On Mon, 10 Mar 2003 10:58:23 -0700, you wrote: > > > > >>AFB, but Vlad said something similar to "my soul would have gone to feed a >>sentience in six inches of steel" in Jhereg (I think). It's the sort of >>line that sticks with you. Maybe "feed" is being used metaphorically >>there, but I got the impression from other bits in other books that >>they're actually eating the souls. > >I remember that -- I really got the impression that it was metaphorical, in >the sames sense that we talk about feeding wood to a fire. Of course, this >is blurred by the fact that MWs, unlike fire, actually do appear to have >some level of sentience, making them more akin to living beings, but I don't >get the impression that they have metabolisms. We don't see them, for >instance, excreting anything after they've consumed a soul, nor do they >appear to have anything like respiration, growth, or reproduction. > >As such, pending any evidence for a metabolism (which is the whole reason >that living organisms feed upon other things), I don't think that an MW >"eating" a soul is really like it *eating* a soul. > > Or possibly this "feeding" is what distinguishes MWs of varying strength? IOW, the more souls eaten, the stronger the MW. -- lazarus "To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American Public." -- Theodore Roosevelt