He Couldn't Lose [SG Spoilers]

[megarows]

If CD was any indication, we need to worry about the opposite. Harry struggles against the Winter Mantle (the 'natural order' personified) urging him to rape and kill. When Mab shows humanity, it is a rare and unnerving thing. The Summer Mantle overwhelms Lily, making her burn the landscape and attack indiscriminately- making her threaten the man her human side loves.
Nature is not the one being (ab)used here. It may not initiate Table rituals, but it certainly dominates their participants.

Those things aren't from nature though.  They arise from the mantle, artificial constructs made by humans with black magic and human sacrifice.  A mantle isn't "nature"... it's a thing created with murder.  Literally, the definition of crimes against humanity.

The fae queens -- humans with stolen power obtained by black magic -- have inserted themselves into at the very least, atmospheric weather, in a manner similar to a human building a dam.

The Hoover Dam is built incredibly well.  Maybe not in our lifetimes, but inevitably even with maintenance, it will fail.  Lake Mead is less transient.  And when Hoover Dam fails, all the water comes crashing down.  Just like in DF when the balance of the fae queens fails.

But yes, nature always dominates in the end.  Because it is eternal.  What men create -- dams or mantles -- may last a very long time, but a finite amount of energy went into their creation.  There is no free energy even for magic in the Dresdenverse.

This is the part of The Dark Tower I was referring to: (Song of Susannah, p109)

(click to show/hide)

“How many Beams do there be, Susannah of New York?”

“Six,” Susannah said. “At least, there were. I guess now there are only two that—”

Mia waved a hand impatiently, as if to say Don’t waste my time. “Six, aye. And when the Beams were created out of that greater Discordia, the soup of creation some (including the Manni) call the Over and some call the Prim, what made them?”

“I don’t know,” Susannah said. “Was it God, do you think?”

“Perhaps there is a God, but the Beams rose from the Prim on the airs of magic, Susannah, the true magic which passed long ago. Was it God that made magic, or was it magic that made God? I know not. It’s a question for philosophers, and mothering’s my job. But once upon a time all was Discordia and from it, strong and all crossing at a single unifying point, came the six Beams. There was magic to hold them steady for eternity, but when the magic left from all there is but the Dark Tower, which some have called Can Calyx, the Hall of Resumption, men despaired. When the Age of Magic passed, the Age of Machines came.”

Mia shrugged. “You doom yourselves, Susannah. You seem positively bent on it, and the root is always the same: your faith fails you, and you replace it with rational thought. But there is no love in thought, nothing that lasts in deduction, only death in rationalism.”

“The magic went away. Maerlyn retired to his cave in one world, the sword of Eld gave way to the pistols of the gunslingers in another, and the magic went away. And across the arc of years, great alchemists, great scientists, and great— what?— technicians, I think? Great men of thought, anyway, that’s what I mean, great men of deduction— these came together and created the machines which ran the Beams. They were great machines but they were mortal machines. They replaced the magic with machines, do ya kennit, and now the machines are failing. In some worlds, great plagues have decimated whole populations.”

“The Crimson King’s Breakers are only hurrying along a process that’s already in train. The machines are going mad. You’ve seen this for yourself. The men believed there would always be more men like them to make more machines. None of them foresaw what’s happened. This … this universal exhaustion.”

“The world has moved on.”

“Aye, lady. It has. And left no one to replace the machines which hold up the last magic in creation, for the Prim has receded long since. The magic is gone and the machines are failing. Soon enough the Dark Tower will fall. Perhaps there’ll be time for one splendid moment of universal rational thought before the darkness rules forever. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

[Argonometra]

Those things aren't from nature though.  They arise from the mantle, artificial constructs made by humans with black magic and human sacrifice. 

Yet these mantles manifest themselves through frost and blossoming flowers. If they're inventions of human sin, why aren't Summer Queens followed by streams of blood? Why is it that howling winds- not dying screams or tortured sobs- herald the Winter Lady's arrival?
Because the Mantles show themselves through clear natural phenomena, we may assume they are creations of nature. Natural creations? That remains to be seen. But there are plenty of situations where nature establishes a symbiotic relationship with human life and humanity's 'artificial' constructs.

A mantle isn't "nature"... it's a thing created with murder.

When Harry killed a man to protect his daughter, that was also nature. A natural instinct equal to any falcon call or palm leaf. Remember what his id said? "Protect the offspring."

But yes, nature always dominates in the end.  Because it is eternal.  What men create -- dams or mantles -- may last a very long time, but a finite amount of energy went into their creation. 

