Coldfire re-read: Black Sun Rising - chapters 25-27

[trobadora]

Once again alighiera can't be here at posting time, but that won't stop her - here's her post:

The lovely trobadora will once more be posting this for me, since I am still abroad.

Chapters 25 to 27 today - to look at a castle, meet a currently undead inventor of a religion and reveal a few identities in the process, and to finally get Damien and Tarrant to be properly introduced.

Plot summary

Chapter 25
Damien and Senzei are taken to the Keep, the former seething with anger, the second too weak to really care. They are treated to the scenic view that is the Hunter’s Keep – something that looks very familiar to Damien .The familiarity soon gets worse when the real identity of the Hunter is revealed, who turns out to be Gerald Tarrant and at the same time the Prophet of the Law. Who should have been dead for nine centuries. More snark between Damien and the Hunter follows, as well as fixing Senzei with coldfire and a reunion with Ciani. Lots of questions are asked, some of them are even answered, and Damien gains a travel companion he’d rather not have. But as Tarrant explains – he’s not going to get a choice about it, so he’d better deal with it.

Chapter 26
The mind-eating demons hunker down for an ambush .Which goes wrong because Tarrant, contingency planner that he is, has made preparations and sent some more expendable travelers along the intended route first.

Chapter 27
Tarrant is faced with the minor inconvenience of having to take a slightly different way to avoid awkward questions about a few dead bodies, and with the realization that he is not quite certain what to think about what he got himself into.

Quotes

• If the current had been that bad there, then Working it this close to the center of the whirlpool would be tantamount to suicide.
  I’d do it, Damien thought grimly. If I thought I could Heal him before it got me, I’d do it in a second.


• “A supporter? My God, he wrote half our bible. More than half! His signature is on nearly every holy book we have. The dream that we serve is his, Zen. His!”
  Senzei looked confused. “What about your Prophet?”
  "He is the Prophet. Don’t you understand? That was the name that they gave to him, when . . .” He shut his eyes; a shiver ran through his frame. “A name for the first part of his life. The time when he served God and man, and designed a faith that he believed could tame the fae, if only humanity would accept it. How could we follow in his footsteps without recognizing the source of our inspiration? But the Church didn’t dare use his name, because that might have invoked something of his spirit. They struck it from the books. And after... after...”
  He turned away. He didn’t want Senzei to see the tears that were coming. He might misread their source, assuming weakness - when in fact they were tears of rage. “He was an adept,” he whispered hoarsely. “One of the first. And the premier knight of my Order. One day he... snapped. We don’t know what caused it. We’re not even sure exactly what happened. But those who searched through Merentha Castle after his disappearance found the remains of his family, gruesomely slaughtered. Apparently he... vivisected his wife. His children.” He turned back to Senzei. “You have to understand,” he whispered urgently. “In our tradition, there is no greater evil. Because he was, before he fell, all that we venerate. All that we strive to become. And then he threw it all away! In an act of such brutal inhumanity that there could be no question that he had damned his soul forever...”


• “It’s been almost ten centuries, Zen. Ten centuries! How can a human being live that long?”
  “Maybe,” the sorcerer said nervously, “by becoming something that’s no longer human.”


• Hands shaking, thoughts reeling, he somehow managed to find his voice. “You vulking bastard . . .”
  Gerald Tarrant chuckled. “The soul of courtesy, as always. You surprise me, priest. I would think that the premier of your Order deserved more respect.”


• “You’re no servant of the Church!”
  “Oh, I am that. More than you could possibly understand.”


• “You will trust me, priest.” His voice was a mere whisper, but the power behind it was deafening. Ripples of earth-fae carried the words deep into Damien’s brain, adhered their meaning to his flesh. “Not because you want to. Or because it comes easily to you. Because you have no choice.”


