Old Kingdom: Difference between revisions

The first book tells the story of Sabriel, daughter of the Abhorsen, who discovers that since something bad has happened to her father, she must protect the world from the hordes of undead that threaten it. The second and third are set some years later and follow several other protagonists as they attempt to prevent [[Sealed Evil in A Can|a great evil from escaping its prison]].

 

* [[Afterlife Antechamber]]: Death is like a river running through a series of caves, the last of which opens out under what looks like, but isn't, a sky full of stars. That's as far as any character goes; anybody who goes on from there never comes back. Undead raised by necromancers are always souls from within the caves, either because they died recently and hadn't finished the journey or because they deliberately lingered in one of the caves in hope of finding a way back to the land of the living.

* [[Agent Scully]]: Nicholas Sayre thinks his best friend's obvious magic is [[You're Just Jealous|just showing off]], and other obvious signs of magic are [[Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions|superstition]].

*** They may not have been invited in the first place, they may have snuck in. Plus, not all of them can be dealt with by Clayr; the Stilken, for example, can only be killed with Free Magic, something no self-respecting Clayr is going to use even for a good cause, but it can be sealed using Charter Magic. The others might have been kept around as research subjects, then forgotten about. They should really either stop doing that, start putting them in slightly less stupid places, or start taking inventory every couple of decades to make sure nothing unpleasant gets out, but where would the fun be in that?

*** Or, as the Clayr can see the future and tend to plan ridiculously far ahead [[Fridge Brilliance|maybe they're kept there waiting for some important reason in the future,]]({{spoiler|like they did with the mirror for Lirael.}})

*** The delay for categorising a new aquisition to the library is 50 years ''minimum''.

** Librarians are given magical daggers on first recruitment, and are instructed to attach whistles to their lapels so they can call for help if they can't use their arms. Or if their arms are no longer attached.

* [[Badass Family]]: The Abhorsens, the royal family, and the Clayr.

* [[The Berserker]]: Touchstone, when he's pushed to the edge. This is a result of his father having been a warrior from the North.

** This ability passes down to his son, Sameth.

* [[Cryptic Background Reference]]: There are all these hints thrown in around the wider world around and in the Old Kingdom.

* [[Dark Is Evil]] ''and'' [[Dark Is Not Evil]]: The same magic is wielded by both the antagonists and the protagonists - the heroes just balance it with relatively good magic.

* [[Dead Ex Machina]]: {{spoiler|The entire line of Abhorsens, including her father}} for Sabriel, and {{spoiler|the Disreputable Dog}} for Nick. Both examples {{spoiler|send the recipient back to the world of Life.}}

* [[Deader Than Dead]]: Spirits can be pulled back from the River of Death, but if they're far enough along, the current becomes too strong and recovery becomes impossible.

* [[The Determinator]]: Frequently, it is Sabriel and Lirael's willpower that allows them to persevere against the forces of the Dead.

* [[Divided for Publication]]: Basically ''Lirael'' and ''Abhosen'' are one story, having been written as one story, but after getting past the half way point Garth Nix realised it was getting way, way too long for a single young-adult-aimed fantasy novel and split it in half.

* [[Don't Fear the Reaper]]: [[Famous Last Words|"Everyone and everything has a time to die."]]

* [[Doorstopper]]: ''Lirael'' is around 700 pages long. Since it was [[Divided for Publication]], along with ''Abhorsen'', the full story is over 1000 pages.

* [[Mr. Fanservice]]: Touchstone, and his kilt. Squee.

* [[Eternal Recurrence]]: Lirael discovers in ''Abhorsen'' that the world has been destroyed and remade seven times in the past.<ref> Well, that or the Destroyer annihilated seven or so other planets before he got to theirs. It's not totally clear.</ref>

* [[Evil Is Hammy]]: Kerrigor.

* [[Evil Is Not a Toy]]: Chlorr. "Oh, I hear there's an ancient and mysterious force of evil near the Red Lake! I shall go grab it, since there's obviously no way it could outclass me!"

* [[Evil Gloating]]: Played with (its a case of [[Evil Versus Evil]]) - after Yrael makes his [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming]] choice, he proceeds to {{spoiler|tell the big bad, an omnicidal maniac who hates life, why. He does so in an incredibly poetic and smug way.}}

* [[Fallen Hero]]: At the end of ''Abhorsen'', Mogget hints that {{spoiler|Chlorr of the Mask}} was once an Abhorsen. Garth Nix later [[Word of God|partly confirmed this]] on his blog. {{spoiler|Chlorr's}} original name was Clariel, a.k.a. the lost Abhorsen, and she dates to a few hundred years before the events of Sabriel.

* [[Fantasy Counterpart Culture]]: Ancelstierre is basically 1920s Britain.

* [[Fingore]]: At the end of ''Abhorsen'', {{spoiler|when Lirael uses the reforged Nehima to break Orannis, the fingers of her right hand literally fuse into the molten hilt.}}

* [[The Force]]: The Charter, which organizes the world and energizes it against the corrupting influence of Free Magic.

** Though to be fair to Free Magic, it wasn't corrupting before The Charter was created. It's just that when they made the charter they left out everything they didn't like. It was actually more like the force before, and then got made into [[Functional Magic]].

** {{spoiler|Her first question after being summoned? "When are we going for a walk?" This continues to be her number one favorite activity thereafter.}}

** {{spoiler|Where Mogget's collar is an incredibly powerful binding spell, the Dog's is more like a Charter Stone. She helped ''make'' the Charter, so her collar is a physical manifestation of her connection to it.}}

* [[Gender Equals Breed]]: The usual "Dogs are Boys, Cats are Girls" is inverted. The Disreputable Dog is actually a "Disreputable Bitch, if you want to get technical". If she's a bitch, Mogget is a certainly a [[Magnificent Bastard|bastard]].

