Morgan Micro Fiction

[Snark Knight]

Hm, I bet he was desperate enough to risk the note falling into the wrong hands. But, but, the question now is, will Harry or another character get to read this at some point?

Right. Like, did he succeed at passing it off to Luccio when he saw her? I don't actually remember whether they were alone together off page in TC. Would it have passed to LtW or Mai when he was taken into custody?

[Mira]

@Mira: What makes you say "nobody on the Council seems to know what it [Nemesis] is or that it even exists.  Rashid said as much in Cold Days." Morgan and "we" clearly know.

  Because on page 341 at the Gates, they talk about the Adversary and what Harry is up against, that he needs help.  Rashid says he will do the paperwork to confirm that Harry is indeed alive to the Council.  But then he also says that he knows how it is to be Harry fighting a battle alone and gestures towards the Gates.. Then he says this to Harry.

He gestured toward the battleground.  "Precisely."  He seemed to think about it for a moment, and then nodded.  "I will do what I can.  If we both survive the next several hours, I will settle matters between you and the Council,which knows only as much about our roles as it needs to--and that isn't much

   

[Yuillegan]

Mira - the Council only knows as much as it needs to. Not necessarily everyone in it. I would say that several members, definitely the Merlin and probably Mai, LtW, Eb and Liberty all know bits about his role. Probably a hell of a lot more than most of the entire Council. No idea about LaFortier or Pietrovich but I would be willing to bet they knew a bit. You don't get to the Senior Council without acquiring a hell of a lot of knowledge. Not saying they all know the same bits, but probably a fair bit between them. Plus any other similarly senior Wizards like Klaus the Toymaker, Luccio etc.

Also, I understand what you are saying about how it doesn't seem to make sense with our previous information. Probably because there are deliberate holes. But also because we mostly see things from Harry's perspective. Morgan might look quite different from those who respected him. Not to mention, this is probably relatively new material. I would expect there to be some contrast between it and a book written several years ago, with elements that have come to light that might be entirely new that were not decided at the time of TC. It's meant to cast new light on things, not blend in.

SK - Guarantee the whole Senior Council, and probably including Cristos, read that note. Although Cristos does seem to get shut out a bit...

Bad Alias - Morgan was appearing to uphold the party line, but it might not just be the party line. It might just be that there isn't a formal "Black Council" as such. Eb only vaguely acknowledges the idea, probably because he knows a hell of a lot that Harry doesn't about the real threat. The Merlin was protecting the Council by not acknowledging the existence of an external threat or competing group, but might also know that there might be several groups.

Morris - I think you are right, I think Margaret and Morgan had a deal. They probably weren't friends, but likely by the end had a mutual understanding and maybe even respect. Your idea about Jim's literary device could well be true. Although we should also remember that when writing a journal it is expected often that there will be more than one reader, especially in such circumstances that Morgan wrote his final entry. So it isn't unusual that he should both refer to Anastasia in third person, and then address her later as he realized she might end up reading this (and perhaps hoped so).

Also excellent pick up on the Washington D.C. detail. That was definitely a hint for keen observers. I wonder what is in D.C. that Margaret Le Fay hid or did? I am sure it wasn't mere sight-seeing with Malcolm. Too coincidental in my opinion, especially considering that is where the Library of Congress is (which if you remember, is the home of the vanilla mortal authorities charged with fighting the supernatural by the U.S.A).

Dina - Even if they take Harry's will, they can never make him do anything he doesn't actually want to do. They can coerce and pressure and torture and trick and even play puppet master, but they can not change his will. I think Harry could never become what they want without some part of him wanting it.

G33k - Interesting idea that Mab's might be trying to make him more resilient against temptation, although I would go one further and say that was part of Winter's purpose altogether. Part of protecting mortals. Winter is all about survival of the fittest through natural selection.

