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[lemon10]

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So, I think that he was actually going to be able to resurrect his wife at the cost of annie's life (and that while the things misled him , I don't think they ever actually lied to him). That said, I can't help but wonder if it would have worked if he had tried to use someone else due to the fact that Surma was part fire elemental.
A regular person would have only been able to give their lifeforce, which might not have been enough at all.

I'll quit hating him the minute he explains what justifies everything he's done since showing up, and it's better than "For her own good, to protect her from the vaguely-defined dangers of her heritage".

I was 100% sure he knew about her heritage (and how it killed Surma) even last week, but now I'm not so sure. If he had then he probably would have A) Taken some actions regarding it (and he actually hasn't) and B) Wouldn't have tried to revive Surma (as he would have known that he probably would have needed a fire elemental soul before it could work).

[Zangi]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

So, I think that he was actually going to be able to resurrect his wife at the cost of annie's life (and that while the things misled him , I don't think they ever actually lied to him). That said, I can't help but wonder if it would have worked if he had tried to use someone else due to the fact that Surma was part fire elemental.
A regular person would have only been able to give their lifeforce, which might not have been enough at all.

I'll quit hating him the minute he explains what justifies everything he's done since showing up, and it's better than "For her own good, to protect her from the vaguely-defined dangers of her heritage".

I was 100% sure he knew about her heritage (and how it killed Surma) even last week, but now I'm not so sure. If he had then he probably would have A) Taken some actions regarding it (and he actually hasn't) and B) Wouldn't have tried to revive Surma (as he would have known that he probably would have needed a fire elemental soul before it could work).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'm pretty sure Tom was pass the point of rational when he decided to take off his forearm to resurrect Surma.  He was blinded by his want for Surma's return, forgetting that as Fire Elemental things, there can only be 1. 

On that note, it answers another question... Will resurrecting a direct ancestor of a Fire Elemental... kill the currently alive Fire Elemental?  Yes.
Though... it isn't immediate death... so you could technically keep the ancestor around for a short time at the expense of the current and continue bringing the ancestor back every now and then.  Long term side effects unknown.

[RedKing]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

So, I think that he was actually going to be able to resurrect his wife at the cost of annie's life (and that while the things misled him , I don't think they ever actually lied to him). That said, I can't help but wonder if it would have worked if he had tried to use someone else due to the fact that Surma was part fire elemental.
A regular person would have only been able to give their lifeforce, which might not have been enough at all.

I'll quit hating him the minute he explains what justifies everything he's done since showing up, and it's better than "For her own good, to protect her from the vaguely-defined dangers of her heritage".

I was 100% sure he knew about her heritage (and how it killed Surma) even last week, but now I'm not so sure. If he had then he probably would have A) Taken some actions regarding it (and he actually hasn't) and B) Wouldn't have tried to revive Surma (as he would have known that he probably would have needed a fire elemental soul before it could work).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'm pretty sure Tom was pass the point of rational when he decided to take off his forearm to resurrect Surma.  He was blinded by his want for Surma's return, forgetting that as Fire Elemental things, there can only be 1. 

On that note, it answers another question... Will resurrecting a direct ancestor of a Fire Elemental... kill the currently alive Fire Elemental?  Yes.
Though... it isn't immediate death... so you could technically keep the ancestor around for a short time at the expense of the current and continue bringing the ancestor back every now and then.  Long term side effects unknown.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Only on Bay12 would someone start trying to experimentally test something like this. Then weaponize it.

[miauw62]

As I said, nothing good ever comes from the sentence "They said they could bring [deceased wife] back..."

[lemon10]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

So, I think that he was actually going to be able to resurrect his wife at the cost of annie's life (and that while the things misled him , I don't think they ever actually lied to him). That said, I can't help but wonder if it would have worked if he had tried to use someone else due to the fact that Surma was part fire elemental.
A regular person would have only been able to give their lifeforce, which might not have been enough at all.

I'll quit hating him the minute he explains what justifies everything he's done since showing up, and it's better than "For her own good, to protect her from the vaguely-defined dangers of her heritage".

I was 100% sure he knew about her heritage (and how it killed Surma) even last week, but now I'm not so sure. If he had then he probably would have A) Taken some actions regarding it (and he actually hasn't) and B) Wouldn't have tried to revive Surma (as he would have known that he probably would have needed a fire elemental soul before it could work).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'm pretty sure Tom was pass the point of rational when he decided to take off his forearm to resurrect Surma.  He was blinded by his want for Surma's return, forgetting that as Fire Elemental things, there can only be 1. 

