edenfalling | [Meme] Turn Left

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[Meme] Turn Left

Found via

askerian over on Tumblr.

Inspired by Doctor Who's "Turn Left": Pick one of my stories and tell me a point in the tale that you'd change. Something tiny (e.g. "and then Fay chose silver glitter instead of gold") or big (e.g. "and then Rose was arrested instead of Jack") and I'll tell you how that one difference would have altered the course of the entire story.

I am bored. Play with me?

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I'll choose a shorter piece- "That darkened over coming years" Ilgmuth chooses a different gift other than perfume.

Not much changes! He'd probably have picked jewelry or bells or a silk scarf/sash -- those being other traditional first move courting gifts among the upper classes. (Lower classes tend to go for cheaper and/or more practical things; a pouch of seeds is popular and symbolic, as is a decorative hair fastening of some sort.) And Shezan would have rejected the gift on some other pretext, because people generally want the time provided by a couple back-and-forth steps to get to know their suitors in a marriage-oriented context, even if they've been otherwise acquainted for years.

Now, if Ilgamuth had offered Shezan a poem or something living like a hawk (which is what the bell gift is derived from, incidentally), Zardis would have been much more worried, because those are serious gifts and generally not attempted until after at least one small gift has been accepted and the two people are thus effectively engaged. A person who moves that quickly -- who is rash, like Rabadash -- would not be an acceptable son-in-law. (And to be honest, Shezan would also be pretty discomfited by that scenario, to the point where she might reject the next gift as well, quit teasing Ilgamuth, and call the whole courtship off.)

See- this is so utterly, utterly fascinating to me. Even though it may not change the story much, I feel like I have a deeper understanding of the cultural practice. It makes me wonder more about Cor's choice of gifts then. Though they were more the same sort of small things, was his understanding of the nuances as good (due both to the fact that he was a commoner in a household of only men and because of the years that have passed since being in Calormene).

So... I'm greedy but now am curious about another story- Out of Season. What is Shezan had revealed what she knew about the beaver's escape plot, or what is she had chosen to act as dead weight and pulled the eagle from it's flight.

Alternatively, what is Rabadash's plot had been successful?

The entirety of HHB gets derailed, for starters!

If Shezan overcomes her moral qualms and tells someone about the escape plot, the results depend slightly on who she confides in: Axartha, her fellow priestesses of Achadith, or her fellow Tolkheeras and Tolkaars.

If she tells Axartha, the information gets passed to the Tisroc, and from there to the other Tolkaars and Tolkheeras, plus a dozen carefully chosen guards... but not to Rabadash. Marigold gets chained down to the altar instead of held by a single person, and winds up dead without a much more direct divine intervention. The Eagle likewise ends up dead, killed by the waiting guards. I don't think Aslan would interfere in such conditions, and while it's possible for Achadith to possess Shezan, she doesn't need a favor from Aslan that badly. Calormen therefore has no need to save face with Narnia, and is likely to start some sort of proxy war and/or trade embargo shortly thereafter.

Because Rabadash doesn't pick up on the increased wariness of the guards and abort his plot, he gets spotted by more people than just Axartha. The incident can't be hushed up, and he's killed for attempted regicide and patricide. Axartha barely gets out of the subsequent mess alive -- Malindra Takhun accuses him of aiding Rabadash -- but he and his granddaughter did foil the Narnians' plot, which tips the balance in his favor. He loses a lot of influence, though.

Ilgamuth is killed as a co-conspirator in Rabadash's plot. So are all the prince's sworn companions. Anradin therefore can't visit Arsheesh a few months later and Shasta has no impetus to escape. Bree is confiscated along with Anradin's other possessions and added to the royal stables. (He may take the chance to escape on his own, since he's now so close to Archenland.) Ahoshta rises in status a little faster than he otherwise would, and accepts a different marriage offer before Aravis's stepmother talks Kidrash Tarkaan into arranging engagements. Aravis thus ends up betrothed to a fairly innocuous friend of Prince Ilragesh. She goes through with the marriage, not very happily, but without any grand disruptive gestures.

Shasta does still have to save Archenland, as per the prophecy, but that doesn't happen until several years later, after Arsheesh sells him to some pirates. By that point, the bad blood between Calormen and the north has escalated to full-fledged naval warfare, and his ship intervenes in a crucial naval battle. He is not recognized as Corin's twin and winds up as a pirate captain instead, until he dies fairly young: hanged, in the Seven Isles. Corin inherits Archenland.