* [[Geometric Magic]]: The Charter Marks are unique and named runes, each of which has its own power, which can be written with hand or sword, or even whistled or barked (if one is so inclined.)

* [[Go Mad From the Revelation]]: The Book of the Dead has a mechanism built in to prevent readers from remembering some of the less pleasant parts unless they need them, since otherwise they risk this.

* [[Great Big Book of Everything]]: The Book of the Dead.

* [[Heroic Bastard]]: Touchstone.

* [[Heroic Lineage]]: All the Charter Bloodlines, especially the Abhorsens.

* [[Hidden Agenda Villain]]: Aside from his stated desire to torture all the remaining carriers of the Abhorsen bloodline to death in vengeance for his millennia of servitude, when Mogget acts independently, his motives are never quite clear.

* [[Hufflepuff House]]: The (live) Southerlings in ''Abhorsen,'' who border on being a [[Mauve Shirt|Mauve Shirt Army.]]

* [[Human Popsicle]]: Touchstone has been sealed for 200 years as a wooden figurehead to a ship

* [[Improbable Weapon User]]: Bells? A mirror? And [[Doomy Dooms of Doom|panpipes at the gates of doom]]?

* [[Improvised Weapon]]: In ''Lirael,'' Sam and his classmates fend off zombies with cricket equipment. (Note: [[Older Than They Think|the book pre-dates]] ''[[Shaun of the Dead]]'' by three years.)

* [[The Kingdom]]: [[Exactly What It Says On the Tin|The Old Kingdom]], capitol city: Belisaire.

* [[Lady of War]]: Sabriel in the later books.

* [[Last Girl Wins|Last Boy Wins]]: For Lirael. She first encountered a visitor in the Clayr's Glacier, but was too depressed (and fourteen years old) to notice he was trying to ask her out. Then she met Sam, while he was busy running away and she was undertaking a voyage to find out what Hedge was up to {{spoiler|and Sam turned out to be her ''[[Squick|nephew]]'', so yeah}}. Last guy she meets? Nick Sayre. The series ends with the two obviously attracted to each other, but not actually dating yet.

* [[Lineage Comes From the Father]]:

* [[Ominous Fog]]: Since light is damaging to the Dead, fog is sometimes used instead of darkness as a cover for a large group of Dead. When Kerrigor crosses the Wall with an army of Dead, he brings fog with him.

* [[Omnicidal Maniac]]: {{spoiler|Orannis}}, and by extension, Hedge.

** The Clayr take lovers from among the wider population of the Old Kingdom, but they don't wed or stay together; the men go back to their lives. It's possible that boys born to the Clayr are much less likely to have the Sight than girls, and un-Sighted boys are sent to live with their fathers. Though this seems like something Lirael would have noticed.

** Or they use their powers to pick a time when they will fall pregnant with a child which will be gifted, in the same way that Lirael's mother did.

* [[The Power of Blood]]: Blood from a Charter mage - and especially one of the Charter Bloodlines - has great powers, especially for destruction.

* [[Prescience Is Predictable]]: The Clayr. At least, they like it when it is.

* [[Refusal of the Call]]: Sameth as the Abhorsen-in-Waiting. {{spoiler|The Call wasn't actually for him, though. He just happened to be standing closest to the phone. And when he does get his proper call, as a Wallmaker, he gladly accepts it.}}

* [[Restraining Bolt]]: Mogget's collar. Don't take it off if you value your life.

* [[Retcon]]: The waterfall which separates the first and second precincts of Death is described as "getting louder" when an entity passes through it from the second to the first precinct in ''Sabriel'', but in ''Lirael'' when an entity passing through causes the waterfall to go silent.

** The plot of the later books might qualify, as there's no reference to the {{spoiler|Bright Shiners}} or {{spoiler|Mogget's dual identity as Yrael}} in the first book.

* [[Ritual Magic]]: Charter magic.

* [[Role Called]]: The titles of the three books taken together make an example of this: ''Sabriel, Lirael, Abhorsen.''

*** And then there's the regulation magical voice-activated clockwork mouse that runs back to the Reading Room and sounds the alarm in case you get into trouble and no-one is in earshot of the enchanted whistle...

* [[Sealed Evil in A Teddy Bear|Sealed Chaos In A Teddy Bear]]: {{spoiler|Mogget}}.

* [[Semi Divine]]: Four of the Nine poured most of their power into mortal bloodlines; the Clayr, the Abhorsen, the royal family and the Wallmakers. Consequently, although not directly related to a deity, they all do have powers inherited from a god (or close enough).

* [[Servile Snarker]]: Mogget, since he's basically an enslaved {{spoiler|[[Eldritch Abomination]] of godlike power}} and does not appreciate the magic compelling him to always help the Abhorsens. Being [[Deadpan Snarker|completely]] [[Cats Are Mean|insufferable]] is his only way around it.

* [[Wham Episode]]: The prologue to Abhorsen is an account of {{spoiler|the brutal assassination of Sabriel and Touchstone on foreign ground, using modern weaponry. They received very little screen time in ''Lirael'' and are only revealed to have survived a third of the way through ''Abhorsen'' (and the attack still killed all but one of the royal escort),}} making it especially shocking, particularly if reading the trilogy start to finish. {{spoiler|Their deaths are even more convincing due to a subtle perspective shift in the narration which falls just short of lying to the reader's face.}}

** That prologue was included as a teaser at the end of some editions of ''Lirael'', which may increase the shock value even further.

** "I have not been an ideal parent, I know. None of us ever is."

* [[Wild Magic]]: Free magic.