Rashid the Gatekeeper, Intellectus, Foresight.

[Con]

Given his position and mantle, I think the Gatekeeper has what Harry has on Deamonreach, only with the Outer Gates. It makes sense as a requirement of being Gatekeeper that his sanctum is the Outer Gates, it would be a huge advantage when directing Winter's forces against the Outsiders.

Their's also the fact that Rashid has experience with Intellectus with his experience with Demonreach, here's everything we know of Rashid and Demonreach and his experience with Intellectus.

"I know a Way. I've been here before."....
"Demonreach" the Gatekeeper mused. "It's...certainly fitting."
"The ley line you speak of does not go through the island" he said. "This is where it wells up. The island is its source."

Now theirs also the fact that Gatekeeper has some ability to see into the future or send messages from the future. As confirmed by Bob in Proven Guilty in his discussion on time.

"Oh the Gatekeeper didn't do it to annoy you" Bob said "He did it to prevent any chance of paradox"
...
"He got this form hindisght, he had to" Bob said
"Hindsight" I murmured. "You mean he went to the future for this?"
"Well" Bob hedged "That would break one of the Laws, so probably not. But he might have sent himself a message from there, or maybe gotten it from some kind of prognosticating Spirit. He might even have developed some ability for that himself. Some wizards do"

 But their is a direct example in Turn Coat.

Then he did something strange. He exhaled slowly, his living eye closing. The gleaming steel eye tracked back and forth, as if looking at something, though I could only tell it was moving because pf the twitches of his other eyelid. A moment later, the Gatekeeper opened his eye and said. "The chances that you'll survive it are minimal".

Then the fact that Harry is on the island changes things

He frowned at me and then repeated the little ritual. Then he made a choking sound. "Blood of the Prophet. he swore, opening his eyes to stare at me. "You... You've claimed this place as a sanctum"
....
The Gatekeeper shook his head slowly. "Harry" he said, his voice weary. "Harry you don't know what you've done"

"Messenger arrived from Rashid," Ebenezar said. He's more familiar with what you can do with what you can do with that kind of bond.

Clearly Gatekeeper knows what Demonreach is for which given his position as Gatekeeper and the following information makes sense. Both Demonreach and the Outer Gates were designed to combat Outsiders, Dark Gods, Powerful spirits e.t.c. The fact that he's familiar with the bond is all but confirmation that Gatekeeper has his own bond with the Gates.

"First" he said "do not tap into the power of this place's well. You are years away from being able to handle such a thing without being altered by it."
....
"I cannot set foot on the island" he said
"Why not?"
"Because this place holds a grudge" he said

Now we have this WOJ partially explaining/hinting at the cause of that grudge.

Also, people have a few things wrong about the Gatekeeper and the island.  The Gatekeeper did not hurt Demonreach.  Gatekeeper has been on the island a couple of times, and it’s never gone well, but he didn’t cause Demonreach’s limp.  That’s the work of the glacier that carved out Lake Michigan.
....
Sarks: What did the Gatekeeper do to Demonreach to make it hold a grudge?
Jim: 2) He focused the tank. Oh, wait, no, it's a little more complicated than just a positive-negative situation, and while I don't go into the specifics, yet, you get all the pieces you need in Cold Days.

Which brings us to Cold Days.
Now first their is a description of what limits the Gatekeepers, Foresight/Hindsight in Proven Guilty thats relevant.

"Because if he significantly altered what happened with his knowledge of the future it could cause all sorts of temporal instabilities. It could cause new parallel realities to split off from the point of alterations he couldn't predict or kind of backlash into his consciousness and drive him insane"
....
"But if your car never got stolen" Bob said "then how did he come to know to come back and warn you?"
I frowned
"That's paradox and it can have all kinds of nasty backlash. Theory hold that it could even destroy our reality if it happened in a weak enough spot."
.....
"If it's done subtly enough, indirectly enough you can get all kinds of things changed. Like for example, he tells you that your car is going to be stolen. So you move it to a parking garage, where instead of getting stolen by the junkie who was going to shoot you and tale the car on the street, you get jacked by a professional who takes the car without hurting you- because by slightly altering the fate of the car, he indirectly alters yours"

Okay Cold Days.

