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

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The next chapter, “Dragon’s Head,” begins with an excerpt from a minstrel’s account of events before turning to Fitz and the Fool returning to the Black Man, who marvels at the return of the latter from the dead. Thick makes a scattered report of what he has been told through the Skill, and reports are exchanged, in the flesh and through magical means. The difficulties in concluding the marriage arrangements between Dutiful and Elliania are rehearsed, as are their resolutions–which involved Icefyre shoving his head into the Narwhal mothershouse and touching it to the hearthstones therein.

Fitz and the Fool confer about what was reported, and the Fool delights in connecting with Prilkop–the Black Man–whose experiences are both like and unlike his own. The Fool urges Fitz to return to his life and is surprised to have it affirmed that he will do so. And that night, Fitz connects with Nettle through the Skill, where the latter complains of the difficulties at court and makes her own report to the former, receiving his reports, in turn. Their conversation turns tense around the issue of Molly, but it ends amicably, and Fitz sleeps well in the knowledge that he will return home at last.

Were this the last chapter in the book, I’d not be worried. Even had I not read the book many times before, given what Hobb has shown throughout the Elderlings novels, and knowing how much text remains–nearly 100 pages in my copy–I would be worried. Fitz is in a good place, and that cannot be allowed to continue. And of course not; it is in seeing Fitz persevere against situations that are as often his own damned fault as not that so much of his attraction lies. It invites affective reading, which is something I ought not to do, given my training and experience–but it is how most people read, and I am far enough outside academe–more than ten years since my last degree, now, and some time since I had a college job–that I’m not really outside that “most.” Not so much anymore…

I could use your continued support!

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

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The following chapter, “Whole,” opens with a personal letter from Kettricken to Molly. It moves thence to Fitz and the Fool as the latter continues to convalesce from the trauma of resurrection, beginning to explore the uncertainty of having outlived his prophecies. Fitz continues to care for his friend as they confer about what the Fool should do, moving forward, and the Fool determines to leave the stone city where Fitz had brought them.

As the two prepare to depart, they confer further, talking of their history with Girl-on-a-Dragon as they come to her. The Fool explicates some of what he has learned of the carving–Realder’s Dragon–including parallels between those involved, and he notes his purpose for the Rooster Crown–a thing to be given in exchange for the return of that part of Fitz he had rashly put into the carving years ago. The exchange is made, the Fool taking that part of Fitz back from the dragon and returning it to Fitz with difficulty for them both.

Fitz suffers through the onrush of returned memories, returning to himself only slowly and spending the evening considering what he has regained. The next day, he and the Fool return to Aslevjal, where they survey what had been the Pale Woman’s facility and confer about the nature of the Skill as Fitz recognizes a way home.

The present chapter makes much of the contrast between youthful passion and settled stolidity. I find myself reading with affect yet again, considering my own unexciting nature as I come ever closer to my forties and the ways in which I used to be excited about things. But I have no repository into which I poured my youthful feelings, no stone cellar from which they may be withdrawn by a kiss–and so I will not need to feel again what I felt then, for which I am likely the better.

Let’s be honest. I’m the kind of person who does this, now, and I was not much more active in my youth than now. So much shows in the habits that kept my belly flabby when I did exercise, and I do not do as much of that now as previously–not by quite a bit. I am staid now, and I was then, more concerned with avoiding the consequences of failure than with enjoying the results of success and therefore reluctant to engage with anything. The tendency has left me more timorous than not, and the fatigue and ennui of years spent failing at my goals has not helped.

Fantasy fiction serves as escapism, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But I know I would not be fit to abscond from such confinement as constrains me; I am the architect of my own prison and my jailer, and the judge who spoke the lifelong sentence. There is no appeal in it.

It’d be great if you could lend me a hand!

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

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The next chapter, “Feathers in a Fool’s Cap,” opens with an in-milieu folk-tale before turning to Fitz’s experience in a mental world created by his donning the Rooster Crown. Fitz is aware of other personae inhabiting him, performers much as the Fool had masqueraded as being, and he contemplates the experience amid his awareness of the Fool’s death and bodily decay. The nature of the personae–performers favored of dragons in the days of the Elderlings–is made clear to Fitz, and he hears the Fool’s own voice, coming from his blood in the Crown itself.

The performers in the feathers attempt to expel the Fool from the Crown, and Fitz recalls his experience being taken from Nighteyes’s body back into his own. The recollection gives him insight into what he can do now, and he plies his magics in tandem to bring the Fool back to life as himself. The exercise gives Fitz substantial insight into his long-time friend, and in the wake of the working, the two are exhausted. The Fool’s convalescence begins, Fitz nursing him along as gently as he can, contrasting the Fool’s experiences with his own. At length, the Fool is able to eat and drink, and he and Fitz confer about events, the Fool voicing some misgivings about how Fitz arranged matters. And Fitz continues to offer what comfort he can against what his friend has endured.

