originally posted by R’is’n
If The Uprising was Davien's personal version of the Havens - that would imply that at the time of the first mistwraithe's invasion, and perhaps before, he foresaw the Alliance of light or at least, predicted the pattern of the consolidation of external power by the townsmen & dark factions to create this current crisis - coupled with the limited resources the F7 have to battle Mistwraithe, Kadrim, Methuri, Koriani, black arts etc…
I think it's more than just Alestron that's going to suffer - all seven kinds of hell will break loose over Athera.
Davien assisted Arithon because he knew the F7 were going to be pushed so far to the limit, that the compact would be in peril. He's not adverse to the compact breaking either!
Internal power is going to win this in the end - but internal power often comes at the end of everything… like with Jieret.
I wonder how daring Madame Wurts will be with that! Will the compact be broken? Contrary to what we think, will Arithon actually be required to resist the F7's geas that will prompt them to destroy Atherians in order to preserve the Paravians?
originally posted by Neil
Janny said the "ground shifts" after arc 3…
Maybe we might see the wraiths beng dealt with in Stormed Fortress? Several decades will be needed for Arithon to play them to rest? During this time we might lose the clans! Compact kaputt?
Would the paravians act to help humans or does the drake-binding override everything? If the paravians can redeem the drakespawn, it seems a little uncharitable not to help humans if they *ask* (presumably Arithon would ask; his answer is find the paravians ever since COTM) 
Lysaer is on the agenda with Paravians… this ought to crop up else why did the F7 cast him outside the compact? Or if Lysaer is thrown off Paravia would he still find a way to pursue the curse through technology ?!?
If Lysaer is freed from the curse, this presuambly does not solve the instablity of the "kingdom system" as foreseen by Davien…
…I'm still "wondering" around in circles as per usual
originally posted by skeoke
Recurrent nightmare of mine:
Arithon spends too much time with Davien, learns the secret to his corporate/discorporate existance.
Arithon decides to attempt to break the curse by having it be fulfilled.
Jieret's vision of Arithon on the scaffold, and Dakar's vision of the dripping sword, come to pass.
Would Elaira be content with a corporate/discorporate lover?
-------
'Course, Arithon is due to be skewered by a unicorn, too, so…
originally posted by JO
My thought about the scaffold is - didn't Arithon and Dakar pass through the grimward in the spring/summer. jieret saved him def in the summer from his guilt after they returned from the grimward. If they hadn't wouldn't Arithon have been captured - scaffold dead as a do do spring to mind. Not sure of that works or not just a thought.
originally posted by Mac
Clan bloodllines survive. Fellowship and paravians move on. Wraiths annihilated.
Else there would never be a story - prologue CotM
originally posted by Neil
The prologue is purposefully vague although I guess the sages - that have only the myth/legends to go on and therefore recall in visions the War - are probably human…
Clan blood lines it seems are present in townborn and it seems Lysaer is currently in a position to profit from this by tracking down the relevant blood lines! So probably unlikely to become extinct…although clan blood is only vital if human-paravian interaction is necessary.
I think there was mention once on the board that the F7 logically would move on to become something else other than the Atheran human caretakers…but first paravian survival must be ensured.
Maybe the time has come to try to renegotiate terms; Arithon is maybe Davien's tool to generate alternatives to the current compact; maybe humans just need to get off Athera in order to free Fellowship…Maybe the townborn can be shown to owe the F7 a "debt" and maybe if the background of the F7 is known - likely sooner or later - maybe all Atheran humankind have to forgive them and understand the stakes…maybe Arithon will find a way to allow townborn to see approciate the "real" situation ; presumably the clan sympathise with - can maybe even perceive on some level - the F7's plight.
But I fear things are a lot more unstable than we think and that something is going to occur in SF that *shocks* Certainly it can get a lot worse before it gets better
originally posted by Bec
Quoting Mac "Clan bloodlines survive. Fellowship and paravians move on."
