#dark!elain

IC finally gets suspicious about Elain

They ask Lucien to try to see what's going on with her à la acowar

He's like fuck no am I using the bond to spy on my fucking mate

But then he notices how sus she's being and it goes one of two ways

Scenario A (short-term)

They're all sat down to dinner together with the IC or smth and Lucien just casually says "So Elain, have you buried any bodies for an infamous death god lately?"

The IC are like LUCIEN WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING

Elain obvs tries her innocent denial act and Lucien just gives her this Look and softly says "Tell me another lie, Elain."

Scenario B (long-term)

Lucien is like desperately trying to figure out what Elain is doing and how to stop her and how to help her

He's very conflicted, trying not to spy through the mating bond but is still physically spying on her and its invasive but he wants to protect everyone and her. Lots of internal angst.

Elain corners him and confronts him about it, he confronts her right back

Elain breaks down shes freaking out because she made a deal with Koschei to turn back human but now he's got her doing increasingly awful stuff and she's scared

Lucien is obvs crushed inside but gets Helion to find a way or a different Trove item that can turn Elain back and then they use Elains closeness to Koschei to defeat him

But now Elain has to choose whether to turn back or not

It really irks me how it’s always underlined that she’s alla sweet and innocent... and not very interesting. As if to be cool you have to be a trained warrior.

Friendly reminder, that Nesta, the one who would do anything to save her dear sister, tells her that “at least you’d become interesting”. This is so wrong on so many levels.

But that’s all. 

I really don’t see her being a villain or at least... not a good one. Mostly because I also think that people want to just see her a bit more unhinged and I’m like well she can do that now. No one even pays attention to her. Nesta was like go sleep with strangers, drink, just don’t get involved with the cauldron. Considering what we know too, I really feel that Elain does have a lot of freedom. It’s herself that’s just more simple. Which you know... it is what it is. It’s not what I want to read, but sure. I just also don’t want her to be full blown hero, since... I don’t see that for her either. She’s a relatively neutral character to me because she doesn’t out rightly fight for the cause, or at least we haven’t seen it where she takes the responsibility consequences be damned, she’s not really involved overtly before or after ACOWAR, but she is also not a bad person. She’s very in the middle, normal really. Which again.. ehh. Not something I want to read, but not a bad character. 

But In my own Dark!Elain theory, it’s that everyone thinks that Merrill is the one who is divulging information to Koschei, but it’s actually Elain. I imagine it’s not on purpose at first, but I really want Elain to get jealous and envious and typically middle-child-ish where she’s feeling abandoned and left out, and I want it pointed at Nesta specifically (as it always is), and I don’t know if she really knows she’s talking to Koschei, it could just be an accident that is fueled by anger that have deep rooted consequences. But he does need a new champion and I really just have a hard time picturing it’s going to be officially Merrill--some off the wall character who has had like two lines. But I also really don’t want it to be Koschei taking control of Elain, because again victim rhetoric that I hate. I want her to be consciously aware even if she doesn’t specifically know the full consequence, which is why I don’t see her stealing the trove or anything and giving it to him. That would be a little complicated I think, without her being controlled in some way or another. Thus proving what she is trying to negate. Because if she consciously gave the trove to Koschei fully aware of what it does, then... damn. How do you come back from that?  

But I also think it just seems fitting that Koschei would want Nesta. All baddies do, and who can really blame him lol? Who can really free him? Who is really his enemy, if not the one blessed by the mother? Who is really advantageous to have around if she’s not his enemy? Nesta has been propositioned so many times that I doubt that will stop, even with less power, because I’m still assuming that she has a usable amount now, instead of an overwhelming amount that she can’t control. She has the dead trove at least and it’s locked away by her blood. So let Koschei want Nesta. Let Elain accidentally help Koschei get Nesta or just have an upperhand. Let this be a sibling conflict that is like DAMN, Elain. Let Elain then have to figure out how to help, because the stakes just got higher. Let Lucien help her, because everyone else is too busy with other conflicts that are associated with that. Let this be a moment where Elain and Nesta have a concrete line drawn between them that they don’t know how to get past. Let it make Nesta angry. Let it make Elain feel regret, sympathy, empathy, ANYTHING that is for her sister’s emotional state. Let it highlight her own faulty views on things and maybe... her own faulty views on her mating bond. Because she had been feeling at a loss for control, but she was in control through this whole situation and it still ended up bad. Let her have to take control of her own actions and then learn that she must actually apply that to her life, because news flash guys Elain isn’t happy in her current state, she is not just gardening and avoiding people for fun-seys. 

