The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers
Fae Rankings
Mira:
--- Quote from: g33k on October 15, 2023, 03:40:09 AM ---I do not think Summer & Winter take turns on the Outer Gates.
Before it was the Fae, it was one of the Pagan pantheons; I'm pretty sure there's WoJ to the effect that both the Norse and the Greek pantheons had turns, and I presume an older one (Egyptian? Sumerian?) before that.
--- End quote ---
I think it is complicated, just checked out the chapters where Mother Summer takes Harry to the Outer Gates, she says that it is Mab's job to protect the Gates, and Titania's job to protect the rest of us from Mab. Still at the Gates Summer supplies the medics to treat the wounded, so Winter doesn't do it alone.. It wasn't always Winter, and Winter doesn't do it alone.
Rashid says page 340 Cold Days
--- Quote ---"Always," he said. "There are always Outsiders trying to tear their way in. There are always forces in place to stop them. In our age, it is the task of Winter to defend these boundaries, with the help of certain others to support them.
--- End quote ---
Harry also comes to the conclusion that the White Council has no clue at all about most of this.
Back to the original question as to rankings of the Fae, reread chapters 31 through 34 of Cold Days, you will get a better idea of how the Mothers, Harry called Mother Winter, "a fundamental power of the world," rank compared to Mab and Titania and in turn to at that time to Maeve and Lilly.
g33k:
--- Quote from: Mira on October 14, 2023, 11:07:33 PM ---... It is all about their perception of what is true, not what actually is untrue, ergo a lie, but as long as they believe they are telling the truth by their lights, it isn't a lie! ::) ...
--- End quote ---
Note that the fae don't come anywhere close to practicing the kinds of self-deception and willful blindness that many mortals do. If the fae "believe" something is true, it's more likely to be true than if a human believes it; but it's a highly-specific, letter-of-the-law "truth" the faeries hold to. The fae are so literal-minded about "truth" and so specific in their language, that humans (who are used to dealing with "A implies B" as being virtually the same as "A means also-B") regularly get screwed-over in dealings with the fae. (q.v. "legalese," which also regularly screws-over mortals).
--- Quote from: Mira on October 14, 2023, 11:07:33 PM --- ... However if you bargain with the Fae with the belief that they will be fair to you since they cannot lie, oops, you just got screwed... ::) As Harry has found out trying to deal with Mab...
--- End quote ---
And the Leanansidhe!
But Harry knew better, knew the risks of bargaining with the Fae; he didn't go into those deals expecting the Fae to be "fair" in their dealings.
He just overestimated his own ability to avoid the traps; and of course was in desperate straits...
--- Quote from: Mira on October 14, 2023, 11:07:33 PM ---... But they did have it in hand, didn't they. Somehow Harry just happened to make his way to their cottage where he was given the unraveling...
--- End quote ---
No, the Mothers were also in dire straits, here.
Nemfection, you'll remember, is both subtle and powerful; it acts on a level on-par with the Mothers.
With Aurora having knife-in-hand and Lily on the Stone Table, the world -- and both Courts -- were one slash away from disaster. Not even the Mothers can safely plan that sort of timing, that far in advance; mortals are too random, wild, and unpredictable at the fine-detail level (even if their broader "destiny" sorts of actions largely are predictable). I suspect the Starborn are even-less "predestined" than most.
--- Quote from: Mira on October 14, 2023, 11:07:33 PM --- ... You think it an accident that Mab shows up in his office in the early chapter telling him she just took over his contract from his godmother?
...
Lets go back to when Mab tells Harry that the Summer Knight has been murdered and the Summer Court was holding her responsible. Why in the heck would Mab go to an obscure wizard detective in Chicago to save her hide?
--- End quote ---
Not an accident, no...
But also, not an "obscure" wizard detective... not to Mab!!!
My own WAG is that Mab herself was the one who initiated the "Starbabe" plan; it was her intention, all along, to gain a Starborn-Wizard Winter Knight, and she laid her plans a generation in advance.
My Wild-Ass-Guess:
(click to show/hide)*We have seen, repeatedly, that the Big Players understand that Something Really Big is coming (they have the inside scoop on Jim's writing schedule, and the BAT is coming along quickly).
* Mab's biggest job isn't "be in charge of Winter," but "run the war against the Outsiders," and Mab is one of those Big Players. She knows there's going to be major Outsider action -- likely beyond anything she has faced before -- Really Soon. Jim has said that Mab regularly thinks in generational terms (she doesn't mind spending lives against the Outsiders, because she can so-quickly renew her forces with recruits from the Wildfae and mortal-changeling outcrosses).
* Being Mab, planning long-term, and knowing when the Starborn cycle will produce Starbabes, she looked around to find mortal-practitioner breeding stock. Lo, there was rebellious Margaret LeFay (and, I suspect, another practitioner of the "Mallory" family: Mab's hardly the "all her eggs in one basket" kinda girl! But we have zero info about Elaine's family, so that branch of the speculative tree stops there).
* Mab directed her handmaid to repeatedly cross Maggie Sr's path, "accidentally" encountering her and moving from acquaintance to familiarity, even a bit of comfort. I suspect the Ruby Waystone is partially because Mab wanted M. LeFay to be extra-comfortable with the Fae, and further divided from mortals -- such isolation breeds desperation and extreme plans.
* I think it was Mab's plotting that brought the "Starborn" facts to Maggie's attention, made the idea seem attractive. But of course with Papa Raith in the picture nothing good would come of this, so Maggie first had to get free. She knew it could cost her her life... but she "luckily" (again: no luck involved, all Mab's plan!) had this demi-friend, the Leananside, ready to become a protector / faerie-godmother to the new Starborn.
