@NativeJovian I got the exact opposite idea from Lara and Harry. They now have a common interest and will work together until they acchieve it, but once Thomas is up and running again Lara and Harry will go to war with each other. Harry has hurt Laras pride too much and imprisoning Thomas without telling her beforehand destroyed any bit of trust she still had in him. I don´t necessarily think it will happen in the open immediatly after Thomas is ok again, but Lara will start pulling her strings to get rid of Dresden once an for all. Lara and Harry are now "allies on a timer", with Thomas as the clock.
You may have noticed that I have not, in fact, said this is in any way not permitted.
But just as an author has a right to do whatever they want with their work, note by the same token, I am not obligated to find it entertaining or charming or witty if I think what an author has created isn't an interesting take compared with the original myth.
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.Re: starborn the "chosen one" nature of it sits better with me because the books have very clearly built up Harry's mother to be an incredibly clever individual, and given Eb's description of there being a "spotlight" on the earth that is how the starborn are chosen, for me Harry being a chosen one because his maverick genius mother meticulously planned it mitigates the usual downsides of the chosen one trope
"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."
for me it also helps that it´s an understood and regular occurence, which makes someone that way and that it is just about the timing of the birth opposed to a specific individual. I´m still not happy with it, but i´m unhappy in the same way i´m unhappy with how being a wizard works in general in Dresden Files. I hate magic systemes which you are either born with or you are not, i much prefer systemes where everyone can become a mage some are just more talented at it (everyone can learn how to play any sport pretty well, but not everyone can play on a professional level even if they put in a lot of effort)
Also I enjoy the implication of it being an anomaly that occurs every 666 years, because that means it's probably how Merlin acquired his reputation as an Antichrist.
Although it does mean that Merlin must be hella old. Harry was born in 1975 (presumably), so the only date that makes sense for Merlin (whom we know was around during the collapse of the Roman Empire in the late 400's) is the year 23 BCE. Meaning that by the time he would have met Mab in 1066, he was just shy of 1100 years old.
Edited by math792d on Jul 16th 2020 at 3:39:18 AM
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.Depends. The incubus thing is mostly based on the idea that incubi/succubi (which were the same species, they stole sperm from men as succubi and used it to transform into incubi to inseminate women) were sort of the delivery people for the devil, which is why Merlin was legitimately considered a candidate for The Antichrist before he was baptized and saved from that fate. But all of this is mostly based on the Prose Merlin, whereas in most other retellings he's just like...a prophet, basically.
EDIT: Correction, Geoffrey of Monmouth was the first to coin the idea of Merlin being the son of an incubus, the Prose Merlin is the one in which he becomes an Antichrist figure.
Also I'm pretty sure White Court Vampires aren't the only beings in the Dresdenverse that feed on sexual activity or emotion eating.
Edited by math792d on Jul 16th 2020 at 4:35:09 AM
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.Yeah, but I much prefer the idea that Merlin was just straight-up an Antichrist who went wrong, mostly because if you're going to commit to all the weird medieval Christian shit you might as well commit, y'know?
Corb mentions that Mab was still a freckled young woman when she 'arrived with the Conqueror' (William, presumably, it's not the first reference to Hastings in the series), which means she probably wasn't much older than that. They might not have met at Hastings specifically, but she evidently came with the Normans.
Edited by math792d on Jul 16th 2020 at 4:41:39 AM
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.![]()
Damn, i had hoped i fixed it fast enough... Sorry... i wanted to press Preview but hit Post instead. Titania says to Harry that the last time she talked with Mab was at Hastings when he summoned her during Cold Days
And Merlin could have met Mab far earlier than Hastings (at least i think so). Hastings was the last time Mab and Titania talked. Being made immortal allows Mab plenty of life before Hastings, she could have met and be taught by Merlin before the birth of Jesus then become the Lady before ascending to Queen and survive to the present day.
i´m not up to date on history or geography, but couldn´t Corb have meant some earlier roman conqueror?
Edited by Samaldin on Jul 16th 2020 at 1:51:12 PM
so, it's known that she was a young girl when she was with "the Conqueror" and that she was also at Hastings, where she saw Titania. And that there's no real link between the two other than "the Conqueror" might refer to William the Bastard. Which, given the current Big Bad's sort of blanket contempt for humans, I find strange that they would refer to him by one of his more flattering titles, or even take notice of a human warlord taking conquering another human warlod's domain. Which leads me to believe that either the Norman Conquest of England was actually a supernatural affair, or that they're referring to someone else. Maybe King Arthur, who "conquered" Britain depending on the story, and given his essentially "yeah, he might have existed, might not" status in history, it would be perfectly consistent to have be a supernatural player of some kind. I think the timelines also don't sync up well enough to have Mab be anything other than at least the Winter Lady if not Queen by the time Hastings rolls around.
"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."I'd lean towards Occam's Razor rather than time fuckery over this particular set of events, although knowing Dresden, time fuckery might well be the Occam's Razor answer. Either way, if "the Conqueror" is indeed William, that certainly implies Hastings was a bigger supernatural deal than Jim has thus far let on. If "the Conqueror" is someone else, then there's no contradictions and only different questions.
"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."Jim has previously let on that Hastings was a fairly big deal, given that Mab and Titania 'haven't spoken since Hastings' and Gard mentions it in passing as one of the battles she fought in, so whatever was going on, Vadderung had his finger on the pulse of it.
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.I don't think they're that inconsistent with what he's done before - most of it is with family and regarding family, which is something he once literally committed genocide over - and the one where the other Wardens peered into his sex life was a massive invasion of privacy even if from their perspective they had fairly justified reasons for it.
Edited by GoldenKaos on Jul 16th 2020 at 3:53:57 PM
"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."It just feels like he's been making things increasingly harder to himself than they need to, is all.
I mean, between him dying after committing mass genocide, coming back to life as the Winter Knight, and never really bothering to contact the White Council for God knows how long, I'm inclined to side with Ramirez on this, he is being extremely suspiscious and has been for a long while.
Edited by HailMuffins on Jul 16th 2020 at 12:01:49 PM
Also, just because (and especially because I use the same reddit handle so whoop-de-doo I'm pretty easy to find there anyway), I wanted to link to a post
I made that talks about Eithniu, the Túatha Dé Danann and the Fomorians/Fomoir from a mythological perspective. It has some sources to help you track stuff down for yourself if you want to read the (bonkers) originals.

Seems to me that Mab's vessel is more likely to have been Morgana Le Fey than Nimue, they both fit the comments made but Morgana would open up a lot more interesting possibilities and make some really brilliant connections.
For instance wasn't the dagger that Bianca (hinted to be Black Council IIRC) gave Lenann Sidhe speculated to be Morgana's athame with a decent amount of evidence backing it up? Trying to undermine the Queen of Air and Darkness by giving her subordinate her vessel's former tool is incredibly ballsy and to me at least seems to fit the style of what we've seen from the Black Council perfectly.
It'd also draw a number of quite interesting inter generational parallels between Dresden and Molly, and Merlin (who Dresden has been racking up similarities to for a while now) and Morgana.
Lastly someone with the appellation Le Fey clearly had the kind of connections that would likely enable them to succeed one of the queens mantles if it became available.