How will the Haruchai be redeemed?

[High Lord Tolkien]

How will the Haruchai be redeemed?
By that I mean their whole history has been looking for meaning or validation. (there's a better term I know but I'm forgetting it).
They look at their history with shame.
Finding that their Mastery of the Land serves Foul will be their current/final humiliation.

How can they be redeemed?
Brinn showed them by beating the Guardian, and Linden reiterated using that example, with submission or acceptance is the way to victory.

If they change course, if they submit their pride, what will they do?
What can a few hundred (maybe a thousand) Masters at Revelstone do to combat the evils against the Land?
Because right now, it's just them to save the day.

It's not going to be a small thing.
It has to be freaking huge, imo.
And it has to be the opposite of all that has been previously seen with them.
AND it has to be greater than the Theomach and Brinn's accomplishments too I think.

What can they do?

Here's some thoughts I have.

Their mind speech and collective memory.
How is this a weapon?

Imagine the the Seven Words uttered (in mind speech) perfectly and in unison by a 1000+ force of Haruchai.
Could that be what is needed to make the needed Forbidding to bind (not sure if that's the proper term) the Worm?
They could be some type of 1000+ Ranyhyn riding super Lords....

Foul and SWMNBN must be resolved by TC, Linden and Jeremiah. That much I'm certain.

It will be up to the Haruchai to preserve the Land/World from every threat not born outside it.

I'm imagining Pahni will urge them to action and somehow because of their love of family? wife? children?, make them reconsider their role, the Haruchai will reinvent themselves and all doubt will be erased from their minds when suddenly a Ranyhyn shows up outside Revelstone for every single one of them. Hell maybe even bringing every Haruchai from their Westron Mountain homes too.
This is the end of the World, why think small?

[Orlion]

They were going to be used to fight an army of skurj and Sandgorgons, I thought.

In which case, we can say good-bye to them.

[wayfriend]

Awesome Topic!

First of all, good point about Pahni. She has to be the trigger for the final crisis for the Haruchai. This I base solely on that there's only one book left.

Pahni and Bhapa were charged to "sway the Masters". To ask them to go to Mount Thunder, and do battle with the skurj and the sandgorgons. So that when Linden and Covenant need to get to Mount Thunder, they won't be blocked by monsters.

And Pahni has motivation.

But Pahni swept forward as if she were pouncing. "Yes!" The eagerness of a hawk shone in her soft eyes. "I will lay Liand’s death at the feet of the Masters and compel an answer. They deem themselves the descendants of the Bloodguard. I will require of them a comparable service."

Surely, if Pahni succeeds the Haruchai will have to battle like they have never battled before. Both sandgorgons and skurj have been beyond their skills to this point.

But is victory in such a battle redemption? This is a Donaldson story. I think it's a good guess that a new attitude and outlook come first. Armed with that, they will then have the power.

We also know some things from the second chronicles.

Some of it is about accepting failure. Brinn defeated ak-Haru by failing. The Haruchai of the Quest who succombed to the merewives were the ones who could not be zombied by the Clave.

In the last chronicles, this continues a bit. Stave accepted excommunication from the Masters, and has been strengthened thereby. He and the Humbled have come to accept the necessity of healing for the greater good, rather than as a failure of integrity.

And we also know there is something about grieving.

Liand frowned. "Does that account for their denial of the Land's history and wonder? Do they fear to grieve?"

It was Liand who first suspected that they feared or refused to grieve. And he observed this very soon after meeting Stave.

Here's where it gets complicated. Liand is now dead. Pahni is grieving. She wants him resurrected. Which the Masters cannot abide. And this threatens Pahni's mission.

But the Masters will not heed them. Cord Pahni’s desire for the Stonedownor’s resurrection is abhorrent to us. She has beseeched Linden Avery to demean his death by unmaking the outcome of his life. Thus her every word will be tainted by her craving for the Stonedownor’s humiliation, which she misnames love. No Master would hold him in such low esteem. He was courage in life. Why, then, should he be denied the courage of his death? Is that not false honor?"

Covenent feels this is where the Master's are mixed up. The whole thing ties back to him.

The Humbled had misjudged Pahni: that was obvious. Was it possible that Branl and Clyme and all of the Masters were unforgiving of loss and failure because they refused to grieve? Because they equated grief with humiliation? If so, then of course their only response to bereavement would be repudiation. [...] By that standard, Covenant himself was inherently false. A disease upon the body of the world. "Life depends on death. But there are other things to consider."

