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HFQ Offical Snippet #4

This fascinating series is a combination of historical seafaring, swashbuckling adventure, and high technological science-fiction. Join us in a discussion!
HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by runsforcelery   » Mon Sep 01, 2014 9:58 pm

runsforcelery
First Space Lord

Posts: 2425
Joined: Sun Aug 09, 2009 11:39 am
Location: South Carolina

Merlin Athrawes had no need to breathe, yet he inhaled sharply in muscle memory reflex as she paused and looked up from the fire at him. The matter-of-fact way in which she’d suggested — no, not suggested; stated — that the most important sacred writings of the Church of God Awaiting, outside of the Holy Writ itself, had been forged, or at least significantly ‘edited,’ was astonishing. Not so much because they had been, but because she was so obviously confident they had. In its own way, that was an almost greater surprise than Maikel Staynair’s revelation of the journal of Saint Zherneau in Tellesberg had been.

But she clearly wasn’t finished yet, and she smiled crookedly as he waved for her to continue.

“Saint Kohdy was a seijin, too,” she went on after a moment. “I don’t think he had all the abilities you have, Merlin, but he had quite a few . . . superhuman capabilities. And the stories about Helm Cleaver are true. I know they are, because I’ve handled it myself, used it to shave slivers off a solid block of granite.” She smiled again, the expression softer yet somehow bittersweet, and shook her head. “I didn’t realize when Sister Klairah recruited me — I was much more innocent and naïve in those days — that I would have suffered a very sad accident if she hadn’t been able to convince me she was telling the truth.” Her expression darkened. “Some candidates have ‘suffered an accident,’ and I never would’ve lived to see Helm Cleaver or Saint Kohdy’s journal if Sister Klairah hadn’t convinced me.”

Merlin stiffened, and she nodded as if his reaction pleased her.

“We can’t read some of it,” she admitted. “It’s not written in any language we can understand. According to the part of the journal we can read, Seijin Kohdy wrote that part of it in something called ‘Español.’ He didn’t say why, but I’ve read the rest of it dozens of times, and I think he’d begun keeping his journal well before he began to feel any doubt about which side he was on. That’s certainly how the first half reads, at any rate. The ‘Español’ portions are brief, initially, interspersed with the ones we can still read, but its last eight months are recorded entirely in ‘Español.’ I suspect he switched to that language when he wrote down things that might have done serious damage to the cause of Chihiro and Schueler if it had fallen into someone else’s hands. Or perhaps they were things he might not have been certain of in his own mind at the time he wrote them down. From a handful of entries in the part I could read, I think it was a combination of the two. He wasn’t certain, and if it turned out he’d been wrong to doubt and what he’d written were to fall into anyone else’s hands, he didn’t want it to draw others who might trust him because of who and what he was into the same error.

“I don’t know that for certain, because he never explaned his reasoning in the portions of the journal we can read. Until I encountered that ‘Español’ of his, it had never occurred to me another language might even exist! And however reasonable it may’ve seemed to him at the time, his decision to use it means even the Sisterhood’s members are divided on at least a few points.”

“Oh?” Merlin tilted his head, and Aivah smiled more than a little tartly.

“Some of us — myself included — have interpreted the passage in which he recorded his decision to begin using ‘Español’ to suggest that it came from some time or place which predated the Creation. Combined with a few other puzzling references, one could almost read that as saying all of the Adams and Eves were . . . somewhere else before Safehold was called into existence.”

Her dark eyes were suddenly very intent, boring into him like twin blades, but she went on calmly, almost tranquilly.

“Even those of us who read it that way are divided about where that ‘somewhere else’ might have been. Most of us interpret it as evidence that not even an Archangel could create a soul — that God Himself must be the sole Creator in that sense — and that all those Adams and Eves were with Him while the Archangels prepared the world in which they would live. But a fair number of us think he might just as well have meant the Adams and Eves lived and breathed on an entirely different world and that God and the Archangels brought them here from that other world, rather than first giving them life on the Day of Creation. It’s a substantial distinction, and one I’ve often thought we could have found the answer to if he’d written the ‘Español’ portions in something we could read. Or,” she added, raising both eyebrows, “that the Sisterhood could read, at any rate.”

“I might be able to do a little something about that,” he acknowledged slowly. “I can’t promise. And you’d have to trust me with the journal — or a true copy of it, at any rate.”

“Either we’re going to trust one another a great deal eventually, Merlin,” she said, “or this is going to end very badly for someone.”


