Question of the day.

[Conspiracy Theorist]

Uriel strikes me as the White God’s go to guy, so he has his fingers in lots of pies.

The Knights, Starborn, afterlife enforcement - we have only seen the tip of the iceberg.

Malcolm is most likely a special soul, and shepherded by the Angel of death because his good work attracted the oppositions special attention, most souls do not get this attention. Because of who he was he volunteered to work after he was due for his reward in heaven,  he wasn’t conscripted to work his way into heaven like Jack Murphy, whose deal came about because his suicide was prompted by external supernatural forces.

In a similar fashion Murphy and Hendricks were conscripted by Odin, they will eventually go to heaven/Valhalla etc. Murphy as a former Knight was a sure thing for Heaven, Hendricks really benefits from this deal, that’s not where you would expect him to go.

Jack Murphy’s case is more analogous to Hendricks than Malcolm’s.

[Mira]

  You cannot think of Malcolm alone though without thinking of his wife, Margaret.  She redeemed herself, he is the reason for her redemption.  Either they are working together as a pair for Uriel, or they are in Heaven as a pair. 

[morriswalters]

Right but my point and theory is Malcolm works for Uriel possibly in the same department as Jack Murphy and Sir Stuart. Shade remnants whose souls aren't quite done.

That was flip on my part so I apologize. Still the point is that no one else in the text speaks to anybody who has gone to Heaven.  I get it that Harry is a Chosen One, and as such, is special.  But I don't understand why Uriel would balance anything that Lash does. Harry knows of or at least suspects her presence since he has the sigil and is concealing the fact that he picked up the coin.

Currently my thinking on the Jabberwock is that it is indicative of Lucifer or the Outsiders.

[Mira]

That was flip on my part so I apologize. Still the point is that no one else in the text speaks to anybody who has gone to Heaven.  I get it that Harry is a Chosen One, and as such, is special.  But I don't understand why Uriel would balance anything that Lash does. Harry knows of or at least suspects her presence since he has the sigil and is concealing the fact that he picked up the coin.

Currently my thinking on the Jabberwock is that it is indicative of Lucifer or the Outsiders.

Harry no longer has the sigil, that disappeared when he rejected Lash's last offer that he pick up the coin, then he dug it up and Father Forthill took it.  Harry mentions a "white scar" where the sigil mark used to be.  Harry stupidly perhaps not believing how dangerous they were once touched, picked up the coin to save little Harry, though it would have been better to pick up little Harry to save him from touching the coin.  Then he buried the coin and put a magic circle around it thinking that would keep it's affects contained.  It didn't he still got the shadow of Lasciel in his head.  Having said all of that, picking up the coin isn't the same as accepting the coin.  Harry never accepted the coin even though the shadow of Lasciel put him under tremendous pressure.  He instead transformed the shadow into Lash because of her love for him. That is so rare that it really had never happened before.. That is why he was gifted with Soul Fire.

Perhaps not speak of anyone going to Heaven, but Uriel at the end of Ghost Story hints at it.  Supposedly he was giving Harry a choice, to work for him like Captain Murphy because he wasn't prepared for what comes next.  Harry asks him what he means by that exactly?
Uriel answers; page454

"The part involving words like forever, eternity, and judgement."

I would think that judgement comes first, and I assume that however that comes out, it is Heaven or Hell from there.

[Dina]

I agree with those who said Malcolm was special because he was good, not because he had angelic blood or anything like that. He "simply" was good, like Father Forthill. And I think his good deeds (including Margaret's redemption) granted him a blessed afterlife, which includes some rewards, like having the chance of seeing Harry. By the way, I think Margaret herself got some kind of reward too. In one of the first books Harry feels a woman with him, who helped him when he was about to do something wrong, and that feeling increases when he touches his pendant. I think she was granted some chance to watch over him.

[morriswalters]

@Mira
As of Dead Beat when the conversation with Malcolm takes places he still has the sigil doesn't he? His hand is burnt in Blood Rites.

I agree with those who said Malcolm was special because he was good, not because he had angelic blood or anything like that. He "simply" was good, like Father Forthill. And I think his good deeds (including Margaret's redemption) granted him a blessed afterlife, which includes some rewards, like having the chance of seeing Harry. By the way, I think Margaret herself got some kind of reward too. In one of the first books Harry feels a woman with him, who helped him when he was about to do something wrong, and that feeling increases when he touches his pendant. I think she was granted some chance to watch over him.

That's certainly one way to read it.  I'm just investigating other ideas.  Harry is 6'9".  That's at the high end of normal. Nephilim can be giants, so there is that to consider. The thought is that whatever Margaret intended to do that it wasn't just to create a Starborn.  Unless Butcher has some magic up his sleeve a Starborn to this point is just somebody born at a certain time. She could have made one with some random specimen of males. She was also enthralled by Raith so something had to help her break away. So three things. Harry's size, she broke from Raith's control, and Harry gets to talk to the dead in the afterlife. To me this suggests something, although I'm not sure what. There is a lot going on in Dead Beat off the stage either before or just after Cowl attempts the Darkhallow.  And IMO it's all related.

[Conspiracy Theorist]

Harry may have Bigfoot blood rather than Angel blood, Dresden means People of the Forest after all, and he does get on well with River Shoulders, and given Eb is such a shrimp, he gets that from Malcolm’s side of the family several generations back, it expressed in his height when it mixed with Margaret’s wizard blood. Thomas is much shorter, suggesting the difference in their heights is due to their different fathers.

