I Read Books: Merynthia's Master
Merynthia’s Master
Merynthia, city of crab and cod, crown jewel of the Western Trynacrian Empire, gateway to the Dreaming East, groans under the tyranny of the occupiers. The sons of Sicania cry out for freedom. The sorcerer Barixes Crab-eye seeks an amulet, the Eye of Al-Kahpish, that he can use to make himself master of the city. Unfortunately his tool for acquiring it is his apprentice Worm, who manages to lose it to a handsome guardsman, Marcus Posna of the 113th Legion, originally of another occupied province, one who good-heartedly wants to make a friend.
The Eye ends up with the rich and powerful merchant Lord al-Thari, an Amunajan who, following the traditions of his people, keeps a seraglio. Barixes decides to send an agent into the household, uses his magic to make Worm into a woman. Worm, now Wren, finds this suits her well, eyes, skin, and hair clearing up, the company of the other women in the seraglio a balm after the hard life in the city*.
Strange events plague the seraglio, and though the women welcome Wren (some very much) she does not get summoned to Lord al-Thari, so she does not have access to where he keeps his treasures and performs his magic. She’s a loyal son… she’s a loyal daughter of Sicania though, so will find the amulet. Yet will Barixes be a better master of Merynthia than the occupiers?
This is energetic sword and sorcery – fun in the classic style. Which means that our rogue Worm is beaten, fails, chastised, has very low self-esteem. And even when she becomes Wren she has to keep secrets, which may betray her sisters in the seraglio. It’s a failing of mine but I kept turning the seraglio over in my head. What is it doing? Not in the story, it’s obvious, even load-bearing, a place for Wren to explore her new womanhood, and also for the erotic elements of the novella to take place. Al-Thani keeps a seraglio because that’s what Amunajans do, they maintain a household of women. And he keeps them in idle luxury, as a status symbol. Yet they are remarkably free (they go out on a picnic at Wren’s suggestion) and this is not an Amunanjan city, so he has nothing to prove. It's been taken over from the inside, that's clear, yet should it not have some plausible, legible function or pretext to the outside world?
Why pick at this and not at, for example, the feasibility of the crab/crayfish kaiju that threatens the city in the climax of the story**? Fair points. Firstly I’m a logistics guy, and I reach for examples like the Byzantine Emperor’s women’s quarters. Which at times had the monopoly on weaving silk; in other words the women were not idle in their luxury, they spent their time on making goods. Luxury, royal status goods, but still. And secondly, yes that thing is appalling, the exo-skeleton of a crayfish protects the top, but being so large any threat will come from underneath. Why meld it uneasily with a crab, that's weird, it would pull it forward, make it unstable. And with the size the joints would have huge vulnerabilities. I do not think it as unstoppable as it seems***.
But this is me, I’m always nitpicking, the economics of women’s quarters; tactical alternatives against the giant sea creature attacking the city; the whole amulet business. Maybe I wanted this to be longer, novel length rather than novella. One thing that is well established is the actual coup; Barixes runs the docks, has links to the underworld, has contacts amongst the guards. He’s not just a megalomaniacal wizard with a monstrous old one at his command, he’s got a plausible rebellion organised. Meanwhile Wren, bumbling failure unable to stand up against him, blossoms into someone with her own hopes and dreams. The street rat grows up into a clever rogue. New twists on some classic sword and sorcery.
Read This: Fantasy adventure with plenty of excitement – as
well as considerations of gender, nationalism, and lust for power
Don’t Read This: Force-fem erotic adventure jammed into a
rogue’s flawed quest for freedom and a magical duel
Ebooks Online: Run, don't walk to the itch.io store; physical copies can be got POD from the Amazon.
* It’s possible some of you will not recognise this theme.
** SPOILERS, sorry about that
*** It's sustained by magic, sucking life-force from everything around it
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