From: "James Wynn" 
Subject: RE: (urth) Emigrating chems
Date: Tue, 8 Oct 2002 09:28:43 -0500

Roy asked:
I meant to say something about that parenthetical bit above the last time
you brought it up. Where is the evidence that Chenille is "genetically
engineered"? The list of characters in EXODUS says of her: "Tussah's
natural daughter."

Crush responds:
Yes, so it does. Now the question is, who wrote the list of characters and
places? Was it Wolfe? He's never added any such list to his books in the
past. The answer is, "the list of characters and places was written by the
author of the Book of the Long Sun": Horn and Nettle.

So the list of characters and places should not be viewed as decisive. What
of textual evidence? I can't at this point name the page, but at one point
Silk's remembers seeing a picture (or image?) of Calde Tussah and he's
wearing makeup. We know men don't wear makeup in Viron because Quetzal had
to justify his use of it due to a "skin condition". What reason would Tussah
have for wearing makeup if he were not an inhume? If he's an inhume, then he
can't have a natural human daughter.

Also, Chenille exhibits stunning visual acuity and manual dexterity when
(while talking to Remora in LS2) she was able pull a knife from the wall,
throw it from across the room and stick it exactly in the slot she from
which she pulled it. I realize that she was possessed by Kypris at the time.
But there is no reason to believe possession grants the possessee with any
powers he would not have while unpossessed - any more than Mario Andretti
could win the Indy 500 in an '85 Toyota Sentra. Anyway, proficiency with
knives is a province of Kypris. That trick required physical powers normal
humans could not perform after any amount of practice.

Remora himself knew this to be true. He told Gulo that she was the
biologically engineered heir of Tussah ("son not my son" this is another
hint of why Chenille's name is sexually ambivalent although I have not
unraveled the puzzle yet). Remora was a "whorlly-wise" political operative;
knowledgeable about, and usually involved with all occult (in the old sense)
activity in Viron. His deductions should not be casually dispensed with.

Anyway, as a reader, I can step outside the narrative and realize that
Remora (the eel, the underwater serpent) is thematically the underworld
Ophidian Python of Apollo - the creature Apollo conquered to gain authority
over prophecy. It is Remora who predicts to Silk in LS2 that the mantaeon
*would* be saved - as I recall, that the sale "would not come to pass" or if
it did, "the old structures would be replaced with new ones." Both these
predictions were proven true, since Blood and Musk were killed and the
people of the mantaeon were moved to Blue. Remora is also the one who
declared to the Chapter that Silk was the new Calde.

To sum up: (1) Tussah is an inhume, (2) Chenille has physical abilities
beyond those of a normal human, (3) Remora, after a SINGLE conversation with
Chenille, was convinced that she was genetically engineered AND was the
Tussah's heir.

-- Crush




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