I dunno. Erlking respects hunters, and Harry was basically hunting a major outsider at that point. I could well see Erlking deciding that seeing how that particular hunt goes is more important than his grudge. Not to mention that Erlking is presumably powerfull and aware enough to realise that if the outsiders wins, there will be no more hunts. Erlking respects strength and cunning, and has shown a form of honor before when he let Harry live post-darkallow due to Harry bringing back a greater hunter (T-rex). For him to "want to drink Harrys blood" in that situation would have just been plain stupid of Erlking in every conceivable way. If Erlking were that stupid, he would not be the most powerfull hunter spirit thing in existence.

I would have hated this. Why? Because it would have portraid Mab as being an utter idiot on an epic scale. Harry chose to attack Arctis Tor head on to save Molly, a young girl. He became a Winter Knight specifically to save his child, and its been repeatedly mentioned that Harry does his best to protect children. If Mab HAD killed a small child for Harrys party, Harry would basically have instantly performed a soulfire powered death curse on Mab right then and there. And Mab would KNOW that. Why would you want Mab to be a fucking retard by knowingly doing something to wreck all her plans and instantly lose the very unique (starborn&soulfire) knight she has spent a lot of effort recruiting?

You might have an argument with Maeve not doing this, but its quite possible that Maeve was prevented from doing this by Mab, who KNEW that Nemesis was controlling Maeve. Or maybe Nemesis wished to try and corrupt Harry through Maeve and their mental winter-link. That walker wanted to recruit Harry later on, so presumably having one of these "starborn" such as Harry on their side would be very usefull.

Good point. Harry should have killed Mab right then and there. I mean its not like Harry was told by someone who cannot lie that Molly might well be able to remain herself and keep her soul (oh wait...). He really should have totally killed Mab right then and there despite knowing that doing so would probably fuck the universe (and make it a few million times harder for Molly to keep her soul).

Personally, I like the shades of gray we are seeing in Winter a lot. The idea that Winter would be utterly 100% evil would just be plain boring in my view. The idea that they are vicious bastards, but at the same time performing a vital function for the universe is rather interesting.

Yeah, this is where I do agree. Murphy accepted Harrys return way too easily. It was especially annoying given how easily it could have been dealt with. Bob and Butters figured out last book that Harry might not be dead at all but rather an "astral projection" and his physical body might still be alive but just in a coma.

We could just have had them tell Murphy that and her reaction to Harrys return would have made a lot more sense. Or Molly could have informed them since she was a lot more mentally stable and had solid knowledge from Lea. Lots of ways for this could have been explained without need to change the plot of the books. I do agree that unless we learn later that something fishy was going on (such as Murphy infected of something) then this was poorly done.

Continued existence is a big benefit, even if everyone else gets it too don't you think?

You do realise that it was made very clear that summer had troops fighting outsiders too. They were just acting more as medics and healers and patching the injured winter soldiers. Not to mention the Gatekeeper, a member of the ruling body of a foreign body fighting with both.

I don't want disney villains. I want more complexity.

There are a few problems here. As has been said, the Stone Table war is apparently not a regular occurence, but something that only happens really rarely when something major is screwed up. Heck, the last time it happened was because the big bad had manipulated events!

Second, I don't think we know for sure that the Christian God truly is the creator of the universe. Butcher has been pretty good at avoiding answering that question. We have seen both in books and in interviews/forums that supernatural beings/gods gain power from the belief of mortals in them. There was even a book from Thomas perspective about a secret "war", where the secret organisation Thomas is a member of are trying to make mortals forget supernatural entities/gods, because this causes them to DIE. And Butcher has confirmed that this is indeed how it works (and is actually the sole reason for the creation of the Archive as confirmed by WoJ). In other words, if the Archive and Thomas's group manage to make humanity forget about the Christian God (and associates such as the devil, angels, etc) altogether, then that God will quite literally vanish from existence. In Cold Days, its even pointed out that Mab arranged for stories of Sidhe to be published to make sure this did not happen to the Sidhe/her.

