Line #29 Headscratchers/Dragaera


1	* Something I've seen noted on several fansites which also intrigues me- In the ''Taltos'' books, Vlad and his wife have read Paarfi's Romances. However, according to the timeline of the ''Khaavren'' books "written" by Paarfi, his first work of fiction, ''The Phoenix Guards'' was written at a point when Vlad and Castillo were in their seventies or older. My personal theory is that some of Paarfi's earlier historic works had the same quirks as his later fiction, and so they were enjoyed in a SoBadItsGood way. Otherwise though, this seems to be a major plot hole.
2	** Let's blame it on Verra.
3	** They've read some of Paarfi's work, but as far as I know, there's no indication that they read the ''Khaavren Romances'' themselves...? Paarfi was a writer before he struck gold with the Romances, like you said. I'm on board with your personal theory.
4	** In his introduction to ''Phoenix Guards'', Paarfi lists interviews with "the Baroness of D___________" as a major source, and ''500 Years After'' contains events to which Sethra Lavode, Baroness of Dzur Mountain was the only witness who survived long enough to tell anyone. It stands to reason that Sethra was familiar with Paarfi before the Romances were published, and Vlad could easily have picked it up from her.
5	** The introduction to ''Five Hundred Years After'' indicates Paarfi had written a romance called ''Three Broken Strings'' which apparently attained some renown, and also indicated that people who read it also tended to pick up his historical monographs.
6	** In the first chapter of ''Lyorn'', Vlad is is watching a group of actors rehearsing for a play; the specific scene is for a song, which includes a reference to "that silly book 'The Phoenix Guards'". Maybe evidence it already exists, at least as a rough draft/first edition?
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8	* Another thing, on the issue of Great Weapons. It's stated at some point that the user determines whether or not they want to destroy the soul of someone they kill. However, when Vlad accidentally kills someone with Godslayer in ''Dzur'' it seems like he automatically destroyed their soul even though he had no intent to do so. Similarly, in his highly disturbing slaughter of a village in ''Sethra Lavode'', Morolaan (spelling?) thinks of his victims as sacrifices to Vera which seems to be literally "letting God sort them out", but doesn't exactly fit the two options noted above.
9	** A related question- ''why would you want to destroy someone's soul in the first place?'' I understand how the Jhereg will use Morganti weapons to send a serious message, but it really seems like a MoralEventHorizon- how could you hate someone enough to do that?- why wouldn't it be sufficient to put their body through a cheesegrater so that they wouldn't be brought back to life- why would you care whether or not the gods chose to reincarnate them at some point in the future?
10	*** The Serioli forged the morganti blades as a means to end all wars by making them to horrible to even think about. This worked - for the Serioli. The Great Weapons were created as a way to kill the gods and the Jenoine, because they ruled/rule now over the planet which belonged to the Serioli first.
11	*** Two points: First, it would appear that you only have to cut someone with a Morganti blade to destroy their soul, even if the cut wouldn't normally be lethal. That alone makes them incredibly valuable. Second, damaging the body sufficiently to preven revivification is not always easy to do in the middle of a fight or in the chaos of a plan going wrong. But again, all you have to do is cut someone with a Morganti blade and they are down for good.
12	** But Dragaerans are generally pretty ruthless, right? The Jhereg especially (those who aren't probably get... weeded out... quickly). There are a couple of scenes, IIRC, where some of Vlad's friends seem honestly puzzled that wanton slaughter is something that bothers him.
13	** Also, as of ''Dzur'', Vlad isn't at all familiar with Godslayer, and Godslayer is still very young and not even awake yet.
14	*** Let's be fair: If in our world, not only was the existence of the soul empirically proven, but a mechanism produced which could destroy that soul, does anyone seriously believe for a second that this mechanism would not be at some point introduced? A nuclear-equivalent "ultimate deterrent"; a means of revenge or control, a religiously-fanatical 'cleansing of the sinners'... Even as an implement of justice a step above, or concurrent, with the death penalty.
15	** Given that events in Vlad's life confirm that reincarnation occurs, and that a reborn person retains at least some of their former personality-traits and can recall their former lives through magic, it's technically ''true'' that destroying the soul may be the only way to permanently remove someone from Dragaera. Unless you're ''sure'' your enemy is going to pass on to eternity and not be reincarnated, a Morganti weapon may be your only option to expunge an utterly-hated foe.