• “He was furious with you. For entering the Forest. Furious because he would now have to deal with you, instead of just settling things with me. Any entanglement with the living is a threat to him... as if it somehow could cost him his life, I don’t understand it exactly. He blames you for that.”
  Damien’s eyes narrowed. “That’s fair enough. I blame him for a lot.”


• “It’s the glue that holds it all together for him. The last living fragment of his human identity. If he lets that go... he’ll be no more than a mindless demon. Dead, to all intents and purposes. A tool of your hell, without any will of his own.”
  “Not a pretty concept.”
  “He’s very proud, and very determined. His will to live is so strong that every other force in his life, every other concern, is subordinated to it. That’s what’s kept him alive all these years.” She shuddered. “If he didn’t feel that the question of honor was so linked to his personal survival-”
  “Then we would all be dead,” he finished for her. “That explains a lot. What I don’t understand is that he’s returned the memories to you - along with a few of his own, I gather - and now we’re all here together, restored as a group. He’s undone the damage he caused. So why is it so necessary for him to come along? How does Revivalist honor play a part in that?”
  Her eyes were wide, her voice solemn. “He promised someone,” she whispered. “Just that. He promised someone he would never hurt me... and then he did. He betrayed himself. The force of his self-hatred...” She looked away. “You can’t imagine it,” she breathed. “But I remember it, as though it were my own. And... there aren’t words...” She clutched herself, as though by doing so she could keep his memories from coming to her. “He perceives himself as balanced on a very fine line, with death on both sides of him. And if at any moment he fails to choose the course that will maintain his balance-”
  “He dies,” Damien muttered.
  “Or worse,” she told him. “There are far, far worse things than mere death that lie in wait for him now.”


• "Imagine a whole world like that. A world of unalterable physical laws, where the will of the living has no power over inanimate objects. A world in which the same experiment, performed at a thousand different sites by a thousand different men, would have exactly the same result each time. That is our heritage, Reverend Vryce. Which this world denied us.”
  He looked at the telescope and tried to envision a world such as the Hunter described. And at last could only mutter, “I can’t imagine it.”
  “Nor I. After years of trying. The magnitude of it staggers the imagination. That a whole planet could be so utterly unresponsive to life... and yet life as we know it evolved on its surface.”


• He felt a tremor deep within himself, as if some part of the human self he had buried had trickled through to the surface. Fear? Anticipation? Dread? He had lived for so long within the Forest’s hospitable confines that he could no longer remember what it was like to be afraid. Somewhere along the line he had lost that, too, as if fear and love and compassion and paternal devotion had all been a package deal, discarded together in that first red sacrifice which took him from one life to another.
  And if he feared, was there something that would feed on that? As he fed on the fear of others - that last delicious moment when the human mind abandoned all hope and the defenses of the soul came crashing down? Man had arrived on this planet little more than a millenium ago, and already there were myriad creatures that relied on him for sustenance; why should the food chain stop there?

Thoughts

• I could have quoted all three chapters as a whole. There are so many insights, revelations and turns here, it’s hard to limit myself. I love the exchanges between Damien and Tarrant, and the mutual resignation about having to travel with each other.


• prettyarbitrary - I’m convinced by now that Tarrant thought Damien already had it figured out that he was the Hunter. It’s such a nice little twist to see Tarrant operate under that kind of assumption.


• The chapel and the statement that Tarrant is a religious man always make me wonder. We touched upon it before – does he actually believe in the religion he created, in the same way the other believers do? And if it’s a belief in the effect of organized religion rather than the religion itself, then why keep the chapel around and let your underlings think you go for prayers?


• Tarrant and his concept of honour, and how it is what keeps him alive. Which is only the case because he believes that it is so, and because he clings to that conviction. Do you think he’s right about the theory that if he had not had his honour, he would have turned into a demon? Or would that only be because he thinks it is what would happen?


• Given how often we’ll hear about Tarrant being afraid from now on, it’s interesting to see his musings about how he may have forgotten to fear. (One little trip with Damien is all it takes to remedy that, of course.)