So its quite possible that the only reason the Christian God is powerfull in Dresdenverse, is because its the most popular God (for the moment), and NOT because said god actually created the universe.

Third, it seems that the Sidhe basically reproduce through mortals. A sidhe has sex with a mortal, which results in a changeling, which chooses his/her sidhe side. No mortal contact with NN equals no faeries at all. Actually, that kinda makes me wonder about the accords. Wonder if Mab arranged those specifically to reduce mortal casualties in all the wars supernatural critters probably fought before the accords, so that mortals would be more free to reproduce/multiply (which by extension means more mortals for sidhe to have sex with which means more changelings which means more Sidhe which means more soldiers for Mab).

Well, supposedly there was something about Oberon or something. There is also the fact that it seems that Titania exists solely to use Mutually Assured Destruction on Mab, if Mab gets too greedy. I can see that being a rather big elephant in the room during faily meetings.

No proof that the sidhe were created. Infact, I think it was mentioned by Butcher that the sidhe actually managed to use something similar to darkhallow to become what they are. We also don't have any proof that the sidhe have always been the ones to protect reality from the outsiders, they are just the current ones who have the job. For all we know, some other beings had that job (and maybe WERE created for it), but the outsiders managed to defeat them, at which point winter had the choice of either taking over the job or dying.

No war every year. NN is more than just Sidhe territory, and the Sidhe need mortals to reproduce and replace teir losses.

Which is why things going so bad that the Stone Table comes into play are so incredibly bad. Rashid basically openly defied White Council laws to help Harry stop Aurora specifically because ST coming to play was BAD. And ultimately all a plot by the enemy.

Also, I suspect its pretty hard to actually kill either Mab or Titania. Mab can die anywhere during halloween, and yet she was not all that concerned at having a gun pointed at her, and infact demonstrated that she could instantly remove it from Harry. She only got worried when Harry threatened her with Demonreach (a major superprison created by Merlin who was obviously something beyond normal wizard).

As I said previously, no proof that God designed Desdenverse. It is very possible that the ONLY diffrence between Christian God and Odin is that Christian God has lots more followers left and therefore lots more juice. Heck, one might even argue that the fact that there are things such as outsiders that are trying to destroy the universe and that the defense against them is so hardpressed is proof that Christian God did not create or design anything and is as much a slave to the universal laws as every other god that came and went.

Its been confirmed that the angels are basically directly forbidden from acting by the universe or they instantly fall, which might be taken as further proof that Christian God is not the Creator of Dresdenverse.

Oh, and the angels actually DO hold back the Fallen apparently. The whole point about Harry dying, was that he was killed by a Fallen angel and NOT a Denarian, which allowed Uriel to actually act directly and motivate Harry to stand up against Mab. And previously, we learned that the only reason Uriel was able to give Harry soulfire, was because Lucifer acted first.

It seems that the Fallen angels can act more freely for some reason, but they generally don't accomplish much since the moment they do act, the non-fallen angels are then free to create an equal but opposite reaction.

Uriel could presumably easily have whispered 7 words to Harry right after Lasciel did, to perfectly cancel Lasciels influence and convince Harry to keep on living. However he basically gambled that Harry would survive anyway (thanks to Mab presumably), allowing him to use his unused 7 words to help motivate Harry against Mab.

The Denarians are an entirely different matter. The Denarians basically hijack the free will of human mortals, which is why they can act so openly without being stopped by non-fallen angels. Its also why they need to be stopped by the MORTAL Knights (with free will), who are aided by the holy swords (just as the Denarians are aided by the coins).

Its been made clear that Denarians such as Magog who basically use their mortal hosts as nothing but beasts of burden are pathetic, while those like Nicodemus/Anduriel who collaborate are incredibly dangerous.

As a side-note, its generally believed that the Fallen who whispered the seven words to Harry and as a result killed him was actually Lasciel acting WITHOUT a human host, which is why Uriel was able to intervene. Uriel cannot however do anything to stop Anduriel, because Anduriel is abusing a loophole by tapping into the free will of Nicodemus (who is a human mortal with Free Will).

