Tag Archives: Light Wing

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 30

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Solcintra
Near Orbit

In which a new venture calls for new names.

The Service Families have declared themselves the new High Houses of Solcintra. That didn’t take long.

Partly in response, Cantra and Tor An decide to strengthen their association, from perhaps-temporary co-pilots to permanent clanmates. (As I recall, Shan’s recounting of the Clan’s history in one of the later novels implies that they didn’t take that step until after landfall, but it does make sense for them to take the step now, for all the reasons Tor An mentions – and it has always been said that the contract was with Clan Korval, so that’s all right. In situations like this, Lois McMaster Bujold is wont to say that “the Management reserves the right to have a better idea later.”)

And on reflection, while it makes first-glance sense for the idea of forming a Clan to have presented itself later, at the point where the voyage was over and Cantra and Tor An needed to decide how they were going to carry on into the future, I’m not sure the Cantra we’ve come to know in this duology would have made this choice then. Forming Clan with her co-pilot means hitching her destiny to someone else’s in a way she’s never done, and I get the feeling that on some level she’s only letting herself do it now because it’s not going to matter if they all die soon anyway. If they’d waited to decide until they knew for sure they had the rest of their lives ahead of them, I don’t know that she might not have got cold feet.

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 23

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Solcintra

In which some more reunions take place.

Cantra is still planning to go off on her lonesome at the first opportunity, but there are several people not wanting to give her that opportunity.

I’m intrigued by Wellik’s tattoo. What we’ve been told about X Strain tattoos is that they’re large and gaudy, to off-balance the people who have to look at them, and that a tattoo signifying the soldier’s born-to troop goes on the right cheek. Wellik’s tattoo is not large and gaudy, nor is it on the right cheek, so although he’s following the general trend of face tattooing he seems to be avoiding all the specific rules. Presumably he’s making some kind of statement; I wonder what it is.

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 16

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Spiral Dance

In which all the king’s horses and all the king’s men aren’t available, so it’ll have to be Jela and the Tree.

Back when Cantra was preparing to make way for Maelyn tay’Nordif, she mentioned that coming out the other side usually involved a drug and a “taler”. The task of the taler is presumably the one that the Tree gives Jela: telling her the story of herself, to remind her which bits of her are real. The drug side of it, the Tree seems capable of handling itself, as it did on the way in.

There’s more of the book left than I’d been expecting. I’d remembered the expedition into Osabei Tower as most of it, with a straight run to the end from there.

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 15

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Landomist

In which our heroes shake the dust of Osabei Tower from their feet, some with more violence than others.

Jela has resigned himself to leaving without Cantra, but the Tree digs its heels in (or should that be “digs its roots in”?). It can tell that Cantra is on her way out, and that she’ll need both of them when she arrives. He sends Tor An on ahead with Master dea’Syl, to Captain Wellik, garrisoned on Solcintra. I can’t tell from the description whether Wellik is X Strain or not.

It’s an interesting coincidence that the emblem on Tor An’s ship (I’m not sure whether it’s the emblem of the ship only, or of the Trade Clan) is a dragon.

I note that the sections that are not from Jela’s viewpoint decline to commit themselves on whether they’re from the viewpoint of Cantra or of Scholar tay’Nordif.

Despite, or perhaps because, it’s naturally sessile, the Tree seems to really enjoy travelling at high speeds.

Elsewhere, Lute and his lady encounter Rool Tiazan in the aftermath of his battle with the Iloheen. We learn that Lute’s lady has, as it was foreshadowed last time we saw her, “accepted that burden which no dominant had taken up since the first had been born from the need of the Iloheen”: she has a name. (Indeed, she has a Name, although I confess I’m not clear on the distinction.) Those of us who recognised Lute’s name are not surprised to find that her name is Moonhawk.

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 8

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Osabei Tower
Landomist

In which Kel Var tay’Palin proves a point.

It’s very tempting to speculate about what might have happened had Prime tay’Palin survived a bit longer. (Tempting, too, to assume that it would have made things easier, if only because why else would the authors have killed him off?)

I’ve been trying to remember why Scholar dea’San’s surname sounded familiar. I thought at first that it was the same as the crime boss with the assumed airs, but he was dea’Sord, not dea’San. I’ve got it now, though: Vertu dea’San, Clan Wylan, is the protagonist of the novella “Skyblaze”, which is currently scheduled at the very end of the re-read.

I had also been wondering why Scholar tay’Nordif had decided to take a liking to the cat, but I think this chapter answers that question. Clearly she had been feeling a lack of somebody to talk to who would appreciate the excellence of her thought. (Either that, or she had been feeling a lack of somebody to steal her chair and lie on her keyboard while she was trying to work.)

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 6

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Osabei Tower
Landomist

In which you may call a scholar anything you like so long as you don’t call her late for dinner.

There’s a lot going on in this chapter.

We’re reminded a couple of times in this chapter that Scholar tay’Nordif, unlike Cantra, lacks a dancer’s or a pilot’s grace. There’s her wobble when she’s turning on her heel to look at the entrance hall — by the way, I would not handle ascending a stairway like that with anything approaching calm — and there’s the bit where she fumbles her data-case.

The scene where she accidentally assembles a jamming device and, in general, the whole business of her unconsciously acting in Cantra’s interests for reasons which she insists make perfect sense to herself, is one of the things that really stuck with me from the first time I read this.

(I was reminded, the first time I read it, of Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, in which being possessed by a disembodied spirit is similar: one finds oneself doing unexpected things, and unconsciously inventing explanations for why one did them. There’s also something similar in A Fire Upon the Deep, though I don’t remember whether I’d read that yet. And there are also cases in real life, although not — as far as we know — with another consciousness directing them: some psychologists reckon that our motivations are, to a greater or lesser extent, a story we tell ourselves after doing what our instincts and unconscious urges prompt us to do.)

(Superficial aside: Scholar tay’Nordif talking about her patron from the house of the horticulturists reminds me of Mr Collins talking about Lady Catherine de Bourgh. Carnivorous Rosings?)

Meanwhile, it begins to become really apparent that in the Tower the cut-and-thrust of academic debate is taken rather more literally than we’re used to. And I’ve got to say that I’m detecting an undercurrent to Scholar tay’Welford’s expressions of concern about his boss’s health.

Speaking of health, the news that Liad dea’Syl’s students have been dying untimely is unreassuring (although not, by this point, very surprising). I wonder if that includes Jela’s instructors?

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 3

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Light Wing
Doing the Math

In which is introduced Scholar Maelyn tay’Nordif.

(Because it would have been unkind to Tor An, however tempting, to call it “In which no one really wants to go to the Ringstars.”)

Tor An continues to be dogged by irony. A fabric-of-space problem, indeed.

I feel like I ought to say something about the advent of Maelyn tay’Nordif, which was a striking event the first time I read it. I’ve had enough time to get used to it since then, though, that nothing’s really coming to mind.

(If Cantra yos’Phelium is Daav yos’Phelium’s Grandma, is Maelyn tay’Nordif Jen Sar Kiladi’s?)

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 1

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Light Wing
Transitioning to the Ringstars

In which there is a calm before the storm.

The part with Rool Tiazan and his lady is packed with vague foreboding, isn’t it.

And the part with homesick young Tor An yos’Galan is packed with dramatic irony. Poor Tor An.