[Dragaera] Free Will

[Scott Schultz via Dragaera]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Dragaera [mailto:dragaera-bounces at lists.dragaera.info] On Behalf Of
> Howard Brazee via Dragaera
> Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2014 12:58 PM
> To: Dragaera List
> Subject: [Dragaera] Free Will
> 
> How would you rank various Dragaeran beings by how much free will they
> have?
> _______________________________________________

Is there a reason to believe that any Dragaeran beings we know about have
anything but self-imposed restrictions upon their free will?

Even The Necromancer, a bound demon,  appears on the surface to have as much
autonomy as any ordinary Dragaeran. Granted, that she is extraordinary and
she may very well feel herself to be incredibly confined, but from our
perspective, she appears to be free to go about whatever business excites
her interest.

What does Free Will mean?

Empress Zerika, for instance, has "free will" to the extent that there is
nothing stopping her from burning down the Empire with a thought, or
declaring war on Greenaire, or eating a flashstone and destroying the last
vestige of House Phoenix. She lacks free will, to the extent that her code
of honor requires her to put the good of the Empire above her personal
desires, the placating of the aristocracy above her annoyance with their
petty intrigues, and her desire for peace and prosperity for her people
above the lust for greater power, wealth, and pleasure (doubly-so because
she is Phoenix and prone to such weaknesses at the end of a reign).

Perhaps her love for her Warlock is all that keeps the Cycle alive at this
point and she might well have eaten a Flashstone out of frustration
otherwise.

So, what does it mean to have "more" free will than someone else?

The Teckla suffer the restrictions that accompany a feudal underclass - the
assignment of allegiance to a particular lord and his lands. This doesn't
necessarily seem to inhibit them from traveling around but it certainly
limits where individuals can live and what they can expect at the hands of
their liege lord.

The Serioli are an enigma. As the ostensible natives of the world before the
Jenoine crashed the party and turned it into a genetics lab, they are
possibly the most restricted. We know too little of their lives pre and post
Jenoine to say much about them. They don't seem to live in hiding, per se,
but they are an underclass. It's probably more correct to say that they are
classless as they don't participate in the Empire and the impression is that
they are few in number at this point.

The Cat Centaurs appear to go where they please, do what they please, and
enjoy themselves doing it. They even have a patron Goddess to look out for
their interests. This is in contrast to the Serioli, who have attempted to
undermine and overthrow the Lords of Judgement and so presumably suffer for
that lack of representation in the Halls of Judgement. It may well be that
between their simple life and their lack of much in the way of either
self-imposed or deity-imposed restrictions that the Cat Centaurs are the
most truly free beings on the planet.

The Easterners are a mixed bag. The gods manipulate them freely; at least
those that care about having pliable worshippers who will cater to a
powerful being that grants magical favors. The question of
self-determination for Easterners would well depend upon what part of the
East you mean, who is in charge there, and how beholden they are to outside
influences like Verra or Trinagore. 

In the end, it comes down to what "free will" means? If it simply means "the
freedom to make any decision and act upon it, regardless of moral, legal, or
ethical ramifications" then pretty much everyone has that freedom. They just
choose to be bound by those moral, legal, and ethical ramifications. 

Ironically, the beings with the least amount of free will may well be the
Lords of Justice themselves.

We've been told that becoming a God is a process. It can be taught, or it
can happen spontaneously (in the event of something like Adron's Disaster).
The defining characteristic is that a God is the personification of a
symbol. The new God surrenders his/her/its freedom to make choices based up
on desire or preference. The God's choices become dictated by his/her/its
nature. Verra is not simply capricious. She is capriciousness embodied and
she could no more be direct and plain-spoken about her long term plans than
Vlad could grow wings and fly like a Jhereg.

The other Gods are similarly bound each by his/her/its core being. Trinagore
could not be anything but a bloodthirsty savage intent upon tasting as much
carnage as possible. It was not a choice for him (though it's possible that
assuming that mantle was a freely taken choice) to be a kind and merciful
devotee of peaceful brotherhood.

That restriction of their choice is the source of their power. In some
respects, this is like the gods of Zelazny's _Lord of Light_ who each was
represented by an Aspect that was a conceptual embodiment of their powers,
though those "gods" were enhanced men and women using Aspect as a focus, not
as a fundamental part of their being.

In short, the most powerful beings of the Dragaeran world may actually be
the least able to exercise what we think of as "free will".