Tag Archives: Leafydale Place

Ghost Ship – Chapter 19

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Number Twelve Leafydale Place
Greensward-by-Efraim
Delgado

In which Kamele starts asking questions.

It’s difficult to talk about a chapter that’s all “where might this lead” when it’s a re-read and one already knows where it’s leading.

One thing that’s already apparent, though, is that Daav might be right in thinking Kamele is best left out of Korval’s tangle, but he’s underestimating her if he thinks she’ll just meekly stay where she was left when she knows there’s something she’s being left out of.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 9

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Runcible System
Daglyte Seam

In which the Department of the Interior prepares to attack Korval and her allies.

I like the structure of this chapter. Three scenes that have no obvious connection, but implicitly the latter two scenes concern people who are going to be affected by the events of the first.

It occurs to me to wonder what would have happened if Commander of Agents had chosen to leave Korval alone for the time being. Her concern is obviously that Korval will continue to be a threat, but Korval has accepted Liad’s decision that guarding Liad is no longer its business, which means that the Department is no longer its business – but the Department will quickly become its business again if the Department attacks it directly. I suppose if the Department did leave Korval alone and concentrate on subverting Liad, Korval would eventually become involved because it does still have allies on Liad who would sooner or later be affected by the Department’s actions – but think how much the Department could get done in the mean time!

Ghost Ship – Chapter 6

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Surebleak Spaceport

In which cold Surebleak offers Delm Korval a warm welcome.

Jen Sar Kiladi has “been lost”, which might add to the awkwardness if Kamele ever takes it into her head to demand his safe return. One might say that it offers instead the opportunity to tell Kamele, with some degree of accuracy, that Kiladi has died, but I don’t think that would work for long and in any case I’m confident Daav knows as well as Theo does that he owes Kamele the whole truth. His reluctance to tell her so far has been about trying to spare her the further trouble of being dragged into Korval’s orbit at a dangerous time, not about shirking his duty.

It does raise the question of why Kiladi has slipped away. Perhaps he felt, or whatever part of Daav keeps him working, that he’d served his purpose: Daav has said more than once that he’s completed the Balance in which Kiladi was such a useful tool, and he’s also fulfilled his original purpose in the sense that he was only supposed to stick around until he was discovered, which he now has been. And letting go of Kiladi presumably means there’s more room in Daav’s head for Aelliana. But I find myself remembering that Aelliana’s most striking recent increase in ability was associated with Daav eating one of the Tree’s seed pods, and wondering: Did Kiladi-Daav make the decision that Kiladi’s time was done, or was the decision made for him?

That’s an intriguing background detail, the hint at friction between the Pilots’ Guild and the Federated Trade Commission. I don’t think we’ve heard of the Federated Trade Commission before, at least by that name; perhaps it’s descended from the trade commission that was around in Jethri’s time. I’m tempted to speculate, on the basis of no evidence whatever, that it’s a Terran organisation that takes issue with the Pilots’ Guild because, as we know, the latter is a case of harmonious collaboration between Terrans and Liadens. But then again, we know from various bits with Shan that he was certified as a Master Trader by a Trade Commission that is likewise a collaboration. (I’m sufficiently attached to my hypothesis to wonder if there’s more than one Trade Commission. Perhaps the Federated Trade Commission is a smaller federation of traders who don’t want to be involved in anything that requires collaboration with Liadens. But now I’m really speculating.)

Ghost Ship – Chapter 5

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Arin’s Toss
Solcintra Port
Liad

In which Theo’s father tells her the truth.

Theo’s conversation with her father is one of those things that’s obviously significant but I don’t know how to talk about. (I do wonder if it helps Theo to learn that Val Con’s mother was a respected scholar. It seems like it might make the whole preposterous situation feel slightly more familiar.)

