Entries by Johnny Elbows

There are ten knights
1. Sir Able
2. Sir Bold
3. Sir Callow
4. Sir Daring
5. Sir Effusive
6. Sir Fearless
7. Sir Gallant
8. Sir Hector
9. Sir Indomitable
10. Sir Jolly

Each has a shield with a main color and a trim color. The available shield colors are:
1. Red trimmed with White
2. Blue trimmed with White
3. Blue trimmed with Silver
4. Blue trimmed with Gold
5. Black trimmed with Silver
6. Black trimmed with Gold
7. Black trimmed with White
8. Green trimmed with Gold
9. Green trimmed with White
10. Green trimmed with Silver

The following rules determine how their shields are assigned:
1. If Sir Able’s shield is Black with White, then Sir Bold’s shield is not Black with Silver
2. If Sir Bold’s shield is Black with White, then Sir Callow’s shield has Black on it.
3. If Sir Bold’s shield is Black with Silver, then Sir Callow’s shield does not have any Silver on it.
4. If Sir Callow’s shield has Black on it, then Sir Gallant’s shield is not Green with Gold
5. If Sir Daring’s shield has Blue on it, then Sir Able’s shield is Green with White
6. If Sir Effusive’s shield is Black with Gold, then Sir Daring’s shield does not have any Gold on it.
7. Sir Callow’s trim color must be the same as Sir Gallant’s trim color
8. If Sir Daring’s shield has Blue on it, then Sir Bold’s shield color does not have any Gold on it.
9. If Sir Able’s shield is Green with White, then Sir Hector’s shield is Green with Gold.
10. If Sir Effusive’s shield has Black on it, then Sir Fearless’s shield is Blue with Gold.
11. If Sir Fearless’s shield has Blue on it, then Sir Gallant’s shield color is Blue with Silver.
12. Sir Indomitable and Sir Able have the same main shield color
13. Sir Gallant and Sir Fearless have the same main shield color
14. If Sir Callow’s shield color is Black with White, then Sir Daring’s shield color is Blue with Gold
15. If Sir Gallant’s shield color is Blue with Silver, then Sir Hector’s shield color has Gold on it.
16. If Sir Effusive’s shield color is not Blue with Gold, then Sir Indomitable’s shield color is Green with Silver
17. If Sir Hector’s shield color is Blue with Silver then Sir Able’s shield color is not Black with Silver
18. If Sir Bold’s shield has White on it, then Sir Effusive’s shield does not have White on it.
19. Sir Daring’s main shield color is the same as Sir Fearless’s
20. Sir Able’s main shield color is the same as Sir Hector’s
21. Sir Effusive’s trim color is the same as Sir Fearless’s
22. Neither Sir Daring nor Sir Jolly have Black on their shield.

What colors are their shields?

Normally, the Tulip Tree playhouse catered to the nobles and those who wished to be nobles, the rich merchants who were presenting their daughters as possible matches for the idle scions of the less-wealthy blue bloods. Today, however, its elaborately decorated halls were filled with sell swords, cut throats, and bounty hunters.
"We are looking for this man," the soldier said. His uniform identified him as a captain of the Home Guard. He held aloft a sketch of a thin pop-eyed man with a long, narrow nose. The bare fact that expensive paper had been used for a sketch identified the man as a significant target, but when the soldier continued, it became clear how significant. "A reward of five thousand gold marks will be paid to the man who brings him to me alive."
Continue reading "At the Tulip Tree Playhouse"

Traer opened the door to his small cottage hung his knapsack on a peg beside the door, and sank into a chair beside the table. Papers stood in careful stacks and careless heaps all over the table. An ink bottle and several discarded quills were scattered among the papers.Traer rifled through one of the stacks, extracting a single sheet, covered on one side and part of another with close, cramped script.
Continue reading "The Bringer"

The high peaks of the Blue Mountains form the border between the icy lands of the Normen and the more temperate lands of their brothers, the Harlon. Once, the two lands were one, but the difficult passes, the differences in climate, and more than one succession crisis had separated them. Now they fought as only brothers can, speaking the same language, worshiping the same gods, but hating and killing each other at any opportunity.
Continue reading "An Uninvited Guest"

