Of infants and MacGuffins and timelines
Every time I go back and reread parts of Kings Rising, I am reminded of things that made me crazy when reading it originally.
if you are not already familiar with the concept of a MacGuffin, it is a thing that makes the plot go but that, despite the apparent importance to the plot/characters, it is never actually seen within the work. The most popular example is the falcon statue in The Maltese Falcon. From Wikipedia:
> an object, device, or event that is necessary to the plot and the motivation of the characters, but insignificant, unimportant, or irrelevant in itself
Jokaste claims that she had a baby. But we never see it. One of her attendants, under the threat of her own death, says that there is a baby but that it was sent away.
It seems really to be primarily a device to get Damen and Laurent to the Kingsmeet without their army, where Laurent's--and preferably Damen's--death made to possibly happen. there is no infant at the Kingsmeet, nor anywhere else in the book nor in the short stories.
OK, that's fine, MacGuffins are a time-honored tradition in storytelling.
The part that is particularly odd to me is:
> Kyrina was taken to an antechamber to arrange communication with the wet nurse.
The wet nurse who supposedly has the infant and supposedly has the ability to get it to the kingsmeet for Damen and Laurent.
What kind of communication is arranged? Do they select a crew of Akielon soldiers to escort her in the hopes that the sentries in Akielos will accept them and let them through? even if that works, it would have to be within an acknowledgment that they came from Damen and of course the sentries would take the attendant to the Regent and that would ruin everything for them. They don't particularly seem to think about that, just somehow assuming that they then can sneak across the border in disguise without anyone expecting them. Really?
Presumably the attendant does not know how they are planning on sneaking across the border. In the end, it takes them several days. Much longer, presumably, than it would take a small group of soldiers on horseback to get through to Ios. how is it that the Regent is just sitting there waiting for them to show up? Surely he hasn't been sitting there for a week.
True, this additional journey also serves the eventual plot by giving Damen and Laurent considerable more time together as just men. (Still a MacGuffin)
and the baby is never seen. No idea where the child is or whether it's alive or anything else about it really except that it apparently is male because the attendant referred to it as "he" and Jokaste refers to it as the son of a king.
* additional note: for something that seems like it should be of great importance--the son of a king--it is only ever discussed briefly in a couple of chapters, and only to get them into Ios. I don't believe that it is ever even mentioned a that there might be a pregnancy.
thoughts? Comments? 
