Tales from Earthsea: "Dragonfly"

by Ursula K. Le Guin
In this fifth book of The Earthsea Cycle, five separate stories show more of the magical land, from when the school for wizards was first established to how the villagers deal with love, sickness, and natural disasters.

Here are links to our lists for the tales in the collection: The Finder, Darkrose and Diamond, The Bones of the Earth, On the High Marsh, Dragonfly
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. petty
    inferior in rank or status
    Claiming no title or court privilege in the days of the kings, through all the dark years after Maharion fell they held their land and people with firm hands, putting their gains back into the land, upholding some sort of justice, and fighting off petty tyrants.
  2. interloper
    someone who intrudes on the privacy or property of another
    He came back unsuccessful and embittered and spent his age drinking the hard red wine from his last vineyard and walking his boundaries with a troop of ill-treated, underfed dogs to keep interlopers off his land.
  3. rote
    characterized by mechanical or thoughtless repetition
    Rose was muttering a rote spell, but it was her hands and her little short sharp knife that did most of the work.
  4. nominally
    in name only
    A grubby child appeared from under a bush where he had been asleep and trailed after the ewe, of whom he was nominally in charge although she was older, larger, better fed, and probably wiser than he was.
  5. intransigence
    stubborn refusal to compromise or change
    Once the Master of Iria said he would or would not allow a thing, he never changed his mind, priding himself on his intransigence, since in his view only weak men said a thing and then unsaid it.
  6. constrained
    lacking spontaneity; not natural
    The witch sighed, like the ewe, uneasy and constrained.
  7. complacent
    contented to a fault with oneself or one's actions
    “Wine of the Andrades,” said the young man with a modest, complacent smile.
  8. poultice
    a medical dressing spread on a cloth and applied to the skin
    And when the youngest daughter came down with a wasting cough, Birch’s wife dared not trouble the wise young man about it, but sent humbly to Rose of Old Iria, asking her to come in by the back door and maybe make a poultice or sing a chant to bring the girl back to health.
  9. dappled
    having spots or patches of color
    But he had an eye for beauty, and liked to look at the old house dreaming away in the dappled light of the early summer afternoons.
  10. lather
    exude foam resulting from excessive sweating
    When he got the lathered, gasping mare to stand still, he saw the girl as beautiful as a flowering tree.
  11. reprove
    reprimand, scold, or express dissatisfaction with
    Sometimes he smiled at her ignorance, but he never sneered at it or reproved it.
  12. stoutly
    in a resolute manner
    “Rose’s spells work as well as ever,” she said stoutly.
  13. ordained
    fixed or established especially by command
    “So I could go to Roke! And see, and learn! Why, why is it only men can go there?”
    “So it was ordained by the first Archmage, centuries ago,” said Ivory.
  14. eunuch
    a man who has been castrated and is unable to reproduce
    Maybe celibacy isn’t as necessary as the Rule of Roke teaches. Maybe it’s not a way of keeping the power pure, but of keeping the power to themselves. Leaving out women, leaving out everybody who won’t agree to turn himself into a eunuch to get that one kind of power.
  15. piety
    righteousness by virtue of being religiously devout
    As for the joke of it, the notion of actually getting her into the school on Roke disguised as a man, there was little chance of pulling it off, but it pleased him as a gesture of disrespect to all the piety and pomposity of the Masters and their toadies.
  16. toady
    a person who tries to please someone to gain an advantage
    As for the joke of it, the notion of actually getting her into the school on Roke disguised as a man, there was little chance of pulling it off, but it pleased him as a gesture of disrespect to all the piety and pomposity of the Masters and their toadies.
  17. rustic
    awkwardly simple and provincial
    But when he told her they’d have to hire passage on a ship, she said simply, “I have the cheese money.”
    He treasured her rustic sayings of that kind.
  18. yokel
    a person who is not intelligent or interested in culture
    In daylight, when he saw her big, dirty hands, when she talked like a yokel, a simpleton, he regained his superiority.
  19. terse
    brief and to the point
    “That would be unwise,” he said, with a good imitation of the Master Changer’s terse solemnity.
  20. tentatively
    in a hesitant manner
    When he very tentatively approached her, taking her hand, she struck him away with a blow to the head that left him dizzy.
  21. uncouth
    lacking refinement or cultivation or taste
    When his ears stopped ringing he stole after her, hoping the charm was working and that this was only her particularly uncouth way of leading him at last to her bed.
  22. oblige
    provide a service or favor for someone
    “You mean they’ll oblige a wizard? But you aren’t a wizard.”
  23. solemn
    dignified and somber in manner or character
    Down in their tiny cabin Dragonfly sat waiting for him, solemn as ever but her eyes blazing with excitement.
  24. ponderous
    slow and laborious because of weight
    He put a ponderous emphasis on the last word, and inwardly murmured, “Avert.”
  25. precarious
    not secure; beset with difficulties
    If he had known it would be this easy, he could have had her name and with it the power to make her do whatever he wanted, days ago, weeks ago, with a mere pretense at this crazy scheme—without giving up his salary and his precarious respectability, without this sea voyage, without having to go all the way to Roke for it!
  26. sham
    something that is a counterfeit; not what it seems to be
    It’s all lies, shams. Old men playing games with words.
  27. rictus
    a gaping grimace
    He turned, showing his teeth in a rictus of triumph.
  28. reproach
    a mild rebuke or criticism
    She looked at him without regret, or reproach, or shame.
  29. resonant
    characterized by a loud deep sound
    The door opened as a resonant voice behind it said, “Come in!”
  30. dissension
    disagreement among those expected to cooperate
    She has no place here nor ever will. She can bring only confusion, dissension, and further weakness among us.
  31. arbitrary
    based on or subject to individual discretion or preference
    The young heart rebels against such laws, calling them unjust, arbitrary. But they are true laws, founded not on what we want, but on what is.
  32. beguile
    influence by slyness
    But he lied to you and beguiled you.
  33. decrepit
    worn and broken down by hard use
    As for decrepit walls, mice, dust, cobwebs, and scant furniture, all that was quite homelike to Irian.
  34. recompense
    make payment to
    What the school did not supply for itself, he said, the farmers round about provided, considering themselves well recompensed by the protections the Masters set on their flocks and fields and orchards.
  35. unprecedented
    novel; having no earlier occurrence
    On Way, the phrase “a wizard without his porridge” meant something unprecedented, unheard-of.
  36. stifling
    characterized by oppressive heat and humidity
    She lay awake in the little house, feeling the air stifling and the ceiling pressing down on her, then slept suddenly and deeply.
  37. gaunt
    very thin, especially from disease or hunger or cold
    Outside was the man she had thought was a gardener, the Master Herbal, looking solid and stolid, like a brown ox, beside the gaunt, grim-faced old Namer.
  38. transgression
    the violation of a law or a duty or moral principle
    All this year the patterns of the shadows and the branches and the roots, all the silent language of his forest, had spoken of destruction, of transgression, of all things changed.
  39. defile
    spot, stain, or pollute
    No witches will defile sacred ground.
  40. sacrilege
    blasphemous behavior
    “Witchery,” they said, “sacrilege, defilement.”
Created on Tue Oct 11 16:27:08 EDT 2022 (updated Tue Aug 22 13:03:56 EDT 2023)

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