Proven Guilty speculation, because, why not?

[KurtinStGeorge]

I do not think it's reasonable to claim that faeries are the only beings capable of using illusion magic without detection.

Ok,who?

If the party doing the magic is someone who we didn't see in Proven Guilty, but we will learn about in a time travel story, a good candidate would be Mavra.  She's very good at veils.  We learned this from the way she took pictures of Murphy killing the Reinfield in Blood Rites.  She would have been within 10-15 feet from Harry and the Hellhound, and neither one of them had a clue.

Now Bob doesn't think Mavra is capable of creating a fine thrall; assuming that's what Sandra Marling was, someone who wouldn't even know they are a thrall, but what if Bob is wrong?  It wouldn't be the first time.

Another possibility; but one which too little is known to put together a detailed description of, is there is more than one party at work in Proven Guilty, maybe several.  Each could be acting for their own reasons.  For example, Mavra was trying to corrupt Molly, but Maeve was the one summoning the Fetches.  We already know there was a Denarian assault on Arctis Tor which probably took place sometime before events in the novel started, but it's why Mab was inside when Harry got there.  I'm not saying it was a Denarian a Splattercon, I'm just saying things are complicated to the point where a simple explanation, meaning a single actor was responsible, might not be the best one. 

[morriswalters]

I'm gonna jump in with the claim that the fetches were there on Mab's behest, or maybe Lea-as-Mab's-Right-Hand.

Lea's in jail.

Consider the series of events.  If Nelson doesn't go to jail, Harry never gets the call, no call and he gets to see LC blow up in his face, since when Molly calls he is getting ready to use it.  As coincidences go this is a big one.  And conveniently there is a cop just outside the bathroom when Pell gets his beating. Harry even calls it out.

It looked like I’d found the black magic the Gatekeeper warned me about. Just as well that I hadn’t tried the dangerous spell with Little Chicago.

Attack two is clumsy, the summoner kills the light with some kind of spell which sounds a lot like myrk and uses a ward to slow Harry down.  And they have to dash when Harry gets in the room. Almost like it was improvised just to impress Harry. 

The third attack will kill the lights and alarms mechanically, but no ward and no myrk.

[nadia.skylark]

I gave you the quote.

I'm not arguing. Your interpretation makes perfect sense, probably more than mine--it had just never occurred to me before.

If Nelson doesn't go to jail, Harry never gets the call, no call and he gets to see LC blow up in his face, since when Molly calls he is getting ready to use it.  As coincidences go this is a big one.

This coincidence always struck me as one similar to the coincidences the Knights of the Cross get, especially in light of Harry's leap of faith at the end of the book.

[g33k]

Lea's in jail.

Right you are.
So... Mab.  I feel like my basic "Why Mab" argument isn't affected by Lea being available (or not) as Mab's agent.

Consider the series of events.  If Nelson doesn't go to jail, Harry never gets the call, no call and he gets to see LC blow up in his face, since when Molly calls he is getting ready to use it.  As coincidences go this is a big one.

Again, Mab.  The Nevernever-side of the Harry's lab is Lea's deathgarden.  And Mab was running Lea's "protect Harry" chores, in-loco-godparentis.

[morriswalters]

Right you are.
So... Mab.  I feel like my basic "Why Mab" argument isn't affected by Lea being available (or not) as Mab's agent.

You do realize that my post doesn't disagree with you about the first attack?

Another possibility; but one which too little is known to put together a detailed description of, is there is more than one party at work in Proven Guilty, maybe several.

Two as I see it.  Mab and the Adversary represented by his allies.

And we know a lot, but only in hindsight. 

Who is manipulating Lily?  Maeve. And we know now that this was the first step in her Mab is crazy campaign.
Who is manipulating Maeve?  The Adversary.
What group is at least a fellow traveler with the Adversary?  The Black Council. Whose existence is deduced in the recap.
That something exists that can possess the second most powerful person in faerie.
That Rashid has it within his power to use the gate to watch events unfold in the world including acts of Black Magic.
That Mab has been watching both Harry and Molly.  Perhaps since Death Masks.
Maybe why Arctis Tor was attacked.

[g33k]

Here is an interesting idea.  At least, _I_ think it's interesting...  bit of a WAG, but here goes...

What if the whole thing was MOSTLY not about Molly, or the Denarian assault on Arctis Tor?

What if it was - mostly - a deep plot by Mab to ...
trick the Summer Lady into ...
giving some Summerfire to a Starborn fire-mage...
 to dump onto the Winterwell ...
so Mab could use that power-hit to cure Lea...
who was right there after all.

