Margaret Katherine Amanda Carpenter,[1] also called Molly, was a human wizard, now the Lady of the Winter Court of the Sidhe; she is the daughter of Michael and Charity Carpenter. Molly first appeared in Death Masks. She is first mentioned as Michael's eldest daughter in Grave Peril.
Molly Illustration
Biography
Molly is the first child of Michael and Charity Carpenter.[2]
During Death Masks, Molly is fourteen years old.[3] By this time she developes a rather Goth scene look in clothes, piercings, and make-up when not at home, but changed back to conservative clothes in the treehouse before going home.[3]
Molly at Spattercon!!!
Molly first manifested her magical power about two years before the events of Proven Guilty, when she instinctually created a veil. After coming home from school she had entered the house while still wearing her Goth clothes, confident her mother was out. When Charity, who had stayed home sick, happened onto her in the living room, Molly, in a panic, unconsciously veiled herself. Shocked to discover her mother did not acknowledge her, she went to her room to change her clothes, now aware that she might have magical talent.[4]
Molly was arrested for possession of marijuana and ecstasy, which she was caught holding during a police raid at a party, and sentenced to community service. Her father thought her apparent repentance was enough, but her mother insisted on further actions and restrictions. In the spring before Proven Guilty the familial situation escalated, resulting in Molly leaving home and dropping out of school.[1]
Personality
Molly is a lot like her mother. She is selfless and brave, but sometimes unable to see other points of view. However, unlike Charity, Molly seems to be outgrowing this trait. She is a loving daughter and big sister, and a hard-working, well-organized apprentice to Harry. When Harry Soul Gazes Molly he sees many different possibilities in her future. It may be that the black magic she used will affect her for the worse, or it may be that it will teach her better control in the future.
Harry nicknames her "grasshopper" (Kung-Fu TV show reference) or "padawan" (Star Wars), both references to her promising apprentice status. After coming under the Doom of Damocles she has seemingly grown to understand that mental manipulation is off limits. She is rebellious in the ways that you would expect from someone growing up in the stifling limitations of the Carpenter household. She volunteers to come to Chichén Itzá, despite her unsuitability for combat, and Harry correctly agrees to take her along, seeing that she has matured to the point where she can help. As Harry realizes, he himself gets into plenty of dangerous situations he only gets out of with the help of friends, so why would Molly be different.
Molly has a serious crush on Harry and has hit on him (without success) a few times, and has soulgazed Thomas Raith, expressing a great deal of empathy for his inner pain.[5]
Molly is severely hurt by Harry's rather callous decision to have her help him with his suicide, which lasts until Lea tells Molly that Harry is not dead.
Molly thinks of herself as much less capable than Harry, but this is actually untrue. She suceeds in keeping the Svartelves and the Fomor from signing a non aggression pact, which would have led to other nations of the Unseelie Accords doing the same, and allowing the Fomor to become a major supernatural power, if not THE major power. ( Bombshells). Because forcemagic is not her strength she often uses quick, tricky thinking, and illusion to get through dangerous situations. In this way she is exactly like Harry. Although she thinks that she is not ready to face dangerous situations, she handles them no worse than her mentor.
Abilities
Fan artist's rendering
Compared to those of her mentor Harry Dresden, Molly's magical abilities are more sensitive, finely tuned and delicate, though less powerful,[6] allowing her to easily perform many fine magical tasks, such as illusions and veils,[7] while making much more difficult for her to perform combat magic, due to her lesser brute magical strength and greater sensitivity to magical (and emotional) energies.[8]
In Small Favor, it's mentioned that Molly is extraordinarily sensitive when it comes to various magical energies. It's what makes her so good at: psychomancy and neuromancy.[8]
Unlike her mother Charity, Molly has been noted to possess very poor cooking skills; though she is very good at making coffee.[9]
After training under Lea, she has become capable of shielding, adept at using illusions, and tricking enemies into killing each other. Molly also has a sleeping spell that can safely incapacitate several people at once.[10]
After she put a dozen or so Big Hoods to sleep way too easily—with Neru—Harry thought that what she had done was hard and something to be expected only from a White Council wizard.[11]
Spells
- Main article: Molly Carpenter's spells
As of Changes, Molly has at least one named spell, Hireki, which is used to reveal anyone under a veil. She is also able to cast what she calls her "one woman rave," a display of dazzling light and sound. In "Ghost Story" she reveals a few more.
