Or it could be that the Red King is the predecessor of all the currently living Red Court, with the Eebs perhaps being the survivors of a great purge that rid the Red King of his peers. If that's true then the Eebs may be different enough from the clone effect that the Red King and his offspring have going on (sharing blood) that they would be immune to the curse.

Of course that's assuming they weren't protected because they were in the Nevernever at the time of the curse.

 

.. which is also assuming the Erlking didn't <fill in random verb> them to death.

 

Does the Erlking really seem like the type of thing that would just kill its captives straight away? Really?

 

The gem is just the physical container for the spell LeFay created, so that her knowledge (her only real "inheritance" that could be passed down) could be conveyed to her son in a safe manner. She learned the ways by traveling them herself, without the aid of the gem.

The ways changed, but not very often, so it can be assumed that the gem would still be fairly accurate, if not exact.

No idea which page this is from, I just copied it out of my html copy of the book. Not hunting it down in my hardcopy.

EDIT: I have no idea where the little stars came from, but they show up any time I attempt to copy and paste. Sorry, you'll just have to read around them/do a search in your own copy of the book.

 

Well.... I guess <random verb> could be tortured. And keeping in mind the time differential, it might have gone on for quite a while before their hearts exploded.

 

Nevernever, remember? Chances are they were insulated from the curse because of that and the likelihood of the Erlking's halls having wards around them, and that's ignoring the idea that they weren't the Red King's descendants.

 

And if all that failed the Erlking himself might shield them. The rooms must be used after all.

 

Harry wasn't 100% sure crossing into the Nevernever would insulate him from the curse in Storm Front - and this version was much more powerful. That said, we just don't know (which, I guess, is why this is a debate). On the other hand, it would be much more interesting if they were protected - because they could then show up again.

I also wondered if there could be any survivours for one other reason; the time between Susan turing and Harry 'using the knife' was pretty tight - but it wasn't instantaneous. In that one or two minute gap, who's to say another random vampire wasn't created in Belize or Tierra del Fuego?
Young vampire with no kin, no guidance and no idea what the hell just happened to all the other vampires... just a wee bit dangerous.

As to the gem, I think she passed on actual recordings of relatively stable passages - it was a recording of her voice, after all. If it had just been her 'sense', I can still understand it manifesting as her voice in Harry's mind, but why would it be the exact same message every time he heads for a particular passage, where she's running out of breath or talking about her dress?

And why would the recordings have notes to other people (Corwin)?

 

Personally, I'd say the gem is just Margaret's version of a dictaphone. She used it to help herself remember each passage because, well, she's only human.

 

I agree that it is not at all implausible that a handful of Red Court may have escaped - maybe one new vampire in that space of time between Susan being turned and dying for the ritual, and maybe one or two happened to be in the Nevernever when it happened and avoided the curse, or were maybe laid up for a few weeks, instead of instant death.

Either way, I see this more as an excuse for fangirls to write Romaces with Red Court, or Red Court self-inserts, than I see it as the Red Court ever coming back in one of Jim's novels. Maybe a short story, but really...I think, on the power scale, the Red Court is off the radar.

Harry Dresden the Winter Knight probably takes its place in the mind of most people in the know as a force to be reckoned with.

 

I'd also agree with this explanation, but there is one thing I don't understand - what about this curse that comes with knowledge of the Ways? For Margaret it was insomnia, but if Dresden got only "dictaphone" why his godmother warned him about this?

 

Perhaps she ran into things in there that led to sleepless nights? Or perhaps some of the Ways lead places that are perhaps best left unexplored? Could mean anything really, and since it depends on the person how bad the effects are I'm going to hazard a guess that it's not something very nice that caused Maggie's insomnia.

 

Harry's seen horrible things with his Sight. The Queens, Shagnasty, etc. And he's had nothing resembling insomnia. Unless Margaret was running around the deep dark places (like Hell) with her Sight on 24/7 I don't think anything she'd seen would prevent her from sleeping.

 

That's why I think it varies from person to person. Put simply, Margaret may have been too empathetic to deal with it, whereas I suspect Harry would cope better.

 

That might also explain how she ended up with Lord Raith in the first place. Emotional bliss to help her sleep.




But is it ever mentioned if the fae sleep? If not her iirc unsurpassed knowledge of the ways might have been making her more fae-like. /tinfoil hat off

 

Was the release date of Ghost Story moved forward? I thought it was around September?

 

Finally finished reading Changes, and one thing that struck me as odd that I haven't seen anyone bring up yet is why is Harry so certain that Nicodemus survived Small Favor?

One of the things I greatly disliked about the ending of that book was the insufficient amount of aftermath. I mean, I at least expected Harry to tell someone that, hey, I may have killed Nicodemus, and I at least figured out his weakness. We never even really got to find out how Michael fared after his injuries.

And given Deirdre's reaction to Nicodemus's "death," I actually expected him to be, you know, dead. Sure it would have been a terrible end for one of my favorite characters (though I'm not sure how significant he'll be now that Harry has picked his poison), but as I said, I never picked up on the fact that anyone had any reason to assume he hadn't been taken out.

Did I miss something?

Oh, and Fix is apparently Completely Fucked now. That's what you get for picking a random little shit to be the Summer Knight. I can at least respect Mab in that she knows how to hunt down quality.

 

He may have told people about the weakness and he may have heard that Nicodemus is alive during the past two years. We see a few days of Harry's life at a time. This is nothing like Harry Potter where we deal with an entire year per book. Each book is only a few days out of each year so its entirely possible he found out Nicodemus survived.

The reason we didnt learn about Michael at the end of Small Favor is that at that point no one was sure how he would fare as he was still in recovery at the end of Small Favor. We do learn in the short story Warrior though.

I feel sure Nicodemus will be significant again at some point. The last 3 or 4 books are supposed to be end of the world type stuff correct? Thats what Nicodemus has lived, breathed, and planned for during the last 2000 years.