Royce's Random Thoughts

Short Version: At first read, a better read than the previous book, TSK: Legacy. Certainly not fraught with emotional danger for Dag & Fawn. Most of the time is spent with Fawn wowing everyone with her 133t cooking skilz and Dag wowing everyone with his 133t Lakewalker healing skilz. There isn't even that much sex in it. Mostly it's just a lazy trot down the river while Dag explores his emerging abilities.

( Speaking of which (spoilers) )

I recently made myself re-read LMB's The Sharing Knife, Legacy in anticipation of the next book in the series coming out later this month. Knowing what was coming ahead in the plot made me feel much more charitable towards it, in comparison to my initial reaction of "Dag and Fawn got screwed!" I also think I have a much more evenhanded understanding now of Dag's actions and the reactions of the Lakewalker community around him, especially after reading kikibug13's post about non-conformist dystopias

The important thing, I think, is that Dag is a non-conformist by his society's standards. He's a Patroller, when by all rights he ought to be a patrol captain. He's living with his birth family (as much as he tries to avoid them) rather than his late wife's clan. At the start of TSK: Beguilement he's also practically a monk, when his genetic duty is to make more little Patrollers, especially given his extraordinary Groundsense. He gets away with this because he's a damned fine Patroller, and has enough Malice kills to his credit that no one can argue he's shirking that duty at least. The other Lakewalkers, his mother excepted, have learned to swallow it.

Then he marries his little Farmer child-bride Fawn, and like Miles' grandfather in "The Mountain's of Mourning", they just can't swallow that.

The thing to remember is that the Lakewalker's duty to destroy Malice is a serious one, and that up until the Farmers' tech level started to seriously outpace their own, the system was working. Every Malice that had ever appeared had been killed. If they were to miss one, then the world would surely be destroyed. That's a powerful reinforcement to keep doing what you were always doing. That means Dag bucking the system, asking for something no other Lakewalker has ever been permitted to get away with, has definite and unavoidable consequences.

But at this point, I think, the system that the Lakewalker's always counted on isn't going to work anymore. They can't can't stop Farmers from settling above the cleared line. There have been two major Malice outbreaks in Dag's lifetime now, both of which were only barely contained. Another way of doing things has to be found, and it'll be up to Dag and Fawn to find it.

Otherwise the next Malice the Lakewalkers confront, might be the one that finally does destroy the world.