When Freda rides out from Elfheugh:
"The wind whined around her and bit through layers of fur." (p. 112)
When she realizes that she is pursued by trolls:
"The wind of her gallop screamed about her, nigh ripping her from the saddle, forcing her to shield her eyes with an upraised arm." (p. 113)
Air hoots and bites. During the prolonged pursuit:
"Time brawled past like the wind." (ibid.)
She is captured by a troll but immediately rescued by the returning Skafloc!
Meanwhile, elven women welcome troll invaders into Elfheugh. Leea has spoken of:
"'Women's weapons...'" (p. 110)
The trolls will be put off their guard and, in the fullness of time, slaughtered.
17 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Ha! The trolls should have been more suspicious and watchful of those elvish women.
Ad astra! Sean
Well, troll culture is rather male-centered... 8-).
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Fatally so! I hope I would have been more wary and suspicious.
Ad astra! Sean
Yeah, I don't underestimate women. They're sneakier than men -- they have to be.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Exactly! Women can be just as ruthless as men--simply in different ways. IWHBD.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: Elizabeth the First, for example. She managed to avoid getting killed by her sister Mary, which was quite an accomplishment, and required considerable acting talent! She was clever and above all patient -- not afraid to wait, and then to strike in the right instant.
Sean: she also said she didn't want to "make windows into mens' souls". In other words, she was concerned with their religion only as it affected -politics-.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
While I agree with you about the abilities of Elizabeth I, I still don't like her. I am not forgetting how she dragged England into schism from the Catholic Church via the Second Act of Supremacy of 1559. And, she had great difficulty ramming the Act thru a reluctant Parliament. And that Act was inevitably supplemented by increasingly harsh anti-Catholic laws, long before Elizabeth was excommunicated by the Pope in 1570. The Penal Laws and the Catholic martyrs of her reign contradict her words about not making windows into men's souls. Esp. when I recall that many of these martyrs insisted they acknowledged Elizabeth as their queen.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: yeah, but a large % of them acted in concert with the Spanish or French. Nationalism hadn't become more important than religion then, or it was at a tipping point.
Also, of course, Elizabeth had to rely on Protestants, and their wishes vs. a vs. religion had to be accomodated.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I agree, there were English Catholics who would have supported a Spanish invasion of England (France was too torn by civil wars in Elizabeth's reign to be that kind of threat).
Exactly, whatever her own beliefs were (some of them close to Catholicism), Elizabeth's dependence on Protestant support meant she had to accommodate their theological wishes.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: Yeah, Elizabeth was a very, very practical politician. The way she did the "VIrgin Queen" thing, for example.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I agree about Elizabeth's abilities as a politician, despite disliking her. But I have been puzzled why she did not try to provide for the succession by marrying a suitable man after becoming queen. Elizabeth was still only 25 in 1558--young enough to hope for children. Assuring the succession is one of the prime duties of monarchs.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: She wanted the Stuarts as successors. And I think she had a deep dislike of the prospect of marriage.
Sean: which, considering her dad, was natural enough.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I agree your comment about Elizabeth wanting/accepting the Stuarts as her successors makes sense--except, as so often, she could be irritatingly ambiguous. After Queen Mary of Scots gave birth to the future James VI/I in 1566, this was how Elizabeth reacted to the news: "The English queen with her famous outcry, the primitive complaint of the childless woman for a more favoured sister: "Alack, the Queen of Scots is lighter of a bonny son, and I am but of barren stock" (Antonia Fraser: MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS, Delacorte (1969/1970), page 268). Meaning that while Elizabeth declined marriage, she knew it came with very personal costs.
I can see how the baleful influence of Henry VIII might have frightened Elizabeth away from marriage, considering how he brutalized his own family!
Everything from not allowing his daughter Mary to marry while young enough to have children herself to having his tame Parliament defaming his admittedly invalid marriage with Ann Boleyn, declaring Elizabeth a bastard.
Ad astra! Seam
Sean: Henry VIII and Elizabeth were similar in both appearance (when he was young) and mentality -- except that Elizabeth had far, far more self-control and Henry VIII was self-indulgent.
They both had volcanic tempers, for example. Henry VIII's rages were notorious, and when Elizabeth lost her temper... strong men turned pale and shook.
And Elizabeth made ambiguity a weapon. She had to -- being a woman in command.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
All we have to do is compare portraits of Henry VIII as a young man with those made late in life to see the difference: the latter showing Henry as monstrously obese and menacing looking.
Yea, Elizabeth was far more self-controlled than her father, more like her grandfather Henry VII. She was also like him in being stingy and parsimonious.
What you said about Elizabeth's calculating use of ambiguity reminded me of her distant cousin and old enemy, Philip II of Spain. He too made a tool of ambiguity.
Ad astra! Sean
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