“In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is lynched.”
– Praesi saying
Since my crowning I’d found it necessary to occasionally entertain ‘people of import’. It wasn’t something I particularly enjoyed, but a shared meal and a bottle of wine was a decent way to take a good look at what influential individuals of Callow were up to. Most of the time it’d been members of the Queen’s Council or envoys from my governors, more rarely emissaries from the northern baronies. Those dinners tended to be calm affairs, where more importance was placed on the conversation than the food. I rather preferred the dwarven take on it, all things told. After nibbling at rations for weeks, a slab of ribs lathered in sauce with a goblet of some kind of pitch-black liquor that smelled like berries and kicked like a mule were a delightful change of pace. The Herald had made a point out of being the one to offer them, even if another dwarf brought the plates, which I guessed to be some point of dwarven etiquette. The table was granite and low even by my standards, though it’d clearly been crafted with burlier types in mind: Akua and I didn’t even come close to filling our side of it.
The Herald and his interpreter – not that he needed one, as it turned out – had dug into their own plates without any mannerly pretences. I followed suit, rather enjoying the meat even though I did not recognize it. The liquor was a treat though, I’d own to that much. Diabolist was more interested in the fine make of the cutlery we were using than the meal, though she made sure to eat and drink enough no insult would be taken. The dwarves polished off their plates at admirable speed, knocking back the liquor all the while, and it was not long before all were finished. There’d been no attempt at conversation while the plates were on the table, not from their side anyway. I’d followed suit, in no great hurry, and Akua had followed my example. Soldiers took away the plates when we were done, bringing bowls of tepid water to the table where the dwarves soaked their fingers clean before wiping on cloths. My brows rose. They were a strangely clean people, for a race that dwelled in dirt. Still, I imitated them and saw with mild disappointment that our cups and bottle were taken away.
“Diplomacy cannot be had over such mild drinks, Queen Catherine,” Balasi told me amusedly, having noticed my look. “It would be unseemly.”
“Your people have an enlightened sense of etiquette, Seeker,” I replied. “The liquor, may I ask what it is called?”
“Black kasi,” the dwarf said. “I will part with a bottle as gift, should these talks be fruitful.”
It’d been a long time since a bribe that baldly offered had tempted me even a little, I mused.
“The stakes have been raised,” I drily replied.
Soldiers returned with four small wooden bowls and set them down before each of us. I studied mine curiously: oak, if I was not mistaken. Old and rough, never varnished or sculpted. A heavy glass bottle was brought, and the dwarven soldier bearing it very carefully poured maybe half a cup’s worth of liquid into each bowl. It looked like wine, I thought, but vapour wafted off the surface and it was very clearly near boiling. I glanced at Balasi and found him staring at his own bowl reverently.
“It must be allowed to seep,” he told me. “These bowls have never seen other purpose than the cradling of sudra, and so the taste of old toasts mixes with the new.”
“I’m honoured,” I said, inclining my head.
“As it should be,” the Herald said. “No such bottle has ever left the Kingdom Under. I doubt more than a dozen of your kind ever tasted sudra, much less properly served.”
It was utterly wasted on me, considering my tastes in drink had moved from ‘decent table wine’ to ‘nearly flammable’ since I’d taken up my mantle. It might be undiplomatic to say as much, though, and I was curious about the taste. I inclined my head again, a little deeper this time. The Herald of the Deeps responded in kind.
“You were introduced as Queen of Callow,” the green-eyed dwarf said. “Yet your second name is Foundling, not Fairfax.”
“There are no more Fairfaxes,” I said. “They were slain to the last, when the Dread Empire of Praes conquered Callow. I am first and only of my line.”
“A worthy purpose, that will have earned no small burden,” Balasi said approvingly.
The Herald turned amused eyes on him, then back to me.
“You will have to forgive my old friend,” he said. “He is quite the radical, even for a seeker of deeds.”
“No offence was taken,” I said. “There was none to be found, in my eyes.”
“I have told you before, delein,” the deed-seeker snorted. “The ways of their kind may be chaotic, but they are not without merit.”
“To each thing born, purpose and burden,” the Herald chided. “What you seek as correction is mere revelation. Our truth is absolute.”
I was missing too much context to be able to truly follow that exchange, but some guesses could be hazarded. Purpose and burden, huh. There was a weight to that, one familiar to me. Name and Role. Indrani had said that the deed-seeker were trying to win something other dwarves thought they weren’t supposed to have. Considering their way of going about it was to hunt the most dangerous creatures around, their behaviour might just be an attempt to raise their ‘purpose’ by first raising their ‘burden’. Interesting, and worth keeping in mind, but not ultimately why I was seated here with them.
“From your question I take it you’re not too familiar with surface affairs,” I said.
“They are neither my charge nor concern,” the Herald said. “Balasi is more knowledgeable of such affairs, though it has been some time since he last journeyed upwards.”
