Seely
| Also known as | A Knower of Many Things, Mr. Seely |
|---|---|
| Title | Knower, expelled |
| Affiliation | Knowers, formerly |
| Home | Outside Treenode |
| Status | Alive |
| First appearance | Sacred: Eslura's Calling |
Seely is the only Knower the books name, expelled from the order at Galecrest for pursuing research Eslura would rather have kept quiet, and living afterwards in a mushroom house outside Treenode.[1] The research is the reason the Olphins can be shown innocent: working from the Olphin Stones with Pemadee of Ovallia, he concluded that Obellius Kalaar had bargained with the god Nelazgus for the power to control the Olphin race, and demonstrated it on Barnaby Britto in his own front room.[1]
Appearance
Seely is a small creature about the size of a wild hare, with the big feet to go with it, massive floppy elephant ears and a hump protruding from his back. His head comes up to Bea's waist. He has beady eyes, one of them completely white, tiny grey hairs on his chin and three-fingered paws, and he limps.[1] Book 2 refers to him simply as the elephant-eared creature.[2] His ears flap up and down like wings when he nods and stick straight up when he is alarmed.[1][3]
A faint scar crosses his neck, left by the blade the purple-finned Olphin held to it when she robbed him.[1]
Personality
Seely speaks of himself in the third person, as a Knower, a Knower of Many Things, or an asker of many questions, and waves away any more formal address: told he is Mr. Seely, he answers that a Knower of Many Things does not abide by such formalities and that just Seely is fine.[1] Whether the habit belongs to the order or to Seely alone is not established anywhere in the books, and he is the only Knower who appears in them.
He punctuates himself with "mhm, yes, yes" and greets strangers by naming them and where they come from, which is how he identifies Barnaby Britto of Ovallia and Alpin Loomin of Farenworth on sight. He fires questions without pausing to think, apologises for it, and does it again.[1] Alpin, who is unimpressed throughout, asks him to stop repeating the name and the town every time he speaks.[1]
He eats blue candies constantly, sucks them, spits them half-finished into a waste bin or onto the floor, and keeps sacks of them beside his desk. The trail of chewed candies through the mud is what leads Barnaby to his door in the first place, and at Millennium Loftwind's table in Galecrest he reaches straight across a banquet for the candies and ignores everything else.[1][4] When he is anxious he paces in tight circles and bites his fingernails.[3]
He is delighted by his own results. Watching Barnaby obey the stone he claps, scribbles notes and calls the demonstration brilliant, and afterwards thanks Barnaby for proving the theory while Barnaby is still on the floor wondering how he got there.[1]
Background
Seely worked as a formal Knower at the Galecrest Library before he was forced out of his position for seeking out information Eslura would rather keep quiet, on the reasoning that Eslura could not risk her people discovering it. He went to Treenode to live in solitude, and says he found more there than he ever would have at Galecrest.[1][2] The expulsion is common knowledge: Nordwelg brings it up flatly in front of a Sacred Ruler as a reason to doubt him.[3]
His house stands on a giant mushroom in the woods outside Treenode, reached by spiral stairs up the stalk to a balcony under a wooden roof. A bamboo rocking chair faces into the woods with a pair of binoculars on it, bird-shaped wind chimes hang from rusted nails, and a hand-painted sign on the door reads Resident Knower. A fist-sized hole beside the door, badly camouflaged with dried flowers, holds a wooden hand on a long shaft that he works from inside to inspect callers and open the door. Within, the shelves carry jars of blue and green liquid with small creatures floating in them, and the floor carries notebooks, crumpled parchment and sacks of candy. He writes with a peacock quill whose feather is larger than his head, and asks visitors to leave their shoes at the door.[1]
He had been researching the Olphin question with Pemadee for many moons by letter, holding one of the two stones while Pemadee held the other, so that if one of them were caught the other would still have a stone.[5][1] His half was taken from him at knifepoint by a purple-finned Olphin who broke through his door, and he wrote to Pemadee hoping Pemadee's Olphin boy might help him find her.[1]
Story
Sacred: Eslura's Calling
