On Fri, 16 Jun 2006 Jon_Lincicum at stream.com wrote: > Philip Hart <philiph at slac.stanford.edu> > > Not unreasonable. Yet the concept of the Demon needing to go ask the > council for permission to do something doesn't really jive very well with > Kragar's account of how the Demon rose to power (killing two of the three > surviving council members, then "getting somewhere and declaring the top > to be where he was"). I'm thinking he makes a fortune selling titles (incidentally making a lot of money for the council, getting him into their circle and allowing him to plan his next move). Clearly a random Jhereg can't sell titles - there must be some link to the Empire. Of course he could taken a seat first, but I think the quote was 'he showed up selling titles' not 'he showed up and seized power and started selling titles'. Fortune above implies a non-negligible rate of sales, presumably. > >for example. Do we see him (them) make use of psionic contact? > >I'm wondering how much of a selection advantage having a link gives. > > At one point in /Athyra/, Vlad takes Savn out into the woods and teaches > him to make psionic contact--and it's something he seems unfamiliar with > (but, is obviously capable of, since Vlad teaches it to him). Will have to reread - thought this was a witchcraft-related thing, as Vlad wouldn't want to take off his phoenix stones for something minor. > > My guess, then, is that while the ability is there, (confirming what > Aliera relates to Vlad in chapter 9 of /Jhereg/) Teckla don't generally > get the training needed to use it. Odd - it must be such a huge advantage - consider cell phones vs no snail mail. Maybe this is an instance of isolation/rural cultural inertia - perhaps that doesn't affect my argument about Easterners in or next to a metropolis.