On that note, it answers another question... Will resurrecting a direct ancestor of a Fire Elemental... kill the currently alive Fire Elemental?  Yes.
Though... it isn't immediate death... so you could technically keep the ancestor around for a short time at the expense of the current and continue bringing the ancestor back every now and then.  Long term side effects unknown.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It doesn't answer the question at all. He called annie, and thus the spell fed upon her life, included in which was the Fire Elemental.

If he had called someone else, presumably it would have tried to kill them instead. And while it might not have worked (simply killing them without properly resurrecting surma), it might have also worked just fine (killing them, and giving surma a human "soul" instead of a fire elemental one). Of course, either way you would be required to kill someone.

Also, I'm not quite sure he knows about Annie having the fire elemental inside her, and what exactly its effects are. It seemed pretty clear even last chapter that he did (eg. seperating Annie from her fire elemental self, trying to drain her fire elemental self and losing his hand in the process), but since its not clear that he didn't do the first at all, didn't do the second on purpose, and hasn't mentioned it at all, I'm not quite sure he understands why Surma died at all. And plus, if he knew he simply wouldn't have let surma have a child since he loved her so much.

[Bauglir]

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Eh? Why do you think the spell fed upon the life of whoever got called? It seems clear to me that a generic Fire Elemental soul won't do, it's because it's the particular one inherited from Surma that it got pulled back when rebuilding Surma.

[Culise]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

So, I think that he was actually going to be able to resurrect his wife at the cost of annie's life (and that while the things misled him , I don't think they ever actually lied to him). That said, I can't help but wonder if it would have worked if he had tried to use someone else due to the fact that Surma was part fire elemental.
A regular person would have only been able to give their lifeforce, which might not have been enough at all.

I'll quit hating him the minute he explains what justifies everything he's done since showing up, and it's better than "For her own good, to protect her from the vaguely-defined dangers of her heritage".

I was 100% sure he knew about her heritage (and how it killed Surma) even last week, but now I'm not so sure. If he had then he probably would have A) Taken some actions regarding it (and he actually hasn't) and B) Wouldn't have tried to revive Surma (as he would have known that he probably would have needed a fire elemental soul before it could work).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'm pretty sure Tom was pass the point of rational when he decided to take off his forearm to resurrect Surma.  He was blinded by his want for Surma's return, forgetting that as Fire Elemental things, there can only be 1. 

On that note, it answers another question... Will resurrecting a direct ancestor of a Fire Elemental... kill the currently alive Fire Elemental?  Yes.
Though... it isn't immediate death... so you could technically keep the ancestor around for a short time at the expense of the current and continue bringing the ancestor back every now and then.  Long term side effects unknown.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It doesn't answer the question at all. He called annie, and thus the spell fed upon her life, included in which was the Fire Elemental.

If he had called someone else, presumably it would have tried to kill them instead. And while it might not have worked (simply killing them without properly resurrecting surma), it might have also worked just fine (killing them, and giving surma a human "soul" instead of a fire elemental one). Of course, either way you would be required to kill someone.

Also, I'm not quite sure he knows about Annie having the fire elemental inside her, and what exactly its effects are. It seemed pretty clear even last chapter that he did (eg. seperating Annie from her fire elemental self, trying to drain her fire elemental self and losing his hand in the process), but since its not clear that he didn't do the first at all, didn't do the second on purpose, and hasn't mentioned it at all, I'm not quite sure he understands why Surma died at all. And plus, if he knew he simply wouldn't have let surma have a child since he loved her so much.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

As far as he knew, he called Surma; unless he's explicitly lying to one of his closest friends, he didn't even know it was Annie until Zimmie socked him one.  It does indeed shift the question, however.  If his "mysterious benefactors" knew he was calling Annie specifically and rigged the spell to target her via the fire elemental, ignoring Surma entirely in this, then it doesn't answer the question; it attacked Annie because the spell itself was intended to summon Annie, as you say, regardless of Anthony's beliefs on its intended effect.  If they only established it to pull in the fire elemental spirit of Surma (whether or not they knew that it was a part of Annie as well - it could have been targeted against Annie and still operated on that part of Surma, if they knew fire elementals worked in that manner), then it actually does seem to imply what Zangi stated.  It also makes the sizeable assumption that the spell works explicitly by draining the life of its target; for all we know, if it only worked to summon the fire elemental spirit, Annie's collapse was an unanticipated side-effect of trying to summon what was basically only half of a person (that is, only the latter part of Annie's mixed human and fire elemental heritage), like pushing a person halfway through a teleportation gate and turning it off. 

