Tag Archives: Theonna yos’Phelium

Neogenesis – Chapter 20 part V

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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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Alliance of Equals – Chapter 19

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Vivulonj Prosperu

In which Aelliana returns.

Okay, so I wouldn’t have been left in the dark much longer about Tolly sharing a background with Inki. (This is far from the first time it’s happened that I’ve wondered about a thing in a blog entry and it’s been answered in the next chapter. That’s a good thing, I figure; it means the stories are well-paced and handing out information at an appropriate rate.)

Given the fact of their shared background, I think that that’s why Inki doesn’t want Haz telling Tolly about the confrontation with Stew. (I suspect the specific detail she doesn’t want Haz sharing is less the bit where she had to convince him with money, but the bit just before that where she frightened a man who wasn’t frightened by an Yxtrang. Or maybe it is the money thing, but because if she’s the legal owner of the ship the Admiral is installed in, that might give her leverage if she decides to run off with him.) She apparently hasn’t told Tolly she’s a Lyre graduate, which is an understandable precaution since he probably wouldn’t trust her if he knew — and so doesn’t help us tell whether she should be trusted, since she’d want to avoid that either way. She’s told Haz that they’re graduates of the same institute, but in a vague way that Haz will probably take to mean that they learned mentoring in the same place. And Tocohl knows Inki is a student of the Lyre Institute, but doesn’t know that Tolly is.

Meanwhile, over in the Daav-and-Aelliana plot line, we have a recap of the Tanjalyre Institute, for the benefit of readers who had forgotten or never knew about it. Among other things. (“could not help but overhear”, forsooth.) For the record, I’m very much enjoying the Daav-and-Aelliana side of the story, but I have less to say about it because its direction is less of a surprise.

Dragon in Exile – Chapter 10

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Jelaza Kazone
Surebleak

In which Kareen and Kamele have an informative conversation.

I was a bit glib and a lot unfair when I suggested that Kareen might view Kamele as a performing dog. A better way to characterise the situation might be that Kamele has a genuine interest in and enthusiasm for learning the intricacies of the Liaden language, which makes it easier for one to forgive any stumbles since she’s clearly doing her best and it’s not her fault she’s not fully fluent yet. One might be less forgiving of a Terran who seemed to have made only the effort required to get by, for instance.

Also, they seem to actually like each other, a fact of which I took some convincing if only because Kareen has generally not made friends easily and it seemed unlikely that she would find it any easier with a non-Liaden.

(It’s interesting that, after Kamele was worried she might miss nuances if the conversation about the portrait was in Liaden, Kareen makes what must have been a deliberate choice to step out of Liaden into Terran to tell her about it, perhaps specifically to spare her that worry.)

Kareen’s description of the circumstances of Er Thom’s birth didn’t quite make sense to me at first: I wasn’t sure why it would be necessary for yos’Galan to produce a back-up delm of certain piloting ability when there was already Sae Zar. I think, though, that the problem with Sae Zar as a back-up delm is that he didn’t have the training for it; we know that training for a delm’s heir begins when he or she is very young, as happened for Daav (and Er Thom, as the designated back-up heir, got the same training). Also, Sae Zar was already designated as the heir to yos’Galan’s Master Trader, and to add Delm’s Heir to his pile would have been a disservice to yos’Galan, to be avoided unless no other solution was available.

Of the delms Kareen mentions in passing, we have heard of Jeni yos’Phelium, who helped establish the Scout Academy, and Theonna yos’Phelium, who was responsible for the Tactical Defense Pods. Edil yos’Phelium and Var Ond ter’Asten are new names. (ter’Asten is itself also a new name, unless it’s an alternate transliteration of “ter’Astin” – Jethri’s friend the scout was named Jan Rek ter’Astin.)

The implication of Kamele’s remark about Aelliana also being delm is, as I understand it, that her death wasn’t as simple as Daav failing his duty as delm to protect the vulnerable and husband the clan’s resources; Aelliana was also acting as delm, with a different assessment of who was most vulnerable and which resources the clan could least afford to lose, and no time for the two halves of the delm to reach a consensus.

Ghost Ship – Epilogue

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Pod 78
Moonstruck

…even this, in its own way.

Given that it’s already something of an effort for Theo to convince herself that things are going well with Win Ton, it’s probably just as well she’s not aware her father is likewise going to be spending the indefinite future in a heavy-duty medical unit.

There was apparently some controversy about this ending when the book first came out, but for myself I think it’s a reasonable cliffhanger, though I’d probably have thought differently if I hadn’t already known there would be another book coming along to pick up the loose threads. I’d also have been less well-disposed if there hadn’t been this epilogue – not that I’d have believed for a moment that Daav was really dead, but I’d have been annoyed if the authors had made us wait for the next book before they admitted it.

And of course the Uncle, being right there and, as we’ve been reminded recently, in possession of certain methods of cheating death, is the obvious explanation for why Daav isn’t out of the game just yet. Though I realised more on this reading that it’s not nearly so obvious from the Uncle’s point of view – after all, he’s notoriously self-centred and Daav yos’Phelium isn’t anything like a friend or an ally – and that the authors have done quite a bit of work in this chapter and the last few the Uncle has been in to put him in a position where he wants to help Daav.