“Last I heard, Praes was trying to invade your people and getting smacked around for the presumption,” the deed-seeker said. “Queen Moirin was ruling, I believe.”
Queen Moiren, he likely meant. The grandmother of Good King Robert, the Fairfax who’d died on the Fields of Streges failing to turn back the Conquest. Anything they knew of the surface dated back at least a hundred years, then.
“Callow was conquered, and under my aegis was made independent again,” I said. “We are now at war with most the great powers of the surface, three of which have declared a crusade on Praes and would break my homeland on their march to the Tower.”
“And so you come to the Everdark in your hour of need,” Balasi said. “You must truly be desperate, to seek anything but corpses from the kraksun.”
“I’ve knocked at every other door,” I said. “The Dead King is on the march, now, and there are no limits to his hunger. This is no time to be squeamish about one’s allies.”
“The kraksun will flee, or perish,” the Herald of the Deeps said, and he spoke it not as promise or prophecy but as mere fact.
As if there could be no doubt. Gods, maybe there wasn’t. What little I knew of these people was enough to have me very, very wary – and they were just the vanguard.
“Such an outcome may very well be inevitable,” Akua said. “Yet the path by which it is reached remains shadowed, does it not? There is little purpose in entertaining us otherwise.”
Balasi cast a look at me.
“You allow your spirit a great deal of freedom,” he said.
“She has her uses,” I mildly replied. “And considering the costs of her service, she will be worked until she breaks.”
Diabolist bowed her head at me, without the slightest hint of displeasure on her face. It could be true, I thought. The right of the victor, she’d called it. It could also be a lie, and I would never know until the end. My very own viper, always dangerous no matter how tight the leash.
“How much do you know of this ruin of a realm, Queen Catherine?” the Herald asked.
I hesitated. Admitting ignorance here might see me hoodwinked. Dwarves were infamously disinclined to fair bargains. On the other hand, pretending to be an expert where I was not was just as dangerous in its own way. These were not people to trifle with.
“Little in most matters, yet I have glimpsed deep in some,” I finally said. “My power is both kin and foe to the Priestess of Night’s, in some eldritch way.”
The green-eyed dwarf nodded slowly.
“I have long studied their kind,” he said. “Seven wars we fought against them, two of them lost. Yet we won the last three, and the lands of their ancient colonies were swallowed in the Ninth Expansion. The echo of the last defeat saw them collapse, hiding behind the Gloom and turning their knives on each other. They are a pale imitation of what they once were.”
“A ruin of a realm,” I softly agreed. “And the spider at the centre of the web lies waiting in Tvarigu.”
“She is more monster than woman now,” Balasi said. “She devoured the Twilight Sages, it is said, and made them into the first of the Night. She has only grown since: her hand is on every knife, her lips wet with every red bite.”
“A creature without purpose,” the Herald said, and there was hatred in his voice. “A burden on all her kind. You surface people quibble over devils and books, but the Sve Noc is breathing blasphemy. Voices were raised, when we warred against the goblins, and Ishti’s Bargain extended as mercy. Yet there was only silence in the Deep Places, when call was made for war on the Everdark.”
“I have known little but war since I was sixteen,” I quietly said. “And so I know this: annihilation is a costly enterprise. To break an enemy is one thing, to destroy it wholesale another.”
“Yet annihilation is the only path, so long as the Sve Noc draws breath,” Balasi said. “Many will die, for this purpose. It will take decades to scatter the greatest of the Mighty and lay siege to Tvarigu itself, perhaps as long as a century. We will not have that.”
“The King of Death has turned his eyes to the wars of the surface,” the Herald said. “Yet we have seen this before. It never lasts. The dead will return to the depths soon enough.”
The green-eyed dwarf leaned in.
“The Gloom must fall,” the Herald of the Deeps said. “You fled forward, I think, without seeing our host. It is not only that, Queen of Callow. We have brought artisans and tenders, masons and runescribes. Families as well as soldiers.”
My fingers clenched under the table.
“You intend to settle the outer rings,” Akua said in my stead. “To raise fortress-cities from which you can fight the war against the drow even after the Dead King returns.”
“A long and bleak exile, for hundreds of thousands,” Balasi said. “None who felt this to be their purpose expect to see their kin for many years. The Fourteenth Expansion will be a treacherous one.”
“Yet if someone killed the Priestess of Night,” I said. “The Gloom would end. No exile, no hard decades of war severed from home.”
“Slayers have been sent before,” the Herald said. “As far as we known, none lived to reach the inner ring.”
“Yet you have taken kraksun prisoner,” Balasi said. “Used them. A dwarf would be attacked on sight. A human, of sufficient power? That would be different matter.”
