Tabitha Falkayn/Hrill of Highsky to Christopher Holm/Arinnian of Stormgate:
"'I daresay your Khruath decided that western Corona and northern Oronesia must work out a means of defending the Hesperian Sea.'
"He nodded awkwardly..." (p. 465)
Sure. The Sea is between the continent and the archipelago. But are the Hesperian Islands themselves not still inhabited? Later, in Chapter XI, High Wyvan Liaw of The Tarns will address the Greath Khruath of Avalon from outside David Falkayn's house on First Island. But have the Islands been depopulated and transformed into symbols and museums?
Meanwhile, when Arinnian visits Hrill on St. Li:
a sailor scouts for piscoids;
a herder and his uhoths control a flock of Ythrian shuas;
Avalonian pteropleuron lumber about;
native susin still grows on upper slopes;
lower down, Ythrian clustergrain grows to feed shuas;
coconuts, mangos, oranges and pumpernickels grow for human Highsky members.
"A wind blew, warm but fresh, full of salt and iodine and fragrances." (p. 466)
Poul Anderson's winds usually mean something. This one seems to mean life.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
Falling behind. Mostly because I've been binging out on Stirling's BLACK CHAMBER series. Read the first volume and now rereading the second, THEATER OF SPIES. I don't like everything I see in them, but Stirling knows how to tell page turning stories!
I don't think the Hesperian Islands were abandoned--rather, as population and the economy grew and spread to the continents, the centers of wealth and power inevitably shifted to those continents. The islands became sleepy backwaters.
Ad astra! Sean
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