• I'm quite surprised that the Church actually managed to erase the Prophet's name from collective memory. In history that kind of approach has never worked out.


• When they play with the telescope, Tarrant admits that he cannot imagine a world without the fae. And yet, isn’t that what the Church aims for? So wouldn’t that mean failure at the most basic level, if even he cannot believe in it?

On Monday we'll look back at what we've read and discussed over the last weeks, since we have now finished the second book of Black Sun Rising. As always, enjoy yourselves!

Comments

[linaerys.livejournal.com]

And if it’s a belief in the effect of organized religion rather than the religion itself, then why keep the chapel around and let your underlings think you go for prayers?

I think the whole point of his religion is that it doesn't matter which it is. You can make the whole thing an intellectual exercise, but as long as you are focusing mental energy on your desire (a God who divorces the fae from the humans a little more) it works about the same is if you truly believe.

Which I think also answers the question of his honor. That's what I love so much about this world--it asks the question, what if magical thinking actually worked, and answers it in a way that is both beautiful and horrifying.

When they play with the telescope, Tarrant admits that he cannot imagine a world without the fae. And yet, isn’t that what the Church aims for? So wouldn’t that mean failure at the most basic level, if even he cannot believe in it?

But later he feeds Damien a dream of a world without fae, so clearly he can imagine it to some degree. And he can pray for it, without being able to picture it, right? Their religion involves prayers to a God that is too vast and impersonal to manifest as one of Erna's pet godlings, and that, but definition, is unimagineable and unknowable, but they can pray to it anyway.

I don't know, maybe I'm understanding Erna and the fae wrong, but I thought it responds to desires as much as, if not more than belief. That's how the rakh evolution is shown to work, that's how the conscious manipulation is supposed to work. And later, in the second book, Damien describes how humanity's multi-layered consciousness is the reason the fae is so unpredictable, because we have all these different layers of conflicting desires, many of which are consciously thought, but they all shape the fae.

[trobadora]

I think the whole point of his religion is that it doesn't matter which it is. You can make the whole thing an intellectual exercise, but as long as you are focusing mental energy on your desire (a God who divorces the fae from the humans a little more) it works about the same is if you truly believe.

Yes, agreed. Either you believe there is a God, or you want there to be a God - it's all the same, for the purpose of the Church's project. And Tarrant definitely believes in that project.

And I agree about his honour too - it's what keeps him human because he believes it's what keeps him human. Erna is all about the self-fulfilling prophecies. *g*

But later he feeds Damien a dream of a world without fae, so clearly he can imagine it to some degree.

Yes, that - and also, I think what he's saying is not that he can't imagine it at all, it's that he can't imagine what it truly must be like to live in a fae-less world and not know anything else. That's what none of this generation of the humans on Erna will ever have - the calm expectation that the universe operates in a rational way, independent of our own thoughts and desires. That's what neither of them can truly imagine.

I don't know, maybe I'm understanding Erna and the fae wrong, but I thought it responds to desires as much as, if not more than belief.

Desire, fear, belief - everything that comes with strong emotion, I think. Some kinds of fae respond more to certain parts of the human mind, like the dark fae which responds to the more unpleasant side, but in general - I think the more something is on your mind - any part of your mind, conscious or not - the more likely it is that the fae will respond to it in some way. At least that's the way I always understood it.

[linaerys.livejournal.com]

Erna is all about the self-fulfilling prophecies.

That's what makes the question of Hell so interesting to me. I guess that humans create the hell they believe in. I love that Tarrant tried to erase Hell from the Church mythology--that would have been such a wonderful, beautiful change.

Yes, that's how I've understood it too, different fae respond differently to different types of emotions.

[carmentalis.livejournal.com]

I love that Tarrant tried to erase Hell from the Church mythology--that would have been such a wonderful, beautiful change.

It's quite an ironic twist, given that Hell is religion's way of inspiring fear in their followers to keep them in line.

