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i_read_whatSo last time, Niall, Ian and Gisella were on their way back to Homana. There have been some positive developments by way of partially shaking off mind control and maybe not needing to commit ritual suicide! W00t!
We rejoin Niall and Gisella in Homana-Mujhar. And Gisella really doesn't seem to be doing well.
She stood in a corner of the antechamber, hugging herself. Hugging herself, rocking herself, singing to herself. Softly, so very softly; she meant to disturb no one. She meant only to lock herself away from the fear of what must come.
I stroked the hair from her eyes. She had gone away from me to that very private place she had sought more and more the closer we came to Mujhara. I had lost her somewhere on the road from Hondarth. Physically she was with me, but otherwise she was not.
She sang. She hugged. She rocked.
Poor thing. Anyway, somehow they'd managed to get into the palace without some kind of grand procession, I guess, because Aislinn's at the door of the room. Gisella just keeps singing and rocking, so Niall goes to greet his mother.
Aww.
“Say nothing.” Her words were muffled; most of her face was pressed against my chest. “Just—let me hold you.”
And so I let her hold me, even as I held her. It was odd to think of her as the woman who had borne me nineteen years ago, even as Gisella would bear my child. Somehow it was impossible to think of the Queen of Homana as ever being little more than a woman in travail, trying to give Homana an heir for the Lion Throne.
Hah, you have no idea. Also, Niall can't do math, since, per Aislinn, he's been gone fourteen months. He should be twenty now. Donal also enters.
I released my mother and went at once to him, to clasp his arms Cheysuli-fashion and then pull him into an embrace. In all the years of my life I had wanted to do it, and yet somehow I never had. He had seemed closed to me, somehow; closed to demonstrations of affection.
I am incredibly shocked to hear that Donal is not emotionally accessible to his son. Shocked.
But to be fair, Donal is actually pretty emotional here:
“Leijhana tu’sai,” he murmured fervently. “All those months I had to be strong for your jehana…yet there was no one to be strong for the jehan.”
I could not imagine my father needing anyone but himself. And yet, once I might have said the same about my brother. “You know about Ian?” I stepped back out of the embrace. “The messenger did tell you he is alive?”
“Aye,” my mother said dryly. “Your father made him repeat it four times, just to be certain.”
I searched for resentment and found none; she was genuinely relieved. But I was not certain how much was for my father’s sake rather than my brother’s.
a) fuck you Donal. Yes, I'm not being fair. No, I don't care.
b) The Aislinn-Ian plot thread is so interesting and the main reason I regret that this book is in first person. Niall is pretty self-absorbed, which is understandable given his age and the pressure he's under, but it also means that there's a lot that we don't see.
I'm also pretty annoyed that we never got to see Aislinn and Donal adapt to having Ian and Isolde living with them. I don't think Donal was wrong to bring them to the palace, but it's a massive adjustment. And his and Aislinn's relationship was so fraught that it can't have helped to add a traumatized child into the mix. (Isolde was an infant, but Ian was old enough to have some idea of what happened.)
Donal asks after Ian, and we learn about a Cheysuli practice that becomes more important in these later books:
“Ian is—at Clankeep.” I saw the minute twitch of surprise in his face. “He said he required—cleansing… and that you would understand.”
“I’toshaa-ni.” My father turned away from me as if to hide his thoughts and feelings. But when he turned again I saw a residue of a fear I could not comprehend. “Is he all right?”
“Well enough,” I answered. “Tasha is mostly recovered and so Ian is more himself, but—” I could not avoid the truth any longer, and so I would not “—he is not the warrior I knew before we left for Atvia.”
“No. Not if he is in need of i’toshaa-ni.” Troubled, my father looked more grim than I could expect of a man who knew both of his sons were alive when he had believed them lost.
1) I'toshaa-ni is a really interesting concept to me. I'm not sure we ever get a clear look at what it entails, but it's going to come up more and more often as a character beat. Different characters have different views on the practice.