[Dina]

Not necessarily. I don't remember the physical descriptions of Margaret and Malcolm. Perhaps they both were tall. Margaret's mother could have been tall, balancing Eb's short height (Argh, it always bothers me that, as far as we know, Harry never asked his grandfather anything about his grandmother. And yes, I've read the theories that it's Lea). The genetics of height are not so simple.
It is true that Thomas' height can be a hint that Harry inherited his tallness from Malcolm's size (Do you remember if Raith is tall?)
I always understood that every magical being in the Dresdenverse sees Harry as a starborn and a powerful wizard, but nothing else. I don't remember any of them hinting there is something especial in Harry's lineage (besides magic!)

[morriswalters]

Both his father and mother were tall. Harry isn't out of human range, it's just that Butcher has been pointing at it more and more as time goes on. Shrug/

[Conspiracy Theorist]

Not necessarily, if Bigfoot are Gigantopithecus then a relict population may have interbred with humanity as occurred with Neanderthal man. We know this is the case in the Dresdenverse because of Irwin, a noticeable percentage of humanity may therefore have Bigfoot genes, from generations back, but most are recessive. Magical ability be one set of genetic recessives from Bigfoot heritage, and height another.

Harry was originally a shrimp like Eb, he got a growth spurt about the time his magical ability started to manifest, perhaps the interaction of two sets of Bigfoot genes normally recessive, height from Malcolm and magic from Margaret.

[Mira]

Not necessarily. I don't remember the physical descriptions of Margaret and Malcolm. Perhaps they both were tall. Margaret's mother could have been tall, balancing Eb's short height (Argh, it always bothers me that, as far as we know, Harry never asked his grandfather anything about his grandmother. And yes, I've read the theories that it's Lea). The genetics of height are not so simple.
It is true that Thomas' height can be a hint that Harry inherited his tallness from Malcolm's size (Do you remember if Raith is tall?)
I always understood that every magical being in the Dresdenverse sees Harry as a starborn and a powerful wizard, but nothing else. I don't remember any of them hinting there is something especial in Harry's lineage (besides magic!)

Agreed, plus we don't know how tall uncles and aunts, grand parents were. Harry's grandmother may have been a tall woman or came from a tall family.  We know nothing about her.  My parents and grand parents were average height, between five and six feet tall, my mother's uncles on her father's side were big men, well over six feet tall, my brothers grew to be 6'6 and 6'7 respectively, though I am considered tall at 5'7 I am closer to average in height. So we don't know what the gene mix is for Harry, as far as where he gets his height from.

[Mira]

As of Dead Beat when the conversation with Malcolm takes places he still has the sigil doesn't he? His hand is burnt in Blood Rites.

Yes, but he got that because he picked up the coin, but he never accepted the coin.  As in fully embracing it, taking it into himself, thus becoming a Denarian. The coin is physically taken into the body in some way, remember when a Denarian dies the coin sort of falls from the body.  Or as in Sanya's case thrown away in rejection. One of Lash's last acts in White Night was to save Harry by trying to get him to accept the coin,when Harry refused it, she sacrificed herself for him.. Once she did that the sigil was gone from his hand. Lasciel had marked Harry, because he touched her coin, but she never got him.  With the death of Lash the mark went away. Page 395 White Night

I'd worn a mark for years--an unblemished patch of skin amidst all the burn scars, in the perfect shape of the angelic sigil that was Lasciel's name. The mark was gone.  In it's place was just an irregular patch of unburned skin.

That's the deal with Uriel, he rewarded Harry for that with Soul Fire, to replace Hell Fire. When Lasciel cheated by trying to influence Harry free will to commit suicide, Uriel could step in with his seven words.. I think he could have stepped in sooner than he did, but he felt that Harry needed to learn a thing or two as he did in Ghost Story.

[Conspiracy Theorist]

Agreed, plus we don't know how tall uncles and aunts, grand parents were. Harry's grandmother may have been a tall woman or came from a tall family.  We know nothing about her.  My parents and grand parents were average height, between five and six feet tall, my mother's uncles on her father's side were big men, well over six feet tall, my brothers grew to be 6'6 and 6'7 respectively, though I am considered tall at 5'7 I am closer to average in height. So we don't know what the gene mix is for Harry, as far as where he gets his height from.

Thats genetics, environment also plays a factor, average modern heights are generally achieved because of good nutrition. Eb may just have been poorly fed as a child. Scotland still has a bad reputation for nutritional eating. Victorians are shrimps.

[Mira]

Thats genetics, environment also plays a factor, average modern heights are generally achieved because of good nutrition. Eb may just have been poorly fed as a child. Scotland still has a bad reputation for nutritional eating. Victorians are shrimps.

I was going to add nutrition but decided that would perhaps complicate what I was trying to get across.  Yes, if you ever visit or have visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art, they have rooms reconstructed from the the 16th, 17th, and 18th Centuries, I found my head nearly touching the ceiling at 5'7.  Eb was born somewhere in the late 17th Century, going by the fact that he participated in the French/Indian Wars that I think were in the 1750s.  The average height for Americans in that time was 5'10 inches however those in Europe averages were about two inches shorter, this is according to the Livestrong website, contributing factors for the differences were both nutrition and disease.  Eb was born in Scotland.  Of course there are exceptions in any population.

[Dina]

True, nutrition is a very important factor, and, as Mira says, it complicates things.  In summary, I do not think we can extract a valid conclusion about the reason for Harry's height.