That said, I'm not sure I buy the idea that these people intentionally lied to Anthony in order to orchestrate an attack on Annie, and also that they designed the spell to feed off the life force of the target instead of just bringing it to the caster.  For one thing, we don't even know who "these people" are, or what they would have against Annie either as a Forest medium, a psychopomp, or a person.  Though we don't know much in general about them yet, it seems more like a "be careful what you wish for" where they gave Anthony exactly what he wanted (the revival of Surma), regardless of his actual desires or any other side-effects (the death of Annie).  Annie was entirely incidental in that.  I'm open to new information being revealed that may make these more malevolent than uncaring, but I don't think what we have yet supports that.

As for what Anthony knows, he probably knows the fire elemental spirit exists, but like most of the Court, he views much of the rumour and hearsay around ether as pseudo-scientific hokum that won't stand up to proper scientific inquiry, and especially not as something to just be blindly accepted in a rather fatalistic mindset.  I could easily see him not believing that Annie's birth means Surma's death, or rather, I can see him believing in his ability to prevent it through his knowledge and understanding of both the etheric sciences and medicine.  It's not that he believed too little; rather, he believed too much.  In other words, the woman he loves wants a child, he agrees, thinking he can stop any of the negative effects.  This, if true, also has certain knock-on effects on his characterization: he was distant and sent Annie to Court alone not only because he lost the woman he loved, but because he personally and specifically had failed to save her, and his personal quest to understand what had happened was a desperate attempt to cope with that knowledge and atone for his perceived failures, as well as if possible, to undo them.

[lemon10]

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http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=1552, I could be taking that page the wrong way, but it seems to me that it implies 1) that they told him he needed to contact somebody, 2) that he then contacted Annie because she was the first person he thought of, and 3) That after contacting that person the spell it tried to steal their lifeforce/soul to resurrect the other person. The reason that it was taking Annie's fire elemental part is because that is her "soul" that was needed to power the spell is her lifeforce (unlike regular people where the "soul" and lifeforce appear to be different).
Now, the spell might not have worked simply if it tried to steal the lifeforce of a regular person, but it similarly might have stolen their human soul, which would have been able to work just fine for surma despite it not being a fire elemental soul.

I don't think that these entities particularly cared who any of these people are either, and I don't think they did this for particular purpose (except amusement, or because they could).

As for Anthony knowing, after thinking about it I'm not quite sure *how* he would know. I don't think any of the people in the court would know about it (due to it being magic), and while a few people in the forest
Actually, Renard makes it pretty clear that everyone (especially Anthony) knew exactly what would happen if Surma had a kid. I guess I was wrong there.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Eh? Why do you think the spell fed upon the life of whoever got called? It seems clear to me that a generic Fire Elemental soul won't do, it's because it's the particular one inherited from Surma that it got pulled back when rebuilding Surma.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I think any fire elemental soul would work just fine, as a soul is a soul pretty much. She might act differently, but I think it would work out.

[Culise]

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http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=1552, I could be taking that page the wrong way, but it seems to me that it implies 1) that they told him he needed to contact somebody, 2) that he then contacted Annie because she was the first person he thought of, and 3) That after contacting that person the spell it tried to steal their lifeforce/soul to resurrect the other person. The reason that it was taking Annie's fire elemental part is because that is her "soul" that was needed to power the spell is her lifeforce (unlike regular people where the "soul" and lifeforce appear to be different).
Now, the spell might not have worked simply if it tried to steal the lifeforce of a regular person, but it similarly might have stolen their human soul, which would have been able to work just fine for surma despite it not being a fire elemental soul.

I don't think that these entities particularly cared who any of these people are either, and I don't think they did this for particular purpose (except amusement, or because they could).

As for Anthony knowing, after thinking about it I'm not quite sure *how* he would know. I don't think any of the people in the court would know about it (due to it being magic), and while a few people in the forest
Actually, Renard makes it pretty clear that everyone (especially Anthony) knew exactly what would happen if Surma had a kid. I guess I was wrong there.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Basically, how I read that page is that his goal was to contact Surma on the far side of the ether, and to do that, he needed surgical supplies to conduct what he later referred to as his final surgery.  To get these supplies, he contacted the first person at the Court that he could think of, Annie.  What he heard and spoke through was through the mysterious glowing ball of green in the caves; what she, and by extension Donald and the others heard and spoke through was through the nearest cell phone (actually, it being an aetheric communication explains quite a bit, including how he knew to reach Annie through Jones; he didn't, but the spell merely affixed to the nearest valid, compatible target).  Afterwards, he conducts the surgery, casts the spell to summon Surma, and accidentally sticks Annie instead.

