posted
One of my MC’s is thinking about doing something and I wanted to see what sort of reaction people would have to it because I'm a bit ambivalent in my response to his action. So . . .
In my current WIP, one MC (Mordent) has taken the other MC prisoner. Mordent has married her but is unwilling to rape her. In fact, because he’s in love with her and she can’t prove that the marriage hasn’t been consummated (she has already had one child), he has promised not to force himself on her and intends to keep the promise. If she accepts his attentions and acknowledges the marriage, he becomes the king of her country and will, at minimum, impoverish it to save his own. Over the course of the story, he continues to break down her resistance to his advances, each time, she allows things to progress a bit further. He has some time (months) to convince her but not unlimited time. He is also a mage and can interact with her dreams.
With that background . . .
1) How long, either in terms of days, weeks, etc, or number of actual attempts, will you, as a reader, buy his “failing” at the seduction?
and
2) If in an effort to avoid breaking the promise, he invades her dreams where she doesn’t resist him:
Would you feel that he has broken his promise? How would the action make you feel about the character?
posted
One possibility is that when he invades her dreams, he sees a different side of her that little by little makes him not want to continue trying to seduce her. The longer it goes on, the less he wants her, but the more his country needs him to. Could end up being quite a battle.
There could be a role reversal in the dream world.
posted
If he is awake and in control of himself when he invades her dream, then I'd say it's the same as if he did it in real life, particularly if she has no idea that he can invade her dream. "As a man thinketh" and all that. I'd buy that once he seduces her in the dream, and sees her reaction to it waking up (feeling anxious, wanting to set it aside) it would be adequate impetus for him to despair.
Though just last night I had a dream where I was a woman (not myself) looking at a farm to purchase with my husband. For some reason he shoots an FBI agent who shows up. I crouch silently while he decides whether I need to be shot. I think I actually passed into his point of view while he was wondering that. Then he does somthing that caused pieces of another agent to fly past my field of view. I was still pretty scared when I woke up.
I tried to focus instead on an earlier part of the dream where I was myself and we attended a Christmas pageant and I got chosen to be the blessed mother.
[This message has been edited by franc li (edited January 11, 2007).]
posted
I like the direction erpagris suggested, but to answer your question, I'd buy maybe a few months of the MC trying to woo her, but there'd have to be some interesting sequences to keep the story going during that time. Maybe she's plotting something...maybe she really does love him and is resisting to protect him somehow.
If he invaded her dreams, I'd view that as breaking his promise. Does she know that he has this ability?
posted
I'd say a few months. After that, their relational positions will be entrenched, and rejecting him will be so commonplace that it won't be tempting not to reject him anymore. My wife agrees. The window is open for couple months in a constant-contact situation like that, no longer.
As for the dream thing, all he's really doing is probing (no pun intended) how she really feels about him and maybe planting a suggestion or two. Depending on what he promised, I don't see how that's breaking it.
posted
The promise is only to go as far as "she allows." He is very aware that he is seriously bending the promise if not breaking it.
Erpagris and Franc are close on the conflicts.
Her county/duty requires that she resist him so she can't allow herself to act on what she feels.
His country needs him to get her with child as soon as possible, he is refusing to do his duty by waiting. She fails to object to the seduction in the scene so he could consummate the marriage in "real time" and not violate the promise. He doesn't because he can sense how she is feeling and knows that if he does it will break her. Reverting to the dream is his attempt to stay in control of his actions and not break the promise. He's hoping that without the concious mind butting in (i.e. when she's free of duty), she'll act on how she feels.
She is NOT aware he can do this. For her, it is just a dream. He doesn't have complete control of the dream situation. All he can do is enter her consiousness and start the dream. Once he enters her dream, she is in control. The dream is more of a mutual seduction.
Acting in the dream does cause him a lot of problems because for him it was "real time."
There is a lot more going on beyond the seduction. We have rescue attempts, trying to save his kingdom from a famine, trying not to get killed by his own warlords, people trying to keep her kingdom together until she can be rescued, murder, mayhem and magic. Needless to say, I've been having lots of fun writing it.
[This message has been edited by kings_falcon (edited January 11, 2007).]
posted
I think it depends on whether he's serious about "seducing" her. Is he, when you get down to it, okay with not consumating the marriage?
In that case, I can see him really leaving it up to her. Which means that she can "hold out" for as long as she really wants to hold out.