16	** Vlad's (well, Godslayer/Lady Teldra's) automatic destruction of the sorceress' soul was explained at some point, as being a proportionate response to the severity of the attack, but it seems as if soul destruction is the default setting (if you will) for a Great Weapon.
17	*** ''Hawk'' further elaborates on this, revealing that Great Weapons actually ''need'' to feed to maintain their full powers, although they'll refrain from doing so if their wielders disapprove. Lady Teldra was most likely ''starving'' when the sorceress attacked, and wasn't "awake" enough as yet to sense Vlad's objections even if he'd warned her not to.
18	** I had the impression that- as of ''Hawk''- Great Weapons 'had' to feed on either Souls or Sorcery, and Lady Teldra had little chance to feed before that book; both because of the Phoenix Stones, and Vlad not using his newfound "sidekick". So Teldra was starving by the time ''Hawk'' rolls around... But before that? Sethra mentioned something about "when she awakens", so maybe Great Weapons run 'on automatic' to a certain extent until the owner 'claims clear ownership' and awakens the (latent) personality, and tells "it" what he/she/the owner wants regarding default behavior? (Especially since a different book-I forget which- states that, with Morolaan unconscious, '''Blackwand''' moved his arm around as part of its defence... partially because Blackwand had to defend him and was stuck in his hand...)
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20	* Regarding all of the EpilepticTrees (especially the Kragar as Mario idea), Brust responded that no character is anyone else. However, this isn't true, as Sethra Lavode and Kiera the Thief are the same person. I wondered if Brust changed his mind, because there is a comment in one of the ''Khaavren'' books where Paarfi says the same thing, but of course Garland becomes Graycat and Grita becomes Orlaan.
21	** They probably just changed their names. Grita seems to be the rough equivalent of Mordaunt from the Musketeer trilogy, and he used at least one alias. His mother Milady (=Illista) had many.
22	** The quote from Brust was "No-one else is anyone else." and was made after the Sethra/Kiera revelation. My interpretation of it was more that he was saying "That was the only time I will ever use this plot device in the Taltos novels" rather than "It will never appear in a Taltos novel"
23	** However Sethra pretty much outright told Vlad that she had other identities, but that they were "no one he knew." So it's possible that the "no-one else is anyone else" simply applied to all characters that had thus far been introduced, not any future characters.
24	** The Garland/Graycat incident was a case of ExactWords -- Paarfi says "Graycat does not appear in this book under any other name", and indeed he doesn't. When Khaavren recognizes Graycat as Garland, Graycat replies that he left the name Garland behind him at the end of ''Phoenix Guards'' and won't reclaim it until he returns the the Imperial Court (which he never does). Paarfi never said Graycat hadn't or wouldn't appear in other books in the series under other names.
25	*** Technically, he never said that Greycat wouldn't appear by any other name either: he said Greycat would never appear in any other ''guise''. And indeed, Greycat never did dress up in his old Court persona as Lord Garland, because he got killed and the Court, destroyed, before he could get the chance.
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27	* There were flying castles before the Interregnum. How could anyone reach them if they couldn't teleport or levitate easily?
28	** It's possible that the castles raised and lowered themselves to take on passengers and supplies. Impractical, but they did some crazy stuff before the Interregnum.
29	** Teleportation was decidedly impossible, but clearly levitation on a scale adequate to supply a castle existed, since levitation adequate to hold a castle up in the air existed.
30	** Mechanical elevators and cargo cranes, powered by counterweights or beasts of burden, could also suffice.
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32	* Why is everyone (at least on the main page) assuming the House of the Pheonix is doomed? They are the House of the ''Phoenix''. The Empire and the House of the Phoenix seem to be match each other - Adron's Disaster killed the Empire and seemingly the House of the Pheonix (Zerika lived under a false name) but both are reborn as Zerika leaves the Paths of the dead. My theory is that after a cerain number of cycles - probably something like 17x17x17x17 (or more) - the empire "dies" and is then "reborn." This is probably either a bug or by design inherently to the cycle itself, with the House of the Phoenix as something of a destroy/rebuild job.