I took a moment to let the implications of that sink in. Not that they wanted me to traipse through the Everdark and murder yet another demigod for their advantage – that much I’d expected – but the sheer scope of what they were undertaking. Hundreds of thousands, Seeker Balasi had said. That was all of eastern Callow, I thought. All those people sent marching across some sorcerous barrier not out of fear or desperation, but because the empire of the dwarves had deemed it strategic necessity to destroy the drow. What kind of empire could do that? The sum whole of the Tenth Crusade, which had three great nations joined, could barely muster two hundred thousand soldiers. I’d read as a child that the Kingdom Under likely spanned two thirds of Calernia underground: that to the east it reached the heartlands of Praes, to the south it touched the upper half of the Dominion. To the west a gate was rumoured to exist in the coastal principality of Brus, though one scarcely used, and the Kingdom of the Dead had long been thought to be the northern border of the dwarven kingdom. I was no longer certain that was the case, to be honest.
I’d read the words stating all that, ink on parchment, but never really understood them until now. Black had once called the Kingdom Under the only Calernian nation that could be considered more than a regional power. I’d not disbelieved him, I’d had no reason to, but neither had I truly taken the words to heart. Mighty as the dwarves were, they were barely Calernian in the end. Their presence was lightly felt, more an adjacent existence one must avoid provoking than a nation we shared borders with. I supposed that was true, in a way – could an ant really have a border with a giant? And while the great nations of the surface had been tearing each other to shreds for yards of land or points of principles, the Kingdom Under had grown so great it could afford to send a few hundred thousand soldiers and settlers into the dark for a mere gamble. A possibly century-long roll of the dice that would shatter a people’s spine over the knee of the King Under the Mountain if it worked. I wasn’t a nobody, I knew. I’d done things that would be remembered in histories. In sheer power, there were only a handful of people on the continent that could be called my equal and even fewer my superior.
All of that was dust in the eyes of the people I was speaking with. It was worth remembering that much, before I tried to strike a pact.
“I supposed most queens would find it beneath their dignity to play the assassin for a foreign power,” I finally said. “Fortunately, I have no such qualms. You need the Sve Nocte removed and the Gloom lifted. I believe I can deliver this.”
“Then we now speak of terms,” the Herald said. “You will want payment, for this service.”
“I will,” I said. “Before that is discussed, forgive my ignorance but I am uncertain of what your title means. Does it carry the authority to make such a deal?”
Balasi’s face turned stormy and he pulled at his beard, but the Herald quelled him with a look.
“I am the Herald of the Deeps,” the green-eyed dwarf said, and his voice rang with power. “Promises I make will be observed by all who call themselves dwarves.”
I could taste the power in the air, the sharp tang of it. My eyes narrowed. Named, I thought. That man is Named. Until now there had not been so much as a mote of spillover, which was worth noting. I hadn’t seen that kind of control since Black. The dwarf was either a religious or cultural figure of some sort, from the sounds of it. Some kind of priest? Curious as I was, it was not necessary to delve too deep in the ways of the dwarves to make a deal. Asking questions now would only distract from that.
“Understood,” I simply said. “Shade?”
Akua leaned in over the table. She knew what I needed, right now, and would be better at bargaining for it. Soldiers were the most direly needed. Drow would have made for useful shock troops but if I could field a few thousand dwarves instead? It was a clearly superior outcome. There was precedent for their kind warring on the surface, though only as mercenaries. After that, my desires were split between diplomatic pressure and gold. An infusion of gold would get Callow through the worst of the current troubles, at least in some respects. Trade with the League of Free Cities had not ceased, and Mercantis never closed its shores to anyone: what my kingdom lacked and could not make could be bought, if we had the coin. On the other hand, a quiet word from the Kingdom Under to any of the powers might solve a lot of my troubles. Even something as simple as declaring the Kingdom of Callow under protection for two years would free my hands to do so much. If I could actually rebuild in peace instead of sinking all the treasury into the army… No doubt the Empress would continue striking through deniable means, but Thief was becoming better hand at the shadow games with every passing month. Breathing room would be godsent, and I could ask for starker price than that.
“Her Majesty came to the Everdark to obtain an army,” Diabolist said. “As the days of the kraksun seem numbered, we will need to secure another source of soldiery.”
Seeker Balasi smiled.
“You can have right of recruitment among them,” he said. “Any you can take into your service will be spared, so long as they depart.”
That was a broad promise, I thought. If I managed to sway even a third of the drow, were they really willing to let them go? I supposed it made sense, from their perspective. So long as they left the Everdark, they were no longer a dwarven problem.
“A right we possess, strictly speaking,” Akua politely replied. “As you made it clear you have no intention of pursuit beyond the span of the Fourteenth Expansion. Dwarves have served as mercenaries before, this would not be significantly different.”
“It is against decree to war on the surface when the Kingdom Under seeks expansion,” the Herald said replied. “You will find no purchase here.”
The deed-seeker frowned, then spoke to his fellow dwarf in their tongue. They traded a few sentences, then Balasi cleared his throat.
“While not in official capacity, I could speak to a few of my fellows,” he offered. “Should you deliver, we could seek deeds in your wars.”
