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

The chapter discusses genital mutilation and other objectionables.

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A “Report to the Four” regarding the Fool precedes “Another Ship, Another Journey.” The chapter proper begins with Bee rehearsing her situation and the changes to the same as she is forced to accompany Dwalia and Vindeliar towards Clerres aboard ship. The deception they work upon the ship’s crew is noted, as is Vindeliar’s lessening power in the wake of his being dosed with serpent saliva, and he bemoans the work he must do for her. Bee unsuccessfully resists the impulse to sympathize with her captors as she learns more of Vindeliar’s personal history, and she finds him in her mind.

Wolf-Father moves within her to defend her, presenting memories of Nighteyes’s earliest torments. It is successful, but Wolf-Father cautions Bee against allowing further intrusions. Bee takes the lesson she learns from the exchange and applies it to Vindeliar, lashing out at him through the Skill. They are interrupted from further tumult by a summons from Dwalia, which they move to answer. As they complete their assigned tasks, Vindeliar claims to Dwalia that Bee has stolen power from her, which Dwalia denies before beating Vindeliar again.

Bee realizes as Dwalia confronts her that she does, in fact, have the Skill, and she attempts to ply it against her as Dwalia makes to assail her again. At Wolf-Father’s urging, Bee feigns defeat, and Dwalia’s abusive attentions soon return to Vindeliar. Bee learns yet more of her captors and begins to slot that information together, including how Dwalia had come to know of her father and begun to move against them. She also realizes that she has made an enemy of Vindeliar, more than he already was.

I‘ll note that, as I was doing the rereading for this write-up, I got lost in doing the reading again. It’s something that happens to me fairly often when I am doing work with Hobb’s writing; I often find myself swept along by the prose, and I have done so for years. It complicated the work of writing my master’s thesis, in fact; I’d be looking through the Farseer or Tawny Man novels for quotes from which to construct my argument and realize, chapters and an hour or so later, that I’d gotten entirely sidetracked. That ease of immersion is one of the reasons I keep returning to Hobb’s writing, all these years later; it continues to draw me in. It’s nice to be so drawn; I don’t let it happen as often as I used to and as often as I probably ought to do, one of the changes in my life occasioned by my leaving academe.

I’ll also note that the explicit mention that Vindeliar is a eunuch is 1) unsurprising in the context of a society that practices eugenics (note here and elsewhere), and 2) an invocation of a standing trope of eunuchs as evil (and not seldom associated with magic powers). While there is some motion towards sympathy with Vindeliar, both within the narrative and between it and the reader, I have to wonder about the figuration at work in this case. As noted, the trope makes sense in context, and for the (dehumanizing) reasons the text has asserted directly and less so throughout discussion of Clerres. Still, I have to wonder how much, if any, is a response to Hobb’s contemporary, George RR Martin, and his use of the trope in Varys. I also have to wonder if Vindeliar is somehow being used as an inversion of Thick…something that makes more and more sense to me as I think on it again. Both might be true, of course. And it might well be true that the deployment of the trope serves other functions, perhaps helping to keep the Realm of the Elderlings connected to the Tolkienian tradition from which it has decided distinctions…among others.

More scholarly somedays await, it seems.

Scant weeks remain, but there is still time to get your bespoke writing for the holidays!

Or you can send your support along directly!

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

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An old letter from Shrewd to Desire regarding the Fool precedes “Silver Ships and Dragons,” which opens with Fitz ruminating on the comparison between meetings of his family and the assemblage of the intertwined Vestrits and rulers of the Pirate Isles. Fitz assesses and describes those present at the meeting, and conversation about events and the coming changes to the liveships ensues. The looming end of Brashen and Althea’s mercantile careers is also reported.

Conversation is interrupted by the arrival aboard the Paragon, not entirely welcome, of Paragon Kennitsson. The brash heir to the Pirate Isles is described as he arrives, and after a tense exchange, the young man is summoned by the ship to the figurehead. Althea and Brashen confer over her difficulty with Kennitsson, due to Kennit’s mistreatment of her, and the whole group moves to the prow of the ship. There, they find Kennitsson and the ship plotting for the former to sail with the latter, and Wintrow argues against it, joined by Sorcor.

Kennitsson takes his leave, and the others confer about him, noting their failures with the young man. Fitz observes and ruminates on the difficulty and undesirability of having so much companionship on his errand of destruction. Conference continues until interrupted by the arrival of Etta, herself, in a royal dudgeon. It is quickly clear that she is aware of the current situation surrounding the Paragon and her son, and she voices her displeasure with how events are unfolding. Brashen pleads for assistance in sending along what can be sent of the goods they had carried in trade to their originally intended destinations, to which Wintrow agrees, but the notion of sailing without Kennitsson provokes anger from the Paragon; the threat to Althea and Wintrow provokes the Vivacia to anger.