 

Can't find the quote, but Butcher said that DF will not be one of these books where the Christians are wrong about their belief.

 

I've read that one too.

Either way it matters not. Something created the Universe and the Outsiders, so they must have did it for a reason. Assuming for a moment that the White God is in fact the Creator, why would create what looks to be a pretty balanced universe in terms of good and evil, and then rig the game in favour of one or the other?

It seems to me that the idea is for either free will to triumph or to fail, and the Creator is there to see what happens. After all, the Knights of the Cross could easily be getting their orders from Archangels. (I've mentioned this before: the Archangels are choosing their champions. Uriel chose Harry, Raphael chose Michael (and now Thomas). Gabriel chose Murphy and Michael chose Sanya.) So the White God may not have to be directly involved in things.

 

I would very much want to see this quote. (Talking literally here, not doubting your word or anything, but want to analyze the quote)

EDIT: To clarify, I want to see if Butcher clearly stated that Christians are right in Dresdenverse and the "White God" (as its called) is the true omnipotent creator.

Or if he said that he would not prove them wrong. There is a big difference. So far, Butcher has remained quite neutral and speculation-friendly in this matter, and I truthfully expected that it would never be confirmed one way or the other which god in dresdenverse is the True God (or even whether or not such a god exists at all or ever existed).

So for example, I never once expected that Butcher would suddenly go "Hahahaaa, all you christians are morons". Not only would that be just plain stupid PR, but in none of the interviews or youtube videos he has never come off as the type of person who would insult his fans like that.

However, neither did I expect that he would start to use Dresden Files to preach his religion (whatever that may be) and start claiming for example that Hindiuism/Buddhism/Islam/Whatever is 100% wrong.

 

Yes. And when the plot is blatantly steering us towards the conclusion that that's what will ultimately happen and be necessary to not-die, it makes the whole system that's apparently in place look stupid.

Let me put it to you this way. So far, one out of the three Winter Queens has nearly resulted in the world being destroyed (Maeve, right now). By comparison, three out of the four Summer Queens that we have seen have nearly destroyed the world (Aurora in Summer Knight, Lily in this book, Titania also in this book).

The Winter Court, the ones that alledgedly need watching so badly because they might accidentally the mortals, had one queen that nearly fucked over the mortals. Summer, by comparison, has had three. Arguably two if you want to say that Titania refusing to do fuck-all to stop the apocalypse because fuck you Harry doesn't count, but even then, you're still looking at one-third versus half. Literally the only Summer Queen that seems to have been doing a decent goddamn job at their goddamn job is the Summer Mother. That's it.

Because even if you want to argue that Titania wasn't guilty by refusal to take action in the "Everything Nearly Exploded In Cold Days" plot, her job, her fucking job, is to make sure Mab doesn't fucking snap and steamroll everything. So Harry goes to her for help, and asks "Can you tell me if the whojigger evil thing has turned Mab yet? Because you're kind of her sister."

Her response? "The hell should I know? I haven't talked to her since your kind pulled yourselves out of the ooze."

It is literally. Her goddamn job. To know whether or not Mab is apocalyptically insane, or just standard Sidhe Clownshit Insane. And she could not tell you if Mab was or not. No fucking clue. Just a hunch, that probably not, which is no different than the advice Harry got from other places, and didn't have to risk getting his heart eaten to hear. Mab shouldn't be able to scratch her nose from her frozen throne without Titania hearing about it. Titania literally, literally, has one. Job. But she couldn't tell you. No idea. Haven't talked to her in eons.

Mother Summer, meanwhile, lives in the same goddamn house that Mother Winter does.

Who is doing the better job of keeping an eye on their counterpart, you tell me.

The exposition can tell us Winter needs watching all it likes. By my accounting, I'd like to know who the fuck is watching Summer, because they're oh-for-two and 3/4ths into the Apocalypse chart, while Winter is oh-for-one and 1/3rd. And Summer is unquestionably incompetent, because Mab and Harry are doing their jobs just fine, while Titania literally cannot tell you the one thing she is literally required to know by her job description, and Fix got his ass stomped by a naked, unarmed version of his counterpart, who he is specifically designed to stymie.

