#row chapter 14

That statement is just incorrect on SO many levels.

She didn't deliberately choose anything. She fucked up handling merzost, and she, herself, sees her loss as "punishment for greed".

“I didn’t sacrifice my power. It was taken from me because I fell prey to the same greed that drove you. I paid the price for tampering with merzost. Just as you once did.”

Rule of Wolves- Chapter 14

Her light isn't some tool to give up, to become a person who does no harm, it's what makes her herself. It's not a measure of harmfulness. It's her very being, her soul.

And what does "giving it up" change? Who does it help? How does it help?!

Alina's "sin" had never been burning so bright she damages others, it's avoiding responsibility to the point of shutting her eyes to harm done to others. Harm she could help prevent.

She might've chosen peace, but it's artificial one. It's living in a sponsored bubble at her fellow Ravkans' expense. The very same people, who are lead to believe she even paid the ultimate price to save them...

Rule of Wolves- Chapter 14

alternatively:

Ruin and Rising- Chapter 2

Yup!

Totally psychosomatic.

Alina waits for specific conditions to even attempt to summon.

She has a ready-made excuse as for why it doesn't work.

She's never been one to persist.

She still views her powers as something separate from her.

“It isn’t something separate from you,” Baghra snapped. “It isn’t an animal that shies away from you or chooses whether or not to come when you call it. Do you ask your heart to beat or your lungs to breathe? Your power serves you because that is its purpose, because it cannot help but serve you.”

Shadow and Bone- Chapter 13

That's failing in basics of Grisha teaching. Her mindset is of the very same girl, who couldn't summon, because she "Isn't Grisha.".

It was time to let go. That day on the Shadow Fold, Mal had saved my life, and I had saved his. Maybe that was meant to be the end of us. The thought filled me with grief, grief for the dreams we’d shared, for the love I’d felt, for the hopeful girl I would never be again. That grief flooded through me, dissolving a knot that I hadn’t even known was there. I closed my eyes, feeling tears slide down my cheeks, and I reached out to the thing within me that I’d kept hidden for so long. I’m sorry, I whispered to it. I’m sorry I left you so long in the dark. I’m sorry, but I’m ready now. I called and the light answered. I felt it rushing toward me from every direction, skimming over the lake, skittering over the golden domes of the Little Palace, under the door and through the walls of Baghra’s cottage. I felt it everywhere. I opened my hands and the light bloomed right through me, filling the room, illuminating the stone walls, the old tile oven, and every angle of Baghra’s strange face. It surrounded me, blazing with heat, more powerful and more pure than ever before because it was all mine. I wanted to laugh, to sing, to shout. At last, there was something that belonged wholly and completely to me.

Shadow and Bone- Chapter 12

Alina forgot the Light is her, not the sun on the sky or amplifiers on her body. Since her summoning depends on her will, her powers act accordingly.

See?

Alina is great in self-gaslighting and guilt-tripping. She did something terribly awful- using the unnatural merzost-, therefore punishment has to follow. And what is the one thing making her feel only good? What could her subconscious easily take away?

Looking at the end of her story and her appearance in RoW- even if her powers were only temporarily exhausted, or could be regained somehow, she will never wield them again.

“I didn’t sacrifice my power. It was taken from me because I fell prey to the same greed that drove you. I paid the price for tampering with merzost. Just as you once did.”

Rule of Wolves- Chapter 14

Alina: Despised and laughed at in her own house, but that's okay, because she knows. Lost a vital part of her being, killed a person she had metaphysical bond with. She can't ever even immitate the first, or talk about the second, because no one could (or would want to) understand.

Alina in RoW: "I'm happy now."

... because you can simply ignore long-term verbal abuse, when it's happening behind your back. Besides- The Darkling killed her shitty mother figure, so Alina simply hired herself ten more to shame her, instead of overcoming her mommy issues and become OPENLY assertive about her choices.

"I'm happy now."

... because living in unfriendly enviroment full of gloryfied disturbing memories is actually pretty comfy, once you paint the walls and turn it all into fairy tales to tell other fucked up children.

"I'm happy now."

Shadow and Bone- Chapter 19

While the previous chapters had plenty of Malina interactions, those felt a lot like short episodes. Here comes another more continuous one:

Finally? Some self reflection?

Best friends my ass! He didn’t rush to help her, because he thought she was in trouble. He thought he has a debt to repay...

Not “I forgot how I care about you.”, but “You were happy with another man!”.

Here comes the famous RoW retcon. You never saw me happy my ass!

Now, I’m aware this was meant as some great romantic proclamation, but what it sounds like is possession. As if he were some fixed point, and she left of her own free will. She just told him she felt lonely with him and his answer is basically “Do you realize now, how important I am to you?!”.

Once again, their previous relationship seems rather one-sided. How can you be surprised you miss your “oldest friend”?

Look what I’ve done for you!

“You’re MINE!”

Too little, too late. This is the lousest love confession I’ve ever read/seen. The wording just sounds like “You were nothing to me, but now ~I~ feel like you finally deserve my attention.”.

I suppose this was written as some meant-to-be solid OTP moment, but it leaves me fully indifferent, almost bored. I don’t even have to compare it to her first kiss with the Darkling. Obviously it’s not the case of “The writer can’t write ~ scenes well”, I’ve read better in this book.

Also-- I'd tried to bury that [foolish, lonely] girl and the love she'd felt ... but I wouldn't make that mistake again.- combined with- I would have waited for him forever.- reads a lot like “Now I’m okay being nothing.”. I would have waited for him forever sounds tragic, if anything.

Praise the antlered cock-blocker!