In the ensuing tumult, Fitz offers to find another way for he and the Fool to proceed, but he is rebuffed, the Fool citing aspects of his prognostication in support of his assertions. This occasions upset among Fitz’s party, and Fitz voices his anger, but the Fool persists nonetheless. Fitz absents himself from the ongoing discussion between the liveships, considering Silver and trying to sort out more of his understanding of the Skill. Implications of using such of the substance as he carries occur to him, although his reverie is disturbed first by Lant, then by the need for his labor, and finally a sending from Tintaglia, whose approach is imminent.

As often, I find my attention taken by the prefatory materials of the chapter. For one thing, the revelation of an aspect of Shrewd’s character is a welcome thing. When he appears directly in the Farseer novels, he is a necessarily remote figure; it makes sense that a child and youth of disfavored parentage would not be terribly close to a ruling king of a grandfather, and even in closer relationships along family lines, there is often a distance between children and adults that is not easily bridged. To get a glimpse into Shrewd, then, is informative. It is also revealing, showing how besotted the man was with Desire–and it speaks again to the delight of emblematic naming in the Realm of the Elderlings, here making the clear point that desire can overwhelm even a shrewd mind, ultimately to bad ends.

The prefatory materials also connect back to the very beginnings of the Realm of the Elderlings novels, with the Fool’s first recorded words to Shrewd being a maxim Regal complains to Verity of him repeating upon his first meeting Fitz–to paraphrase, don’t do what you can’t undo without knowing what you can’t do after doing it. There are some minor variations in phrasing between what Shrewd gives in his letter and what Regal quotes his father as saying, differences between contractions and not, so nothing that much alters the meaning of the quip…which is, itself, very much in keeping with the Fool’s prognostications and recognition of the butterfly effect in enacting and avoiding them. To my rereading, it comes off as a nice bit of binding-up, a back-threading that makes a more cohesive narrative whole, and it’s something I appreciate seeing.

On the topic of prognostication, I note the Fool’s insistence that he cannot guide Fitz, that Fitz’s foreknowledge would taint his actions and skew the Fool’s visions. Here, again, the resonance with Asimovian psychohistory comes out for me, an older correspondence. While it’s been a while since I reread the sequence of the Robot, Empire, and Foundation novels, it used to be the case that I would reread them (and The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings) annually, doing so starting at age ten or so; they’re in me pretty deeply, even now, and so they do inflect my readings of other works. That’s to be expected, however; we all exist in a multilayered environment, and any interactions with any part of that environment will necessarily be influenced by the other parts of it–including the legacies of environments that were but no longer are. That I see a thing is a result not only of something being present to be seen, but also my predilection to look for that kind of thing; that I understand a thing in a given way means not only that the thing is available for that understanding, but also that I am apt to apply such an understanding. It does not mean other things are not present and other ways cannot be followed, which is something that I think many people run into, but I am digressing more than I ought to at this point.

There will be other days.

The holidays continue to draw closer, but there is still time to get your bespoke writing!

Or you can send your support along directly!

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

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After a report from Rosemary to Dutiful, Elliania, and Kettricken that follows up on Fitz’s work in Kelsingra, “Serpent Spit” returns to Bee in her captivity. The effort of Dwalia and her followers, with Bee still captive, to depart from Sewelsby is reported, and Bee begins to be taken by her dream-visions. Vindeliar attempts to offer some comfort to Bee, and she steels herself against it as best she can.

Vindeliar continues to suffer under Dwalia’s attentions, begging for magical aid, as Bee watches and considers the straits in which she has found herself. She notices that, underneath her flaking skin, she is paler than she had been before. At length, Dwalia finds a victim upon which to focus her attentions for passage to Clerres, and she harshly pushes Vindeliar to work upon that victim. As he does, Bee becomes aware that he plies the Skill, and he pulls from her for his working. It succeeds, however, and the group finds a ship to take them onward.

Aboard, Dwalia plies Vindeliar with an intoxicating substance that amplifies his abilities. Vindeliar reaches out through the Skill to Bee, and she reaches into him in turn, learning much of his background. She begins to be moved to sympathy for him but rejects the notion as she is dragged onward.

The present chapter returns to an idea that has come up before in the series, that more successful White Prophets become less white as they increase in success. I believe I most recently address it, if perhaps only glancingly, here (and I am again confronted with my lack of proper indexing!); the idea is noted at several points in the series that, as a White Prophet moves the world closer to their vision, they darken as their skin peels away. The Fool shows it several times, and the present chapter presents the inversion. Bee cannot be considered to be advancing towards the future she envisions, or does not seem to consider herself doing so (prognostication is always a tricky thing), so she grows whiter as she goes. Again, the inversion of the usual trope is present, and, again, it makes things more interesting than a more common treatment would be apt to be. It’s one of those details I appreciate in Hobb’s writing.