"Oh, bother!" said Pooh, as Piglet came back from the dead.
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by Cartref   » Mon Sep 01, 2014 10:12 pm

Cartref
Lieutenant (Senior Grade)

Posts: 91
Joined: Thu Apr 18, 2013 10:15 pm

Truely excellent and like most we cannot wait for the book to be released. :D

All the very best to you and yours from down under :D
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by ksandgren   » Mon Sep 01, 2014 10:25 pm

ksandgren
Captain (Junior Grade)

Posts: 342
Joined: Tue Jun 14, 2011 6:54 pm
Location: Los Angeles, California

Thanks again RFC. I can hardly wait until the full book is published and distributed, but for now I'll live on these snippets as if they were as sacred as Seijin Khody's journals.
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by Undercover Fat Kid   » Mon Sep 01, 2014 10:28 pm

Undercover Fat Kid
Commander

Posts: 207
Joined: Sat Oct 12, 2013 11:20 pm

HAZZAH!! I've been checking the forums with a mindless persistence for days and finally it pays off!!!

Interesting that saint Cody is or was bilingual. I wonder who taught him the language?
.
.
Death is as a feather,
Duty is as a mountain
This life is a dream
From which we all
Must wake
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by SHV   » Mon Sep 01, 2014 10:59 pm

SHV
Lieutenant (Senior Grade)

Posts: 50
Joined: Mon Jan 27, 2014 11:32 pm

I think that she qualifies for an all expenses paid vacation to the cave.

Steve
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by DrakBibliophile   » Mon Sep 01, 2014 11:26 pm

DrakBibliophile
Admiral

Posts: 2311
Joined: Sun Sep 06, 2009 3:54 pm
Location: East Central Illinois

Perhaps he learned it in childhood on Earth. :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:

Undercover Fat Kid wrote:HAZZAH!! I've been checking the forums with a mindless persistence for days and finally it pays off!!!

Interesting that saint Cody is or was bilingual. I wonder who taught him the language?
*
Paul Howard (Alias Drak Bibliophile)
*
Sometimes The Dragon Wins! [Polite Dragon Smile]
*
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by laz   » Mon Sep 01, 2014 11:39 pm

laz
Lieutenant (Senior Grade)

Posts: 73
Joined: Mon Jun 03, 2013 1:25 am

SHV wrote:I think that she qualifies for an all expenses paid vacation to the cave.

Steve


not quite. thank god its written in a romance language! so i either see merlin
showing them the roots and translating or having OWL print up a spanish to english dictionary...if he just gives them the dictionary or translates it with them, or we get a history lesson on latin is up to RFC.

i think the all expenses paid vacation depends on what it says and HOW they take what it says....


laz
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by Theemile   » Mon Sep 01, 2014 11:50 pm

Theemile
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 5060
Joined: Sat Feb 27, 2010 5:50 pm
Location: All over the Place - Now Serving Dublin, OH

laz wrote:
SHV wrote:I think that she qualifies for an all expenses paid vacation to the cave.

Steve


not quite. thank god its written in a romance language! so i either see merlin
showing them the roots and translating or having OWL print up a spanish to english dictionary...if he just gives them the dictionary or translates it with them, or we get a history lesson on latin is up to RFC.

i think the all expenses paid vacation depends on what it says and HOW they take what it says....

D
laz


If she doesn't give Merlin a copy, I forsee many a snark crawling over that abby in the future.
******
RFC said "refitting a Beowulfan SD to Manticoran standards would be just as difficult as refitting a standard SLN SD to those standards. In other words, it would be cheaper and faster to build new ships."
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by PeterZ   » Tue Sep 02, 2014 12:15 am

PeterZ
Fleet Admiral

Posts: 6432
Joined: Fri Apr 01, 2011 1:11 pm
Location: Colorado

Dang! This was better than having Randall Cobb dumped on the waiver wire 2 days after the Fantasy draft while I hold the top waiver pick! Some things are so good it seems too good to be true...but isn't.

