#WordWeavers 2402.15 — What does your character think their greatest achievement is?
My former bodyguard for a mob boss? Not anything she wanted, and she feels somewhat responsible for it occurring in the first place, but she's the Hero of Harbor City. She got a building evacuated before an explosion and afterwards, triaged the survivors from a hail of rubble and flying glass. There's a photo of her covered in blood, front page, top of the fold, in The major newspaper. She's simply "the hero" because she left before anyone identified her.
The one who counts, who knew what happened, credits her with saving 217 lives.
Wintereyes doesn't really understand what achievements are. She's happy living amongst the beasts she's befriended. Pressed, she might mention that she's surviving being forced to attend school amongst humans and hasn't mortally offended anybody or created an embarrassing incident.
The one who counts would say talking to a dragon and convincing her not to burn down the capital qualifies, It makes Wintereyes very interesting indeed—and worth controlling.
#KnowYourAuthors 7. Do you most enjoy writing in past settings, modern day settings, or futuristic settings? When is your current WIP set?
I don't write historical or contemporary fiction. The research requirements for getting it right, to me like earning a Ph.d., aren't fun. At all. The contemporary restriction makes it hard to write urban fantasy, which I like, so what I do instead is I write fantasy set in a modern magical world that is definitely not ours. I do write epic fantasy and science fiction, too.
My WiP is set in a world where everything is derived from "spirit," and the current story in that world, /Inklings/, is set in a university town, taking place at a school, a character's home, another's dorm, and in the city at a photography studio. Modernity (magical versions of lights, auto-mobiles, refrigerators, and trains) is important, but so are the MC running with wolves and talking things out with a dragon.
#PennedPossibilities 221 — Which of the four seasons suits your MC best, and why?
The character most affected by seasons is Wintereyes from /Inklings./ Living amongst wolves, her life resembles that of traditional temperate hunter gatherers prior to domestic animals.
Spring is obviously best. Abundant vegetation, plenty of young prey animals, warming weather that puts a human physiologically more on par with a wolf.
Winter comes second, however. Human ingenuity, and knives, work well with wolf fangs, claws, and organization to make snow an advantage in a hunt. Food storage and a well tended fire pit ensures plenty to eat for the pack. That means she has plenty of time to spend in her lodgepole tent, reading the books her brother brings her.
Wintereyes from /Inklings/ hasn't yet had a need to apply the human concept of mercy. Wolves and other beasts she lives amongst have a less symbolic more socially strict idea of how the world works. You could assert she's fought for mercy for a pack mate, though you could argue she intervened in a fight for another. She's kind, she's helpful, she supportive, but has never had to kill except to eat, or to fight for other than survival—because for beasts, name a cause that isn't survival?
Using her gift so she could bargain with an uncooperative dragon was a matter of survival, right?
Not everyone likes what she can do with her gift (read: humans). Chances for giving mercy and learning what mercy is seem likely in her future.
Wintereyes from /Inklings/ is shy and her actions come off as sweet and vulnerable. Since she tries desperately to fit in with people, or be invisible, she generally is. She's often kind. Often sexy, since it is an erotic romance. However, we readers know that Her Highness is working to tame and control our MC, and that Her Highness is both powerful and scary. Let's not forget that Wintereyes lives with wolves, hunts with them, and they understand her.
I think the David Bowe hints what could go terribly wrong.
#KnowYourAuthors 1 Do you listen to music while you write? If yes, do you have a specific writing playlist? Did you make it yourself or was it curated for you?
Regularly? No. Occasionally, yes. When I need to block out the world; for example, if the spouse is driving the car on trips, I wear the noise-canceling headphones and open the computer.
I don't have a specific playlist for writing, just an "On the Go" playlist in which I've gathered all the songs that either improve the mood or make me think. They need to have color and depth, which means bass and complexity. Mostly they're trance and progressive, but I have songs that range from J-Pop to Prodigy. A driving rhythm is often good, but not required.
Sometimes I fixate on one or another song, putting it on repeat play for hours. We Appreciate Power, by Grimes is good for a cyberpunk vibe, Center of the Sun by Conjure One conjures a sense of broken people, and Intuition by Salem Ilese makes me think of a woman often harried by the world, but strong and perseverant enough to teach it a lesson in return. Since that describes an MC for which I've written a few novels, I listen to that one fairly often.