He leaned over to scan each of the fallen closely, nodding at the medics after each.
....
The other eye had been replaced with the crystalline material that was identical to that which had been used to create the gates and the walls around them.
....
"But they need a good eye here to be sure that the things that must remain outside do not slip in unnoticed"
....
"Oh" he said waving a hand "You've danced about in the shadows at the edge of life now young man. That's no small thing, to go into those shadows and come back again----You've no idea the kind of attention you've attracted"
....
I nodded thinking. "okay" I said. "First how do you know if the adversary has... infected someone?"
"Experience" he said. "Decades of it. The Sight can help but.." Rashid hesitated
.....
'I don't recommend making a regular practice out of it" he continued "It's an art not a skill and it takes time. Time or a bit of questionable attention from the Fates and a ridiculously enourmous tool" He tapped finger against his false eye.
....
"Hells bells. The gates, they're, some kind of spiritual CAT scanner"
"Among many other things" he said "But it's one of their functions yes. Mostly it means that the adversary cannot use such tactics effectively here. As long as the Gatekeeper is vigilant it rarely tries"

[morriswalters]

Bob is unreliable, like that know it all cousin.  There is what he knows and what he says he knows. 

Given that in periods of glaciation Demonreach Island would have been under 6000 or so feet of ice, depending on which period you are talking about,  getting pinched by a ice cube a mile thick would have had to hurt.  One must wonder though what the structures on the island with all those nifty runes  from some ancient era were doing while the ice went over the top.  Just maybe those damaged buildings are the source of the limp.

It all makes you wonder exactly how long ago those building were put into place by Merlin, as played by Alec Guinness.  Apparently the last glaciers went over that area about 35,000 years ago.  Or 34,000 Years BM(Before Mab)

Now, If a guy were sitting at Mack's place, about half crocked, he might ask himself a couple of questions. 


We know who built the well, but how did he get the prisoners into their cells? 
Who built the gates?
And when will Atlantis come into the story? (Just kidding)
Sounds like the stuff of an apocalyptic trilogy.

[Yuillegan]

How do you mean Bob is unreliable, morris? I have always thought his theory to be sound. Hell, he has explained more magical theory than most and he even knew how to kill an immortal (which so far very few other mortals know). His literary purpose is somewhat of a "talking head" (hence why he is a talking skull - it was a joke that he made to annoy his writing teacher). I think the only time he has kept info from Harry was about the Kemmler stuff, though he does get shaky around Mab.

Is Thomas unreliable? That is a big question. He frequently has come through for Harry. He does keep him out of the Oblivion War - but that is because it would be completely stupid to include him. At times, he has shown reluctance to help Dresden like after he got tortured. But I would say he has been compromised - like a veteran with PTSD. It happens. But overall he has always been in Dresden's corner.

As for the limp - I mean Jim has literally given his word-for-word reason that the island has a limp. No need to look for another reason - we have the reason. Unless you mean the ice-age cause the buildings to crumble. Maybe the buildings are that old. I think it more likely Jim is referring to what the island was BEFORE it was an island - a mound and before that, a pit. A pit where perhaps someone through a bunch of demons or nasty creatures and built a hill on top. Someone like Raphael "the Demon Binder" perhaps. Which should answer how those prisoners got in there.

I think the Gates wern't always Gates, per se. They resemble Fairy architecture because Fairy control the Gates. They likely resembled something more Nordic when it was the Norse Gods (or Jotuns - depending on your theory). WOJ is that the Gates look like Gates to Harry because that is how he "sees" them - his mind can't process the true reality of them. Likely the truest way to describe them that fits into Jim's mythology is the threshold to Reality (which is why we have all the stuff about invitations, hospitality etc being so important both magically and socially). If the Gates are the threshold to Reality - the natural conclusion is they were built by the Creator (which may or may not be the Almighty/something that resembles it). WOJ is that the Almighty built his Creation and told the Outsiders to stay out and so they did, but he doesn't stop us from letting them in.