It seems to me that "these other things to consider" might be the heart of the matter.

So it looks like a showdown between Pahni and the Masters. On the one side is the Land's rescue and her love of Liand and grief at his demise. On the other hand is the arrogance of the Humbled, their disdain of healing, and their refusal to grieve.

Out of this showdown will arise the answer.

Finding that their Mastery of the Land serves Foul will be their current/final humiliation.

Yes. That has to be part of it too.

[Edit] And when you think about it this way, we probably know why Liand had to die.

[High Lord Tolkien]

Pahni and Bhapa were charged to "sway the Masters". To ask them to go to Mount Thunder, and do battle with the skurj and the sandgorgons. So that when Linden and Covenant need to get to Mount Thunder, they won't be blocked by monsters.

There has to be a change in that they use weapons. One Skurgi alone could kill them all. The Ranyhyn are also useless.
Unless every single Master and Ranyhyn die to clear a path..........which would.............be predictable and boring.

Their collective memory retains the entirety of Kevin's lore.
I see such potential with that.

[lucimay]

Awesome Topic!

And Pahni has motivation.

But Pahni swept forward as if she were pouncing. "Yes!" The eagerness of a hawk shone in her soft eyes. "I will lay Liand’s death at the feet of the Masters and compel an answer. They deem themselves the descendants of the Bloodguard. I will require of them a comparable service."

you know i don't usually get involved in the chrons discussions because i am at a loss to understand or explain any of it really. but this topic will always catch my attention (and i have to give Iquestor some credit for getting me more interested in this aspect - haruchai - of the chrons.)

i think, wayfriend, that this quote really is the key in speculating what will occur with the haruchai. i've felt, everytime they sort of evolved, that eventually they were going to have to return to their "origins" (for lack of better term) in some way or another.

speculating what donaldson might come up with is useless, they're his creation and i've never really understood how their vow and sacrifice gave them power anyway. i totally did not see THIS most current incarnation of them (the masters) coming, tho i do understand how and why they got there.
but it's apparent that they are misguided, that there is something "wrong" with this kind of fanaticism and that they will have to really come to see that in order to "redeem" themselves or regain any kind of pure power.
what that power could be, i can't even imagine (mostly because, as i said up above here, i've never understood how they got the power in the first place, and also because i am not donaldson and long ago gave up trying to second guess him, his imagination exceeds mine in this, his story.)

i have no doubt at ALL that they will redeem themselves but i do fear for them, because...well, i think redemption sometimes demands sacrifice.

i guess that's all a little vague but i love the haruchai. i hope it ends well for them.

[Zortag]

This thing about Pahni & Bhapa and the Masters has fascinated me from the time that the Ardent took Pahni and Bhapa away to Revelstone.

Covenant, through Anele, addresses Phani and Bhapa:

In some ways, you two have the hardest job. You'll have to survive. And you'll have to make them listen to you.

The general consensus is that the "them" that have to be made to listen are the Masters. And now the Ardent has taken Pahni and Bhapa to Revelstone, "home" of the intransigent Masters.

"Life depends on death. But there are other things to consider."

Panhi's "dead" is one for whom the Masters have little concern, seeing Liand as more of a problem than anything else; but there are others of the "Dead" who the Masters revere. The Dead were to be found in Andelain, but that land is now under attack by the Kastenessen, the skurj and who knows what else. But if the Dead collected in Andelain because it was an "earth-powerful" place, the Dead are not likely to be found there anymore. But, just out Revelstone's back door is the last remaining "earth-powerful" place, Glimmermere.

And my feeling is that Pahni/Liand/Berek are the ones who end up prodding the Masters off their perch.

[Ananda]

And my feeling is that Pahni/Liand/Berek are the ones who end up prodding the Masters off their perch.

I like theidea of the dead getting involved. When you said the above, Kevin came to mind. He has had his forgiveness and maybe it is time for him to help the haruchai get their own? The vow was partially his fault (he accepted it) and the vow was part of their degradation.

On a side note, I never liked the haruchai. I liked them as part of the story, but always saw them as kind of creepy.

And Luci, I think they got their power with the vow because of the earthpower or whatnot that they swore to? It was explained once, but I forget the details.

[High Lord Tolkien]

But if the Dead collected in Andelain because it was an "earth-powerful" place, the Dead are not likely to be found there anymore. But, just out Revelstone's back door is the last remaining "earth-powerful" place, Glimmermere.

