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

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After a journal entry from Bee, “Unsafe Harbor” begins with Fitz grousing about sleeping poorly in advance of major tasks facing him. He rises from sleep aboard the Paragon and makes his way to the bow of the ship, considering Clerres. His reverie is interrupted by news through the Skill that he is a grandfather, Nettle having been delivered of her child, a daughter she has allowed to be named Hope. Fitz delights in the news, and he delights further in the news that Dutiful and Elliania are now expecting, their child to be named Promise. Upbuoyed by the prospect of his family continuing, Fitz returns his attentions to his task at hand, in which he is exhorted by his king.

Fitz breaks off Skill contact when he feels the touch of Vindeliar’s magic upon his mind, and he hides as he can; the Paragon rejects the touch from Clerres. Fitz is aware through the Skill of how Vindeliar is being questioned about the deaths of Symphe and Dwalia, as well as how Vindeliar lashes out through the magic at those around him. Fitz struggles to disentangle himself from Vindeliar’s mind, roused to awareness in his own body by Brashen, bidding him bestir himself.

Brashen relates that Amber has absconded from the Paragon, and Fitz realizes he was drugged. He finds Spark similarly befuddled, and the two confer about Amber’s likely progress. Fitz doses himself with carris seed rather than cindin, and the two realize that one of the tubes of Silver that had been given Fitz has been taken.

Given the assertion of two new Farseer names, I am reminded in the present chapter of Hobb’s predilection in the Realm of the Elderlings novels towards emblematic names (most recently discussed here). The names in question seem uncommonly optimistic for the Farseers; Hope is something of a contrast to Nettle or Bee, and while Promise is not necessarily at odds with Integrity or Prosper (or Dutiful, for that matter) denotatively, the connotations of the latter three names are somehow sterner and more rigid. They certainly contrast with Chivarly, Verity, and Regal, and with Shrewd before, but such sequels as are hoped for by many of Hobb’s readers may well show how clear but uncommon associations of those names can be brought forward. Shrewd’s shrewdness, Chivalry’s chivalry, Verity’s verity, Regal’s regality, and Dutiful’s dutifulness can all be read in some ways as back-handed commentaries on the ostensible virtues the names represent (perhaps another scholarly someday for me), and it does not stretch credulity to think that integrity, prosperity, and promise can be similarly regarded. All that lies in a future that may be hoped for but may not come to pass, however.

The present chapter also presents a certain irony, again, of Fitz being drugged (and from his own stores, no less). It might well be thought that someone who had drugged his own companions to rebuke and had not long ago been drugged by another of them, to strong effect, would be wary of it happening again. That Fitz was so trusting…I’m not sure how to read it, honestly. On one hand, he knows and should be expected to know that Amber is problematically fixated on things; on the other, Fitz is himself publicly fixated on things and has fatigue and grief to contend with, to boot. The oversight makes some sense…but not as much as it might. At least as I read the chapter this time.

I also note, as a minor point, the extended list of effects of cindin use in the chapter. I’ve commented before on the substance and the possibility of it paralleling cocaine. The comment in the present chapter that one of the effects of cindin use is increased libido seemed to confirm it for me to some extent; I recall claims about cocaine driving sexual behaviors from my work alongside substance use disorder treatment, and a short search of formal research finds at least one study appearing to confirm the anecdotal evidence. That study–“Cocaine Administration Dose-Dependently Increases Sexual Desire and Decreases Condom Use Likelihood: The Role of Delay and Probability Discounting in Connecting Cocaine with HIV” by Johnson et al. and appearing in Psychopharmacology 234 (599-612)–might possibly have been available to Hobb during composition of the present chapter; an electronic version appears to have been in evidence in 2016, although formal publication did not occur until 2017. Even if Hobb lacked access to it, though, the fact of it…it amuses me.

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

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Following a letter regarding the Kendry and the challenges recently besetting the ship’s crew, “Feather to Blade” begins with Bee, imprisoned, regarding the passage of time in her cell and considering her situation. After lamps are lit, Prilkop speaks to her of dreams, particularly prophetic ones, and relates ominous portents. Wolf-Father rebukes her self-pity as her mind turns towards Fitz, and Bee suddenly realizes Symphe stands outside her cell door.

Bee regards Symphe as the latter undoes the locks holding her captive. Symphe offers candy as if Bee is a foolish child, and Bee, urged by Wolf-Father, follows her amid Prilkop’s jeering. Bee is taken to a chamber Wolf-Father recognizes as smelling of blood, in which Dwalia and Vindeliar await. Symphe confers with them about what will be done with and to Bee, and Bee acts in her own defense. A brief melee ensues, with Symphe being burned, her throat slashed, and Bee coming into contact with a vial of serpent spit that Symphe had purloined. Its power adds to her inborn Skill, and she revels in it, accepting the proclamation that she is the feared and foretold Destroyer and killing Dwalia with a word.

Bee returns to her cell to await a better chance for escape. Prilkop recognizes what has happened, and Bee weeps for what she has had to become.