I remember, back when I was working on my master’s thesis, my advisor, Chris Healy, told me he had read the books about which I was writing–and that the present chapter had stood out to him as doing much to advance the idea of what might then have been and would certainly now be called a queer studies approach to the text. It’s far from the only thing that would, as the Fedwren Project attests and as I’ve commented on more than one occasion before. Somehow, I find myself in mind of the conversation again–perhaps because it has been a decade since my doctorate, now, and fifteen years since mastery.

I don’t have as much to show for either as might once have been hoped.

I’d be happy to put my talents to work for you; let me know what all you need written, and we’ll talk!

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

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The following chapter, “Catalyst,” begins with a note about wizardwood before turning to Fitz’s efforts to reenter the Pale Woman’s domain. He finds a path inward, if with some difficulty, and makes his way through the labyrinthine facility. Among others, he finds the flayed skin of the Fool’s back, and he swoons; when he comes to, he leaves the marred skin behind, although he takes the piece of the Rooster Crown he finds.

Pressing on, Fitz finds scrolls and records that had been sold away from Buckkeep, musing on it but leaving it behind as he continues to search for the Fool. He finds one of his erstwhile companions along the way and makes a pyre for him, and then he finds the Fool, dead among filth. Fitz attempts to Skill into the body to bring it back to life, but even with the help of the whole Skill coterie, he cannot do so. Chade and Dutiful offer such comfort as they can, little enough in the wake of the Fool’s death and the announcement to him of Burrich’s.

Fitz closes off Skill contact and recovers the Fool’s body, mulling over where to bear it when interrupted by the maimed Pale Woman. She taunts him, seeking to provoke him into killing her, and he refuses; she attempts to negotiate with him, and he walks away.

Wandering, he comes to a room with a map detailing the geographical extent of the Realm of the Elderlings and marking Skill-pillars. Another room contains a Skill-pillar, and Fitz takes the Fool through it to a plaza in a ruined city. There, he lays the Fool out and tends to the body, repairing the broken Rooster Crown and inserting the wizardwood feathers into it. Before placing it on the Fool’s head, Fitz hesitates, placing the crown upon his own head in an attempt to change what has happened.

I note with some interest the exchange of names mentioned by the Pale Woman as a custom of the Fool’s native people. The significance of the custom is noted explicitly, if in mockery, as the Pale Woman asks Fitz “Did you ever call [the Fool] by your name, to show him that he was as dear to you as your own life?” It joins the comments about hair-cutting as mourning that appear at intervals in the novels treating the Six Duchies to increase the verisimilitude of the milieu; such small things pepper lived experience, and having them appear in fiction adds richness to the fictional worlds in which they appear. And in the case of Hobb’s Fool, the recollection of how many times the character called Fitz “Beloved” becomes all the more poignant…

Send a little support my way?

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

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The succeeding chapter, “Doors,” opens with an in-milieu spy’s report before returning to the retrieval of Dutiful’s party and those they have recovered from Aslevjal. Those aboard celebrate the return and recovery, but Fitz lays out his purpose to Swift; he means to return to the Pale Woman’s domain to cremate the Fool and to confirm the death of the Pale Woman. He affirms as much to Dutiful when the Prince speaks with him as the rest board, adding that his return as himself will occasion problems in the Six Duchies.

Unbeknownst to either Prince or Fitz, Thick remains behind on Aslevjal with Fitz. His emergence startles Fitz, though his cleverness in remaining behind and easy acceptance of Fitz’s intent prevent the latter from sinking into depression. Thick also reports on Nettle’s status in Buckkeep, which displeases Fitz; she is not in a situation he would choose for her.

In the morning, Fitz sets out to find a way into the Pale Woman’s holdings, Thick trailing him. Progress in that line takes some days, and Fitz grows closer to Thick. In his sleep, Fitz communes with Nettle through the Skill, and in the morning, he wakes to find signs that the Black Man has been present. Pressing on, Fitz and Thick find their way to the home of said Black Man, who welcomes them in warmly and offers cryptic advice to Fitz. He also notes that he was once a White Prophet, relating some of his history on Aslevjal to Fitz as he sends him on to recover the Fool.

If I think about narrative structure, I am not certain how to regard the present chapter. I suppose this might be the beginning of what Freytag would call the denouement, what my musician self is inclined to call not a coda (that’s the epilogue), but another movement. Themes long heard in the work are being woven together, even if the main line of the melody is something other than what is being presented now. Something like a shift to another mode or a pivot into a minor key or a blues pattern begins to emerge…I think. After all, I wasn’t able to make it as a band director; my education in that line is truncated, so I might well have it all wrong.

If you like it, rather than put a ring on it, put some cha-ching on it!