Unless, again, Anthony is either lying now or was systematically lied to, which is not beyond the realm of possibility, I don't think there's any more similarity between the phone call and the aetheric antenna he constructed afterwards than there would be between a phone call and a fax; similar medium (the aether), different sort of signal interpretation, and the targets don't have to be the same.

[lemon10]

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I don't think he was lied to, in the sense that I don't believe that the beings ever spoke an untrue word. I do think he was deliberately misled however, in much the sense that coyote would mislead someone.

I think the spell was going to kill someone guaranteed to power it, because you can't get something (bringing someone back to the dead) for nothing, and while it might be possible to do it without ritual sacrifice (eg. Coyote could probably do it (although its very very unlikely you would be pleased with the outcome he gives you), you might be able to draw energy out of the surroundings, you might be able to use a powerful relic) this spell clearly had no other way to power it, and thus I think that they decided to power it with a (human) life.

Upon rereading:
Its not clear if the spell was intended to permanently bring Surma back, or just for a conversation. If for the later, then there wouldn't really be a need to power it with sacrifice, if the former, then I stick with my point that sacrifice was a fundamental part of the spell.
The antenna of bone connected Annie and Surma and actively (not passively) sucked the fire elemental out of Annie. There is no way that is a coincidence, and I can't see a generic revival spell automatically knowing that there is a fire elemental relative of the revival target somewhere in the world and being able to find her. Either 1) They used the "phone call" (or etheric connection, the medium used doesn't really matter as you point out) to find any target to power the spell, or 2) The beings already knew about Annie when the crafted the spell and made the spell with her in mind.

If 1) Then they didn't know about Annie, and were fine draining the life force of anyone for the spell. In this is true, then he only thinks he called for medical supplies, but I suspect that they used it to find a power source for the spell to steal from.
If 2) They knew about Annie, and made the spell in such a way that it would (presumably) kill her given time (assuming of course that the spell was intended to bring Surma back permanently).

[Culise]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I also contend that it wasn't a coincidence that the antenna reached the fire elemental.  I just don't believe it was done to power the spell (that is, to generate a motive force by which the spirit of Surma could be summoned), but rather that it was done as the target of the spell (that is, it itself was the spirit of Surma).  From what we've learned before, nothing was left of Surma as far as the psychopomps, our experts on crossing the veil from this side, are concerned, by extension implicitly excluding the bit that was already passed to Annie, the fire elemental spirit.  Thus when the spell reached out to Surma, what it reached was the fire elemental spirit, with the consequences we saw for its present vessel/form, Annie.  I also don't believe that sacrifice was necessarily a fundamental part of the spell, but rather that it was a consequence of how Surma's ancestry led to her death.  I also especially don't believe that any of the parties in question meant for such a thing to happen.

But, now we're just getting into speculation, for which we'll likely have to wait until we understand more about those who helped Anthony.  I think I understand a bit more about what you intended by what you say, though, and I can see where you're coming from.

[Bauglir]

For what it's worth, my understanding is equivalent to Culise's. I think we're all agreed that Anthony was probably never told an untruth, and I think it's possible (nay, probable) that the entities giving him the info either didn't know or didn't care about Annie. However, they are surely untrustworthy, as implied by the fact that they suggested he lash together a machine of bone and blood to bore a hole between this world and the next, and neglected to mention the mechanics (instead counting on his desperation).

I don't think there's any today-spoilers in there, so I'm not gonna bother with spoiler tags.

[Zangi]

Ah, I stand by my assessment, Fire Elemental shenanigans.   Surma didn't immediately die at child birth... and Tony knew why/how she was dying.  Conventional doohickeys clearly failed.

As for the creatures knowledge, at this point I think that Tony may have revealed that to them.  He seemed to be at wits end about then, considering he went as far as taking his arm to at the very least meet Surma once more.
It is kind of a double whammy, losing his arm and his daughter... to probably at best only see Surma again for a short time. ... Before the creatures move in and acquire a new Fire Elemental spirit/soul.  >.>

[timferius]

Annnnnnnd there we go. NOW I feel bad for hating him.

[miauw62]

;_;