[Venerus]

By Illuyankas' suggestion, re-posting this thread from the MoI forum. I was trying to find an answer to this question, stumbled across this, originally posted by a now-defunct forum member:

"I have something I need clarification on: on many topics in this forum I have read that Icarium shattered a warren. Is that the warren in Raraku you are referring to? I got the impression that it was the shattered warren that made Icarium his present self, as it changed so many others. I thought that shattered warren was the result of the Soletaken ritual gone awry. I believed i read something in MoI that led me to believe that the Warren was that of Chaos, but it could also be Kurald Emurlahn, because they seem to have something to do with shapeshifters, because the real gate of the Path of Hands led into Kurald Emurlahn, which Shadowthrone wanted to prevent someone from entering and becoming "his" master. So, where do the books say that Icarium shattered a warren? Pagereferences welcome." -Nexuslord

Reply: "In the the last 15 pages or so of Deadhouse Gates, Gothos mentions it to Fid, Apsalar and Crokus (he's explaining Icarium's madness). Unfortunately, it doesn't discuss which warren in particular, although the fact that he presumably shattered it in Raraku and that the Apocalypse is using a fragment of KE would lend credence to your theory. Against it is the fact that Icarium shattered whatever warren it was 94,000 years ago, and I still can't track down when KE was shattered."

And then Illuyankas added "you'll get an answer in the next few books."



Not soon enough -- let's all speculate woo woo!

[Illuyankas]

Well, considering when I checked your previous posts to see how much information I could reveal without spoiling you, and found you had several in this forum, I assumed you'd read up to and including RG. Am I right?



In any case, we know for certain Scabby broke KE, which is all you need to know if you haven't read RG, and we know from DG that Azaths can grow around warrens, and best guess about the one that Iccy broke is that it's a fragment of KE that was claimed by the Azath and remade into it's own.

[Aptorian]

Actually Scabby started what would lead to the sundering. I think he merely wounded it... the quotes are very vague. I'm guessing dragons and ascendants did the real destruction.

As for the question whether it was a shadow fragment that was reshattered at the soletaken ritual or at the Tremolo Azath... good question. I don't recall if Gothos for example actually says "it was a fragment of Kurald Emurhlan".

If the First Empire was messing about with Shadow fragments it might be connected to another mystery. The hounds of shadow. Perhaps what ever Dessimbelackis was up to with the Deragoth involved shadow and when he did what ever he did to become a D'ivers an unconnected shadow of the Deragoth was created .

[caladanbrood]

Yes, the details are still rather vague. Basically Scabby started it by spilling royal blood (The Edur royal line, I'm assuming). They carried on using it anyway, which broke it apart more, and when Icarium destroyed the azath, it lost it's anchor-point, so to speak.

[Optimus Prime]

Yeah if you remember in Midnight Tides...Silchas basically calls Scabby out on the whole "You started the Civil Wars" accusation. Scabby gets mad...and then stabs Silchas in the back.

We still don't know who the Royal line of Edur was and what their relation is to the rest of the Tiste guys (Anomander, Osseric, the Three Sisters etc) though.

[Thelomen Toblerone]

caladanbrood;248267 said:

Yes, the details are still rather vague. Basically Scabby started it by spilling royal blood (The Edur royal line, I'm assuming). They carried on using it anyway, which broke it apart more, and when Icarium destroyed the azath, it lost it's anchor-point, so to speak.

Well that makes alot more sense than my thoughts, which were "Scabby wounded it. It slowly died and broke apart."

But then again, I am a simpleton.

[Optimus Prime]

So does the spilling of Royal blood that is attuned to the warren tear it? My question then would be that Andarist is technically part of the royal blood (son of MD) and if Rake and or Silchas were to die...would that wound Kurald Galain in any way?

[Coco with marshmallows]

good question, but i think it might depend on what the whole 'casting out' ritual entails, remember a la trull there was supposedly a distinct seperation.

suppose something similar had been done for the children of mother dark, and it might be that their deaths will no longer affect it. Their link to it has been severed.

[Optimus Prime]

True.

I guess we don't know enough about the Civil Wars yet. I would think that Rake's death would be a heavy blow to KG and MD. He was her favored son after all.

I wonder if that is part of the CG's scheme? Weakening or breaking up all the Tiste Warrens. We've already heard rumors that the Liosan Warren is poisoned or infused with some foreign god's power.

[Dolorous Menhir]

I've always thought it significant that "sundering" has never been defined. People seem to conflate the shattering of KE into fragments with Scabby's sundering, but I don't think they are really the same event.

