>How often does a soul of the e'Kieron line get reincarnated as an Easterner? I'm sure that Vlad is the first and only. However, Karen was speculating that the ability was not tied to the soul at all but to the genetics of Easterners. She was wondering whether Vlad was, in fact, being duped by Aliera and Sethra. I don't believe this is the case. >Vlad may, in fact, be the first, and only, Easterner who's learned Elder Sorcery. >Seems likely, in fact. Anyone can practice Elder Sorcery, though I'd agree that Vlad is probably the first Easterner to make much of an attempt at it. The E'Kieron ability is the ability to create it from nothing at all (or from existing matter) and with training to manipulate it rather more easily than the average sorceror. Morollan practices a certain amount of Elder Sorcery and Grita taught herself by "coming to an accomodation" with the Lesser Sea. She implied that anyone with the patience, skill, and daring could do the same thing. Indeed, the Jenoine themselves were eventually able to link to it and harness it so the ability to do so must not be strictly an E'Kieron ability. I'd speculate that the E'Kieron line was, in fact, the crowning glory of the Jenoine scientists and the ultimate goal of their research program. That is, the creation of a slave race that could summon and control amorphia at the behest of their masters. The birth of Kieron and his siblings (or possibly their ancestors a few generations removed) may have been the event that triggered the Revolt as a "now or never" kind of thing. >I can't think of many e'Kierons left to mint the souls, in fact. Aliera is about it. >(Which means Devera, obviously, can use the Elder Sorcery, not that she seems to need >this ability.) If they were all in Dragaera City when the Disaster struck then that might well be the case. Perhaps Verra's liaison with Adron, aside from being pleasurable, was ultimately another one of those "feelings" of hers that turned out to be right in the sense that it preserved the line from destruction.