Oh I like that!
What if it's the souls of all the dead female Haruchai that change the Masters?
Or if we're truly looking at the end of everything it could be the souls of all the Haruchai that were killed when the Worm destroyed their mountain home.
The Masters could be the only ones left of their race.

[Vraith]

First HLT, the idea of the 7 words mind-spoken by all the Haruchai at once is just a completely cool idea. I don't think it will happen, but that doesn't affect the wow-factor of it at all.

I'm not at all sure how they'll be redeemed. But I think they will, and I think in some way it will involve their recognition that Earthpower/Lore isn't really a weapon or path to corruption. It is the very source of their lives, the beating of their hearts. [That is why the Vow did what it did] Perhaps also that use of a weapon is not, all by itself, a sign of weakness/insufficiency, but an expression/extension of the self.

Somehow they will discover that their mistakes were always the same kind: They have an Ideal to serve/be, and a Code/Honor to follow to do so. But they have conflated the two over and over, such that being pure and true to the path, as if it were the Ideal, they are walking a maze, lost sight of the end.

I was somewhat worried about their ultimate fate [not a lot, but a bit] until

I am Haruchai. I do what I must."

[dlbpharmd]

We've seen genocide in the 1st and 2nd Chronicles (the Unhomed, the Waynhim.) I could see the Haruchai sacrificing themselves to the skurj and Sandgorgon, especially when they realize that they're servants of Corruption.

[wayfriend]

Lucimay, I hope you come by more often and post good posts like that. (I haven't forgotten the day you asked someone to explain Linden to you; I have been working on it. )

The setup does seem to be that Phani and dead Liand are the critical impetus behind whatever becomes of the Haruchai.

In some ways, I think the answer the Haruchai are looking for is simple: serve yourselves.

But not simple. They always seek others to serve. Because they feel that they are missing something that others have? Worth?

The Haruchai do not believe in their own worth, I feel. This is the origin of their opposition to being healed. They don't believe that they are worth healing. In their minds, it's more important to wear a badge of honor, in the form of scars or amputations or death, which proves that they served well. They only see value in themselves insofar as they serve something else that is intrinsically valuable.

And so they do not allow themselves to grieve for themselves. If they have no worth, then there is no loss when they are gone. Service will continue, another Bloodguard will replace the one lost.

And serving corruption is not serving something of worth, so that's out, too.

On the other hand, if they learn to value their own worth, everything else follows. They will follow their own hearts, not the hearts of those they serve. They will not resist ways that enable pursuing their desires, like weapons and lore, because they no longer have to prove how excellent a tool they are in themselves. When they die, they will grieve, because they recognize their own worth.

It all comes back to the Vizard. At that time, they served themselves. Then they measured themselves against the Vizard, and failed. They deemed themselves of no worth. They lost purpose until they found Kevin, and said to themselves, we have no worth, but we can serve those that do - that is our path.

HLT, Donaldson has always said that they are beings of Earthpower. If they recognize this, and embrace it, they could each individually be as powerful as Anele sane.

But the question no one can answer, I feel, is how do Pahni and Liand get the Haruchai to that point?

[lucimay]

thanks wayfriend. i appreciate the welcome into the discussion.

yes, you said it best. it's about service isn't it. while i was reading your thoughts in this last post i couldn't help but be struck by the idea of military service and the selflessness of that kind of service to a principle or ideal.

i'm not sure how that fits in with the discussion, it just struck me that that is what armies do, serve a higher ideal, selflessly. and the service becomes the self, yes?

gah...i need to think this over some before i can post a coherent thought, but thank you way, that was a very good post and helped me understand a bit better!

(you keep workin on that Linden thing now. hugs!)

[shadowbinding shoe]

Good post, wayfriend.

I'm not completely sold on the idea that the Vizard is the original cause for the way the Haruchai turned out. Sure, he humiliated them but their quest was flawed from the start. They set out from their homeland to beat everyone they meet so everyone (themselves foremost) will know that they are the best. What happened to them is the logical result.

They met a bigger bully.

What I'm wondering about is how their story would be introduced into the book. I highly doubt Donaldson will introduce a new point of view so it will have to be told by someone Linden and or Covenant meet and I don't think there will be a lot of page space dedicated to something like that.