The present chapter is not the first mention of the Destroyer, although I would appear to have failed to mark mention of the figure previously. Said figure is mentioned as an imminent threat to Clerres and the society that centers on it, the coming of which is foretold in an increasing number of recent prophetic dreams. Its approach is certain, especially given the Servants’ hubristic belief in their own correctness; the irony, recognized in the present chapter, that the Servants have brought their Destroyer into their stronghold themselves is delicious in no small part because it does proceed directly from that hubris. Bee points out (540-41), rightly, that she had a life from which she had been torn that would have kept her from Clerres save for the Servants’ need to control every possible bloodline of White Prophet and every possible outcome that could be foretold. Had the Servants been content to leave well enough alone, they would not have invited their own unmaking–but they could not, being as they were and are.

That is, of course, the point of all of it. The Servants, by relying so heavily on prophetic foreknowledge to guide themselves, inevitably place themselves into the position of making their prophecies come true. By not only accepting foretelling, but actively working to enact and guide it, they subject themselves to it, and by exerting the kind of ruthless control over it that they seem to have for generations if not far longer, they have made themselves unable to conceive of their own actions as being potentially in error. They are trapped by the very thing that they have used to accumulate power.

There are political comments to be found therein, I’m sure.

To pivot: the idea of the Destroyer as a figure of imminent menace is hardly new to Hobb, of course. I grew up and again live in the Texas Hill Country, where there were and are an awful lot of people who claim to be convinced that the End Times are a-comin’, and soon; it’s the kind of thing that lends towards apocalyptic figures. It’s not the only one, either; it’s an archetype for a reason. While Hobb does have a tendency to play with tropes and archetypes, this one seems to be pretty straightforward. At least at this point…

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Read the previous entry in the series here.
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There is discussion of cannibalism in the present chapter.

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After a brief excerpt from Tom Badgerlock’s journals, “Silver Secrets” begins with Fitz joining the others from the Six Duchies aboard the Paragon in mourning the death of Chade Fallstar. There is some disagreement about the amount of hair that should be shorn from Fitz’s head, and he muses on his not having done so at Burrich’s death, as well as on the length of his association with the old man. Report arrives that the Paragon has reached the vicinity of Clerres, and Fitz considers the tasks awaiting him and the dangers to Bee that can be found among them. Plans for how to proceed are voiced, and Fitz confers with Brashen and Althea.

In the wake of the conference, Amber proposes a plan for infiltrating Clerres. Having none better, Fitz reluctantly accedes to it. Argument briefly emerges about Fitz’s retention of the Silver given him by Rapskal, but it soon fades against continued exposition of plans to retrieve Bee and enact revenge against Clerres. Fitz excuses himself from the planning for a time and finds himself conferring with the liveship about his death.

Afterward, Fitz observes as the liveship relates experiences in Clerres, and he makes his preparations as the ship approaches within sight of the city. He and the Fool confer, the Fool relating some regrets and some of the circumstances of his imprisonment in Clerres with Prilkop. They range to extreme depredation on the part of the Four and the Fool’s unwitting participation in the same. Fitz offers such comfort as he can and urges him to preserve Bee at all costs.

Discussion is interrupted by Spark arriving with water for tea. The Fool contributes herbs to brew, and Fitz is eased by them and the memories they spur, leaving Spark and Fool as they fall into sleep.

To deal with the big issue: the presentation of evil in the present chapter, the discussion of the Fool being induced towards cannibalism while imprisoned in Clerres, seems to me to be another instantiation of the almost cartoonish we-need-the-capital-letter-Evil at work in some of the later Realm of the Elderlings works. I discuss it previously here and as linked, and I find I’m not sure of the effect of the particular ponerology at present. Given the other descriptions of Clerres and its inhabitants in the novels, the motion towards cannibalism is, if unexpected on an initial reading, not out of place even in one. After all, Clerres is filled with Bad People, and cannibalism is, at least for the presumed primary readership of the Realm of the Elderlings corpus, a Bad Thing; Bad People tend to do Bad Things–and to try to get others to do them, too.

But that’s where the confusion is for me. What does Clerres gain from the Fool eating the flesh and blood of those who attempt to help him? He is already their captive, and he has demonstrated that, despite both cozening and torture, he will not turn to their ends; is it mere amusement for them in Clerres that they act so? Is it simply a demonstration of just how Evil (and, again the capital letter seems needed) they are?

As I think on it some more, the thought occurs that it might be a back-handed anti-Messianic image. That is, the Fool is constrained or impelled to drink the blood and eat the flesh of those who are sacrificed for their support of him, something of an inversion of Christian Communion and one deepened by the fact of their failure. That he is yet imprisoned when he partakes is an indication that their sacrifices have not availed. Clerres is highlighted as being yet more Evil to Hobb’s presumed primary readership–a high-selling author in the United States can be presumed to be writing to a predominantly United-States-based audience, and that country says an awful lot about its putative Christian underpinnings; if Clerres inverts what is perhaps the principal ritual of a religion, it is being figured as antithetical thereto, thus more emphatically Evil…and I think I may have to rework a paper once again.

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