reiinai

I love that Alex is doubling down on the “people who grew up in fucked up situations don’t automatically know those situations aren’t fucked up when they leave them,” it’s such a fun way to take Occtis in a direction that is a little unexpected and narratively very jarring in a very enjoyable way. Like, the “neglected noble child” trope loves to have the character not understand that they deserve love or kindness, but it’s worth acknowledging that (at least in Occtis’s scenario) it might also result in him not fully understanding that People Cages Are Bad.

This is what struck me about the argument Thaisha and Occtis had. It’s not just her taking out her worries on him, it’s in reaction to his actual behaviour. He doesn’t register the cage as abnormal. He said something like “We had an important job” in relation to Tannasar, which means he’s viewing the Tachonis’ status and role as valid and still identifying them as “we”. He’s indicated that he hasn’t ruled out bringing Sylandri back. And then there’s other stuff like him trying (and succeeding) to intimidate the druids over Vaelus, and developing necromantic spells that are both very Tachonis and very antithetical to druid stuff.

Thaisha has realized out that she put her identity and role as a druid, which has been central to her for many years, on the line when she called Occtis not to go down the path to death. She could lose the core purpose of her life because she chose her love for him. And he is now repeatedly doing and saying things that highlight that his values and beliefs are very different from hers and that he’s open to doing things she would be dead-set against. He’s not on his family’s side but he gets where they’re coming from and there’s a lot of things he hasn’t deconstructed. And when on top of this the group is dealing with a very serious threat from the Tachonis, all that is going to influence how she reacts to him!

I just read a book by one of my favorite authors whose plots are essentially airtight, but the MC was walking on a country road on a cold winter night and she was knocked down and fell into a drainage ditch covered in ice, broke through and got covered in icy mud and water.

Then she had a “miserable” 3 more miles to walk to the inn.