1. Is Sarrisa more loyal to Mab or to Titania now that she is the new summer lady?
2. Why Titania would accept Sarrisa as summer lady being the daughter of her deadly rival Mab, and not kill her and give the summer lady power to the person she wishes?
3. Is like having Sarrisa as summer lady like making the Summer Court as a vassal to Winter Court.

 

1) I imagine Sarissa is more loyal to Mab than Titania. However, the Summer Lady literally cannot disobey Titania's commands (see: Lily in pretty much everything post-Summer Knight). And that doesn't even touch on the whole "wear the mantle, become the person" aspect of it.

2) It's entirely possible she can't directly kill the Summer Lady, in much the same way the Summer Lady cannot disobey the Summer Queen.

3) No, not in the slightest. Sarissa was a changeling. She was pretty irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. Mab just favored her, for obvious reasons.

 

1.But Summer Lady Mantel can be resisted.
2.It was said that Santa Claus was an example why Winter Court is not evil. Now we find that Santa Claus is a Norse God. What is correct? And if Santa Claus is a Norse God then what good people are in Winter Court?
3.Did Molly managed to keep her free will?

 

1) Yea, it can, but it takes a colossal amount of GAR. Not many people are capable of keeping up that level of determination for their entire lives.

2) Not sure what you're going for here. The Winter Court isn't evil in the first place. Good or evil doesn't enter into the equation at all. They're fundamentally alien concepts to the fae. They're vicious, cruel and deceitful sure, but that's not because they're evil. It's because they represent the winter, "Air and Darkness" as it were.

Beyond that, why do they need to be "good"? What's wrong with them just being evil or whatever?

3) Word of Jim is, as of the immediate end of Cold Days, yes. She hasn't lost her soul, but it is at risk of being consumed/subordinated by the Mantle.

 

Ok thanks.
So who is the Santa Claus? Odin or a Winter fae?

 

The smart money is on Odin right now, due to the masks comment in the last book. There are other powers out there that consort with the Winter Fae besides wizards and demons.

 

Also I heard that in the next book Dresden with the help of Michael(a knight of the Cross) will help Nicodimius a denarian in a heist.I'm correct?
Why should a Knight of the Cross help a denarian? Isn't his job to kill the denarian or force the denarian to give the coin of his own free will?

 

It's not terribly clear. If I understand Butcher's comments correctly, Santa is both.

IRL, right around the time Christianity swept through Scandinavia, almost all of the Odin myths were incorporated into the new belief structure using the figure of Saint Nicholas. Presumably, this was done so that the people who grew up worshipping the pagan gods could feel more comfortable and/or preserve that history in the new religion.

From what Butcher's said, it's not at all an unreasonable conclusion that this had an effect on the actual Norse god and shifted him into serving both roles.

Dresden is helping Nicodemus break into Hades' treasure vault, yes. I haven't heard anything about Michael being involved though. I can't really see it happening either, especially since he's a cripple.

That said, he's no longer a Knight. He gave up the sword after Small Favor and focused solely on his family.

 

According to Jim he is bringing Michael back off the bench. Presumably he'll be taking up Amorrachius again.

 

So why a sword of the cross bearer will tolerate a denarian? And not try to kill him or voluntary take his coin to hide the coin.

 

Actually I don't think Jim has said that Harry and Michael are working together at all. It might actually be the other way around.

I mean if you look at it from Michaels POV, Harry looks pretty damn bad.

He became a Winter Knight, who are generally or generally become monsters, serial killers and rapists.

He took Michaels daughter to a genocide.

He died, leaving said daughter to go basically insane.

He came back, and the day he did Molly became the Winter Lady, which is something that might actually endanger her immortal soul which should be utterly horrific to a christian such as Michael.

And now, Harry is working WITH Nicodemus, the leader of the Denarians. And don't forget that Michael never had total proof that Lasciel is truly gone.

Taken together, would it really be all that strange for Michael to think that Harry has gone totally evil, corrupted his daughter and is now a fullblown denarian. Makes sense to me that he might take up the sword to stop/kill Harry.

Remember that Michael knows none of the things we do. Harry has NOT told Michael that he can wield soulfire and that he actually has an archangel looking out for him. He has NOT told Michael how much he regrets taking Molly to the Red Court Genocide. Michael does NOT know that Lash truly changed the way we do. Michael does NOT know that a fallen angel actually took away Harrys free will and forced him to commit suicide. Michael does NOT know that the Winter Court actually protects all of reality from outsiders and that WK is actually an important job. Michael does NOT know that Demonreach was about to explode and that taking Molly made sense. Michael does NOT know that Harry did not want Molly to become the WL and that he was so upset about that happening that he nearly shot and killed Mab on halloween.

From his POV and based only on what Michael knows, Harry is a monster.

 

The thing is, the Knights don't go out aiming to kill Denarians, do they? Moreover, even if Michael were fully convinced that Harry had gone batshit-crazy-evil-insane, it's really not up to him. He doesn't decide his own agenda when he takes up the sword, the sword does, and if Uriel has any say in the matter (which he should, being an archangel, messenger between God and humans, etc.), the sword will never, so long as Harry remains decent, instruct Michael to lay out the Wrath.

 

I don't think we're going to see Michael holding the sword. I think he's going to be involved as just a regular guy, not the fist of God.

 

Even with a motivation to smite Harry, Michael is pushing sixty at this point. Even if he wasn't crippled, he'd be ill suited for the job.

I'm assuming he'll be aiding or working against Harry in a non-violent capacity.

 

You guys seem to be forgetting that Michael is crippled. If he does get involved, it's almost certainly going to be in a nonviolent capacity.