“And how many of your fellows could we count on, Seeker?” Akua asked.
“Two, three hundred,” Balasi said.
“Not a significant enough force, I take it,” the shade asked me in Mtethwa.
“I already have enough monsters up my sleeves,” I honestly replied. “What I need is solid foot to give the vultures pause. Three hundred wouldn’t make Hasenbach or the Dead King think twice.”
“Their deaths could be leveraged into greater dwarven involvement,” she suggested.
“We’d also have to answer for that,” I grunted. “Pass.”
“Then we return to recruiting from the drow,” Akua said. “Shall I press coin or influence?”
“Coin first,” I decided. “Best we stand on our own, if we can have that that. But try to get protection if you can. Doesn’t matter if it’s short so long as we can call in the favour when we need it.”
It would have been polite to call diplomacy what followed, but I knew haggling when I saw it. That Akua was arguing the murder of a lesser god was not cheap instead of loudly exclaiming fresh fish for silver was highway robbery did not make the substance of what took place any different. It was a delicate line to walk for Diabolist. We were useful to the dwarves, but not necessary – there was only so far she could push. I’d learned to put a leash on my temper, over the years, but I was still glad she was the one doing the talking. Balasi was near-openly trying to screw us, first suggesting a loan to the Kingdom of Callow instead of outright payment. As was always the way with these things, what was hammered out was a compromise no one was truly happy with. The treasury in Laure would be getting enough coin that Juniper should be able to raise the Army of Callow as she saw fit without picking clean every last copper, though after the expenses of feeding the southern refugees through the winter I suspected we’d have a rather tight belt when spring came around.
Though Akua pushed hard for a degree of open support from the dwarves, the Herald personally killed the notion. What we got was a little more abstract, though in some ways just as useful: for the next five years, sale of weapons to any nation at war with the Kingdom of Callow would end. I would dearly like to see Cordelia Hasenbach try to raise half the countryside of Procer without a steady supply of cheap dwarven armaments. Unlike Praes, Procer had no large set of forges and smithies directly under the authority of the ruler: her options without the Kingdom Under propping up the war effort were few and rather unpalatable. Our right of recruitment from the drow was confirmed, under condition that they left the Everdark without fighting. It was at least two hours before everything was settled, Diabolist arranging for the payments and announcements being carried out through Mercantis as swiftly as possible. We ended as we began, drinks in hand: at the Herald’s careful instruction we raised the wooden bowls and drank deep of the sudra. It was smooth all the way down, I thought, yet no sweeter for it. There was a faint aftertaste that was almost coppery. Like blood.
A fitting drink for this pact, then.
I think we can all agree that Practical Guide to Evil is the best guide to evil out there on the internet, Practical or otherwise.
Now, not everyone knows that this is the best guide to Evil, because The Guide is only first on the list over at Top Web Fiction.
We can do better.
We must keep rising, until Practical Guide claims it’s rightful spot as the One Web Serial to rule them all….
Only not get destroyed in the fires from whence it came like the One Ring of legend…
Go vote! http://topwebfiction.com/vote.php?for=a-practical-guide-to-evil
(This has been a weird post telling you to go vote. So do it!)
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In fairness it’s really more of a guide to antiheroism. I think the Overlord List is still more of a guide to Evil qua Evil.
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Yeah, there’s not much doing wrong right lately.
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I mean let’s be real she just agreed to assassinate a demigod in order to obtain the support she needs to raise an army of cannon fodder to absorb losses for her main army.
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No. She just agreed to help remove genocidal despot from power and liberate proud Drow men and women from tyranny and slavery. She also magnanimously agreed to provide refuge and education to any willing Drow while dwarfs restore their ruined homeland.
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Just a point: no education is to be provided xD
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It’ll be in education in the advisability of trusting “liberating” revolutionaries.
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Military training is considered an education.
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That still seems like doing right to me. Murder The Gods And Topple Their Thrones!
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I bet Cat wishes she was a noodle vendor right now.
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She’s certainly got the “terrible blade of Want” thing down.
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Ooooh, Kill 6 Billion Demons reference? I always thought that beggar knight was a noodles’ consumer, not a vendor.
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What is this Overlord List? Googling only gave me literal lists of overlords, plus tons about the overlord lightnovel. Can you give me a link or something?
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Oh I am SO happy to be the one who gets to share this with you. One of today’s lucky ten thousand!
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EvilOverlordList
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I’ll admit, I was expecting something similar to this novel, but can’t say I’m disappointed. Good stuff, much of which I had an idle thought or two about before when writing 😛
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Thanks for this gem, it was really dope, and i just shared it with 10 more peeps, so I’m doing the overlord’s work too.
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In the kingdom of blind, nobody can find a one-eyed man.
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I’m sure there is a Name trick or two for that. Or at least an Aspect.
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Set off a brightstick, then follow the sound of, “AHH!My eye!”
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That, too.
