The Merlin will have his public plan, his SC-arranged plan, and his ace-in-the-hole plan that involves Harry.

I think it would be very interesting indeed if the Merlin had Harry as his ace in the hole.  That implies all sorts of changes in the council and the Merlin.   I would argue that up to this point the Merlin has never looked at Harry as anything more than a annoyance, a dangerous warlock or a lever to use against other senior council members.  The Merlin has certainly been petty with regards to Harry, he has not devoted much energy to opposing Harry beyond petty political games.  While the books are harry centric, the Merlin has shown no indication of being harry centric. 

Also, if the Merlin's plans involved Harry in some significant way, then the Merlin plans to disrupt the peace talks in some significant way.  The Merlin has always seen harry as a force of destruction/chaos/disruption.   If the Merlin sees benefit in Harry's involvement, then he wants the Peace talks disrupted.   Otherwise the Merlin's plans for Harry would all be about how to keep Harry away from the Peace Talks.   Why do you imagine the Merlin wants the talks to fail?

  I think that part of your premise in in error.  It's been a while since I saw the 1st chapter, but I don't think its about ending the war with the RCV, Harry did that fairly convincingly in Changes.  If I remember correctly, these Talks were requested by the Fomor and are about the battles being fought in the vacuum of the Reds departure.

The peace talks are about resolving the war with the Red Court, Black Court and White court.  I agree with you that this war is effectively over, but it is NOT actually over.   The black and white courts were active participants in the war and they are not destroyed. 

I do agree that the primary focus of the peace talks themselves are the spoils/territory to be divided and managing the conflicts already happening as supernatural races fight over the spoils.  Simply ending the war would be fairly easy as the Black and Red would just keep what they got and return to the status quo.  It is all the red territory that is now up for grabs that is the problem -- especially as the White Council is not capable/willing of taking it for themselves and defend it against all comers -- and winter/summer do not want it. 

One reason for the ritual is that Justin is about to go public with Harry and Elaine.   They will get introduced to other wizards, learn about the laws of magic, etc.  At some point Justin MUST do this as he cannot isolate himself for decades to train them in secret.  He is a warden after all and has responsibilities.    If Justin was black council, remember they were working towards a war 30 years in the future (during Grave Peril) which means close to 40 years in the future when Justin had Harry as apprentice.  That is a VERY long time to go into hiding or retain the blind trust of an apprentice. 

While it might be perfectly possible to isolate and brainwash kids to be loyal, such behavior is very hard to instill in a very independent minded and stubborn teenager who you have only worked with for 1-2 years.  It might be enough to earn a significant measure of loyalty and trust, but not the level of control Justin might want if he sees Harry (or Elaine) as dangerous weapons even if he trained them for another decade as apprentices. 

Keep in mind that Justin did not come across as super charismatic or loving to Harry.  Also keep in mind that Harry was willing to walk away fro Eb (who he was much more fond of) in a heartbeat when he realized that Eb was acting contrary to the principles he preached.   If Justin was perceptive enough to understand this aspect of Harry's character, then he knew he would not be able to effectively control Harry's behavior while openly doing bad things.   

I wonder if the Blackstaff, a tool of Mother Winter is capable of destroying someone like Mab

Tons of weapons can kill Mab.  Permanently killing Mab requires some special conditions like Halloween, not a special weapon.   

Or perhaps you meant that the blackstaff "is" one of those special conditions and thus can kill imortals without requiring Halloween or other special conditions.   Interesting speculation, but no evidence to support.   I suspect not -- because if it was that easy to kill and immortal, why bother with Demonreach.   

The latter wouldn't exist without the former.  The Council wouldn't let someone become tainted on a regular basis.  There's no point in naming someone else.  They'd either fight him for it, accept him, or discontinue the position.

This is not true.  Not every action that breaks the laws of magic is black magic (example - time travel) and not every use of tainted magic breaks a magical law. 

As described in the books, the purpose of the Blackstaff job is to protect the council against foes who would use the White Council's own laws against the White Council. 

Separate question.

Murphy took a chain saw to the chlorofiend and it hurt Aurora -- clearly she felt a lot of pain from the (iron assisted) attack.   However, I do not recall the chlorofiend suddenly being able to target Murphy freely after this point.   

Why would attacking an Aurora possessed plant creature not constitute involving herself in faerie?  I had always assumed that attacking a queen freed them up to counter-attack.   But this example proves me wrong (if I am remembering it correctly at least). 

I am not sure myself, so I think I am missing something.

What we know or can be fairly certain about
* If you attack Mab directly, she can kill you. 
* If you are a random mortal, she can use her knight to kill you - but is unlikely to do so unless she has a reason.
* We do know that Aurora was able to attack Murphy ineffectually with the plant monster.  Enough to cause some bruises perhaps, but nothing more.   
*  We also know that the same restrictions apply to any agent Mab directs to harm you. 



Speculation
*  I think the restrictions on her actions are quite severe or she would not need a knight.  if all it takes is some illusion to manufacture a token offensive action against Mab, that would be child play for Mab to arrange.   
*  Equally sure, Mab can do all sorts of bad stuff to you that is NOT prohibited by this stricture.  Things like imprisoning you for a thousand years in a block of ice...   Yet that too seems a significant loophole.  I wonder if Mab's actual restrictions are much more than simply a limit against killing a mortal.   
*  Ditto with selecting an agent which is likely to harm you "on their own"   Seems a huge loophole. 


My own personal feeling is that the actual restriction is much broader than simply killing someone.  I think Mab is prohibited from harming directly or even somewhat indirectly any mortal that does not "choose" to involve themselves in fey business.    This includes her taking actions that are likely to result in harm, even if she does not direct it.   However, she is allowed to create conditions where an enemy feels motivated to attack or harm Mab in some way.  But they must be in the wrong, not Mab.   

Even if your hypothesis is correct, any surviving members of the Fellowship might not be too happy to see Harry seeing as how in destroying the Red Court Harry also killed most members of the Fellowship.

Agree that surviving fellowship members are almost certainly young and/or not half vamps.  They are unlikely to be the ones so dedicated the cause that they willingly except the deaths of their friends.   That said, most of the fellowship was killed by the Red Court and their leadership decapitated -- as stated by Martin to the Red King.   If the survivors are aware of this, they may see Harry's actions more favorably as most of the survivors from near certain death.    In any case, they are - at best - going to have mixed feelings about Harry's actions.    However, I think that just would make the story more interesting if Harry must recruit such reluctant help. 

Comparing the Fomor and the Fellowship is like comparing horses and elephants.  They both have four legs, big ears and long noses.  But they are really different animals.

Not sure they were that different.  The books implied that the fellowship were into all sorts of illegal (but unstated) activities to raise money and clearly operated in a manner similar to terrorists (bombings, etc).  It is likely they smuggled drugs, bombed, assassinated and did other unpleasant things.  These were not knights of the cross.   Having contacts with the Formor seems quite reasonable/likely to me given this context. 

Both the fellowship and the Formor recruited heavily from outcasts. example - Hanah asher was recruited by fellowship.  Just saying that there are likely to be connections (personal or organizational).  They recruit from the same pool of creatures and are both outcasts and they both mostly work outside of supernatural society.   I would be shocked if some members of the fellowship did know well some members of the Formor