Dragon Wing

by: Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman

As I read this book for the second time, I had the chance to really look into details. This book, which the first of the seven "Death Gate Cycle" series, has a long and complicated plot, an interesting writing style and a surprising end.

I would like to continue analyzing characters as book reports, because that's the way I can really feel the character going through the adventures, and I can feel that I know the character personally.

The hero of the entire series, a Patryn (which is a race of demigods) named Haplo, would be the obvious choice. But I've decided, that another character, a human, named Hugo the Hand, would be a better choice.

What's so special about Hugo? Why did I chose him? The reason I chose Hugo, is that he is a very extraordinary man. Even though, he is not so important to the story of the entire series, he is the main character in the first book of the series.

Why is he so extraordinary? Hugo is trapped between great powers and greater powers, between wizards, dragons, demigods and a long list of people that want to kill him, for he is an assassin. And a successful one.

He hasn't got the skill of magic, and he is unaware of the big game that he's in, played by greater powers, fighting each other. But he survives through most of it, and die in the end, trying to defend the first woman he ever loved. Almost tragic.

But if you know the details around that tragedy, Hugo's Life seem dark and cruel, as the story begins, with Hugo's execution. He was close to death various times in his life, and always got away, the book says. As Hugo lay his head on the stone, and is about to be executed, a dragon with a messenger comes.

At this point of the story, the reader doesn't even know what world is he in. Arianus, kingdom of air, is a world built of floating islands. As the story unfolds, I discovered more and more details about the world Hugo lived and died in.

The messenger says "King's Business" and shows a letter from the king. Those two words can get you anything, the storyteller tells us and Hugo is free to go. That's what Hugo thought, when he discovered that actually he is only deeper in trouble.

I will not bother to continue and write here the rest of the story. I will now address it to the way Hugo's character is built by the writers. Hugo is described as a cruel, dark man. He has no pity. He agreed to kill a ten cycles (a measure in Arianus, close enough to years)old child for money.

Hugo became an orphan when he was very young. He didn't knew his parents at all. He was taken by Kir Monks, and was raised like one of them. The Kir monastery is a weird order of men, that wear only black live and only to die. They have nothing to do with the living, the book says, they only deal with the dead. They take care of corpses, and take lonely orphans that has no home and raise them to become Kir. Hugo escaped the monastery, after he killed the head monk.

But the Kir haunt him. They don't chaise him, they haunt him in his mind. He was raised to think that death is the master of all. But he escaped because he wanted to be his own master. Several times in the book, when Hugo's close to death, a black monk appears and asks him: "who's the master now?"

Self control was always the most important thing for Hugo. He trust no one but himself, and always act to do what he wants. He never let anyone do anything for him. Along the years, he had built walls around him, the book says, never let anyone or anything in. The cruel image grow stronger and stronger, as Hugo tells somebody how he killed his father.

Before he left the monastery he read his file. He was not wanted by his father. His mother couldn't take care of him, and his father notified the Kir to 'do what ever you want with the bastard.' His father was a Lord, from the high society and didn't want to have scandal.

Hugo is a man of action. Even Haplo thinks that, and Haplo doesn't think much of humans. Hugo is very skilled and he's a very tough rival, but as the story unfolds, there's a change.

Hugo can't kill the kid. He blames it on magic, but the reader know that the spell is broken. Hugo is charmed because he wants to be charmed. He convinced himself that he's doing it for the money, and that the kid worth more money alive, than dead.

This is true. But it means that Hugo must brake a contract. And Hugo the Hand never broke a contract, it's bad for the reputation. The writers tells us of a crack in the wall that Hugo built over the years. And there's an attempt by Hugo, to shut it, to have his darkness again.

But the crack widen, and the story gets more and more complicated, and Hugo finds himself braking a lot of his principals. He is becoming different, except form the pipe he keeps smoking.

There's a part in the book, that he has the chance to run away, to run away from the boy, the contract, the ray of light that came through the crack in the wall, and so he decide to do. But he changed his mind in the last moment, and carried out with mission anyway.

This is where he met the first and only woman he can ever love and die trying to save his and her life. That way we discover the change in him. That way, the writers gave a criminal, a death of honor. But because he was the only one that fell into a dead end, forced to walk to his death - I felt sorry for him.

One more thing about Hugo, that really helps to understand who he is, is the name he chose for his dragonship. He was the only human on Arianus that could fly an elven dragonship, not to talk about owning one. But he did.

His dragonship was named 'Dragon Wing' after a saying. 'Walk the Dragon Wing' was saying that meant walking on the edge, taking big risks, walking on dragon wings. Hugo says that he always felt that this a good descriptions to his way of life. And the book is named after his way of life, 'Dragon Wing'.