[GS Spoilers] Uriel's long game? FM, DB, Ch, and GS (WIP)

[Jared]

In other threads, there has been discussions about the whispers we saw in GS. I felt like we were missing something, so I went back to the previous books.

Let's begin, shall we? [Note: I've incorporated ideas/clues that I've picked up from other threads. I forget who pointed out what, but I appreciate the conversations.]

A slender shadow crouched beside the cot, vague and difficult to notice, even by Uriel’s light—but it was there, and it was leaning as though to whisper in my ear.

And it was all your fault, Harry.

This is the shadow whisper that lead to Harry taking up the WK mantle, ordering his own hit, and then his death.

That's always bothered me. Harry doesn't actually think like that, does he? Internal monologue where he addresses himself by name? That's silly. Of course he wouldn't do that.

Where was Michael? Where was… anyone?

Cassius leaned down and said, “And when I start, Dresden, I want to be free to indulge myself. To really let go and live the moment. I’m sure you understand.”

No one is coming to save you, Harry.

Oh. Well, except for this time, I guess. But that thought didn't ever really do anything.

Quintus Cassius’s liver-spotted face went pale with horrified comprehension. “Wait.”

“Mouse,” I said. “Kill him.”

I had only one open eye with which to watch Cassius meet his end. But in that final second, rage and terror and horrified realization flashed through his eyes. And just as Mouse’s jaws crushed the delicate bones of his neck, there was a flare of ugly energies, a flash of unholy purplish light around him, and he spoke words that rang in echoes totally out of proportion to their volume.

“DIE ALONE,” he spat.

A flood of power hit me and my vision went black.

Okay. So Harry gave up on help coming so he killed Cassius himself and got a death curse for the trouble. But Cassius wasn't that strong, so the death curse didn't really do anything, right?

I thought, Why did I pick the shirt with a bullet hole in it?

Then I fell off the back of the boat, and into the icy water of Lake Michigan.

It hurt, but only for a second. After that, my whole body felt deliciously warm, monstrously tired, and the sleep that had evaded me seemed, finally, to be within reach.

It got dark.

It got quiet.

And I realized that I was all by myself.

"Die alone," whispered a bitter, hateful old man's voice.

Well, crap...WAIT! I got it. He died, so he heard the death curse words. It's not like there was anywhere that the curse could have changed his mind and put him solidly on the path to that death, right?

“You realize,” she said, “that I could change this, Harry. Could find out who you were using to kill yourself. I could take it right out of your head and call them off. You’d never know.”

“You could do that,” I said, quietly. “And I feel like an utter bastard for asking this of you, grasshopper. But I don’t have anyone else to ask.”

“You should call Thomas,” she said. “He deserves the truth.”

Thomas. My brother. My family. He’d be one of little Maggie’s only blood relations once I was gone. And Molly was right. He did deserve the truth.

“No,” I said, barely louder than a whisper. “Tell him later, if you want. After. If you tell him before that, he won’t stand for it. He’ll try to stop it.”

“And maybe he’d be right to do it.”

“No,” I said quietly. “He wouldn’t. But he’d do it anyway. This is my choice, Molls.”

Ummm...so Harry was thinking that Thomas would stop him from ordering the kill and that Molly was right that he deserved to know. But he decided, no, I will not tell Thomas. And that was his last chance to avoid the kill shot. Now he was going to die because of something that made him think he was making his own choice, but he wasn't.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the death curse didn't really influence this at all.

Q: "Did Cassius's death curse get resolved?"

A: "Heck yeah! And that was a factor that Dresden didn't know about that influenced his decision in Changes."

Or maybe not.


But let's go back to that whisper in Dead Beat.

No one is coming to save you, Harry.

One two three four five six seven eight.

But...

And it was all your fault, Harry.

One two three four five six seven. From what Uriel (who may be lying out and out or through omission) told us, shouldn't there be another eight-word whisper somewhere else for balance?

I laughed again. “Tell you what, big guy. Just tell me something. Something useful. I’ll be happy with whatever I get.”

[Uriel] pursed his lips and thought about it for a moment. Then he said, “No matter where you go, there you are.”

Eight words. But we've seen that somewhere before.

My double slipped in front of me again, apparently without needing to cross the intervening space. "It isn't that simple, Harry. No matter where you go, there you are."

