From: David Wells <ADW@ovum.com>
Subject: (whorl) Inhumi secret again
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 2000 17:08:09 +0100

I think the idea of a voluntary sacrifice of some kind has all the right
qualities to be "the secret".
 
But the details seem elusive - especially as wielding the secret is supposed
to return the inhumi to the status of dumb predators.
 
Suppose, however, that the inhumi were to feed from zoanthrops?
Like those involved in the melee with the alzabo, Severian and the Little
Severian's doomed family in Ch. XVIII of The Sword of the Lictor?
Would not the result be exactly what Horn states to be that of wielding the
secret - to make them "stop thinking forever"?
 
...which leaves the question of who is going to "volunteer" to be
lobotomised and fed to the inhumi...
 
It's logical, I think, although I can't pretend to believe that it's a very
_satisfying_ theory. What do you think?
 
old newt
P.S. I also think that the question of what happened to the "wonderful"
inhumi who had fed from the Neighbours, and the offspring who presumably
inherited some of that wonderousness, is an interesting one.
P.P.S. The alzabo, needless to say, as a supernaturally and adaptively
imitative predator, is extremely analogous to the inhumi. But the alzabo
never got to snack on a zoanthrop, because of the near-100% body count which
resulted from their encounter. Hmmm...
 

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