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But one-eyed man would see you preparing a brightstick, so he’ll close his eye and ears, while everyone else will be deafened.
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I was not aware that your race is able to close its ears like it can close its eyes. This sounds fascinating — tell me more. 😉
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My race has this fascinating thing called arms. It’s a limb that goes from your sides and you can use to various purposes. Like tentacles, but not that pretty.
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Cat’s getting PAID to kill now? Might as well pay me for breathing.
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Your breathing just not as useful 😉
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I feel hurt. Like a dove. An injured dove.
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I see your injured dove and raise you a snapped branch of olives.
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Well, she’s not getting paid to not breathe.
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Why is everyone set on Cat killing the Sve Nocte, all we heard she agree to was the removal of Sve Nocte. Unless clearer language was used in the terms Cat would be still be honoring them if she went off and made a deal with Sve Nocte to take all the drow away to Callow.
Is it likely no, but it is still a great idea.
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The word murder was used several times.
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Because the dwarves see the Sve as a blight on the world.
That’s literally what she’s being paid to do.
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> “Yet annihilation is the only path, so long as the Sve Noc draws breath,”
The dwarves made it beyond clear that Sve must die. They’ve also established that Catherine will kill Sve Noc and become their ‘assassin’. Those were her words, not theirs. The dwarves will hold her to it.
Even worse, she might actually kill Sve Noc, accidentally manage to absorb her Night and the Dwarves are going to claim she’s technically still alive. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. Cath needs a solid win for once.
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Combining her Winter Powers with the Night the Sve holds and Cat stands a damn good chance of wiping out the entire Dwarven expansion though that course of action would likely see the Great Hole being formed where Callow used to be.
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Ooh-hoo-hoo. I love Dwarven Diplomacy.
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Good chapter
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I really, indescribably love this take on the dwarves erratic. For a while they’ve been an enigmatic boogeyman rarely mentioned, but now we have a face to the hearsay and it’s rather satisfactory. As someone who’s dabbled in amateur fantasy fiction, it’s impressive for me to see someone make something so common as dwarves so wholly their own. I shouldn’t be surprised after the orcs, but here we are.
Thanks erratic, for making my weeks a little better every time you post.
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oh my, 5 years of no one at war with Callow getting weapons?
That is going to be crippling.
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I assume the smart ones will think to purchase a lot, and then make war. Which is still a negative, in terms of being able to afford a war, but it’s still a thing.
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But they would have to see it coming…
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Damn you Augur!
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Over five years? The first will not, but after a year or two they’ll notice the pattern
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Betraying dwarven trust seems a good ritual to summon Quagmires under your feet.
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Who said anyone would be betraying Dwarven trust?
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“We are not at war with most the great powers of the surface, three of which have declared a crusade on Praes and would break my homeland on their march to the Tower.”
That is some mighty typo.
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Huh, Dwarves are interesting. I feel like the Dwarves are building up to something a bit more, we are seeing aspects of their culture that may either lead Cat to war against them, due to something happening with the Sve, or to see Cat to form a further truce with them. I know not which might happen, but either, or a third option still involving seeing the Dwarves in action, would be interesting.
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Not as much as she wanted, but still, a fairly decent payout.
Of course, this likely means Cat has underestimated the difficulty of her side of the bargain.
But, on the other hand, nobody is going to care how many drow and their settlements get broken by Cat in the process of pulling off her end of the bargain.
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There is the point that what is difficult for one may not be for another. The gold Cat would save them by killing the Sve easily outsets the loss incurred by not selling to some of the Calernians, and a lot of the gold she gets from them is likely to go right back to their coffers as she arms her people and no longer has as much access to goblin steel.
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She does have access to goblin steel, from her own tribe in Callow
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Just not as much as she had before.
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I was under the impression that only supply of Goblin Steel was from Foreman & that supply was basically under monopoly by the Tower
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That was munitions.
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That’s still less than when she had access to the Eyries themselves.
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It was mentioned that the Matrons are seeking audience with Cat. So acquiring Goblin Steel may not be such an issue after all…
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It’s possible.
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I wonder what Black will think when he hears Cat managed to negotiate with the Dwarves. Especially without getting overcharged.
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We don’t know if she is overcharged yet. We’ll have to see when the murder comes.
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Enough gold to bring Callow from crisis to a tight belt feels like short shrift for killing a demigod imo. The Dwarves were willing to commit a force that could likely wipe out the Tenth Crusade several times over for the same purpose.
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She won’t have to kill every single Drow in existence to get there, they think, while gold is really not a problem to the Kingdom Under.
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It wouldn’t be overcharged. It would be underpaid.
And while I’m guessing Cat probably is getting underpaid for the value and difficulty of what she’s offering (killing Sve of Night and transplanting some number of drow), what she’s getting is close enough to what she needs that it is still quite valuable.
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Sudra is obviously the blood of hagglers.
