Tag Archives: Rockflower

I Dare – Chapter 37

Day 51
Standard Year 1393

Departing Lytaxin

In which Daav and Aelliana go on a journey with several surprises in store.

I find myself wondering when Edger found time to acquire the new shuttle and have it fitted to the ship of the clan. The months he and Sheather spent waiting on Shaltren to see if the Juntavas could find Val Con and Miri seem most hopeful, except that they didn’t have the ship with them, it having gone on to Volmer and them having opted to go straight to Shaltren on a Terran vessel.

That also gets me wondering how they got from Shaltren back to Lufkit to visit Liz, and then from there to Lytaxin. They must have switched back to the ship of the clan at some point, since they arrived at Lytaxin in it.

Perhaps when Edger and Sheather left Lufkit for Shaltren, Edger sent Handler, Selector, and Watcher ahead to Volmer, to secure the ship of the clan, make arrangements for the addition of the shuttle, and await them there. Then after Sheather’s visit to Liz, Edger and Sheather went to Volmer, collected the upgraded ship, and proceeded to Lytaxin. That seems to cover everything, except that we’re still left with the question of where Handler, Selector, and Watcher are now.

Mouse and Dragon – Chapter 33

In which Daav decides to go into a possibly-hostile port without accepting backup.

Had this book been other than it is, the previous chapter might easily have been the last, perhaps with an epilogue in which Daav finally gets to hold his son in his arms. It is, after all, what the main plot line was building up to for the last two volumes.

But this is a prequel, which knows if any form of literature does that Peter Beagle was right about endings, and getting married isn’t the end of the story; it just means that Daav and Aelliana now have attention to spare for what else is going on in their lives.

I see a parallel between Daav’s decision to go to the Low Port alone, declining backup, and Aelliana’s decision last novel to go to the house of Mizel alone, declining backup, though in this case I’m not sure the decision is wrong; Daav does have a point about the advantages of working alone and under the radar. Still, one can wish he could have gone better protected. (Perhaps another Scout might have worked, if there were another Scout he could trust with this business. It’s a pity that Clonak is not available to be suggested as a possibility.)

Daav’s deliberately exaggerated worst-case hypothesis of “ghosts who lure the unsuspecting into the mists and steal their self-will” is not, after all, so far from the truth as one might prefer.

Mouse and Dragon – Chapter 2

In which Daav returns to Chonselta.

I wonder about Aelliana’s grandmother sometimes. She usually comes up when Aelliana is reminded of happier times, before Ran Eld was nadelm, and it’s clear that under the old delm’s eye he’d never have gotten away with behaving the way he has done. And yet… the situation which allowed him to get away with it once the old delm was gone did develop under the old delm’s eye; he was already showing the kind of man he’d grow into before she died, and some of how he turned out must be due to how he was raised by his mother — and thus in some measure to how she was raised by her mother.

The half of this chapter with Daav in it is a reprint from the final chapter of Scout’s Progress, give or take a few punctuation tweaks and altered choices of wording. Most of the latter are in the narration; the only ones that result in an actual change of event, if you’re interested in comparing them, are a couple of refinements in the paragraph where Master Kestra describes the treatment Aelliana has been given for her various injuries.

Scout’s Progress – Chapter 27

In which several people ask, reluctantly, “Now what?”

I’ve said this before, in the comments under Chapter 39 of Local Custom, but I might as well say it again so it appears in a post: I don’t believe that lifemating works on the basis of there being a pair of people predestined to join together. (Which is a relief, because it’s a pretty horrifying idea, as Daav suggests here: what if something happens to one half of the match before they meet, and the other is left forever incomplete?) Every time we see a lifemate bond form in this series, it’s a consequence, not a cause, something that happens to a pair of people who have already joined together in other ways. It makes sense that some people can’t form a lifemate bond at all, and that those can can’t do it with just anybody, but I don’t believe it’s as reductive as each person having one and only one possible partner.

