Day 66
Standard Year 1118
Kailipso Station
At Leave
In which Jethri is put at liberty to enjoy those things which Kailipso offers.
This is one of my favourite chapters in the book. It has the nice little scene with the bookseller, and the action and excitement of the incident later.
The bit where Jethri’s being chased by the two Liadens has echoes of Khat’s story about Byl. Jethri must be hearing the echoes, too, and it affects his judgement of the situation.
Jethri’s back to thinking of Arms Master sig’Kethra as “Pen Rel”. Maybe because he’s off duty?
I’m a thought puzzled about the name of Kailipso Station, which strikes my ear as a more likely name for a Terran establishment than a Liaden one.
Our first Scout, and our first mention of Solcintra City.
It must mean something that Iza never told Jethri how Arin died. Was she deliberately keeping the details from him, or did it just not occur to her that he might care to know them? Maybe she didn’t care to know them, and didn’t enquire into details beyond the fact that he was dead. (I wonder whether, if so, learning that Arin died a hero would make her feel better about it, or worse.)
Why doesn’t anyone see that Jethri needs a partner? It puzzled me.
I like the bookseller very much. I forget this scene between readings (unlike the jump scene), but enjoy it every time.
I’m interested in the scout. Why is he so interested in Jethri?
It is odd that they didn’t think Jethri might need a partner. It could be they were showing him the same consideration they’d give a Liaden apprentice of his age and experience, and, this being Jethri’s first time off the ship, they hadn’t really grasped all the potential extra trouble a Terran apprentice could find wandering about alone in a Liaden space.
A good Scout is interested in anything out of the ordinary, a category which definitely applies to Jethri. On top of that, this Scout has history with Norn ven’Deelin, so he’s got some additional interest on account of Jethri being part of whatever history she’s making now.
I loved the bookseller scene, but then became frustrated when it became obvious that its only purpose was to enable Jethri to obtain a guide to the station. At the time I first read it, it seemed to have more importance to story than that, and I expected it to appear again.
Again the bookseller scene is enjoyable. It’s too bad though, that the authors did not take the opportunity later in this story—when Jeth Ree is told he may take with him to the Trader’s Guild Hall any books he’d like to borrow from Tarnia—to have him react in such a way as would have been appropriate considering how he views real hardcopy books here in this scene.