And things continue to shake out a little differently thereafter, since Calormen's focus was on the north rather than on internal unification and then southern conquests. Kutu isn't defeated and doesn't break into three remnant kingdoms, etc. I doubt much of this directly affects Narnia, though it may alter some minor details of the Telmarines' eventual invasion and conquest, since I'm sure Telmar itself was affected by Calormen's northern forays.

(I will answer the other options tomorrow.)

Edited 2015-01-08 18:26 (UTC)

If Shezan tells her underlings, the information stays within Achadith's temple and the priestesses have a long debate over their theological obligations that ends with the collective decision that they can't have an eagle -- a symbol of their goddess -- be seen aiding a demon. So Shezan lets Marigold Beaver know they're aware of the plot and tells her to call it off or they'll kill her would-be rescuers. Marigold does so, the Narnians can't think of an alternate plan in time, and the sacrifice goes off without a hitch. The guards haven't been put on high alert, so Axartha is able to stop Rabadash without anyone else noticing.

However, there is no plausible reason to send Rabadash away and he makes another attempt a couple weeks later. This one is much less dramatic and therefore less obvious, and he gets away with it. He takes over Calormen, but without the curse binding him to Tashbaan and thus forcing him to find creative ways around traditional problems (and without the loss of half his sworn companions -- specifically the ones who tend to encourage his worst tendencies), he's not a very good ruler.

Ilgamuth doesn't come apologize to Shezan after the sacrifice, since the assassination plot was still running, but he does apologize after Rishti's death. They don't start courting at that point, but they do become more friendly, particularly in the wake of Axartha's death from old age and their shared and growing realization that Rabadash is never going to live up to his better qualities and instead is quite possibly going to tip Calormen into a broad-based civil war -- not just isolated provincial rebellions, or rival claimants fighting for the throne, but full-scale social revolution. Around this time, Malindra Takhun comes to Shezan to request sanctuary from Rabadash, who intends to execute her.

Long story short, Shezan, Ilgamuth, and Malindra form the core of a new assassination plot, which results in Rabadash's death after barely one year on the throne. Prince Ilragesh is long-since dead by this point, but he had a son of his own whom Malindra was able to rescue. They set him up as Tisroc and rule in his name until he comes of age. Shezan and Ilgamuth fall in love and get married a few years into the regency, and when the new Tisroc officially takes power in his own right, they get out of Tashbaan as quickly as possible to avoid any political repercussions. (This does not work; they get killed within a couple years as part of the backlash over an event I will describe below.)

Rabadash kills Ahoshta upon his accession to the throne, so when Kidrash goes husband-shopping for Aravis, he intends to marry her to Anradin. Aravis runs away, as per canon, but she and Hwin don't encounter Shasta and Bree. They head northwest instead, and cross the desert on the Great Oasis route that ends in the land of Mergandy. From there they make their way to Narnia, where Hwin finds a herd of Talking Horses to join and Aravis falls under Lucy's wing at Cair Paravel. After the Pevensies vanish, she is one of Peridan's chief supporters, and later marries into one of Narnia's minor human noble houses.

Bree never escapes.

Shasta gets sold to pirates, as in the scenario above, and ends up saving Archenland nearly twenty years later, from the consequences of Corin's rash decision to invade Calormen in retaliation for... I don't even know what, but I'm sure Corin could find something to take offense at, particularly in the immediate wake of Lune's death. Once again, he helps win a decisive naval battle, only this time he does get recognized as Corin's twin -- Corin being the sort of king who is personally present for the fighting -- and may be said to save Archenland a second time by promptly abdicating so as not to be the cause of potential civil war.

That naval battle, of course, is the incident over which Shezan and Ilgamuth lose their lives.

(More to come in further comments...)

Edited 2015-01-08 02:18 (UTC)

Ah! All of these are so interesting to me- I am particularly interested in the fact that Ilgamuth would choose to break his oath as a sworn brother, because that seems like it would have been such a hard decision for him even knowing that Rabadash is a bad ruler.

Malindra also seems like such an interesting character... but then, all your Out of Season verse characters do, and are so interesting to read about (even Rabadash is more interesting in your stories.)