33	** Doesn't Zerika IV's reign start the second Great Cycle? So there have only been two Phoenixes of that caliber, Zerika I and IV. Even Sethra Lavode hasn't seen what happens with this sort of thing, and given how miserable everything looked after Adron's Disaster, it's no wonder everyone's freaked out about the Phoenix House dying. But we've seen no solution to that and we may never since it will be another cycle/couple thousand years before it comes up. In the meantime, important people and gods will worry and hopeful find a solution from keeping the Cycle from crumbling.
34	*** In ''Vallista'', Verra implies that destroying the Cycle is an important step in the Gods' ongoing efforts to undo Jenoine meddling.
35	** If events in ''Tiassa'' set a precedent, there's at least one option (i.e. hooking up with a deceased Phoenix in the Paths of the Dead, like Aliera hooked up with Kieron) by which Zerika IV might avoid being the very last of her House. No knowing how many generations could get away with that, however.
36	** Aliera herself was considered acceptable as Dragon Heir, despite being half-Dragon and half-deity. Presumably if Zerika had a child whose father was a god, that child would be considered a true Phoenix.
37	*** From what I remember- from one of the 'Kaveraan Romance' books- House Phoenix '''requires''' any (potential) members to have an actual Phoenix appear in the sky during 'the hour' of their birth. Add in the general apparent revulsion towards half-breeds (which also shows up in one part of ''Tiassa''- "Papa Cat"'s revulsion towards Vlad and Lady Sara's implied relationship), and some Major intervention is needed for the cycle to continue. [As to whether it '''should''', if the Jenoine are destroyed....]
38	*** Of course, that's assuming Zerika can't unilaterally declare the "born under a phoenix" stricture null and void. In a House of one member, it can't be that hard to reach a consensus about House policy.
39	*** A relationship between Vlad and Sara wouldn't rouse concerns about half-breeds, because the official position of Dragaera's genetics experts is that they're different species and not fertile together. If anything, their hooking up would be scandalous because of implied bestiality overtones. As for the real-phoenix-flies-over criterion, if a god can't arrange for one to put in an appearance for his child's benefit, how much of a "god" could he be?
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41	* The system of Dragon bloodlines is a bit confusing at times. It's stated that Dragonlords' "e'whatever" designation indicates their descent from an illustrious ancestor, yet it's unclear whether that lineage is traced down through the male line of descent, the female line, or by whichever sex the famous ancestor in question happened to be. The fact that Morrolan ''isn't'' considered an e'Kieron, despite his mother having been Adron's sister, suggests it's only the male line of descent that's relevant; however, this runs counter to the existence of an e'Lanya bloodline, as the original Lanya for whom they're named was female. So how, exactly, is a bloodline traced from one generation to the next among Dragonlords, and how does tracing ancestry through only one parent's lineage even make sense in the first place, for a gender-blind society?
42	** Dragonlord's choice which bloodline they cleave to upon reaching maturity, perhaps? There's no reason they can't trace ancestry through both parents' lineages, but choose to honor a specific one. Or maybe it's simply agreed to on a case-by-case basis which lineage is "dominant" in a relationship and thus any resulting children are counted as members of such. Or maybe the "choice" is based on something like birth year and which house is dominant in the Cycle. Or maybe important rituals of foretelling at the child's birth. Or maybe... Well, suffice to say there are a lot of ways such might be decided, just that no narrator has ever known it or considered it relevant to mention.
43	*** Personal FanWank, but: Each person in 'House Dragon' is assigned an "e'whatever" name at birth, as part of their name, with the generic default being one of their parents' "e'whatever" names. Unless the parents choose otherwise; either way, it happens when the baby/kid is named. '''Later on''', (presumably when the child is "old enough" to decide for him/herself), the name can be changed, with appropriate registration,on order to honor someone else. Morolaan[[note]]For example[[/note]] can change his "e'whatever" [last name] as much as he wants, as long as he fills out the paperwork/tells the proper authorities each time. (And the name ''seems'' to make some sort of [In Universe] sense.)
44	** As I recall, Dragonlords simply choose which ancestor to honor based on their own values, and they can even change it during their lifetime if circumstances change. So Morrolan chose to name himself e'Drien instead of e'Kieron because he'd rather associate himself with Drien than Kieron.