But why would Uriel want to remind Harry of subconscious Harry? The seven-word whisper that Uriel wants Harry to believe is him balancing the church's seven-word whisper is:

And a voice—a very calm, very gentle, very rational voice whispered in my ear, “Lies. Mab cannot change who you are.”

So...maybe subconscious Harry said something somewhere. Perhaps relating to Lasciel's shadow in his head.

“If I open this door now,” I said slowly. “I might not be able to close it again.”

“Or you might,” my double said. “I have no intention of allowing her any control. So you will be the one who determines it.”

“What if I can’t contain her again once she is freed?”

“Why shouldn’t you be able to? It’s your mind. Your will. Your choice. You still believe in free will, do you not?”

Huh. That sounds a lot like what Uriel might say. And Jim did say Lasciel and Lash were back.



Okay, so here's my take on things. Normal font is stuff from the text, italics if my interpretation/impression/thoughts. My I/I/T are descriptivist here, I'm not taking a stance on the characters' reasons for doing this unless I explicitly state a motivation.

Harry went to town on deDenarianed Cassius, making an enemy. [Death Masks]

Cassius came back with Grevane and attacked Harry. Harry waited for help, but then he realized, with the help of an angelic whisper, that there was no help coming. He fought and had Mouse kill Cassius, but not before Cassius leveled his death curse. [Dead Beat]

Harry's building is set on fire and he breaks his back trying to get the old people out. Uriel sends Sanya a moment too late to save Harry but in time to same the old people. [Changes]

In the church, broken-back Harry gets a whisper that pushes him to accept the WK mantle. Molly almost convinces him to tell Thomas, which would stop the hit, but Cassius' death curse kicks in and makes him order the shot so that he will die.

Harry gets shot and falls into the water. Uriel yanks his soul and sends it back to Chicago six months later. That whole show was that Uriel could tell Harry about the seven-word whispers so that when Harry was back in his body, he would recognize a seven-word whisper and think it was Uriel giving him a truth so that there would be balance.

Uriel set Harry up to break his back and thus to have to accept the WK mantle, but Cassius' death curse is what made him call Kincaid for the hit.


Unresolved questions (for me, at least):

• Was the first eight-word whisper Uriel or a Fallen?
• How did the whisperer know what Cassius' death curse would be? Did he get his own whisper that I haven't seen signs of? It could have been off-screen, I suppose, but Jim usually at least leaves hints.
• If Uriel was the whisperer, did he know that five years down the line, Harry would go after the Red Court and would need Mab's power to do it? At the time of Dead Beat, Maggie Jr. was ~1 yr old.
• Was Uriel's 'there you are' eight-word comment a balance to the one in Dead Beat? That first whisper led to the death curse which led to a false choice that led to Harry's death, after all. Four possibilities that I see are that Uriel's lying about the balance thing, it was for balance but Uriel just didn't tell Harry, Uriel's the one that whispered in DB, it didn't count towards the balance for whatever reason.
• How much are Uriel, Mab, and DR lying to Harry and playing with/against one another.

So, there we go. I'm currently thinking that that the sequence of Harry's death down, at least for the most part.

Thoughts? Additions? Requests for clarifications?


Edit: If a thought that ends with ", Harry." is a sign of an angelic whisper, I need to go through all of the books again.

[tinygargoyle]

“Intellectus,” I said. “Um. It’s a mode of existence for a very few rare and powerful supernatural beings—angels have it. I’m willing to bet old Mother Winter and Mother Summer have it. For beings with intellectus, all reality exists in one piece, one place, one moment, and they can look at the whole thing. They don’t seek or acquire knowledge. They just know things. They see the entire picture.”
from TC

regarding your last question
So it might be difficult to know who knew ,what and when.


edited for accidental vagueness

[Jared]

So it might be difficult to know who knew ,what and when.

Which part of my post is that pointed at? The unresolved questions at the end?

I am assuming that if a piece of information is required to answer a question and that question is meant to be answered, Jim will put the information into the books. He doesn't do much completely off-screen. We may not get the act itself, but we'll get enough waves that we can work back to the splash.

[BigDPizzle]

Where was Michael? Where was… anyone?

Cassius leaned down and said, “And when I start, Dresden, I want to be free to indulge myself. To really let go and live the moment. I’m sure you understand.”

