On Wed, 16 Nov 2005 Jon_Lincicum at stream.com wrote: > IIRC, "The Lavode Scandal" was, indeed, a couple hundred years before the > events of TPG, yes? > > And Sethra is said to have been dead "For several Hundred Years" prior to > this. > > Either way, it doesn't make a dent in the 220,000 year history of the > Empire. Either way it's not evidence of anything except that she's been dead recently. You might consider the possibility that Sethra was joking about how long she had been dead - perhaps in reference to how long she got away with her pretence. Or being coolly disdainful to some upstart Athyra who discovered her status - "You're dead!" "Yes, I have been dead for some hundreds of years. Perhaps you will be dead in some hundredths of seconds."