2) It's possible that we've seen it, or at least seen it alluded to before. I'm thinking of when Finn attacked/was attacked by Electra the first time and fled the castle. There was mention of him being gone for a few weeks. Carillon, not being Cheysuli, wouldn't likely be aware of the details.
3) This also gives us a bit of a glimpse of an ongoing cultural issue, also very briefly introduced in Song of Homana which is that the Cheysuli are VERY bad when it comes to disability and also mental health. To give Roberson credit, however, I think it's a deliberate piece of values dissonance. We're not supposed to see the excommunication of a man who loses a hand, or the claustrophobic man constantly berate himself in disgust, or the father afraid for his non-neurotypical son's competence as good things. The Cheysuli culture is in many ways harsh and unforgiving and has its ugly sides as well.
So anyway, Aislinn is puzzled by this and asks what could be keeping Ian away from his family. Donal gives us an explanation.
“A ritual of cleansing,” my father said, patently reluctant to speak of it at all. “It—is a private thing…when a warrior feels his spirit soiled by something he has done—or by what others have done to him—he seeks to cleanse himself through i’toshaa-ni.” He made a gesture of subtle finality and I knew the subject was closed.
Still not terribly enlightening. It's also very sad. And I'm not really sure a practice that re-enforces the idea that a rape victim must be cleansed of what was done to him is really all that conducive to recovery. But at least it's something, I suppose.
And then Gisella enters the room. And everyone is shocked, not in the least of which, because Gisella is pregnant. Okay, and this is bullshit.
“Niall,” There was no hesitation on my father’s part, no careful search for diplomacy. “She is as well come as your cheysula ever could be…but what your jehana means to say is that the Homanans will claim the child is not your own.”
“Does it matter what they claim?” Beneath my hands, Gisella trembled. “When have you ever cared?”
He did not smile, my father, being less than pleased with me. “On the day when I at last understood what my tahlmorra truly entailed, I was made to care. But you may not have that chance.” He did not so much as look at Gisella, being too intent on me. “Even now there are growing numbers of Homanans who rally around a faceless, nameless bastard, known only as Carillon’s son. Not his grandson, Niall—his son. And as those numbers grow, so does the threat to you. So does the threat to the Lion. And, by the gods!—so does the threat to the prophecy of the Firstborn!”
Okay, wait one FUCKING minute here, Donal. (And Ms. Roberson.)
a) Niall and Gisella are ALREADY MARRIED. That was the whole point of the fucking proxy marriage. Otherwise, he could have just married Deirdre, a woman who has almost all the necessary blood of the prophecy (one MORE than Gisella) and isn't an incestuous blood relation!
b) Niall has been gone for fourteen months! Why on Earth would anyone think the kid isn't his?! No one needs to know the full details of his captivity. Claim he stayed in Atvia until his wife conceived.
c) While it isn't Donal's fault that the Carillon's bastard exists, I seem to recall that there's a faction of Cheysuli who are more than happy to offer a different candidate to the throne. One that Donal DID have a part in creating. So fuck off, Donal.
d) It's a fine thing for the man with a wife and a mistress to get angry at his son for having sex with his wife. Obviously, he doesn't know what we know: that Niall wasn't in his right mind when the sex happened. But still. Fuck off, Donal.
“No, Aislinn. He will have to know the truth.” He moved closer to me, confronting me squarely, still ignoring Gisella. “On the day our kinsman has you slain in the name of Homanan rule, will you ask then if it matters what the Homanans claim?” His face, like his voice, was taut with suppressed emotion. And now he did look at Gisella. “Will you ask it when they have slain her as well, because she bears a child who might become a threat to them? Think of that, Niall, if not of yourself.” He smiled, but there was no humor in it. “And now—ask me again.”
...how the fuck is ANY of this Niall's fault, you fucking asshole?
Anyway, Niall is chastised and agrees that the wedding should be very soon. Even though the whole point of the proxy wedding was to forego that need. Also, fucking lie, you morons. Claim they married in Atvia. Alaric wants to see his daughter on the throne of Homana, so he'll back you up. Stop being fucking morons.