No one is coming to save you, Harry.

Two thing about this. 

• After "hearing this, Harry clearly gave up on a rescue & instantly became more cynical.  I think this was the last straw as far as he was concerned in giving Cassius any mercy.  Therefore it pushed him towards killing Cassius & giving him more guilt & getting him that much closer to "becoming a monster"
• Also, it could have been Lash that whispered it to help him on the path to corruption.  Remember, that it was a big deal for Harry later to have killed Cassius in cold blood.  He had trouble talking to Murphy about it & it was the first thing he talked about with Michael just before he confessed about the coin

[Lajos]

The problem is figuring out what "whispers" were actually "whispers" from something outside, and which are simply a writer's way of reminding us of/emphasizing a point for dramatic purpose. Jim has opened a can of worms. Now we have to analyze every time Harry talks to himself in 3rd person.

And what constitutes the fulfillment of a death curse? Remember Malcom telling Harry that everyone dies alone. So, was the death curse actually part of what pushed Harry to it, or simply an ill-conceived intent on the part of a dying wizard (meaning "well duh, everyone dies alone", and having no real part in it? Maybe Jim just considers the curse resolved, but it was essentially a waste of effort on the part of Grevane.

Or, was the shadow that whispered in his ear actually the embodiment of the death curse, as directed by one of the Fallen? Kind of like using a radio carrier wave to carry an actual message?

We know, from Margaret's example, that death curses aren't simply just a nuke of last gasp power. They can get pretty creative.

Some very interesting speculation. Time to go back and reread again.

[Beefstew]

Was the first eight-word whisper Uriel or a Fallen?

Based on a fairly bold assumption that anything that Harry thinks to himself and uses his name is a whisper from an angelic or demonic entity.  I very much doubt that.  The balance allows people to make a free choice, unbiased by either side.  To doubt that would be to doubt the entire purpose of the White God.  He's all about the free will.  That's why I doubt Uriel is lying about balance.  And if Uriel had whispered 8 words, doesn't that mean the other side has 8 free words?  And wouldn't that mean that the confirmed demonic whisper was actually restoring the balance?

I think the 8 words you're referring to are a pretty natural thought process when seen in context.  He's wondering why he isn't getting saved by some mysterious force.  Then he realized that no one is coming to save him.  Lots of people, especially when they're trying to motivate themselves, think or say their own name.  I think Harry does it a couple of times, but I don't know for sure.

Other then that, it's a fairly solid theory.  I'm just not sold on the idea of Uriel lying, or that we've been seeing multiple demonic/angelic whispers throughout the series, and Uriel hasn't mentioned anything before, or now.

Jim is sneaky enough to do that though, so who knows.

[Jared]

Based on a fairly bold assumption that anything that Harry thinks to himself and uses his name is a whisper from an angelic or demonic entity.  I very much doubt that.

Well, as I quoted, Harry died because of the death curse and the death curse occurred because of a thought that was similar in structure to the one in the church. In the GS scene, when he tells Uriel what happened, he says “I remember saying to myself that it was all over. And it was all your fault, Harry.” So at least one thought that ended with ", Harry." was an angelic/demonic whisper. Doesn't mean this one was, but it's not impossible and I think it makes sense.

I think the 8 words you're referring to are a pretty natural thought process when seen in context.  He's wondering why he isn't getting saved by some mysterious force.  Then he realized that no one is coming to save him.  Lots of people, especially when they're trying to motivate themselves, think or say their own name.  I think Harry does it a couple of times, but I don't know for sure.

I'll have to go look, as well. I don't remember that.

Other then that, it's a fairly solid theory.

Thanks.

I'm just not sold on the idea of Uriel lying, or that we've been seeing multiple demonic/angelic whispers throughout the series, and Uriel hasn't mentioned anything before, or now.

The best thing about this "no one is coming" whisper is that it's not a lie. Michael was not being sent.

Edit: Mouse and Butters did run back in, but whenever Harry talked about that night with the other people, he made it sound like he was talking just about Camp White God.

[Hopefire]

Regarding what happened back in Dead Beat though, I think that if it were anyone thinking the thought other than Harry, it was just Lash telling Harry that no one was coming. My suspicion is that Lash intended to let Harry suffer a little, recognizing that he wasn't going to grab the coin quite yet, but that he would be more likely to grab it after the disemboweling got going, with no one arriving to help him. What occurred after wasn't to her plan.