* Enter Malcolm Dresden, stage Right. NOT part of Mab's plan, but Uriel's subtle contribution. Eb testifies that he was "a man with a good soul like few I have ever seen," and Uriel saw to it that this man was Harry's father & had the rearing of Harry for the critical formative years.
* Exit Malcolm Dresden, stage Left. I suspect Lea killed him: Harry found him with a smile on his face, and cold (and WoJ is that Lea has done something that would make Harry angry enough to kill her, if he knew what she had done). But Malcolm couldn't raise a prospective Winter Knight right: he was to kind, too gentle; Malcolm (by Mab's lights) had to go.
* Orphanages are notoriously-good places to "toughen up" a child. After a few years, send him off magic tutelage by a harsh wizard, to get some conventional training & toughen him further. Perfect!, Mab would think. Note here: Ebenezer apparently knew Harry was in the orphanage, and kept a (somewhat distant) eye on him. But it was Justin DuMorne who spotted Harry's first spontaneous use of magic, and scooped in to "rescue" him.
* I think Justin's sponsor was Mab. The fae could keep an even-closer eye on Harry than any WC wizard could. Then when Justin grabbed him, Mab covered his tracks (I think the later element of Morgan "spending" his Oak-Leaf to proved impenetrable resistance to tracking was a clue-drop by Jim: as a Senior Badass, Morgan could easily have been written to do this on his own, this was Jim telling us how the Fae can stop tracking; just like Harry became un-trackable -- even to Ebenezer! -- during his apprenticeship with Justin).
So... Mab is making her plans; and they very much involve Harry, the Starborn wizard.
The Mothers' plans are even subtler than Mab's, but I don't think they wanted to let matters get to the knife-edge they got to; "it all worked out" doesn't mean that was what they had planned, wanted, or would willingly have allowed. But, the Mothers' hands were tied in this matter; and their lips sealed, unable to give the Queens the info they needed.
--- Quote from: Mira on October 14, 2023, 11:07:33 PM --- ... No, it took a neutral party for all the elements of the conspiracy to be rooted out, that took detective work ...
--- End quote ---
Aurora cleverly hid the truth from the Titania and from Mab. They each had to name an Emissary, to uncover the truth. Harry -- and the two Queens -- needed the "detective work." But when Harry finally worked his way up to the Mothers, it was clear they were "leading the witness," helping him to formulate the right questions to ask.
The Mothers knew the right answer, they had the solution in-hand already.
As I argue above: the situation had gotten too chancy, the issue too important. If they could have told the Queens, they would have.
vincentric:
When it comes to Aurora, I think you're slightly off.
I think it's highly likely that both Titania and Mab knew that she was Nemfected by the time of SK but were unable or unwilling to take direct action against her.
If someone as cold and calculating as Mab couldn't bring herself to directly put Maeve down, how much harder would it be for Titania, who is governed by her emotions, to destroy Aurora. I think Titania let things go so far to force Mab to stop Aurora. She couldn't face the pain herself. Mab was willing to do it, hence Harry, but she didn't want to kill her niece and further hurt her sister directly. Any future works they had to cooperate on would be more contentious and therefore risky. Plus, though she only shows it in extreme moments, Mab does care. She just won't let caring get in the way of necessity or expediency.
Mira:
--- Quote ---Note that the fae don't come anywhere close to practicing the kinds of self-deception and willful blindness that many mortals do. If the fae "believe" something is true, it's more likely to be true than if a human believes it; but it's a highly-specific, letter-of-the-law "truth" the faeries hold to. The fae are so literal-minded about "truth" and so specific in their language, that humans (who are used to dealing with "A implies B" as being virtually the same as "A means also-B") regularly get screwed-over in dealings with the fae. (q.v. "legalese," which also regularly screws-over mortals).
--- End quote ---
Back to the old question, "what is truth?" Because as we have seen over and over again, what you are saying it Fae truth might not be the same as human truth, so both can be true and at the same time a lie depending on your point of view.
--- Quote ---But Harry knew better, knew the risks of bargaining with the Fae; he didn't go into those deals expecting the Fae to be "fair" in their dealings.
--- End quote ---
Only because he had to learn the hard way.. As a frightened sixteen year old boy he bargained with Lea to get the power to beat Justine.. She took full advantage getting three promises from him for as Jim said, "confidence.." He already had enough power apparently, but she never told him that.
--- Quote ---My own WAG is that Mab herself was the one who initiated the "Starbabe" plan; it was her intention, all along, to gain a Starborn-Wizard Winter Knight, and she laid her plans a generation in advance.
--- End quote ---
Not just yours, that is easy enough to surmise, who gets a "real" fairy godmother, and a powerful one at that, unless there was a lot of planning in advance.. I also surmise that the only reason Margaret's death curse had any effect on Lord Raith is she had help from Mab or even Mother Winter in setting it up before hand, because she knew that leaving Lord Raith and having a child by Malcolm was most likely a death sentence for her.
--- Quote ---The Mothers knew the right answer, they had the solution in-hand already.
--- End quote ---
Did they? Or if the solution was attained too easily it in of itself would create suspicion and make matters worse for Mab.
Mira:
--- Quote ---If someone as cold and calculating as Mab couldn't bring herself to directly put Maeve down, how much harder would it be for Titania, who is governed by her emotions, to destroy Aurora. I think Titania let things go so far to force Mab to stop Aurora. She couldn't face the pain herself. Mab was willing to do it, hence Harry, but she didn't want to kill her niece and further hurt her sister directly. Any future works they had to cooperate on would be more contentious and therefore risky. Plus, though she only shows it in extreme moments, Mab does care. She just won't let caring get in the way of necessity or expediency.
--- End quote ---
I agree, Titania also carried a grudge against Harry, not for killing her daughter, which she knew had to be done, but by having Toot and Company do it with steel..
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