Join me as I review Hederick the Therocrat by Ellen Dodge Severson, live! Share your thoughts on this fourth volume in the Villains Series, released on February 1, 1994. You can buy a copy here: https://amzn.to/4eraQsz
About Hederick the Therocrat
Hederick, leader of the Seeker religion in Solace and self-ordained conscience of Krynn, embarks on a terrifying Inquisition that threatens all who follow magic and the true gods and allows the forces of evil into the world
Transcript
Intro
Welcome to another DragonLance Saga review episode. It is Palast, Reapember the 23rd. My name is Adam and today I am going to give you my review of Hederick the Therocrat by Ellen Dodge Severson. I would like to take a moment and thank the DLSaga members, and invite you to consider becoming a member by visiting the link in the description below. You can even pick up Dragonlance gaming materials using my affiliate links. This year is the 40th Anniversary of Dragonlance, so join in on the celebration by submitting a video, piece of art or writing about Dragonlance to info@dlsaga.com. It will be added to the dlsaga.com/40th-anniversary celebration landing with all other contributors! This is my perspective only, and if you have any thoughts or disagree with mine, I invite you to share them in YouTube chat.
This novel has enraged me. Not just because it presents Hederick in a light that has never been shown until now, but it brings back my sheer hatred of his action in the novel and their real world reflections. The story is framed by Aesthetics assigned to write his story to earn their place in the Great Library of Palanthas working under Astinus. It begins with his childhood which again, actually endeared me to him for at least a chapter and a half. His mother is an insane woman who shunned her daughter for having magical talent, and her daughter Ancilla left to learn from the Wizards of High Sorcery and would ultimately become a white robed wizard. The mother claimed to have a vision of a god and took over the entire town under this insanity. When her husband failed to live up to her expectations she had the townspeople kill him, And when Hederick did the same as a nine year old child, she banished him into the wilderness.
I was kicked out of my childhood home for not conforming to my Mormon parents’ worldview, so I immediately connected with Hederick. He was fending off a wild cat when a man named Tarscenian rescued him. He was a Seeker priest, clearly a charlatan, but Hederick rejected him, believing in his mothers version of foolishness, even still. The man went to his town of Garlund and turned the townspeople against his mother and toward the Seeker faith, all the while enriching himself. Hederick was fascinated and fell in line with the seeker faith immediately. Then his sister returned to take him, and Hedeick was a blind follower at this point. As Tarscenian fell in love with Ancilla, Hederick believed he was a sinner. Hederick gained favor of Tarscenian by poisoning the supposed blasphemers and killing them. Hederick realized that he needed to punish his sister and Tarscenian too.
He went to the grove where his sister was waiting for him, and had a vision of a seeker god, like his mother had a vision of her god. This only convinced him of his righteousness and favor of the gods, then attacked Tarscenian and his sister, taking a magical artifact she was gifted after the Test of High Sorcery. This protected him from her magic and the cottage burned down as they fled, and Hederick returned to the village. He had the townspeople murder his mother and then kill each other so he was the only survivor. Then he traveled south to Haven and Solace, finding Elistan and bringing him to Haven, then taking over Solace. I hate the reality of this novel. Abrahamic religions have been terrorizing mankind in this exact same way since their inception. The inquisitions, witch burnings and recently the Satanic panic, priests molesting and raping children, parent torturing their children at conversion camps because of their sexual orientation, trying to shut down LGBTQ rights, and thousands of lesser infractions that torment and scar people physically and emotionally. Why anyone follows these clearly made up and hate filled religions is beyond me. They actively make up lies, then kill people for not believing them, or for not living up to their standards. They claim victimhood while actively controlling other people’s lives through legislation.
The author takes all this, and puts it in Dragonlance and it drives me insane. Hederick rules through fear, knowing it’s all bullshit but murdering and turning neighbor against neighbor all the while preaching peace. It’s like evangelists who pretend to teach Jesus’ word but only enrich themselves, and the dupes who follow them are either stupid or blind or both. He has literal witch trials which men and women have suffered under in our own history at the hands of the good and faithful christians in Scotland, America, and all of europe. Then his sister and Tarscenian convince the conclave to allow them to give up their lives to stop him because he is so powerful with her artifact, their souls would go into the Vallenwood trees and their power would go into Ancilla to stop Hederick.
And when they face off at a witch trial, Hederick actually wins! It’s totally inconsistent with the character from Chronicles yet it is set right before it. I know this is not a real book, but the situations are very true to reality and I am actually angry at a fictional character. So I guess the author did a good job writing a bad guy who is very real in his beliefs and actions, but the irony is that those who follow Abrahamic faith, who have committed these exact acts of evil will or would never admit or even see it. They will live their life claiming victimhood while actively taking away women’s rights, human freedoms, all in the name of their made up, clearly bullshit, bronze aged, fairy tale god. But after saying this, I guarantee that they will say that I am the bad guy. Oh the bitter irony!