So yeah. Summer is looking kind of shit right now. Meanwhile, Winter gets shit done, protects the entire universe, and is friends with the we-don't-take-sides svartelves.

[/OPINIONS]

 

You realise that the root cause of the Summer Queens becoming a threat against reality has been the machinations of the Outside, yeah? It's not just been an occasion where they've fucked up. Nemesis decided that one of the ways it was going to achieve victory for its side was by screwing with the Summer Court--the check to their immediate foes, the Winter Court.

 

Yes. Doesn't change the fact that no one is watching the watchers, nor does anyone seem to care, even though it's the watchers that are causing the most damage and being by far the most incompetent of the two.

You would think the fairies would have a contingency for Nemesis, a power that is almost certainly of the Outside, and one that they are certainly aware of, beyond "hands in air, panic." But they don't. Titania should have contingency plans out the ass, seeing how that is, apparently, her job, and even if she is Summer, she is also a clone of Mab. Apparently, though, she's too busy blubbering over one dead daughter years later to care. In fact, it's pretty clearly implied that Titania is indirectly at fault for Lily dying, because she was so busy crying over spilled milk that she accidentally any training or instruction that might have actually mattered. Like, for instance, never trust your counterpart, fucking ever, even if they double pinky Sidhe swear.

Titania lost a daughter to Nemesis. She was then so busy mourning and holding a massive goddamn grudge against someone she herself admitted she owed a debt to, that she lost another daughter. And she still couldn't tell you what Mab was doing, which, again, is her entire. Freaking. Job.

And knowing Titania, this will be Harry's fault. Or she'll kidnap and torture Murphy, or something. She can't ever apparently blame the Outsiders, even though she knows they're the ultimate cause of the problems. It's like she wants to hold grudges and fuck everything up. Like it's one gigantic pity party or something.

Either way, I'm getting real sick of both Queens, for different but related reasons (plot-induced stupidity and general incompetence versus gradually escalating wankery and hypercompetence), and I'm kind of hoping they'll both get offed at some point in the near future. It probably wouldn't be that hard, since we're apparently dead-set on replacing every cosmological position of significance with people who are Harry's friends and/or want to have his babies. All that's left is for Murphy to pick up a sword and Elaine to become a Queen, and that's everyone who isn't dead.

 

Who is guilty here. I think this is an interesting question. I think your blaming of summer so badly is perhaps a bit unfair(though admittedly not entirely).

We know there is an entity out there capable of infecting and corrupting people. Nemesis/Adversary. It infected Aurora and tried to use her to disrupt the balance of the world in order to gain an advantage. I am unsure how fair it is to blame Aurora for these events. Leanansidhe was directly said by Mab to be the most powerfull person in Winter other than herself (and the Mother naturally). That obviously makes her more powerfull than one of the Ladies, quite possibly a lot more powerfull, and yet she was still unable to withstand Nemesis. If so, it seems to me that Aurora would not have had a chance.

Lily was not infected (that we know of anyway), but when we actually consider things, she was pretty badly screwed from the start. She was a changeling and basically a victim while mortal. It was repeatedly implied that she was raped and tortured, then the one she trusted (Aurora) betrayed her, made her a knight and turned her to stone. Then Harry killed Aurora, and the mantle of a lady was forced on Lily due to the fact she was a knight. We don't yet know what effect becoming a winter lady will have on Molly since she is purely human, but it was confirmed by Butcher that Lily (who was a changeling) became pure Sidhe. Whether she unconsciously made a choice or not is unclear, but she basically was tortured/raped, betrayed, given a mantle that alters ones mind, turned to stone and finally had an even stronger mantle (that also alters ones mind) forced on her too. And to top it all of, her entire species was changed (without her being aware of it!).