Humanity itself endures. The towers and dams don't matter, they're just byproducts of life- human life. Judging us by dams is like saying all Dalmatians are going extinct because dog shit can be washed away.

[megarows]

Yet these mantles manifest themselves through frost and blossoming flowers. If they're inventions of human sin, why aren't Summer Queens followed by streams of blood? Why is it that howling winds- not dying screams or tortured sobs- herald the Winter Lady's arrival?
Because the Mantles show themselves through clear natural phenomena, we may assume they are creations of nature. Natural creations? That remains to be seen. But there are plenty of situations where nature establishes a symbiotic relationship with human life and humanity's 'artificial' constructs.

Why didn't using the red court's bloodline curse, powered by human sacrifice, drive Harry insane?  For whatever reason, we have situations where sometimes something created by black magic is innately tainted, and others where it is not.

My point is not that mantles secretly have goatees.  My point is they are artificial constructs with a finite amount of energy.  Whether they were created by petting kittens or murder.

When Harry killed a man to protect his daughter, that was also nature. A natural instinct equal to any falcon call or palm leaf. Remember what his id said? "Protect the offspring."

Man is an animal and part of nature, sure.  And a beaver will construct a dam just as man does.  The difference in these things is the scale of consequences when what man (or beaver) creates inevitably fails.

Humanity itself endures. The towers and dams don't matter, they're just byproducts of life- human life. Judging us by dams is like saying all Dalmatians are going extinct because dog shit can be washed away.

I think it is a question of scale.  Man would not survive the beams or Tower falling in The Dark Tower.  It would end all life, all reality, every universe.  Just like that.  Man did not build the Tower.  The Tower as such is a fictional invention of Stephen King, but it is also a metaphor.

Yes, the Hoover Dam breaks, very sad, but Soviet Bear marches on.  It is not an extinction-level event.

Something goes wrong with the fae queens, the weather gets messed up.  Likely to kill more people than Hoover Dam from SK's description, but again, it's not like climate change is an extinction-level event or anything, amirite?

But is weather alone the only way fae queens have intimated themselves into natural processes?  Is that their worst failure mode?  And what about the dragons, if they are mantles as well?  What about Hades, and his prison of souls?  What would be the consequences of that dam breaking?  We already know from the text that Demonreach's prison and the Outer gates are two "dams" that woud destroy us.  Granted, those latter two are not natural processes being usurped, but they remain systems with entropy.

Humanity may survive many of these things.  But past a point, the consequnces would be an extinction-level event.  Maybe not necessarily the end all of realities like the Tower falling, but as far as we're concerned, game over.

[Argonometra]

fae queens have intimated themselves into natural processes

If Harry is any indication, the Fae created and bear Mantles because of natural processes: to protect themselves, to protect others, to fight and/or survive better. Remember, Mab doesn't spend her days partying or swimming in mountains of gold: she fights Outsider incursions, she kills traitors, she disciplines the mightiest army Earth has ever known. ("Power has purpose," says Mother Winter in CD.)
Nature is not some flawless harmony where everybody gets what they want. Natural processes always conflict with each other- often to the detriment of nature itself- but that doesn't make them any less natural. It is natural for humans to dislike being cold (because cold is dangerous): therefore, it is natural for humans to build shelters. The resulting houses are no more artificial than the rain wearing them down.
Similarly, Mantle creation is a natural process. Unhealthy, yes- for the Fae involved, and perhaps even the world. But it is not unnatural, or unusual, for any creature to seek power.

[Quantus]

Those things aren't from nature though.  They arise from the mantle, artificial constructs made by humans with black magic and human sacrifice.  A mantle isn't "nature"... it's a thing created with murder.  Literally, the definition of crimes against humanity.

The fae queens -- humans with stolen power obtained by black magic -- have inserted themselves into at the very least, atmospheric weather, in a manner similar to a human building a dam.

I think you may be assigning a whole lot more characterization to all mantles everywhere, than is necessarily called for here.  We know that the fae queens have used their Table to increase their Power, and can assume that some (but certainly not all) of that was Human Sacrifice.  We Know that the The Erlking gathered his power by consuming energy in a qualitatively similar fashion to a DarkHallow, and we know that a Darkhallow can gather enough Power to birth in Immortal. We do not know if that is how they all work, or where they actually came from.  There are lots of ways to level a building  We've seen a Nuke in action, but we can go saying all explosions work that way.