On the other hand, if he's really determined to go through with this, and isn't utterly incompetent in some important aspect, then it should only take a couple of days if he presses the issue. You say that she's attracted to him, but only holding out because she believes that he'll ruin her kingdom. All he has to do is persuade her that her kingdom will benefit in the long run, or at least that the relative amount of impovershment they suffer will result in a far more dramatic improvement in the state of affairs within his kingdom. If he can't persuade her of either, then he has to really be totally inept as an administrator and ruler, and she has to know that from the outset. Of course, I'm already presuming that she is capable of feeling something for the plight of people in his kingdom...that may not be the case. But if it isn't, I think that opens up considerably the lattitude that he would feel in regards to how much respect her will ought to be accorded.
If you throw in a few potent demonstrations that her continued indecision will result in nothing more than her kingdom dissolving into civil war while he loots it with impunity, then not only does she have no reason to resist but a positive reason to move the situation to a conclusion...in addition to the fact that she already likes him personally. You can consider his initial pose of "letting her decide for herself" as part of the persuasion process, a demonstration that her resistance won't stop him from taking what his kingdom needs, it only will prevent the two of them from enjoying the benefits of marriage...oh, and it will result in the destruction of her kingdom as a viable state.
I could do this in a couple of hours even without having someone effectively under my physical control, if I were determined to get persuasive. Most of the time I'm too lazy to bother. Remember, he doesn't need to be telling the strict truth about things either, he just has to seem to be telling the truth. I really don't see what basis she has for resisting his arguments unless she's certain that he's utterly incompetent.
posted
Everyone has neglected to think about the fact that she is (apparently) the ruler of a DIFFERENT country than the man. If she is truly a ruler of a country, then it's her duty to ensure the safety of her country. Nowhere do I see him offering any surety for her people, her economy, anything else. You say he's actually going to impoverish HER country to save HIS. If this is the case, a true royal who honors her position as the ruler of her country won't give in to her baser instincts (that's what stable boys are for, after all, isn't it??? ), she will resist him, possibly try to kill him to escape from him, possibly try to have her own soldiers overrun HIS kingdom to rescue her, if she can get a message to them. I simply don't see a seduction happening, but I'm a woman and see this plot line as making the woman a wimpy dishrag rather than a QUEEN (who should be a woman of inherent power). If she's a queen, make her a *good* one. The story will be much more interesting if the guy's trying to seduce her and she's trying to kill him or escape from him or both. JMO.
The solution to the problem of the seduction, IMO, would be for him to come up with a COMPROMISE that benefits both countries. Otherwise, why should she give in to him? It's the same as rape, IMO, if he tries to seduce her in order to take over her country. If I were her, I'd geld him in a heartbeat. With a dull knife. Slowly. Go Queen!!! Now THAT's a story!! LOL! Not the one you're writing, apparently, but oh well. JMO.
posted
1) How long, either in terms of days, weeks, etc, or number of actual attempts, will you, as a reader, buy his “failing” at the seduction?
I think this depends on what else is going on in the story. Is his kingdom in danger of collapsing anytime soon? How quickly is he expected to produce an heir? If these things are urgent, I wouldn't buy that a king in his position would allow the game to go on very long if it put his kingdom in jeopardy.
2) If in an effort to avoid breaking the promise, he invades her dreams where she doesn’t resist him:
Would you feel that he has broken his promise?
Yes. But I think he would try to get around this by choosing the words of his promise carefully. He knows prior to his promise that he can invade her dreams. So instead of having him tell her, "I promise never to force myself upon you." He could weasle out of it by saying, "I promise to never physically force myself upon you." Or, "I promise to never touch your body in any way that you don't want me to." He is only coming to her in dreams, so there is no physical, bodily contact.
How would the action make you feel about the character?
Is he a hero in other aspects? I would think less of him, but to me, flawed heroes are more interesting than goody-goody heroes.
posted
Some clarity, Mordent is already in control of her country. Also, his country has already collapsed, he's trying to fix it. It is her country that is now in danger of imminent civil war.
I chose the "seduction" method I would personally use in this situation, a direct attact on the nominal reason for her refusal. However, it is clear that Mordent has a number of alternatives. He can simply try outright seduction...this should work but would be risky and dangerous ("in a heartbeat. With a dull knife. Slowly."). He can use some varient which involves magical dream contact, but that seems even more dangerous to me (very bad things happen to people in my dreams, including me--if anyone out there has ever tried guest-starring in my dreams, it was probably a one-time affair...actually, it may have happened a couple of times, I have to wonder if any of them are still alive).
