In which Ride the Luck and her crew test their capabilities.
Aelliana continues to develop. Daav is pushing her in ways he wouldn’t have when they first met because she wouldn’t have been able to handle them, and she is handling them.
One consequence of this which gives superficial pleasure to the reader, on top of the deeper pleasure at her progress, is that she’s now able to participate in the banter instead of just watching in dismay as it whizzes past.
For my favourite moment in this chapter, I’m torn between “Clonak — Clonak calls you Captain,” she told him, as if this might have someway escaped his notice. and “Thank you, but I — don’t believe I am hungry.” “Yes,” he said placidly, “I know.”
The preface to this chapter seems ominous. All those missing scouts — supposed to be eklykt’i, living off-world — probably became agents of change. I wonder how long ago began this sinister organization.
Preface:
A statistically significant number of Scouts are reported eklykt’i—unreturned—every Standard Year. While some undoubtedly fall prey to the omnipresent dangers of their duty, there is reason to believe that most have simply found a world that suits them better than the homeworld and have decided to stay.
There are those who argue that Scouts who are eklykt’i are the most successful Scouts of all.—Excerpted from “All About the Liaden Scouts”—-
I hadn’t considered it in that light before. There’s reason to believe that the phenomenon of Scouts dropping out when they find a world that suits them better than Liad is a genuine one; I don’t think we’ve seen it actually happen in the series, but we’ve seen Scouts tempted. At the point in The Gathering Edge that I’m up to, Win Ton has spoken of doing it, and I think Val Con might have stayed on Vandar if it had been only a question of personal preference without duty calling him away.
And, as the quote says, sometimes a disappeared Scout just means that that Scout is dead.
So I don’t think every Scout who vanishes was taken by the Department. But the fact that the Scouts were already used to disappearances would have given the Department cover to sneak in an extra disappearance here and there without being noticed.
I agree with your logic. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s a combination of the two.