(dead) occtis tachonis

but getting back up to it in my rewatch (and specifically the scene about half an hour before it), i don't even know that vaelus was really the main problem he was having there?

occtis has this look, when he's upset about something but doesn't feel like there's any point to being upset, and it is all over his face through the entirety of brennan describing the fairy cave and planting the miller's road tree there. the more beautiful the description the more frustrated and miserable he gets, to the point of alex describing him as just despondently kicking at the water's edge

under normal circumstances, occtis would love this place, he's always been fascinated by new magic and faerie stuff and it's so beautiful and it's a safe bastion from the sundered houses and it's giving life to all the faeries in this city, temelow mentions they can all feel themselves aging slower when they're nearby, getting a small piece of their immortality back. thimble was occtis' only friend for the longest time and she's still the person he cares about most, something this good for her should be a happy thing for him too, and he knows that

but creating it almost killed him and he didn't get a choice in that. had alex not rolled a 21 on that con save, he would have died for this place to exist. no one would have wanted him to! thimble definitely would have been majorly conflicted, and he knows because he asked that vaelus didn't deliberately choose to sacrifice him here. but it still would have happened

and that probably hits a little too close to home as someone whose life (the real one, the one he's never getting back) was forcibly sacrificed ten days ago by people who should have cared for him but didn't, because his heart was of more use to them than his personhood

this is a worthy cause, how can he possibly argue vaelus shouldn't have done that, seeing all the good it's done for others? given what he actually says in that conversation, he might well have made the same choice had the choice been his. but it wasn't. and the fact that this was undeniably the correct choice is just the universe affirming that his family's mentality towards him was right. he is of more use dead than alive

and because of that, there is no fully right answer vaelus could have chosen here. had she remembered what this might cost in the moment, then either she would have chosen to do so anyway (going back on her promise to the seekers that she'd put her own life on the line for this before any of theirs, and actively declaring occtis an acceptable sacrifice), or she would have chosen to keep the stone out of the ritual and that would have been much much worse. in the most horrible way, being forgotten about is kind of the best of all worlds?

New Release: Narcissus [-Victoria-] Purple Cape, Red Cape and Dark Green Cape