That's hardly the same as including her in the image, or at least convey the duality of saidin and saidar.

The illustration is a very weak concept, considering what the scene was, and represented thematically.


The most likely reason they didn't went for Rand and Nynaeve is because they had a concept very much like that for TPOD.

That was a mistake in the first place, to have chosen these two complementary scenes for two covers.

In Jordan's idea, the fixing the weather was like a prelude to the Cleansing of Saidin. It was the female deed, that reunited Kin, AS, "WO" and Windfinders for the first time, and performed a deed like the WT alone, or any of the groups, had never done. They had to come together for something like this to happen.

They overdid it, though, and there was no one to guide saidin because no man was in the circle to give access to it to the leader. The bowl drew saidin on its own, and did what it wanted with it. The OP went "wild"/mad in the whole area. It's as if the women had "tainted" the OP temporarily, to fix what the DO had done on the world. Jordan designed this episode so it was like a female euphemistic version of the sealing of the Bore (and by the end of the book, the main consequence is channellers began to lose control of the OP, Rand had an episode of madness and lost control of Callandor, and all kinds of accidents happened - the euphemistic version of the Breaking...

The Cleansing was the great deed that worked. A lot more ambitious, a lot more complex and impressive, driven by a man but with a woman at his side. Rand/LTT redeeming the price of his mistake at SG. It was the first time AS and Asha'man worked together - a pair lead by a man to cleanse the Taint, a woman to lead the battle against the Forsaken. The was also a protective shield over Rand, so the Forsaken could not come in contact with Rand - and allusion to Latra Posae's plan of shielding the whole area of SG, instead of touching Shai'tan directly like LTT planned. Instead of risking the OP/TP touching, Rand had the TP touch the SL taint so they attracted/repelled one another. Nynaeve placed her fate in Rand's hands, while Rand placed his in Cadsuane's, who placed her in both Rand and Nyaneve. It was like the great undoing of the Concord, the mistakes of LTT - all at once - LTT correcting the consequences of his mistake, using the tools designed for Latra's plan - and woman and man working together at last. The male/female element of the Cleansing was massively important.

The TPOD cover is really nice, and it's a good idea to show Aviendha and Elayne and Nynaeve with the Bowl, but it really limited their options for WH.... Rand & Nynaeve would have looked pretty much the same as TPOD, and showing the three women like this also deprived them of the alternative choice of showing Rand bonded by Min, Elayne and Aviendha for WH.

Anyway.. it's a nice enough image, but it's just not a good concept for the scene they sought to depict.