Lets face it, Lily should already be insane by this point. But somehow she manages to maintain some stability. However we do know that unlike Mab who apparently is quite willing to support Molly, Titania was so grief-stricken (ill address this later) that she did not really do much to guide/support Lily. Infact the only one we do know that apparently did support her, was ironically enough, Maeve. In book 8 those two were close enough to collaborate together, and in the latest book it is clear that Maeve had taken full advantage of everything that had happened to Lily to manipulate her. Or rather, Nemesis had. Lea was already an icicle in book 7 (Harry tries to summon Lea and gets Mab instead), but in the latest book its revealed that Maeve was infected before Mab caught Lea. So in addition to everything else that went wrong with Lily, she was being manipulated for years by an outsider that apparently is an expert at manipulating others.

Harry, who is a trained wizard, who resisted Lasciels shadow to the point of impressing an archangel and who was trained to resist mental manipulation was having real trouble maintaining his mind against the influence of the mantle of a knight. Bob claims that the mantles alter the person they are given to the point that they basically become the same person (That is to say, Lily would turn INTO Aurora). Mother Summer later confirms that this is not actually true and that it is possible to resist this change, but she also states that its very difficult to do so. I could well see both Harry and Molly (who are trained wizards) being able to do so, but Lily? Given who she was, what had happened to her and what was still happening to her?

I think blaming Lily is as unfair (if not more so) as blaming Aurora. I atleast will happily declare her not guilty by reason of insanity.

Maeve is a more complex case. She too is infected by Nemesis, however we get some impressions that she wanted to be infected and enjoyed the Free Will she gained by this. It was implied that Mab could heal someone who wanted to be healed (such as Lea), and that the reason she could not heal Maeve was because Maeve did not wish it. Its a bit hard to say then how much Maeve is to blame for all of this. How much of her was her, and how much Nemesis.

But then we get to the two more interesting cases of Titania AND Mab.

I don't think it was that long, though admittedly not much better either. She mentions that she has not talked to Mab since "Hastings". I am unsure what that means exactly, but googling it might imply that she means "Battle of Hastings" which happened in 1066, or about a millennia ago. Ofcourse that does not mean she has not been keeping an eye on Mab in other ways, since she only stated that she has not talked to Mab directly since Hastings. She could have Mabs entire court filled with spies, and still have been telling Harry the truth. Likewise, her claim that she does not know is a bit unclear, since even if she was 99.9% certain that Mab was not infected, she would still be able to say "I don't KNOW", since she truly would not absolutely KNOW with total accuracy. One of those annoying ways a Sidhe can lie by speaking the truth.

All in all however, I agree that Titania has screwed the pooch completely. The question I wonder here however is, why?

This is what I see as being a list of her crimes:
- Not curing Aurora. Aurora seemed to be really conflicted in book 4. We also know that Mab (Titanias equal) was able to heal Lea, who wanted to be healed. Was Aurora so enamored with Free Will the way Maeve was that she too simply did not want to be healed, or was she more like Cat Sith who was basically possessed? This is unclear, but at very best Titania must have known/suspected that Nemesis had Aurora and still did nothing to stop her.

Now admittedly this same charge applies to Mab, who ALSO knew that Maeve was infected and did nothing. It is stated that she could not bring herself to kill her own daughter (and Maeve did not want to be healed). Understandable perhaps, but still a failure of large proportions given the risk (for both queens). Though Mab atleast ordered Harry to do the job.

- Titanias second charge is not helping Lily. Or atleast Harry believes she did not do so. This is actually quite believable given what Bob stated. Bob claimed that the mantle would literally alter Lily into Aurora, and Titania loved Aurora. Mother Summer said this could be resisted, but would Titania want Lily to resist? I would think Titania might want the exact opposite, she would want the mantle to so change Lily that given enough time Aurora would basically be "reborn" and Titania would get her daughter back. Ofcourse this also would have left Lily utterly vulnerable to Nemesis/Maeve, so vulnerable, that Nemesis did not even bother to possess Lily directly despite having Nemesis!Maeve RIGHT THERE.

