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

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The seventeenth chapter of Forest Mage, “Routine Duty,” starts with Nevare establishing regular habits of work, detailing some particularly unpleasant aspects of the same and the benefits of his diligence in those habits as he inters a young child. The work puts him in mind of Amzil and her children, and he makes for the garrison both to begin the process of returning her goods to her and to consult with Haren. While he is about doing so, he finds himself confronted by Spink and pretends not to recognize his erstwhile friend and classmate, mulling over his reasoning as he departs for the garrison headquarters.

Reporting to the commander, Nevare rehearses his difficulty in doing so before considering Haren, whom he finds much as he had upon their first meeting (see this novel’s “Gettys”). Haren initially upbraids Nevare but is pleasantly surprised to find him not attempting to back out of his commitment, but instead attempting to address it more fully and diligently. Nevare lays out his ideas, to which Haren responds and makes amendments. Haren also calls Nevare out by his true name, finding a swift response and conferring with him about Keft’s missives and his own intentions. He also asks Nevare about the situation with the road, Nevare offering three alternative approaches, of which two are novel to him. Nevare asks about wider knowledge of the situation in Gettys and is provided limited information about it before he is dismissed.

Nevare goes from the colonel’s office to the garrison mess, which is described, and he sits to table with fellow grave-workers Ebrooks and Kesey. Nevare asks about sending a package to Dead Town, finding little of use, and is reminded of Tiber and their commonalities. Nevare also learns more about the situation he occupies as the garrison undertaker and the depredations of the dead that take place. Conversation is interrupted by orders from Sergeant Hoster, whose antipathy towards Nevare is reported; after his tablemates depart, Nevare watches Tiber’s arrival and considers the man as he goes about his business.

Returning to his lodgings from the garrison, Nevare is surprised to find someone awaiting him–not the Spink whom he worries about, but Hitch, who has availed himself of Nevare’s provisions. Hitch speaks to Nevare about the changes he has caused with his exercise of magic, addressing a courier station that has received no supplies since his harsh words towards it (see this novel’s “The King’s Road”), the Dancing Spindle (this novel’s “Spindle Dance”), and a vegetable garden in Dead Town (this novel’s “Journey to Gettys”). Hitch again warns Nevare against the exercise of Speck magic, and he relates some of his experience with one Speck woman: Noselaca.

Conversation between the men winds down as Nevare asks Hitch to return Amzil’s sack to her and turns down an offer of a visit to a local brothel. After Hitch leaves to avail himself of the brothel, Nevare puzzles over how to call back at least some of what he has done with the Speck magic, eventually arriving at some idea of forgiveness and a possible working before he sleeps.

To address the chapter-length issue: the present chapter, in the edition of the novel I’m rereading, runs 29 pages in length, approximately 3.97% of the novel. Only one chapter in the novel, “Buel Hitch,” is longer. Much of its length is taken up by backward looks, the present chapter doing much to connect its narrative back to earlier events not only in the present novel, but also in the first novel in the Soldier Son series, reminding readers of the narrative whole the series comprises. Admittedly, not all readers will necessarily need the reminder, and some might think the coincidences involved somewhat contrived–as though any act of fiction-writing is not necessarily and inherently a contrivance.

Also, for indexing purposes, the following: Amzil, Carsina Grenalter, Clove, Colonel “Rabbit” Haren, Corporal Geddo, Croaker bird, “Curly” Kesey, Dancing Spindle, Dark Eve, Dead Town, Ebrooks, Epiny Kester, Farleyton Regiment, General Brodg, Gernia, Gettys, Gettys sweat, Holy Writ, Keft Burvelle, King Troven, King’s Road, Laudanum, Narina “Narrie” Geddo, Nevare Burve, Nevare Burvelle, Noselaca, Orandula, Plainsfolk, Renegade, Rheims, Rollo’s Tavern, Sarla Moggam, Scout Lieutenant Buel Hitch, Scout Lieutenant Tiber, Sergeant Hoster, Specks, Spinrek “Spink” Kester, Widevale, Wind wizard, Yaril Burvelle. A longer chapter might well be expected to have a larger number of indexable items; the present chapter seems to meet the expectation. It also pivots away from the name-lack of the previous chapter; Nevare names more of his fellow soldiers, reinforcing his explicit assertions of greater integration into the life of Gettys and its garrison amid his repeated returns in thought to earlier events.

As noted above, the repeated returns serve largely to reaffirm the connections within the present novel and between it and Shaman’s Crossing. Nevare’s own musings–on Amzil, on Spink, and on Tiber (with reference to Shaman’s Crossing‘s “Tiber”)–do no small part of the work in that regard; he spends a fair amount of the chapter thinking about what he had done, what he had failed to do, and what he anticipates others needing based upon those two quantities, all without someone else in the milieu planting the idea in his head that he needs to do so. Hitch’s explicit references back to Nevare’s earlier exercises do yet more, reminding Nevare and the reader that it is not only Nevare who keeps in mind what he has done, but that others yet will also remember. And the exchange with Haren about his father’s missives (with reference to this novel’s “Flight”) serves similarly for Nevare, although with the nuance that Haren is attempting to offer something of a clean slate to the younger man. Another scholarly someday presents itself in treatment of memory, its sites, and its functions in the Soldier Son novels–possibly with explicit contrast to similar things in the Realm of the Elderlings corpus (as discussed here).

Gender dynamics come up again in the present chapter as Hitch discusses Noselaca. The topic has been one under consideration in the series repeatedly, as witness such items as Shaman’s Crossing‘s “The Return” and “Séance,” as well as the present novel’s “Forest Dreams,” “Rosse’s Wedding,” “A Day of Letters,” “Dewara,” the already-linked “Flight,” and the already-linked “The King’s Road.” While it has been the case that both adherence to and divergence from Gernian gender norms have been presented, those presentations and the considerations they prompt exist within a common culture; the difference between them and the practices of the Dappled People–which, admittedly, extend past gender norms in the present chapter’s discussion–is striking, and it brings to mind the matriarchal social structures of the Out Islanders in the Realm of the Elderlings novels (and which inform some of my scholarship). Hitch’s remarks that “There was a woman, a Speck woman. She wanted me, and what a Speck woman wants, she takes. And a Speck woman is just like their magic. She makes you her own, and that’s it” (393) and “She’s not my woman […] Never talk about a Speck woman that way. She could put you in a bad way over something like that” (395-96) bespeak a markedly different gender dynamic at work among the Dappled People than among the Gernians, and while it is not necessarily presented as a desirable option, it is also, due to its framing, not presented as one that is necessarily bad, either. Gender norms continue to comprise an issue to which to attend in the rereading in the present chapter, and I expect that will keep on being the case as I keep on reading through the novels again.

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