[Aptorian]

So lets get this discussion on the way.

As IH remarks, we all noticed the problem of the age of the daughters, but no-ones thought of a probable solution.

First there's Karsas own age. There's always been two conflicting sources on his age, first there is Leomans boasting/warning to Kalam in DG:

DG p. 200

Quote

My companion is Toblakai, an escaped slave from the Laederon Plateau of Genabackis. He's seen seventeen summers and has personally killed forty-one enemies. Those are their ears on his belt.'

This is of course strange as Karsa, in a internal monologue, remarks:

HoC p. 35

Quote

And I have but just begun on this path. Newly arrived to my eightieth year of life, finally a warrior in truth.

People have always put this down to Leoman not knowing Karsa's past. Now we have the TtH prologue with Karsa's daughters - and they <i>are</i> his daughters, you can't get around that. Here's a couple of clip-outs, just to refresh their scene in the prologue:

Quote

Its departure was noted by two girls <b>still a year or more from their nights of passage into adulthood</b>. There was a similarity to their features, and in their ages they were a close match, the time of their births mere days apart.

Quote

And so, upon seeing the limping dog leave the village, they exchanged a glance, set about gathering what <b>supplies and weapons were near at hand</b>

Quote

Like the limping dog, <b>the two girls</b> were fearless and resolute. Though they did not know it, such traits came from their father, whom they had never met.

Quote

The dog did not look back, and when <b>the women</b> caught up to it, the beast maintained its indifference.

I would like to start with what I'm guessing might be a mistake. In the last quote, within two lines, Erikson calls the daughters both girls <u>and</u> women.

I'd also like to note, that the quote about them gathering weapons and rations, do not state that the weapons are theirs. Perhaps they just took them because they knew they'd need them. Do girls even learn about fighting? Are they heading into terrible peril as Gigantic mountain bears can eat them and they could be raped and stolen by other tribes?

So here's the <b>FOCUS: If Teblors take at least 4 times as long to age "as far" as human beings/normal mortals do, how can the daughters be coming of age?</b> I've been trying to wrap my mind around this and I just can't find an easy solution.

1) Perhaps Karsa's own idea of his age is a HoCism. But that can't be right seeing as the two farms, that Karsas grandfather Pahlk attacked, grew to become a thriving seaport with hundreds, if not thousands of town people, a garrison, etc. Karsa himself remarks that:

Quote

Silver lake shall, after more than four centuries, once again tremble to the coming of the Teblor.

I'm ignoring the possibility that the entire city grew up in a matter of years or decades because of a need for a seaport to support trade, etc.

2) Karsa lived in Raraku A LOT longer than it seems. But that doesn't make sense either, since Leoman states that Karsa has only seen 17 summers. If Karsa had lived long enough in the dessert for his daughters to just mature a bit, he had to have stayed there for decades.

3) Time moves in different ways in the Teblor lands, compared to time outside the mountains. This could actually have been an Icarium construct/ritual and would help the Teblors to cleanse their blood faster. But it's just incredibly improbable. It would mean that for the Uryd, Karsa had been gone for 50-60 years... I don't like that solution.

Can any of you come up with a probable theory? I'm stumped.

EDIT: Been 5 years, went in and reformatted the quotes and stuff from the forum transfer.

This post has been edited by Apt: 19 September 2014 - 07:33 AM

[Optimus Prime]

I thought about it and wondered if the Teblor year is much shorter than races like Humans reckon? I know it sounds stupid but it could be possible.

Is it also possible we have a HoCism? SE made a mistake? Simple as that?

[Zanth13]

Well how much time passed between Karsa raping the villagers and the present time.... That was the first thing he did pretty much in his HOC story...

I dont think Teblor age slower then Humans... just that they stay in thier prime for much much longer...but I imagine ina race that can live a couple hundred years or more that that is why an eighty year old can still been considered young... Doesnt mean it took all eighty years for him to grow...just that that period in his life he is considered a young man or child...

Also it could be different for females...if they age similar to humans and just have a longer time in the prime of thier life... they could reach "adult hood" as in able to rear children pretty fast...

any to summerize my possible solution to the problem

1. Teblor dont age slower, just dont grow old as fast as humans

2. We dont have an exact age on the girls so we dont know how old they are... we can speculate that they are between 12-16 I guess... some one who is better with time lines could answer that (even though time lines dont exist to SE lol)

[Aptorian]

Xander;266360 said:

I thought about it and wondered if the Teblor year is much shorter than races like Humans reckon? I know it sounds stupid but it could be possible.

Is it also possible we have a HoCism? SE made a mistake? Simple as that?

I considered this aswell but that would still mean that there's something strange about the Teblor lands. They mark the passing of time like every other people, sunrise and sundown, the passage of the moon and stars. If they use those to count the days, then, if their years are shorter than "the normal" they would be counting years by something else than celestial bodies... Seasons, perhaps?

[Optimus Prime]

Zanth, that's a good point. Perhaps Teblor are considered adults at 80 because it's more a mental age than physical...add that to the female's possibly maturing quickly...and we may have a solid answer.

Nice work

@Apt, Seasons could be a possibility. that could explain the seeming 4-1 difference in ages..

adult human around 20
Teblor 80

[Zanth13]

Did a re read of the prologue and It said that the chicks were "a year or more from their nights of passage into adult hood"

this seems like SE pretty much closed any time loop holes.. we dont have an exact age on the girls except that they are young... and they should be...so there case closed....I win!

not to mention they are the spawn of a powerful creature...

[caladanbrood]

Of course, maybe their father isn't Karsa, but in fact Karsa's father - wasn't he supposed to be a bit "different" too?

No, ok, it was Karsa:(

[Aptorian]

I realise that I have managed to become the first person of the TtH forum to post a spoiler in a thread title.

