The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers
Murphy in Peace Talks (WoJ spoilers)
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--- Quote from: Arjan on August 25, 2017, 04:12:20 PM ---Yes, that. She took serious risks there for him.
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Either took a serious and real risk with a potentially out of control monster, or took a big personal step forward confronting her own fears regarding the possibility of such. Either way it was gutsy in my book.
DonBugen:
I just want to say, I love being part of a community that obsesses over all of the same sorts of stuff that I do. It’s fantastic to be able to bounce thoughts and ideas and arguments against people and have them come back with reasoned, thoughtful discussion - so instead of thinking the same thoughts and coming to the same conclusions, I get new ideas that I had never come to.
I’m going to reply to things out of order, and probably pulling in different people’s responses, just ‘cause.
--- Quote --- Harry received Power for the task in Changes, but he doesn't get the Mantle until after.
--- End quote ---
Yeah, my bad. Harry being angry in Changes was pretty much situation-driven. Doesn’t take much for a dad to be really angry when his little girl’s in danger. I should know.
--- Quote --- Father Douglas tried to take the Swords through murder, hostages, tazing and threatening to blow up an innocent teenage girl.
--- End quote ---
Michael referred to the actions of Father Douglas as evidence that Roarke was being deceived and was in the wrong; despite his anger, the main argument that Michael makes is that it is not up to mankind to second-guess the will of God. Roarke makes great arguments; the knights have been short-staffed at this point for about a decade and the world DOES grow darker by the day. Three knights would obviously be able to do a great amount of good. But we have to take the long view on this, and as readers we know what the characters do not: the swords are being held in wait for their intended users to take up in a fight with a gigantic evil on the horizon, which we know because JB’s told us about the BAT. But Michael don’t know that, and yet he trusts that they should wait with their ordained custodian, despite how the situation presented itself.
--- Quote --- So, at least to my reckoning, Harry having the Swords in Cold Days into Skin Game tends to end worse for everyone involved. Murphy, consciously or not, ended up putting the Swords where they needed to be to do the greatest good.
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Dear God, you’re right. Why did I not see this earlier? I mean, look at this:
--- Quote ---I grunted. “That smells an awful lot like predestination to me. What if those people choose something different?”
“It’s a complex issue,” Jake admitted. “But think of the course of the future as, oh, flowing water. If you know the lay of the land you can make a good guess where it’s going. Now, someone can always come along and dig a ditch and change that flow of water, but honestly, you’d be shocked how seldom people truly choose to exercise their will within their lives.”
--- End quote ---
We keep talking about whether the swords would or would not be in danger if kept in Harry’s possession, and the kinds of harm he could get into if he went bad. But looking at it retrospectively, we see that this argument is moot when compared to what actually transpired: Harry would not have abused the swords during the events of Cold Days, and would have no opportunity to in the period of time between CD and SG. Therefore, the only immediate consequence of Karrin not returning the swords when Dresden reappears is that the swords are in Chicago, and not locked away on Demonreach.
This makes perfect sense. Karrin has her own personal, human reasons for keeping the Swords away, due to mistrust and fear and concern for the future. But Uriel and company know the lay of the land; they know the kind of man Harry is and the kind of woman Murphy is, and can estimate that when Mab inserts Harry into the Denarians’ plan that the swords need to be present.
To return to the original argument: Was it right for Murphy to take the swords from Harry? In this case it seems so on both the mortal and immortal levels. I agree that it was right on the immortal level because the Archangels needed the swords in Chicago for Skin Game. And I echo the Gatekeeper’s words to LaFortier to satisfy the mortal justification: “You question Dresden’s loyalty and his ability. You imply that only a bad seed can grow from bad soil. Your concerns are understandable, and if correct, then Dresden poses a major threat to the council.”
One area in which Murph does go wrong, though, is that she then assumes that she has the right to dole them out to people who she thinks could use them best. I stand by what Michael says at the end of Skin Game: Despite Harry’s clear inclination he thought Murphy could wield a sword, he never actually did call her to be a knight, and she appointed herself despite the fact that she knew that she wasn’t in the right place and mindset to wield one.
