Will we see Vain or his equivalent in the 3rd Chronicles

[burgs]

Can you explain more as to WHY you believe her to be his half sister? She seems kind. Esmer is an ass.

[Nerdanel]

Esmer is messed up on the inside but is a harmonious combination of Haruchai and merewife on the outside. The Mahdoubt with her weird fire/sea eyes, patchwork clothes, and unregular features is messed up on the outside but harmonious on the inside. Esmer takes after the worst of both his parents; he is as unyielding as a Haruchai and as treacherous as a merewife. The Mahdoubt serves loyally like the Haruchai of old and has the deep caring without which the merewives wouldn't be so bitter. It is all very symmetric. I think Esmer is immortal and the Mahdoubt long-lived mortal. Both have significant magical abilities.

It's not that rare for siblings to end up very much unlike each other. I and my brother are just one example...

[burgs]

It's an interesting theory...very well thought out and logical. For some reason, though, it doesn't seem to fit. For me, at least. Don't ask me for a better explanation though because I don't have one.

Speaking of siblings...my brothers and I? Couldn't be more different. Of course, I am adopted.

Hey! Maybe the Mahdoubt was adopted. *Kidding*

Seriously - regarding your theory - the Elohim do have a tendency to flit in and out, physically speaking. A Haruchai would be more likely than a Ramen to sense that, and see *something* - if not an Elohim, something - and realize that it is not an entity whose nature is servile. Who knows. SRD, I hope.

[Nerdanel]

Perhaps some Haruchai did notice, but the Mahdoubt magicked them into un-noticing it, like it sounds like she did with Mahrtiir. Either way, it looks like the Haruchai were highly overconfident and wouldn't think that they had a magic-user right under their collective noses, particularly under the lowly guise of a servant. They had eradicated the magic-users (minus Anele) from the Land, after all! It is certain that the Mahdoubt whatever she is is just the kind of being the Haruchai didn't want to have walking around and would have wished to imprison.

[burgs]

All apologies - that just sounds to D&D to me, and something SRD wouldn't employ.

I could be wrong.

[The Laughing Man]

RK: Madness is important to you – your characters tend to live on the edge.

Stephen Donaldson: Most of them, yes, but there are others like Liand whose point is that he is an ordinary moral man caught up in events. Or like the Mahdoubt, who just has her housekeeping job to do and does it.

RK: Rather like the Shadout Mapes in Dune, in fact.

Stephen Donaldson: Names are very important to the way I feel my way into who characters are. And yes, there is a memory of the Shadout Mapes in the Mahdoubt's name for that reason.

[burgs]

Given the nap that I've taken, I had completely forgotten about SRDs comments on that. It certainly sheds a different light on things.

[The Laughing Man]

please stop staring at me burgs......

[burgs]

I'll do my best. That roving eye is rather attractive, I must say, and is quite enticing.

Never mind my sexual proclivities, however.

[Aleksandr]

Re: Esmer says "I am the sone of Cail and the merewives." Why not give this as much credence as these other things that he says?

In what sense is he their son? The statement above is a little odd: he isn’t saying he’s the son of Cail and a merewife which would mean he’s simply a biological offspring of the normal sort. How can he be the son of merewives (plural)?

[High Lord Tolkien]

Re: Esmer says "I am the sone of Cail and the merewives." Why not give this as much credence as these other things that he says?

In what sense is he their son? The statement above is a little odd: he isn’t saying he’s the son of Cail and a merewife which would mean he’s simply a biological offspring of the normal sort. How can he be the son of merewives (plural)?

Maybe the "merewives" is like the Hydra.
One body with multiple heads.
Each head is it's own independant "merewife" with one body doing the reproducing.

[Roynish]

Vain comes back saves the land and has some quippy dialogue with TC.

Great plot line.

Bump.

[Arturia]

Perhaps his purpose is to persuade Kastenessen not do do whatever he is doing, by showing him that he is his descendant and that through him Kastenessen's love's memory lives on?

[Arturia]

Re above post, I'm referring to Esmer

[Tjol]

^It would be an interesting twist to see some powerful being whose power is bent only to realising some simple pleasure (simple isn't quite the right word... if only I knew a word like base, or primal, but without the negative connotation...). It'd be kind of like Foul uttering 'Rose Bud' just before he ceased to exist before the Lord's laughter.

It certianly would fall in the line of possibilities, that a character plot might revolve around remembering love.

[Avatar]

I don't think that primal necessarily has a negative connotation.

--A