The cliffhanger will remain hanging for a while longer, however, as tomorrow is “Prodigal Son”, filling in the details of what Val Con’s been doing lately, and after that Necessity’s Child.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 42

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Pod 78
Moonstruck

In which Pod 78 draws blood.

I don’t think I’ve observed before, and given the events of this chapter there’s not going to be another chance, that Daav flies Ride the Luck from the co-pilot’s chair. There’s probably more to that than simple force of habit.

There have been a number of moments over the past few books when Daav has felt Aelliana’s presence and forced himself not to look because he knows he won’t see her, and they pay off in the moment at the end of this chapter. Which is a neat trick, really, considering that when the authors started including those moments they had no idea this scene was in their future.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 41

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Starrigger’s Cafe
Mayflowerport

In which Daav consults an expert.

The Uncle doesn’t come right out and say it, of course, but that does appear to be an admission that he deliberately put Theo in harm’s way so that Bechimo would be obliged to come and rescue her.

His reminiscence about meeting Theonna yos’Phelium confirms the hints about him having survived in a series of bodies. It also suggests that each individual body has a longer than usual lifespan, since the body in which he met her was older than hers and yet lasted “long years” after she died. (On the other hand, maybe that says something instead about the lifespan of a delm of Korval.)

The mention that Theonna had “known his relationship to the shipyards of the independents” might be taken as another hint toward Bechimo‘s origins being tied into some of the background details of Trade Secret (Theonna would have been alive during the events of Trade Secret, if not yet delm), but we still have that definite statement at the beginning of this novel that Bechimo has been waiting far longer than that.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 40

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Jelaza Kazone
Surebleak

In which various preparations are made.

And while Val Con is off dealing with his metaphorical bombshell, Miri is stuck with another one – which is going to become rather less metaphorical if it’s not dealt with promptly.

This is one of Korval’s weak points at the moment: there aren’t very many members of the clan, all things considered, and there is such a lot to do. And if it should happen that something comes up when everybody who could do it is already elsewhere, there’s going to be serious trouble. (Come to think of it, this situation was somewhat foreshadowed earlier, with the difficulty they had lining up a suitable group to go and retrieve the children from their hiding place.) Now I’m maybe a bit surprised that the Department hasn’t tried to do anything with that, but then again maybe they don’t have any good ideas about what trouble they could cause that would require a specific clanmember to deal with; they only stumbled on this one by accident.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 10

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Spaceport Gondola
Gondola

In which old machines make their presence felt.

That’s the trouble with signing on with the Uncle. On the up side, he has an interest in old things that’s useful for dealing with the Bechimo situation. On the down side, that same interest means that associating with him is not exactly keeping a low profile when it comes to certain other people who have an interest in old things like Bechimo.

When Priscilla was trying to find out about Tactical Defense Pod 77, Pod 78 was the only other one of the series listed as still active, with a cryptic notation she didn’t have time to follow up at the time.

Plan B – Chapter 31

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Dutiful Passage
Lytaxin Orbit

In which Tactical Defense Pod 77 has a plan.

A couple of things come to mind about this chapter, but they would be better said later, after it has been revealed what is going on.

I’ve been idly speculating, between chapters, about whether it would have done them any good if one of the people on the surface had known about Pod 77 and been able to get it going sooner. Would it have been able to do anything for them that they haven’t done anyway? The strike it’s about to take will be pretty impressive, but it depends a lot on various factors, including timing and the unknowing co-operation of the Yxtrang. It probably couldn’t have done it any earlier, and it’s going to work now only because the Yxtrang have no idea the Pod exists; if it had been active earlier, they might have been able to take measures against it.

Plan B – Chapter 30

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Erob’s Boundary
War Zone

In which Val Con has a plan which is too audacious to fail.

Over the course of this book, I’ve been having trouble figuring out what it means for a Liaden to be one of “the line direct”. Earlier, Nova said that Miri’s heirloom showed her grandmother was one of the line direct and that would make her easier to identify, and I thought maybe that meant the line direct was whichever family line a clan’s delm was chosen from: Line Tiazan in Miri’s case, or Line yos’Phelium in Korval. But here is Shan counting himself and Priscilla as members of the line direct, so at least in Korval’s case it’s not just yos’Phelium.

But now that I’m thinking about it, I recall a scene back in Scout’s Progress where the term is used to distinguish between someone who might wear Korval’s crest because they’re actually a member of the clan and someone who might wear Korval’s crest because they’re an employee in one of Korval’s businesses. So, I guess that’s what it means, and that does fit the bit with Miri’s heirloom: knowing that her ancestor was an actual member of Clan Erob and not just someone who happened to work for them at some point would make it easier to narrow down who she is. (I’m not sure I see the usefulness of the concept in general: wouldn’t every person be in the line direct of their own clan? But then again, Liadens don’t really do “in general”; there’s always a context. Whenever a Liaden says “the line direct”, the meaning would always be outlined by who’s speaking, who they’re speaking to, and what hats they’re wearing.)