 

Well, in the short story "warrior" he was able to take down some guy that had military training. Now he was a vanilla human so obviously Michael has no chance against Harry or Nicodemus, but he is not totally helpless either, especially if he takes up the sword again.

Whats more, its made clear in that short story that while Michael is generally pretty stable and good guy, he has one berserk button and thats his family. He nearly brutally beats the bad guy in Warrior to death for threatening his daughter, and that bad guy was pure vanilla human who was a member of church and was simply misguided.

Molly becoming Winter Lady means that there is literally a chance that her immortal soul will be lost, and she will be denied heaven. Imagine that from the POV of Michael, who is an incredibly devout christian. If Molly was merely dead, Michael could atleast grieve and take comfort that she is in a better place. But Molly has actually been changed into a Sidhe, who as far as Michael knows are all SOULLESS. It would be totally in character for him to into a blind rage against Harry over this.

Still, its just one possibility. Depends on how things work out I think. I mean if Molly for example explains (during the timeskip) how she became WL and that it was actually Murphy killing Maeve that made her WL while Harry was screamin "NO", then Michael might accept that Harry is blameless. Especially if Michael learns that Demonreach is a prison that was about to explode with sufficient force to utterly wipe out the entire city (including ALL his other children), giving Harry justification to bringing Molly along on such a vital mission. Whats more, we know from Jim that Molly has NOT lost her soul (not yet anyway), and as a wizard she can easily test and confirm the truth of that by initiating a soulgaze with someone. So that would be another way to potentially calm Michael further and make him willing to forgive Harry.

In that case, I could see Michael truly aiding Harry. I mean Harry is forced to work with Nicodemus by Mab, but I think Harry knows that Nicodemus will betray him at the worst possible moment (since thats just what Nicodemus does).

Michael may play a non-combat role in arranging some situation to counter Nicodemus. I mean strictly speaking Michael would not need to do any fighting at all. All he would have to do is be there and raise his sword so the holy light from the sword would repel Nicodemus and his shadow. That would allow Harry to do a repeat of what happened on the island and physically attack Nicodemus (this time with WK strength bonus) and strangle him with the noose, while Anduriels shadow would be blocked from killing Harry by Michael and the sword.

 

You're assuming the sword will still work for him after he gave it up.

There's no evidence either way, but making assumptions like that is dangerous. Especially since one of the central points of that short story you mention is that Michael has given up the sword for good. It would be decidedly strange for him to flipflop on that.

And the fight in the warrior was against a psycho with military training who was swordfighting someone who'd been fighting with a sword for decades. Military training nowadays doesn't generally cover sword techniques, and even if it had, it would have been an incredibly minor thing in favor of guns and whatnot. Buzz had no idea what he was doing and was facing the equivalent of a grand master. The physical disparity was made irrelevant through sheer skill.

That's not going to help against beings that can, and did, fight Michael in his prime and come out on top. If Nicodemus needs help with the burglary, that means he can't just walk in and stomp everything. The same Nicodemus who took on Michael in his prime, who was wielding two of the Swords of the Cross. Whatever's there would swat the cripple down and move on, barring some ridiculous handwave of author fiat using the Swords.

I'm fairly confident Butcher is a better writer than that.

 

I'm very confident that Michael will be there in an advisory role. After the first confrontation with Harry and Molly he'll likely fall into the spot of specialist advisor for Harry against Nicodemus. He knows how the Denarians work better than Harry does, even after Lasciel.

On that note, I'd put a large amount of money on Lasciel (the Fallen) showing up as well. Very probably at the most opportune moment to fuck with Harry. Lash is going to have to be dealt with as well, given that she's due to burst from his skull Athena style any time now.

 

Now I'm curious if there's a gestation period for Fallen Angels...

 

Hmm, maybe. On the other hand I cannot help but remember the scene with Rosanna, where she pretends to be a victim and basically plays with the emotions of Sanya and Michael easily, while Harry is the only one to see through her thanks to his experiences with Lasciel, a fact the fallen within Rosanna then acknowledges.

I think Michael has more raw knowledge on denarians and Nicodemus (as in strenghts and weaknessess and so on) than Harry, but when it comes to the actual nature of the fallen and how they truly work, I think Harry might know more. He is the one who had a shadow of one stuck in his head for years and wielded hellfire. I think Harrys knowledge is far more intimate and personal than Michaels.

Quite possibly. On the other hand I think there are a few problems.

For one, we know from WoJ that BOTH Lasciel AND Lash appeared in Ghost Story. Lash is almost certainly the Parasite (though there is some debate), and Lasciel had to be the fallen angel who whispered lies to Harry and drove him to suicide (agreed?). Seems to me that if the actual Lasciel had a new host, then she would have used said host to try and assassinate Harry. Instead Lasciel acted against Harry directly despite knowing that it would give Uriel a chance to balance the scales. Something which backfired on her quite nastily by making Harry much stronger and allowing him to resist Mab much better.

I tend to think the fact Lasciel did not use a host suggests that her coin is still imprisoned by the church. Then again, its been quite some time since that scene, especially by the next book. There is also the chance she will try to strike at Harry directly once more. Though that would be a bit repetitive so I doubt it.

As for Lash, I still feel it questionable whether or not Lash is actually going to physically burst from Harrys skull, Alien style. Demonreach is a spirit who has trouble communicating verbally, so its words here might not be truly literal. Especially since the spirit suggested that Molly could help. Molly specialises in mental magic, while an actual physically growing entity would probably be more in the realm of either LTW or an actual brain surgeon. I tend to think the whole "bursting" might be more similar to somekind of mental overload where Harrys mind is overwhelmed by her return in a way similar to when he used the Third Sight on the Skinwalker, rather than Lash physically tearing her way out of Harrys skull.