Seely is first a name in a letter. Pemadee tells Barnaby that the letter he found came from an old friend who used to be one of the Knowers at Galecrest, that he goes by the name Seely now and lives outside Treenode, and sends Barnaby to him with the other stone.[5]
Barnaby, Alpin and Bea follow the trail of spat-out candies to the mushroom and knock. Seely keeps them waiting, inspects them through the hole, then lets them in and answers Alpin's complaint about the address with the whole account: the expulsion, the research, the Olphin who robbed him, and the stone Barnaby is hiding under his cloak. He rubs the stone until it glows, puts Barnaby under it, has him fetch a candy, and reverses it, and Barnaby remembers none of it. His conclusion is that Obellius struck a deal with Nelazgus, as others of his kind had before him, and obtained the power to control the Olphins. Asked outright by Alpin whether that means the Olphins were innocent, he agrees that it does.[1]
A storm of black smoke reaches the house before he can say more, breaking his shelves and burying him in spilled candies. He stands, looks out of the window and says a Knower of Many Things fears that his new friends may have company.[1] He leads the others out into the woods away from the smoke, and they are separated when Bea falls and Demise takes shape around her.[6]
Alistair Archibald carries Bea to Blighburrow and Seely, Alpin and Barnaby arrive there too. Seely lays the research before Alistair, Alpin confirms it grudgingly, and Nordwelg asks whether he has gone completely mad. Alistair refuses to dismiss it, and says that if what Seely says of the Olphins is true there is no reason they should be imprisoned any longer. Seely then argues that a second piece of the stone exists which would restrict its power and save the Olphins from their ailment, and urges the party to find the Olphin who robbed him and recover it. Alistair holds him to waiting for the full council at Galecrest, and Seely paces.[3]
He travels north with them to the High Moon Festival and is unscathed by the earthquake that brings the library roof down.[3] In the fighting that follows he meets the purple-finned Olphin herself, Tabitha Glowdish, and says that a Knower would not classify the reunion as pleasant.[4] Afterwards, at Millennium Loftwind's table, Alistair opens the business of the afternoon by saying that Seely's discovery must be dealt with first, and Seely stands on his seat and bows.[4]
Sacred 2: Flames of the Awakened
Seely explains the deterrent stone to Bea in Galecrest, too quickly for her to follow completely, and she trusts it anyway on the grounds that he has spent most of his life studying the stones.[7] He leaves the room during the argument at the castle, with no blue candies left on the table to keep him there, and Bea presumes he has gone back to the Galecrest library. She does not see him again.[2] He appears once more among the crowd of her friends in a waking vision at the Sacred City.[8]
Relationships
Pemadee is the friend he researched with for many moons and never meets on the page. Seely calls him his dear friend and had never seen the second stone with his own eyes, only heard of it by word from him.[1]
Barnaby Britto brings him the stone and becomes the demonstration. Seely knew who he was before he gave a name.[1]
Tabitha Glowdish is the purple-finned Olphin who put a blade to his throat and took his stone. Neither of them enjoys the reunion at Galecrest.[1][4]
Alpin Loomin spends the entire acquaintance rolling his eyes at him and confirms his findings anyway.[1][3]
Alistair Archibald knows him of old, greets him as a pleasant surprise, and is the first Sacred Ruler to take the research seriously.[3]
Behind the scenes
Chapter 17 of Sacred: Eslura's Calling is titled "A Knower of Many Things", after the way Seely refers to himself.
The pronunciation guide at the back of both novels gives his name as Sea-lee, with no surname and no other name attached.[4][9] Seely himself says a Knower of Many Things goes by many names and that Seely is one of them, but no other is recorded.[1]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 1.20 Book 1, Ch. 17.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Book 2, Ch. 3.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 Book 1, Ch. 24.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 Book 1, Ch. 26.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Book 1, Ch. 11.
- ↑ Book 1, Ch. 20.
- ↑ Book 2, Ch. 2.
- ↑ Book 2, Ch. 17.
- ↑ Book 2, Ch. 28.