Stories we'd like to see

[JulianneTK]

Please do write.  I know that the one story that I wrote in KK's universe was actually helped along by Katherine.  It was one of the first things I ever wrote and before I even started, I wrote Katherine to ask her if (1) my idea was okay and (2) would she mind if I wrote it.  Her response was a (1) yes and (2) WRITE IT!  She helped with the editing and made my story (which was actually a missing scene from QSC) all that much better.  In fact, I still have a copy of my story with her red marks all over it.  She gave me the encouragement I needed and I hope that my little story will encourage you to write.

Can we see it??? 

[Elkhound]

I second this.  My HP/Deryni story will never be fit to see the light of day; the only part that I can salvage is the ABC's conversation with "the Other Archbishop"--a scene in Lambeth Palace between Lord Carey and the Most Rev. Wulfstan Longbottom, Archbishop for the City of the Legions (yes; another of Neville's great-uncles). 

[AnnieUK]

Resurrecting an old thread, but I'd love to see more of Richard FitzWilliam.  We see enough of him in DR and DC to intrigue me, and then he's gone, but it sounds like he could have a story in him.  Anyone want to write me a Richard FitzWilliam story?  (I can't write fiction to save myself BTW, so don't suggest I do it!)

[Evie]

Ooh, I liked Richard, but can't think for a good story for him off the top of my head.  Then again, it will probably cudgel me upside the head on my drive home, or wait until I'm in the shower, as story ideas tend to do.  

I want to see the Bishop's Heir have an heir.  Which means that young Dhugal will have to settle down with a lass eventually, rather than just stealing kisses in shadowy alcoves at Court dances.  

But here's a question I have which, although it wouldn't lead to a very important story in the scheme of things, still makes me really curious about how to fill in the gap.  If I'm remembering correctly, right before Rothana marries Conall, she says goodbye to her dreams of being Kelson's Queen and throws the ring he gave her (the one he'd married Sidana with) into the Rhemuth Castle moat.  But then three years later, in KKB, Kelson is wearing this ring again, and it's not permanently destroyed until something like midway through the book.  Am I remembering this all wrong, or is that basically what happened?  Because if it is, my question is, how did Kelson get that ring back?  Did he go mucking through the castle moat for it (or, more likely, send someone to do so)?  If so, that bespeaks a certain level of emotional desperation, doesn't it?  I'd really love to know the story of what happened between Rothana's getting rid of the ring and Kelson's regaining it.

[BalanceTheEnergies]

Amazing what a perusal of the Codex will suggest:

1) Teymuraz escapes and marries into the Byzantine imperial family. (I'm with DesertRose on this one.) Suppose he tries what his ancestor Festil did? (There was that Byzantun conquest circa the third century, much like Torenthi ambitions later fulfilled by the Festils.) This could be a theme for a whole other trilogy. Can the new rapprochment between Gwynedd and Torenth survive the tensions such an assault would bring? Will Teymuraz and his followers be able to sow discord and rekindle the bad feelings from the past two or three centuries? Can Kelson and Liam-Lajos hold their alliance together in the face of such discord?

2) There's a Transfer Portal in the master bedroom at Sheele, set to work only for blood relatives of Evaine and Rhys Thuryn. Say Duncan is asked to give Extreme Unction to someone in that room, and he feels the faint tingle. Morgan is set to chair a kind of reconciliation commission aimed at either restoring Deryni estates or compensating Deryni owners (that's how Barrett and Jehana get a place of their own). Morgan and his team do some research and learn the Thuryns owned Sheele. Arilan is consulted for his Portal expertise, which leads to more research. Morgan and Duncan learn that they and theirs are descendants of Evaine and Rhys (hence their healing abilities), and therefore descendants of Camber! One or both of them get places on the Camberian Council (only right IMHO, since they were so badly dissed by that same council in the Chronicles). Along the way, research indicates that Healing is a minority gift, and they learn that healing orders in Camber's day discouraged Healers from celibacy (per Deryni Magic), so Dhugal is prompted to get serious in his search for a wife. Oh, and Briony manifests healing like Evaine and Rhys' daughter Jerusha. Sounds like enough there for a book...

[wombat1138]

Along the way, research indicates that healing is a minority gift, and they learn that healing orders in Camber's day discouraged Healers from celibacy, so Dhugal is prompted to get serious in his search for a wife.

Unfortunately, that's inconsistent with the entire Gabrilite order, though it would've made sense-- the relative rarity of female Healers (and iirc some of the notes in Deryni Magic) certainly suggests a recessive sex-linked factor, which each individual Gabrilite's celibacy would've removed from the gene pool, except via collateral transmission through his mother and sisters (and of course any Healer brothers who remained in the laity).

The controller probably isn't a simple, single on/off switch, though-- there are several matters of relative degree involved, ranging from overall strength of Deryni powers to the specific power-blocking ability.

[Elkhound]

Unfortunately, that's inconsistent with the entire Gabrilite order, though it would've made sense-- the relative rarity of female Healers (and iirc some of the notes in Deryni Magic) certainly suggests a recessive sex-linked factor, which each individual Gabrilite's celibacy would've removed from the gene pool, except via collateral transmission through his mother and sisters (and of course any Healer brothers who remained in the laity).

I haven't my books here, but I do remember a passage that among the student healers who came to St. Neot's for training "only those in whom the religious vocation burned most strongly" were encouraged to stay; others were encouraged to leave, marry, and make more healers.

