Read the previous entry in the series here.
Read the next entry in the series soon.

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Information about the Pocked Man legend in the Six Duchies prefaces “Touch.” The chapter begins with Fitz regaining consciousness as the Fool seeks him out, bearing Bee. The two confer about their situation, and Fitz assesses Bee’s condition through the Skill, finding her only stunned. He and the Fool fare far worse, and Fitz constrains the Fool to accept Skilled healing and to take Bee and flee. He and Nighteyes confer internally as he does so, and when that work is done, he starts to sink into welcome oblivion.

The prefatory comments of the present chapter call back to much earlier portions of the Realm of the Elderlings corpus, notably the early incidence of Forgings, Regal’s depredations on Buckkeep, and the death of Shrewd. The clear implication is that one or another of the members of Fitz’s group is being made parallel to that figure, and Fitz and Bee are the most likely candidates for being so (and in that order). The present chapter does not do much to reinforce that implication for them, however. Both are scarred, certainly, and Fitz has gotten to enjoy another encounter with Chade’s exploding powders, the very things that made him an image of the Pocked Man. Both Fitz and his younger daughter have been death-bringers in Clerres, but that has not been new to the present chapter. Why the image appears again when it does, then, does not swiftly become clear.

As I think on it, perhaps it serves as a counterpoint to Fitz’s brief prayer to Eda, made over the head of his younger daughter. It’s still uncommon for him to voice religious feeling, and Fitz remarks upon as much in the text, so the occurrence is marked. Given the repeated assertions that Eda and El coexist, there is some sense in presenting a figure tied to El in a chapter that features a rare prayer to Eda in its five-page span…but it still strikes me oddly.

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