#KnowYourAuthors 2 Do you have a title in mind for your WIP (work in progress) as soon as you start? Do you feel like you need a title to get started?
It depends where I get the idea; I certainly don't need a title to get started as they only roughly imply the idea of a story, they don't describe it or set it in stone.
/Inklings/ started life as a (hashtag) writever prompt, Ink or Inking—I think the latter. When I realized the story was a whole heck of a lot more than a tootfic or a flash fiction, that it had become an erotic romance novella, I no longer had a title for it.
Instead, I had a set of characters and a situation to start, and a fun playful ending to write toward. Titles usually come later for me. I've been known to change them along the journey, even at the moment of publication.
In the case of /Inklings,/ I'm pretty sure I'd misspelled the prompt to inkling instead of inking. When I realized the characters were all about tattoos and standing out in a crowd and being /not normal,/ I understood they were indeed Ink-lings as in people with ink.
#WordWeavers 2402.6 — What smell would instantly bring up a good memory for your SC?
The ocean.
Caramello, as he's called by Wintereyes of /Inklings/, is the youngest child of the murdered Chieftain of Crab Island. Whilst his numerous siblings fight amongst themselves for succession, his mother sent him away to school on the mainland lest he be killed by the machinations, though he has no chance to succeed. As the story starts, he's been in exile for a year in a cold temperate land far different than the tropical archipelago he grew up sailing around. He used to captain a boat in the fishing fleet. Now he's a university student, rudderless.
Wintereyes has something that resembles a tattoo. That it is mistaken for "ink" accounts for the "Ink" in the story's title, /Inklings/.
Should you happen to see her inner thigh, assuming she hasn't covered it with makeup, you'd find what looks like three nearly photorealistic powder blue feathers tied with a green tendril from a pea plant. Were she allow to you to touch, you'd notice it feels downy. Writing the story the other day, a scene depicts her taking off her socks. What's revealed is discussed in a page from my notes below.
The "tattoos," and she has many, weren't drawn by an artist. Each were burnt into her skin when she used her spirits-given gift (magic).
#WordWeavers 2402.5 — Who is the most influential person in your MC’s life?
Wintereye's brother.
Wintereyes is a late-in-life child of a contraception failure, which explains why her (as yet unnamed) brother is 15 years older. He'd become an expert hunter and scout by the time the girl manifested her gift at age 7. She hadn't been exactly normal before this, though studious: A sign of things to come, the animals on the farm would jump fences, break out of paddocks, find ways out of the barn to be near her. Birds often sung to her. Her parents were already 50 when her gift manifested and she suddenly befriended wolves, then insisted on living with them. Her brother was better equipped to deal with her "living arrangements," and he loved his little sister, regardless. He worked to keep her human when her parents couldn't deal with the situation. He visited her often, and made sure she talked and talked and talked—in human language. He got her to continue reading and tutored her, insisting she study. Importantly, he taught her to live in the wild, even in winter, and how to hunt like a human, something the wolves couldn't do. It helped her establish a better position in the Blue-feathers pack. He was a big influence on her life.
#PennedPossibilities 215 — Is your MC inclined to help others, or will they only do it when it benefits them, if at all? What makes them this way? Has it ever gotten them into trouble, or inconvenienced them?
Wintereyes from /Inklings/ doesn't have a particular sense of justice and her ethics aren't particularly human, thanks being a human who's lived and hunted amongst wolves. She has befriended other beasts, but has eaten those that are prey (never using her gift to make them more vulnerable.). She is disinclined to help others, but does more often than not, even when it has gotten her in trouble. She sports bite scars from saving a pack mate from another, but then she did bite off the alpha's ear the next day to teach him a lesson. Had she not befriended the red dragon, Her Highness might never have discovered her existence or her gift, then forced her to attend a gifted school amongst, ugh!, humans, to make her, ugh!, /more human./ She'd had to handle the dragon, regardless, because it kept burning down parts of the forest. That would qualify as helping when it benefits her, I guess...
#WordWeavers 2402.3 — If your antagonist had to choose something to wear from your wardrobe, what would it be and why?
Wintereyes from /Inklings/ definitely respects Her Highness. Though Wintereyes befriended the red dragon, she knows it would be very unfriendly to ask the wyverness to dissuade the powerful woman who seemed to hold sway over a nation of humans. Her Highness is a master of spirit and radiance; merely lighting something as mundane as flame in her palm is so elegant, so perfect, and so awe inspiring, you /know/ earning her wrath could destroy a forest.
