Volmer

In which yos’Galan makes connections.

I can’t remember the last book in which we had so many bows in so few chapters. The last few books have either been set on Surebleak or involved people being off having adventures among the Terrans, so there hasn’t been so much opportunity for Liadens interacting.

And there’s a definite melant’i play in the bow that Dyoli gets Mar Tyn to give to her brother. A bow between equals gives notice to everyone that Dyoli’s not going to let anyone write Mar Tyn off as a lesser personage — including Mar Tyn himself.

I admire the writers’ craft in giving us such a clear picture of Dyoli’s mother in so few words. In the case of Dyoli congratulating Til Den on achieving the amethyst, part of the picture I receive is that Til Den is another who could make Padi’s joke about her achievements being taken for granted, except that if Til Den said it it wouldn’t be a joke.

The last time Delm Ixin was mentioned before this book was during one of the Council meetings in I Dare. That would presumably have also been Dyoli’s Uncle Vis Dom, or else Til Den would have had news of a passing to give Dyoli in this chapter. Before that, the next most recent appearance was in Mouse and Dragon, when Rema’s uncle Lus Tin was delm.

We get some clarification on Dyoli and Mar Tyn’s shared gift: apparently it’s limited by the ranges of the gifts that contribute to it, so that it can only affect things nearby in time and space. That suggests that although it can produce a good result from Shan and Til Den happening to both be here at the same time, and from Shan intending to go where Dyoli and Mar Tyn need to go, it doesn’t have the reach to have brought Til Den here nor to have given Shan the idea in the first place. Which is, honestly, a weight off my mind.

After that warning about the possible dangers of touching Tekelia, Padi does it for a moment without any apparent ill-effect. Which might be just because the manner of their meeting introduces ambiguity about whether they actually touched, but I got the impression that Tekelia found it more interesting than that.

The response to Priscilla’s prayer is interesting to me, because I think it’s the first time we’ve heard the Goddess speak directly. I’ve tended to assume, since we were given the story of how Moonhawk and her sisters wove themselves into the fabric of the universe and became Living Names, that the Goddess arose from the combining of their powers (kind of like how Dyoli and Mar Tyn’s powers combine to create something new, albeit on a very different scale). If so, though, it would appear that the Goddess exists as something separate, with her own point of view and personality. And perhaps that means that, like Priscilla and Shan, she will survive the departure of the last of the Living Names.

When I started reading this novel, I thought it was going to take place mostly on Colemeno. Since then, there’s been at least one point where I was suspecting that it would go so far the other way as to end as soon as Dutiful Passage finally arrives there. Priscilla’s vision reassures me that it won’t be quite that extreme; I take it we will get at least as much beyond that as to find out what’s going to happen to Shan on Ribbon Dance Hill.