The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers
Kincaid microfiction "Goodbye"
Mira:
--- Quote from: Avernite on March 19, 2020, 08:48:16 PM ---No.
Harry even tells us the difference in PG:
"That boy had noone to tell him the rules, to teach him"
Kim had. She just refused to listen.
--- End quote ---
Exactly, what I never understood was why when Harry told her it was dangerous and beyond her training and experience she simply didn't come clean and tell him about MacFinn? If she really knew Harry, she would have known he would do what ever he could to help him. Or even if she didn't know that, just tell him the truth about what had happened?
Here is a tin hat theory, thanks morris for bringing up both the Korean kid and Molly in the same breath as Kim.. What do the three have in common? All three had talent, that talent unless totally suppressed like eventually in the case of Charity, has to be used, it is a compulsion. The Korean kid may not have started out bad, he may have done just little things, but as he practiced without guidance a degree of hubris begins to take root. All adolescents suffer from arrogance to a certain degree, but in a kid with talent it is on steroids, evolving into the Korean kid using his power over others until eventually leading to warlockhood, people getting hurt or worse and the loss of his head.
Molly followed pretty much the same path, only she got kidnapped and hauled off to Arctus Tor, rescued then assigned to Harry under the Doom before she was totally gone.
Kim may have avoided some of the pitfalls that both the Korean kid and Molly fell into. She may never have had that kind of talent to begin with, but she had enough. So she did a lot of small stuff, Harry perhaps answering questions and offering some guidance, but it was never master/apprentice.
Then she ran into MacFinn and the huberis bug bit her.. For starters I doubt she knew what in the f--k a Loop was or what one could do.. In her arrogance and ignorance she thought this circle was like following a recipe in a cookbook.. Follow the directions, say the secret word and you've contained a monster. She was taking her first step on the road to warlockhood, but it killed her before she could go very far.
Harry was called a warlock because he killed Justin with magic, however Harry had spent the last six years of his life under the strict training and mentor-hood of a retired warden/wizard. No, Justin didn't teach him about the Council or the Seven Laws of Magic but he did put some controls on his charge because he didn't want him to blow up in his face... Well, it happened anyway, but that is another story.
In the case of Kim, Harry lacked the experience to see the danger signs of where she was headed.
Had she been successful with MacFinn, I think eventually she would have ended up a warlock.
Talent + hubris + the arrogance of youth = warlock if left unchecked by the mentorship of a strong experienced wizard.
--- Quote ---The argument has been that Harry wasn't Kim's teacher. Clear this up for me if you would. Was he or not?
--- End quote ---
No, he was not, not in any formal way, not in any informal either... It is like having a medical doctor as a friend, one might ask him or her a medical question once in a while. Usually they rather not answer, but sometimes they do depending on the question. Yes, you are getting information from him or her, you might even learn something, but that doesn't make him or her your teacher. That is the kind of relationship Harry and Kim had. Anymore than I am being your teacher now, though I am answering your question.
morriswalters:
Then to speak specifically to Avernite's position, if he wasn't a teacher, then he taught her nothing. Teaching isn't going, oh, don't do that. At least teaching as I understand it.
didymos:
Just to add fuel to the fire, Harry considered her an apprentice:
--- Quote ---A steak dinner was less than my usual rate, but she was pleasant company, and a sometime apprentice of mine.
Butcher, Jim. Fool Moon (The Dresden Files, Book 2) (p. 2). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
--- End quote ---
Obviously not full-time, but still...
Dina:
I knew I have read that she was her apprentice! Obviously, nothing formal like Molly later, but there was some teacher-student relationship. Yes, that grey area is probably something to blame Harry. And I think he could have been a better teacher. But I still don't think he is responsible for Kim's death.
Mira:
--- Quote from: Dina on March 20, 2020, 02:31:42 AM ---I knew I have read that she was her apprentice! Obviously, nothing formal like Molly later, but there was some teacher-student relationship. Yes, that grey area is probably something to blame Harry. And I think he could have been a better teacher. But I still don't think he is responsible for Kim's death.
--- End quote ---
I don't either, also just because he called her his sometime "apprentice" doesn't mean she was, or she really considered him her "master." Just consider her attitude when she didn't get her way. When Harry realizes that she wants to use this circle, he flat out tells her she doesn't have the training. Her retort is
--- Quote ---"You don't have the right to choose for me."
--- End quote ---
Then he answers..
--- Quote ---"No," I told her. "I've got the responsibility to help you make the right choice."
--- End quote ---
Finishing with
--- Quote ---"Look, Kim," I said. "Give it some time. When you're older, when you've had more experience. . ."
--- End quote ---
Here is what says to me, she doesn't take him seriously never had..
--- Quote ---"You aren't so much older than me," Kim said.
--- End quote ---
He goes on to say she was one of a number of youth that he helped coach though their awakening talent.. Sounds to me like a warlock prevention program.. But back to Kim, perhaps Harry could have been a bit more tactful, but telling the truth doesn't always come out that way. Harry may have called her his sometime apprentice, but from the sound of that argument, she never respected or considered him her master or as a teacher. If she had, she might have heeded his warnings.
Harry feels guilty because he couldn't persuade her to make the right choice, that he feels is his responsibility. But it isn't, he tried to help her choose, but she refused to be helped.. She never respected Harry or saw him as her teacher, if she had, she never would have lied to him. She would have asked him to help her with MacFinn.
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