- Titanias third charge is the biggest one, the failure to deal with Mab. However it occurs to me that this could have been a manipulation of Harry. Its possible that Titania refused to confirm that Mab was sane using Sidhe wordplay (as mentioned above), but did confirm the existence of a sentient entity capable of manipulating powerfull beings. Its pretty easy to predict that without confirmation from Titania, the only choice Harry would have is to try to contact the mothers. Titania knows that Harry has already met them once before (in book 4), so I could actually suspect she deliberately manipulated Harry into contacting Mother Summer. If so, her action here is less a total failure and more a shifting of responsibility to someone more powerfull.

So, whats up? Titania might have lied about not knowing Mab was not insane in order to trick Harry into summoning Mother Winter, or she might truly not have known. She probably refused to help Lily (which allowed Nemesis!Maeve to screw Lily up), but may have done so in order to try and get her Aurora back. And she failed to kill/heal Aurora when she was infected by Nemesis, but thats a failure no bigger than Mab equal failure to deal with Maeve.

Unless ofcourse Aurora was healable, in which case the situation changes dramatically. One thing we still don't know here. How did Aurora get infected? We know that Cowl gave Lea "Morganas Athame", that had been trapped somehow so that it infected Lea. Lea then infected Maeve under possession from Nemesis, after which Mab caught it. Lea wanted to be healed, and so Mab managed to exorcise Nemesis out of her, but could not do the same with Maeve, who welcomed the infection.

But how was Aurora infected? Who infected her? One random possibility is that maybe Titania herself is atleast partially infected by Nemesis? That would certainly explain her total failure with everything quite well. And if she is fighting the infection and is not fully possessed, it would explain some other things too. She would have infected Aurora, and been prevented from stopping/healing her, making her indirectly responsible for Auroras death. She could not have revealed the plans of Nemesis to Harry, but she might have been able to resist Nemesis enough to manipulate Harry to the uninfected mothers. And ofcourse her failure to stop/help Lily could also be explained by Nemesis paralyzing her while another part of Nemesis(Maeve) dealt with Lily.

It would also mean that if Titania is ever totally possessed, she can destroy Mab, which would now mean that Molly would become the Queen of Winter. At the start of the apocalyptic trilogy perhaps?

I should mention that there are some indications that the two mothers may be connected somehow, or even be two aspects of the same entity. Mother Summer claims that Harry had only guessed the name of a "mask" of Mother Winter, rather than "our most powerfull name", implying that the two mothers may be two sides of a single coin. Its been suggested that maybe the "our most powerfull name" might be something like Gaia or Terra or Earth or something like that.

A few notes. Harry is a wizard, and possessed an intellectus during the fight against Fix. The ability to wield magic alone would give Harry a significant advantage, but the intellectus basically dropped the chances Fix had to zero. Though it is interesting that Harry thinks that Mab had pushed Harry to become strong, while Titania had not done the same to Fix. This could just be the same as Mab having left Slate alone, or it could be a sign of incompetence as you suggest, or it could be another clue that maybe Titania is not all there. A strong knight might have been able to protect Lily from Nemesis!Maeve afterall.

And another note, Mab too failed to stop Maeve herself when she could have. She ordered Harry to do the job. Titania, who apparently is less able to act in cold-calculating manner did not have a knight she could order to kill Aurora (since Nemesis!Aurora killed the knight). Though I do admit that Mab did finally kill Maeve herself by unfreezing Murphy. The fact does remain however, that had Mab done that right from the start, a LOT of trouble would have been avoided. Unless ofcourse this whole thing was just another training exercise for Harry (which is actually possible knowing Mab).

Yeah, Titania is looking either very pathetic or very suspicious here. Sarissa is the current lady, and unlike Lily was prepared for the job of being a lady by Mab. Granted, Mab thought she would become lady of winter, but even so I would expect that Sarissa might be able to do what Mother Summer said was possible and resist being changed by the mantle.

That would mean that if Titania does/is possessed and kills Mab, we will have Sarissa as Queen of Summer and Molly as Queen of Winter. And Harry would know and perhaps be friends with both, if she maintains contact with Sarissa. Might allow the two courts to unite in the apocalyptic trilogy.

 

First we have no idea how the threat of Nemesis is or if is even the first of its kind. It is entirely possible it a relative new threat and the Sidhe had no previous experience with it.