Jordan stays true to form. After a whirlwind finish to the previous book, he settles into his deliberate pace, and begins setting up the story for this book. The chapters were fun, if a bit slow moving. Summaries below the fold. Continue reading "The Fires of Heaven (Prologue - Chapter 4)"

I really enjoyed the Two Rivers portion of these chapters. Perrin seems to be growing and changing very quickly as a character, even though he himself doesn't seem to see it. The later chapters, when the story returned to Rand and Mat seemed much more deliberate, and once again returned to setting the stage for later things. In seeing how much Jordan has laid out for himself, it's no wonder that it took him so many books to fulfil the prophecies and wrap up the loose ends. Continue reading "The Shadow Rising (31-36)"

After the fast-paced ending to the last book, we go back to the typical deliberate pacing. A lot of plots are in motion, but for the most part, it is slow motion. Summaries below the fold. Continue reading "The Shadow Rising (1-6)"

There were a few interesting things that happened in these chapters, but for the most part, they were just setup/exposition chapters. So far, I have concluded that Robert Jordan meant to make the Wheel of Time series so that each book was a stand-alone story. Because of this, he explains and re-explains the same things over and over again. While this might be useful if someone tried to read a single book of the series, it turns many of the chapters into exposition instead of action, lengthening the books and breaking their flow. Continue reading "The Dragon Reborn (Chapters 14-19)"

A lot of things happen in these next chapters, but the events seem to be beginnings, not endings, and the number of beginnings without endings is growing rapidly. It would be really nice to see some threads wrapped up instead of started up.

See below the fold for summaries. Continue reading "The Great Hunt (30 -35"

The Great Hunt starts with a good hook. I think that its prologue is one of the strongest pieces of writing in the series so far. After that, though, the pace slows down quite a bit, and for the most part, these chapters seem to be building up a new set of characters as pieces for Robert Jordan to move around his world.

Chapter summaries below the fold. Continue reading "The Great Hunt (Prologue - Chapter 5)"

Summary

After their adventure at the ferry, they continue their journey to Baerlon. Seeing no evidence of pursuit, the boys begin talking about going back home. Moiraine overhears them and tells them that they are wanted by the Dark One, and that she will personally destroy them before allowing them to fall into his hands.

Eventually, they arrive in Baerlon and take lodging at an inn. While there, they meet a friend of Moiraine's, a girl named Min, who has a talent for seeing a person's destiny by looking at the aura that surrounds them. They also hear the beginnings of rumours about a false Dragon named Logain who is stirring up trouble. When they go to sleep, the boys all have identical dreams. They dream about a man who calls himself Ba'alzamon. He threatens them, and shows his power by killing a rat, breaking its back without touching it. When they awake, they find that all of the rats in the area of the inn are dead, their backs broken. In spite of this, at Thom's advice, they keep quiet about their dreams.

Later, Nynaeve shows up at the inn. She has tracked them from Two Rivers, and has come to take them back home. After some discussion, they decide to stay with Moiraine. They are planning to leave in the morning, but when Rand sees a Fade in the hallway of the inn, their departure is hastened; they leave Baerlon in the middle of the night. The Children of the Light try to keep them from leaving, but Moiraine uses an illusion to make herself appear "taller than a giant," and intimidates their way out of the city.

As they journey toward Caemlyn, they are pursued by almost 500 Trollocs. They drive them away from the road, and against Moiraine's better judgement, the party flees into Shadar Logoth for shelter.

My Thoughts Below: Continue reading "The Eye of the World (Chapters 13-18)"

We've had a new arrival at our house. Her name is Madeleine, but we usually call her Madi (or Squeak, since she squeaks rather than crying most of the time). There's a picture of her below the fold.

Continue reading "News From the Elbow Family"