I think there are two possible reasons the Council had trouble keeping track of Harry as a child.
1. They actually kept track of him well enough (but quietly) right up until Justin hid him
2. Conspiracy. Maggie would definitely have tried to hide him, just like Harry does with his own child. Eb also probably would have assisted with that I am sure, not to mention what other friends either of them had who would have aided that. And of course, Justin probably had help from within the Council (and likely outside of it) to obfuscate Harry's whereabouts. Hell he probably agreed to help with the search. And when Morgan couldn't turn up anything (one of the Council's best Wardens) they probably realized he was lost for a while. Chance and fate helped bring him into their vision, and they were on him like white on rice ever after.

[Dina]

The thing is, Harry has shown an extraordinary degree of stubbornness about this sort of thing.  Lash testified that it was unique.  Nic (and Anduriel!!!?!) both expected the Shadow to still be inside Harry, ready to immobilize him at a word.  Even if she had been there, I think Lash wouldn't have:  she was Harry's friend Lash, and no longer Lasciel's Shadow.

At the Shedd, Ivy witnessed him penetrate the Denarian plot, call a warning, and fight against ALL the Denarians (when he knew he'd be overmatched)... and then come back to fight another round, and rescue her.

Cold calculation as an Archive (of Harry-the-potential-Destroyer) may be at war with Ivy-the-girl (who experiences Harry as warm, kind, heroic beyond all expectations, and persistently able to resist both tempting lures and vast coercive pressures to turn to the Dark Side).
 
It's now well after Morgan wrote that entry, of course, but the theme persists...

I think Mab is an active and knowing participant, intentionally tempering Harry to resist "becoming" something terrible against his own will.  Where Harry perceives her as trying to bend him to her will, turn him "into a thug" (and he feels the need to show her "why he isn't one" and "why she shouldn't do it") and keeps throwing Hot&Sexy babes at him, placing him in situations to tempt him into rage, lust, other darkling Winter passions... what she's actually doing is tempering him, making him more and more able to resist being turned into something he would despair being.

She wants him to be terrible, yes; but within the limits of his own will.  Terrible, but also terribly self-controlled.

I agree about all that, specially about the Mab part. It makes a lot of sense.

@Dina: The journal entry is clearly written before Turn Coat.

Ehrm...so? And I disagree. I think it is written in Turn Coat. But anyway I don't think how that is relevant.

Dina - Even if they take Harry's will, they can never make him do anything he doesn't actually want to do. They can coerce and pressure and torture and trick and even play puppet master, but they can not change his will. I think Harry could never become what they want without some part of him wanting it.

I agree, because I am a reader and Harry is the main character. Ivy does not know that, so she may have some doubts, even when g33k is right about how Ivy "the girl" probably has enough faith in him.

[morriswalters]

Trying to help clarify.  The journal entry is written during the events of Turn Coat but before Morgan knocks on Harry's door.  The motivating action of Turn Coat, La Fortiers murder, happens off text and before the journal entry.

[Mira]

Mira - the Council only knows as much as it needs to. Not necessarily everyone in it. I would say that several members, definitely the Merlin and probably Mai, LtW, Eb and Liberty all know bits about his role. Probably a hell of a lot more than most of the entire Council. No idea about LaFortier or Pietrovich but I would be willing to bet they knew a bit. You don't get to the Senior Council without acquiring a hell of a lot of knowledge. Not saying they all know the same bits, but probably a fair bit between them. Plus any other similarly senior Wizards like Klaus the Toymaker, Luccio etc.

   Need to know, means almost everyone is kept in the dark.  I find it hard to believe that Morgan was on that list.   As Rashid said, " they know only as much as they need to about our roles, and that isn't much."

Also, I understand what you are saying about how it doesn't seem to make sense with our previous information. Probably because there are deliberate holes. But also because we mostly see things from Harry's perspective. Morgan might look quite different from those who respected him. Not to mention, this is probably relatively new material. I would expect there to be some contrast between it and a book written several years ago, with elements that have come to light that might be entirely new that were not decided at the time of TC. It's meant to cast new light on things, not blend in.

I think Jim is making an attempt to rehab Morgan's image, but I think it just raises more questions that gives answers. 