Con - you definitely are on to something. I think WOJ is the Gates have an awareness, but it only really amounts to "I AM HERE". Demonreach is vastly more complex in that sense. But I wouldn't be surprised if the Gates/Walls have their own Genius Loci - from which Rashid gets assistance. One could argue even that that might be the Mothers - specifically Winter. Power has purpose after all. The Mothers do have intellectus - which does seem to be shared. Food for thought.

I do suspect the Gatekeeper (like being The Warden or The Merlin) is a mantle. It might not be a big power boost, but likely it comes with the Eye and maybe some other tricks. Who knows what the Merlin mantle comes with, likely knowledge. Remember Jim has said all the Senior Council have their own sources of power, but they keep them secret. The Blackstaff - mostly the staff more than a "mantle" in the magical sense I imagine.
 

[Snark Knight]

One must wonder though what the structures on the island with all those nifty runes  from some ancient era were doing while the ice went over the top.  Just maybe those damaged buildings are the source of the limp.
It all makes you wonder exactly how long ago those building were put into place by Merlin, as played by Alec Guinness.  Apparently the last glaciers went over that area about 35,000 years ago.  Or 34,000 Years BM(Before Mab)

Well, Merlin must have gone some distance into the past to lay the spell for the prison in five different times. But the stone buildings may not have been created at the earliest point he visited the island.

For one thing, even if he quarried and assembled the stones by magic, the fishing town that occupied the island somewhere around 1900 probably would have noticed something out of place if the architecture of the lighthouse was characteristically pre-medieval European from Merlin's native time, and showed obvious centuries worth of wear. Chances are Merlin convinced some settlers to build the structures on one of his forward excursions through time, and dropped his own enchantments on top.

[morriswalters]

The phrase is unreliable narrator. Jim Butcher likes to keep you guessing and I think Bob is one of the tools he uses to do that.  Take the idea of killing an immortal.  It isn't technically true.  The mantle doesn't die, it simply moves.  And that is the immortal part, not the person who wears it.  And in Ghost story Mab is telling Demonreach Harry is her to mold as she sees fit.  And then there is this.

And a voice--a very calm, very gentle, very rational voice whispered in my ear. "Lies. Mab cannot change who you are."

Yet later in Cold Days Bob tells Harry he is doomed to become like Slate.  Draw your own conclusion.

Well, Merlin must have gone some distance into the past to lay the spell for the prison in five different times. But the stone buildings may not have been created at the earliest point he visited the island.

For one thing, even if he quarried and assembled the stones by magic, the fishing town that occupied the island somewhere around 1900 probably would have noticed something out of place if the architecture of the lighthouse was characteristically pre-medieval European from Merlin's native time, and showed obvious centuries worth of wear. Chances are Merlin convinced some settlers to build the structures on one of his forward excursions through time, and dropped his own enchantments on top.

The obvious question is, why would he do that?  Consider that magically he built the caves that lie beneath as well as the cells.

Tonight is my wacky doodle night for weird theories.  The trilogy  titles are,

Hells Bells
Stars and Stones
Empty Night


Basic premise.  The trilogy will be when the well gets built and populated.  One of the weird things about Merlin is that he knows when things happen.  At some point in time he goes into the Library of Alexandria to save some of the books.  He helps found the Church in Rome. Almost as if he knew these events would take place. 

Well maybe he did, maybe he went into the past to save the future.  He could be Harry.  Vadderung knows something, because he uses the term banefire when talking about the fail safe.  So far in the book there have been two types of magical fire in the books, hell fire and soul fire. No one prior to Cold Days has used it or mentioned banefire.  And fire is Harry's thing.

Jim has revealed the Oblivion War.  If it wasn't going to come up later why bring it up at all?  When that battle is over all of the beings in the well will be sealed out of reality, unable to effect events thereafter.  Now Jim says the Oblivion War will never come up in the books, and that could well be misinformation.  It could come up in the trilogy.  The well, the archive, and the other mysterious constructs came from somewhere.  And were the creatures to escape from the well, then the Oblivion War would be lost.  And last, for the Oblivion War to be possible, someone had to confine the Old Ones and their kind. So that they couldn't act.

A couple of other things.  Ivy is in her way very similar to Bob, with a human host.  It is at least in the realm of possible outcomes, that Bonea is the foundation for the archive.  Lash had more knowledge of reality than even Bob.  And her child would know some portion of what she knew.  And would be a very powerful spirit.

