Small, random questions about RotE that still bother you (spoilers all RotE books)

[Farseer]

Sorry to add to the amount of questions being asked!

Don't apologise! Questions beget answers, and the fun is in sorting them out together.

2) Is it at all possible that Gernia and the Six Duchies/Bingtown continents are actually on the same world? Any hints to this or to the contrary?

So much more to add but I am in the midst of teaching my daughter about The First Fleet (!!)...just wanted to point you to this Voyages of discovery thread, erikh, where I prompted a bit of a discussion re Gernia, a while back. You may also like to have a look at some of the posts in the Gernia threads for various comparisons (that are, by no means, complete!).

So many ROTE and Gernia threads to get back to one day!

['thul]

1) Where exactly are the pirate isles? At first I thought that they were the islands along the Cursed Shores, like Last island, Shield Wall island, etc. Then it seemed like they weren't actually on the map as islands, but as a gray area that appeared to be mainland. Which one of these more closely matches the book?

The pirate isles are outside the cursed shore, but not on the outer edges... They're hard to map since they're constantly shifting, so a non-constant count, with irregular sizes... The region they cover is between bingtown and jamilla.

2) Is it at all possible that Gernia and the Six Duchies/Bingtown continents are actually on the same world? Any hints to this or to the contrary?

That thread Farseer linked has proof (somewhere) that they are not on the same world. The level of technology is too high in Gernia... Magic there also has too many things that do not fit into the RotE magic system...

3) Why aren't the OutIslands on the map?

No idea. Perhaps because of that Out Island law on charts and maps? (charts only on sea animal skin, maps only on hide of land creatures) But they would have been placed a good distance out from the near islands.

[Farseer]

Gah, I have so many things I want to go back and respond to in this thread! This one, at least, I can offer without too much thought and time needed:

I know its going back a bit but re the 'broken' one. Do we know the overheard conversation was between Shrewd and Chade? Doesn't Fitz talk about it sounding like one person having a conversation with themselves? Could have been Shrewd arguing with himself or skilling to someone!

I would never be so bold as to ever say I 'know' anything about RH's characters or works...she's a trickster who could allude to all sorts of things that would then turn out to be the opposite of whatever it was she was leading me to or what I was suspecting! Still, I am as sure as I can be that it definitely was a conversation between Chade and Shrewd. Other than what I have posted already, there is this from Fool's Fate, which Fitz noted just prior to the Skill coterie healing him at Buckkeep (remembering he was just coming to so was unsure as to who was speaking as this point...he could only hear the voice):

'No!' I thought the voice was King Shrewd's. Then I knew it could not be. It must be Chade, sounding so like his brother.

Shrewd was long dead, and the passage later goes on to show that it was Chade talking, and not Shrewd.

Here Fitz demonstrates just how alike Shrewd and Chade's voices were (as they also were in the original passage which we are talking about) and seeing as he was also 'under the weather' during this and the original coversation, it is justifiable that his confusion mirrors itself each time.

[Farseer]

...and what is it with the Fool and roses?

I'm not doing another thing until I ask,"Fool has a thing for roses?"

I have been researching the use of roses throughout the ROTE books (ever since I began looking into the rose Gankis and Kennit found on the Others' Island ) - see post #68 for a general 'roses' information dump! - so I would be ever so interested to hear what you have found out about them and a connection with Fool, Nightchade!!!

I have a short list already eg rose-scented flannel; Fool's white rose with black stem, given to Garetha as a gift; use of the rose to indicate the changes that occur between Elderlings and dragons etc, so it would be fantastic to compare findings. I'll get to listing mine as soon as I can...better cook dinner for a starving, waiting (getting angry) mob!!

[Nightchade]

Farseer. Actually I might be going mad...I saw your post and started hunting for a scene where the Fool appears with a rose emblem embroidered on his costume. Gad, I cannot find it and wonder if it twas a dream! This image made everything else for me assume a significance perhaps it didn't have. Maybe I'm so obsessed at the moment that RL and fantasy are blending! Does anyone else recall such a scene ? if not then maybe I am prescient and its in a future book!!!..steals my thunder a bit though..sorry.

I have had some fun looking and of course ended up reading huge chunks instead of getting on with 'Dragon Keeper'. I have: the carved flower given to Garetha, Rose oil in the bath, the rose scented 'kerchief over his eyes(I think this happens at the Bresingas) along with huge bouquets of roses in the room. (This just could be the Bresingas hospitality but did they know the Fool was fond of roses?) Fool asks (sarcastically) whether Kettricken had scattered rose petals in front of the traders(they would not have questioned it because she was foreign to them) In FF the little teapot the Fool has with him has a rose shaped lid. The analogy with the white and red roses which leads to the Fool speculating as to whether Fitz had been touched by dragons in the past. (earlier after spying on the traders the Fool is talking of flying dragons and Fitz has the ghost of a memory where he seemed to be flying himself) With the rose found on 'others island' I was also looking for a meaning and so thought there had to be some significance.

