Tag Archives: Mr dea’Gauss

Due Diligence – Chapter 8

In which Chi yos’Phelium’s son is born.

Good morning, Daav. Welcome to the world. It’s going to have its ups and its downs, but that’s life for you, I’m afraid.
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Due Diligence – Chapter 4

In which Fer Gun pen’Uldra gets married.

And so here is the context for the things that had puzzled me about Chi’s behaviour.
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Due Diligence – Chapter 2

In which Petrella yos’Galan is diligent.

I had some things I was going to say about how I still didn’t understand why Chi is going to these lengths, but they’ve been rendered moot by the helpful person in the previous post’s comments who wished to spare me the trouble of waiting for the story to explain itself. So.

I like the discussion of the difference between offending nobody and offending everybody.

The thing Petrella thinks she remembers about Line pen’Uldra, which has not yet been revealed, is I suspect likely to be connected somehow with the fact of Fer Gun being the last of the Line.

Code of Honor

In which Tommy Lee goes home.

It can be tricky placing a story in chronological order without reading it first, as we’ve seen already in this project, but I think I did all right with this one. It’s definitely set somewhere during Ghost Ship; a bit further on than where I’ve put it, I suspect, but we were already stopping here to read two other short stories, so doing “Code of Honor” as well means that after this we can finish off Ghost Ship without any further interruptions.

Putting it next to “Kin Ties” also produces a nice bit of synchronicity, since this story, too, turns out to be concerned with the question of bad delms and where duty lies for those burdened with them.

I have my doubts that it’s within any clan’s reach to take Korval’s proverbially unique place aside-but-not-among the Fifty High Houses; surely the fact that Korval is in a class by itself is the very point of the proverb. (For that matter, I would think that no clan would want that place, if they’d really thought about what it meant to be aside but not among the High Houses.) But I suppose that when ambition talks there’s always somebody willing to listen.

I appreciate the detail that Tommy needs his aunt to point out a flaw in his plans for his future. He’s clever enough to think his way out of a very difficult situation, but he doesn’t think of everything.


Tomorrow: We resume Ghost Ship at Chapter 24.

Moon on the Hills

Surebleak

In which Korval acquires a new neighbour.

It’s an evocative name, “World’s End”. There’s the obvious sense in which the place is named, referring to a physical boundary, a place where the world comes to an end, but there are other things it could mean, such as a temporal boundary, a time when a world comes to an end. Sometimes a person’s world can come to an end even though the planet continues untouched. Yulie’s world might have ended when he lost the last of his kin. It might have ended today, if Boss Conrad had been someone other than the person he is.

(And isn’t it interesting how, when he’s talking to Yulie, he’s mostly Pat Rin but sometimes he’s Boss Conrad for a moment or two?)

It’s also interesting to speculate how things might have gone differently if Yulie’s brother hadn’t got himself killed before Boss Conrad showed up, and had been the one handling the negotiation for road access.

I Dare – Chapter 57

Day 59
Standard Year 1393

Solcintra
Liad

In which the Council of Clans throws Korval into the briar patch.

The Delm Hedrede who delivers the Council’s judgment here is not the same Delm Hedrede who clashed with Korval thirty years ago in Scout’s Progress – different pronouns – but it does make me wonder if Hedrede has a personal investment in Korval getting booted off the planet.

There’s a neat bit of narrative sleight of hand with the problem of what to do with the dies: the problem is carefully laid out, then just as Val Con is about to suggest a solution, the conversation is interrupted. The reader is left to assume that a solution is found without the authors having to actually come up with one.


Tomorrow and tomorrow: Revisiting old friends and seeing how they’re affected by recent events, in “Misfits” and then the remainder of Saltation.

I Dare – Chapter 55

Solcintra
Liad

In which the Captain acts for the safety of the passengers.

The mode of Ultimate Authority, which is referred to twice in this chapter, has, perhaps unsurprisingly, not come up much before: three times in the series up to this point. Priscilla adopts it briefly when putting Sav Rid Olanek in his place at the end of Conflict of Honors; Commander of Agents is said in Carpe Diem to use it when dealing with his underlings; and Val Con, greeting the Tree in Plan B, places the Tree in the position of ultimate authority.

The fact that it’s used twice in this chapter, and by whom, is the central conflict in a nutshell: the first is Commander of Agents again, and the second is Miri when she takes on the melant’i of Liad’s Captain. And I think it says something that, whereas Miri adopts the mode temporarily and in a situation where she is in fact the duly-appointed ultimate authority until the emergency is resolved, the Commander is not only self-appointed but apparently expects to be regarded as the ultimate authority all the time.

There’s a leap near the end of the chapter that I’ve never been able to follow. After the doomsday weapons are activated, ter’Fendil says he can deactivate them if Val Con gives him the control device, and Val Con does. Then it cuts to another scene, and when it cuts back everybody’s running for their lives and talking about the urgent need to do something before the weapons break out and start killing everybody. Is there something missing, or is it just me missing something?

I Dare – Chapter 51

Day 54
Standard Year 1393

Dutiful Passage
Jump

In which various people spend time in transit.

I haven’t been noting it every time a relevant detail has come up, but I think by now we have to acknowledge that in the Liaden universe cats are sapient and capable of dramliz-type abilities. Some cats, anyway. Merlin, at least. (Come to that, I wonder if Val Con knew how appropriate the name was when he chose it…)

I feel like I should say something about the scene with Hazenthull and Nelirikk, but nothing particular is coming to me.

It’s good to see Trilla again.

I Dare – Chapter 49

Day 54
Standard Year 1393

Solcintra
Liad

In which Anthora is boxed in.

Well, that’s one way to prevent Nova sorting things out by going in front of the Council and accusing the Department: send someone in front of the Council to accuse Korval of everything the Department has done.

Interesting that it’s Aragon who’s been maneuvred into making the accusation. Aragon has been mentioned several times as an old and respected High House, so an accusation from Aragon will be taken seriously; it’s a significant step up from the last time we saw somebody make an accusation in Council at the Department’s instigation, when it was an ambitious clan hovering around the border between the high and mid levels. Also interesting because the most recent of the Agents of Change that have been named to us, earlier in this book, was a chel’Mara, and chel’Mara looks to Aragon — so it might even be her specifically that Aragon is about to ask about when he’s interrupted.

Because of course there’s an interruption: having Korval called before the Council to answer an accusation might be an effective way to force Anthora out of Jelaza Kazone, but letting things run on long enough for her to actually answer would be risky. I presume the interruption was part of the plan, for that reason and because it provided the excuse to hustle Anthora into the room where the trap lay ready, but I wonder how the Department managed it. Did they know their targets so well as to be able to predict that attacking dea’Gauss at a particular time would result in a Master Accountant interrupting the Council hearing? Worrying thought, that.

Having done this re-read, paying more attention to names than I usually do, I recognize everyone in the list of Korval’s allies and friends. Justus is the clan of Ken Rik, Guayar is the clan of Clonak, Ixin is the clan of Jethri and of Aelliana’s prize student Rema, Reptor is the clan of Aelliana’s space pirates, and Mizel is the clan that produced Aelliana herself. (The fact that it’s counted now among Korval’s friends is a pretty clear sign that Aelliana’s mother is no longer delm.)

The date issue is compounding itself: if the chapter heading was wrong about it being Day 53 when Anthora was told to present herself to the Council the next day, this chapter must also be wrong about it being Day 54 when she presents herself to the Council. But I still think that’s more straightforward than the alternative.