(urth) Catherine/Carina

[David Stockhoff]

I noticed the following line in Talos' play:

FAMILIAR: The Contessa waits outside, and as she is of exalted blood, and a

favorite of our sovereign's, I beg you see her first.

Enter the CONTESSA.



This suggests Sev's mom was a favorite of the Old Autarch's. If so, this 
confirms for me that Sev only learned/suspected his maternity upon his 
ascension.

(1) He only suppresses his knowledge as he writes the Inn of Lost Loves 
scenes because he didn't know it at the time they occurred. He can't be 
accused of hiding it, just of not connecting the dots for his reader. 
He's being delicate in the narrative because of Dorcas as well and has 
no wish to be cruel to his father. So he leaves the obvious unsaid, even 
for the reader.

(2) AFAICT, when Sev interrogates Ouen he is only interested in figuring 
out Dorcas. He already suspects that she is much older than she looks, 
and that Ouen is her son. He has no idea Ouen is his father. He only 
inquires about Catherine after he is told he resembles Ouen; he puts 2+2 
together because the Old Autarch knows Catherine but not Ouen. Nor, 
presumably, did the Autarch know about Sev or of twins, or else Sev 
would know about any Severa. This confirms that the Autarch had no hand 
in any breeding project, but Inire may have.

(3) Sev's motive for not making his parentage clear at the beginning of 
his story remains one of needing to set up the orphan tale, and it 
persists at the end. It's a genre thing: you can't have "Chapter 82: In 
Which Our Hero Finds His Parents" without changing the tale from "orphan 
makes it alone in the world" to "orphan finds success and parents." In 
fairy tales, plenty of orphans discover their parents, which discovery 
tends to dominate the resolution. BotNS satisfies this technically but 
not emotionally by passing it by.

Nor does Sev go in search of Catherine, because he is sure, as Old 
Autarch and young torturer, that she is dead. Andre-Driussi has some 
great ideas about the Atrium of Time, but Catherine's hiding there 
doesn't work, because Severian would know she still lives. Further, 
while Valeria as ancient, frozen child has no real flaws I can see, I 
don't see the point in a noble family serving the Autarchy for a chiliad 
by ... not even knowing time has passed. Loyalty must mean more than that.