I have always have a problem with this - I don't think the prologue tells us that the sages are still on Athera. I can't see how humanity could survive on Athera without either the F7 or the Paravians. The problems with the Grimwards and the drakespawn spring to mind. The Grimwards can become unstable due to Geological disruption (even without Morriel I am sure this could happen) and there will be no-one there to correct the imbalance. From my understanding the ghosts/dreams of the Great Drakes would then "escape" and cause havoc. The drakespawn in the swamps and the other flying "mini-dragons" (sorry having mental block at the moment and can't think of the name - starts with K… - & at work with no book to check!!) are also kept restrained by the F7 - so if Paravians & F7 aren't there who is keeping this under control? My feeling is that humanity moves on to another planet/realm/home etc. The Paravian survival is assured and the F7 drift off into the ether. Ooops… hadn't intended to speculated into the future - now I will have to wait and see what really happens!!!
originally posted by Neil
Khadrim
I have wondered sometimes if this series would involve some space-faring "bit" a little like what is implied at the end of cycle of fire…
One wonders though why the F7 would labour for 5000 years when the simplest solution is get humanity off Athera…But once they are allowed on (See TK for Davien's comments) I think now that the solution is not to get them off but to allow them to develop to the point where they could move on without too much ignorance (although a mortal is never going to have the depth of a F7 member) concerning their environment… or is the Ath's adept path the suggested "way"? Would living 500 years help?
If Humanity stays on Athera they have to develop as a group to the point where they no longer need the F7 to monitor the compact.
F7 must know this…or I'm completely wrong
originally posted by R’is’n
quote:Janny said the "ground shifts" after arc 3…
The ground shifts, but just before it, you need the earthquake to shift it…
quote:Arithon decides to attempt to break the curse by having it be fulfilled.
That's quite an idea skeoke. He mastered it, but it's still not gone, and I wondered about that. By suppressing the symptoms of illness, you can make the sickness worse. So you 'detox' by actually assisting the symptoms - the homeopathic approach to ridding yourself of a curse!
quote:Clan bloodllines survive. Fellowship and paravians move on. Wraiths annihilated.
Else there would never be a story - prologue CotM
We know that. But HOW, WHEN and BY WHOM is what drives us.
quote:Arithon is maybe Davien's tool to generate alternatives to the current compact;
I've always understood Arithon to be Davien's 'weapon', as he said, one with free will. He doesn't use Arithon's for his inherited geas, like the F7 do, he uses Arithon's skills of sorcery and music.
Ooh… that just set off a little revelation: perhaps the instability that Davien refers to, is the one the F7 engendered by creating an unchangeable inheritance in the clan bloodlines. Anything static is subject to entropy. He doesn't use Arithon as King of Rathain, like the F7 wanted to initially. Instead, he trains Arithon as Sorcerer, Masterbard and Seer, a far more fit weapon against the mistwraithe and also, the stew of factions that have developed on Athera. He did refer to Arithon as 'My wild, leashed falcon." Leashed by the S'Falenn Geas as much as by the curse. Davien has not only allowed him to master the curse, but to free Arithon from the compulsive geas of compassion, as we saw in TK, he's free to act on his own.
quote:simplest solution is get humanity off Athera…develop to the point where they could move on without too much ignorance
In order to contain the grimwards, the F7 would have at least, to train able replacements before they left. Why else train Verraine and Dakar?
originally posted by Neil
Sethvir comments that Davien is not Arithon's friend (I feel currently Davien *has* been a "friend" to Arithon; perhaps we should not trust Davien too much?).
Wasn't "saint/mystic" used in the prologue? A Martyr too perhaps?
I don't think Arithon is free from compassion? But he does have the additional awakened foresight now which should help him to make sound choices(?).
Could the grimwards eventually be healed? Or can they only be maintained? Were they ever more than 18 grimwards? How many drakes were there on Athera at any one time?
I don't feel either Verraine or Dakar are in a position to help with the grimwards for the moment (apart from letting one of the discorporate F7 borrow their bodies?) I would guess that apprentices were strong talents that needed something to do / training in order to stablise perhaps otherwise unmanageable gifts.
originally posted by R’is’n
I take your point Neil, but I hardly think Janny would write Dakar in just as a character who had unmanageable gifts. Dakar most likely would have had to have asked for the training, and the F7 have some kind of reason to train him, and not just sent him to Ath's brotherhood or a seer. Likewise with Verraine.