If Shezan tells her fellow Tolkheeras and Tolkaars (aka, the other high priestesses and priests), they promptly decide not to tell the Tisroc or any other secular powers. Instead, they set a few of their own temple guards to catch and kill the Eagle when she comes to rescue Marigold Beaver... but don't use any extra chains, because that would send the message that they don't trust in the gods' power to keep a demon under control. Shezan doesn't let go of the chain (it would be too obvious a move, and also her colleagues have reinforced the half of her that thinks the sacrifice must be made), and both Marigold and the Eagle die dramatically.

Everyone is focused on the altar, so Axartha is able to stop Rabadash without anyone noticing. The crowd is restive, though, so Shezan steps forward and claims the whole thing as a sign from Achadith. Without the goddess's voice, she can't make as dramatic a statement as in "Out of Season," but she says something about how turning on each other is abhorrent to the gods and Calormen must look outward rather than inward for its foes. Which leads, after much argument, to Axartha persuading Rishti to send Rabadash to Narnia as part of an embassy demanding repayment for the attempted disruption of their holy rites.

This gets him out of Tashbaan, but he has no intention whatsoever of courting Susan. Ilgamuth comes to make his apology, but Shezan is feeling more shaken and morally compromised than in "Out of Season" and therefore doesn't make a courting overture; they simply strike up a slightly closer friendship. The Calormene embassy manages to wring an extremely vague apology from Narnia, but nothing more, and the two countries start the same trade embargo and proxy war as in the first scenario. When Rabadash returns, he agrees to postpone killing his father -- it will work much better if he lays political groundwork for his own accession and rule rather than just taking over by fiat.

In this scenario, Shasta, Bree, Aravis, and Hwin actually follow the canonical plot of HHB until they reach Tashbaan, at which point things derail because the Narnians aren't there to snatch Shasta from the street. Instead, they get safely through the city and across the river, then swing westward until they reach a standard caravan route. This one (not the Great Oasis route, incidentally) deposits them in southwestern Archenland, where they promptly have a massive debate over whether to reveal themselves as refugees or continue undercover all the way to Narnia. Shasta just wants to stop hiding, and Hwin is sure Northerners will be sympathetic, but Bree remembers that the humans who captured him were also Northerners, and Aravis is quite aware of the historic enmity Archenland holds toward Calormen. So they continue incognito all the way into Narnia, whereupon they are directed to Cair Paravel, that being the only place really set up to handle situations like theirs.

(comment split for length, tbc...)

People notice that Shasta resembles Corin, but Corin isn't in Narnia at that point -- he has gone to Archenland in Susan's company, partly to spend time with his father, and partly because Susan is talking to Lune about Calormen's increased hostility toward the north. So it takes nearly a year for the news of Corin's double to reach Lune, who promptly rides north and goes, "OMG, my long-lost son!!!" at Shasta, who had settled happily into being a fisherman who just happens to be best friends with the Lady Aravis, Queen Lucy's new protégé. Cor gets hauled south to learn how to be a prince; a few months later, after the Pevensies vanish, Aravis requests permission from Lune to join him at Anvard.

Presumably we wind up with the same decisive naval battle as in the first two scenarios, though this time Cor participates as the commander of the Archenlandish fleet and Aravis is right there beside him. This wins her more credit with the Great Council than her canon actions (which is odd, because she's the one who discovered the warning Shasta passed on!) and there is not nearly as much opposition when she and Cor announce their intent to marry.

Rabadash does kill Rishti a couple years after what would have been HHB, but in the intervening years he's learned to hold his temper a bit and therefore is not an immediately disastrous ruler. Shezan is still morally appalled at patricide and regicide, and turns down Ilgamuth's courting attempt. However, Rabadash doesn't survive the aftermath of the dramatic naval defeat. Ilgamuth escapes by requesting sanctuary from Shezan before the new claimants to the throne can kill him as part of the old regime. Shezan comes under a lot of fire for her family connection to Rabadash, though, and about a month after his death she and Ilgamuth flee to the Seven Isles, where they join one of the small expatriate Calormene enclaves.

They do eventually marry, but never have children. (Obviously they don't marry in scenario one, where Ilgamuth is executed for treason. In scenario two, they have two or three kids, at least one of whom survives their assassination.)

If Rabadash successfully knocks Axartha aside and stabs Rishti, assuming other events to have gone as per "Out of Season," Achadith speaks to the assembled population of Tashbaan immediately thereafter. Except this time, after Shezan makes her speech, Rishti falls to the ground stone dead, since Rabadash and Axartha can't hold his corpse upright indefinitely.

