Lois McMaster Bujold
Glad you're enjoying the books!
Demonic dissolution is indeed about the same thing as sundering, only on fast-forward. Desdemona's ultimate fate is undetermined at this time, but is certainly one reason she's trying so hard to keep Pen alive.
One possibility may be that she's reached the maximum size of demon that any human head can hold, and her next jump would entail some trimming, mutilation, or loss, like a human-expanded demon going back into an animal. It might not be good for the human target, either. Demons aren't Great Beasts, but one also remembers the messy fate of Pen's Great Earthworm experiment. Another is that over some unusually long sorcerer's life, the human-demon amalgam may undergo some change-of-state that makes such a, for lack of a clearer term, soul-upload to the god possible. Des is in no hurry to test the problem.
Ta, L.
Glad you're enjoying the books!
Demonic dissolution is indeed about the same thing as sundering, only on fast-forward. Desdemona's ultimate fate is undetermined at this time, but is certainly one reason she's trying so hard to keep Pen alive.
One possibility may be that she's reached the maximum size of demon that any human head can hold, and her next jump would entail some trimming, mutilation, or loss, like a human-expanded demon going back into an animal. It might not be good for the human target, either. Demons aren't Great Beasts, but one also remembers the messy fate of Pen's Great Earthworm experiment. Another is that over some unusually long sorcerer's life, the human-demon amalgam may undergo some change-of-state that makes such a, for lack of a clearer term, soul-upload to the god possible. Des is in no hurry to test the problem.
Ta, L.
More Answered Questions
Carro
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
In Curse of Chalion you have scenes of crossing a mountain pass and Penric likewise crosses a pass. You make it all very vivid and immediate. I've never been up in such a place and was wondering what experience and research you'd based this on? (This question was prompted by watching a documentary on a team of scientists looking for Hanibal's route across the alps - and seeing mountain passes.)
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