Non Fool linked rose stuff, the pale woman uses an analogy, something along the lines of 'futures bud at the end of every moment,each one changed by a falling rose petal..' Hap talks about not wanting to tend his master's wife's rose garden, Patience talks about caterpillars on the roses to show how things had changed with the times. I haven't 'attacked' the first trilogy yet or liveships but hadn't picked up anything in my initial readings other than the Others Island thing.
I don't know what this means if anything. Red roses are traditionally linked with love but I'm wondering if there's a link with roses and change, with roses somehow representing life before a change. (Rose bushes live a long time even if the flowers don't, the Others Island rose will not perish, love never dies) or perhaps as a portent to change.(dragon analogy,caterpillars,falling petals) which is why they might appeal to the Fool. Of course he may just like the scent... I need to think some more about this. Sorry if this disappoints and you've heard it all before.I'm still relatively new to these books. I'm off to view the rose thread you mentioned now. Fascinating.

[Nightchade]

...Oh I forgot...AQ the 'roses' the Fool saw in Fitz's cheeks!

[Farseer]

Yes, I had all of these listed, Nightchade, though your having had them up here has now freed me from having to type them up!

Still, I agree, it is all fascinating to find these little tidbits and look for links! I near squealed the house down around my ears the first time I realised Fool's teapot had a rosed-shaped lid...!!!

I’m the same in that it is so easy to get sidetracked when searching for one topic…I end up reading a couple of chapters before I remember I was there for a reason, or I come across another subject I was looking for quotes for, and so then begin searching for things related to that topic!

I'm not sure about the Bresingas re roses. I certainly went when I first read it, and I absolutely WANT it to mean something (!!), but as it later mentioned their rose garden, I started to second-guess myself, thinking that they had a rose garden so it was only natural that they would place bouquets of roses in Lord Golden's room. Of course, you may be right in that they may still have had some knowledge that Lord Golden enjoyed roses over other flowers. They certainly seem to feature more in TM than the Farseer books.

I thought there would be a clue within Fool's old room (in the Farseer trilogy) but the coverlet on the baby had pansies, not roses, on it. Fitz also noted that there were 'flowers' in a bowl, and the patterns on Fool's bed covering appeared to be flower-like, but he didn't single out the rose as being present let alone significantly more in evidence than any other kind of flower.

A few other things from Farseer and RWC as well, though I doubt that any of these are anything of worth in the whole ‘rose’ scheme of things:

Fitz went to give Molly some yellow roses from the Women's Gardens but then discovered her with Jade. He had also expected the pleasure of the Skill to be like the scent of a rose. A minstrel sang the song 'A Fair Rose Amidst the Clover' to Lady Grace. Some of the women from the Mountain Kingdom wore rose-coloured robes but there were many other colours worn also.

Fitz asked Burrich for rosehips to relieve his Skill headache after he Skilled with Shrewd in RA, and at one time likened the colour of Kettricken’s face to the roses that would one day bloom again in the Queen’s Garden. Rose was also one of the flower names Fitz wondered if Molly would call their child.

Ah, RWC, Alise’s family home had a humble rose garden, Alise’s mother had purchased rose silk and pink ribbon for her ball dress, Alise had dreamed of roses being brought to her by a romantic suitor and she later likened one of Heeby’s scarlet scales to a large rose petal.

Will add more soon. I can't think of a time where I remember Fool with a rose embroidered on his chest but that's not to say it's not there. Was it when he was 'Fool' or 'Lord Golden' do you think? As LG, I thought he always just wore the cock pheasant on his chest? Hmm, far more searching is required!

[Farseer]

3)
Why aren't the OutIslands on the map?

Quick reply as I need at least an hour or two of some shut-eye...it's so hard keeping up with old posts, let alone new ones, especially when working on other 'stuff' in between...!

Yes, I agree with 'thul with regard to the laws on charts and maps. The Outislander laws are very firm with regard to their creating charts and maps.

I also have a little theory that the positioning of the islands could be somehow significant eg that they create some kind of pattern or shape when seen from above. I'm not sure why I think that but they are "The God Runes" after all, so, ah, I don't know ...I guess I'm thinking that El, or Eda, etc put them in some kind of special order? At the very least, they make me think of the Stone Game, with the islands being in strategic places rather than the stones.

It is also worthy to again note that Aslevjal was depicted as the most likely centre of the entire 'world', at least on the map within the Aslevjal map tower. This makes me wonder if there is some true connection to it and the gods...or was it like that as those in Aslevjal simply considered themselves the centre of the world (as we humans once believed we were the centre of the solar system?)...or was it merely to hint at the (unknown) lands to the north and to the very east of the map?

['thul]

It would've been most nice to see a map, but perhaps the map of the out islands is not for mortal eyes? (kind of like that the David/Leigh Eddings plot elements known as the darine codex and the mrin codex were never published because the authors would only write them if the publisher published them on scrolls...)

Ok, time to pull at straws... Say the islands are meant to be seen from above... The gods (El and Eda) see them from above. Dragons fly and see things from above. Could therefore El and Eda have been dragons? (El could easily fit in as a cruel and arrogant dragon, and Eda could be some form of kinder, more helpful dragon that taught her human flock various arts...

[Farseer]

It would've been most nice to see a map, but perhaps the map of the out islands is not for mortal eyes?

Yes, that's what I figure. If Fool is going to keep things from RH, who therefore cannot share certain things about 'him' with us, then I am certain she has been given no inside knowledge re the God Runes, from the gods either.

Could therefore El and Eda have been dragons?

I brought up a discussion regarding this...sorry but just have to sift through and find it!