“It took the king almost a week to get up the courage to invite the Heffian ambassador into the court for an audience. When he did, he found that his fear was justified. After some bluster and babble about how great the king was, the Heffian ambassador said, ‘You must understand, your majesty, that you have given my master great cause to worry about your intentions. He has lived long with the Dina. He knows that they, and their god, Tor, are little more than animals that will fight for food, for money, or for any slight of their supposed honor, no matter how minor it may be. My master has always harbored good feelings toward you and your people. He sees you as a people of the land. He has felt that you are good neighbors, and that our peoples are good friends. Your alliance with the Dina has caused him to doubt these feelings.’” Gannon paused for another bite, and Lena cut in.
“How do you know so much about the goings on at court?”
Gannon finished chewing, and then replied, carelessly, “I was a journeyman at the time. Kingsbury was my guild station, and I happened to enter Kingsbury to buy birds on the same day that the Heffian ambassador did. I decided to stay in town and find out what was going on. One of the masters that I knew in Kingsbury got me into the audience chamber.”
I had no idea what Gannon was talking about, but Lena nodded as if she understood. Not wanting to look foolish, I kept my questions to myself, and willed Gannon to continue his story.
He picked up the thread after a few more bites. “The ambassador didn’t have a whole lot to say after that. Basically, he finished with a threat. He said that we had a short time to break up the alliance with the Dina. He also said that if we didn’t break it up, that they, the Heffians, would regard us and the Dina as a single people, and that they would exterminate us from off their lands as noxious animals.”
Lena’s face looked thoughtful. “We thought it was bluster. But it wasn’t, was it?”
Gannon shook his head. “You were there, at the battle at Goat Pass. Did you notice anything?”
Continue reading "13"

Gannon laughed. “See, you’re a snoop, too. But no matter. Here’s a question for you: why do you think you’re here with me, instead of with her father?” He gestured toward Lena with his chin.
“I don’t know. Some kind of emergency in Torwell?”
“That’s a pretty good guess. But not quite. Several years ago, the king got the idea that we should ally ourselves with the Dina. They’re great warriors, but they’ve always had trouble feeding their people. We, on the other hand, are great farmers, but our armies are fair to middling at best. In the king’s mind, we could be perfect allies. They would supply most of the military might, and, in turn, we would supply most of the food. It sounded like a good idea, but the king’s Mask warned him that if we allied ourselves with the Dina, that they would drag us into a war that we could not, and would not win.”
“So, what happened?”
“The fool ignored his Mask. He finalized the alliance just three hours after he heard the warning, and we’ve been sending our surplus food to Aster and Torwell ever since.” He paused. It was starting to get dark. I had been listening to him too carefully, and had barely started my cage, but he had been working as he talked and had finished another cage. “Let’s put these things away, and go get some dinner. You can finish the other cages as we drive tomorrow.”
He gathered up the willow switches and carried them over to the wagon. I put the newly-repaired cages into their places in the bird hutch, and piled the remaining ones under the bench of the wagon where I could access them easily the next day.
When I got to Lena’s fire, she was serving Gannon salt pork, beans, and an apple in tight-lipped silence. I picked up a bowl and ladled out some of the beans for myself, and chose a seat between them. For a moment, we ate in silence.
Gannon swallowed a bite of his apple, and started talking. “About eight months after the alliance was finalized, a Heffian ambassador showed up in Kingsbury with his entire entourage. Nobody had even known that he was coming, but he walked into Kingsbury dressed in scarlet and gold, and announced that he had come to speak to the king.” He paused, gulped a spoonful of the beans, took a long drag at his bottle, and continued. “Of course the king tried to delay, tried to make it look as if he wasn’t worried, but it was pretty obvious that there were some very worried people at the court.”
When Gannon paused for another bite, I found myself willing him to hurry up. I wanted to know what happened next, and I wanted to know right away.

We stopped early that day, setting up our camp near the place where the road curves around the feet of Mount Arian. Lena busied herself starting a fire and preparing dinner. At Gannon’s request, I unloaded the cages that had been damaged when my predecessor dropped them. While I rearranged the wagon in my quest for the damaged cages, Gannon wandered over to the banks of the Fangos. He returned bearing an armful of willow switches, and piled them near the stacks of damaged cages. Pointing to a roll of hairy twine, he called out to me, “Grab that cage twine, and come help me.”
I’m not sure why I looked for Lena before I asked my question, but I didn’t want her to hear me ask it. “I don’t understand. How can you be a Mask when you don’t believe in Mora? Why would you even want to be?”
He looked at me for a moment, and then responded, “Watch.” A small box crafted from a dark colored wood sat on the ground by his side. From that box, he took a short knife with a curved blade. With quick, practiced strokes, he cut the twine that bound the broken withes on one of the cages. He pulled sharply at the broken twigs, gradually working them out of the loose weave that made up the cage. When they were gone, he carefully wove the new ones into their places, re-shaping the cage as he went. “What do you think? How does it look?”
“Good, I guess.”
Continue reading "11"