Dutiful Passage
In which Padi makes connections and Shan receives news from home.
The looper families Shan mentions are among those who have appeared or been mentioned in the Jethri-era stories: the Smiths were the first family to have norbears travelling with them, the Tragers were friendly with Jethri’s family, and the Wildes did that ill-fated bit of experimenting with Old Tech.
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Bechimo
In which the Pathfinders join the conversation.
Chernak and Stost are welcomed back with some of Clarence’s baking — more maize buttons?
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Jelaza Kazone
In which Chernak and Stost go to rejoin their captain.
That appears to settle, fairly definitely, the question of where Chernak and Stost would serve if they had their preference.
I notice that Val Con refers to Theo as “your captain” near the end, suggesting that Diglon told him what Chernak said, or perhaps Jeeves did. I wonder if anybody plans to tell Theo, or if they’re going to let her figure it out for herself.
Jelaza Kazone
In which there is a new mission for the Pathfinders.
If Spiral Dance is being taken up again, one hopes that Nova didn’t re-engage all the safety features, or at least left her delm with instructions on how to disengage them at need.
One also wonders if anybody’s going to be provoked by yet another instance of a ship taking off from Korval’s back yard instead of a proper shipyard.
Surebleak Port
Office of the Road Boss
In which Delm Korval has visitors.
Well, there’s an answer to my question about how things would have gone if Emissary Twelve had done this on Liad, anyway.
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Jelaza Kazone
In which Val Con receives a letter from an old family friend.
Timeline sorting: The last two Surebleak chapters of Neogenesis each focus, as this chapter does, on half the delm starting the morning’s work. This one appears to fit between those two; it’s the morning after the first of them, in which Val Con receives the news from Tinsori Light. The second, in which Miri receives an unexpected visitor, appears to yet be in the future.
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Surebleak
In which it’s a new day.
It looks like we’re done with dramatic confrontations for now, and are into the part of the book where things are wound down and tied off. There were a couple more dramatic confrontations I was expecting, but maybe they’re being saved for next time.
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In which Val Con and Miri gather information about their visitors.
This is the first mention I can recall of there now being two separate branches of the Scouts, but it doesn’t surprise me. I presume the schism is a consequence of the events surrounding Korval’s big play and subsequent exile, and the subsequent removal of a chunk of Liaden society to Surebleak. Liaden society as a whole was divided over how to view Korval’s actions, and although many Scouts had a sympathy for Korval it is not to be supposed that they were unanimous in their approval.
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In which Val Con and Miri have a busy morning.
I like “a salute so smart it could have driven itself into town”. And Val Con’s interactions with the cat.
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In which Val Con and Miri are not getting much sleep tonight.
Chapter 20 is shaping up to be a long chapter, to the point that I’m almost wondering if I need to subdivide the sections even further. Makes sense, though, since this is the chapter where a whole bunch of plot strands come together, not just from this book but from the four books preceding it.
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