Proven Guilty speculation, because, why not?

[nadia.skylark]

Ok,who?

-There are probably demons that could manage it.
-A descendent of one of the sneakier gods.
-Someone who has been given power by one of the sneakier gods.
-The Genowska (or however you spell that) wasn't detectable without use of the Sight, except for eating goats.
-Probably other Coin-host pairings could do the same. (maybe the other Rosanna)
-A ghost might be able to--I'm not sure if they can hex things when corporeal, but I don't remember anything about recognizing one that is corporeal if you don't already know it's a ghost.
-Nemesis might be able to prevent mortal hexing and stop other practitioners from recognizing them--it seems like the same kind of "subverting one's nature" as allowing faeries to lie.
-the scion of a skinwalker like Goodman Grey (not by illusion, but shapeshifting)
-maybe Jade Court agents? They're supposed to be good at being sneaky, I think.
-an older version of Molly
-a spirit of intellect might be able to possess someone and qualify
-maybe a rakshasha? Some versions have them good at illusions, and we don't know how detectable they are

[morriswalters]

You do realize that this is called making stuff up?

[Bad Alias]

Harry knew Grey was a shapeshifter. Harry was surprised that Grey was a scion of a skinwalker. There were four operatives who could have done Grey's job. Maybe they were all shapeshifters, maybe not. But I think the key here is that there are enough excellent shapeshifters that "skinwalker" and "shapeshifter" aren't even close to synonymous.

For all we know, Marling was Grey.

I honestly have no idea what was really going on in Proven Guilty, so I'm not saying it happened this way or that way. The facts are too sparse and the possibilities too broad to have any confidence in just about any theory.

[morriswalters]

I doubt that at the advent of Proven Guilty that Goodman Grey was a twinkle in Jim's eye.

I honestly have no idea what was really going on in Proven Guilty, so I'm not saying it happened this way or that way. The facts are too sparse and the possibilities too broad to have any confidence in just about any theory.

I'm theory crafting, as such I'm setting bounds to make it fun without being overly complicated.  The only thing that screws things up is Mab not hitting on the Reds.  The timing is messed up.  Jim primes you with the idea that the attack happened recently.  It only makes sense if it happens somewhere near the events of Dead Beat. 

Some interesting things happen in the books around Proven Guilty, One is that Jim has Luccio's boot camp attacked twice. Once in Proven Guilty and again in White Knight.

The Reds had to find a way to draw off some of our heavies and they found it. Luccio’s boot camp.”

[Bad Alias]

I doubt that at the advent of Proven Guilty that Goodman Grey was a twinkle in Jim's eye.

Yeah, but Butters was supposed to be a one off. It's easy to imagine that Marling was an agent of someone, and Jim didn't have a reason to get more specific than that, or to change it later when he thought it would be fun to bring Grey back in.

I'm theory crafting, as such I'm setting bounds to make it fun without being overly complicated.

I'm just saying we don't have enough specifics to set bounds that aren't arbitrary. I'm fine with arbitrarily set bounds for the sake of argument. Especially when used to make a specific point.

[morriswalters]

So I told him all about the last few days, especially my dealings with Lily and Fix, Maeve, and Mab. Ebenezar listened to it all in silence.
“What a mess,” he said when I finished.
“Tell me about it.” I sipped at my beer. “You know what I think?”
He finished his beer and shook his head.
“I think we got played.”
“By the Summer Lady?”
I shook my head. “I think Lily got suckered just as much as we did.”
He frowned and rubbed at his head with one palm. “How so?”
“That’s the part I can’t figure,” I said. “I think someone set Molly up to be a beacon for the fetches. And I’m damned sure that it was no accident that those fetches took Molly to Arctis Tor when it was so lightly defended. Someone wanted me there at Arctis Tor.”
Ebenezar pursed his lips. “Who?”
“I think we got used by one of the Queens to one-up one of the others, somehow. But damned if I can figure out how.”

Given Cold Days you should be able to answer these questions pretty definitively.  I'll set one bound.  Nobody was involved that we haven't been introduced to by Cold Days.

[nadia.skylark]

You do realize that this is called making stuff up?

  I'm making stuff up?

You claimed that faeries are the only beings in the entire Dresdenverse capable of using illusion magic without detection, despite the fact that
A) There is no evidence that I recall that faeries are particularly undetectable
B) There is definitely evidence that other beings can use illusion magic, and
C) There is no evidence that other beings can't be undetectable while using illusion magic.

I responded by saying that I was confused, due to these facts.