The motivating action of Turn Coat, La Fortiers murder, happens off text and before the journal entry.

But Morgan found Luccio knife in hand over the dead body, in Turn Coat he goes into a lot of reasons why she cannot be held responsible, but the hard evidence points to her.  He then veiled her to get her away, but for some reason unable to veil himself, so he became suspect, he had to run almost immediately.  It takes time to organize one's thoughts and write a thoughtful entry.  Harry says in Cold Days that very few knew that Margaret was Eb's daughter, that inner circle of Eb's friends were Rashid, Listens to Wind, Martha Liberty...  Rashid of all of them so far has been the best at keeping his promise to Margaret, he has pulled Harry's chestnuts out of fire on more than one occasion.. Listen to Winds is next on that list..  Morgan never. 

Here is another question, if Morgan knew about Nemesis, it is strange that he never knew of Rashid and his role as Gate Keeper, above all, his Nemesis detecting eye.  Rashid had his own tests for Harry as we saw in Summer Knight, and was satisfied.. More suspicious on Demonreach, he actually scanned Harry with his eye and was satisfied.  The point I am getting to, was it just Morgan who suspected Harry?  Or the whole Council?  Surely the Merlin is in the loop as to what Rashid's role as
Gate Keeper really is..  All that needed doing was to ask him to scan Harry early on.  If Margaret asked Morgan to protect her baby, she must have told him why..  But in the first place, here is Morgan, the Warden's Warden, he'd just let Margaret go?  She did violate Laws, we have that from
Chauncy, I just cannot see Morgan having a rational conversation with her that didn't include arrest. 
 

[toodeep]

Lots of issues.

1.   Ridiculous that he would write an entry before going to see Harry saying that he is going to see Harry.  What if someone finds it before he is caught?  If it is a friend it puts them in a moral quandary, and if it is an enemy than it gives his location away.  Either way it sets up Harry for all kinds of crap.

2.   He promised to protect Margaret’s son?  Why?  We have had no indications that they knew each other, though I think they may be of approximately the same age.  If that is the case than we can assume he also knew Justin well as well.  I think Jim has a thing (which may be accurate) about people of an age grouping together.  Ebenezer has known the Merlin since he was 16, and it sounds like Eb, the Merlin, and Listens to Winds probably ran all over for and against each other in the war of 1812.  There seems to be a coterie of people Maggie’s age, and we know the new wardens all hang as a group.  Only Harry is pretty much out on his own, which is well explained.

3.   He couldn’t find Dresden?  Had he not taken any samples before he disappeared to be able to find him?  If he hadn’t it seems like he was remarkably stupid in his attempts to protect Harry.  If so, and they didn’t work, it indicates there are even more things Harry doesn’t know, since he seems to feel blood is a unpreventable connection method.

4.   “That bastard Justin DuMorne got to him before I could.  From then on, we could not be sure that the child was not molded to be a creature of Nemesis.”  I’m assuming he only assumes Justin got him then, but I find it interesting that, assuming that, he then assumes that Justin was making a tool for Nemesis.  It really makes it sound like:
   A.   He/They knows what Nemesis is and are opposing it. 
   B.   It seems obvious that they should oppose it if they know what it is, but if they knew/believed that Justin was a tool of it, why didn’t they take him out earlier?  They wouldn’t have learned it after his death, so they must have known it before.  Why leave a known tool of nemesis running around?
   C.   “we”  How many people know about nemesis?  Considering that this was a essentially a note to Luccio we can assume she know.  Considering he was welded at the hip to the Merlin I think we should assume he knows.  How does that effect our thinking?

5.   Morgan knew Maggie was Eb’s daughter.  This isn’t really a huge surprise if one thinks about it.  I mean, if he was of an age with her, it would be a hard secret to keep when they were younger.  But it also indicates it is not a well kept secret, so we should assume that at the very least the entire senior council knows.