That doesn't mean Wintereyes likes Her Highness. In fact, she's the one who forced her to attend the gifted school, which made her have to deal with people every day, and discover her disabling shyness. Around people, only. Not beasts. Every night Wintereyes sleeps in a bed, she misses sleeping snuggled amongst the furry wolves of the Blue-feather pack, whom she considers family.
Worse, she's forced to wear completely unreasonable clothes that inscrutably cover her with extraneous functionless fabric that often causes her to sweat. Unable to cool, she finds she sometimes stinks unlike she ever did amongst the pack. Human clothing taboos were ridiculous!
Would Wintereyes let Her Highness choose something from her wardrobe?
Maybe, though she is over a head higher and little would fit.
Maybe not.
She'd ensure it was wash day. She'd then let Her Highness choose from her drawer of fundoshi, the loincloths her brother had insisted she had to wear whenever he or other people visited her in Fell Forest.
Certainly, that would be the last time Her Highness would ask! Teaching her how to wear one and seeing what Her Highness looked like unclothed might be worth it.
#WordWeavers 2402.2 — If your MC stayed in your place for a few weeks, what would their favorite room be and why?
My house is too cluttered for her taste, what with the living room converted into a mail room since COVID. I'm betting that Wintereyes from /Inklings/ would prefer the covered patio. Were it not that we're experiencing an atmospheric the river of rain—Now with Thunderstorms!—she'd set up her tent in the backyard.
Her tent resembles a three-pole tipi, smoke flaps and all. We have plenty of firewood for the firepit in the rack against the back garden wall. The AQMD might have something to say about an urban campfire, however. She can sleep there with the wolf from the Three-feathers Pack that escorts her. Here's to hoping the wolf eats our pesky squirrels and raccoons!
On second thought, /inside the house/ her favorite room might be the downstairs bathroom. We have a walk-in soaking tub, one of those that looks like a little car with a door that you dog closed and a seat—designed for the mobility challenged.
Having lived with beasts in the forest for more than a decade, hunting and sleeping with them, she doesn't understand people's fetish with cleanliness, being scared of even the dirt ground into the pads of her feet, them crying, "But hygiene!" She'd blow air through her lips at that. She knows that odors help you identify who's there when the stars swarm in the sky, to know what a pack-mate has hunted and eaten so you can plan tomorrow's meal, and to detect if someone is sick. She's good with forest herbal medicines.
That doesn't mean she didn't /instantly/ take to the concept of Japanese-style bathing and a hot soak! She's willing to ditch her personal scent to that anytime, even share with other people. I have a feeling we'd lose Wintereyes to a good soak nightly. I'd make sure she cleans the tub, though, thoroughly.
#PennedPossibilities 211 — Where does your MC draw inspiration in life? What motivates them? Wintereyes in the Caves of Wood
Nature—it's all around you.
Imagine, for a moment if you will, that you are a little girl and you live in a small farmhouse near a forest. You like playing outside any chance you get. When you sit on a log, listening to the rustling of the leaves and watch the butterflies flit by, you feel the entire world of life speaking to your heart. Sometimes birds fly over, even land on your shoulder or head, and they chirp and sing, as if they know you understand them. You want to believe that you do, just as you are aware of a deer crashing through the underbrush and think her unhappy because of the stag she smells, just as you hear the mice skittering to their dens and think they whine about the red fox. You hear all the beasts as they pass by or watch warily.
You always have, but now you're 7 years old and the spirits pull you strongly.
One day the rain ends, and something tells you to look through the droplets spattering the glass and wetting the garden. The world is so verdantly green, uncounted spirits sing in delight that they are so incredibly alive. Your gaze lifts to the forest, to the brush and brambles.
To the left, about there...
You see...
Tawny eyes.
Your eyes meet. You know they've met. You feel your heart thump in growing anticipation. What is this? Like a friend you knew once long ago, you now recognize what you've forgotten, though you know not what it is. The beast takes a step, branches part, and you see a wolf. Grey ruff. Tan and brown fur. Pink scarred black nose.