You responded with something that had nothing to do with what I was saying (since you said something about what happened in Proven Guilty but nothing about faeries, whereas what I was saying had nothing to do with Proven Guilty and everything to do with faeries).

I responded by clarifying what I was saying.

You responded with more Proven Guilty stuff that wasn't what I was talking about.

I responded by briefly addressing the Proven Guilty stuff, and again clarifying the bit of what you had said that I found problematic.

You, rather than providing evidence or reasoning to support your completely untenable claim, then requested I provide a list of hypothetical beings who would disprove your claim (despite your claim having, to my knowledge, no supporting evidence whatsoever, and therefore being in no need of disproving).

I figured, "why not?" and came up with a list, using words like "maybe" and "possibly" since it was, after all, speculation.

And now you're saying that I'm the one who's making things up? At least I don't make completely unsupportable claims and then act as if they are facts.

And for the record, while most of my list was speculation, both the Genowska (spelling?) and Goodman Gray have canonical support for being able to use magic/magic-like abilities to disguise themselves undetectably.

[morriswalters]

That was probably poorly chosen phrasing.  And I apologize if you are offended.

Of all the things you suggested Goodman Grey is the only one known to be a shape shifter and he can't or didn't use magic.  I can spell genoskwa either, but he doesn't appear to be a shape shifter.  Molly has never been shown to assume a different outer shape, she's the invisible girl and a copy monster.  The rest never show up in the books, or if they did I missed them.

A)Jenny Greenteeth sits in for Georgia at Billy's wedding, Billy never catches on.
In Summer Knight Harry takes some time to catch on to what Mab is.
And both Mab and Lea have used their magic  to mimic Molly and random people.

B)Listens To Wind is the only human in the books to shape shift and use magic.
The Whites don't do it and neither did the Reds, if you don't count their flesh mask.
Gods or at least angels do.
If any of the Denarians can they've never done it in story.
I don't remember the name off hand but the were human who teaches the pack how to turn into wolf does.
The Hags do in the comic books and Dresden never tips to it until the end.
And last but not least the Ghouls can apparently pass.

C)I'm not certain that the Fae can conceal themselves if you touch them, it's never come up.  But they don't give off an aura like a wizard and they can use phones.

And yet again my apologies.

[nadia.skylark]

That was probably poorly chosen phrasing.  And I apologize if you are offended.

Don't worry about it. 80-90% of my offense was caused by having gotten 4 hours of sleep, followed by 8-9 hours of learning new skills (workshops are fun, but not when you forget you're taking them until the evening before they happen, and you have other stuff you need to get done before then!).

Of all the things you suggested Goodman Grey is the only one known to be a shape shifter and he can't or didn't use magic.

True, but shapeshifting accomplishes the same thing as magic when it comes to disguising yourself as someone else, which I believe is what is being discussed.

I can spell genoskwa either, but he doesn't appear to be a shape shifter.

No he isn't (apart from the Denarian thing) but he can at least use veils (which are a subset of illusion magic) undetectably. Based on this and his skill with earth magic, I figure it's a pretty safe bet that he could learn to use other illusion magic (and thus gain the ability to impersonate others) undetectably if anyone could give him a good reason for doing so.

Molly has never been shown to assume a different outer shape, she's the invisible girl and a copy monster.

Molly's illusion powers can explicitly make her look like other people. She is also less prone to hexing things than Harry, and we know that even Harry can suppress the hexing thing for a little while. Thus, I figure that an older version of Molly has something like a 90-95% chance of being able to suppress hexing and other magic-detecting effects (maybe the other magic-detecting effects aren't suppressed, she just veils them from notice) while using illusion magic.

The rest never show up in the books, or if they did I missed them.

They don't show up.

Jenny Greenteeth sits in for Georgia at Billy's wedding, Billy never catches on.

But Billy, to my knowledge, has never shown any particular ability to detect the supernatural (except maybe smell, and is also understandably distracted by the wedding.

In Summer Knight Harry takes some time to catch on to what Mab is.

She's Mab, Harry's a wreck, and he still catches on within five minutes or less.

And both Mab and Lea have used their magic  to mimic Molly and random people.

True for Lea, but when did Mab do it?

Listens To Wind is the only human in the books to shape shift and use magic.

Well, technically the Alphas all shapeshift due to a spell, so they are using magic by definition--but I get your point.

However, weren't we mostly talking about illusion magic? I'd thought shapeshifting was just an alternate option for that.

The Whites don't do it

True.

and neither did the Reds, if you don't count their flesh mask.