Related, but not the same.

Dictionary definitions suggest that "sunder" means separate. This is not the same as shatter, and I think it may have more to do with the civil war and infra-Edur strife rather than the literal destruction of KE.

[Skywalker]

I just thought up a really crazy theory... bear with me.

Killing the dragon that was associated with Kurald Emurlahn (the way Sorrit was with Serc) would certainly sunder it. Maybe Scabandari was guilty of killing the Edur royal line, and then going after whatever dragon that was... it would make sense that to get to that dragon, he'd have to go through the royals.

Now, assume that Scabandari did to the Shadow dragon what he did to Sorrit - crucified it on a blackwood frame... without quite killing it. That would weaken the warren immensely... for arguments sake let us say that this happens on Jackuruku... (hint hint!)

Next Father Shadow tries to take the throne. Because he's been going around hunting dragons, he causes the attacks by the 'feral' dragons. The throne of Shadow becomes too pricey to try to occupy...

Scabandari then goes ahead with an insane powerplay - he allies with the Andii and invades Wu. Then betrays Silchas Ruin to the Azath and thinks himself ruler of Wu since he realizes the KCCM/ KCNR are nearly extinct, and he underestimates the Jaghut, Imass, and surviving Andii (no mention here of the Forkrul Assail... )

Kilimandaros and Mael then whoop his ass and Gothos puts his soul in the Imass dagger as a just punishment. Note that Kurald Emurlahn is still intact but beset by many contendors to the throne (the three dragons chained in the circle of rocks in Shadow, and Edgewalker's other companions)...

Later on, two events sunder Kurald Emurlahn beyond recognition...

The Crippled God is dragged into Wu and the first of the Jade giants follows him and crashes onto Jackuruku... in the vicinity of the impaled dragon of Shadow... thus converting it into the Otataral Dragon, and causing an initial breakup of Kurald Emurlahn. When the three Elder Gods later deal with Kallor, K'rul picks up said Otataral Dragon along with the topsoil on Jackuruku and puts it into what will become the Imperial Warren...

An indeterminate amount of time before/ after, or maybe around the same time, Icarium goes batty and attacks an Azath that he believes houses Gothos - said Azath being Tremorlor, which exists in Shadow...

And thus, we have explained a) the sundering of KE, the Otataral dragon, and c) Scabandari's role in all this.

Find chinks in the theory please... I'm tired now.

[Optimus Prime]

Good point DM.

I think Edgewalker knows the answers. Perhaps if we get another PoV of him...he'll shed some light.

I kind of like the idea of certain Tiste being tied to their warrens.

Would Rake's death and many other Eleint's death affect SD warren?

[Venerus]

I like your theory, Sky. I'm wondering -- Tremorlor seems to have grown up specifically to house a fragment of KE/shadow. If there are two sunderings/shatterings of KE that makes sense, but if Icarium is responsible for the big blowout in Ruraku then it wouldn't make sense if Tremorlor were already there before his rage. We'd need to come up with a reason for Icarium finding out Gothos was in an Azath while Icarium is in Raraku (or flipping out in Raraku instead of on Malaz island).

Related point: Do we know what warren/hold is associated with D'ivers and Soletaken? We know that bonecasters use the beast hold, is there anything to suggest that D'ivers and Soletaken use it too? The OP (the real OP, not me ) suggested that KE or some part thereof is the Soletaken warren -- presumably Dissemb will give us more clues in tTH and onward. Maybe Icarium's breaking KE is what caused the first empire to fall apart (would make some sense since he was around to murder all those Imass that showed up).

[D'rek]

Venerus;248524 said:

I like your theory, Sky. I'm wondering -- Tremorlor seems to have grown up specifically to house a fragment of KE/shadow. If there are two sunderings/shatterings of KE that makes sense, but if Icarium is responsible for the big blowout in Ruraku then it wouldn't make sense if Tremorlor were already there before his rage. We'd need to come up with a reason for Icarium finding out Gothos was in an Azath while Icarium is in Raraku (or flipping out in Raraku instead of on Malaz island).

I like to think that after KE was "sundered" it was a bunch of fragments instead of a whole warren, but the Shadow-House held all the pieces in place. Then after the Shadow-house was destroyed by Iccy, the warren was "shattered" and the pieces started floating around like they are now.
As for Iccy finding out Gothos was in an Azath, Gothos implies in DG that Iccy's memory problems are a result from him destroying the Azath. Thus, Iccy could have learned about Gothos at any time before that event, though his rage towards the azath probably only occured when he came near it.