The Courts are inhuman so it makes no sense for a normal human to understand what motivates them and their Queens (who seem to have the most freedom of the whole bunch). We have no idea how hardwired they are and how flexible their thinking is...

The whole mess of the Dresden books is happening relatively fast and this could be big a problem for nearly all major powers. They don´t have experience in dealing with rapid changing environments.

 

Because Titania and Mab, indeed the Summer and Winter Courts, have unstated and unresolved issues that go back very, very far. It was pretty clearly stated that this is a family matter and a family dispute. The question is still why, but it's framed in the context of "what happened." It will presumably be covered at a later date.

As much as I'm all for blaming things on fairies, that's not a charge. It was flat-out stated that Mab could not heal Maeve so long as Maeve did not want to be healed. She did not have the strength to force a healing on the Winter Lady, who did not want to accept it.

Aurora was convinced she was doing the right thing. Thus, she would naturally reject healing, because she didn't think anything was wrong with her. She thought everything else was wrong. Titania would not have the power to heal Aurora, because she is Mab's counterpart, and Mab couldn't heal Maeve.

A better question might be "why didn't Titiania do anything about it," but since we don't actually know the details, we can't assume she didn't. So we can't really hold a void of information against Titania. It would be unfair.

I agree with this, for your reasoning, and the additional note that I'm sure Titania resented Lily personally for being the 'replacement.' It's obvious to understand why Titania wouldn't help her, and it's almost certainly true that she did not. And that is a charge against her.

So am I. It explains a lot of what has happened far too well. For someone who is supposed to be an effective clone of Mab, Titania has been behaving remarkably stupidly and shortsightedly, almost to the point of rampant idocy. There are too many consistant failures, and, in particular, too many consistant failures from the side of Summer for it to be a coincidence. Winter is perhaps expected. The Athame was sold to them, to a Sidhe of that high court.

But that doesn't explain where Aurora's infection came from. Maeve's and the other Winter Sidhe, yes. But not Aurora. The only person it could have been is Maeve, but that doesn't make sense, because Maeve didn't start behaving like an apocalyptic psycho bitch until after the time Mab found out she had been infected and had her fit of Doomvoice. So there are only two possiblities:

1.) Maeve was infected for ages without being detected, and managed to pass it on to Aurora before the events of Summer Knight.

2.) Someone or something in Summer is also corrupted, and got to Aurora independently of Maeve.

One almost works, kind of, until you do the math in your head, and realize what a tiny, microscopic window Maeve would have to infect Aurora with Nemesis in time for the events of Summer Knight to happen on schedule. And then she would have to play it off and act natural for years without Mab figuring out anything, which I also find suspect.

Two makes more sense. A frightening amount of sense. And it has some disturbing implications. Someone in the Summer Court, possibly someone we already know, is corrupted by Nemesis. Just from that alone, the entire Summer Court is a risk. And if it actually is Titania, then Summer is practically lost already. She's almost certainly already gotten the Gruffs, just for starters, and since the Erlking is technically her husband, he and anyone associated with the Wild Hunt is a potential suspect as well.

Basically, if one of the Queens is taken by Nemesis, Faerie is kind of fucked. So, given the setting this takes place in, that's probably how it's going to be. It would make for a hell of a book.

It has a name, and people who 'have experience spotting it' can detect it. That doesn't sound like something new. And if it came from the Athame, then it is, by defination, quite old. It's at least as old as Merlin, and that's assuming Morgana was the one who invented it. I know enough ancient mythology and classical history that I suspect we've seen this dagger before, in other places, without realizing it.

Like, for instance, in the hands of Brutus. Or perhaps even as the instrument wielded by Cain.

As an elder omni-lorefag, I can assure you, there are an almost uncountable number of legendary or semilegendary daggers associated with treachery or betrayal of one sort of another. The Athame could be any of them. It could, in fact, have been all of them, and my money is that it's exactly that. This is the Dagger of Brutus we are dealing with, in my opinion. This is the murder weapon wielded by Cain. This is the Throat-Slitter, the Backstabber, the original Treachery.