The story continues with Ancilla reaching out to Tarscenian in spirit form where she is trapped in a Vallenwood tree, and they decide to try to steal the diamond dragon artifact protecting Hederick. Then we have a scene where Ancilla tries to collect the artifact herself during a sermon by Hedereick but is unable. And instead forces him to embarrass himself in front of the congregation. Then Tarscenian tries to connect with the local thieves guild by approaching a girl named Mynx. They connect with a Kender named Kifflewitt and steal the High Seeker priest Dahos’ ring. This convinces Mynx to lead Tarscenian to the guildmaster, a half-elf named Gaveley. The guild was looking for Tarscenian anyway as there is a bounty on Tarscenian and they are going to turn in Mynx as well.
So Mynx leads Tarscenian to her hideout for disguises and they get rid of Kifflewitt but he overhears Tarscenian telling Gaveley about the diamond dragon which he wants the guild to steal. The kender wants it as well. Then centaurs witness lumberjacks cutting a Vallenwood tree which reveals a wizards spirit inside, and they go to tell Hederick about it, but he’s in the temple, oh yea, there’s a massive temple near Crystalmir lake that was never talked about anywhere but here. This temple houses a Materbill beast that consumes heretics. Dahos sends the centaurs to it to get rid of them, but the kender saves one of them. Then Hederick gets pissed the Centaurs desecrated his temple and finishes services at the lake.
The guards bring a black robe wizard bound and gagged and they are about to judge him when the kender cuts his bindings and the mage casts a spell at the same time Hederick pulls out the dragon and the kender takes it. Then Hederick dies from the spell, but the kender gives his corpse the dragon which heals him! And runs off! The aesthetics recording this are arguing over writing that Hederick did in fact die, as if to truly kill him. It’s unclear if they believe what they are writing forces history, or if they are just recording history. But it’s obvious to anyone who has ever read dragonlance they are recording it as it happens, so I have no idea why this portion is even in the story.
The kender ended up actually taking the diamond dragon artifact and Hederick, now healed, is convinced he was saved by the Seeker gods, and that he has the diamond Dragon in his necklace pouch. Tarscenian and Mynx, frustrated, believing that Hederick has the artifact again, return to the thieves guild to demand an answer from Gaveley. He refuses to do the job, leaving Tarscenian to try to steal the artifact from Hederick himself. Gaveley sends a thief to tail Tarscenian on the off chance he gets the artifact, the thief is to kill him, take the artifact and collect the bounty Tarscenian has on him from Hederick. Mynx complains and is taken into custody as she also has a bounty on her now.
Kifflewit sneaks into the thieves guild, finds Mynx, and breaks her out, revealing that he has the artifact. They leave and fight over ownership. Mynx is worried about Tarscenian going to the seeker temple to get the artifact that isn’t there. As they are fighting over it, she is summoned into the diamond dragon and trapped! The kender has no idea where she went and meets a Centaur he ran into before who is going to his forest to collect warriors. They are going to war with the Seekers. The kender rides with him, and as they get to the outer vallenwoods where the wizards are trapped inside, they call out to Mynx who manages to get the artifact to touch a tree, the mage inside releases her and she tells them both what happened, and that they need to go rescue Tarscenian. The centaur calls his warriors and they head out.
Tarscenian sneaks into the temple with the thief who saved him from a lacydon, and the thief dies from a blob of blue slime as Tarscenian flees He gets to the laundry level and is met by the maidens who work there. They clothed him and gave him a dagger to kill Hederick with. He sneaks into Hederick’s room, but falls into a trap. Gaveley informed Hederick that he was coming and he was put in a cell. He’s given a chance to tell Hederick where the artifact is, but he really doesn’t know, only that it might be with the Kender, but he’s not saying anything. This leads to an execution date which is the culmination of the novel.
The centaurs free slaves being led out of the city and together they are accosted by three hags, which they eventually defeat. They rush to the execution of Tarscenian and end up freeing Ancilla with the artifact, it allows her to release the mages, and they all have a massive battle. It ends with Ancilla demanding that Hederick destroy his temple, which he does, intending to die inside like a martyr, but is carried out by Tarscenian and Mynx. The temple is now destroyed, Hederick is alive, and is ultimately going to be brought before Verminaard, but it doesn’t happen in this novel. Instead it focuses on Ancilla dying and Tarscenian and Mynx returning to normal life.
The sages finished recording the tale for Astinus who elevated them to full scribes, but one of them decided to live history rather than write it, as he tried to write that Hederick died, only to have it rewritten by the quill. Proving they couldn’t change history, only record it. This was a wildly frustrating novel that made Hederick out to be so much more influential and powerful than he ever was in the modules or other novels. I don’t think I minded the change, but it didn’t contextualize him any more than the Kingpriest. Believing he was doing good, even when it was evil, and wanting to be an all powerful god. While I am not a fan of religion, and this story brought that out in full force, I don’t believe this was a consistent novel with the main character which is the whole point of the novel.
If you are easily triggered by religion like I clearly am, I might suggest you steer clear of this novel. If you want to enjoy a wacky Dragonlance story and you don’t care about religion, you would probably like this novel, so if that’s the case, check it out. It was written well, with interesting characters outside of Hederick.
Outro
And that’s it for my review of Hederick the Therocrat by Ellen Dodge Severson. What did you think of the parallels with real world religious events and Hederick’s? Do you mind having an established character be realized differently from the Chronicles? And finally, are you glad the Seeker religion went the way of the Dodo? Feel free to email me at info@dlsaga.com or leave a comment below.
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