Wisdom's Kiss (89 page)

If a character has to bite it, the obvious question is "of what?" It's best to make their death not only fit within the logic of overall story (Providence can't die in a nuclear submarine accident) but also strengthen the overall story. Passing peacefully in one's sleep is far less useful than a murder that starts a war—that is, should the author need a war started. I needed to make the point that magic was in use within Montagne but suppressed and discounted within the broader Empire of Lax. Thus Providence falls off a flying broom: it shows that Dizzy and Ben have magical powers but Providence and Temperance do not (a fact Temperance heartily resents); that magic is highly risky, not only because of prosecution but also personal safety; and that Providence's death has kept Dizzy and Ben from further magic. Whew.

This "solution," though, raised another problem: how would I tell it? How does one describe a secret, particularly if the secret's two bearers already know it by heart and thus have no reason to write it down for readers to read? Good question. I even went so far as to write up the details of Providence's death in a footnote, later wisely scrapped. Finally, I figured out a cryptic explanation within Dizzy's
diary
, but if you missed the nuance, I won't hold it against you. (It is described in detail in the
full first act
of
Queen of All the Heavens,
however.)

If Providence's death suits her character and the story, then
Cuthbert's
suits it times ten. For a mushroom nerd to die of mushroom poisoning is pretty much as good as it gets.

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Author's commentary on Pierre Stein, Trudy's father
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"Pierre" is French both for "Peter" and for "stone;" "stein" is German for "stone." And Trudy's father was a stone carver. (Snort.)

Moving quite flagrantly out of my weight class, I can't help but mention the biblical text where Jesus turns to his disciple Peter and announces, "I tell you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church" (Mat. 16:18). In Greek, the name "Peter" also means "stone," so this was a bit of wordplay: "You are Rocky, and upon this rock I will build my church." (The Bible is full of such puns, most of them sadly lost in translation.) This quotation can be read multiple ways: Peter was rock-solid loyal and Jesus viewed him as the foundation of the church, which in fact he came to be—note that the seat of Catholicism is St. Peter's in Rome. Or Peter could have simply been a big guy, or thick-headed—other New Testament passages hint as much...

All of this I learned from fifteen minutes of Internet research as I attempted to determine if the French words for "Peter" and "stone" evolved from this original Bible passage. While I still don't have an answer to that question, I've learned a lot of religious history. For the record, my Pierre Stein name is completely nondenominational.

More Commentary on Characters
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Structure and Format
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Opening Scene
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Title and Cover
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Challenges of Magic
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Trudy's Sight
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The Globe d'Or
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Cuthbert of Montagne
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Styles of Address
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Feminine Nouns
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