"Davdi Silverrock" <davdisil at gmail.com> Sent by: dragaera-bounces at dragaera.info 06/22/06 04:17 PM To "Dragaera List" <dragaera at dragaera.info> cc Subject Re: Adron and the Dragon Council >Well, yes, that's my point. I'm not trying to say that it was >asserted that Aliera was not legitimate, only that the whole business >was sufficiently unusual that the Council elected to postpone *any* >decision for a few centuries in order to see how Aliera turned out, >and for the interim, changed who the Heir was so that there would be a >clear succession to someone who was not in any way problematic. Well, it's not an unreasonable theory. I see no solid evidence for or against it. >It occurs to me that part of her testimony might have been to mention >that she assisted in the creation of Dragaerans and of the first of >the House of the Dragon, in the first place. Heh. What, so now Verra is Kieron's mom too? But that means that if Kieron and Aliera... uh... eww. >But still. Since not all of the Dragon Council would have the >expertise to evaluate Verra's statements, there may well have been >some who felt less than willing to commit themselves immediately. Surely you're not suggesting a Dragon would be cautious and tenative in his actions? Well, okay, an older Dragonlord might. > >Yet how could the conspirators have been certain that K'laiyer and > >Miera would declare war, rather than a personal duel with Sethra > >Lavode, or for that matter, keeping their cool and demanding a full > >investigation into the allegations? > > Because they are Dragonlords. >Insufficient basis, I nearly think. As you mentioned, Norathar almost >attacked Sethra Lavode immediately; why might not her parents have >done the same? Well, Sethra was in the same room with Norathar at the time. Norathar's parents would have had to get at Sethra by attacking Dzur Mountain, which would require an army, hence, war would have been inevitable. >if Sethra had insulted them on her own, attacking her might have been >the only option to achieve that goal. But Sethra conveyed a piece of >intelligence *to* the Dragon Council *from* someone else. Even if >they somehow had defeated Sethra, that still leaves the Council, who >may well have thought that the problem of legitimacy needed to be >investigated *anyway* (which would probably have had the effect of >removing K'laiyer as the Heir), and more importantly, it leaves the >one or ones who gave Sethra the information in the first place which >she brought to the Council. Well, if we were talking about an Issola, then certainly. Or even an older, wisened Dragonlord might hold back and not attack immediately. K'laiyer e'Lanya and Lady Meira were apparently realtively young Dragons, however (based on the fact that Norathar was still a baby at the time). Also, if we use Norathar's later actions as an indication of how her parents were likely to have behaved, it seems that these e'Lanyas were not the sort of Dragonlords to hold back. I'm sure that the SiG would have studied the temperments of her victims, and would have taken this into account in her plans. >Cooler-headed Dragons might have seen that they were being attacked >*through* Sethra Lavode, not by Sethra Lavode, and worked to find out >who the real enemy was, making the investigation into the truth, and >the defense of the truth, their own personal war. Yes, cooler-headed Dragons might have. No argument there. >Yes - and recall that Norathar was talked out of seeking immediate >revenge. Given time for the immediate rage to subside, the next step >is to figure out what is really going on. Wars are won not just by >attacking, but by figuring out who to attack, and how to attack them. Talked out of seeking immediate revenge... By Sethra. The oldest and most experienced Dragonlord in the Empire. And probably even then it was only the fact that Iceflame was at hand, that Sethra was in her own lair, and that Norathar's closest friend in the world (Cawti) was by this time quite friendly with a close friend of Sethra's (Vlad) that was enough to make her stop long enough to listen to Sethra's advice. Majikjon