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I wonder how drow will change with the death of Sve of Noc or Nocte. Might it be that they are corrupted by Night, and what Cat can offer them is a salvation?
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They’d be a lot weaker is my guess.
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Well, if Cat devours the Power then she can parcel it out as she sees fit. What if the ‘Night’ was suddenly given out by standing with Cat instead of murder?
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Given it is apparently part of the reason the Drow have torn themselves apart, she should probably keep to her initial decision to stay away from it.
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“Night, meet Winter, Winter, Night”
“Sve, meet Akua, Akua, Sve”
then the Drow get upgraded to (Moonless) Night Elf
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That made me laugh sooo hard. Everyone thought it, but you said it in the most funny way. Kudos.
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Latest chapters are undeniably shorter in a wide margin compared to the first few ones. Still, a good chapter nevertheless!
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I love this deal Cat has struck with the dwarfs. There will be complications of course, but I believe that should Cat succeed at killing the Priestess of the Night, the only part that’s into question is how many drow will she get to recruit. My guess is that she will get enough to alleviate her problems a great deal but not enough to truly solve them.
I don’t know what an organized military force of Drow would be, but if they keep the Night beyond the death of its priestess, then they could function very well as special forces, not that the Wild Hunt doesn’t already fulfill that role incredibly well
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I feel like the obvious Praesi answer of turn them into light disposable shocktroopers wouldn’t cut it for this conflict. Coming up the amount of logistical equipment needed to completely arm and armor these pelt wearing dipshits would be too expensive for Callow’s treasury, and doing anything less would be a waste compared to the effort to raise this particular “levy.” However, if Catherine (or possibly Adjutant) could make some connections with the Matrons, it would be a lot smarter for her to outfit them like skirmishers or sappers. Play to their strengths of lightweight fast moving Night users. Even if the Night dissapears with the death of the head Drow woman, she’ll still have a division’s worth of sappers using goblin munition. That’s not anything to sneer at in the hands of a person like Juniper.
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though could you imagine running the drow though legion training?
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They are undisciplined idiots broken into stone-age primitives, organized military force they wont be for centuries. Cat needs a usable force to buy 3-or-more years to rebuild the Army of Callow; I’d suggest a variant of Bonfire as Cat uses the drow as the Wild Hunt’s attack dogs targeting the heirs and other claimants of the various lords heavily invested into the 10th Crusade.
Having their momentum undercut as their heirs die and succession crisis bloom across three countries will make Malicia’s game with Hasenbach during the Proceran Civil War look like a house party.
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she has those three years, at least from the crusaders
dead king is attacking, remember?
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Also worth remembering that bonfire is an incredibly last-ditch plan, and that according to Juniper Callow will have enough of an army to successfully defend herself by the end of the year. The drawbacks of bonfire remain the exact same, and Cat still wants peace at some point.
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Hmm why are they considered primitive? The Tenets of Sve currently have them in survival mode but their technology and power are not neccessarily primitive especially since we dont know what kind of configurations their technology has or what means it gives. Obsidian is naturally formed into a formation of exquisite sharpness, depending on how it takes to magic this could have many effects when the fabric of reality is relative/a illusion. Similar things when it comes to leather and cloth, depends on their methodology and role. Course they will change over time due to environmental conditions(various cities change as they come into conflict, and will have even more change depending on Cats and Sves conflict and its aftermath.). Just seems a strange judgement to think of them as such when what most of what we see is but the purpose of forming individuals by one who doesnt appear to want them to be more than that(if only because of her learning from every action they do). Personally I wonder if Sve will desiminate the information gotten from the dwarves last actions, hell I wonder how well she can see through the current prisoners eyes,eyes and skin.
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I still don’t like Cat giving callowan territory to so many other races.
Immigrants from the south, orcs and goblings from North, and uncivilized drows from underground.
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With the right incentives to stay and a spot of light social engineering, they wouldn’t really be immigrants any more, would they? It’s an idiotic ruler that turns away useful labor on the basis of something like “cultural purity,” when there’s so useful a service to extract from them.
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Is Cat dooming Procer against the Dead King by denying them weapons? Obviously we don’t want a new Proceran army raised to fight Callow, but can the current Proceran armies withstand the full might of the dead? Neshamah’s had centuries to raise his numbers. Plus Cat herself can shred most heroes short of the Saint and Pilgrim, while we’ve seen dead Names that can take the Black Queen, Hierophant, and Diabolist all at once.
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Yeah, but for this war, Heavens won’t just use their hand, they’ll put their fat arse on the scales.
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Or they could end the war with Callow.
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That would be a reasonable thing to do, which is why I’m convinced they will not be inclined to do so.
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To be fair, I suspect that Hasenbach and her uncle would be inclined to limit their overt/military actions against Callow to fortifying the Proceran sides of the Vales and the Stairway, letting Callow amd Praes fight each other, while they focus the majority of their attention to dealing with the Dead King and with Black.
Unfortunately for them and for reason, the actions of the Conclave will complicate matters for them.