Lucimay - In theory, higher ideals do indeed motivate soldiers but in practice its the brotherhood of arms, the strong bonds that develop between the fighters in a unit, that is the real motivator for fighters. He fights to protect his comrades from harm.

[Ananda]

I've been thinking about the connection between Covenant and the hurachai for a while now and this topic has made me think about the connections a little more closely. To me, it seems like the life and times of TC is reflected in the life and times of the haruchai. And, at times, specific haruchai are the reflection of their people and of TC.

TC writes a best seller, has a happy marriage, a new baby son. he's on top of the world.
The haruchai find that they are awesome. They can beat everyone around them. They are on top of the world.

TC decides to write a second novel.
The haruchai decide to go show the world how awesome they are.

TC gets his little purple spot and the wife and son gone, he turns his former pride against himself.
The haruchai get beat up by a single little old man. Their pride turned against themselves.

TC takes to his dehumanised position in life. Goes through his VSEs, etc. and withdraws from the world with everyone else. People in society betray him, making him doubt himself and his worth even more.
The huracahi accept this vow that dehumanises them. It separates them from their wives and children (SRD made a big point of this) and from life, really. they may be with the Lords, but they are 'other'. Further, the H are betrayed by doubt and Kevin.

TC then has his adventures in the land. When he contributes to the death of Elena, he betrays himself to the point where his delusion of the core of sanity in his situation is exposed. He realises that he's been lying to himself- that he has become his own betrayer.
When the haruchai take the stone, they also have the lie of their own life exposed to them.

Both go into sort of a free fall.

TC seeks redemption for himself against how he has been. All the lies he told himself and the pain it has caused him and others.
Bannor (personifying the H here) seeks redemption for himself. The big lie is eating him up. He seeks to make amends to the horses of ra and to himself.

TC gets his redemption in a way.
Bannor is implied to have returned to his people (thus the story of TC's last quest involving Bannor is known to the H in the second series) and we can assume he has his redemption.

Second Series:

TC has found a way to live with himself, though the isolation and guilt still bother him. He revisits his past with Joan who is 'broken'.
The haruchai seemingly live with themselves, withdrawn from the land. Maybe they still have guilt that bothers them. Then, they return and find Revelstone 'broken'.

TC, through the series, has to learn that strength is sometimes to surrender.
The H learn the same. (Cail and Brinn representing the hurachai in this)

Both surrender in the end and achieve some sort of victory.
TC finds a new enduring purpose- the arch of time
The H find an enduring purpose- Revelstone.

Third series:

TC is the Timewarden. The Master of the arch.
The H are the Masters of the land.

Perhaps both can be seen as being a bit prideful.
TC sends people messages, predicting their futures. He goads Linden to raise him knowing it will release the worm. He has been plotting some intricate plot to take down LF while he was within the arch. He's sure he knows what he's doing.
The H are likewise prideful. They Master the people and manipulate them for what they think is best. They are sure they know what they are doing.


Anyway, I have to start dinner and so have to just end it here, but that is the lines I was thinking of for the harchai and TC. So, in some way, I think maybe TC will have his own pride exposed and get a redemption from there and the H will have a similar experience.

[lucimay]

great post ananda! i agree that there are definitely paralelle themes between covenant and the haruchai and you laid it out beautifully! thanks!

Lucimay - In theory, higher ideals do indeed motivate soldiers but in practice its the brotherhood of arms, the strong bonds that develop between the fighters in a unit, that is the real motivator for fighters. He fights to protect his comrades from harm.

that sounds like the voice of experience?

yes i've heard lots of real AND tv and movie soldiers say that very thing and i do believe it.

i think, in a way, the Haruchai remind me of the Bridgeburners (from Malazan Book of the Fallen.) and they ARE a "unit" aren't they? the Haruchai (in all their incarnations.)

one of the things that tMBotF did for me was help me to understand and appreciate the...i don't know what to call it...the...mindset of a warrior maybe? warrior mentality? prior to reading the malazan books i rarely gave a thought to the positive aspects of being a warrior or a soldier. i think i thought that violence was always irrational and that men (or women for that matter) who sought military service were just inherently violet people and that there was something wrong there. maybe we as a race have not conquered our primitive base instincts for violence or something. i don't know how to explain it, i just know that i had somekind of inner disdain.
(probably comes from watching the vietnam war on television as i was growing up)

i know i'm blathering here but bear with me a minute.