I found another interesting one, way back in chapter eighteen of Small Favor. It was during the War Council with Harry, Molly, Murphy and Thomas.

"Nothing's ever convenient with you, Dresden," Murphy said.

"Exactly my point." I rubbed my jaw. I needed to shave, but my throbbing nose was bad enough without adding a couple of razor nicks to the mess. I didn't trust my hands to be steady. There were too many scary things moving around, and if I stopped long enough to think about how far in  over my head I was getting, I might just crawl into a hole and pull it in ever me.

Don't think, Harry. You know too much about what you're up against.

Analyze, decide, and act.

The italics are in the original text. After hearing/thinking those words, Harry shifts gears, regains his mojo, and starts effectively planning. If, as the OP essentially suggests, these italicized sections where Harry refers to himself by name are foreign entities influencing him, it's one sneaky long game that Jim Butcher is playing with us.

Again though: I think that this was Lash. Not yet strong enough to make herself clearly heard by Harry under most circumstances, still reforming herself, I think that she might well have sent out some bolstering advice to get Harry back on track when he needed it.

[Kuvasza]

I love what you've done, but I would concur with Beefstew that sometimes Harry talking to himself is just Harry talking to himself.  As he and Uriel agreed in GS, the shadow's whisper was effective because it fit into a pattern of behavior: Harry blaming himself, railing against his own limitations until some idea comes to him.

I personally want to know whether every wizard out there has their own version of id-Harry in their mind or whether it's just that Harry is nuts.

[AcornArmy]

This whole line of reasoning was awesome, but I have to agree with Beefstew and Kuvasza that Harry talks to himself a lot, and most of the time, it's bound to just be Harry, talking to himself. On the other hand, Hopefire may also be right, and Lash may be responsible for some of the Harry-thoughts after White Night. I had a similar train of thought recently, because it seems like, in recent books, Harry is doing a lot more thinking to himself and answering. Of course, in GS, he's dead, which raises questions of how Lash would be able to talk to his soul while it was away from his body-- but, honestly, I'd bet she could manage it if she really wanted to.

The main problem with the idea that Uriel was behind the eight words in Dead Beat is that it would open the door for one of the Fallen to insert their own eight words into Harry's head. If the eight words came from Lash, there's no imbalance at all, so Uriel's eight words in GS wouldn't act to balance those out.

Of course, Harry was doing something very rare for him in that scene. He was trying to exercise faith in a Higher Power, that Someone would send one of the Knights along to help him out, considering who Cassius was. That didn't happen, and Harry assumed that meant that no one had sent help of any kind. But that didn't mean that help wasn't actually sent; help could've come in the form of those eight words, or it could've come in the form of Butters, who showed up later. Butters might have been given a nudge to fortify his courage.

But if the help came in the form of those words, then there might not have been any imbalance at all. If someone asks for help from God or Whoever, and then an Archangel whispers in their ear-- is that outside the rules? Somehow, I doubt it is. The person is asking for intervention, the intervention isn't being thrust upon them.

At any rate, I don't see how there's a good route for Uriel to say the eight words to Harry in GS as a balance for the eight words in DB. My personal take on it was that the words in GS were something that Uriel was allowed to say, since it was already covered under "fortune cookie wisdom," and Harry was already familiar with them. Which doesn't mean they won't turn out to be useful. Harry might find himself in dire straits one day, think back on that sentence, and laugh, because it lets him figure out how to solve his problem.

On the underlying theme of the OP, though, the idea that Uriel may have directly or indirectly led to Cassius' death curse, I think it's certainly possible that Uriel helped it along, indirectly. I don't think Uriel directly performs malicious acts, but I do think he's willing to foresee them and capitalize on them in some way down the line. And if Uriel needed Harry to be the Winter Knight, and if he thought the only way for Harry to be the Winter Knight and remain himself was to die and learn some useful stuff, then I think Uriel would help that sequence of events happen. He wouldn't do it by harming anyone himself, but I think he'd make use of the harm that others had done and turn it to his own ends.

[Ziggelly]

Wow, I love this. You've opened up a whole new can of worms. Now I'll have to re-read the series with this in mind. That's how you make a theory, people!