I seem to recall that it was indeed outright stated either in the book itself, or by WoG. Whats more, we even know where they "ascended". The stone table that changes ownership with the seasons, and which absorbs the power of whoever is killed on it and transfers it to queen whose season it is.

So it was not exactly darkhallow (not necromancy, no ghosts were eaten), but more like the ritual sacrifices in Changes were the reds powered a huge curse by sacricing lots and lots and lots of humans on the altar. Presumably Mab and Titania did something similar.

Or perhaps they sacrificed some supernatural entity. That way they would have avoided notice more easily. I would expect that if Mab and Titania had sacrificed massive amounts of mortals a millennia ago (when the population was smaller), then it would have been noticed. Sacrificing someone who already had power would have avoided that nicely.

Bob did state that the stone table was designed in such a way that immortal entities killed there die for good even if its not halloween. Mab and Titania might have managed to capture some deity/powerfull entity or whatever somehow, created the stone table and then sacrificed the deity/whatever on the altar and each took 50% of the things power.

After that, they could both have started increasing their powerbase through more traditional means (bargains with mortals, stealing power from other immortals during halloween, etc).

I wonder if its possible that the original Mother Summer might have been sacrificed. We know from Butcher that Mother Summer has changed once in history, but Mother Winter has not. Maybe Mab and Titania somehow sacrificed the original Mother Summer. Ofcourse that would have caused a severe imbalance (since 50% of Mother Summer went to Mab), and as a result Mab got forced with the job of protecting the outer gates to balance her greater forces/power.

 

I believe that it has been mentioned that the first Mother Summer 'got tired' and 'moved on', but I couldn't provide a reference for that off the top of my head. I do believe it is from the books, however.

 

Okay, here's what we know about the Queens.

• The mantle of Mother Summer has had one previous bearer. Mother Winter hasn't changed at all.

• Mab became Queen Who Is of Winter ~1000 years ago.

• The Lady of each Court is the one to become Queen upon the death/abdication of the Queen.

• The Queens of Faerie became insanely powerful through the use of Rites of Ascension at the Stone Table.

• Mab used to be human, as did a number of notable Sidhe (possibly all of them).

• The mantles of the Faerie Queens change their bearers to fit the mould of that Queen.

• A strong willed person may be able to retain their humanity/soul against the corruption of the mantle.

• There was a Winter Lady before Maeve, during 'Mab's time' (presumably after she became Queen) who died at the time of the last Starborn.

So assuming I haven't made any mistakes, here's my theory.

Mab and Titania are half sisters through birth, with their father being a mortal and their mothers being Mother Winter/Summer respectively. They eventually became Ladies of their respective Courts, but kept a civil relationship. Later, Mother Summer retires and the ranks of Summer move up a notch, making Titania the Queen of Summer. Mab becomes Queen of Winter at a later date, probably at the death of the last Queen.

Some time passes and the mantles begin to take effect on the souled Fae that were Mab and Titania. The Battle of Hastings comes around and the Summer/Winter divide becomes a personal feud between the two, which is the last time they speak to each other.

Maybe (and this is pure conjecture) the Winter Lady before Maeve dies during the battle, at the hands of a Summer-bound Starborn (in much the same way Aurora died to a Winter-bound Starborn this time around). Mab shows just how far into Winter she's fallen by doing her cold, logical thing, and Titania (who acts on emotion rather than logic) is so appalled by her that she refuses to speak to her. Or hell, maybe Mab just holds a grudge over the death of her daughter, which would signify the 'spark' of a soul that Jim mentioned.

Still, most of this is conjecture based on the evidence we have, but it wraps up the points neatly enough that I think it plausible.

 

Jim on Harry's age, obviously. While not entirely ground-breaking, WoJ is still WoJ.

On the subject of Hades and Daedelus' maze, I doubt that Tarterus is going to come into the equation, though if it does, it'll probably be a stretch of the Nevernever that nobody really goes to without a good reason.

Then again, we have been told, more or less, that all deities do or have existed in some way, so this makes me wonder if each religions' depiction of Heaven and Hell also exist.

For example, Miss Gard's status as a Valkyrie. I don't think it's been confirmed, but if it has, that pretty much ensures the existence of at least Valhalla.

 

He is a little younger than I was expecting him to be. I thought he was 27-28 in Storm Front and about 39 in Cold Days.

 

His age doesn't really matter much, considering he's a wizard. Once he hits his forties his aging will slow to a crawl anyway.

 

From the Ad Astra review on Arched Doorway. There a little bit of stuff about Skin Game, a little about the Fantasy Epic, some bits on the Cinder Spires, all that good stuff. Have at it, guys.

 

Dresden Files anime? It needs to be done. One OVA per book. Preferably in an animation style similar to Cowboy Bebop.

 

More Mab. I look forward to this.

 

The return of Faith <3. Doing The Humbert to become canon?! Let's find out! And yeah, everything else. Cinder Spires sounds sweet, I will be very happy to read a Martinesque epic from Jim Butcher, and Skin Game is shaping up to be super special awesome.

 

God that'd be creepy.

 

Finally decided to stop being lazy and put this together. All of it's from that reddit thing Jim did awhile back.

 

A question: As from the last book does the Winter Court and the Summer Court are ballanced? Have the same level of power?

 

Not absolutely, but practically, yes.
Basically:
[all of winter court]-[forces dedicated to defending from the outside]=[all of summer court]
Though there are some summer forces dedicated to helping the winter court at the Outer Gates, so this is a simplification of that.
Winter protects everyone against the outside, Summer protects everyone against Winter.

 

Protects? Nobody. "Protects"? Winter.

 

I wouldn't go that far. The White Council makes a decent, if flawed, effort at it at least.