probably most people understand this kind of thing without having to dissect and ponder over it but it took me reading the malazan book of the fallen to understand that there is honor in being a warrior. it's not just a base need to kill something that drives a warrior. on the contrary, i think now that there are just some people born to be warriors, protectors, fighters. i mean we have to have em, right? (why am i hearing jack nicholson saying "you WANT me on that wall!" LOL!!) and sure the thing that motivates those warriors, those soldiers, is the desire to protect their comrades. but i think what actually gets them to that unit in the first place is the other part of that oft uttered phrase. protect and serve. service. to a city (police), to a country, to an ideal or way of life.

so to try and wrap this blather up here, i really do think that is what i meant when i said that the haruchai need to redeem themselves by returning to their "origins", their original "service", if you will. the higher ideal.
i mean it's what the masters are trying to do, right? protect and serve.
no matter how misguided their methods, that's what they're doing.
and that will be their redemption, i believe.

arg. i hope that all makes sense. it's luci logic.


* LOL!! i had to leave that typo in there cause it was so funny! VIOLENT people! i meant violent. not violet! LOL!!!

[wayfriend]

Lucimay's comment about the military got me thinking about how the military almost universally strips away a soldier's individuality as part of the process of building a unit that can do what it needs to do.

Because, as I reflect on it, I think the Haruchai and the Bloodguard have always been indistiguishable to me. Sure, you can distinguish them by which one did what. But you can probably say that anyone of them could have done what any other of them did.

It also occurs to me that this is a byproduct of mindspeech.

Then, it occurs to me to see Stave in this light. He's been excommunicated from the Masters. And this excommunication includes, most prominently, that he is no longer allowed to participate in the Haruchai mind-union. And the result? His efforts at being an individual and not a fungible warrior have made him the better of any other Haruchai.

I wonder if Donaldon isn't pointing us to this: that the Haruchai need to give up their mental communiion and be individuals in order to achieve their potential and therefore their redemption?

[shadowbinding shoe]

Lucimay - In theory, higher ideals do indeed motivate soldiers but in practice its the brotherhood of arms, the strong bonds that develop between the fighters in a unit, that is the real motivator for fighters. He fights to protect his comrades from harm.

that sounds like the voice of experience?

Eh, not really. I'm not a soldier/fighters and wasn't on the sports team at school either. Just knowledge and intuition.

yes i've heard lots of real AND tv and movie soldiers say that very thing and i do believe it.

i think, in a way, the Haruchai remind me of the Bridgeburners (from Malazan Book of the Fallen.) and they ARE a "unit" aren't they? the Haruchai (in all their incarnations.)

one of the things that tMBotF did for me was help me to understand and appreciate the...i don't know what to call it...the...mindset of a warrior maybe? warrior mentality? prior to reading the malazan books i rarely gave a thought to the positive aspects of being a warrior or a soldier. i think i thought that violence was always irrational and that men (or women for that matter) who sought military service were just inherently violet people and that there was something wrong there. maybe we as a race have not conquered our primitive base instincts for violence or something. i don't know how to explain it, i just know that i had somekind of inner disdain.

I haven't read the Malazan books so I'll your word for what's in them.

I'm not sure if the Haruchai are really army. They're more of a bodyguard unit for the Lords. The comradeship and need to protect is not to their fellow Haruchai but to their protectees, the Lords, Thomas Covenant and the rest.
This fits in nicely with their low self esteem now that I think about it.

probably most people understand this kind of thing without having to dissect and ponder over it but it took me reading the malazan book of the fallen to understand that there is honor in being a warrior. it's not just a base need to kill something that drives a warrior. on the contrary, i think now that there are just some people born to be warriors, protectors, fighters. i mean we have to have em, right? (why am i hearing jack nicholson saying "you WANT me on that wall!" LOL!!) and sure the thing that motivates those warriors, those soldiers, is the desire to protect their comrades. but i think what actually gets them to that unit in the first place is the other part of that oft uttered phrase. protect and serve. service. to a city (police), to a country, to an ideal or way of life.

Do you really think people are born/destined to be warriors and fighters? That idea bothers me a lot. People join the army for all sorts of reasons. Some do it to serve some ideal like 'serve and protect my country', some do it for personal reasons, some do it to impress others, some do it because they need the safe income it ensures or to gain citizenship and some (like the Vietnam soldiers you mentioned) do it because they were enlisted.

Who is this proto-soldier you envision? Is it the school bully who has violent tendencies? They tend to be rotten soldiers as I understand it because they tend to excesses and lack the discipline.