[megarows]

If Harry is any indication, the Fae created and bear Mantles because of natural processes: to protect themselves, to protect others, to fight and/or survive better. Remember, Mab doesn't spend her days partying or swimming in mountains of gold: she fights Outsider incursions, she kills traitors, she disciplines the mightiest army Earth has ever known. ("Power has purpose," says Mother Winter in CD.)
Nature is not some flawless harmony where everybody gets what they want. Natural processes always conflict with each other- often to the detriment of nature itself- but that doesn't make them any less natural. It is natural for humans to dislike being cold (because cold is dangerous): therefore, it is natural for humans to build shelters. The resulting houses are no more artificial than the rain wearing them down.
Similarly, Mantle creation is a natural process. Unhealthy, yes- for the Fae involved, and perhaps even the world. But it is not unnatural, or unusual, for any creature to seek power.

You are getting hung up on the verbiage of the word "nature" and missing my point, I think.

The concept of nature as gaia is not my viewpoint.  Nature is not some monolithic whole.  It doesn't matter wnat natural behavior is for humans.  All that matters is when you hold back Lake Mead, eventually your shit breaks and everyone in Cottonwood Cove has a real bad day.

You can say Hoover Dam is natural, the water will not care.  You just drown.  It is not a value judgement, it is not the plot of Final Fantasy VII.  It is gravity, cause and effect, thermodynamics, entropy, inevitability.

We know that the fae queens have used their Table to increase their Power, and can assume that some (but certainly not all) of that was Human Sacrifice. 

It's the only known way mantles get created in DF.  Sure, Butcher can define an alternative, say... petting kittens... but it is fundamentally the same for what I am saying.  You have X number of human lives or kitten pets that go into the mantle.  Each is worth Y energy.  However massive your human sacrifices or harem of kittens is, it is finite.  Nothing escapes entropy, not magic in DF, not even the sun.

And sure, if you keep up sacrificing on the stone table and adding energy, it will extend that.  But never infinitely.  And the fae queens remain vulnerable to other things as we saw in SK and elsewhere that an untainted atmospheric weather system would not be.  Which is the same reason you can no longer drive over the Hoover Dam and they built a bypass.  Which is the same reason Shardik was created in The Dark Tower.

[namkcas]

Why didn't using the red court's bloodline curse, powered by human sacrifice, drive Harry insane?

1. Harry was not involved in any of the Human Sacrifices.

2. The Curse's target ended up being inhuman.

If we go back to the laws of magic, there seems to be a complete distinction between killing a Human and killing a Red Court Vampire.  The latter (associated with the problems of Black Magic) seems to be taint free.  Since Harry only killed RCV's there was no problem.  If he had killed people, well something else may have happened.

As an extension of this, you would have to look at the Fellowship of St. Giles.  Harry did not kill any of the Humans.  He killed their Vampire 1/2 and the loss of that aged the Humans past their lifespan.

[Quantus]

If we go back to the laws of magic, there seems to be a complete distinction between killing a Human and killing a Red Court Vampire.  The latter (associated with the problems of Black Magic) seems to be taint free.  Since Harry only killed RCV's there was no problem.  If he had killed people, well something else may have happened.

As an extension of this, you would have to look at the Fellowship of St. Giles.  Harry did not kill any of the Humans.  He killed their Vampire 1/2 and the loss of that aged the Humans past their lifespan.

Yup. Legally The Laws only ever apply to what is done to Mortals.  Mtaphysically I think it's a bit more subjective than that.  For example I think you're average Warden would have no fallout from Killing a White Court Vampire, but Harry has a more personal perspective and sees them as actual People.  Similarly a Wizard who can speak to animals might have more issues killing them with magic, Thralling them, etc, depending on how their own views of said animals had been changed by contact. 

[knnn]

Yup. Legally The Laws only ever apply to what is done to Mortals.  Mtaphysically I think it's a bit more subjective than that.  For example I think you're average Warden would have no fallout from Killing a White Court Vampire, but Harry has a more personal perspective and sees them as actual People.  Similarly a Wizard who can speak to animals might have more issues killing them with magic, Thralling them, etc, depending on how their own views of said animals had been changed by contact.

I'm quite interested in the Metaphysical aspects about breaking the Laws.  While the exact amount of "objective corruption" (for the lack of a better term) one gets might depend slightly on the relative morality of the wizard, I think the fact remains that killing mortals (and possibly only humans) with magic seems to universally confer some amount of "objective corruption", be them Harry or Cassius.

This begs the question of course of what exactly qualifies as "human" for purposes of magic and why Wizards are included while Whampires/Denarians are not.

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WAG: My own theory on this is that we've been told that the Laws of Magic can slowly change and that "belief" can have a strong influence on how your magic works.  Add to this mix the way "mass belief" works for the various gods/pantheons, and we get the idea that maybe the reason you get "objective corruption" for killing human (and humans only) is because that what the wizards of the White Council collective believe.

