An omnibus response to various folks followups. Believe it or not,
this long spiel is all off the top of the head.
Mark Mandel writes (in response to me):
> There are numerous tribes or nations of Easterners [FHYA12]. We don't
> know the names of any of them except Vlad's people, the Fenarians . . .
Actually, I'm trying to make a different distinction here. Admittedly
it's on thin evidence, so there's probably no way either you or I can
be proven right short of input from a higher authority. But that's
half the fun of conjecture...
I think the Fenarians are a third branch, distinct from Dragaerans
and Easterners. They're not baseline human, but they don't seem to
be Dragaerans as we know them. Their language is much different, and
that's more important than might be immediately apparent. In PHOENIX pg
116, it's clear that the Communist documents that Kelly found and read
were originals, and therefore not something translated into modern,
er, Dragaeran or Easterner. So we're talking millions of years with
little or no language change for Dragaerans. So distinctly different
languages probably imply *very* ancient divisions. There are also the
the magical differences. I wrote:
> Miklos, Sandor, and Brigetta all learned wizardry in Faerie. All are
> non-Dragaerans. None seem to have any link to the orb.
It would have been more accurate to say 'had their wizardly powers
awakened in Faerie.' Miklos appear to have gotten just a bit of training,
Sandor more. But the training can continue (as per Sandors offer to
Miklos) and the power can grow outside of Faerie. It seems to only awaken
there, tho.
Mark continues:
> They don't think of it in those terms. Whatever Alfredo has, the Tree or
> the power behind it cuts him off from. But I don't see why it's not
> straightforward Orb sorcery.
I can give you a couple of reasons why it isn't. First and foremost,
everyone we've seen who has a link with the Orb is either Dragaeran or
has purchased a title. There was some brief discussion here a week or
two back about how Vlad got his link to the Orb, but whatever the
actual mechanism is, it isn't something that's handed out to common
Easterners who wind up doing farm labor for the lord of the Pepperfields.
Vlad (and everyone else who has it) is very aware of his link to the
Orb. From everything I can see in the text, Vlad is the *only* easterner
who has one. Cawti doesn't. Noish-pa doesn't. I really can't believe
that all three of the Fenarians who've gone into Fairie got one in their
relatively brief stay there.
And the link to the Orb includes things that the Fenarians with power
don't seem to have, like a clock, immediately knowledge of the Empress,
etc. All of this seems to be blank to Sandor, Miklos and Brigetta. So
I'm pretty convinced their talent, whatever it is, is not due to a link
to the Orb. It may be sorcerous in nature (in PHOENIX, Pg 117, Sethra
says that sorcery was possible but difficult during the Interregnum)
but IMHO it's not Orb-related.
Hmmm, I just had an idea. Maybe Fenarians are actually Dragaerans
of a sort! Maybe they're the remnants of the of the 14 lost tribes.
Maybe they're half-breeds. I don't recall the textual statements about
Easterners and Dragaerans not being able to inter-breed; do they come
>from a reliable source? Maybe it was once less difficult than it is
now (genetic drift, isolated populations, insert biological BS here),
giving us a set of mixed breed Fenarians who've continued to live largely
in isolation. And I'll point out we know of at least two cross-species
children, Brigetta and Aliera. Both will successfully have children
of their own, too. Just how much 'god' blood is mixed in with these
groups, anyways?
[[ An aside: in BROKEDOWN PALACE, Brigettas non-human father would
torment his wife by assuming his true form. This leads me to
think he's one of the non-human appearing gods and pretty durned
ugly. Like, say, Barlen. Brigettas father is called a demon,
but let's remember the linguistic differences here -- demon is
a technical term in Dragaeran, a godlike creature that can be
compelled. In Fenario, it might just me 'ugly god' or 'god who
is in opposition to Verra.' ]]
[[ And what about Vlads parentage? I remain convinced there are gods
in his bloodline, specificly Verra. ]]
But having the Fenarians be semi-Dragaeran would explain an awful lot.
It would explain why Vlad has the soul of a Dragaeran. It would explain
why brief dwelling in Faerie awakens `powers' in Fenarians. It activates
their hereditary link to the Orb, and once active, the distance can no
longer be active. Perhaps they all had a lot more of it before Adron's
disaster, lost it like everyone else during the Interregnum, and the
powers are latent until sufficiently awakened by greater proximity to
the Orb? So while it may be orb-related, I don't think it's
*straitforward* Orb sorcery. Sandor's true age might tell us a lot. He
has extended his lifespan quite a bit, but could he have lived through
the Orb-less interregnum without it? The dates of Sandors journey to
Faerie are quite vague (see Alexx's Timeline), so we don't really get a
clue there.
[[ An aside: Hey Steven -- is Sandor a bit of an homage to Steven
Kings 'Flagg' in 'Eyes of the Dragon'? (yes, I know Flagg appears
in other King stuff. But the one in 'EotD' is the one that's
closest to Sandor.) ]]
And a special thanks to Mark for reminding me of his Cracks and Shards
page <http://world.std.com/~mam/Cracks-and-Shards/>. That, and Alexx's
Dragaeran timeline <http://world.std.com/~alexx/timeline.txt> are two
of the most helpful sources around; I should have looked in C&S before
writing my original.
