VICTORY!

Rose wrote: Hi everyone, great site and i cried piteously at the end, i really couldnt help it, im emotional at the best of times. I felt so sorry for Kitty at the end of it though, I wish there was more.

Don't we all Rose, don't we all.

*sobs in the corner of the page and hopes no-body sees him*

*hires neighbour to hug Gladstone*

Now I think the end was perfect, but when first read it I couldn't believe my eyes. Nat couldn't die in the end, not after all. Anyway, now it seems a perfect ending.

Nat's birth name was known by Bart *and* Kitty, it was too dangerous for him to stay alive as John Mandrake. He had to die. It's kind of beautiful now that I think about it, how death allowed the memory of the person Nathaniel to endure. Think of how Nat was the only magician who revealed his real name to Bart, the ones before him were remembered by Bart as Solomon or whatever. I think though, that Nat's gravestone will have Mandrake's name on it, unless Kitty intercedes (unlikely imo)

Whoo rambled a bit there.

EDIT: Ohh yeah, Bartimaeus knew Ptolemy as well, but that's less significant to me, because some other pharoahs were called that and it seems more like a family name that way.

I think Barti only remembers Solomon because he was so famous and powerful. Solomon probably used the best djinni, and Barti would be proud to be called by him. And Barti wouldn't have as personal a relationship with him because Solomon had so many slaves.

But then Barti tends to understate his more important relationships.

Solomon had to start somewhere...

If he started with Barti, we'd never hear the end of it. Barti brags too much.

Being the first Djinni summoned by a beginner? Not brag matiriel.

Yes it is, you'd remember the first one more the like the 263th one right?

Why would Bart be bragging? He wants to eat (in a manner of speaking) magicians.

But he always says that he's spoken with Solomon. He probably respects him, even if he wants to eat him. Like people care for chickens before they eat them right? (bad analogy)

He was a mighty magician, probably one the most powerful.

And the most promiscuous, as Stroud/Bart reminds us.

Solomon was supposed to have tons of slaves, and most of them were probably more powerful than Barti. Someone, I think it was Honorious, (@ the beginning of GE), when Barti said he spoke with Solomon, Honorious said, "Didn't we all?" or something like that.

No, it was a different afrit.

I think it's the matter of Barti can't really brag in front of higher spirits because they've done more already.

Not really, Ramuthra had didn't done all that much, he was just more powerful.

I always thought that afrit was Honorious, he and Patterknife were supposed to be leading the charge and the afrit and Honorious had similar senses of humour. Of course, if Honorius was leading the charge, he couldn't have been there to ambush the Emperor.

But it'd seem like Honorious would recognize Barti if it was him.

Meh. Probably.