Author Topic: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?  (Read 3358 times)

Offline SerScot

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Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« on: January 18, 2023, 06:09:06 PM »
Would knowing that have had any impact at all?  Or… does he assume Eb already knows?
"Maybe there will be a laundry emergency at the Carpenter house, and Harry shows up with detergent saying, 'I am Harry of the White Council. And I come back to you now at the turn of the TideTM.'" -  Vairelome 9/25/2011

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Offline Mira

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #1 on: January 18, 2023, 06:35:35 PM »

 Well, the truth came out when Harry told Eb that Thomas was his brother.  We saw the reaction.

Offline SerScot

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #2 on: January 18, 2023, 06:38:37 PM »
Well, the truth came out when Harry told Eb that Thomas was his brother.  We saw the reaction.

Why not immediately?  I’m rereading right now and I don’t recall what happened.
"Maybe there will be a laundry emergency at the Carpenter house, and Harry shows up with detergent saying, 'I am Harry of the White Council. And I come back to you now at the turn of the TideTM.'" -  Vairelome 9/25/2011

Mab =/= Molly

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Offline Conspiracy Theorist

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #3 on: January 18, 2023, 07:23:42 PM »
Thomas and Eb met earlier in Peace Talks, Thomas knew exactly who Eb was, Eb didn’t know Thomas as other than a Whamp, and needled Harry endlessly.

Harry knew all along Eb’s view on Whamps and used it to beat him in his battle with Eb.

Offline Mira

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #4 on: January 19, 2023, 04:54:35 AM »
Why not immediately?  I’m rereading right now and I don’t recall what happened.

 I think for several books or the impression I get anyway, that Harry would have loved to have told
Eb earlier, but he also knew Eb's attitude towards vampires.  What is interesting is that Eb never figured it out, especially given the events in Changes and the bloodline curse..

Offline Ed0517

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #5 on: January 19, 2023, 08:00:16 AM »
I think for several books or the impression I get anyway, that Harry would have loved to have told
Eb earlier, but he also knew Eb's attitude towards vampires.  What is interesting is that Eb never figured it out, especially given the events in Changes and the bloodline curse..

Maybe Eb thinks his grandson was killed by Raith, who usually killed his male heirs?

Offline Mira

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #6 on: January 19, 2023, 12:07:17 PM »
Maybe Eb thinks his grandson was killed by Raith, who usually killed his male heirs?

  That is possible, but his violent reaction was to the fact that Margaret consensually slept with Raith at all, let alone had a child by him.  However Eb may have been in denial about this for years.

Offline KurtinStGeorge

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #7 on: January 20, 2023, 11:45:07 PM »
I agree with Mira.  Also, looking at the way Ebenezer freaked out and attacked Lara in Turn Coat, when Lara said she was going to travel with Harry, I'm pretty sure Harry made the right decision not telling Eb about Thomas earlier.  It just wasn't going to go well. 

Even if in a later book Thomas should show up in front of Ebenezer as a KotC, I feel fairly certain that Eb wouldn't believe what he was seeing.  Not right away.
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Offline vincentric

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #8 on: January 21, 2023, 12:04:10 AM »
The only opportunity to tell Eb was the breakfast visit in PT. Right after Harry invoked guest rights on EB, he could have stopped Thomas from leaving and had an impromptu family meeting. Perhaps in Next Book, we'll learn what caused the feud between Eb and the Whamps. I don't even think Lara knows the details of how it became so personal.

Offline SerScot

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #9 on: January 21, 2023, 12:13:23 AM »
The only opportunity to tell Eb was the breakfast visit in PT. Right after Harry invoked guest rights on EB, he could have stopped Thomas from leaving and had an impromptu family meeting. Perhaps in Next Book, we'll learn what caused the feud between Eb and the Whamps. I don't even think Lara knows the details of how it became so personal.

That would have made sense.  Has Harry told Thomas that Eb is his Grandfather?
"Maybe there will be a laundry emergency at the Carpenter house, and Harry shows up with detergent saying, 'I am Harry of the White Council. And I come back to you now at the turn of the TideTM.'" -  Vairelome 9/25/2011

Mab =/= Molly

Malcom =/= KotC

Offline Ed0517

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #10 on: January 21, 2023, 05:02:18 AM »
That would have made sense.  Has Harry told Thomas that Eb is his Grandfather?

I have to believe Thomas knows who his mother was. And that papa Raith and Lara know too. 

Offline Ed0517

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #11 on: January 21, 2023, 05:08:16 AM »
  That is possible, but his violent reaction was to the fact that Margaret consensually slept with Raith at all, let alone had a child by him.  However Eb may have been in denial about this for years.

Oh, hates his ex-son in law for sure. But I think both the assumed dead and the hatred can live together. I am just giving a little possibility why Eb hasn't openly made the connection. 

Offline Conspiracy Theorist

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #12 on: January 21, 2023, 05:36:04 AM »
I have to believe Thomas knows who his mother was. And that papa Raith and Lara know too.

That is established fact from the text.

I think it is safe to assume that the White Court consider monogamy to be a tropical hardwood. We know Whamps are largely infertile and so spread it around, so during the period Raith was with Margaret he likely had hundreds if not thousands of sexual partners any of whom could have been Thomas mother. It may have been been a 1000 to 1 chance or greater that Thomas Mother was Margaret. Eb never saw Margaret pregnant and likely never knew of the pregnancy. Wilful blindness did the rest. The mothers never survived long after the birth and Thomas was the black sheep, his existence wouldn’t have been publicly announced, at least until his hunger manifested (not all Whamp children become Whamps, like Inari. I doubt Raith let anyone know of his failures if he could avoid it.  He wouldn’t have known what he was until his hunger made its first kill, more than a decade after Margaret left.

Offline SerScot

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #13 on: January 21, 2023, 12:32:17 PM »
I have to believe Thomas knows who his mother was. And that papa Raith and Lara know too.

We know Thomas knows his Mother.  Unlike Harry he has living memories of Maggie Sr.  Does Thomas know who his Grandfather is?  That’s a different question.
"Maybe there will be a laundry emergency at the Carpenter house, and Harry shows up with detergent saying, 'I am Harry of the White Council. And I come back to you now at the turn of the TideTM.'" -  Vairelome 9/25/2011

Mab =/= Molly

Malcom =/= KotC

Offline Mira

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Re: Why didn’t Harry just tell Eb Thomas is also his Grandson?
« Reply #14 on: January 21, 2023, 03:24:41 PM »
We know Thomas knows his Mother.  Unlike Harry he has living memories of Maggie Sr.  Does Thomas know who his Grandfather is?  That’s a different question.

It is, but unless Margaret failed to tell him who her father is, he should know.  But it does get a bit weird, Harry had no clue until Blood Rites that Thomas was his brother, though Thomas knew and didn't tell him right off.  Harry didn't know that Eb was his grandfather or that Margaret was his daughter, though he and Eb had that little heart to heart at the end of Blood Rites. Guess given Harry's injury Eb thought he had had enough shocks,i.e. that Eb was the Blackstaff.  Back to Thomas, he and Harry never talked about Eb on page, so maybe he didn't figure it out.  But then again in Changes, the bloodline curse, Thomas had to know, he isn't stupid.