Another 'hmmm, just had an idea.' Perhaps the Dragaeran extended lifespan
is a genetic trait that's activated by exposure to sorcery? If this is
to be true, we can extrapolate some things by looking at the texts. First,
there's no requirement that the slowdown in ageing only works if you're
an infant during the contact. Sandor was at least an adult and quite
possibly old before going to Faerie. Second, the onset of slowed ageing
must be gradual. Otherwise Vlad would still be whatever age he was when
his father bought their title. A slow onset would also explain Sandors
apparent age, as it would Brigettas. Have we ever seen Vlad known to have
grey hair? He sure ought to by now, given everything he's been thru.
And the effect must not be present during pregnancy, otherwise it would
take a looong time to gestate. Imagine being pregnant for 30 years! In
addition, the effect can't be Orb-specific. Dragaerans didn't suddenly
start growing old during the Interregnum. One might argue that the Orb
still existed, but Dragaerans couldn't reach it or draw on it. That must
include newborns, who couldn't have linked to the Orb. There's no
statement that Dragaeran children born during the Interregnum suddenly
started growing up faster, and that kind of thing would surely have been
noticed. So it's not the link to the Orb, it's the link to the sorcerous
pool of power that the Orb also draws on.
[[ An aside: I've made the claim that the increased sorcerous powers
post-Interregnum are not due to skills honed during the low-power
Interregnum days; that's just plain silly. If it were true, folks
born after the Interregnum (like Vlad) wouldn't be able to teleport
because they didn't get those centuries of skill honing. I think
the power increase is due to the presence of the 'fresher' amorphia
from Adron's Disaster. That pool is sentient with Adron's remains,
and therefore (IMHO, of course) qualitatively different from the
Great Sea.
[[ An aside to the aside: why did Adron's disaster not consume
the world? Perhaps because Adron realized what he'd done and
halted the expansion. ]]
This might also imply that with the increased sorcerous pool, there
will be a further increase in Dragaeran lifespan. Since we're only
a few hundred years past the Interregnum, it's too early to tell the
if theres a difference. Very old Dragaerans quite likely died fast
due to lack of good healers during the Interregnum. The Dragaerans
who made it thru the Interregnum are likely either the younger ones
or are attributing their current good health to the powerful healers
post-Interregnum. ]]
Damien Sullivan writes:
> Cook? Do you mean the wizard, Sandor? nee' Alfredo?
Yes, sorry. And if his name means he's not a native Fenarian, that
shoots a lot of my conjectures above in the head. But we don't know
that to be the case; certainly it's possible that he's a native Fenarian
named after a non-Fenarian.
> > Also in BP is are several discussions of 'wizardry'. I put the word
> > in quotes because I don't think the Fenarian use of the word matches
> > the Dragaeran. Consider:
>
> No, their use matches Dragaeran sorcery.
Dragaeran sorcery always requires contact with and drawing power from the
Orb. I've submitted my case above that Fenarian wizardry doesn't draw on
the Orb, but will admit it's not a definitive case either way.
> > People using it can almost fly (Miklos reports this). . .
> Like flying castles and levitating Alieras.
Ouch! Yes, correct.
> Life extension is novel, though. (Although on the witchcraft side
> Noish-pa is rather spry, and Cawti could nullify or at least delay shock
> reactions, although sorcerers seem to have that ability as well.)
Others have made the claim that Cawti is Brigettas daughter, and this
might give her stamina far beyond the abilities of mortal man (sorry, got
carried away). But life extension is (IMHO) a killer difference. The
Jhereg have been selling titles for a long time, and I deeply doubt that
the Taltos family are the first Easterners to get one. There's no mention
that it causes life extension in Easterners, and that surely would have
been noticed! So I'm guessing that life extension either doesn't come
>from the Orb but from some other Power, or that it only hits those with
the right bloodlines - eg, Dragaerans and Fenarians.
It's also widely known that there are multiple magical skills, only one
of which is sorcery. In TALTOS, pg 37, Sethra Lavode apparently defines
a wizard as "one who can achieve the skill in sorcery, necromancy, and
other disciplines to combine them effectively." We know for certain of
sorcery (which is greatly increased in power when being Orb-related),
witchcraft (the `psionics' which the Jenoine bred into baseline humans),
and necromancy (which appears to have to do with alternate planes of
existence). Fenarian magic might be a fourth branch, and Serioli (if
there is such a thing) a fifth. Serioli magic was mentioned on the list,
but I don't recall a reference to it in the books.
> > When the young Morrolan was sent East for protection,
> > did he learn witchcraft? Or did he learn these Fenarian skills?
> Vlad and Noish-Pa both recognize blatant signs of Morrolan's witchcraft.
Correct, but Vlad notes Morrolan doing things (opening and closing hands,
gestures and motion of eyes and mouth - can't recall specific reference)
which are clearly neither witchcraft nor sorcery. Is this Fenarian magic?
Serioli? It doesn't jibe with what little we've seen of the Necromancer
at work.
Felix Surnamed Eisen writes:
> I was under the impression that the area named by the Empire as 'The
> Pepperfields' actually WAS Fenario.
Possible, but I don't think so. Fenarr gets there by going past the lake
the bears his name; so I think the Pepperfields is the area just NW of the
mountains of Faerie.
Thanks to all,
Steve