[Dragaera] Vlads blood

[Mark Mandel]

OK, this looks like the time to throw in my personal WAG. Citations and
sources are left as an exercise for the reader as a convenience for the
tired writer.

1. The Jenoine created the Dragaerans from human (Easterner) genetic
material, adding genes from Dragaeran animals to create something like 44
proto-Houses, of which 16 survived to the creation of the Empire.

2. The original "House of the Jhereg" was a band of outcasts from the other
Houses, almost certainly including crossbreeds and possibly including some
genetic material from extinct proto-Houses. They were accepted as the
seventeenth House because of their services, under Dolivar/Vlad, to Kieron's
inchoate <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/inchoate> Empire.

3. Although Dragaerans are bigger and stronger than Easterners, and live
fifty times as long, every Dragaeran is constrained by the genes of gya's
House (or House(s), in the case of crossbreeds) and *cannot* act otherwise.
This implies that Dragaerans are LESS than human in some real and important
sense.

4. The Vladiad is to comprise* nineteen books: *Taltos* (#4), *The Final
Contract *(#19), and one for each of the Houses. Each of what we might call
"the House books" has centered around the title House, or a member or
members of it; and in each, Vlad has learned or acquired some
characteristics of that House. In *Dragon* he bonds with his messmates and
fights bravely in battle, in fact with something like a Dragonlord's battle
rage. ("'You'll do, Easterner.' I'd've killed him for that, but I was too
tired to stand up." OWTTE.) In *Athyra* Savn reminds Vlad of what he'd said
about Athyra's attitude toward other people, and Vlad realizes with some
shame that that's how he's been using Savn. And so on.

* or "to consist of", but not "to be comprised of". No way, no how.

5. There is reason to think that Vlad may also have divine blood: that his
mother (whom his father spoke of seldom and called "that witch") may have
been Verra.

6. As has been pointed out upthread, Vlad has done a helluvalot more than
any Easterner before him (and most Dragaerans).

7. I suspect that Vlad is becoming something MORE than human (in either
sense of human):
 * an Easterner who is the sum of (original/Easterner/true) humanness PLUS
all the Dragaeran House capabilities PLUS something of divinity, rather than
either
 * unaugmented human, like normal Easterners, or
 * human + lifespan + size + House genes MINUS flexibility and full
capacity, like Dragaerans

Just my two coppers' worth.

-- Mark A. Mandel, proprietor, Cracks and Shards
   http://www.cracksandshards.com
   a Steven Brust fan website