shimotsuki | TSK discussion | Legacy, ch 1-9 (Reply)

Welcome to the special Lakewalker edition of our TSK discussion group! I am posting from a small lake at roughly the latitude of Dag's Hickory Lake, and the water is indeed a bit murky, but the sixteen (!) of us gathered here in two ~~tents~~ lake houses do not yet smell green. Possibly because we have a shower that is fed by the city water system. I have not yet been out in a narrow boat, though I plan to if the wind dies down a little, but there has been lots of swimming and floating. On the other hand, no plunkin, (un?)fortunately, has graced our dinner table...

Summary

Chapter 1: The story picks up exactly where Beguilement leaves off, reinforcing the idea that these two books are really more like one long book. Fawn and Dag are riding away from West Blue on their wedding day. They camp, and find that Dag's broken arm has made the wedding night more complicated, but the "ghost hand" that Dag used to fix the glass bowl usefully re-emerges. There are conversations that give us more clues about Lakewalker family and camp structure. Fawn and Dag reach Hickory Lake only to find that Mari's patrol has made it back first.
Chapter 2: Dag and Fawn enter Hickory Lake camp, so for the first time we see Lakewalkers in their home (well, summer) territory. They meet up with Fairbolt Crow, the patroller company captain, who is not in the least thrilled about Dag's marriage to Fawn, and seems to expect bad fallout from the camp in general. But Fairbolt is also impressed by Fawn's backbone and good questions, and seems to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Chapter 3: Dag continues to face the music -- this time, it's his family. His brother's wife, Omba, is distant but not overtly hostile. But then they find the brother, Dar the knifemaker, at the bone shack, and hostile becomes the operative word.
Chapter 4: More gantlet. Fawn, Dag, and Dar head together to Tent Redwing, where Dag's mother Cumbia is incensed and says quite nasty things about Fawn. In the heat of her argument, she says that Dag is not welcome in her tent unless he gets rid of Fawn. Dag takes her at her word, and whisks Fawn off to spend a rainy night in the bone shack. They talk, about Dag's family, and about the origins of Lakewalkers and malices. And, inevitably, about plunkins.
Chapter 5: Dag and Fawn find a place to set up Tent Bluefield, at a campsite shared by Mari, her husband Cattagus, and other relations (including Utau and Razi and their wife Sarri). Fawn starts trying to settle in, but bumps up against having so little to work with and not knowing how things are done. Meanwhile, Dag goes to the medicine tent to get a ground reinforcement for his broken arm, and talks to Hoharie, the medicine maker, about his ghost hand.
Chapter 6: Dag takes Fawn to Stores, where he collects various things he is due, for sending down to West Blue as bride gifts and for outfitting their tent. Among other treasures -- and some mud-wolf hides -- Dag shows Fawn an alligator skin, and tells her about seeing the sea. A few days pass; Dag's splint comes off, and he starts to teach Fawn how to swim, while she starts to cook and spin and knit, and try to make a home. Dag takes Fawn to see the water lilies that were his "something beautiful but useless".
Chapter 7: Dar appears, to tell Dag that he is making Tent Redwing a spectacle, and Dar and Cumbia aren't standing for it, so they're going to go before the camp council and demand a string-cutting or a banishment. Dag goes to talk to Fairbolt, and learns that if Dar doesn't go up before the council, others likely will. The camp seems concerned with not letting Dag get away with something that others have been prevented from doing in the past, and with setting an example so youngsters don't start taking up with farmers.
Chapter 8: In the face of the threat from the camp council, Dag decides it's time for Tent Bluefield to be more visible around the camp, so they help with plunkin distribution for a few days. Fawn, always looking for things to do, starts learning from Cattagus how to make and fletch arrows. But then in the middle of a weapons-practice session comes bad news: a bad malice outbreak in the Raintree hinterland, Saun's home. Fairbolt wants Dag to serve as company captain...which he hasn't done since Wolf Ridge. Fairbolt makes a persuasive case -- which includes leaking the information that Dag is about to be called up in front of the camp council, within days.
Chapter 9: Fawn helps Dag prepare to leave for Raintree. She asks him if there's anything he can do to let her feel his ground through her wedding cord, and he comes up with something...interesting. Morning comes all too soon. Fawn sees Dag off, and then hurries to a spot where she can see the patrollers ride by as they leave camp. To her surprise, she spots Cumbia there as well. The chapter concludes with Dag choosing patrollers who he knows can keep their grounds locked down, and planning a dangerous ambush on the powerful malice, which will, he hopes, be distracted by the fighting already going on in Raintree. He realizes that now, for the first time since Kauneo, he wholeheartedly wants to survive and have a future -- and he wonders if that will affect his success as a patroller.