Bravo Apt, good work

[Quick~]

Its pretty hard for their not to be a time paradox given that Karsa left his village in 1159 or 1162-63 burns sleep depending on how you view it.

we're at what, 1165? 1166? However you're counting years thats not really workable.

[Skywalker]

I'm surprised no one said it yet - so I will.

The timeline does not matter.

[Jorram]

Not that it's very likely, but this prologue gives no time period. It could be hapenning 10 years after the end of TBH (and presumably the beginning of the action in TTH) and then the first chapter would switch back to current time. This could explain the issue.

Yes, it IS unlikely...

[Ellestra]

Time travel must be somehow involved again.

Teblor call humans children because humans are so short-lived. They are old or dead by the time Teblors reach adulthood - 80-ty.

Karsa's journey was either 1159 (the book date) or 1161 (the fall of Pale mentioned).
End of Reaper's Gale 1166.
So it's been 5 to 7 years since the rapes. That's the girls ages (and I'm not even mentioning you'd have to substract for the pregnancy I'm nice like that).

So I thought the toddlers comment should be about them.
But the passage into adulthood, calling them women?
Somebody's been traveling in time. Again

[Aptorian]

The mention of toddlers weren't adressed to the two kids, it was the babies that the daughters had been watching until the dog left town.

Rereads are good for you.

[Tiger_sword]

Jorram;266430 said:

Not that it's very likely, but this prologue gives no time period. It could be hapenning 10 years after the end of TBH (and presumably the beginning of the action in TTH) and then the first chapter would switch back to current time. This could explain the issue.

Yes, it IS unlikely...

One would presume that the moment the dog started off was the moment that Karsa stepped through the portal in the CG world. Adds an extra year or so onto the end of BH (i.e. the end of RG) hence these GIRLS could be 7 or 8 years old. Prehaps they do not play such a major role in the story (except meeting Karsa)?

Also we have seen young children do some pretty remarkable stuff in the Malazan World

[Jorram]

No one ever said Karsa was teleporting to Laurderon or however it was called. He might as well have been to world's end and is finally back ten years later

- was the point of my post.

[Aptorian]

About the thread title.

Thanks for editting the thread, but could the mod that changed it possibly change it again to "The Daughters, a time paradox", rather than "Toll the Hounds, a time paradox"?

3 out of the 4 post in the forum already start with Toll the Hounds...

[amphibian]

What if the girls are half-human?

[Imperial Historian]

My current understanding of the timeline is that toll the hounds will be taking place roughly 5-6 years after the end of MOI, and that there is an unspecified period of time prior to that when karsa started his journey and MT started but this period isn't particularly huge maybe 10 years maximum, but probably much less, I'd say karsa's journey most likely took place maximum 5 years before the beginning of DhG. So at a stretch counting a year for the events of DhG, and taking maximum values we can get the age of karsa's daughters to be 12 without stretching the timeline much... but this isn't even close to the age the teblor lifespan would suggest, the unbound speak of another century of waiting for the girl child by bairoth on dayliss, a child which is referenced as a girl child in flesh only "what I make within is neither a girl, nor a child"(mmpb p39).

So clearly it takes at least 80 years for a teblor to mature, and girl children are no different than males. We do see a teblor youth "No more than forty, not yet at his full height, lean of limb as the unready often were" (mmpb p56). So it looks like we have a very large stretch of time to make up.

The only possibility I could come up with was the old passage through the nascent where time passes differently one, but that's foiled by the fact that we meet kindly, ebron, cord and co before that passage, and they don't age by any significant amount. So it looks like its going to have to be another of those erikson timeline inconcistencies.

EDIT: I'll change the title to what you asked Apt

[Illuyankas]

Jorram;266443 said:

No one ever said Karsa was teleporting to Laurderon or however it was called. He might as well have been to world's end and is finally back ten years later

- was the point of my post.

I'm pretty sure the CG wouldn't have put his portal to Genabackis, meant to send Karsa to the Teblor, in Elingarth, for example.

@Amph: The parents are the wife and daughter of the chief of that Teblor village Karsa, Bairoth and Delum blitzed in HoC, quite clearly.

[Ellestra]

Imperial Historian;266446 said:

My current understanding of the timeline is that toll the hounds will be taking place roughly 5-6 years after the end of MOI, and that there is an unspecified period of time prior to that when karsa started his journey and MT started but this period isn't particularly huge maybe 10 years maximum, but probably much less, I'd say karsa's journey most likely took place maximum 5 years before the beginning of DhG.

So clearly it takes at least 80 years for a teblor to mature, and girl children are no different than males. We do see a teblor youth "No more than forty, not yet at his full height, lean of limb as the unready often were" (mmpb p56). So it looks like we have a very large stretch of time to make up.

The HoC prologue gives 1159 as the time they leave for their killing/raping spree. Karsa is captured by Malazan soldiers about the same time the Pale falls and that was 1161.
As I understand it ToH will take place in 1166.

Imperial Historian;266446 said:

The only possibility I could come up with was the old passage through the nascent where time passes differently one, but that's foiled by the fact that we meet kindly, ebron, cord and co before that passage, and they don't age by any significant amount. So it looks like its going to have to be another of those erikson timeline inconcistencies.

This part of prologue is really 80 years in the future and the girls will follow the dog through a time rift back to 1166. God-touched dogs live extremely long and have special powers.
Or maybe those girls are one of those rapidly growing up offspring the fantasy worlds are full of.

Timeline is really NOT Erikson's strength.

Aptorian;266439 said:

The mention of toddlers weren't adressed to the two kids, it was the babies that the daughters had been watching until the dog left town.

Rereads are good for you.

That's why I said should be - 5-7 year old Teblors should be no more then toddlers. Reading carefully helps to understand meaning.