Actually, is there an existing religion that made do without the concept of Hell in some form? It may just be that Tarrant tried to go beyond what is philosophically possible.

[linaerys.livejournal.com]

Judaism as my conservative synagogue practices it doesn't really have a hell, or a heaven either.

Any religion with reincarnation tends not to have a hell, although your next life might suck if you're not good enough in this one.

There are a lot of thinkers, from well before the Englightenment, who found Hell to be an unjust, unreligious concept. What kind of loving forgiving god would also have a place of eternal torment? Clearly, I have my own issues about this.

And the Gnostics had another perspective on it, with Earth being Hell and Heaven being Heaven and no other Hell.

But no, I don't think erasing Hell is unprecedented. A lot of people have tried it before, but just like on Erna, in order for some people to feel righteous, to get something out of their religion, they need a hell to condemn sinners to. And some people need to believe in punishment in order to feel like they have a reason to do good.

I don't think Tarrant went beyond what is philosophically possible, but he may have tried to go beyond what is psychologically possible.

[carmentalis.livejournal.com]

Hell may be too narrow a definition - some kind of retribution for not being "good" in the present life?

I thought Judaism had the concept of Gehenna? Which I realize is not hell per se, but doesn't that amount to something similar to the Christian purgatory concept?

The idea of hell is perhaps the easiest way of keeping followers in line. Behave according to the rules, or something bad will happen to you, and surely you don't want that? Pitchforks and vengeful demons are just optional touches.

I don't think Tarrant went beyond what is philosophically possible, but he may have tried to go beyond what is psychologically possible.

Agreed - badly phrased on my side. With eliminating hell, he tried to eliminate fear, or at least the fear of retribution, and that is just built-in instinct. Which isn't to say that with enough time to work on it, he couldn't have altered instinct in mankind.

[linaerys.livejournal.com]

Judaism has Gehenna and it also has Sheol, but that's also sometimes a metaphor for the emptiness of unlife.

But neither of these are used in the liturgy or sermons. The concept of Hell just is not a guiding concept. Jews are supposed to obey God's laws because they are God's laws, not because of a future reward. The world is broken, and the Jew's job is to follow God's laws and perform mitzvot to heal it.

And I don't understand anymore than that, but I do know that even the concept of the afterlife is considered outdated and questionable by modern Jews.

I do find it interesting that Tarrant trying to erase Hell was one of the things that got him thrown out of the early church, in addition to his practicing sorcery. It's as if at first he tried to be more kind than the church fathers (because enjoining your followers to create a hell is cruel in my book), but when they wouldn't accept it, he said fine, I will be even more cruel.

[carmentalis.livejournal.com]

That really is an interesting take on the concept. Especially the lack of rewards and threats in form of heaven and hell.

I'm not sure, do we ever get to hear Tarrant's reasoning about eliminating hell? It seems like an unusually idealistic move to me. After all, it's a powerful concept when it comes to keeping people in line.

[linaerys.livejournal.com]

I wonder if his reasoning about eliminating hell is just that it gives more power to the evil forces of Erna. It seems to undermine the whole point of the church if their belief also creates individual torments for them. So maybe it was an attempt to make the church more pure, more focused on what they all need, less what the individual needs from religion.

But I don't think we do ever hear his reason.

[carmentalis.livejournal.com]

That could be it. Given that they don't seem to have saints, and that the only revered figure is the Prophet and he got stylized beyond being an actual human, it would make sense not to add Hell. Keep everything abstract, turn it on the central goal of reaching the stars, and don't waste energy thinking about what happens if you fail. Hell may well have been an addition made to keep sorcery under control that then turned into something bigger.

[trobadora]

I wonder if in part it was that the Church thought they needed something beyond the Prophet's project - that if all they had for threat or reward was the fae, that very pragmatism would undermine the necessary faith?

[trobadora]

that would have been such a wonderful, beautiful change.

Yes - it may not have been entirely selfless, but it's a thing of beauty nonetheless. It's depressing that they put it back in, and one has to wonder what would have happened to Gerald without that hanging over him.