I take it that the deadline for Mordent to convince her to consumate and validate the marriage is associated with the imminent outbreak of civil war within her country. If this is not the case, then that needs some clarification. The point is that she's up against a deadline as well, and one that actually concerns her more than it should him (unless he's just way nicer than her). If I were him...well, he's in love with her, so he wants the marriage to be validated anyway. But if he weren't, and were a little less of a nice guy, he could just provoke the civil war and then move in his own troops to mop up and annex her kingdom as a protectorate or something. Since he's already got hold of her kingdom's treasury and civil authorities, it shouldn't be hard to finance or justify (unless somebody is in a position to ask why such a colossal screw-up should turn out to his benefit, in which case he might just take the money and run).
posted
Some clarity is needed because this plot line is not the one in F&F under my Query letter.
By the time this part of the story has happened the political landscape has dramatically changed from the King's Falcon synopsis as this is Book III (The Price).
Mordent does not want fighting in Tarishah because it destroys the crops he needs to feed his people.
Book II - Falcon's Cry: Among other things,
The people of Tarishah, lead by Falcon, rebel against the tithe leading to war between Tarishah and Fayette. Because she has been subject to a kidnapping attempt and is pregnant with the heir to the kingdoms (if you have a score card - Jurriaan's child NOT Mordent's), the decision is made to hide her and the child. Jurriaan and Mordent are told she is dead. Mordent can't find her aura (because she's pregnant and it has changed) so he believes she's dead.
Taking advantage of the chaos and the fact that her "death" has ended the Regency, Mordent attacks and captures a sizable part of Jurriaan's kingdom to force Jurriaan to negotiate the surrender of Tarishah to Sabbatus, and get troops out of Tarishah where they are destroying the harvest he needs. To resolve the Fayette/Tarishah conflict and save his kingdom, Jurriaan strips Mordent of the administration of Tarishah. Mordent then arranges for the murder of Jurriaan and an attack the main castle to force Sabrina to marry him in an attempt to regain control of Tarishah. Plans are thwarted. Jurriaan is saved. Falcon is captured. Sabrina is killed.
So coming into The Price, the civil war has already happened. Fayette and Tarishah are united in thier attempts to rescue Falcon and her son is the hier to both kingdoms.
Book III:
Lynda is right on Falcon's issues as it's currently written.
Mordent's not offering to protect her people so Falcon can't give in to him. Yes, she does try to kill him. Yes, she does try to escape. When he makes it impossible for her to escape (by using a spell that keeps her tethered to him), she enlists help of a mercenary she met while she was "dead" to get a message back to Fayette to assist with a rescue. Part of the reason Mordent made the promise is because he knows that she WILL kill him even if it takes years for the opportunity to arise if he rapes her. She'd use a dull spoon for the gelding though.
His kingdom HAS collapsed and famine is a real risk. He needs to get the supply of food he was taking from Tarishah re-established no later than the follwing spring, about 9 months after he captures her. The first 2 months she is recovering from the injury she received during the battle. He marries her about 2 months later. So, he has a maximum of 5 months to regain control of Tarishah.
While he needs an heir ASAP, having one also puts him at risk. Strongest heir, as defined by who's still alive, takes the Sabbat throne. One of the warlords could decide to kill Mordent, marry Falcon and rule through the kid. Mordent would prefer to have better control of the warlords before having the heir.
posted
Is is impossible for Mordent to offer to protect her people?
In that case, he needs to establish a realistic plan for putting her country to the sword and exterminating the populace entirely (or as much as possible) to free up food resources and eliminate future problems. Let her figure out some alternatives if she likes. But if the cold, hard fact is that there isn't enough food to go around, and a military alliance isn't going to be possible, then genocide is the logical answer.
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), she will resist him, possibly try to kill him to escape from him, possibly try to have her own soldiers overrun HIS kingdom to rescue her, if she can get a message to them. I simply don't see a seduction happening, but I'm a woman and see this plot line as making the woman a wimpy dishrag rather than a QUEEN (who should be a woman of inherent power). If she's a queen, make her a *good* one. The story will be much more interesting if the guy's trying to seduce her and she's trying to kill him or escape from him or both. JMO.
