On dream travelers

James Wynn · 15 Feb 2011, 17:51 · from 2011-February.txt.gz

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From: crushtv at gmail.com (James Wynn)
Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2011 11:51:07 -0600
Subject: (urth) On dream travelers
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>
> Roy-
> That when Fava's natural body died in the snow her spirit, as manifested by
> her astral body, lost its tether and became disembodied, which is why
> Silkhorn never saw her again.
>
> [snip]Her
> spirit body was starving, just as her natural body was starving back on
> Blue, and she knew it. When she returned from a spirit warp she immediately
> flew off to find human blood to drink, as did Juganu.
> [...]

I think it is a really interesting theory that an astral body will 
eventually starve if the traveler does not return to his corporeal form. 
It has the benefit of explaining why the Rajan did not allow leave 
Juganu and Jahlee in astral form. I'm not convinced it is true and the 
main reason is that I think--if you were right-- it would be really 
interesting to show the result of someone remaining in dream-travel, but 
Wolfe didn't do that (admittedly my discrepancies are based on the 
absence of information which I consider to be "weak" form argument). 
Other problems are:

1) Jahlee doesn't say she's hungry in dream-travel IIRC. She only says 
that the inhumi bring her food that she can't eat. Now that doesn't mean 
that she isn't "starving" anyway. Still, it could be that astral bodies 
starve but don't feel hunger.

2) If an astral body can "starve to death" it has to be different from 
merely being killed in astral travel. Fava is able to enter people's 
dreams. No one else who dies seems to be able to do that.

Now, The fact that the Rajan doesn't RECORD any further meetings with 
Fava, doesn't really bother me. I mean, if astral bodies can starve to 
death, then it takes a while. He still had plenty of opportunity to find 
her, right?  Why didn't he? Also, that the Rajan says Juganu will "die" 
if he stays is not troubling (in itself) because of course his corporeal 
body WILL die if he stays. Still, it doesn't explain why Juganu would care.

So, while I admit that the question of why the Rajan insisted the inhumi 
return with him is perplexing AND your explanation resolves that issue, 
I'm not convinced. There's something about it that makes me uneasy. It 
is possible that the Rajan could imagine all sorts of mischief that an 
astral inhumi could cause with the ability to walk through walls and 
create objects at will. So, he's unwilling to leave them unsupervised. I 
think Jahlee wanted the Rajan to return for her because being stuck on 
Green as a goddess to the inhumi is not what she wants.

HOWEVER:
What happens to Fava is still mysterious whether one believes she 
"starved" or if one believes she could not. I've assumed that her astral 
body is not destroyed instantly when her corporeal body dies, but do we 
really know? In that case, "astral starving" is really not the issue. 
Her astral body is destroyed and she is left in the Limbo-world of 
dreams. That would explain what the Rajan's warning to Juganu meant. But 
would that be worse from the perspective of an inhumi than being stuck 
as a monster?

PS Regarding the "rations" eaten by the Rajan's men. Is it possible that 
the food an astral traveler carries with him into dream-travel is 
edible? In which case, I would presume that "conjured" food would be 
nourishing to dream travelers.

u+16b9

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