Brief notes: Radu, the Orden & the extremists

[narcasse]

Textual silence may be one of my favourite phrases at the moment because it’s perfectly applicable most of the time.

How did Radu contact the Orden?

How did he know about them in the first place? Caterina has trouble proving that they even exist.

Why trust them? Did Dietrich win Radu over? Did Radu read in to the actual meaning of the Orden motto? If so how did he know about that? Was the connection in fact between Radu and Isaak via that piece of common esotericism? If the implication was that Radu was well-read then a Western esotericism link is plausible.

Did he believe in the Orden ideal over the extremist cause? A world revolution rather than just a regime change?

What were the extremists like? Did Radu perceive them as too limited in their scope? Too ineffective?

Why, even though he finds the involvement of organisations from the Outer distasteful, did Süleyman agree to let Radu involve them?

Why if Süleyman was the leader of the extremists was he listening to a young, low ranked noble? Why did he trust Radu with the most important details of his plans?

How did Radu become involved with the extremists in the first place? Was he really involved with them or just Süleyman? He doesn’t call on extremist support in Carthago after all though apparently there are plenty of them about.

Where were the supporting extremists during the rebellion? Süleyman doesn’t appear to trust them. Were they just low-level grunts as far as Süleyman was concerned? Did he pass this idea on to Radu? What Radu receptive to the idea because he himself came from an intellectual background and from his ivory tower everybody else looked like fools?

Süleyman spent so much time trying to understand the Empress: did he neglect to understand the extremists? Did he and Radu in fact both misunderstand the situation because they were focusing on ideals rather than reality?

Was Radu selected as Ion’s tovarăş in part due to academic ability? Was Mirka trying to shore up her grandson’s lack of academic skill? Was part of her choice due to Radu’s idealism?

Did Mirka recognise a similarity between Radu’s idealism and Süleyman’s? Was she hoping to improve on the Empress’ failure and raise an idealist who would support the state mandate?

If Radu hadn’t lost his faith in the Empire was Mirka expecting him to guide her grandson and cover up any of Ion’s mistakes, effectively ruing from the shadows? What she expecting him to take on the role of a nurturing and pragmatic spouse?

Just how did Süleyman and Radu end up interacting in the first place? Ion doesn’t seem to have any particular regard for Süleyman. Astaroth is a distant relative of Süleyman’s: Radu doesn’t appear to be. Süleyman was once Governor-General of Egypt: did he begin his involvement with Radu’s family there so that when Radu arrived in the capital Süleyman offered to keep an eye on him? Latter point: fic needs to be written.

How would Ion have felt about Süleyman taking an interest in his tovarăş? Was he jealous of time Radu spent away from him? Would this jealousy have manifested in petty nastiness to the point where Radu started to seriously question his loyalty to Ion? Would Radu have questioned Ion’s judgement if that pettiness demonstrated itself in disparaging Süleyman? Would the combination of the two have been the cause of Radu’s speculation on the justness of the state structure? Ion after all is judged to be more worthy simply by virtue of birth.

Would the physical absence of an Empress have had any impact on Radu’s thinking? Did he even care? Did he believe in her as more than an abstract? How did he view Süleyman’s obsession with her?

Did Ion in fact become more needy because he could tell that he was losing his tovarăş? It certainly would have made things worse if he did. Was he aware that something was wrong but didn’t know what? Or did he guess what the problem was but still was at a loss as to how to deal with it? He seems pretty ready to just pretend that Radu never did anything wrong in Carthago as long as Radu went along with it.