Tag Archives: Veralt

Crystal Dragon – Chapter 7

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Osabei Tower
Landomist

In which Scholar tay’Nordif acquires a robe, an account, a grad student, and a cat.

Scholar tay’Nordif seems to have a fondness for quoting the philosopher bin’Arli, to the disconcertion of those around her.

Twenty-four qwint make one flan. I very much doubt that this is a piece of information that will prove useful in future, but it’s there, so I figured I might as well make a note of it.

There’s something oddly familiar about the business of ser’Dinther’s cat, but I can’t quite put my finger on it…

(I remember thinking the first time I read this that whereas ser’Dinther’s experiment was based on the assumption that he was located in the line of causality the cat would escape from, the grudent’s account of the cat’s progress sounds very much like what one would expect to see from the viewpoint of the line of causality the cat was escaping to.)

(What I’m thinking this time around is that the description of the what the cat is supposedly able to do by instinct reminds me of what Rool Tiazan is able to do deliberately, and in particular that the description of a creature in peril for its life shifting to a situation in which the peril is non-existent is, on a different scale, pretty much what the Great Migration will turn out to be like.)

(Also that the casual way these people discount their servitors is really unpleasant.)

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 5

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Osabei Tower
Landomist

In which Maelyn tay’Nordif is welcomed home, a pleasure that continues to elude Tor An yos’Galan.

Jela’s party succeeds in winning entry to the Tower, with a thesis calculated to draw attention and give Scholar tay’Nordif reason to ask nosey questions about Liad dea’Syl.

It’s interesting, considering what I recall about what happens later, that Scholar tay’Welford is the designated viewpoint for the admission scene. Although that, of course, may simply be because he’s the admissions board’s designated expert in Scholar tay’Nordif’s specialism. (On the gripping hand, that’s not an unrelated coincidence.)

Tor An, meanwhile, is having trouble drawing anybody’s attention to his problem. Apparently people really aren’t all that interested in other star systems going missing. Though if everybody who insists on being interested winds up getting shot, perhaps that’s not as surprising as it first appears.

His polite sarcasm when he’s talking to the X Strain captain reminds me strongly of certain of his descendants.