Either Theo’s taxi ride from the Port or her nap, or both, must have consumed a considerable amount of time, since it is now the day set for Korval’s departure and Theo left the Port at dawn the previous day. (Local calendar, explicitly stated, so it’s not one of those things where the Standard Day changes halfway through the local day.) No, excuse me: Theo went to call a taxi at dawn; maybe the city’s in such a commotion at the moment that it took most of the day to turn up.

The detail about Trealla Fantrol is interesting; they couldn’t take it with them, but they weren’t going to let it fall into anyone else’s hands. In which light, I wonder what it says that they didn’t mind letting Liad keep the formal gardens.

Tomorrow: “Moon on the Hills”, then back to Chapter 6.

Saltation – Chapter 39

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Primadonna
Volmer

In which Theo meets a Dulsey and an Uncle.

It’s not clear whether this Dulsey and this Uncle are the same Dulsey and the same Uncle that Jethri ven’Deelin knew a few centuries ago, but if they are that might have something to do with Theo finding them both indeterminate of age. (Win Ton described this Uncle as “one who fell heir to the title”, which could be interpreted several ways, particularly bearing in mind the whole business back then about Uncle Yuri’s “younger brothers”.) I notice that the description of the Uncle, when he appears, carefully avoids any of the details – height, build, eye colour, hair colour – that might give a basis for comparison with descriptions we’ve previously been given of Uncle(s).

Saltation – Chapter 38

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Conference Room Able
Pilots Guildhall
Volmer

In which the bad news keeps on coming.

Caratunk is a planet we’ve heard of before: it’s where Jethri’s father met Iza Gobelyn.

And we heard about that in the same chapter which first informed us that “there are secrets in all families”, a phrase that’s associated with a particular family, and a particular person who is likely to be the same person Win Ton is on his way to meet. It amuses me that he’s implicitly included in Win Ton’s reference last chapter to unspecified people “even less reputable” than Scouts or Juntavas.

The fact that Win Ton was at Nev’lorn when the fighting broke out is interesting, and offers an additional reason for the Department to have decided the time was right for overt action. (And prompts one to wonder what might have happened if he and Daav had encountered each other there.)

And now the bad news from home has caught up with Theo, having been somewhat delayed by Kamele’s lack of familiarity with the options for sending an urgent message long-distance to a person in motion. There’s an irony here: Theo does know where to find her father – or would, if she had the means to link together several things she’s learned recently – but, lacking those means, she doesn’t know that she knows.

Breath’s Duty

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Delgado
Leafydale Place
Standard Year 1393

In which Scout Reserve Captain Daav yos’Phelium returns a favour.

Speaking of first published appearances, this is Kamele’s, brief as it is, and it gave me entirely the wrong impression of her until Fledgling came out. I blame the translators’ decision to use “mistress” as a substitute for whatever word they use on Delgado, because while it has the advantage of bypassing a lengthy explanation it fails to capture the actual spirit of Kamele’s relationship with Jen Sar. On the other hand, I admit there were also some failings of comprehension on my part, regarding (a) the actual likelihood of Daav getting in the kind of relationship that “mistress” implies, and (b) the fact, which is mentioned right there in the story, that they’ve been together long enough for her daughter to be grown up.

This may also be, even more briefly, the first published mention of timonioum.

One of the purposes of this re-read was to see what new associations would come out of the stories by reading them in a different configuration: what would come out of a story by reading it near another story I maybe hadn’t read it near before? In this case, a new thing that struck me was the first dissonant detail: after a couple of pages of Jen Sar Kiladi getting ready for a fishing trip, just as he always does, he pauses to run through the Rainbow pattern. Reading the story so soon after Carpe Diem, with everything it has to say about the Rainbow and about the Rainbow being a Scout thing, that really jumped out at me as a sign that Professor Kiladi isn’t the groundhugging academic he appears. It says, if one didn’t already know, a great deal about his background in a very few words.