I don't know that I take this seriously, but it is a rough outline of how I might end it. 

[Yuillegan]

Oh I agree with that. Very unreliable narrator. Sometimes he says stuff which we are to take as fact, some stuff is Harry being "limited" or "just his perspective" etc. But no way to know which is which. Not helped by the fact Jim has retconned and readjusted ideas more than a few times, which is totally his right to do, just makes it hard to follow and theorize lol. Yes partly it is because Jim enjoys torturing us too, but a fair amount is just inconsistency and rejigging.

A perfect example the immortal problem. He basically says you can kill X, but they will reform. Except not most of them. And true killing of them only results in their mantle being transferred or absorbed, which can only be done at certain places in space and time. So the only real way to eradicate an immortal is to kill it at one of those places, and then either absorb the energy or wage a consistent and focused campaign a la the Ventors and wipe them from human memory. Which makes absolutely no sense. Because SO MANY BEINGS existed before humans existed, reality existed for BILLIONS of years without mortals just fine. Why would mortal choice make such an impact?

My only conclusion is Jim is treating the Nevernever like the Immaterium/Realm of Chaos in Warhammer (the idea being that all the emotions and thoughts of mortals have a psychic presence and create gods/monsters/etc). Love JB but sometimes these things really get my goat lol

I agree that the trilogy will reveal a lot about Merlin and how he is connected to it all - but not sure it will be the basis of the whole trilogy. Also pretty sure banefire isn't related to hell/soulfire. It may be magical, but likely he is simply describing a fire that will be a "bane" to the evils in Demonreach. Which as we know, regular old fire is strong enough to hurt and disrupt magical beings and so the banefire would disperse them for a while but then they would reform and end the world. Hell/soulfire seems to be more to do we the nature of power itself than merely fire. Fire is almost a metaphor for what it really is - which is pure energy. The rawest form, from which presumably the Almighty created Reality. Think of it more as the foundation for energy itself.

I think when the Oblivion war is successful those being don't merely go dormant...they are locked outside in Oblivion. They cannot be Real any longer as they are not in Reality. So not really sure it is related to the Sleepers and the beings under Demonreach...which are more like caged prisoners than banished ones. I am not saying it won't make an appearance in the later series, but not in that way I suspect.

If he goes that way though and Harry is TT Merlin and Bonea is the Archive etc it would be interesting. And I think there are enough threads in the series that you could create that story with. Not sure if that is his plans, but he has that door open at any rate.

[morriswalters]

Proving that you can find just about anything on the internet.

As then explained, bonfire is derived from a 16th-century Middle English word banefire which, it won’t surprise you to hear, originally concerned a fire where bones were burned.

If he goes that way though and Harry is TT Merlin and Bonea is the Archive etc it would be interesting. And I think there are enough threads in the series that you could create that story with. Not sure if that is his plans, but he has that door open at any rate.

I'm 66, Jim ain't writing faster than I'm dying.  Which isn't his problem to be fair about it.  But it means that I have to write my own trilogy assuming that he doesn't have a burst of creativity and finish it sooner rather than later.

[Yuillegan]

Haha well how about that. Bone-fire...bon fire. Makes a lot of sense. Especially as in many myths and stories, burning the bones is a way to destroy the spirit. Perhaps that was the intention?

Haha Good on you, well maybe you can offer to ghost-write a few novels for him then! Certainly you'll have to get him to tell you the ending before you go. At the current rate though Jim might not outlast the series either! 25 years till the BAT at current rate, who knows how long those will take - he keeps saying they are each going to be enormous!

[Con]

If Rashid does have an Intellectus/Forsight/Bond with the Outer Gates Genius Loci. It would make sense as to his poisiton as Gatekeeper as well as how he is able to appear at just the right moments.

[morriswalters]

I see no reason why it would tell him anything about anywhere other than the battlefield.

Haha Good on you, well maybe you can offer to ghost-write a few novels for him then!

Mine would be inferior, he's good at what he does.  As it is I don't need to satisfy anyone but me. Currently I thinking about the stream that is running backwards and the crystal pyramids.