 

@LordRaine: 10:1 odds Elaine is the one that infected Aurora, and she got infested by Justin

 

Part of me thinks that Harry has been punched in the balls enough. But I bitchslapped that part back down into it's hole, because it's too wishy-washy to understand the artistic beauty intrinsic to a suffering protagonist.

But yeah. Even so, in the realm of Really Dick Moves, that would probably be the biggest dick move this side of the Changes climax. Besides, wasn't it implied at some point that DuMorne picked up Harry and Elaine because they were Starborn? I.e., wasn't it implied that she was like him? Because considering what little we know about it, I wouldn't be surprised if Starborn can resist Nemesis.

I suppose it kind of depends on whether or not Nemesis 'has' to take somebody over, or if they can jump between people and use them as 'carriers.' I doubt Elaine is infected, and I'd suspect she couldn't be, but that's not to say she might not potentially be carrying the taint with her somehow. It could have Trojan-horsed itself into Summer through her, or through some other route.

 

I do think that someone in the Summer Court is infected with Nemesis, but I don't think it's one of the Queens.

Lea got the Athame from Bianca's party. I think Bianca gave out other bits infected with nemesis. I think Ferrovax got one, and I think Mavra got one. That's why Mavra wanted the Word of Kemmler, because Nemesis wanted.

More importantly, I think Nemesis wanted it gone. The Kemmlerites were plannin the Darkhallow on Halloween against the Wild Hunt. What would happen if somebody used the Darkhallow at Demonreach? It's also why Nemesis tried to stage a prison break in Cold Days.

 

LR, I remember you being somewhat annoyed about the svartlaves being friendly with Mab, despite them being "neutral". Being friendly and neutral are not mutually exclusive.

For example, I work in gas station. I am friendly with many of my customers, especially my regulars. Many of these customers want to rip each others throats out. I remain neutral in their disputes, yet very friendly with these customers.

I imagine the Svartlaves to be sort of similar. Besides, if Mab is frequent customer, that makes one very friendly with another, even if you remain neutral in disputes.

 

Holy mother of fuck that's an amazing idea.

 

They don't need to be. From what I understand the Darkhallow draws in all energy (except necromatic), that's why Dresden summoned Sue, so he could coat himself in necromantic energy and protect himself. It being on Halloween is what allows one to draw in Immortals.

At least that's how I understood it.

 

I don't know about the whole hate-fest going on against Titania. Could be my lack of sleep talking. But the way I took it was that Titania's sole responsibility was to drag Mab if Mab made a move against humanity. And I mean that as in, abandoning the Outer Gates and attacking Summer with the full force of Winter.

If that's her only job, dragging Mab down into defeat along with the Summer Court, then, to me at least, it makes sense that Titania wouldn't need to pay close enough attention to know whether or not Mab was insane. If Mab decided 'fuck the gates' and attacked, it's not like it would matter any whether or not she was insane. Titania's job would be the exact same either way.

Is it smart? Hell no. But Titania said it herself, and I'm paraphrasing from memory here so it could be wrong. She said, Mab is logic, I follow passion. I didn't really have that hard of a time believing that Titania could sulk and not focus all her attentions on Mab's doings because of Aurora's death. I mean, if Mab decided to make a move, it'd become pretty fucking obvious almost immediately.

 

This. Even if they got through Demonreach's spirit (which I highly fucking doubt, considering how freaking Mab walks on eggshells around it), if it's Merlin's ubermagic wards vs Kemmler's Darkhallow and assorted disciples, my money is on Merlin.

It's a prison which prevents the dark things inside from getting out under any circumstances - the worst thing that happens if the Darkhallow does somehow manage to reach through the wards and Demonreach into the prison - which, once again, I doubt - is that the failsafe activates and Chicago gets hex-nuked so hard it sends a shockwave through time. Congratulations, you've pulled off the Darkhallow and are now a god! Enjoy your half-second of godlike power before (purgefire, was it? Whatever, it's fucking balefire.) you get balefired.