You lift the casement window without hesitation, to see more clearly, to smell the rain freshened air and hear the dripping from the eaves. The wolf looks either way, sniffing, ready to bolt should the farmer who hates him be lurking, but he isn't. You know it is market day, and you are alone, practicing your numbers and letters. You lean out, waving, knowing your Mom and Da would say that's wrong.
The wolf trots into the clearing, then along the row of cabbages, careful not to touch, leaving prints in the mud. Not worried he might be tracked, but curious because he feels something. Within a minute he stands below the sill, looking up. You see a curved tongue for a moment, then he sniffs. You smell wet fur, and because he pants, you smell that last mouse he ate.
You can tell he feels what you felt. He sees a friend he knew once long ago and now recognizes that it is you he forgot.
"Wait," you say.
He tilts his head, eyes blinking, as you scramble to the drawer beside the tiny table that serves as your desk. You grab the tine of a deer antler you knew was special, grasping it and rushing back, only to see paws on the sill, the wolf studying your room, and you, frowning. He is /that/ big. He whines softly, tapping his teeth together.
You walk up, wondering if he might take fright. Might snarl. Might bite, but you know better. You don't stop until your nose touches his muddy wet one. It's cold. You've seen this greeting from very far away. You breathe the same warm moist air, and he blinks, not frightened at all!
You're not frightened, either, and your heart races with certainty.
Grasping the tine, you think, /We're friends and have always been. I so want us to speak again./
The antler tine warms and a silvery glow envelopes you both in the same warmth, that very warmth that kindred spirits feel when they meet again. The air sings with a chorus of half-heard voices of joy.
Friends once more.
The texture and fabric of a whine and a yip and clicking of teeth change. You understand he says, "The hunt has been good. The world is new once more and the air clean! Why do you hide from us in these caves of wood?"
-=-=-=-=-
When nature speaks to you, the spirits inspire you to know it better.
#PennedPossibilities 210 — How is your MC typically seen by others? Does it ring true to who they really are?
Another opportunity to explore the meta aspects of Wintereyes from /Inklings/, who is seen differently than who she thinks she is—as described in her 1st person narrative.
Her Highness is a reoccurring character in a number of my shorter stories, and known to me only through the eyes of protagonists. Her Highness' behavior—thanks to two stories that feature Wintereyes—leads me to believe the powerful woman sees Wintereyes as a threat and an asset because she can befriend beasts. Wintereyes notes that Her Highness discovered her when she befriended that silly, misguided red dragon that started a forest fire and caused a grain silo explosion.
Students at the university, which Her Highness forced Wintereyes to attend, find her incredibly attractive—despite of her scars, a few of which at first glance look like tattoos but are almost photographic. Many have heard the rumor that she saved Capitol City because she scolded a dragon, telling her to be more careful with her fire. They find her "wild woman" misunderstandings about how people should act entertaining (especially her wardrobe malfunctions), her strange brand of shyness endearing, and are always on the lookout for a new faux pas. This understanding perception would surprise Wintereyes to the core.
Wintereyes is very focused on the present and discovering everything she can about her gift, as well as the beasts, the flora, and the spirits of the forest. She's attuned to nature. Most beasts see her as they see themselves due to her gift: wolf, squirrel, dragon, etc. In their species-specific perception of behavior and worldview, they see her as kind and supportive and want to be around her. This holds for both for the predator and the prey species she befriends, even though she's omnivorous and they know it.
Around people, she knows she's shy. She doesn't understand them and keeps her distance. She thinks most people are frightened by her, and should be, because she doesn't act like them. She wants to be invisible and doesn't understand why they won't let her be so.
#PennedPossibilities 209 — Does your MC have any "unusual" habits, interests, and / or talents? Do they hide it, or are they proud of it?
I just learned this one! Wintereyes from /Inklings/ hunts with knives. Usually this means rabbits or squirrels, but when the pack brings down big game, she ends the struggling prey before anyone can get hurt. She's /very/ proud of being so quick, accurate, and helpful. While it's not exactly hiding her ability with knives, she's been told not to wear them at school. It adds considerably to her nervousness around people. She never talks about it, but then she's shy and doesn't talk to many people. Wearing her knives outside the university town wasn't talked about—and she's not asking. She's going to have to travel into Capital City to help a friend land a photography job, but that'll happen only if she's modeling. She's thinking she'll be much more confident with the familiar weight strapped to her hips.
#PennedPossibilities 206 — Does your MC often reflect on their own actions? Do they ever think about the past, and what they could have done differently?
