Nettle's motive
The Whorl list — 1 messages, 1 voices, 11 Apr 2001
https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/1339

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Michael Straight — 11 Apr 2001, 08:33

> On Wed, 11 Apr 2001, [iso-8859-1] Nicholas Gevers wrote:
> is said and done; Oreb accompanies Silk to the Whorl
> again, as you would expect; Nettle ditto, because the
> only remnant of her husband is in Silk, Old Viron is
> her old home anyway, and her children are all grown up
> on Blue and Green; Seawrack ditto, because she and
> Silk form an archetypal couple once Hyacinth is out of
> the way, and Horn (again) is still in Silk

Don't have the passage in front of me, but in OBW, Horn tells Wizer that
he wants to see Silk again and talk with him more than anything else in
the whorl, and "Nettle feels the same."

I think Horn is pretty much gone at the end of RTTW, and that Nettle knows
he's dead.  So with her husband dead and (as you note) her children grown,
she follows her desire to be with Silk, not as a wife, but as a disciple.

Seawrack, I don't understand, but I think that Scylla knowing how to
summon her is a clue.  I'm guessing her leaving has more to do with the
designs of the undines, the Mother wanting to send her to other whorls,
than any attachment she has to Silk.  Why Silk would summon her, I don't
know.

-Rostrum


*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun.

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