[Dragaera] Ten New Questions after Dzur. [Dzur Spoilers]

[Ken Koester]

Michael Wojcik wrote:

>Ken Koester wrote:
> > Jon Lincicum wrote:
> >
> >> 5. Will Vlad's actions against the Left Hand lead to all out war?
> >>
> > Only if he hangs around & they find him again.  He does have one 
>subtle
> > bargaining chip:  whats-her-name's soul is still in Lady Teldra.  He
> > could offer to restore it, if they work out a way to get a body.  It's
> > not like it hasn't been done before, after all (-;
>
>Is it? We know Great Weapons can hold souls temporarily, and perhaps
>permanently (if soul-holding is an accurate description for what
>happened to Teldra herself, for example). But Daymar says that the
>sorceress's soul was "destroyed", and he appears to have some idea of
>the mechanism involved.
>
>  
>
Good as Daymar is, I doubt he knows all there is to know about GW's & 
particularly, I doubt he knows very much about Lady T.  For that matter, 
none of us know all that much about GW's, either.  We do know that they 
*can* choose to hold the souls they take; we don't know if they 
*require* the wielder to make that choice, or if they do it 
automagically, or if it happens only on the 13th day of the month, or 
whatever.  I'd say at this point it's open enough to lead the storyline 
that way in the future, if necessary, *without* contradicting anything 
we've been told up to now.

>Also, part of the appeal of Great Weapons and other Morganti blades,
>for the reader, is that they represent finality. A world with
>resurrection and reincarnation needs some sort of real threat. If
>it turned out that Great Weapons routinely hang onto the souls of
>folks they kill, that would undermine their value as plot devices a
>bit - and, for me, seem a bit of a cheat.
>
>  
>
De gustibus non disputandem est.  I don't find this a problem, myself.  
And I doubt that GW's ever get used this way very often, even if they 
can be, so for the overwhelming majority of cases, death by GW is as 
final as it can be.  In Vlad's/soceress' case, there's the added wrinkle 
that the body is presumably no longer around or revivable; the only case 
we know of where a new body *was* found involved rather more extensive 
work than I feel sure the Left Hand is capable of.  So the difficulties 
would be rather more than a routine plot point could dispose of; if this 
is how Vlad gets a truce with the LH, it aint exactly going to be a walk 
in the park.  (I don't know what would be involved in releasing the 
sorceress' soul from LT so that it could arrive in the Halls of 
Judgement, but that would probably mollify her sister a bit & be easier 
to arrange than finding a spare body lying around cluttering up the 
living room.)

>For example, it means Vlad needn't feel guilty about what happened to
>the sorceress. Heck, he can just go around zapping the souls of anyone
>he dislikes; he can always put 'em back later.
>  
>
Except it don't seem to be that easy.  Not routine.

Snarkhunter