Aislinn, meanwhile, is angsting about the fact that her beloved father sired a bastard that is giving them so much trouble. Oh, honey. Carillon was terrible. It is what it is.
And then of course, there's Gisella, who asks if Donal is the Mujhar:
Color came into her waxen face. Some of the weariness dropped away. “Donal of Homana! My father speaks of you.”
My father’s smile was wry. “Aye, no doubt he does. And does he speak of me with kindness?”
He did not expect her to answer honestly. He expected embarrassed prevarication. But then, he did not know Gisella.
“No,” she said, with all the guilelessness of a child. “He says you are a leech upon the treasury of Atvia, and that one day he will squash you.”
I am rather fond of Alaric. Anyway, Donal is good humored about that, and basically just says that Alaric created his own position and Gisella can tell him that when she sees him. Dude, it's not her fault.
Gisella rambles a bit about being needed here. Then remembers that there's a thing she has to do. She starts to curtsey, then:
Immediately he stepped forward. “Gisella, there is no need for that—”
—and she was up, clawing godfire from the air with her left hand while her right hand clawed for his face.
No. Not clawed. Her hand was filled with a knife.
...is it wrong that I'm kind of cheering for Gisella?
Anyway, it's pretty chaotic. Niall holds Gisella back as she chants the word dead over and over again. He shouts at them to leave her alone, claiming that it's weariness over the child. I'm not sure if this is lingering mind control or denial, and the book doesn't really give us a hint here.
Donal and Aislinn are rather understandably pretty fucking upset/angry right now. Gisella's pretty clearly insane after all. And when Donal wonders aloud if this was something Lillith did to her, Gisella again identifies Lillith as her mother. And tells them point blank that her father shot her mother out of the sky.
“My father slew my mother,” she said brightly, and sucked on a piece of hair.
“Gods,” my father choked. “That ku’reshtin murdered Bronwyn, but it was I who sent her there.”
“Donal, no, do not blame yourself!” My mother’s hands were on his arm. “I beg you; do not do this to yourself—”
“I gave her in marriage to that man…I made her wed him when she wanted nothing of it!”
I won't lie, I do find Donal's pain entertaining. Fuck you, dude. But it's essentially the same thing we saw over and over again in Legacy of the Sword. Donal isn't mentally ill. He's capable of guilt and empathy. He just does this shit ANYWAY.
I'm not happy to see Aislinn bend over backward to excuse him either, but I do appreciate her clear appraisal of the situation:
My mother looked at Gisella. “You cannot marry that.”
“He has to,” my father said wearily. “The prophecy requires it.”
It really doesn't!
The prophecy requires the blood of four warring kingdoms and two magical races! Gisella is Niall's first cousin! She has the same blood he does! The only difference is that Gisella has Atvian blood through her father and Niall has Solindish blood through his mother.
DEIRDRE ALSO has Atvian blood! Moreover, she has Erinnish blood too! That's the fourth warring nation! (Homana + Solinde + Atvia + Erinn) They're a generation ahead of schedule!
I know I ranted about this before, but it's still fucking true!
(I'm not a fan of Aislinn's dehumanization of Gisella there, though.)
Oh, and by the way, Donal's still an asshole.
“She just tried to slay you!”
“And once, you tried to do the same.”
It was clear she had made herself forget that once she had been no less a tool for murder than Gisella. That once Tynstar, through Electra, had set a compulsion within her mind: to slay the man she was meant to wed. I knew the story. My father had told me once.
“Oh gods,” she said brokenly, and tried to turn away.
But my father did not let her. “Shansu,” he said, “it is over. A long time over.”
Go fuck yourself, Donal. Do it with a rusty rake and die of tetanus.
Aislinn, wisely, asks what if Gisella tries again. Donal, stupidly, points out that Aislinn only tried once. Aislinn points out that this was because they had Finn get the bullshit out of her head. Gisella, on the other hand, was raised by parents who specifically hate Donal, and thus doesn't really need to be mentally boobytrapped to try to murder him.