Here’s an interesting sentence: “Jelaza Kazone had not spoken and he wished, with everything in him, to be at Binjali’s.” Is it that the Tree did manage to suggest an idea to Daav without him realising, or is it that the Tree didn’t speak because it knew that he was already, on his own initiative and by his own desire, going to do what it would have told him to do?

Scout’s Progress – Chapter 26

In which Samiv tel’Izak is introduced to the Tree.

The Tree disapproves of Samiv tel’Izak, and is not shy of making its disapproval known. What the basis of its disapproval might be is less easy to see. It’s unlikely to be merely that marrying her would make Daav unhappy; the happiness of its fellow creatures has not always been the Tree’s primary concern, and Daav was making some progress toward a comfortable union before the Tree itself stomped on his efforts.

One suspects that it disapproves of Pilot tel’Izak because she is not Aelliana Caylon and the Tree has realised, as Daav has not yet, that Aelliana Caylon is an available possibility. Presumably it’s aware of Aelliana second-hand, through Daav — though one does wonder what other sources of information it might have, remembering that it was a suggestion from the Tree which put Daav in Pilot Caylon’s path in the first place…

Scout’s Progress – Chapter 20

In which Aelliana is having a much better day than Ran Eld.

Ran Eld is not just personally unpleasant, he’s taking advantage of his status to embezzle money from the clan to fund his lifestyle. When he’s not funding his lifestyle by borrowing money at ruinously high rates of interest, with the result that he now owes to one creditor more money than Aelliana earns in a year. Not only is he a crook, he’s not a very smart crook. (I suppose he might not have needed to be, as long as his mother’s regard tended to shield him from the consequences his actions might otherwise have had.)

Meanwhile, Daav is introducing Aelliana to a Terran dish called ”pecha” (sounds vaguely familiar, but I can’t quite put my finger on why…) and telling her stories about his days in the Scouts. Here we get the story of the planet where he gained his earring, which sounds a lot like the planet Tol Ven yo’Endoth visited in “Sweet Waters”, though the Mun are not one of the tribes he encountered and their traditions are not exactly like the traditions of the Sanilithe.

Scout’s Progress – Chapter 11

In which Daav and Aelliana meet for the first time.

Daav has part of his wish now: someone who knows him only as himself, without any idea of his rank and status.

Which is probably the only way they could have made a connection; if Aelliana had known he was Delm Korval, it would likely have been a disaster, though for the opposite reason from most of the women he’s had to deal with. She’s not the type to play up to him because of his wealth or rank, but she’d have been even more terrified of him than Syntebra el’Kemin was of Er Thom. And as Delm Korval speaking with one not of his clan, he would have limits on his conversation options that would prevent him from soothing her the way he is able to as just-Daav in the place where everyone speaks Comrade.

Scout’s Progress – Chapter 6

In which Daav and Aelliana each turn their steps toward Binjali Repair Shop.

The game of pikit or piket was mentioned in Balance of Trade, where the twins taught Jethri to play it. I said then that the name was reminiscent of the Regency game of piquet, but what little we were told of the gameplay wasn’t. We see more of the gameplay here, and it reminds me rather of poker. (Though it must be said that my experience of card games is not broad, so many games remind me of poker.)

Var Mon denies having set Aelliana on Vin Sin chel’Mara, and it’s true that she chose to challenge the chel’Mara on her own initiative; but it’s also true that the opportunity and the impulse wouldn’t have arisen had not Var Mon invited her to tour the casino in search of practical applications of her mathematics, so Rema’s accusation may be basically correct.

Master dea’Cort was mentioned in “Pilot of Korval” as one of Daav’s instructors at the Scout Academy. There’s also a Scout named Jon dea’Cort back in “Phoenix”; if this Jon is the same man, he must be well into a hale old age by now — that was nearly seventy years ago, and he was already a full Scout then.