I would DIE for this plotline. Honestly I’m gunning for a Dark!Elain arc. There has got to be something rotting/gone wrong beneath the surface. Part of why I love Elain so much is that gardening imagery and stuff is SO JUICY for a dark character arc. Idk that we will get that, but it’s just sitting there waiting should Sarah want to go there. And I honestly think it would be so great.

I mean I could talk forever about how villains and darkly powerful people are often depicted as tending gardens in movies and books. Like. Ugh. And how gardens are this thing you literally lord over. And constantly tend. And how just beneath the surface things are literally rotting and writing and squirming in the dirt. Like it’s just JUICY for a dark arc. It’s also juicy for the idea of control. Elain not controlling anything in her life so shy hyperfocuses on the one thing she can. And daaamn if/when that stops working or she can’t get to it or she gets pulled away or can’t lose herself in it the right way.... oof the potential for an explosion of angst is just so good.

I keep thinking that she’s like.... deal drugs or doing something no one expects behind the scenes. @a-fawn-in-the-night-court recently takes to me about the idea that Elain could be self harming and hiding it. Which i think it totally on the table with how the series has gone and SJM’s hard lean into adult themes and topics. I also thought maybe she was already sneaking around with Azriel or something when the Az POV was announced. I still think she could be a low key shadowsinger. I would love if she was somehow sending info the Greyson. Or even if it was, like, by accident. Like she was talking to soemone she thought was a good person but ended up menipulating her for info and using Greyson’s name to do it. The possibilities are endless. But I really LOVE the idea that she could be actively and knowingly doing it.

Maas has never had a “good” main character turn into the villain (or soemthing close to the villain). And I would be here for that.

This definitely wasn't going to be this long (an intended paragraph), but here we are. I was just curious as to why some Archeron’s get along better than others, and then I digressed into Nesta and Feyre and Dark!Elain....

I believe that Nesta and Elain work so well is because they’re incredibly similar. Where Nesta builds her walls a mile high and three feet thick to keep others from seeing her insides, Elain does the same thing except she decorates hers with flowers. Not a lot is known about either character, and sure, that’s a consequence of not having their perspectives, but Nesta is aggressive to hide her feelings and Elain is nice to do the same. In the case of Nesta and Elain, like calls to like and their relationship may stem from them hiding their feelings.

This is opposed to Feyre who is more physical with her emotions. After she crosses the wall, she fights through the trials, throws the spear at Amarantha, explodes with her panic attack, wears through Cassian’s punching gloves, shoves Rhys to the ground after he used her as bait with the attor, chews Rhys out for hiding the mate bond, paints the cabin, kills the attor with burning malice, etc.

I’m not saying that Feyre’s actions are better or that Nesta and Elain’s are, but what I do see is that the two sisters who stuff and hide their feelings are the ones who bond more. Nesta’s protection of Elain may have less to do with how fragile Elain is, and more to do with how she sees herself in Elain. She understands Elain’s need to hide herself, and I think inside Nesta deeply wants to understand Feyre. That moment when Nesta says, “That was why you painted the night stars on your drawer,” is the moment when she finally sees her sister. The significance of Feyre painting that image way back when is another physical representation of her feelings, and I think Nesta realizing that could be the moment when Nesta gets it. Her sister is not one to build walls, she acts out everything she feels inside. To supplement their possible relationship development, when Feyre is on the bridge with Cassian she describes Nesta as feeling too much saying that “She comes across as rigid and vicious, but I think it’s a wall.” (my italics) There is no coincidence that Feyre’s story begins once she crosses a physical wall, Nesta hides herself behind an emotional wall, and now all the Archeron’s have crossed said physical wall.