On the other hand, they will have the argument that with or without the Dwarven deterrent, Callow is not really in a condition to go on the offensive against the Grand Alliance, and so can be safely lowered in priority relative to the actively invading Dead King.
Alternatively, Procer may not war with Callow, but Ashur and Levant may not be as dependent upon dwarven armaments as Procer is. Though they’d still be dependent on dwarven seige, which would rather complicate any efforts to breach Callowan border defenses.
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If they want metal weapons, Procer can go kill the undead with priests and loot them off the corpses.
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Y’know, I’ve gotta think the Dead King has some kind of answer for that. Not sure what, but I doubt his troops just die like flies in the face of some priests.
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I bet his forces simply stay dead in the face of some priests.
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That’s kind of the point. The more priests the Dead King harvests, the less bullshit between Juniper and the Proceran commanders.
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So my thought is when Cat kills the Sve of the Night the Drow’s reaction is going to be to follow Cat, causing her to have her drow army and the dwarves promised help. Unfortunately this series being what it is I doubt that will happen because it’s too convenient for Cat’s cause.
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Cat now strikes at blow at the heart of Procer’s war effort, money. War is expensive and suddenly Procer has a lack of cheap equipment
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So the question is when the dwarves say weapons does that include the dwarven made seige engines or only things like swords? Because if that includes seige weapons that’s going to be devastating for anyone who doesn’t make their own, and from what I can remember only Praes and more recently Callow make their own.
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They most likely don’t sell those (at least not the super cool ones), so the ban won’t really affect that.
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They don’t sell the lava catapults, but they definitely sell basic ballistae and catapults to people. I’m sure the kingdom’s have enough experience/examples they can mock up some of their own given time, but I doubt they’ll be quite as good as professional work since they’ve never really had to bother before now.
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I admit I was a bit worried about how this Arc was going to go but I am pleasant surprised by this chapter. I would say this was the most enjoyable chapter to read since Akua riding Cats body.
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It has just occurred to me that Hierophant will be besides himself with jealousy if he learns Akua got to examine Drow *and* Dwarven magic. Plus another demigod, which is in his wheelhouse, dammit!
As for the deal, the negotiations confirm a lot of what I thought, though the size of this enterprise did lend Cat more negotiating power than I thought she had.
What most interested me, however, was the Herald’s talk of Purpose and Burden. The idea that the two exist in balance seems to defy the idea of Good and Evil that exists elsewhere in Calernia – in fact, the Dwarves seem to care not one whit about them. Makes me wonder whether this Good and Evil thing is as local as the Fae, and whether it would be possible to slip that particular noose inspired on Dwarven culture.
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Burden = Name, Purpose = Role.
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I dunno. Purpose = Name and Burden = Role would seem more intuitive to me. =/
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Maybe, I don’t think it’s really that important.
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The Purpose is what you do, the Role is who you are.
Because it’s a different ontology than side/name, it doesn’t have perfect parallels. For example, the Purpose of the Empress in the current story is pretty weak,
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It’s a different way to put it, which points at different views. For example, they believe they can increase their Burden by fighting and so obtain a Purpose, which is not how Roles and Names work.
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Actually it doesn’t when you think about it. Certain names have different scopes but because of the unpredictability of reality don’t grow linearly into their role. It’s why names don’t unlock their aspects immediately and why the knight of the dawn was built as he was. If you think of providence as a search aid for who and what to burden at one time it actually shows just how transient destiny is as a concept at least til the “end” of the question that is the guides reality.Cats in a unique transient position due to the nature of her name her role is winter and her purpose is pretty much whatever she wishes. Her ability to add on a burden is tremendous, though with her I suppose the story is all that matters til she decides she wants a new one so intricate s herself into other values mutilating and furthering her role and her burden.
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Cat is not Named right now. She has enough power to play on their field, but she’s not Named. She has no Aspects.
Anyways, they don’t have anything like Deed-Seekers in other cultures, or at least not that we’ve seen, and this points at that cultural difference.
Dwarves seem to think about Named in other terms than the rest of Calernia – much like how Procerans think in terms of Blessings and Damnation is different from the more narrative focused concept of heroic and villainous “Named”.
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No, Cat’s technically still the Squire, though there isn’t much of it left, and she predominately uses her Fae/Winter powers.
At this point Cat’s current iteration of the Name of Squire has basically been stripped down to the skeleton, between Cat’s Winter/Fae-related escapades (and the associated consequences) and the broken transition to Black Queen.
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Pretty sure she lost the Name when she ripped off Masego’s construction and let Winter mix with her soul.
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She didn’t lose it. She “killed” it. The raw power of Winter overwhelmed her Name and ripped it to shreds. She still has those shreds lying somewhere on the metaphorical bottom of her soul. She does have a Name, it just doesn’t function anymore. I don’t think there is a precedent for that.
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Going by what the Dead King says, apparently so.