The MC from one series tends to reflect the more she's under stress. She was raised to be responsible, and when her actions hurt someone (that she doesn't have permission to hurt) it hits her emotionally, especially in her internal dialogue (1st person narrative). The worst was when people died because her pride as a bodyguard kept her from letting her employer die after she figured out the woman was fomenting a war. It's even made her think she should have murdered her for the sake of others. It leaves her second guessing herself. She knows she should not be trusted to be in charge, yet people keep making her a leader. It weighs heavily on her actions.
The MC from /Inklings/ constantly reflects on her actions as she doesn't understand well how people behave, having been raised a peculiar type of isolation. Anything she does or says inevitably gets a reaction she can't or doesn't interpret correctly. Should she have done this? Done that? This causes her to reflect a lot over her past actions, consequently stifling her from taking action in the moment—other than trying to be invisible . Incapacitating reflection is her brand of shyness.
#PennedPossibilities 205 — Do any of your characters have an accent? (This all depends on where they’re from and where they currently are, of course.)
Very good question—thank you for making me think upon this. Though Wintereyes from /Inklings/ was tutored by her brother, an itinerate big game hunter, and she does visit her birth parents often, she was raised from a young age by the wolves she used her gift upon. I imagine she has a wolffish accent of some sort...
#PennedPossibilities 203 — How does your MC view the world: as a cruel and unforgiving place, a land full of wonders, or something in-between? Where does that worldview come from? (Reference their experiences, life lessons, etc.)
When Wintereyes lived amongst the beasts she befriended, her world was a land full of wonders. Plants to learn about, forests of endless trails, spirits to find and to study, pack mates to lay with and seek comfort amongst, new animals to observe maybe also befriend. Even when she had to work to find her unique place in the Blue-feathers Pack, despite the nips and the snarls they taught with, and enduring the painful knowledge that she slowed her wolf family down, she learned to hunt and to kill—albeit with knives not fangs.
Not cruel. It was how the world of beasts worked.
The way her befriending gift works, she understood she sometimes had to eat beasts she'd also learned to speak with. Beasts ate other beasts or starved. Being human didn't make her less or more of a beast herself.
Not cruel. Just was.
Now that she's forced to attend a school and live amongst her kind, gifted humans, she's not so sure. People are complex in return for being fascinating. They've got unforgiving rules, especially about clothes, no pack mate would endure. If they don't like you or you don't conform, their unpredictable behavior feels...
Cruel. It is. As before, though, for her...
It just is.
She deals with it stoically, adjusting, being as invisible as a single red rose on a bush of thorns can be—until the human powers release her obligation. She does as she did...
#PennedPossibilities 202 — What is something or someone that your MC takes pride in? How do they express that pride?
I'm not sure Wintereyes would /express/ pride—she's shy around people. She /feels/ pride, however, for how much more effective she's become using her gift.
With the wolf pack, it took years to stick without constantly refreshing it. It's one of the reasons she had to live with them. Now they always remember she's their friend, how she helps them and their cubs, and they tell her so.
Her gift worked much faster with the red dragon last fall, though the forest fire and the grain silo explosion did draw attention to her.
She's shy. She'd rather not be noticed by her kind...
One thing science fiction writers should keep in mind is that your futuristic lingo for new tech should probably be minimal. The human tendency is to not adopt new words unless we need to. What we call a "phone" now does not even remotely resemble what it did in 1970, but we still just call it a "phone." We still "film" things and "rewind" and mac keyboards say "return." It's okay not to make up new words for everything.
keeping in mind [] that your futuristic lingo for new tech should probably be minimal.
Minimal, yes, but not non-existent. BTW: There's a "return" key on some keyboards and an "enter" key on others. I think hard about the shortcut words I choose when writing SF—and fantasy.
For me, it's important to evoke a meaning deliberately. I need a good reason to let a reader misconceive what I am referring to. Take "car." I need a good reason to suspend their understanding to hit them later with what's different about it. Yeah, I'd use car for things that carry people, and the rich lady might take her Lambroghini to flit between orbital colonies. A character in an old story of mine uses a Chevrolet shuttle. I think I could get away with having a car turn out to be a flying saucer /once/ in a story, but I would need a very good reason to do so.