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Related point: Do we know what warren/hold is associated with D'ivers and Soletaken? We know that bonecasters use the beast hold, is there anything to suggest that D'ivers and Soletaken use it too? The OP (the real OP, not me ) suggested that KE or some part thereof is the Soletaken warren -- presumably Dissemb will give us more clues in tTH and onward.

In MoI, when talking about the ascension of Togg and Fanderay to the Beast Throne, they remark that "All those fools on the Path of Hands, the game was one far away." ie, the path of Hands, which was supposed to give the victor godhood over the pure soletaken and d'ivers, was a route to the throne of the Beast Hold. Seems to me that the Beast Hold is the fundamental warren or hold associated with the shapeshifters. Dessimbelackis may be a special case where he combined traditional shapeshifting magicks with darkness and/or shadow...

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Maybe Icarium's breaking KE is what caused the first empire to fall apart (would make some sense since he was around to murder all those Imass that showed up).

The T'lan Imass showed up to slaughter the Empire citizens, but I don't recall any mention of the T'lan Imass getting murdered themselves...

[Ain't_It_Just_]

Sounds paranoid, but I think Telorast and Curdle had something to do with it. Even Kallor quailed before them. Probably just a passing fancy.

But yes, Iccy shattering KE sounds a distinct possibility. Going into the Machine, repairing it (or working towards it)... hmmm.

[Mentalist]

heh... my take on things
Edur royal line was Draconean. Scabby kiling them, spilled their bllod, destabilised KE. as it got destabilized, various powers wen in to claim it, causing more blood to be spilled, ala RG prologue. KE got thrown to pieces--the biggest one hanging over Lether, one over Raraku, one (presumably) in the Cloud forest and any other place we;ve seen the Edur. Also, one over Drift Avail, where Rake took the Throne of Shadow. Another chunk got tossed over Jhag Odhan, where an azath for the continient of 7C superimposed itself over it. When Iccy went mental and wounded the Azath, he destrroed that part of KE, which was an isolated "pocket warren" on its own.
May not be as fancy as some of the other explanations, but here it is...

[D'rek]

you know what's weird? that there's still all these floating shards of KE, but the throne of shadow itself has relocated to 'Wu'...

[Illuyankas]

Shadowthrone and Cotillion actually hid it on Drift Avalii themselves, it didn't move itself.

[vaiski]

I thought that Rake moved the throne way back when - in HoC Apsalar notes that Shadowthrone would move the throne away from there if he could, but Rake's sorcery prevents him.

[Venerus]

A few quotes that caught my eye this morning:
HoC p. 699 in the US paperback. Phyrlis is speaking w/Cynnigig:
"...[the Azath] was already dying and had been for years. Fatally wounded. Oh, Icarium was on his knees by the time he finally delivered the mortal blow, raving with madness...
...so the house died, weakening the fabric...
Sufficiently for the warren to be torn apart"

From MoI, Treach's memories of the second First Empire, p. 206 in my version:
"Gods, we tore a warren to pieces on that distant continent. Turned the eastlands into molten stones that cooled and became something that defied sorcery. The T'lan Imass sacrificed thousands to cut away the cancer we had become..."

Skirs;248704 said:

The T'lan Imass showed up to slaughter the Empire citizens, but I don't recall any mention of the T'lan Imass getting murdered themselves...

There's a few mentions of Icarium killing them, most evident in DG. Mappo and Icarium are walking through a 7c town that was utterly ruined, there are destroyed Imass littering the ground, sword marks everywhere etc, but Icarium's machine is intact. Icarium wonders at who would have had the power to destroy the city and all those Imass but leave his machine intact -- it's there that we learn it happened 94,000 years ago (or less) -- and Mappo concludes it was Icarium himself, who spared his own machine in his rage. Granted, Mappo could be wrong, but seriously -- who COULD have destroyed all those Imass!?


It would tie in nicely if Icarium's rage weakened KE...even further after Scabs? Not sure on that point. Then, according to Treach, it was the First Empire that actually shredded the weakened warren (but then the First Empire were an arrogant bunch; maybe they only shredded a fragment left over). When the Imass showed up to kill all the first empire soletaken/d'ivers, some managed to escape the T'lan's usually thorough cleansings because Icarium murdered a fair number of them.

Of course, just as there are multiple chainings of the CG, there's a precedent for many different warren shatterings. Theories about fragments being broken up, entirely different warrens, multiple warrens being involved etc etc are all equally likely until SE gives us something definitive to go on.


Also, wtf, the first empire created Otataral? How did I miss that the first time!?