[wombat1138]

I haven't my books here, but I do remember a passage that among the student healers who came to St. Neot's for training "only those in whom the religious vocation burned most strongly" were encouraged to stay; others were encouraged to leave, marry, and make more healers.

Maybe it's in Deryni Magic, which I haven't yet covered in my series re-read-- I do remember that it had several chapters/stories specifically devoted to Healers' training. I'll keep an eye out for the passage when I go back through.

right before Rothana marries Conall, she says goodbye to her dreams of being Kelson's Queen and throws the ring he gave her (the one he'd married Sidana with) into the Rhemuth Castle moat.  But then three years later, in KKB, Kelson is wearing this ring again, and it's not permanently destroyed until something like midway through the book.  Am I remembering this all wrong, or is that basically what happened?  Because if it is, my question is, how did Kelson get that ring back?  Did he go mucking through the castle moat for it (or, more likely, send someone to do so)?  If so, that bespeaks a certain level of emotional desperation, doesn't it?  I'd really love to know the story of what happened between Rothana's getting rid of the ring and Kelson's regaining it.

Kelson was still sunk pretty heavily in emotional desperation up through the first half or so of KKB. The ring's recovery is somewhat explained the first time it's mentioned (p 14 of the hardback): "the ring she had cast into the moat before her marriage to another, believing him dead-- recovered that next summer, through no little exertion of the power of several of his Deryni associates." Presumably they went scrying for it, in a similar way to the MacRories retrieving the Haldana necklace after it was accidentally dumped down the garderobe. At least if it went into the main moat and stayed there, no one would have to go wading around the garderobe exit zone the way Camber had to.

I do wonder if the ring would've had a devastating emotional charge attached to it from Sidana's death, judging from the impressions that were stored in Henry Istelyn's bishop's ring. Sidana didn't wear her ring for very long and it probably hadn't been made from another piece of Camber's altar plate, but it had been made by a Deryni artisan, after all.

[Evie]

I do wonder if the ring would've had a devastating emotional charge attached to it from Sidana's death, judging from the impressions that were stored in Henry Istelyn's bishop's ring. Sidana didn't wear her ring for very long and it probably hadn't been made from another piece of Camber's altar plate, but it had been made by a Deryni artisan, after all.

Ack!  Yeah, I can't imagine something that devastating not having some psychic impact, though it's probably a good thing Sidana didn't wear it any longer than she did, or it would have been a wonder that Kelson could have borne to wear the thing at all, much less for as long as he did.  I mean, consider Duncan's reaction to putting Istelyn's ring on his finger for the first time.... 

[DesertRose]

Yeah, but Istelyn's ring was some kind of Camberian relic, so it might have been...erm...rather charged even into Duncan's day, and then for it to come away from Istelyn's body the way it did would only have added to the psychic dissonance.

[Evie]

True, but Alaric and Duncan seemed to be expecting that putting on that ring for the first time would be very unpleasant, even before they knew it had a Camberian connection, so that would seem to indicate they expected that the violence that Istelyn had experienced would leave a psychic imprint.  It having been associated with Camber first just added to the impressions they picked up from it.  But length of usage has some influence too, I think.  In QSC, when Duncan and Alaric are trying to find Kelson and Dhugal, they think about trying to track them by focusing on their Camberian medals, but then think those won't work because Kelson and Dhugal hadn't had them long enough, so they focused on Kelson's ring instead.  (Not knowing, of course, it was either with Rothana or in the moat by that time.  I have to wonder if they managed to pick up any impressions from it, and how confused they must have been if they did and it was entirely in the wrong direction from where they were searching!)

[Evie]

OK, here's a situation that occured to me last night.  You know how, when Kelson has a new squire learning the ropes, one of the first things he does is set controls in the lad's mind so that confidential information won't be remembered, much less repeated?  Well, OK, what happens the first time Kelson (or Dhugal, or whichever Deryni is doing this) decides to set the controls on the new squire, only they unexpectedly discover shields?  And the new squire immediately realizes what's going on, having detected the subtle mental probing, because he, too, is a secret Deryni?

Discuss.   

[AnnieUK]

Um, can I sleep on that one?  LOL.  Seriously, getting late, and I've just had Alaric and Randolph arguing morality in my head, so I'm not up to that one just now.  I look forward to you exploring it, though! 

If anyone would like to tell me how the Hort of Orsal's son gets on in Corwyn, I'd be obliged, too.  I've been moderately concerned for him for many years past now.

[Evie]

There's a sentence or two in KKB, I think, in which it's implied that the experience didn't exactly go swimmingly, since the boy wasn't really suited for the martial sort of life, but that Alaric managed to get a hint across to the Hort of Orsal that perhaps he'd be best suited as a scholar (or some such?), and so now the boy is on a path that's better suited for his aptitude and interests.

[AnnieUK]

Ah ok,  I have to confess to only having read KKB once, so it's all a bit hazy.  I am on a big re-read ATM and am up to HD so a way to go yet.  I'm then going back to the Camber era.  I've read the Camber x3 two or three times, but have only managed the Heirs x3 once.  I did like them, but it's taken me a while to be able to face them again.   I hope he's OK.  I was taught at school that first son was the heir, second son was the soldier, third son was the priest, but the principle obviously didn't work here.