[Tatterdemalion]

Hello. Halfway through Toll the Hounds reread.

Just finished the chapter where Nimander and crew bring Clip into the Bastion citadel while simultaneously Seerdomin is clocked on the head and awakes next to Itkovian to defend him from the priestess.

Can anyone just clear this part up for me? I was confused the first time... this time I thought everything would make perfect sense, but... not perfect. Better, not perfect.

1) Itkovian and Seerdomin are in his barrow when Seer fights kalyk-crazed priestess Salind. This, surely, is not literal. They are just in a 'magic god realm' type of place that resembles the inside of Itkovian's jewe and gold-filled tomb?
2) The voice Nimander etc. hear is a child's... a boy's? Why is Bellurdan's voice a child's? I assume what happens is when the salmaenklyk (or whatever) hits Desra, Aranatha, Skintick and Nimander when they arrive in the main room they go unconscious, Nimander being sucked into a realm with tons of Hairlock-esque dolls and the mocking voice of 'the Dying God' who we know to be the final fragment of Bellurdan Skullcrusher. Aranatha appears and knows who he is, summons the doll, basically destroying the illusion. Everyone awakes, Desra walks in with blood on her sword saying there was a final priest and a body 'scarecrow.' I take this to mean Bellurdan was prone in sorrow before the stitched-up limbs of Nightchill in a gruesome ressurection attempt (as per Bellurdan's norm when it comes to said hot elder goddess) Is this right|?

3) Who is the 'she' Bellurdan says will pay? Tattersail? Silverfox? Not Nightchill...

4) Why is the paragraph where Skintick breaks through the illusion there? He starts crawling but... does nothing by such crawling. What use was telling us he escaped its mindtrap? Nimaber and Aranatha do everything...

5) Gradithan somehow knew Clip's body was being brought to be used as a vessel to... do what? Was his objective for the Dying God to destroy Itkovian (fledgling, weak god) by using Salind as a pathway to him? Trap Itkovian in Clip? Or use Clip some other way?

6) The Dying God was 'related' to the Crippled God according to Gradithan. Is there reason to believe the Crippled God, deep down below the surface, was controlling Bellurdan? Using him in his broken state (as he is wont to do) to rally more forsaken?

7) The only thing I fully get is Kallor's comments about the curses issued ages past - since he cursed Sister of the Cold Nights in the MOI prologue.

Help!

[Tatterdemalion]

8) And how did Bellurdan get there in the first place? I thought he was a PART of Silverfox and she still exists in the Beast Hold warren with her Imass plantlings. Sometimes I wonder if this section was his way of further involving awesome characters not fully realized (perhaps) by GotM.

[ShadowRaven]

It's been a while since I last read TtH, but here's how I remember it:

1) I assumed Seerdomin's spirit goes to the Redeemer's warren and he is there in a quite real sense, akin to Dead Hedge.
2) That's pretty much how I understood it.
3) I took it to mean Tattersail (and by extension Silverfox, although I'm not sure whether Bellurdan even knows what happened after the explosion that takes him out, maybe he thinks Tattersail survived)
4) Don't really know about this one.
5) Don't remember about this one either, maybe to trap Itkovian in Clip and thus making it possible to truly destroy Itkovian?
6) I don't think the Crippled God was controlling Bellurdan, the relationship was more due to the nature of his being: he is a creature of the Abyss, which is related to chaos, plus he is completely insane and broken inside.
7) Nothing to add there
8) The Dying God is only a part of Bellurdan, possible only the angry/grieving part of his persona that we see revealed in GotM when he goes to apprehend Tattersail. MoI never gives us a perfect answer, but other parts of him might exist inside Silverfox.

This post has been edited by ShadowRaven: 22 January 2011 - 07:51 AM

[champ]

Tatterdemalion, on 22 January 2011 - 01:20 AM, said:

5) Gradithan somehow knew Clip's body was being brought to be used as a vessel to... do what? Was his objective for the Dying God to destroy Itkovian (fledgling, weak god) by using Salind as a pathway to him? Trap Itkovian in Clip? Or use Clip some other way?

His ultimate goal was to usurp Kurald Galain, using Clips body to walk straight into the Andii throne room and to the heart of matters...

Tatterdemalion, on 22 January 2011 - 01:20 AM, said:

6) The Dying God was 'related' to the Crippled God according to Gradithan. Is there reason to believe the Crippled God, deep down below the surface, was controlling Bellurdan? Using him in his broken state (as he is wont to do) to rally more forsaken?

Bellurdan and tCG were only related in the sense that they had a similar religion, they were not connected in any other way that we know of.

Tatterdemalion, on 22 January 2011 - 05:52 AM, said:

8) And how did Bellurdan get there in the first place? I thought he was a PART of Silverfox and she still exists in the Beast Hold warren with her Imass plantlings. Sometimes I wonder if this section was his way of further involving awesome characters not fully realized (perhaps) by GotM.

He was an unwanted guest and the part that was kicked out of Silverfox was all his anger, hate and malice

[Tatterdemalion]

So then the body of the priest hugging the crusified corpse of Nightchill was... a new body of Bellurdan's he got when his rage half was forcibly removed from Silverfox's creation? That is a bit of a mindf$#%!

Thanks for the answers. I guess the Dying God felt Clip's portal to KG and put efforts in to bring him to the temple? How was Gradithan, a glorified thug, smart enough or cool enough to almost pull this crazy coup off? And if Bellurdan's grieving angry half was left behind from Silverfox, why would it (prime mover behind the Dying God cult) even care about usurping KG? Power? More power to revive Nightchill? For that matter, I suppose that would be its reason to usurp Itkovian's fledgling god-realm.

This part is tricky indeed.

[Jade Giant]

Gradithan was an Urdo, Urdomen commander under the Seer, so command was not something he was unused to.

Besides that, the kelyk appeared to be the Dying God's power (he was trying to find a vessel that could contain it and not just leak out again, as Hairlock did). Perhaps he could assert some measure of control through it.

[Sinisdar Toste]

when you're thinking about bellurdan/dying god, you can't forget that he spent a lot of time wandering around the bottom of the abyss, eating pieces of various dead gods. what came out of the rent with the machine probably has very little similarity to bellurdan as he was. the stitched up scarecrow was, imo, not nightchill, but the body that the dying god was trying to get his worshippers to build for him. this is up for interpretation though. why couldn't he use just anybody? cuz they had souls? then why could he use clips? was clip more receptive because he was a plug? oonoes eh? oonoes?