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46	* Every Morganti weapon we've seen in the series has been a sword or dagger of some description. The meta reason for this, of course, is AuthorAppeal: Brust just likes swashbuckling fight scenes. In-Verse, is there a genuine restriction on how Morganti weapons can be designed? If they need to be blades so they can slice into flesh, could you have a Morganti battleaxe or pole arm? How about shuriken? Can piercing weapons like spears, or spiked weapons like some mace-heads, be Morganti? Or could a blunt weapon like a lepip be made Morganti, so you'd have the option of striking a light blow to render someone unconscious whose soul you ''don't'' want to destroy, yet can use more force to crush their skull with the same weapon if you want them DeaderThanDead? Vlad did mention that hitting someone with the ball on the hilt of the Morganti blade in ''Issola'' would hurt like a bitch, so presumably clonking someone with such a weapon doesn't ''have'' to eat their soul: if it did, pain would be the ''least'' of the target's problems.
47	** In universe, Morganti weapons were produced to make war (among the Serioli) terrifying; like a magical Gatling Gun. It works better if used on edged objects, especially if they're going to be introduced into a war environment. ''So far'', we haven't heard of anyone else ''developing'' them; just that the Great Weapons exist, Morolaan has a stash[[note]]mentioned in ''Dragon'', when Vlad is being hired to trace the "theft" of the sword[[/note]], and Vlad would ask Krager for one occasionally without knowing his supplier. And others are floating around; the 'blade' of [=GodSlayer=] was found as part of a random job, after all.
48	** Even if the Serioli ''invented'' Morganti weapons, it doesn't seem plausible that they'd be the only ones making them at all. Several of the ones we've seen are too big for Vlad to lift, and Serioli are smaller than Easterners. And there are so few Serioli around in Vlad's time that it's unlikely the few who remain could be making all those Dragaeran-scale weapons to order.
49	*** Eh, a pre-emptive "make the biggest weapon you can, show it off, it'd be a shame if it ''had'' to be used"? Yes, it's undercut by the "they made (any)/(the first batch) and found the whole idea horrible" tone of the story Vlad gets told, but it's already a case of BlueAndOrangeMorality, even InUniverse; Vlad is surprised that it stopped war amongst the Serioli, when even the Jhereg use them as 'just a part of business'. For bigger Morganti weapons to be made later implies the Serioli taught the method to non-Serioli, versus keeping the whole process under their control, and any weapons found/used being stolen/bought/picked up off the ground.
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51	* Ok; ''Vallista''. Vlad finds out more about his previous lives. The fact that he had ''any'' was already brought up in earlier books, so not a surprise. It's just... uh, how many he's had. (I didn't count the "flashbacks", but it was 5+, and seemed like 10+.) So... Given the empire is, roughly 200-250,000 years old (Vaguely remembered from an early book's discussion of Sethra's age) and various older Dragaerans are mentioned as being 2500-3000+ years old.... How the f*** do you ''comfortably'' fit 5-10+ reincarnations without them finding out about each other, in a Deja Vu kind of way? (Remember, when Vlad was originally told, he ended up completely accepting it in a "Search your feelings, you know it to be true" sort of way, and that was when he was compared to the original founder of House Jhereg.)
52	** Two ways. First, there's no guarantee that all or even ''most'' of Vlad's prior incarnations survived to die of old age; we know they didn't get Morgantied, because he's still around, but prior to the Interregnum it was almost impossible to resurrect the dead and he's probably gotten himself killed plenty of times. And second, ''Vallista'' itself reveals that Dragaeran lifespans were ''originally'' as short as regular Easterners', lengthening gradually since Doliver's day. So, Vlad probably lived out his early incarnations at a much faster clip than his recent ones.
53	** The 'problem', to me is more this: when Aliera tells him he's a reincarnation, he primarily gets a sense of his first life ''only'', but not of any of the "others". Presumably, the Doyalist reason is Brust hadn't really though at the time of Vlad having (so many) other reincarnations, but...
54	** Vlad ''does'' have that momentary pre-WhamLine flash of awareness that Aliera's incarnations are '''always''' just a bit faster than his, though. Which implies they've had ''that exact conversation'' in plenty of lives before, with outcomes so similar that he ''can't help'' but recall it, even if he can't consciously dredge up any details of those past incarnations besides that fact.
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Context Headscratchers / Dragaera