[morriswalters]

Here is an interesting idea.  At least, _I_ think it's interesting...  bit of a WAG, but here goes...

What if the whole thing was MOSTLY not about Molly, or the Denarian assault on Arctis Tor?

What if it was - mostly - a deep plot by Mab to ...
trick the Summer Lady into ...
giving some Summerfire to a Starborn fire-mage...
 to dump onto the Winterwell ...
so Mab could use that power-hit to cure Lea...
who was right there after all.

I like it, you should start a thread.

[nadia.skylark]

What if it was - mostly - a deep plot by Mab to ...
trick the Summer Lady into ...
giving some Summerfire to a Starborn fire-mage...
 to dump onto the Winterwell ...
so Mab could use that power-hit to cure Lea...
who was right there after all.

There's a WoJ saying that Mab did not expect Harry to dump Summer Fire into Winter's Well.

[g33k]

There's a WoJ saying that Mab did not expect Harry to dump Summer Fire into Winter's Well.

Are you sure? (any confirmation @Serack (or others with better WoJ-fu than me?))

Alas.  Another great WAG gone up in flames...
 

[morriswalters]

There's a WoJ saying that Mab did not expect Harry to dump Summer Fire into Winter's Well.

This is me helping you out, g33k doesn't need help.  This may get me moderated for posting too much text.

The Summer Lady looked up, her weary smile gorgeous. “I only provided a minor comfort and guide in order to repay my debt to the lady Charity,” she murmured, a small smile on her lips. “I had no way to know that the wizard would steal that power for his own use.”(you can add the innocent tone of voice, Marsters does it well.) She drew in a deep breath and said, “Help me up. We must go.”
Fix did so. “Go where?”
I said, “All of those Winter forces are now at the heart of their own realm. Which means that they aren’t on the borders of Summer waiting to attack. Which means that Summer has forces that can be spared to assist the Council,” I said quietly.
“But it only took them a few minutes to show up,” Murphy pointed out. “Couldn’t they just run back and be there a few minutes from now?”
“No, Murph,” I said. “They planned for that. This whole raid was a setup from the get go.” I jerked my head at Lily. “Wasn’t it.”
“That is one way to describe it,” Lily said quietly. “I would not, myself, interpret it that way. I had no part in bringing the fetches here—but their presence and their capture of Lady Charity’s daughter presented us with an opportunity to temporarily neutralize the presence of Mab’s forces upon our borders.”
“We,” I murmured. “Maeve is working with you. That was why she showed up at McAnally’s so quickly.”
“Even so,” Lily said, bowing her head at me in a nod of what looked like respect.
Fix blinked at Lily. “You’re working with Maeve?”
“She couldn’t have altered the flow of time at the heart of Winter,” I said quietly. “Only one of the Winter Queens could do that.”

As a side note if you look through the WOJ's somewhere there is a post where Jim tells you that the order of Proven Guilty and Dead Beat were changed.  Make of that what you might.  Also read the recap when Eb tells Harry what Rashid might have been doing.

“Rashid,” I said in a firm voice. “Tell the Gatekeeper.”
Ebenezar frowned, though it looked more weary than anything else. “Likely he knows already. Knew already. Maybe even pointed you in a direction that would show you more. Assuming he wasn’t simply using you to poke a hornet’s nest and see what flew up.”

Also note the change in tense.  And read Love Hurts.

Edit
Just because, note that Mother Winter, Mab, and Maeve are referred to as the three queens.

[g33k]

Dunno, man.

This quote seems to imply that the Ladies have out-smarted Mab on the "cunning manipulations" front.  Freaking MAB.

I'm not buying that.

Of course... given that Mab was apparently right there all along, hidden beside Lea, it's equally possible that the plan went off mostly as the Maeve&Lily wanted it to... which was, in most regards, ALSO mostly as Mab wanted it to.

I'm still noticing that, even if Mab wasn't expecting the Summerfire (per nadia's WoJ), she DID still get a big ol' pile of Starborn magic funneled into the Winterwell, which wouldn't exactly have helped Nemesis find its Happy Place...

... Edit
Just because, note that Mother Winter, Mab, and Maeve are referred to as the three queens.

OK... but in what context?

I mean, yes they're Winter's three Queens.  But which "referral" am I to look at/for?

[nadia.skylark]

Are you sure?

Here is the entire (long) WoJ, straight from the WoJ compilation that you can access via the link on Jim's website. The important bit is in bold.