Donal is a fucking idiot.
No, really, look at this:
“Donal, have sense! Gisella has spent her life with an Ihlini witch as well as with a father who despises you. Do you think she will not try again?”
“Not if I defuse the trap-link…if there is a trap-link.” He looked at me. “Niall, you know what I must do.”
"IF" there is a trap-link. THERE MIGHT NOT BE. Aislinn has a point here. Gisella is mentally handicapped girl raised by people who hate Donal. She doesn't need to be mind-controlled to hate him!
Niall tries to put off the impending mind rape, pointing out that Gisella is tired, but Donal declares that he won't risk his son or himself to the chance she might be ruled by Ihlini and tells Niall to "prepare her."
You are so fucking gross. Also, she could be "ruled by Ihlini" WITHOUT being mind controlled. THEY RAISED HER.
Anyway, this is a new experience for Niall as well. Apparently, he's never witnessed the non-shapeshifting side of Cheysuli powers. He tries to get Gisella ready and prepare her as much as possible. And for her part, Gisella says something revealing.
I put Gisella to bed, covering the mound of her belly with a silken coverlet as she leaned back against the bolsters. She needed food, rest, sleep. She needed to be rid of the weight of the child.
“Two more months,” I said aloud, splaying my hand across her belly. “Two more, Gisella, and you will be free of this burden.”
Her own hand covered mine. “A baby, Niall. Something that will not drown as my puppies drowned, or break as my kitten broke.”
...yeah, this bodes well. Niall is a bit freaked out by this, but not fucking enough. He just tells her that a baby is nothing like a pet. They talk about the importance of the baby. They're clearly not on the same page, and Gisella very obviously doesn't understand the metaphor of the Lion. (When Niall says that if they have a boy, he'll become the Lion, Gisella thinks he's being literal and laughs. Not even she can shapeshift into a lion.)
She asks if Niall will be the Lion. Not any time soon.
She sighed. “But I want to be a queen.”
A step sounded in the room. “Aislinn has no intention of relinquishing her title for a long time to come,” my father told her bluntly. “Your pride will have to be satisfied by a lesser title.”
For fuck's sake, Donal. She's pretty obviously mentally ill. Don't be a dick.
Donal apparently decides now's the time to bitch at his son as well:
“Is that why you almost never refer to me as jehan?” He was unsmiling. “Is the Cheysuli word so hard for you to say?”
It hurt. I felt the twist in the pit of my belly. “You have Ian to use the Old Tongue.”
“And you for something else?” He shook his head as he moved to Gisella’s bedside. Taj perched himself upon the casement sill as Lorn lay down on the floor at the foot of the bed. “No, now is not the time; my lir remind me of it plainly. You are just home after more than a year away, and reprimands can wait. I apologize.”
An apology from my father. I stared as he sat down across from me on the edge of Gisella’s bed. I could not recall if he had ever offered me an apology before.
Or if I had ever deserved one.
Or if I deserved one now.
WOW. Donal, you really do fucking suck. LOOK at this bullshit!
a) How dare your son refer to you by the language that he's most comfortable with!
b) Either Donal is not aware of Niall's issues vis a vis Cheysuli culture or he just doesn't care. Both options are pretty fucking unforgivable. Niall is NOT SUBTLE about any of this. And you can't tell me that Ian, as conscientious and supportive as he's been all along, wouldn't have tried to talk to Donal about this.
c) Your kid has just come back from fourteen months away, in various captivities. His brother is off going through cleansing. His wife is non compos mentis. You should apologize and back off.
d) The fact that Niall has both never heard an apology from his father in his life, and is uncertain if he deserves one now is lowkey heartbreaking.
You are terrible, Donal.
