Dread Empress Triumphant (MSNR)

I have met, I feel actually, of people that I have gotten to know, I've really gotten to know Ethrand Tachonis. I don't think there's any more getting to know him, that I need to do. And so, jump on the bird, come here real quick because... I am seeing. I am of the house of the Western Wind and I can see where the wind is blowing. And so, we have to make some quick decisions about who gets informed about what. So that I can have a different life.

Campaign 4 Episode 28: Chasing Shadows

Bonus: “Thaisha.”

But it feels like an eternity since I had you here with me, since I had to learn to be someone you don't know.

Been in my Vaelus feels during Convergence so I made a vid about it.

Song: Eternity - Alex Warren

I mean imagine just after the end of the shapers war if the Lloys had made moves like the Halovars would have. They made the weapon that killed the god of war, their druids turned a wasteland green. They are heroes, practically saints. They could have been the new nobility and secured the borders of Dol-Makjar completely icing out the Sundered houses from the only non-blighted land left in Aramán. The Sundered Houses would be in absolute disaster if the Lloys decided to play the game like they do.

What are they doing instead? They are making public infrastructure for free and selling just a sword when they need the money. Thaisha wanted to be a jewelry maker and everybody thought it was a great idea. Even now her truly calling and her families seeing as her grandmother is head of the order of Ancients, is healing the world from the damage done by the shapers. This is obviously great for them and the rest of the world, not to mention that in the long run it's probably more effective. I mean just look at what Thaisha did in episode 29 with the opening of the path to the orc souls freed by the ritual. I truly believe that if given enough time they will figure out a way to fix the barrow dels.

I have been operating under the assumption that these are the only noble sorcerous houses, especially because of the theories surrounding schools of magic. This means that the three rebel houses were the only rebel houses (ie, no rebel houses were believed fully destroyed in the Shapers' War), and specifically were on a slightly lower level than all five other houses (ie, there's Obridai at the top; Halovar, Tachonis, Kalystra, and Memnari at the second level; and then Cormoray, Einfasen, and Royce).

We know the power sources for Cormoray, Einfasen, and Royce (djinn, giants, and fae, respectively). Einfasen is explicitly stated to pre-date the Obridimian Empire and I suspect that the others do as well. I also suspect, given the knowledge of the Sea of Lachris, that House Tachonis also pre-dated Obridimia and simply joined its service as psychopomps; though it is possible that they were granted this connection by Tansul and merely knew of the Sea of Lachris because they have an inherent connection to the Tenebral Reaches. Also of note is that their connection seems to be specifically to the Tenebral Reaches, not to other realms of death, which is why they have grown in power since the Shapers' afterlives fell, and why they are trying to shut down all other options.

House Halovar's original power source is not clear. However, we know that Wick's power derives from his celestial ancestry, as a Clockwork Soul sorcerer. I've said elsewhere I suspect they were probably Divine Soul, and their deals with demons do not tie back into their sorcery, but this is not confirmed.

We know House Kalystra seems to have had stone-related abilities. One possibility for that is they had a connection to the dao as Cormoray did to the djinn (though, to be fair, Cormoray seems to also have efreet-related abilities and sometimes people refer to all the genies as djinn; I believe in the original Islamic folklore ifrit are demonic but grouped with jinn in some ways, so like. it's complicated). As Cormoray is looking into their quarries I suspect they were likely closely related.

the idea that primus is evil and morally corrupt and sadistic but his wife/mother of at least some of his kids must have been good and kind is just... misogynistic. she's upstanding enough to abandon her noble life and fall in love with a seditious rebel and start over fresh after being high status enough to marry primus tachonis? because woman = moral arbiter.

it plays into the audience's discomfort with the idea of the noble class of aramán being top to bottom wicked/complicit (and during the falconer's rebellion, when this would've happened, that does include royce). especially when it comes to women.

there are loads of logistical issues with this theory, like the fact that petra and ryah are closer in age to kattigan than they are occtis, but they've never been called his half-sisters, which means if they share a mother she would be far too old to be marienna and if they're half siblings it has not come up.

the idea that occtis is uniquely special and not a bad tachonis because he had a special nice mommy is insulting to occtis and insulting to his mother and to marienna. it's not impossible that his mother was kinder to occtis than the rest of his family was, if she didn't simply die before he was old enough to remember her, but to say that extends to the point of being morally superior and more enlightened than anyone else who exists in the social strata she occupied is clinging onto sexist fantasies of Women Nicies and Men Meanies. iris halovar is nice but we can't deny that her (kindly intended, in her mind) plan to keep wick in the dark about the creed was a shitty thing to do. trimus is as nice as any tachonis we've met so far but she's still luring poor wizards to their deaths for her brother's plans. it's not impossible that occtis's mother was cut from this same cloth of graceful, polite noble women, but that is a far cry from "marrying known rebel and living in a shack" a thing the most morally good sundered house lady, aranessa, failed to do.