--- Quote --- Heaven didn't chose her for the job, and she was a bit less than truthful with Harry about that. Again in her arrogance as Nic put it she had more faith in her own judgement than that of Heaven... Which did lead to a Sword being broken.. She knew why she shouldn't bring or wield a Holy Sword, but she trusted more in her own judgement..
--- End quote ---
Agreed. One thing that is in character for TWG (assuming that these attributes parallel the attributes of the Christian/Hebrew God of the real world) is that the choices of the people in rebellion with God are often used to fulfill the will of God for good. See the destruction of Jerusalem and exile of the Jews during the Babylonian Exile, or the betrayal of Jesus by Judas. Just because the heavenly host turns the results of a person’s actions for good does not retroactively make that person’s actions good.
(BTW - I don’t bring this in to be preachy about Christian faith or anything, but to clearly refer to it as texts which describe this deity as is portrayed by the believers. I’d do the same if I was referencing Homer’s Odyssey to draw a conclusion about Hades.)
--- Quote --- So breaking and entering would have been ok without a werewolf? What about ringing a bell?
…..
Murphy would not have been in his position because she would never have broken in in the first place, she would have used the bell.
--- End quote ---
Harry breaking into Butters’ presumed-empty apartment is not out of character for Private Investigator Harry. Heck, he commits breaking-and-entering several times in Dead Beat – first to the Radio Shack, and second to the Field Museum. Sorry Arian, but I have to agree with Mira’s statement, at least in reference to Andi.
Mira – I used Andi mostly because she’s been mentioned earlier, but you could easily substitute Harry hitting the wall next to Murph’s head for that same scene. In either case, I don’t think that Harry’s acting in a way that Uriel wouldn’t expect.
--- Quote --- Nicodemus is allowed to have one of them too.
--- End quote ---
Agreed. Having the artifacts isn’t any sort of badge of moral clarity; only that a person was clever and skilled enough to get it.
--- Quote --- Again after cold days. Cold days is not really about the big battle scenes, it is about Harry's internal struggle and to ignore that is to rob the book of its meaning.
--- End quote ---
Completely, absolutely yes. I mean, it IS also about the battle scenes; leading the Wild Hunt across open water to wage a naval battle is kinda epic. But the underlying struggle in the entire book is Harry trying to get control of this new influencing factor and trying to figure out how to stay himself.
The mantle doesn’t directly influence a person to change their nature. Human nature itself does that. It’s natural for a human to make the choice that seems easiest and most profitable for the person, and the mantle makes one’s impulses seem extremely pleasurable and good. It’s why people procrastinate so much, for example.
I don’t see the mantle as being more dangerous to Harry than having Lash’s coin. Both were immensely tempting magical forces, for which there just weren’t many examples of people withstanding the temptation of it. Both influenced Harry to act uncharacteristically angry and violent. There are some differences, of course – the mantle makes Harry more of a testosterone junkie than Lash did, but I think that Lash’s ability to reason with Harry and argue her point makes the danger of Dresden falling about equal in both. The difference between the two is that Harry keeps the coin hidden from almost everybody; Michael is the only one of his close friends who knows that he has it. And Michael is OK with Harry holding a sword. Everyone, though, knows that Harry is Winter Knight, and now suddenly people don’t trust him and Karrin feels she has to strip Harry of the sword.
If Karrin knew in Proven Guilty that Harry had a fallen angel in his head, tempting him to give in to her and causing him to act differently, in which at least once an innocent person died because he was indulging his rage, do you think that she would feel similar to how she felt in Skin Game? And does this mean that Karrin would be right when Michael was wrong?
--- Quote ---As for Harry as a wielder... in the right circumstances, maybe. I don't think he's cut out for a permanent position, though. I don't see him wanting to save the Denarians any more than Murphy is. Maybe even a little less willing.