I forgot about these guys! Why don't you count their flesh mask? According to Changes, some of them can use it to look like other people (one of them looked like Susan for the purpose of hiring a guy to kill Dresden).

If any of the Denarians can they've never done it in story.

True, but Skin Game shows us that Denarians don't have an anti-technology aura (otherwise Tessa would have triggered the anti-wizard defenses at Marcone's bank) so any Denarian that learns illusion magic would be able to use it as undetectably as a faerie.

I don't remember the name off hand but the were human who teaches the pack how to turn into wolf does.

Terra West.

The Hags do in the comic books and Dresden never tips to it until the end.
And last but not least the Ghouls can apparently pass.

I forgot about these guys too!

[morriswalters]

@nadia.skylark
I'm discussing characters in the book who can appear as a human but can summon a creature of Winter.  The summoner in particular is someone who has done magic that is familiar to Harry.  For the purpose of this theory, I would like the summoner and Sandra Marling to be one and the same.

For the purpose of this theory the person should do nothing or use nothing that isn't canon.  So you can speculate that the genoskwa could do anything but never does anything like that on page before he is killed.

I don't remember Molly as taking on anyone's appearance.

She's Mab, Harry's a wreck, and he still catches on within five minutes or less.

Harry doesn't detect her because he senses Magic, he detects her because she isn't good at being a modern human.  The Ladies are closer to the mortal plane than Mab. They live here, not in faerie.  In the last short story Molly is raising cohorts form creatures living here.  And I missed another creature of Winter that can appear as humans, the ones in Alaska.

True for Lea, but when did Mab do it?

Mab calls Thomas in Cold Days imitating Molly.

Now unrelated to my response to you a word about Rashid in Proven Guilty.  Ebeneezer talking to Harry in the round up in chapter 47 says.

“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.”

My theory is assuming that this statement from Eb is the precise reason behind the events of Proven Guilty.

[nadia.skylark]

I'm discussing characters in the book who can appear as a human but can summon a creature of Winter.  The summoner in particular is someone who has done magic that is familiar to Harry.  For the purpose of this theory, I would like the summoner and Sandra Marling to be one and the same.

This would explain how we keep talking past each other--because I'm not talking about Proven Guilty. At all. I'm talking about one claim you made when discussing Proven Guilty, which I consider to be untrue.

I don't remember Molly as taking on anyone's appearance.

She does so at least in Cold Case, and maybe in Ghost Story or Bombshells--I don't remember.

Also, Harry creates an artifact that Thomas can use for magical impersonation--so whoever's doing the impersonation might not even be able to use magic/shapeshifting themselves at all.

Harry doesn't detect her because he senses Magic, he detects her because she isn't good at being a modern human.  The Ladies are closer to the mortal plane than Mab. They live here, not in faerie.  In the last short story Molly is raising cohorts form creatures living here.  And I missed another creature of Winter that can appear as humans, the ones in Alaska.

As I recall, he detected Mab because she left magic static on his doorknob.

Mab calls Thomas in Cold Days imitating Molly.

Thanks.

[morriswalters]

As I recall, he detected Mab because she left magic static on his doorknob.

You recall incorrectly. The static isn't magic static.

"Static on the doorknob," I said. "It should have been locked. You shouldn't have been able to get in here, so you must have gone through it.

  The static is on the doorknob because the knob hasn't been touched, or at least that is what Harry implies. And that is as good as Jim's physics and neurobiology.  Which is to say, lacking.  That isn't how it works.  However this is a book about magic.

I still don't remember about Molly, but ok.

Also, Harry creates an artifact that Thomas can use for magical impersonation--so whoever's doing the impersonation might not even be able to use magic/shapeshifting themselves at all.

Ok.

[nadia.skylark]

The static is on the doorknob because the knob hasn't been touched, or at least that is what Harry implies.

Is that what Harry was implying? Huh. I'd always thought that he was implying that the static was magic residue from her spelling the door unlocked.

[morriswalters]

I gave you the quote.

[g33k]

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.

It began the Winter-Molly path that culminated in Lady Molly.

There may have been another agent involved... a Mortal wizard, a Denarian, a Vamp of some stripe.  My bet would be on a WinterFae or a Denarian, (or agents thereof) because those are the agents we find entangled at Arctis Tor.

But it's a pretty good notion that the Fetch who came in through the bathroom mirror was SENT by someone with authority over it.  And THAT list is, AFAIK, limited to... Mab (and Lea, if so delegated).