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Fantasy fiction - lcsh,
Taltos; Vlad (Fictitious character),
Taltos; Vlad (Fictitious character) - Fiction
don't understand entirely how it works; I am neither god nor demon."
"I don't think I've ever met a demon," I said. "Unless a certain Jhereg who goes by that name means it more literally than I think he does."
"You have," said Sethra. "The Necromancer."
I stared. "She's a demon?"
"Yes. But I suggest you don't try to control her; she is liable to take it wrong."
"I'll take that advice to heart."
She nodded and continued. "As I say, this one skill implies many others. How did they acquire this skill? Some of the younger ones have been taught by some of the older ones; I was once offered godhood. But this still begs the question: Whence came the oldest of the gods, and how did they acquire their abilities?
"We must go back a long way, Vlad. A long way even to me. Before the Empire, and even before the thirty-one tribes that became the Empire."
"Wait. Thirty-one?"
"Yes."
"Uh . . . why thirty-one? I mean, is the number significant of anything?"
"Not as far as I know. It's just the number of tribes there happened to be then. And please don't interrupt; this is difficult enough."
"I'll try."
She nodded. "Your people came first, my good Easterner. I imagine that doesn't startle you, perhaps you guessed it, or were told something of the kind by Aliera, who indulges in much enlightened speculation. Well, I tell you now what is no guess: Your people predate mine. How they came here, I do not know, but I know they arrived, they were not produced by Nature, as were the dragon, the dzur, the jhereg, and the Serioli. Yet even these were changed by - but no, all things in their proper time.
"Your people were here, though in what state I cannot say, and the animals, and were found here by others, by those we call the Jenoine. I don't know what they call themselves, and I don't know where they're from, except that it isn't here. They came here, as your people came here, only later."
Yes, I had known some of this before, too.
"There is so much we don't know, Vlad; that we can't know. I have said nothing of what I saw, what I later learned, what I have since deduced, because of all that I don't know. Were those who came here representative of all Jenoine? Were their actions typical? What were their motives when they arrived, and how did these motives change?
Is the word 'motive,' as we understand it, even meaningful when discussing them?" That was a rhetorical question if I'd ever heard one, so I didn't answer it.
"You have met Verra, her you call the Demon Goddess. That name - but never mind that now. She is of yet another species, and was brought to this world as a servant of the Jenoine. She was there when they began their experiments with the plants and the trees, and then with the animals, and then with the people who came to be called Easterners: changing some of them a little, some of them a great deal, some of them not at all. Improving, in certain cases, upon them: extending their lifespans and the abilities of their minds, and making into them the people who came to be called Human. Yes, Vlad, our beings and even our languages come from your people, and you can take whatever pride in that you care to. Aliera, of course, refuses to believe it, but it is true." I had a pleasant moment imagining taunting Aliera about that, but Sethra was still speaking.
"From what Verra has said, I would guess that they were, in their own minds, benevolent; but one must sift her words to discover this, for she hates them. She was their servant, and they were not kind to her. For that matter, she was not kind to them, either. Of this, I know only what hints she has dropped, and a few words from Barlen, her consort, but it is clear that it was Verra, and a few others, who sabotaged their work, who created the Great Sea of Amorphia, who unleashed upon the world that which we call sorcery, who themselves became the first of those we know as gods, and who destroyed all of the Jenoine who then lived on this world.
"I have lived through
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