Then, it occurs to me to see Stave in this light. He's been excommunicated from the Masters. And this excommunication includes, most prominently, that he is no longer allowed to participate in the Haruchai mind-union. And the result? His efforts at being an individual and not a fungible warrior have made him the better of any other Haruchai.

I wonder if Donaldon isn't pointing us to this: that the Haruchai need to give up their mental communiion and be individuals in order to achieve their potential and therefore their redemption?

Isn't the mindspeech an integral part of who they are? Maybe lessening the strength of their connections would be a good for them but I can't see the Haruchai renouncing their mindspeech.

[wayfriend]

I wonder if Donaldon isn't pointing us to this: that the Haruchai need to give up their mental communiion and be individuals in order to achieve their potential and therefore their redemption?

Isn't the mindspeech an integral part of who they are? Maybe lessening the strength of their connections would be a good for them but I can't see the Haruchai renouncing their mindspeech.

Compare and contrast with Kevin's Wards. When the New Lords found out that Kevin's Wards and the Oath of Peace didn't work together, they ditched Kevin's Wards - they abandoned all the lore of the Old Lords for a new way.

I see this as something similar. If mind-speech, the way they use it now, prevents them from finding their fulfillment, they would need to choose like the New Lords chose. Hang on to the old ways, or give them up to find something better.

We also have the Ramen riding Ranyhyn. They have given up the old ways to find a new way. Covenant had to give up his belief that the Land was only a dream, something that was absolutely critical to him, in order to obtain victory in the first Chronicles. Examples of this abound in Donaldson.

That doesn't mean I am correct ... I just don't think you can rule it out on the basis that the Haruchai would never give up something if it meant achieving all their dreams.

[lucimay]

probably most people understand this kind of thing without having to dissect and ponder over it but it took me reading the malazan book of the fallen to understand that there is honor in being a warrior. it's not just a base need to kill something that drives a warrior. on the contrary, i think now that there are just some people born to be warriors, protectors, fighters. i mean we have to have em, right? (why am i hearing jack nicholson saying "you WANT me on that wall!" LOL!!) and sure the thing that motivates those warriors, those soldiers, is the desire to protect their comrades. but i think what actually gets them to that unit in the first place is the other part of that oft uttered phrase. protect and serve. service. to a city (police), to a country, to an ideal or way of life.

Do you really think people are born/destined to be warriors and fighters? That idea bothers me a lot. People join the army for all sorts of reasons. Some do it to serve some ideal like 'serve and protect my country', some do it for personal reasons, some do it to impress others, some do it because they need the safe income it ensures or to gain citizenship and some (like the Vietnam soldiers you mentioned) do it because they were enlisted.

Who is this proto-soldier you envision? Is it the school bully who has violent tendencies? They tend to be rotten soldiers as I understand it because they tend to excesses and lack the discipline.

no. not the school bully. and "proto-soldier" is not quite the way i'd describe what i'm talking about. i think everyone is born with certain talents, a talent that is specific to that person, whether it be a talent for working with their hands, like carpenters or chefs or sculpters, etc, or talents with numbers, or vocal and aural ability, everyone has something they are good at. sometimes it takes a long time (or a lifetime) to figure out what that talent is. sometimes it's a matter of whether or not that talent is discovered and nurtured by the people who raise you. sometimes there are obstacles that keep us from discovering what our talents are.

and then there are those other people just come out of the womb knowing who and what they are and their own capablilities and talents. and some of those people are warriors, people who have the physical, mental, and emotional capability and the drive and ambition to find the best way of using their talents for good, or for service.

i'm saying that warriors are born just as musicians and artists and writers and chefs and carpenters and accountants and doctors and gamers and...well you get the idea.

i do not believe that anyone could support the idea that no one is a warrior until they are sent to the army or the navy or the police academy and taught to be one.

you're either "cut out" for it, or you're not. cut out for it = born to be one

sure there are plenty of people who become soldiers or warriors that SHOULDN'T be or were drafted into it or would rather not be even if they are capable. there are plenty of people who join plenty of professions for the wrong reasons.

i'm just saying that i respect those people who are born to it and do it well and with honor in service to a higher ideal. prior to reading malazan i had not considered that.

that's all.

[SGuilfoyle1966]

]But the question no one can answer, I feel, is how do Pahni and Liand get the Haruchai to that point?

They'll have to triple dog dare them.