But where did you get that she has pieces of her name? As I understood it, she has powers of her mantle that behave like her old third aspect, but that’s mostly because the third aspect was related to her mantle.
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Well then Hierophant shouldn’t have taken off to take his Father and Papa to task for withholding things from him. He made his bed so gets to sleep in it 🙂
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Doesn’t mean he won’t be envious.
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What’s new here is the notion that voluntarily increasing your burden is the path to increase your power. This goes against the destiny notion in Calernia.
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The way I understand it is the Purpose is your Name and Burden is your Role. Black mentioned way back in book 1 that the closer a Named plays his Role in the story the more powerful he becomes at the cost of developing tunnel vision. You can either be overtly powerful and rigid or weak and fluid. A similar thing is evident in principle alienation: the more Cat uses Winter the more she slips into Stupid Evil.
So by adding to your burden it makes sense that you become more powerful and since all Stories have a predetermined outcome for all its characters, and playing closer to your Role gives you blinders you are in effect manifesting your destiny.
Unless you have a different concept of destiny.
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Did they remember to include Archer’s bow in the deal?
Especially since Cat sworn…
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Dwarfs may be magpie assholes but I don’t think they’ll reduce the fighting capabilities of our favourite murder of incompetent vandals, especially when they’re going to kill a demigod for them and reduce their military expenses several dozen times over
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Just mentioning the rule rightful owner of the bow will be enough.
As with any law, dwarven property rights only make sense if you have the power to enforce them.
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I wonder if Cat’s core ability set has to do with Usurping.
The resurrection
*Take*
The shit with the Duke of Squalls
Aqua
The Crown
There’s a few examples, but she’s just been taking everything.
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“The King of Death has turned his eyes to the wars of the surface,” the Herald said. “Yet we have seen this before. It never lasts. The dead will return to the depths soon enough.”
You know this implies that the drawfs have been in a state of contestant if low end combat against the dead king for a long time. Meaning that the dead king’s army hasn’t been growing completely unchecked. On the other hand he’s been matching the drawfs in fighting.
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I know Cat can be flexible with the truth, but that is one heck a big lie…
(Joking, I know a typo when I see one.)
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This was a fascinating chapter.
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Well good things to be seen here. The Dwarves echo back to the days of yore when heroes were more about going out and doing great deeds to change things. They accept purpose and burden neccessary/inherent in that position but some do not. They echo some of the things said about those ruled by both Above and Below. The deedseekers recognize certain parts of their system as incorrect by their views seek to correct their purpose through changing the world and seek to do so by getting a increased role by taking it from others.They seek to rectify and correct what once went wrong or perhaps is becoming wrong? While those at large(or perhaps more centralized along their religion/living conditions, do what they need to do and work with their purpose. Its interesting how they try to get the most out of what they can get…similar to Goblins actually. I can see why Ranger would be worthy to them, even if her(somewhat speciically ambiguous) depth of purpose when doing so hasnt been shown. At least the echoes/waves of her actions when doing so. I would classify the dwarves as greedy compared to the others shown so far…though given the amount of duty they also show it could just be part of their self-perpetuating system(Deep keeps them stable along with the king, while seekers rectify and self-correct whats going wrong).
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Pact made, now let’s see to it’s delivery.
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//consciousness.stream.start
Know what I suddenly was reminded of?
Lexx.
E1S3, “Eating Pattern”, in particular.
So. If it is true what was said, what was the reason? Was she found lacking? Impatient? Jealous? Or already beyond the boundaries of sanity? And if so, was it the fallout of the Ninth that served as a catalyst, or the seed of the deed was already there?
I wonder…
Well, we will wait then.
We’ll wait, and – maybe – it will be revealed in due time…
//consciousness.stream.over
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What if the Dwarven view of Purpose is similar to name Roles, while the Name itself is the Burden? Names empower, but also limit at the same time, as mentioned earlier, they can lewd to tunnel vision if one is not careful. In which case, deed-seekers are atteting to act according to some Name until they gain or align closely enough with its Role to make it become true?
I am still waiting for Cat to be pressed into a corner where she takes the next step in accepting her current Role. Perhaps absorbing Night from Sve will be enough to make her dole it back out to avoid becoming lostto overwhelming power? Granting new Court titles to a group of Mighty wou!d allow for an outlet of pressure and could cement a Name of sorts. All Hail Cat, Queen of Ice and Darkness?
Granted that is only if Akua doesn’t use what appears to be a growing connection to Winter to hijack a good chunk of thatpower for herself instead. She has been doing an excellent job of steadily conditioning Cat to let her use that connection more and more.
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Good thing she’s not Bellerophan, or they would be wiping her off the walls now.
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I really don’t enjoy that Cat is not named all this while… will she ever be again?
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Spoilers. I can neither confirm nor deny that she does or doesn’t regain a Name.
I can say that this post was 10 months ago and that a lot has happened since. 🙂
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