--- End quote ---
I don't know. That's where he is right now, sure. But I can't help thinking that he's being prepared in much the same way that Butters was. I've re-read Dresden's fight with Hannah several times, and it's impossible not to notice that Harry does exactly the role of a Knight here: he confronts her, offers her a choice, tries as hard as he can to help her step away -all to GREAT personal risk- and then defeats her when he had no other choice. That empathy could, over time, become a seed that brings him to recognize and want to help others trapped.
My personal WAG is that such a thing would only happen near the BAT, and probably would be part of Harry's leaving the service of Winter - exchanging one mantle for another. We have, what, five books to go until the BAT? Plenty of time for character growth.
Arjan:
--- Quote ---Harry breaking into Butters’ presumed-empty apartment is not out of character for Private Investigator Harry. Heck, he commits breaking-and-entering several times in Dead Beat – first to the Radio Shack, and second to the Field Museum. Sorry Arian, but I have to agree with Mira’s statement, at least in reference to Andi.
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Butters was his friend. If Harry had behaved as a friend a lot of things would have been different.
He should have warned them for the danger that was comming. The resulting kidnappings could have been prevented. Bob was quite right about it.
Besides using the bell for the field museum or radio shack would have been totally useless. Using the bell for Waldo would have been smart even if only to check if someone was home.
Arjan:
Or in Bobs words:
--- Quote ---Bob snorted. “Which is why the first thing you did, when you got back to town, was call all of your friends and immediately tell them you needed their help, and trust them to help you.”
“It wasn’t like the first thing you did was abuse one of your friends and inflict property damage on his house and steal a powerful magical counselor whose loyalties are transferrable to whoever happens to be holding an old skull—presumably so that you’d have a lackey who would agree with whatever you said instead of give you a hard time about it. And the only beings you’re allowing to help you are a bunch of tiny faeries who worship the ground you walk on because you buy them pizza.” Bob made a skeptical sound. “I can see how important trust is to you, boss.”
--- End quote ---
Mira:
--- Quote --- Harry received Power for the task in Changes, but he doesn't get the Mantle until after.
Yeah, my bad. Harry being angry in Changes was pretty much situation-driven. Doesn’t take much for a dad to be really angry when his little girl’s in danger. I should know.
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No, Harry did have the mantle as of Changes, the deal with Mab was she didn't have control of Harry until little Maggie was safe.. Which is why we have Eb telling Harry not to believe her, she cannot mess with his free will, which was echoed by Uriel's seven words in Ghost story.
--- Quote --- So, at least to my reckoning, Harry having the Swords in Cold Days into Skin Game tends to end worse for everyone involved. Murphy, consciously or not, ended up putting the Swords where they needed to be to do the greatest good.
Dear God, you’re right. Why did I not see this earlier? I mean, look at this:
--- End quote ---
No, she sent them to Michael's house but not to be dispensed...
--- Quote ---We keep talking about whether the swords would or would not be in danger if kept in Harry’s possession, and the kinds of harm he could get into if he went bad. But looking at it retrospectively, we see that this argument is moot when compared to what actually transpired: Harry would not have abused the swords during the events of Cold Days, and would have no opportunity to in the period of time between CD and SG. Therefore, the only immediate consequence of Karrin not returning the swords when Dresden reappears is that the swords are in Chicago, and not locked away on Demonreach.
--- End quote ---
True, but then was Murphy wrong not to return them to the rightful custodian?
--- Quote ---To return to the original argument: Was it right for Murphy to take the swords from Harry? In this case it seems so on both the mortal and immortal levels. I agree that it was right on the immortal level because the Archangels needed the swords in Chicago for Skin Game. And I echo the Gatekeeper’s words to LaFortier to satisfy the mortal justification: “You question Dresden’s loyalty and his ability. You imply that only a bad seed can grow from bad soil. Your concerns are understandable, and if correct, then Dresden poses a major threat to the council.”
--- End quote ---
He did say that, but with Murphy it is still a matter of her trusting her judgement over that of Heaven, and what bothers me she knows that Harry doesn't have faith in a formal religious sense, by implying that she did, so she knew better than him.. He didn't question her logic... But not only did she brow beat him a bit on this point, she was lying to him about that.
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