On Mon, 2002-12-30 at 01:21, Greg Rapawy wrote: > (Spoilers for _Paths of the Dead_.) > > 1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8 > 9 > 10 > 11 > 12 > 13 > 14 > 15 > 16 > 17 > 18 > 19 > 20 > 21 > 22 > 23 > 24 > 25 > 26 > 27 > 28 > 29 > 30 > 31 > 32 > 33 > 34 > 35 > 36 > 37 > 38 > 39 > 40 > > > ] "Let Moranthë explain, because she understands the > ] phoenix and its significance, and how it lives when > ] it dies, and creates when it destroys, and > ] prophesies while making its prophecies come to > ] pass." > > > 2. I can't get much out of the second passage > regarding the problem of the Phoenix Heir. The > reference to how the phoenix "prophesies while making > its prophecies come to pass" does seem to foreshadow > Ordwynac's challenge to Zerika in Chapter 34 that she > "cannot both create the Empire, and use the Empire to > defend it, all at the same time," and her answer that > she will. (This is also a neat way to sum up a basic > property of social behavior: institutions work because > everyone thinks they work.) I suppose traveling to > the Paths of the Dead could be seen as a way that > Zerika "lives while she dies," too. I think 'lives when it dies' is one of those things that works on multiple levels. You can look at it as Zerika is living while she dies when she goes into the Paths. But at the same time, it could mean that the House of the Phoenix lives when it dies (when the last of its line are gone). I really like your genetics thoery of the two existing pheonix females having children, and then somewhere down the line those two sets of phoenix genes (possibly mixed with some phoenix genes from the jhereg) mix to form a full-bread phoenix. And if we assume this is meant, the prio passage could be taken as the House of the Phoenix dies when the last of its members dies, yet it still lives in those who are carriers of the genes.