Another association that I don’t think I picked up before this re-read is that Acting Scout Commander sig’Radia has the same surname as Senior Scout Cho sig’Radia, the friend and mentor of Daav’s daughter. Probably a relative, not the same person; “Phoenix” has established that sig’Radia has a history of producing Scouts, and this story says straight up that Daav doesn’t know her. (I wonder, though: I don’t think Kiladi ever actually met Cho sig’Radia other than through written correspondence, and if he did notice the connection Daav wouldn’t make anything of it while he’s keeping the Kiladi connection quiet; conversely, of course, Cho sig’Radia knows Theo’s father only as Kiladi and has no reason to suspect he’s Daav. And one who was a Senior Scout a few years ago might have progressed far enough to become Acting Scout Commander now — especially since the “Acting” suggests that the Department’s recent actions have resulted in some rapid movement in the line of succession.)

I’m pretty sure I got the significance of the Richard A. Davis Portmaster Aid Foundation first time, though.

I seem to recall there being something I wanted to say about the bit where L’il Orbit casts shade on Kiladi’s piloting skills, but the only thing that’s coming to mind now is that it was never Kiladi, in the old days, who was called “schoolteacher”. And that there’s a bit of an irony in Daav yos’Phelium being named as a reliable pilot considering what happened the last time he was seen piloting a spaceship.

Saltation – Chapter 32

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Number Twelve Leafydale Place
Greensward-by-Efraim
Delgado

In which Theo’s parents receive her news.

There’s some looking-back going on in this chapter; not just to Theo’s recent activities, but further back to the events of Fledgling with the news that Kamele’s friend Ella has become the Chair of EdHist and is well advanced in repairing the damage there. (Ella professed to believe, back in Fledgling, that Kamele would be the next Chair, but I think this outcome was more likely and is more useful to all concerned, given their respective attitudes to office politics.)

And then, even further back, to Staederport, which we learned in Mouse and Dragon was where Aelliana first met Jen Sar Kiladi, coincidentally on the same day that she and her co-pilot introduced Hevelin the norbear to Bruce Peltzer of the Pilots Guild.

Like Mouse and Dragon, Saltation has a lapse of some years between chapters (specifically, this chapter and the next). And, as with Mouse and Dragon, I will be putting Saltation on hold while I read the stories set in the gap — beginning, tomorrow, with a return to Eylot for “Landed Alien”. After that, it’s back to see how Clan Korval (remember Clan Korval?) is getting on.

Saltation – Chapter 26

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Codrescu Station
Eylot Nearspace

In which Theo becomes a Guild member in good standing.

The bit about Hevelin being more directly inquisitive and seeming to understand more than the norbears in Vashtara‘s pet library accords with what I remember from their respective previous appearances. It’s also interesting, although there isn’t enough information to be sure what it means, if anything. Is it because Hevelin is older than the pet library norbears? Or because they’re “hothouse norbears”, raised in a comfortable environment (by people who think they’re just clever animals) while Hevelin’s been making his own way in the universe? Or perhaps the line of causality runs the other way, and Hevelin’s intellect and personality led him as a young norbear to choose a wandering life instead of settling for a cushy spot somewhere.

Saltation – Chapter 21

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Howsenda Hugglelans
Conglomeration of Portcalay
Eylot

In which Theo is introduced to the Third Son of House Hugglelans.

The moment in Theo’s encounter with Brine Batzer where she makes the effort to shift her stance to one that’s aware but not aggressive is significant for two reasons. One is that it shows Theo is working on developing an awareness of how her body language will read to others and on adjusting it appropriately (though also that it still needs work). The other is that, as Theo notes, her shift to a less aggressive stance doesn’t get an appropriate reaction from Batzer. This suggests a few things about Batzer, one of which is that despite owning five ships and presumably flying them, Batzer is not a pilot.

(Though it’s not as simple as that; we’ve had other instances of non-pilots being calmed by a pilot’s choice of body language. They weren’t consciously aware it was the body language doing it, was the difference. So perhaps it’s not just that Batzer isn’t a pilot; taking the chapter as a whole, I think it’s safe to say anyhow that Batzer just isn’t very advertant.)