Just my 2c.
originally posted by Trys
It's likely the reason Asandir took Dakar as an apprentice and has put up with Dakar's attitudes for 500 odd years is Dakar's Gift of Prophecy.
originally posted by Auna
I also remember Asandir calling Dakar a diamond in the rough. If you live a very long time, you can afford to wait a very long time for someone to develop into what you see as their potential. Dakar has been pushed into growing by Arithon and, more recently, by his double.
originally posted by Jo
**TK Spoiler kinda**
If Arithon was released from his gift of compassion, wouldn't that be catastrophic? Surely he wouldn't then care about what happens to anyone. I know Mearn etc didn't listen to Arithon with regards to them being more or less obliterated but would he definitely leave them to fight by themselves? Only reason I ask is because Fionn is there, Jeynsa is there and didn't Elaria and someone else go after Jeynsa? Would Arithon leave them undefended. Also did S'Brydon clan send 3 members of their family to King Eldir as I don't think it was claified in FP?
originally posted by John Parsons
quote:One wonders though why the F7 would labour for 5000 years when the simplest solution is get humanity off Athera
I've wondered about that too, but there are possibly (at least)two problems with the 'simplest solution':
Firstly it is implied that humanity had no where else to go - why? had the rest of the universe suddenly become uninhabitable or just inhospitable?
Secondly for the F7 to really gain redemption would they not have to solve the problem of humanity's seeming self-destructive urges.
Just a thought
John
originally posted by Neil
Hi John,
I'm wrong about this actually…just reread FP conversation of Sethvir with Eldir.
The approach of f6 at least is *perhaps* to foster enlightenment of the humans on Athera until they can appreciate how to care for a planet.
From FP, humanity has to *save itself* through "self-will" and "free choice". If humanity does step out of line even if the fellowship are otherwise occupied, wraiths, drake spawn, grimwards, planetary imbalance, humanity will be living on borrowed time since no-one on Athera can stop the F7 from enacting the drake-binding to enforce paravian survival.
I note from FP that slavery is forbidden but the death sentence is not 
Couldn't a king + a Cathdein make a mistake of justice? (or is the F7 involved also in such a sentence?) Wouldn't this make the death sentence someting else the paravians might not approve of?
originally posted by R’is’n
Trys: I get that. But I'm wondering if he's got something more to do with the storyline, the vision of Mages is extremely farseeing…
\quote {If Arithon was released from his gift of compassion, wouldn't that be catastrophic?}
I think he'd become more private, show a lot more of the S'Falenn temper and would tend to keep grudges…? (This from CotM)
I think he's already overcome the pull of the geas, worked on by the mistwraithe as the final scene in Kewar showed - he unmade the vision of weeping faces, and remade it into a compass - a symbol I think that now he was charting his own course.
Davien implied the Mistwraithe would increase its efforts to kill him because he chose not to kill. I really wonder if it's going to require a sacrifice to get rid of it… would tie in with the prophecy Dakar saw, the fate of Jieret, and the interesting point made about the possiblity of Arithon learning from Davien, how to be corporeal when you've lost your body…
originally posted by Mac
Just hypothetical, but i wonder what the unleased force of a fellowship sorcerer without the strictures of the LoMB be. Seladie would be sh###### herself.
originally posted by Maddie
If as discussed Arithon became discorporate or like Davien managed to be a bit of both how is he supposed to have children, become King if eventually he does embrace the crown and also how does it effect the blood oath?
Spoiler?
Also I was reading Perils Gate again and noticed that the centaur that answered Jieret said there are still Paravians on Atherea. Which made me wonder why he phrased it like that. Probably reading too much into that though
Any thoughts!!
originally posted by R’is’n
I was also wondering how longevity spells affect Arithon & Elaira's fertility. For example, will Elaira go through menopause at around 45 regardless, or will she be fertile forever? Surely pushing the boundaries of temporal fertility is going to clash with the law of major balance.
Maddie: you raise an interesting point: Arithon is forbidden by blood oath, to kill himself. I'm presuming that being discorporate means killing off the physical body.
What Davien could be doing, (I'm no physicist…) is translating his spirit energies to lower vibrations and 'writing' himself onto available matter, atoms. Like writing software onto hardware… (I'm no programmer either!)
Presumably, having worked that out, he is able to do the reverse, hence his ability to transport Arithon… and also the transverse - hence his ability to use animals…