6.   Morgan says the enemy has invaded the Senior Council itself.  I first took this to mean that he knew his set up was Nemesis inspired.  I’m not sure if he is assuming that person who was framing him is on the senior council (which is wrong, just very near by) or if he has another reason to believe the someone else on the Senior council is infected

7.   “A Destroyer” obviously has actual meaning.  Not enough info to guess though, other than it obviously ties into him being starborn

8.   This is really important – Wizards are innately assholes.  It is clear that they live by the “I won’t tell you anything, once you find it out on your own you’re ready to learn it” matra to a stupid degree.  Maybe this is a side effect of dealing with fey and the supernatural all the time, but man it annoys me.  He knew all of this and more – he must have known something of what Maggie was up to if he made that promise, he knows about Nemesis being the true threat, he knows about Harry being starborn and what that might entail, and he goes to Harry for help and spends days with him, and tells him nothing.  What an ass.  Especially since learning about Nemesis would have helped Harry in solving the case to some degree, since he would have a better idea of how the enemy is working and thinking.  Was shagnasty in debt to a mere mortal wizard such that he had to be a servant in that book, or was shagnasty infected and being driven by Nemesis?

9.   Nemesis – Everyone seems scared that if you talk about it, it will learn that you know about it and come to get you.  But Harry had that fight with Cat Sith were he revealed to an infected agent that he knew about it, and Nemesis reformatted Sith’s brain and Harry talked directly to Nemesis afterward, and didn’t kill it after that.  Nemesis already knows Harry knows about it.  Harry should be informing everyone who might be able to help in the fight against it about it.  Sure, he has to worry about Nemesis sneaking into his inner circle, but he doesn’t need to worry about Nemesis learning that he knows, because Nemesis already knows he knows.  But Harry is too much of a wizard and doesn’t tell anyone anything.  Harry should take Fix, Marcone, Laura Raith, Goodman Grey, and Carlos on a walk to the outer gates so they know what they are up against and explain the dangers of Nemesis.  Sure, one of them could be infected, but does telling them hurt somehow?

[g33k]

Right. Like, did he succeed at passing it off to Luccio when he saw her? I don't actually remember whether they were alone together off page in TC. Would it have passed to LtW or Mai when he was taken into custody?

I'm betting that Morgan hid it (maybe in the storage-locker where Harry had set up his safehouse?), rather than "passing it off."

It's also possible that he hid it in whatever location he wrote it (before he showed up at Harry's basement).

I'm torn between thinking it's hidden somewhere that Harry will inevitably find it, and hidden such that Harry never will (we know Jim writes some Dresdenverse stuff that's never going to enter Harry's consciousness).
 

[morriswalters]

No doubt that he knew Margaret.  At least in the sense that you know a target.  Almost certainly she didn't end up on the Wardens to  do list overnight.  And nowhere does it imply that he liked her.  And the only Senior Council member that we have certain knowledge that they were aware of Harry's connection to Eb is Rashid. Unless I'm missing something.

[TheMagnificentBastard]

The story strengthens the possibility that Elaine is Nemfected (or is a Nemfector). Morgan's letter associates DuMorne with Nemesis, which associates Elaine with the Adversary as well. So was it that Elaine was enthralled or was she successfully Nemfected? Furthermore, was it Elaine that Nemfected Aurora?

We know from Summer Knight that Elaine is extremely well-versed in subterfuge. We also know that she is keeping a low profile, pretending to be minorly gifted in magic, which as many have mentioned above is quite suspicious.

So what's the long-term implication? Via the events of White Night, Nemfected Elaine could have become a pivotal figure in the fastest-growing supernatural network of those with minor magical talents: Paranet.

[Mira]

No doubt that he knew Margaret.  At least in the sense that you know a target.  Almost certainly she didn't end up on the Wardens to  do list overnight.  And nowhere does it imply that he liked her.  And the only Senior Council member that we have certain knowledge that they were aware of Harry's connection to Eb is Rashid. Unless I'm missing something.

