#twtwtwo

steel is one of the most compelling villains i've ever encountered. the brilliance of everyone at the table is clear in this story, but this episode was the culmination of a dance that aabria and brennan have been performing since the very beginning of the children's adventure.

suvi and her mother. sky and steel. the fact that aabria introduced suvi's justification machine far earlier in the story, and now we finally fully see where she got that from and how deep it goes.

we were realizing this whole time. since bracken. and every moment since we have known that steel manipulates. we learn that she lies, keeps secrets, ties off loose ends neatly and with layers of subterfuge. the geas on silver confirms it. sworn's fear confirms it. steel will not hesitate to eliminate complications.

then, the final straws. now we know just how long steel has been planning this. the curse on ame was always from the citadel. furthermore, not only did steel have a hand in suvi's parents' deaths, she was attacked by suvi's mother. the spell of wounding requires touch, and leaves white scars in its wake. they fought close. it's very likely that steel killed her best friend.

and the worst part is that it's so easy to follow steel's logic. the acadator discovered that the league of whispers was not betraying the citadel, but was in fact the whole point of the citadel. soft and stone knew it was wrong, and therefore the citadel was wrong. steel knew that the citadel couldn't be wrong, so whatever it did had to be right. and that's how she's conducted herself since.

i wonder how she justified it to herself. if she felt like they betrayed her first by betraying the citadel. she was taken there as a child. she has nothing else. the citadel has given her everything, so she must give everything to the citadel. any who believe otherwise are threats.

steel had a promotion and new scars when she came to fetch suvi. she was rewarded for stopping traitors.

maybe taking suvi and trying to mold her into the perfect soldier of the citadel was one last fucked up act of love for her friends: trying to save their daughter from their fate. maybe it was spiteful and calculating, to undo soft and stone's attempts at protection and to keep the person who inherited their brilliance brainwashed and stuck. i wonder if we'll find out in two weeks.