: Yeah, I remember that. They draw him into an inn full of
: rebels that the Company had captured and collapsed the
: whole thing on him while he was in the cellar so that
: Soulcatcher could get all the credit for destroying
: the Rebels. This kind of got me thinking about the
: nature of true names though. Do true names have power
: of all mages or just the most powerful? If so, why is
: Alric seemingly unaffected when Soulblighter and Balor
: utter his name? He doesn't even make an effort to hide
: it. And it doesn't seem to bother The Deceiver when
: Shiver calls him Myrdred but it does affect her to be
: called Ravanna. Is Myrdred and Alric really the two
: Archmages true names? And if true names hold so much
: power over the mage and Alric knew that Balor was
: Connacht why did he call him Balor in the Last Battle
: instead of Connacht and if it was beleived that
: Soulblighter was Connachts leiutenant Damas why
: doesn't Alric use his name in Myth II? The only thing
: I can come up with is that all the mages in Myth hide
: the names they were given at birth from everyone. But
: then how would anyone know if a baby was a magic user
: or not? Then everyone would have to go by a different
: name at least until they determined that they had no
: magical talent. It just kind of confused me how a true
: name could be so powerful against some and useless
: against others.
I think you're probably right that none of the names *we* hear are *anyone's* true names. Not even Ravanna--surely someone would have randomly gone "Ravanna, I say your name!" by now and crippled Shiver, right? Also, true names don't have quite as much power in Myth as in the Black Company; we know that having a bit of the sorcerer himself is more useful.
I think that perhaps everyone, mage or no mage, has a true name they keep secret. That's the way it is in LeGuin's "Wizard of Earthsea" novels; you get a true name when you're born, and you only ever reveal it to a best friend or a trusted teacher. A true name is less of a weakness if you're not a mage--if your initial magical ability is 0, it doesn't really matter if it stays at 0--but it can still be used against you in spells and things, so even non-mages like to keep quiet about their true names.
--SiliconDream
