#willark

just finished bloodmarked and YOUCHHHHH-

but i do wanna talk about will in this book for a second because i think his arc throughout is just so interesting!!

will’s actively the most lawful good character in the series tbh, in the sense that he has intense set of morals and care towards the people he’s surrounded by. his entire life was built on him being a healer, the only healer at the southern chapter in fact by the time bree gets there, and that manifests into the very core of his being.

it’s his high morals and belief systems that shape the foundation of his character. and yet, with everything that happens in bloodmarked, there’s a incredibly long list of things that challenge said morals. being forced to do things to bree in the institute, going through the agony of whitty’s death, killing that demon and watching jones (jonas(?)) die in one fallow swoop. and that only happens in really the first 200 pages.

and while it’s clear this trauma is affecting him, presenting through anger or hunger for knowledge, we don’t ever see that affect his morals or the treatment of those he cares about. because those are what shape who he is. he still deeply cares for every person who’s not out for their necks; in fact, he spends every waking hour caring for or (physically or emotionally) healing his friends.

but what i do love about his arc is how his trauma isn’t shadowed away from us. we see the fiery loyalty and protectiveness he has towards his friends. he doesn’t get the sad boy trope that is often forced onto soft male characters but rather, tracy shows how an intense amount of pressure can manifest into negative coping mechanisms at times. when everything in your life keeps going wrong and you, yourself, have to try and put the pieces back together, there’s a natural and deep frustration that settles in that chasm.

while it may seem obvious, theres a theory/term in the psychological field is called the frustration-aggression hypothesis. This explains that constant frustration will naturally lead into more aggressive behavior. This is especially true for men, because of the gender roles that are forced onto them; the importance of being strong or striving to gain dominance over others are pushed onto to them usually during childhood and beyond. not to say that will is struggling under the issue of masculine gender roles, but it’s more to highlight that it’s only natural for his trauma to present with anger rather than sadness, numbness, or any other way trauma can show itself.

not to mention that he’s an awaken scion of gwain, in which he’s physically the strongest two hours everyday. so therefore, he has that much more opportunity to react to his trauma with aggression.

and yet, unlike sel (no hate towards sel, just a statement of fact), he never takes it out on anyone (except those who deserve it). no matter how much shit he faces, he manages other people’s emotions at every turn while trying to manage his own. i do think that this will backfire on him at some point because it’s only natural (and he 100% deserves to yell at someone), but for bloodmarked, he manages to keep his cool in front of his friends most of the time.

on the other hand, when anger is not actively presenting itself, instead, it’s his intense desire for learning. bree points this out at the end of legendborn, but i also think it’s shown all throughout bloodmarked. the conversation at valec’s bar where he talks about merlins sticks out especially.

it goes back, in my eyes, to another foundation of will’s character, being “useful.” will’s trained his whole life to not only be a warrior like the rest of the legendborn, but at the same time, be a healer. he knows how to read people, to stay calm under pressure, how to calm others under pressure, how to regulate others emotions, just the ability to heal (something no other legendborn at the southern chapter can do) is a stand-out.

to sum it up, his entire life is all about helping other people.

so he’s been set up to be the people pleaser™️ pretty much. so another part of his defense mechanism is diving into what makes him useful, healing and knowledge.

(i also think part of this extreme hypervigilance on others’ emotions as well as his deep knowledge on a number of different magic related topics is founded in neurodivergence but that’s a conversation for a different post.)

the 3rd aspect that i want to talk about as well, which is more in the background, is exhaustion. in bloodmarked, they’re all constantly on the run. in the case of bree and sel, they’re doing a ton of fighting, which is exhausting to both of them as well, but there’s also will who is doing both fighting and healing.

another psychological term is general adaptation syndrome which describes the process your body goes through when you are exposed to any kind of stress, positive or negative. there’s 3 stages, alarm, resistance, and exhaustion. alarm, which is someone’s first reaction to a stressor, like a character’s reaction to seeing a demon or the increased heart rate before a fight, etc.. resistance is how someone reacts during or after the cause of the stress, which generally lasts the longest out of the 3 stages. it’s how your body adapts to it. this is basically getting used to the increased stressor and finding ways to cope with/push the symptoms away, the flight before falling in a way. this, for the average person, can have positive effects if the stress isn’t traumatizing or debilitating but if it’s constant, that can result in the negative consequences of anxiety, C-PTSD, etc.. finally, the last stage of exhaustion is when your body is unable to hold up under the conditions of stress and becomes, as established, exhausted. will presents this at the end of bloodmarked, specifically in the scene of alice being in a coma. he’s clearly having a hard time with not being able to help alice anymore than he already has; it’s clear in the dialogue that he’s tired. there’s not more that he can do to be useful. he’s quite literally at the end of his rope at a number of different points in the book, but we see him quickly push it down this stage of general adaption until he quite literally can’t anymore (end of bloodmarked).

buttttt i think that is part of why i think lark is such a good partner for will. will physically can’t heal lark due to him being part-demon. while this could have devastating consequences later on, lark is someone he can’t use his main skill on. therefore, in william’s eyes at least, he can’t ever be “useful” to lark. yet, that can further push will to explore who is his outside of being a healer (UGH I LOVE THEMMMM😭😭).

anyways, this was meant to be a quick post about will’s trauma but turned into a psychological analysis, sorry about that (not sorry lolol)!