Thanks RFC for the second gift of the Labor Day weekend!
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Re: HFQ Offical Snippet #4
Post by thanatos   » Tue Sep 02, 2014 12:34 am

thanatos
Captain (Junior Grade)

Posts: 324
Joined: Wed Jul 20, 2011 2:29 pm
Location: United States

I'd always wonder if and when other languages might be used. Frankly I was hoping that Charis would start using something like Hebrew or Arabic as a code language, much like the Navajo code talkers of World War II. This adds an entirely different aspect to Nynian's operations though and does point out that Cody was a disaffected member of the command crew (he'd have to be since none of the Adams and Eves were given any language but English - probably interspersed with words from other languages such as "Jihad") whose disaffection became apparent to the surviving members of the command crew.

runsforcelery wrote:Merlin Athrawes had no need to breathe, yet he inhaled sharply in muscle memory reflex as she paused and looked up from the fire at him. The matter-of-fact way in which she’d suggested — no, not suggested; stated — that the most important sacred writings of the Church of God Awaiting, outside of the Holy Writ itself, had been forged, or at least significantly ‘edited,’ was astonishing. Not so much because they had been, but because she was so obviously confident they had. In its own way, that was an almost greater surprise than Maikel Staynair’s revelation of the journal of Saint Zherneau in Tellesberg had been.

But she clearly wasn’t finished yet, and she smiled crookedly as he waved for her to continue.

“Saint Kohdy was a seijin, too,” she went on after a moment. “I don’t think he had all the abilities you have, Merlin, but he had quite a few . . . superhuman capabilities. And the stories about Helm Cleaver are true. I know they are, because I’ve handled it myself, used it to shave slivers off a solid block of granite.” She smiled again, the expression softer yet somehow bittersweet, and shook her head. “I didn’t realize when Sister Klairah recruited me — I was much more innocent and naïve in those days — that I would have suffered a very sad accident if she hadn’t been able to convince me she was telling the truth.” Her expression darkened. “Some candidates have ‘suffered an accident,’ and I never would’ve lived to see Helm Cleaver or Saint Kohdy’s journal if Sister Klairah hadn’t convinced me.”

Merlin stiffened, and she nodded as if his reaction pleased her.

“We can’t read some of it,” she admitted. “It’s not written in any language we can understand. According to the part of the journal we can read, Seijin Kohdy wrote that part of it in something called ‘Español.’ He didn’t say why, but I’ve read the rest of it dozens of times, and I think he’d begun keeping his journal well before he began to feel any doubt about which side he was on. That’s certainly how the first half reads, at any rate. The ‘Español’ portions are brief, initially, interspersed with the ones we can still read, but its last eight months are recorded entirely in ‘Español.’ I suspect he switched to that language when he wrote down things that might have done serious damage to the cause of Chihiro and Schueler if it had fallen into someone else’s hands. Or perhaps they were things he might not have been certain of in his own mind at the time he wrote them down. From a handful of entries in the part I could read, I think it was a combination of the two. He wasn’t certain, and if it turned out he’d been wrong to doubt and what he’d written were to fall into anyone else’s hands, he didn’t want it to draw others who might trust him because of who and what he was into the same error.

“I don’t know that for certain, because he never explaned his reasoning in the portions of the journal we can read. Until I encountered that ‘Español’ of his, it had never occurred to me another language might even exist! And however reasonable it may’ve seemed to him at the time, his decision to use it means even the Sisterhood’s members are divided on at least a few points.”

“Oh?” Merlin tilted his head, and Aivah smiled more than a little tartly.

“Some of us — myself included — have interpreted the passage in which he recorded his decision to begin using ‘Español’ to suggest that it came from some time or place which predated the Creation. Combined with a few other puzzling references, one could almost read that as saying all of the Adams and Eves were . . . somewhere else before Safehold was called into existence.”

Her dark eyes were suddenly very intent, boring into him like twin blades, but she went on calmly, almost tranquilly.

“Even those of us who read it that way are divided about where that ‘somewhere else’ might have been. Most of us interpret it as evidence that not even an Archangel could create a soul — that God Himself must be the sole Creator in that sense — and that all those Adams and Eves were with Him while the Archangels prepared the world in which they would live. But a fair number of us think he might just as well have meant the Adams and Eves lived and breathed on an entirely different world and that God and the Archangels brought them here from that other world, rather than first giving them life on the Day of Creation. It’s a substantial distinction, and one I’ve often thought we could have found the answer to if he’d written the ‘Español’ portions in something we could read. Or,” she added, raising both eyebrows, “that the Sisterhood could read, at any rate.”

“I might be able to do a little something about that,” he acknowledged slowly. “I can’t promise. And you’d have to trust me with the journal — or a true copy of it, at any rate.”

“Either we’re going to trust one another a great deal eventually, Merlin,” she said, “or this is going to end very badly for someone.”
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