neuxue answered:

I let this ask sit in my askbox for a little while because listen, anon, this is such a fic prompt.

But finally I had to admit that there’s no way I’d actually be able to write the probably very very long fic this would end up being anytime soon, so you get an answer now.

I think the main difference would be in accepting her role. I’ve talked before about how Rand and Egwene are very clearly written as parallels in many ways, and how they face versions of the same thing in their own stories, each in their own way. And I’ve also mentioned a few times that what I tend to see as the origin of the differences between their storylines (there are of course many other differences, but this is the first of them in many ways), underscored by these parallels, is that Rand is a hero by necessity, while Egwene is a hero by choice. Egwene chooses; Rand is chosen.

(And wow that’s an interesting play on agency and gender…hm. One for later, perhaps.)

It means Egwene, while she struggles in other ways, embraces the roles she must take on, while Rand fights against them. Even when he does accept, there’s a lingering element of denial, of desperate defiance, of having to hold on to himself in face of who he must be.

Rand fights against what he must be; Egwene fights to be what she must be. Rand tries to hold on to himself against the external pressure of everyone around him seeing him differently, needing him to be the Dragon Reborn but also fearing him, expecting him to go mad, expecting him to be terrible, to break the world anew. All the force of those expectations thrust on him, and he tries to hold himself against them even as he must take on the role anyway.

So while Rand is faced with the overwhelming force of expectation and fear of what he will and must be, Egwene is faced with the overwhelming force of expectation that she can’t possibly be what she knows she must be. It’s similar, and yet opposite. Rand is being pulled under a current that’s towing him out to sea, too fast and too far and he’s afraid he’ll lose sight of shore completely. Egwene is fighting to swim out, against a current that’s trying to carry her back to shore.

Rand has to be persuaded to leave Emond’s field, because he must. Egwene has to ask to be taken out of Emond’s field, because she doesn’t yet know that she must, but she knows it’s what she wants.

Rand has to fight to hold on to his humanity and his innocence while the world expects him to be a monster and humanity needs him to be the Dragon Reborn. Egwene has to force the Tower to see her as Amyrlin rather than as an innocent biddable child.

They’re both fighting expectation, but in different directions. And so, even as their stories hit similar beats, they’re also…opposite.

So I think if Egwene were the Dragon Reborn, it would be similar. (Or similarly opposite, I should say). I think she would accept it sooner and more completely, but perhaps she would struggle to assert her status and her will on those who must follow her. I think in the end she would struggle in many of the same ways - being the saviour and destroyer of a world isn’t easy, and there’s so much that must be lost along the way. It would just come from a different angle, much the way her story already does when compared to Rand.