When Nesta looks for Feyre, she sympathizes with Feyre a little at the wall. And I believe that Nesta will be doing more (emotion wise and physical plot involvement wise) in the next book which will cause them to grow closer.

But in addition to that, I said before that Elain built the same walls like Nesta except she decorated hers with flowers. Which first of all, her constant emotional state is almost always polite, which she chooses in contrast to Nesta’s anger. Second, her fiancé literally has walls built around his property. Now while that obviously is symbolic of her lover, it is symbolic of Elain as well. She wouldn’t be attracted to that unless Maas wanted to demonstrate this whole internal/physical wall thing and how Elain needs to move through two walls. Going off that, Nesta admits to Feyre that Graysen is fine, except his father and the wall which Nesta “thinks… looks like a prison”. Nesta’s statement along with the idea that she approaches The Wall marks her, perhaps subconscious, attempt at change. (*cough cough* letting those emotional walls down *cough cough*)

Think about it: we’re always told how she’s the sweet innocent sister, without much personality who only cares about tending her garden. WHAT IF, she proves everyone wrong?

AND SHE WEARS ONLY BLACK, BECAUSE FUCK YOU CASSIAN AND YOUR UNREQUESTED AND UNWANTED SHITTY OPINIONS.

But let’s think about it. If it’s her POV would it be her just actively fighting this temptation I’m assuming would be from Koschei because he’s down a cauldron friend? But then how would romance even be made except by just someone trying to actively save her? I could see it working if she was only a side character but she’s suppose to be a main right? Unless we’re just gonna operate on her liking to be dark having her whole story either be her doing corrupt things and then falling in love and she hoping that they’re as corrupt as her or she not liking the corruption and choosing instead to be good? But then like.... what would her being corrupt even mean? Her stealing the trove. I’m assuming she can use them. But then is she still really the main character again, or rather a plot point/side villain. Also that cannot just be the only thing that happens, but it would be the biggest thing that happens and how would you fix that mess without giving the problem to other POVs when it falls into Elain’s character growth. Because then we’d probably have to switch back to someone who is stronger than her to defeat her and break whatever is going on with her/ get the items back/deal with koschei because I doubt it would be that easy that just a love interest could do it. Especially since it wouldn’t be just a love interest problem. And then my issue with this is that it could potentially become more about the love interests healing than Elain herself gaining her independence and autonomy. Because by being the villain she does not gain independence or autonomy. Either people learn to not trust her or they go back to what they did before, and say oh Elain it wasn’t your fault. Just sit back relax lol.

Unless it’s Elain being lured to do something, actually doing it even if the intention wasn’t necessarily in a bad place, and then having to fix that mistake. Or acknowledging the fact that when Elain stabbed the king of Hybern she did it in direct relation to protecting her sister. So it could potentially be the narrative of Elain once again proving that she can also protect her sisters. Which in my opinion would be a lot easier to write but maybe not as interesting, though I’m sure there would be a lot of growth in that for her specifically. Because I would hate for Elain’s arc to not be about Elain. Which is some of the issues I find around the ship wars. Even in this book, Nesta is the center in which all revolves even Cassian’s narrative takes a step back. Cassian very much did not get as much development as Nesta and he still needed it most definitely. So, I would hate for Elain to be a plot point in order to further the development of Azriel or Lucien. Which is why I favor sometimes more Elucien than Elriel becuase Azriel will definitely be the main main If it would be them. He already is more of a main main than Elain. We have his POV already. We have nothing of Elain except how she’s viewed to others. I don’t know maybe SJM will fully embrace the side character personality of Elain, which would be interesting.