[fyrie.livejournal.com]

I'm quite surprised that the Church actually managed to erase the Prophet's name from collective memory. In history that kind of approach has never worked out.

But this is Erna. Given what the fae means, they could easily use Gerald's name as synonymous with what he did, thus people wouldn't want to think of his name and identity, because that could lead to badness of a vivisectioning kind ;)

[carmentalis.livejournal.com]

That seems a bit too... intricate, really. They couldn't think or talk of any bad people for fear of having them materialize, in that case. That would even get to a poitn of not gossiping about your annoying neighbour.

[devohoneybee.livejournal.com]

Given how responsive the fae is to human thought -- intentional or unintentional -- I thought it surprising that nowhere in the history does anyone discover (or reclaim) something like a meditation/mind control tradition. Senzei's nickname notwithstanding.

Perhaps having an adept as its founder (in an age when adepts grow up bullied, mistrusted, and generally misunderstood) might color the direction the Church could take.... it's not as if young Gerald got any sort of mentoring or nurturing for his way out of the usual order of magnatude mind powers. He grows up overpowered by his brothers, then takes his revenge when he comes into his own. The template is one of control or be controlled. And yet I was hoping that the relationship between Gerald and Damien (which has much jostling for power in it, but becomes something else as it goes on) might create a new template for cooperation with the fae, rather than dominating it or being dominated.

[carmentalis.livejournal.com]

I thought it surprising that nowhere in the history does anyone discover (or reclaim) something like a meditation/mind control tradition. Senzei's nickname notwithstanding.

I think we get a bit of it in Damien's need to focus before he Works, and in his little keys he uses for it. It would make sense that meditation is used for the learners, and that later they're quick enough to calm their minds that they don't need to explicitely do it anymore.

He grows up overpowered by his brothers, then takes his revenge when he comes into his own. The template is one of control or be controlled.

But that's only the template for Gerald, and under that is still the original sacrifice (and later self-sacrifice, which is the one created by him). Still, control is the driving force for him, so any Working related to it may well have been stronger and more effective than something done for another reason.

I always felt that the relationship between Damien and Gerald is not about control, but trust. They don't like each other (at least at first), they don't like the methods the other uses, but they have to trust each other to reach their goals.

[devohoneybee.livejournal.com]

I believe it comes to be one of trust -- but look how trust is FORCED on Damien in this chapter -- he's basically coerced into it. It will become real in time, but initially, they are each trying to scope each other out. Their first interaction is to scan each other with the fae -- Damien unsuccessfully, Tarrant successfully. They go from power plays to partnership, even sacrifice and compassion. From jockying for hierarchy -- Gerald meets Damien in the garb of the superior of his order, while Damien perceives himself morally superior to Gerald -- to genuinely caring for each other even at their own expense.

So the parallel to the relationship of humans to Erna -- sacrifice is just another side of power plays -- both define relationships as hierarchical. One sacrifices to win favor of a greater power. By the end of the book, the template has moved to self sacrifice, which is a lot more benevolent, but still is part of a hierarchical paradigm. It's not a true partnership, like the far more cooperative, synergistic relationship that the Rakh have with the fae. Too bad we never learn more of what Ciani will DO with all the knowledge she gains from living among them.

[trobadora]

I've wondered about meditation too. It seems like that would be the other, small-scale way of controlling the fae - controlling yourself so that there's nothing untoward there to respond to. Hmmm, fic bunny!

[squeakygeeky]

THE DECOR. I love how Gerald's mind apparently works. "Hmm...I am evil now...I must build a new castle just like my old one but decorate it with the color scheme of a vampire bordello!" The surrounding towns must have had a run on black fabric, gold fixtures, and crimson accent pieces.

So many other things I could discuss with these chapters, but work has fried my brain too much.

