Thom, you've got a gift for understatement."
"One of many gifts." The gleeman was already checking himself for injuries, his hands moving with the efficiency of long practice. "Anyone hurt?"
"Scratched." Spencer pushed himself upright, wincing as his shoulder protested. "Nothing serious."
Rand sat against the rail, staring back at the burning city. His golden thread was dim with exhaustion and something darker — fear, maybe, or the beginning of the guilt that would eventually define him.
"The others," he said. "Moiraine, Lan, Perrin, Egwene..."
"Will survive." Thom's voice was firm. "Moiraine is Aes Sedai, and Lan is... Lan. They'll find us. Or we'll find them."
"How?"
"Tar Valon." Spencer heard himself speaking, the words coming automatically from knowledge he shouldn't have. "Moiraine said to meet at Tar Valon. If we follow the river, we'll reach Whitebridge. From there, we can find passage north."
Thom studied him with calculating eyes. "You know a lot about geography for a village carpenter."
"I listen. And I remember maps."
Not a complete lie. I do remember maps. I just remember them from books, not from studying.
The gleeman's thread rippled with something that might have been suspicion or might have been respect. Spencer couldn't tell which.
---
They found sleeping space in the Spray's hold.
The crew gave them suspicious looks but didn't interfere — Bayle Domon had agreed to carry them downriver, and his word was law aboard his ship. Spencer settled into a corner with his back to the hull, letting the boat's gentle rocking ease some of the tension from his muscles.
Mat sat beside him, turning a coin over his knuckles in that unconscious way he had.
"Thanks," Mat said quietly. "For following me. Back in the city."
"You would have done the same."
"Maybe." The coin flashed in the dim light. "Probably not. I'm not exactly known for thinking about other people."
"You sell yourself short."
"No, I really don't." But Mat was smiling — the first genuine smile Spencer had seen from him since Shadar Logoth. "You're a strange one, Aldan. A carpenter who knows about cursed cities and recognizes danger before anyone else sees it."
"Lucky, I guess."
"Luck I understand." The coin disappeared into Mat's pocket. "What you do isn't luck. It's something else."
He's noticing too much. Everyone is noticing too much.
Spencer didn't respond. After a moment, Mat shrugged and leaned back against the hull, closing his eyes.
"Wake me if we hit anything."
"Will do."
---
Spencer waited until Mat's breathing steadied into sleep.
Then he engaged Thread Sight and looked — really looked — at his friend's fate-thread.
He'd expected it to be clean. He'd stopped Mat from reaching Mordeth, stopped him from taking the dagger. The corruption should never have touched him.
But Mat's thread wasn't clean.
Faint tendrils of green-gold corruption clung to the golden strands, concentrated around Mat's right hand. The same curdled color as Shadar Logoth's stones. The same wrongness that had pulsed through Mordeth's presence.
No. No no no. I stopped him. He never touched the dagger.
Spencer traced the corruption to its source. Mat's pocket. The same pocket where he'd been storing his coin.
The coin. It's not from Shadar Logoth — Mat had it before we entered the city. But the corruption...
Spencer's mind raced. In the books, Mat was corrupted by the dagger from Shadar Logoth. But that wasn't the only way Shadar Logoth's evil could spread. The city had been destroyed by its own hatred, a corruption so complete that even objects from that era carried fragments of it.
Fain. Padan Fain visited Aridhol — what was left of it — years ago. He picked up Mordeth's essence. And if he carried coins from the city, if he gave one to Mat...
The pieces clicked into place with horrifying clarity.
Fain hadn't just fled Emond's Field to escape. He'd left something behind. A coin, pressed into Mat's hand during one of the peddler's visits to the village. Corruption planted long before Winternight, dormant until now.
The butterfly effect. I changed things, and the Pattern compensated.
Mat was always going to be corrupted. I just changed the vector.
---
The boat rocked on the dark river.
Spencer stared at the coin in Mat's pocket — he couldn't see it through Thread Sight, but he knew exactly where it was now. A piece of Shadar Logoth's evil, carried by an innocent boy who didn't know it was killing him.
I have to get it away from him. But he'll notice if it vanishes. He'll ask questions I can't answer.
And if the corruption has already spread...
Mat shifted in his sleep, muttering something about dice and drinks. His golden thread flickered with dreams that were probably pleasant, blissfully unaware of the poison seeping into his soul.
Spencer watched the burning city recede in the distance and felt the weight of another failure settling onto his shoulders.
I tried to change the story. I tried to save him.
And the Pattern found another way to break him anyway.
The night stretched on, and the Spray carried them further from Shadar Logoth, further from their friends, deeper into a future Spencer could no longer predict.
Behind them, the dead city burned. Ahead, Whitebridge waited with dangers of its own.
And in Mat's pocket, a corrupted coin gleamed with ancient, patient malice.
To supporting Me in Pateron .
with exclusive access to more chapters (based on tiers more chapters for each tiers) on my Patreon, you get more chapters if you ask for more (in few days), plus new fanfic every week! Your support starting at just $6/month helps me keep crafting the stories you love across epic universes.
By joining, you're not just getting more chapters—you're helping me bring new worlds, twists, and adventures to life. Every pledge makes a huge difference!
👉 Join now at patreon.com/TheFinex5 and start reading today!