No daemons

[Jez]

There are several characters in the books whose daemons are cut away, or eaten by the Spectres. What puzzles me is that their reaction seems to be different. Tony Makarios's daemon is cut away, yet somehow he manages to escape to a village and hide. He seems to have some sense of himself, asking Lyra where Ratter is and so on. But he dies soon after. The nurses at Bolvangar have had the same operation, yet they seem perfectly capable, albeit with no imagination or much initiative. They don't die after losing their daemons.

Then later on, in TSK, people are attacked by Spectres, and they basically become zombies. They hardly move, they don't react - there's a man who watches his son drowning indifferently. There seems to be some inconsistency here. All these characters lose their daemons, but their condition isn't quite the same. Is there some explanation?

[Dante]

For the nurses / Makarios relationship, I think I can offer a pretty solid answer - it's that the nurses were adults when their daemons were cut away; Makarios was a child. I trying to think of why this would happen, maybe I'll post it later, but I believe that's supposed to be why.

As to the spectre-cutting away discrepancy, I think - think - that it's because Spectres completely eat away the soul of a person. With cutting away, the soul is merely divided, so there's still some semblance of thought and feeling.

[Soapy]

What Dante said!

The daemons were destroyed by the Spectres and only cut away by the Gobblers.

Also, I think the nurses weren't forced to be cut away from theirs. I think it was the shock of being without his daemon that contributed to Tony's unhappy ending.

[Nona]

For the nurses / Makarios relationship, I think I can offer a pretty solid answer - it's that the nurses were adults when their daemons were cut away; Makarios was a child. I trying to think of why this would happen, maybe I'll post it later, but I believe that's supposed to be why.

I always assumed it was because the nurses still had their daemons actually beside them. Obviously the connection between them is permanently severed, but maybe there is still some comfort to be had in being physically close to your daemon. Tony was totally separated from his, and the trauma of it killed him

Mod edited for quotes.

[Leif]

I always assumed it was because the nurses still had their daemons actually beside them. Obviously the connection between them is permanently severed, but maybe there is still some comfort to be had in being physically close to your daemon. Tony was totally seperated from his, and the trauma of it killed him

That's what I thought as well.

[Ripper]

What Dante said pretty much sums it up, but I think that the people who were attacked by spectres also had Dust removed from them, losing their conscious thoughts, unlike Tony or the nurses.

[Taroh]

I'd have to agree with dante, I guess that because they were adults the effects of their daemons being cut away didn't affect them as greatly as when it happened to the kids. It is kinda sad though.