Magical strength
- Veils
- Verisimilomancy
- Psychomancy
- Holomancy
- Neuromancy [8]
In the series
Proven Guilty
- Main article: Proven Guilty
In Proven Guilty, after attempting to help cure her friends, Rosanna Marcella and Nelson Lenhardt, of their addiction to drugs through magic,[12] Molly was found guilty of breaking one of the Seven Laws of Magic by the White Council in Proven Guilty. Harry Dresden spoke in her defense and pleaded for her to be sentenced to the Doom of Damocles instead of a capital execution, accepting her as his apprentice, and both were placed under the Doom with Dresden being held responsible for the future actions of his new apprentice.[13]
Small Favor
- Main article: Small Favor
Turn Coat
- Main article: Turn Coat
Changes
- Main article: Changes
Ghost Story
- Main article: Ghost Story
In Ghost Story, six months after the fall of the Red Court, Molly is in her mid-twenties and has become jaded and cynical, and perhaps a bit insane.[14] She is potentially an official warlock and is currently wanted by the Wardens because, with Harry gone, the Doom of Damocles falls and her death sentence becomes reactivated from her trial. Molly acts as the Ragged Lady in the hope of keeping Chicago safe by creating a reputation similar to the one that Harry once had—to make the bad guys think there was a White Council wizard still in the City. The other members of the Chicago Alliance have tried to have an intervention for her, but she used her illusions on them and have most of them too frightened to even be in the same room as her.[15] She became the "Ragged Lady" under Lea's training,"[16] occasionally switching places with Lea.[17] Molly used illusions to trick a Fomor Servitor—who had kidnapped a little girl, and a corrupt cop—that the Servitor paid off in gold to look the other way, into killing each other.[17]
Two child ghosts brought Molly to Harry by the Big Hoods and Corpsetaker's hideout. He needed her to open a way for him and the ghost army. She reacted strongly when Harry said: "You're one hell of a woman, Molly."[18] Corpsetaker and Molly soulgaze and do mind battle—Molly's complex mental defneses resemble the the Enterprise star ship.[19] Harry followed Corpsetaker into Molly's mind. Just before the battle was about to end, Harry sent out an SOS and then reclaimed his memory of who really ordered his murder and realized how that damaged Molly.[20] Uriel showed Harry how Mortimer helped free Molly of Corpsetaker.[21]
Cold Days
- Main article: Cold Days
In Cold Days, Molly has begun to get her life back together. By this time, she's a full-fledged adult and, Harry notes, as capable as any White Council member (though renegade). She has also confirmed that she's still in love with Harry.
Following the death of Maeve, Molly has become the new Winter Lady.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Proven Guilty, ch. 10
- ↑ Grave Peril, ch. 21. Molly is only mentioned as the eldest daughter, not by name.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Death Masks, ch. 15
- ↑ Proven Guilty, ch. 41: "I walked home from school one day about two years ago and it was raining, so I ran straight inside. It was errands day, and I thought Mom was gone." "Ah," I said. "Let me guess. You were still wearing the Gothy McGoth outfit instead of what your mom saw you leave the house in. "Her cheeks flushed pink. "Yes. Only she wasn't running errands. Gran had borrowed the van and taken the little ones to get haircuts because Mom was sick. I was in the living room and I hadn't changed back. All I wanted was to sink into the floor so she wouldn't see me." [...] "I closed my eyes. Mom came in. She sat down on the couch and turned on the TV, and never said a word. I opened my eyes and she was sitting there, three feet away, and hadn't even seen me. I walked out really quietly, and she never even glanced at me. I mean, at first I thought she'd gone crazy or into denial or something. But she really hadn't seen me. So I snuck back to my room, changed clothes, and she was none the wiser."
- ↑ Proven Guilty, ch. 47
- ↑ White Night, ch. 3: "She’s not as strong as me, but she’s got a gift for the more subtle magic. Especially mental and emotional stuff."
- ↑ Small Favor, ch. 1: "The grasshopper[Molly] might not be able to put up a decent shield, but she could do veils like they were going out of style [...]."
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Small Favor, ch. 40
- ↑ Small Favor, ch. 35: "It turns out that Molly wasn't her mother's daughter in that respect. Charity was like the MacGyver of the kitchen. She could whip up a five-course meal for twelve from an egg, two spaghetti noodles, some household chemicals, and a stick of chewing gum. Molly... Molly once burned my egg. My boiled egg. I don't know how. She could, however, make a mean cup of coffee."
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 21-22
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 46
- ↑ Proven Guilty, ch. 32
- ↑ Proven Guilty, ch. 45-47
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 9
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 10
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 21
- ↑ 17.0 17.1 Ghost Story, ch. 23
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 41
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 48 and 49
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 49
- ↑ Ghost Story, ch. 50
See also
- Michael Carpenter
- Charity Carpenter
- Carpenter family
- Ragged Lady
- Leanansidhe
- Mouse
- Thomas Raith
- Morgan
- Vince Graver
- Anastasia Luccio
- Karrin Murphy
- Chicago Alliance
- Rosanna Marcella
- Nelson Lenhardt
- Merlin
- Jaguar Warriors
- Veil
- Psychomancy
- Warlock
- Doom of Damocles
- Molly Carpenter's spells
- Carpenter home
- Arctis Tor
- SplatterCon!!!
- Harry Dresden's Lab
- Harry Dresden's apartment
- White Council headquarters in Edinburgh
- White Council
- Demonreach
- Chichén Itzá
- Water Beetle
- Blue Beetle