A reader's trust is precious: a delicate balance between suspension of disbelief and attachment to characters, mystery, and plot. I foresee a danger that the reader might take a flying saucer car as an excuse to stop reading. Worse, it could be an editor thinking of buying my book who instead shoves my manuscript back into the envelope.
Balance. I always consider balance.
Keep in mind that airborne, anchorperson, automobile, computer (the person), nonbinary, neurodivergent, smartphone, social media, and other compounds were coined as society and technology needed them, often by combining existing words or by being named after an inventor, like daguerreotype, leotard, silhouette, and nicotine. Don't forget coining word usage: they/them instead of he/him. (I think, but am not sure, that SF led the way with "pronouns.")
The love interest in my magical fantasy WiP talks about "photography" and takes "photographs." My MC knows about an optical device that produces a daguerreotype, but also knows of a non-optical device. It looks like a pair of vacuum tubes and produces something akin to but different from a holograph (I don't use "holograph"), which I bring on stage immediately when that becomes possible. Viewing resultant "photos" requires infusion of the same "radiance" that created them to be seen. Still "photography," but, note, not simply "magic" but "radiance," which goes with /light-writing/ (the etymology of photograph). In their world, it's a "gift," because of from whence what we'd call "magic" comes. "Magic" is an overload that means slight-of-hand, maybe charisma, even good luck, but also a miraculous force wizards, witches, and possibly the girl next door, with a found crystal, can manipulate. My characters still employ "wands;" I wanted a familiar anchor. I'd like to change "wand" to "foci" to avoid the meaning overload (you don't flick or swish them); maybe a scientific term when wand use is firmly established? "Wand" shows that even genre words can become as overloaded as common words, gathering potentially misleading meanings other authors have applied to them.
I judge my borrowed-then-overloaded common words, my usage, and my coined lingo against whether the words make the writing more transparent and succeed better in telegraphing my meaning. I often revise to common words, but sometimes to coined words when I think they'll increase understanding. I don't do it because it might be fun.
One last thing in favor of a shortcut word used consistently in a story. It can become a "brand name" unique to your stories. I can't tell you how many books by an author or in authors' series have become instantly familiar, homey, and attractive once I've recognized a few brand words invented or consistently used by the author.
I rarely write contemporary or historical fiction, so I fall back to the fact that most all names are descriptive. For example, William means "Resolute Protector." Look up your name if you don't know it! My protagonist from /Inklings/ tentatively has the name Wintereyes. Her eye color /may/ be blue-grey.
In a story where people name themselves, I select names to go with the character's demeanor or aspirations. Citron gets his name from a physical attribute. In a story where a parent does the naming, I pick something they might have thought of as hopeful or descriptive. In all cases, I wait for some inspiration to do with the story to spark a name idea.
I do change the names of characters if they turn out to be inappropriate to the story or circumstance.
Wintereyes answers: /Ah, another people thing! Can I manifest mine? If so, wolf. Makes sense since Mother Wolf always protects me, and I've run with the pack since I was 5./
#WordWeavers 2401.17 — Is there a story you’d like to write but aren’t sure you can?
The current WiP, /Inklings,/because the main character was mostly raised by beasts and ignores many human social conventions because she doesn't understand them. The balance of getting it right is making me crazy.
There's also a straightforward naval engagement tale, but I don't think I understand naval culture and procedures to pull it off.
Wintereyes from /Inklings/ could do without people entirely.
She doesn't understand them and is worried she's weirdly attracted to them. Well, not so weirdly attracted; she understands they're the same species as her; she understands about reproduction.
It's not the she doesn't love her parents (despite being people). She understands what it means to be loved because they still demonstrably do. They've taught her how to act just passably human around other people, and to speak fluently, though her gift interferes: she's with her found family weeks at time. Her brother, a talented hunter able to look a predator in the eye, taught her to be a voracious reader and brings her weatherproof bags of books whenever he's in the region.
When she's forced to attend school, what she wants most is to be invisible. She wants /them/ to leave her alone. (She's beautiful despite many scars.)
Her stories are about her bridging the gap from the world of beasts to the world of people.
When I said this about Wintereyes in the original reply,
They've taught her how to act just passably human around other people, and to speak fluently, though her gift interferes
it implies her "gift" might make a difference in how she understands people. As her author, I believe it would, but don't know. She's prohibited from using it on people under penalty of death. It's not yet time to find out...