Chapter 12 Page 3
December 7th, 2015Defiant Elk reveals his mind to Blaise on Chapter 12 Page 3. The cave is Elk’s sanctum, and I’m using it as a metaphor. So Blaise gets to hear Elk’s innermost thoughts, and Elk has a LOT on his mind. Change always brings great upheaval, and the frontier is a harsh place with the future of nations at stake. To see one of the things that weights heavily on Elk’s mind, please vote for Snow by Night on Top Web Comics.
Elk, as I noted before, is in a difficult position: the outsiders do not win just by warfare but by economic dependency. He has two choices: first, to eradicate all incoming colonists somehow so his people can no longer be dependent on them…
Or sacrifice what his people are to become more like the colonists, a slippery slope where his people can lose their identity. That is something that is important to them because in the colonists’ worldview (as it was historically) they are vile barberians. He knows that at first it will be practical things like blacksmithing, but then it will be medicine or something else, then people will adopt useful habits from the colonists (hygine practices to prevent diseases), then they adopt fashionable habits and so on . This is not even considering what happens when the colonist would tryto “civilize” them.
I don’t blame Elk. The thing is not all members of a group are the same and some are individually nobler than their group as a whole, even if they don’t always seem it.
Is it my imagination…or did Elk just get…hotter?
He did.
Hate to say it, but M. Danserau isn’t the best person to tell secrets too. First he can’t keep his mouth shut. Second he will use the information to his advantage if the opportunity arises.
This is the first thing that Elk has said or done that makes me actually like him. I hope that he and Blaise become friends to, because at the core, they have something in common…
They both care about something besides themselves.
Interesting turn of the story. :)
(I noticed the “Prev Page” link goes to page 1, not page 2)
Fixed! Thank you!
Elk, don’t your hands freeze?
(Sorry, my hands get cold easily, and I always shiver when characters walk around in snow bare-handed. :-) )
Protagonist immunity!
“Cold hands snow”… matter of living at room temp summer and winter for most of time, body is not used to it. Elk lives outdoors, so in winter his hands are always surrounded by near freezing temp, becomes no big deal if it is a little below freezing and no wind chill. (Otherwise cold windy days would be unsurvivable even with gloves)
I love how quickly he opened up. I really REALLY hope Blaise and Elk will become friends. And not just because Elk’s scared of Snow burying his village.
I’m basing this a bit on myself. After expressing an extreme emotion, I often enter into a period of reflectiveness.
I hear you. I’ve done the same, and it’s actually pretty helpful. I just usually do my reflecting alone unless I owe someone an apology. :)
Also, I haven’t mentioned this before, but I really, really like Elk’s coat. A super lot.
Posting a lot, but I also just realized that even his cousin (Toothy Kit) didn’t know he could speak the same language Blaise does! Wow! But she speaks it, too. Wonder why he’d keep it from her… Unless she was helping him hide it by always translating everything Blaise said to Elk even though he could understand him without her help…
Elk kept Toothy Kit in the dark, because she can’t keep a secret.
True that, the coat is absolutely snazzy!