[Abyss]

Picking this up from a drift on another thread... re whether Kettle knew what was coming, noting Udinaas and Wither had briefly discussed it.

Gem Windcaster;196660 said:

Abyss, if you read the parts with Kettle again, you'll notice a certain...feeling...that she does know what is going to happen. I don't wanna ruin anything for you. Re-read FTW!

...iirc, it's nothing more than hints - no explicit statement from Kettle that at some point Silch is going to use her as a pincushion.

In fact, i thought the relative lack of Kettle viewpoint and focus (as opposed to her status as a viewpoint character in MT) was so the reader wasn't too freaked out when the supposed ten year old child is throttled, broken and stabbed by a (more-or-less) 'good-guy' of the story. Plus she was ref'd as being raped earlier in the book.

It's all in stark contrast to MT where she was running around killing muggers and apparently punching FA brains out through the front of their heads (see one of Udinaas' flashbacks in MT). Brought back to 'life', Kettle became a victim and ultimately a sacrifice.

Really, she seemed to be around more to make Udi and Seren sympathetic than as her own character... When she attacked Wither as the wraith was strangling Udinaas was about the only point she actually stood out... and we all know how THAT ended.

Not that i'm complaining - it works in the overall. I suspect her death/whatever WOULD have been much less palatable if we had seen more of her in RG.

And of course, we might see her again in the Refugim Azath House.

- Abyss, dissects to admire.

[Agraba]

Well SE isn't supposed to make things palatable for us, and make all our sympathized characters have everything wonderful and dandy. IMO it would have added quality to her death scene if we grew attatched to her in some way. However, in this book SE had too many plot threads to make us all that attatched to anybody, which took a little away from the quality, despite the fact that this was the biggest book yet.

[Gem Windcaster]

I can't say agree with the not-being-attached, Agraba. Besides, we don't know the exact fate of Kettle. Lots of plot threads, though, for sure. Lots of them.

For me, the absolute by-the-way quality of SE's death scenes are what makes them work for me. It makes them feel more real. I don't know how to explain it more, just that sometimes the story-wise unexpected is more beautiful than the worked up drama.

[Falco]

Here's a foreshadowing line from Kettle, Abyss:

Quote

Yes, this is what is to live
It made all she was knew coming a little easier to bear

RG, TPB, p622

In the immediate aftermath of Seren Pedac's rape of Udinaas' mind and the whole party fighting with each other. Just came across while looking for another quote. I agree with Gem, there is other foreshadowing. While I was surprised by Kettle's death I was not stunned.

[Abyss]

Excellent use of quote. Interesting. It makes sense that Kettle would know what was coming, but at the same time it wasn't really apparent that she knew the end was coming for her, other than by that quote in retrospect.

And tet Udinaas - who did know what was coming based on his conversation with Wither - still tried to prevent it.

And given all of that, shouldn't someone have told Seren, who proceeded to brain'splode Wither and make Clip bleed from his skull? Or was she just covering Fear and/or Trull...

- Abyss, really needs to get on with the reread...

[Gem Windcaster]

There's a saying among litterature scholars: a book read only once is not read.

[Mael]

I believe that the Azath brought Kettle to the Jaghut house with the frozen FA inside to take its soul and hold it so that when the time comes for Kettle (who held the place of Seed in the azath Hold) to die and revive the Azath, the FA whose soul she possessed would be reimprisoned aswell.