Did Kemmler start the Black Council?

[Bad Alias]

I'm not so sure that Sells, the FBI hexenwolves, and Cowl and Kumori are infected. Just because the adversary is behind or involved in a plot doesn't necessarily mean that the actor on stage is the adversary. And why bother infecting someone, something that almost certainly has limits, when you can corrupt them with black magic or offers of power?

@peregrine: Did Rashid say "the adversary?"

[morriswalters]

I'm not so sure that Sells, the FBI hexenwolves, and Cowl and Kumori are infected. Just because the adversary is behind or involved in a plot doesn't necessarily mean that the actor on stage is the adversary. And why bother infecting someone, something that almost certainly has limits, when you can corrupt them with black magic or offers of power?

@peregrine: Did Rashid say "the adversary?"

From Cold Days page 350 my Kindle version.

"Unwitting or not, virtually your every action in the past few years has resulted in a series of well-placed thumbs in the adversary's eye."

[Bad Alias]

Thanks Morris.

My view for most of the bad guys in the book is that they are kind of in Harry's position in Rashid's statement. They are unwittingly helping the adversary and are not infected. A few are knowing, a few are infected, and not all those acting knowingly are infected.

One of the reasons I don't like the idea of everyone being infected is that it's kind of like "the devil made me do it." None of the characters are evil; just helpless pawns of the forces of evil. But maybe Nemesis requires active co-operation (or obvious domination like Cat-Sith that we'd notice), so my concern there is baseless.

[Con]

Back to the original point. Kemmler was powerful enough to start World War 2 and fight the entire council. We know from Bob that he had connections to various nasty entities. This to me means that he was able to do this by starting the Black Council ensuring there loyalties the same way Justin DuMorne tried to ensure Elaine and Harry's.

[g33k]

Back to the original point. Kemmler was powerful enough to start World War 2 and fight the entire council. We know from Bob that he had connections to various nasty entities. This to me means that he was able to do this by starting the Black Council ensuring there loyalties the same way Justin DuMorne tried to ensure Elaine and Harry's.

n.b. there is no "Black Council" as such.  That's a label Harry invented to identify a group whose existence he deduced from evidence.

The two names that we have, that such groups have themselves used, are "The Circle" (currently active in the Dresdenverse) and the "Thule Society" (active in the late 1800's).  Whether Thule was a precursor organization, or separate, or is even continuous (and "The Circle" is part of it (or vice versa)) is unknown.  Whether Harry's "Black Council" is the same as (or related to) "The Circle" is also unknown.

I think we should take it as given that "bad-guy" wizard organizations are always around, often several at once, since most of them operate in secret, and may not know of one another.

Kemmler may indeed have founded one (or more), but also likely took over one (or more) that was convenient to him.
 
 

[Bad Alias]

I agree with g33k entirely. If the "Black Council" exists, it is an organization of wizards. Harry posited that there was a group of wizards behind all the bad stuff. We know that the Circle was behind a lot of bad stuff and Nemesis was also behind a lot of bad stuff. It's heavily implied, but by no means confirmed, that the Circle has non-human members. Many theorize that Nemesis controls the Circle.

If Nemesis and the Circle are the same thing, then Kemmler didn't found the Circle. If the Black Council is a group of secret warlock wizards, then Kemmler may have founded it. If the Circle isn't simply an organ of Nemesis, but a collective of "bad guys," human and otherwise, then Kemmler may have founded it.

[toodeep]

I think the circle will be the idea we know that Maggie once pitched to her father.  We know that she was talking about recruiting non-wizards, as the White Court King and a representative of the Red Court were present at her pitch.  We know her father turned her down, but suspect that the creation of whatever she was planning went forward anyway, until she realized the issues with it and got out.

If this is the case, then we can guess that the circle has probably had white court, red court, and wizard members, at the very least.  It is possible they planned to use outsiders, as we know that papa wraith had access to outsider summoning spells, and it seems likely that they planned to have a starborn in their service.  It is likely that DuMorne was a member of the circle, as he was a known associate of Maggie's, may have been in contact with outsiders (due to HWWB appearance), and he specifically recruited two potential starborn as his apprentices and planned mind controlled thugs.

We can see how this could help everyone.  Wizards would get access to red court and white court resources (papa wraith's library, etc), red court got wizard help in their war, and maybe papa wraith got his earing made by wizards or other support by them in his political plays in the court.  We also know they had to have access to truly impressive resources, considering they gave a worthwhile give to Ferrovax and the anthame to Lea.

So we know that Cowl in a member.  It seems likely that Papa Wraith was if the Circle was the organization originally conceived by Maggie.  If so, it is interesting that it tried to overthrow the Wraiths after Papa Wraith lost control.  It makes me wonder how completely Lara has dominated him, and if she does know his secrets, why she declined to participate/support it like he did, and what she knows.