Nobody is sure if this means Achadith supports Rabadash's coup, or whether his patricide is part of the pattern that needs to break. A little pitched battle over the issue breaks out on the temple steps, which ends when Malindra Takhun knocks Rabadash out with her husband's jeweled turban. (Shezan was busy guarding her initiates from anyone who got too close to the altar.) The watching crowd nearly turns into a riot before Malindra climbs up onto the altar beside Shezan and makes her own speech about the pattern of patricide ending with its last practitioner, aka Rabadash, and now everybody cheer for her son, Ilragesh Tisroc, may he live forever. Shezan grits her teeth and lends her support to that idea. Gradually the various guards stationed around the temple complex get the crowd under control and begin doling out bread and wine.

Then things go somewhat parallel to the first "Shezan tells someone" scenario. Rabadash and his companions are executed. Bree is added to the royal stables and takes the chance (not being anyone's prized and favorite stallion anymore, and thus not so closely watched) to escape, perhaps accompanied by a slave stableboy.

Prince Ilragesh inherits the throne, which means Malindra Takhun becomes the power behind it. She doesn't kill Axartha, but she shuts him out... and gets rid of Ahoshta, too, who she only kept around because he was temporarily in Rishti's favor. Aravis once again winds up married to one of Ilragesh's friends. If she brings Hwin with her, the Mare may meet Bree in the royal stables and join his attempted escape, but if she doesn't, Hwin lives and dies a slave in Calavar. After Axartha's death, Malindra and Shezan gradually come to terms with each other, and Shezan becomes something of an unofficial vizier. Malindra gathers a number of other women around her, which may eventually include Aravis and Lasaraleen.

Malindra ignores Narnia and Archenland since she's more interested in ensuring internal Calormene unity, and also since she knows her son isn't a fighter or military strategist and he therefore has some of the same reasons to prefer peace that Rabadash does in canon. Shasta gets sold to pirates, which seems to be his standard fate if he doesn't run away. This time, though, without Calormen and Narnia squabbling at sea, Corin is allowed on a voyage and... you guessed it... gets captured by pirates. Shasta saves Archenland by rescuing his strange lookalike, and the two boys have a long, strange adventure through the various islands in the Eastern Sea on their way back to the mainland and safety.

And then he's recognized as the long-lost prince, of course, and eventually inherits the throne. Archenland and Calormen have a much less fraught relationship for a few generations, under the influence of treaties signed by Cor and Ilragesh. Shezan is one of the authors of those treaties, and does her best to alter the theological view of Talking Beasts as demons.

And that is that!

Cor and Aravis are different from Shezan and Ilgamuth in that they already know that they're both sexually attracted to each other and capable of living in a functional partnership for the long haul. They don't need the testing/dating period of the dance, which is why Cor jumped to offering two gifts right off the bat and left jesses along with the bells, and also why Aravis didn't bother rejecting that first gift. But yeah, he was uncertain that she really was doing what he thought she was doing when she started insulting his manhood and otherwise flirting Calormene-style, because he only knows courting secondhand from folktales and gossip he heard on the infrequent occasions Arsheesh took him into the nearby village. That's why it took him a while to respond. Well, and he also had to acquire the right perfume without asking her for help, which was a little complicated.

I think Cor did half-expect Aravis to reject his first gift, just because that's the pattern in stories -- it usually goes by the rule of threes, so there are two rejections before an acceptance. (That's not a requirement, btw, nor even necessarily the most common pattern in real life; it's just tidy on a literary level.) But he's not stupid enough to look a gift horse in the mouth when she comes to find him wearing the perfume and the bells. *grin*

Ilgamuth was a little uncertain about Rabadash from their first meeting, but yeah, breaking his sworn oath is a huge move. Even just letting Malindra and Shezan plot while doing nothing to either help or hinder them would have been difficult. Actively working against his lord... that's drastic. But he has moral lines in the sand past which he can't continue supporting Rabadash, and in this scenario, they get crossed with extreme prejudice.

He deals with the whole situation very badly, emotionally speaking, and never feels properly honorable again. Of course, Shezan is suffering her own crisis over betraying and working against her might-as-well-be-brother, so they have that in common... which actually delays their eventual romance, because they remind each other of their own shortcomings.

Malindra Takhun is going to have (I hope) a larger role in the sequel to "Out of Season" and HHB that I will write one of these days. That story is nothing but politics and people dealing badly with massive life changes. And then more politics, because I can. *evil smile*

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[Meme] Turn Left

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