Magic
The Magic in the Wheel of Time series is known as the One Power; using the One Power is called channeling. The One Power is split into two sections: saidin and saidar. Men channel saidin, and women channel saidar. Not all people can channel. Specific flows of saidin or saidar are called weaves.
At the start of the series, saidin has been tainted by the Dark One for over three thousand years. Any man who channels it will eventually go insane and die. Because of this, the female Aes Sedai hunt down men who can channel and gentle (cut the man off from saidin) or kill them.
Also exists a power of evil, dubbed the True Power. The tapping of this power caused the bore into the Dark one's sanctum in the first place. Some higher levels of authority in the shadow have been granted access to this power by Shai'tan, and explain its use less as graceful, and more as ripping through the seams of fate and time itself, to force one's will on nature.
Read more about this topic: Wheel Of Time Characters
Famous quotes containing the word magic:
“Without, the frost, the blinding snow,
The storm-wind’s moody madness—
Within, the firelight’s ruddy glow,
And childhood’s nest of gladness.
The magic words shall hold thee fast:
Thou shalt not heed the raving blast.”
—Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832–1898)
“Thou treacherous, base deserter of my flame,
False to my passion, fatal to my fame,
Through what mistaken magic dost thou prove
So true to lewdness, so untrue to love?”
—John Wilmot, Earl Of Rochester (1647–1680)
“There is no magic decoding ring that will help us read our young adolescent’s feelings. Rather, what we need to do is hold out our antennae in the hope that we’ll pick up the right signals.”
—The Lions Clubs International and the Quest Nation. The Surprising Years, III, ch.4 (1985)