   You don't promise to keep someone's child safe if you don't like them.   Rashid says there were several of Eb's friends who knew Eb's connection to Margaret.  However  it seems like Rashid had a special bond with Margaret, and given the time he has pulled Harry's chestnuts out of the fire, he also has a good idea about why she conceived Harry.

The story strengthens the possibility that Elaine is Nemfected (or is a Nemfector). Morgan's letter associates DuMorne with Nemesis, which associates Elaine with the Adversary as well. So was it that Elaine was enthralled or was she successfully Nemfected? Furthermore, was it Elaine that Nemfected Aurora?

That is the theory, it seems a very odd confidence that Elaine chooses to flee to the Summer Court and then Aurora turns up infested.

[morriswalters]

You don't promise to keep someone's child safe if you don't like them.

You do if they cut a deal.  Something for Something.  We even have a program that is well known for doing precisely that.  The Witness Protection Program.

@g33k
The oldest trick in the plot book is to mail a document to someone you  want to have it. Of course in the modern era finding a mailbox could be a pain in the a**.

And just for laughs and giggles are you aware of a comic book character called...wait for it....Destroyer?  He drank some of the same super stuff that Captain America did. 

[Dina]

I have several mailbox locations memorized, just in case 

Trying to help clarify.  The journal entry is written during the events of Turn Coat but before Morgan knocks on Harry's door.  The motivating action of Turn Coat, La Fortiers murder, happens off text and before the journal entry.

Yes, you are right. I forgot it says he would seek Harry's help. As in the future.

Another thing about the location. Wouldn't it be fun if Morgan had a magical way to write in his journal from a distance, perhaps even mentally? And that would appear written in a physical book stored in another place? It would be like uploading something to the Cloud for instant synchronization.

[Snark Knight]

I'm betting that Morgan hid it (maybe in the storage-locker where Harry had set up his safehouse?), rather than "passing it off."

It's also possible that he hid it in whatever location he wrote it (before he showed up at Harry's basement).

I'm torn between thinking it's hidden somewhere that Harry will inevitably find it, and hidden such that Harry never will (we know Jim writes some Dresdenverse stuff that's never going to enter Harry's consciousness).

All credible possibilities. I think "Where did the note actually end up" just shot past fishing for more black court background on my list of questions to try next time there's an AMA.

[Snark Knight]

2.   He promised to protect Margaret’s son?  Why?  We have had no indications that they knew each other, though I think they may be of approximately the same age.  If that is the case than we can assume he also knew Justin well as well.  I think Jim has a thing (which may be accurate) about people of an age grouping together.  Ebenezer has known the Merlin since he was 16, and it sounds like Eb, the Merlin, and Listens to Winds probably ran all over for and against each other in the war of 1812.  There seems to be a coterie of people Maggie’s age, and we know the new wardens all hang as a group.  Only Harry is pretty much out on his own, which is well explained.

3.   He couldn’t find Dresden?  Had he not taken any samples before he disappeared to be able to find him?  If he hadn’t it seems like he was remarkably stupid in his attempts to protect Harry.  If so, and they didn’t work, it indicates there are even more things Harry doesn’t know, since he seems to feel blood is a unpreventable connection method.

I think Maggie is a couple generations older than Morgan. She was probably born late 1700's to very early 1800's; the 1811/12 New Madrid earthquakes were connected to the death of Maggie's mother - most likely Eb's retaliation for the hit. She was just biologically a lot younger than the time since her birth due to spending so much time in the NN.
Morgan born in the late 1800's. WOJ was that Kemmler was holding him as a youth because he was a body with magical potential to jump into next time he needed a backup, and he became Luccio's apprentice when she rescued him sometime following 'Fistful of warlocks'.

As for tracking Harry, Morgan probably wouldn't have been able to get fresh blood regularly enough for optimal tracking spells - it's not clear Malcolm knew Morgan was trying to be a protector and would have cooperated with that. I'm not convinced Morgan read it right in assessing Justin was responsible for hiding Harry in the foster system and only picked him up when he manifested talent, either. Lea is at least equally capable of achieving a vanishing act if she decided that was the best way to harden him up into a survivor.