[prettyarbitrary.livejournal.com]

I know! He has a mind for the ages and a cutting aesthetic sense, and yet when he decorates his own place, he displays all the cliche of a...well...a fanfic.

[trobadora]

"Hmm...I am evil now...I must build a new castle just like my old one but decorate it with the color scheme of a vampire bordello!"

Y'know, that just about killed me. *giggles*

[prettyarbitrary.livejournal.com]

Ah, the appearance of the fae-blocking circle. I wonder how much work he had to put in to design that thing, and how he made it work? How could it have changed Erna if he'd cut that little bit of technology loose? Would it even be possible for someone else to reproduce?

It especially interests me with Tarrant's and Damien's musings on what it might be like to live in a world without the fae. Tarrant, at least, has at least a partial example right there...but of course the larger repercussions go far beyond a fae-empty circle. Still, it's one of the things that consistently fascinates me about this book: that the world and society are built vividly enough that you find yourself trying to imagine what it might be like to live in a world with fae trying to imagine what a world without the fae is like. And Friedman gives you the tools to at lest try.

It also fascinates me because here is one of the first things that, for me, really forms the dividing line between the mindset of a pagan vs. a believer in the Church. Tarrant and Damien hate each other on first sight, yet from the beginning they're capable of carrying on cordial conversations about their shared beliefs and dreams and fears. They discuss how they've tried to imagine a world without the fae looming over them, whereas if you mentioned such an idea to Senzei or Ciani or even Narilka, I think they would be utterly baffled. It doesn't seem like much at first glance, but it's the difference between having the ambition to restructure an entire world vs. simply living at peace in it the way it is.

[trobadora]

I would imagine if that kind of thing were easy to create, someone else would have done it. If nothing else, it sounds like a fantastic security measure.

And yes, she makes her world so vivid that it becomes very possible for us to speculate on what our world would look like, from Erna's perspective. It's very impressive.

whereas if you mentioned such an idea to Senzei or Ciani or even Narilka, I think they would be utterly baffled

Is there ever any sort of reaction from one of them to the Church's project? I can't remember any, and it would be so interesting to see. (And I do wonder what Ciani thinks about the end of the trilogy, and having the fae taken from her again!)

[juonetar.livejournal.com]

Tarrant dressed up for Damien! No matter how irritated the Hunter might have been about invasion of his domain and his privacy, he's nevertheless orchestrated a grand introduction (his servant to announce his title, his best robes patterned with the mark of Damien's Order, claiming to be both the premier of the said Order and a servant of the Church). How incovenient that Senzei passed out in the middle of all that posturing.

[trobadora]

Hee, yes! I love that, Tarrant showing off his titles. :D

[prettyarbitrary.livejournal.com]

Yeah, he did go to great lengths just to impress/irritate the hell out of Damien, didn't he? Somehow I'd never quite looked at it that way before.

Also, the Premiere of the Order is so very "By the way, I'm in charge of you."

[trobadora]

Also, the Premiere of the Order is so very "By the way, I'm in charge of you."

YES! I love that to itty bitty pieces, and I wish we'd got a lot more of that than we did. (I know what I'm going to request if we do a fic exchange again!)

[prettyarbitrary.livejournal.com]

I imagine we didn't get more because Tarrant knew better than to push it. Damien might cede him some minor level of authority out of respect for his offices, but if he actually went and pointed it out, Damien might've realized what he was doing and stopped. :)

But if someone wrote it, I would read that fic!

[trobadora]

Have you seen alighiera's coldfire_sesa fic that plays with this a bit? Fabulous, and it made me realise just how much I want more of that!

[prettyarbitrary.livejournal.com]

I did see that, and I loved it. I was thinking about it regarding this too.

[trobadora]

I love that Gerald still claims that title, and that in a weird, roundabout way, by the end Damien is in a position where he can actually appreciate that. I so want to see more done with that order, and Gerald's role in it, and Damien's reaction to the whole. *craves*

[prettyarbitrary.livejournal.com]

*craves with you*