I should comment, I think, that I do not think the use of tropes in themselves to be bad things. I don’t think I’m the only one who remarks that what works gets used until it doesn’t anymore, and for reason. I also don’t think I’m the only one who appreciates having the touchstones that many tropes represent; I like that there are “straight” productions of Shakespeare, for example, and that there are unironic re-presentations of standard fare. I sometimes return to such things for comfort. I also find them useful; having a baseline for comparison, however arbitrary, is necessary for much discussion, and while I can certainly acknowledge the fraughtness of asserting that any one work is the standard, I still find a measuring stick a good thing to have.

The holidays draw yet closer, and bespoke writing still makes a great gift–that I can help you get!

Or you can send your support along directly!

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

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Following an excerpt from Symphe’s papers, “The Pirate Isles” begins with Fitz mulling over his continued voyage aboard the Paragon as the liveship obliges Althea, Brashen, and the crew to proceed past their intended and agreed-upon destination towards Clerres. The ill regard in which the crew holds him and his company is noted, and the routines into which Fitz and his company settle further are described.

One evening, Fitz disguises himself in Elderling garb and reconnoiters the liveship. Unseen by the crew, he overhears Clef teaching Per, as well as Lant and Spark discussing romantic entanglements. The latter gives Fitz cause to ruminate, and he retires.

The voyage continues, and matters worsen aboard the Paragon. Fitz confers with the Fool about the matter, as well as about how he feels himself treated by the Fool as Amber. The conference leaves Fitz angry, and he walks the decks to try to ease himself. An earlier argument with the liveship is rehearsed, and Kennit’s exploits are glossed to Fitz as the Paragon enters the Pirate Isles and is spotted by one of their ships. A conference about that ship is begun among Amber, Fitz, Althea, and Brashen, and the perils that present themselves at that juncture are noted.

The liveship shudders and shifts as the other ship approaches, and Paragon determines to make for Divvytown. Matters grow tense as the other ship draws closer, and the liveship consents to follow it, finding mooring near the Vivacia. As the ship is tied off, Fitz urges Lant to take Spark and depart, but is rebuffed once again. Fitz prepares messages for Buckkeep as ship’s matters are conducted, and he is aboard as the Paragon makes to confront the Vivacia. The two liveships confer at some odds, and Fitz is nearly overwhelmed by the magical energies that flow between the craft, and he is roused by a messenger bespeaking the return of Amber, Althea, and Brashen to the Paragon. Althea and Brashen’s son joins them, and Fitz muses on the complications that surround them all.

The present chapter is one of the longer ones in the novel thus far, running to thirty pages in the printing I am re-reading. The length does allow for a fair amount of material to be presented in a way that makes sense, in context; exposition is always a challenge to address well, but using time aboard ship with little else to do to address it picks up the gauntlet with relative ease.

That noted, I do find the introduction of the romance between Lant and Spark a bit abrupt. It does seem to surprise Fitz, admittedly, so I can accept it as a thing that had been going on “off-screen,” as it were, but I think I would have liked a bit more lead-up to it, a bit more foregrounding. In a series of novels that largely predicates itself on prognostication, I don’t think that’s too much to ask. (At the same time, I note something of a back-handed joke in the relationship, a spark setting off a lant[ern]. [Yes, it’s FitzVigliant, not Lantern, but still…]) Not that I could do better, admittedly; I do not claim to be able to do so much, and I do not want to be understood as doing so. But that does not mean I cannot point out what I see–or what I would have liked to have seen, even in a series of works I have repeatedly affirmed and demonstrated that I very much enjoy and appreciate.

I’ll note that my issue with the romance is not the romance itself. It makes sense that those who are in close proximity for extended periods of time would get to know one another better the longer they are together, and it does not exceed belief that that greater knowing would lead to greater affection leading towards love. Hell, I met my wife in graduate school, and while that’s not quite as sequestered an environment as Spark and Lant have shared, being in a post-baccalaureate program together does mean you see an awful lot of a relatively restricted number of people, the more so when you share office space as my wife and I did (about which a bit here). And it’s not like amorousness is new to the Realm of the Elderlings; Fitz has had his share, as have Althea and Brashen, as well as others who figure prominently in the milieu. It’s part of life for many people (I see you, aro folks), so it should be present in the work of an author who prizes verisimilitude, even if it’s not the protagonist’s focus at any given point in that work.

The holidays draw closer, and bespoke writing still makes a great gift–that I can help you get!

Or you can send your support along directly!