WAG 2: Personally, I'd take this a bit further.   Remember Exodus 22:18?  The Bible there is explicitly saying that "Black Magic" is *EVIL* (tm).   Thus my wag-conjecture  is that "what constitutes human" for the "objective corruption" of the metaphysical Laws of Magic comes directly from the definition of "human" in the Bible.

In short: 

1) Billions believe in the Bible +
2) Bible defines "Human" +
3) Bible mentions black magic as evil =
 
== Using black magic against "humans" (as defined in the Bible) makes you "Evil" (objective corruption).

[megarows]

I guess I can see how "against humans" explains the RCV bass cannon and Kumori rezzing that dude, but how do the mantles created by black magic ascension rituals avoid being objects of evil?  Or is it that the side effects go to the creator alone?

[namkcas]

Kumori resurrected a Human and broke one of the 7 laws.  It was black magic.

Which mantles were created by Black Magic Ascension?  For all we know the Faerie Queen Mantles were created originally by TWG.  We actually have no information about their origin.  All we have is an explanation that a Darkhallow, done correctly, would create something with powers of a "God" (does that mean Mab like, Molly like, MW like, Hades like - we have no idea). If that being was subsequently killed on Halloween, we have no idea if that became a "mantle" and passed on.

[megarows]

Kumori resurrected a Human and broke one of the 7 laws.  It was black magic.

Which mantles were created by Black Magic Ascension?  For all we know the Faerie Queen Mantles were created originally by TWG.  We actually have no information about their origin.  All we have is an explanation that a Darkhallow, done correctly, would create something with powers of a "God" (does that mean Mab like, Molly like, MW like, Hades like - we have no idea). If that being was subsequently killed on Halloween, we have no idea if that became a "mantle" and passed on.

1.  Perhaps she did, but the guy wasn't tainted by it as far as we know.
2.  Hecate's mantle was created by an ascension ritual.  ("Into the Jungle")
3.  Butcher gives more info about the origin of the fae queens (and Erlking) here: http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,11033.msg494103.html#msg494103
4.  The fae queens' -- humans with mantles' -- "original base of power" came from Hecate.  Not TWG.  Hecate got shanked on the stone table.  Hence why the statue of Hecate in the Underworld shows the fae queens.
5.  If the original base of power of the fae queens (humans) was from a human (Hecate), and human sacrifice (ascension ritual), then I don't really see how they could have insinuated themselves into atmospheric weather systems before humanity existed.  And please, no time travel theories, or TWG will kill a kitten.

[namkcas]

Into the Jungle

I have no idea of what that is or why it applied to this topic.  I see there is some graphic novel that is called Welcome to the Jungle.  I have not read it, so the only info I have is that Harry stopped an ascension rite.  Hectate existed pre-Harry so clearly the person in that ritual is not Hectate...even if they claim to be.  So, you will have to show something more than that.

Hecate got shanked on the stone table.  Hence why the statue of Hecate in the Underworld shows the fae queens.

Again, I have no idea where you have that from.  The statue is a statue.

5.  If the original base of power of the fae queens (humans) was from a human (Hecate), and human sacrifice (ascension ritual), then I don't really see how they could have insinuated themselves into atmospheric weather systems before humanity existed.  And please, no time travel theories, or TWG will kill a kitten.

You are making all kinds of assumptions and additions to the actual words that are written.  I don't.  For all I know, MW was ALREADY MW and got more powerful (not became immortal) by killing people or other gods.  The Erlking is clearly stated as having gone through an ascension ritual.  Do we know if ALL rituals are dark?  Is it possible - POSSIBLE - that some are not?

[megarows]

If you're interested in the lore here, I think reading Into the Jungle would be relevant to your interests.  It's why Hecate is significant, and why the statue in SG isn't "just a statue".  I don't particularly even like comics, but that's where the lore written by JB for this is, and so you miss that if you skip the comics.  Read it, re-read the relevant WoJs having done so, think about the statue in SG, and decide for yourself.

Re: rituals, all the text and WoJ canon thus far is that they are dark.  Every single time.  I suppose you could consider Harry shanking Lloyd Slate to be a good deed in some ways?

[Eldest Gruff]

When it comes to Hecate we've already got three 'conflicting' notions. First Welcome to the Jungle has her ascending this way from a human, or thereabouts iirc. Then Bob offhandedly mentions in DM or BR about big dormant Gods who are still around and brings up Hecate. Now we have SG which has of course given rise to the idea that she is an aspect of power surrounding the six Queens of Faerie, possibly sacrificed on the Table. So...its all conjecture now anyway. Some seem more likely than others.