So, I cleared my 'to do' list so I could concentrate on writing fanfic for the Mag7 Christmas stockings... and I'm having a hard time getting motivated. I'm actually having a hard time getting motivated to stitch, too, either on the machine or hand embroidery... it's kind of annoying, because it's the perfect time to do stuff, and I feel like I'm moping. Oi.
The only good thing is... I've been getting back into Misty Lackey's Valdemar-verse again lately, trying to get into the Mags saga.... And I say this is a good thing not because I'm reading, but because I feel like she's jumped the shark a bit... and that urge to complain and set out my argument might push me into getting excited about this stuff again and dreaming and thinking 'what would happen if?' I don't know if this is chemo-brain or not, this feeling that i just can't get into anything creative, can't focus. But I'm going to start laying out my argument anyway, in an attempt to jump-start some brainwaves.
So, Lackey's formula for Heralds of Valdemar has an abused youngster miraculously saved by a Companion (intelligent, telepathic, white horse), who goes on to serve the Kingdom of Valdemar in capacity as a Herald, who is basically a combination law-giver, first responder, and dirty trickster-on-the-side-of-light. She introduced us to this world with Talia (Arrows of the Queen) and pretty solidified it with Vanyel (The Last Herald-Mage). I loved those works and still think those characters are very deep and well-rounded, with a good, solid set of motivations. I kind of got disgusted with Lavan Firestorm and Brightly Burning, and couldn't quite make myself read Takes a Thief, Skif's story, on the chance that she'd screwed up with him, too, and Skif is an awesome character. And for a while, I stayed away from the universe because of other pretties that were written better, I felt. Then came my current issues, and I started re-reading some Valdemar-verse fanfic (The Grass is Greener Series is amazing... and hilarious, and on AO3), and I got all excited again, and decided to pick up the pro books. And that's where Mags comes in.
Lackey stuck to her best formula for Mags's back-story - he's a orphan that a mine-owner picked up with other orphans to and put to work chipping gems. Because the mine owner is an a$$hole, he barely gives the kids enough to live on, barely enough to keep them warm, etc etc. One day, a Companion comes to the mine looking to Choose. The mine-owner chases him off, only to have a full Herald come back with his own Companion and the original. Mags, of course, is the Choosee. Mags is a strong personality, and the saving Herald Jakyr, is a complicated individual. When the two finally get back to the Palace, Jakyr tells Mags that a new Trainee system is going into affect with his class. That is, they're building a new Heraldic Collegium in addition to rebuilding Healer's and Bardic's. Previously, all the Heralds learned on an apprentice system, basically, and the full Herald who first found the Trainee took up the new Herald for mentoring. It is pointed out that there are over 60 Herald Trainees, and that the Heralds are basically going from an organization where everyone knows everyone else to one where there's about to be too many Heralds for personal relationships.
This... has the potential to be a good story. And if Lackey had set it about 2-300 years after founding, I'd think it would be well placed. Unfortunately, it's not. It's explicitly stated that this is about 75-100 years after the last herald-mage. In between Vanyel and Talia, the size of the kingdom has doubled, expanding to the north and the west. But even at Vanyel's time, it takes him a week on horseback at normal horse-pace to get to Forst Reach (his birth home) to the west of the capital. Figure this is about 200 miles or there-abouts. And the border is even further - witness his hectic ride to Highjorune in Magic's Pride. So at Vanyel's time, Valdemar is a rough square about 460 miles wide and maybe 500 miles high. In this setting, there are at least:
1) The Monarch, Heir, and Monarch's Own Herald
2) The Seneschal's Herald and the Lord Martial's Herald
3) The 4 Guardians of the Web, which were not any of the Herald's we knew in the first LHM book.
4) The courts of Haven - it's been established that Haven has several local courts which include attention from Heralds stationed at Haven just for that purpose as needed.
5) The Weaponsmaster always seems to be a Herald, and at least some of the regular teachers are Heralds.
So if we assume there are 4 courts in Haven with Heralds in attendance every day, then there's always at least 10 Heralds assigned to Haven proper. We can assume at least half-dozen more for teachers. 16.
In addition, there is:
6) Regular Courier Heralds, assume 2 per major road, or 8 total.
7) Regular Circuit Heralds, and we're never sure exactly how many circuit locations Valdemar has. But, if a circuit is a 200 x 100 mile swatch, then in Vanyel's time, there were 10 circuit Heralds as a consistency.... (I'm making a guess, here, because it's difficult to estimate distances with a guide of 18 month circuit, every place hit twice. I'm probably wrong... but I'm also probably wrong about how big Valdemar is, too.)
8) Ambassadorial Heralds, which may not be usual, but do occur. Say 3 random/ roaming Heralds.
9) An on-going war with Karse. Vanyel replaces 5 Herald-Mages by himself at one point, and it is clear that this is in addition to all the other Heralds out there. I'm sure those Heralds weren't the only ones fighting.
Ok, at this point, with a complete non-understanding of how big Valdemar is, we have at least 42 Heralds in Valdemar at the time of Vanyel... this is not including Vanyel himself, or his Aunt Sayvil.
It's pointed out in Mags's book that there are 60 new Trainees, and one character exclaims that's enough that every single Herald, including the King's Own, would have to take 4 apprentices if that were the case. Um... 60 divided by 4 is 25. Assuming the actual numbers didn't change in 100 years, there's plenty of heralds on tap for that. Not that I'd suggest it, but 42 Heralds (plus Van and Sayvil, minus the Crowns) could easily divide up 60 trainees into 2 per with room left over.
The other side is how many people does it take before you're not on a first name basis with everyone in your organization? It'll be different for everyone. But, frex, my real-work office has about 200 people in it, and I can ID by site, although not name, about 80%. Some people know all the names, some people know all the faces. But 200 in a time when memorization is a handy skill is not that much.
There's another thing - at one point, Vanyel mentions the palace servants are used to Heralds talking to thin air - that wouldn't happen unless Heralds are pretty pervasive, to the point of being commonplace. Also, Heralds are common in Haven, and in the towns closest to the city, who are used to courier riders and the like.
What it comes down to, to my mind, is that it just doesn't jibe. Either at Vanyel's time there's a lot more Heralds out there, or there can't be that many Trainees, and thus the time-setting is all wrong. I get that Valdemar is about to undergo a major expansion, but like I said, it just feels like this should have happened way earlier in the country's timeline. Like the *first* major expansion. Remember that the Companions live an average of 10 years before Choosing, and that they have to have a herd large enough to generate future Companions, and make up for losses. So they're not just having kids at replacement rate - they're growing in numbers to ensure a growth of chosen. So 10 years ago, no one noticed a crop of 60 fillies and colts when there's a grand total of 40 Companions, half of whom can't bear children, and half of the ones that can are out on circuit?
Now that I think about it, no one's ever explained the inner workings of the Companion's Herd. Someone should talk to those guys.
In any case, if this were the first major expansion of Valdemar, where the people have begun to spill over the defensive city walls and scatter about the outlying countryside - I could totally be there. But the Heraldic Collegium being new *after* Vanyel's time just doesn't work for me, and I'll probably retcon the timing of it in my personal canon, and assume any references to Vanyel were accidentally copied in by an over-enthusiastic bard.
-boogieshoes
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