Mab as orchestrator of all is just a little much for me to swallow.  Seems like she loses a lot more than she gains, and I don’t think Mab is big on coming out behind in her negotiations.

Jim: Yeah.  It sure looks that way from here, don’t it.

But to correct some minor stuff:  the fetches aren’t even /close/ to her strongest servitors.  They’re her couriers, harassers, spies and occasional assassins.  Captain Kudzu was a being that was deemed more-or-less sufficient on the badassometer, but nothing to write home about.  The fetches main use, to Mab, isn’t as battlefield thugs.  She’s got /plenty/ of other things for that.  Another mild correction:  who says Mab /lost/ the battle at Arctis Tor, before Harry and Company arrived?  At the end of the day, the Winter Queen was still in her fortress–but you didn’t see anyone standing around assaulting the place, did ya.   Also, it has probably occurred to more than one of you that if Mab was /really/ in trouble, she could have had the entire military might of Faerie back at the fortress in moments–exactly the way they *did* come back when Harry smacked the Winter Well with the fires of Summer.

(Which goes to show that while Mab may be canny to an inhuman degree, she isn’t infallible.  Just way closer to infallible than us.)

See above regarding “the question is *why*?”

Ask yourself why Mab had Molly brought in.  What chain of events did that set in motion?  What secondary effects came about because of it?  Ultimately, Mab can always go to the Wyld and draw in more muscle to replace fallen thugs.  If worst comes to worst, with just a few “seed” fae, she could rear up enough Changelings to repopulate her cadre within a human generation or two–nothing, to a being thousands of years old.

As far as she’s concerned, everyone and everything is expendable, including herself, when it comes to adhering to her (seemingly irrational and inexplicable) priorities.

(And by the way–don’t think Titania is much better.  When push came to shove, she let her own daughter be murdered rather than upset the balance of the Faerie Courts.  At least Mab is up front about it.  Usually.)

Sacrifice her best troops?  Mab would sacrifice every creature *in* Winter, every one she could bring from Summer, and every single mortal on planet Earth if that’s what she thought was appropriate.  And she wouldn’t even need to add extra sugar to her cup of tea afterwards, much less lose sleep over it.

But no one does cold-blooded like the Queen of Winter.  Mab’s been in the business a long time, she’s got a balance sheet, and she is *not* going to come out in the red–

–unless, of course, she really *has* stripped a gear, as Lily and Maeve believe.  In which case there’s a stark raving bonkers demigoddess whose powers are no longer being held in check by the Escher-esque code of Sidhe behavior.  And that’s all kinds of bad.

But hey.  It’s probably not that.  I mean, not *everything* that happens can be the absolute worst possible possibility, right?

[morriswalters]

OK... but in what context?

“She couldn’t have altered the flow of time at the heart of Winter,” I said quietly. “Only one of the Winter Queens could do that.”

'm still noticing that, even if Mab wasn't expecting the Summerfire (per nadia's WoJ), she DID still get a big ol' pile of Starborn magic funneled into the Winterwell, which wouldn't exactly have helped Nemesis find its Happy Place...

It appears to me that it, in fact, it almost did let Nemesis find it's happy space.

[KurtinStGeorge]

It appears to me that it, in fact, it almost did let Nemesis find it's happy space.

Do you mean by almost releasing nemfected Lea?  I don't think Mab would have allowed that to happen.

Dunno, man.

This quote seems to imply that the Ladies have out-smarted Mab on the "cunning manipulations" front.  Freaking MAB.

I'm not buying that.

Of course... given that Mab was apparently right there all along, hidden beside Lea, it's equally possible that the plan went off mostly as the Maeve&Lily wanted it to... which was, in most regards, ALSO mostly as Mab wanted it to.

You are both right and wrong at the same time.  The Ladies did not out-smart Mab.  In fact, you could say THEY didn't do anything, the Adversary did.  Poor Lily thought she was a becoming a real power player, when in fact she was just an easily manipulated puppet.  Maeve was pulling her strings and Maeve in turn was run by the Adversary.  Maeve's entire motivation was to screw over her Mom for past grievances, so she went along with the Adversary's plan.  If it had just been Maeve and Lily working together on their own I doubt they would have been much of a challenge for Mab to outmaneuver.   

I think it's only in Cold Days when Maeve put her own spin on the Adversary's orders by killing Lily in order to both remove her possible replacement and take Sarissa away from Mab.

[morriswalters]

Thus the use of almost.

I'll make an observation.  The only chance Harry had against the eldest fetch was the Summer Fire he used.  His own fire spell wasn't working.  Did Mab intend for Harry to die?