Status Updates From The First Binding (Tales of...

After a brief divergence from exact copying, now the author is just having a laugh. The Kvothe arrives at the university, has a battle of wits against the admission committee, one of the masters is a bully, another is a weird kook, etc, some stuff about admissions money, meets a haughty rich kid and runs afoul of him, gets written up, has to be whipped, takes meds to make it bearable, etc

But again it’s a parallel universe Trapis who uses the orphans for his own purposes instead of a kindly older man who cares for the kids out of pure goodness.

So now we meet the keeper of the orphans - a Trapis copy - except this one wants to kill Koli. He even does the Trapis thing “come, come”. Sheesh.

Holy cow this whole thing is straight from NotW. Even down to “son of myself” and drawing a line in the sand and giving them new names. Sheesh.

Ok here’s the demon at the inn. Ultimately this is a parallel universe version of Name of the Wind. It’s not exactly the same, yet it’s identical. It’s a weird feeling.

Also lol because Denna/Eloine is doing the thing where she uses fake names but they start with the first letter of her real name.

But to be fair this is slightly different. Denna is more autonomous in this version. I wonder what’s the purpose of this little digression.

I wonder who Denna’s mysterious patron is going to be in this book.

Lol isnt this scene from NotW too? Denna saves a young girl from a predator.

So yeah it’s almost identical to NotW. I guess he now has to have his Tarbean chapter before going to the university.

So Koli is an Ashura?

No way his home is burning down who could have predicted that! Is he about to meet Haliax?

Ugh the horniness

Ch 16 — More sword training, space around your body. Now lol don’t tell me Mahrab is helping Khalim research a secret story wow, and it’ll be ready when it’s ready. Straight from Kvothe’s dad’s mouth. When will the Chandrian show up I wonder.

Yes you musn’t let your blood be acquired by a binder or Devi might use it.

Chapter 15 — Ari talks with Vithum, a foreigner, who tells him he will be able to start performing in shows after some sword training. No exact parallel I remember. Now we have mention of Athwun and Sura and Haliax/Saithaan and the Asir. All that is the Amir and Chandrian and whatnot I imagine.

Okay now we get reference to a place in the ashram/university that no one can get into.

I guess the Shaen are the Fae and the Sithre are — I forget what they’re called in NotW. Isn’t there a Sithe too in NotW?

Ari continues to learn about binding from Mahrab. I expect the scene where Ari learns quickly and then almost accidentally kills himself is coming up.

Oh binders can go mad can they? I wonder if they go to a special prison/hospital gor binders??

Obviously it’s not “breaking” your mind here but rather “folding” your mind to do the magic. Binding is Sympathy and alar is athir. A few chapters ago there was the creation story very similar to Tehlu and all that. There’s no Bast yes though.

So far we have Ari, a hybrid Kvothe/Chronicler, and Denna/Eloine (isn’t that name from NotW too?) and the frame story. The Auri character is a little thief girl and the Understage is reminiscent of the underthing. Sadly we don’t have the warmth and love of Kvothe’s childhood with his family and troupe, but rather Ari is a mistreated orphan in his Sullied caste in a theatre. We just met Abenthy/Mahrab.