Anyway, Donal is actually reasonably gentle with Gisella, who is unafraid. As they're both in the mindlink, Niall feels lone and lirless. He thinks about how neither the Homanans nor Cheysuli are happy with him, because he's too Cheysuli for the former, and not Cheysuli enough for the latter.
Eventually, Gisella starts to scream, and Niall tries to break his father's grip, which goes badly. He ends up flying back into the wall.
Donal is frantic, yet victim blamey.
“Niall—oh gods, let the boy be all right!” Hands caught me, pulled me up from the bed and then settled me on the floor with the side of the bed serving as backrest.
“Niall?”
His face was split into sixths; I could make no order of the pieces.
“Niall, can you hear me?”
Blood ran down my chin. “Why? Why—harm—her—?”
One of his hands slipped behind my neck and cradled my wobbly head. “Never, never, touch a Cheysuli in mind-link, Niall. Have you not been warned against it?” His face was in thirds, now. An improvement. And could hear him better.
Ugh.
Anyway, Niall asks what Donal did to Gisella, but Donal insists that what happened was Gisella's doing. He doesn't want to talk in front of her. Niall protests weakly.
Donal fills us in on Gisella's condition. Basically, when Alaric killed Bronwyn, he "slew the girl's wits as well" which seems like a remarkably offensive way to describe brain damage even in this crap setting. Anyway, even Cheysuli magic can't heal her.
There's no traplink at all. No mental meddling in Gisella at least.
Niall on the other hand:
I nodded. “How soon can we have the wedding?” I thought he meant to protest; to make some comment regarding my witlessness. But he did not. Bleakly, he said, “As soon as arrangements are made.”
Again, I nodded. “Things will be better, then.” My father looked at Gisella. But he said nothing at all.
I love how it doesn't occur to Donal to look into his son's mind. He apparently just thinks Niall is a fucking idiot.
I'm sorry Niall, Ian, and Isolde, you all deserve a much better father.
The chapter ends here.
We rejoin Niall and Gisella in Homana-Mujhar. And Gisella really doesn't seem to be doing well.
She stood in a corner of the antechamber, hugging herself. Hugging herself, rocking herself, singing to herself. Softly, so very softly; she meant to disturb no one. She meant only to lock herself away from the fear of what must come.
I stroked the hair from her eyes. She had gone away from me to that very private place she had sought more and more the closer we came to Mujhara. I had lost her somewhere on the road from Hondarth. Physically she was with me, but otherwise she was not.
She sang. She hugged. She rocked.
Poor thing. Anyway, somehow they'd managed to get into the palace without some kind of grand procession, I guess, because Aislinn's at the door of the room. Gisella just keeps singing and rocking, so Niall goes to greet his mother.
Aww.
“Say nothing.” Her words were muffled; most of her face was pressed against my chest. “Just—let me hold you.”
And so I let her hold me, even as I held her. It was odd to think of her as the woman who had borne me nineteen years ago, even as Gisella would bear my child. Somehow it was impossible to think of the Queen of Homana as ever being little more than a woman in travail, trying to give Homana an heir for the Lion Throne.
Hah, you have no idea. Also, Niall can't do math, since, per Aislinn, he's been gone fourteen months. He should be twenty now. Donal also enters.
I released my mother and went at once to him, to clasp his arms Cheysuli-fashion and then pull him into an embrace. In all the years of my life I had wanted to do it, and yet somehow I never had. He had seemed closed to me, somehow; closed to demonstrations of affection.
I am incredibly shocked to hear that Donal is not emotionally accessible to his son. Shocked.
But to be fair, Donal is actually pretty emotional here:
“Leijhana tu’sai,” he murmured fervently. “All those months I had to be strong for your jehana…yet there was no one to be strong for the jehan.”
I could not imagine my father needing anyone but himself. And yet, once I might have said the same about my brother. “You know about Ian?” I stepped back out of the embrace. “The messenger did tell you he is alive?”
“Aye,” my mother said dryly. “Your father made him repeat it four times, just to be certain.”
I searched for resentment and found none; she was genuinely relieved. But I was not certain how much was for my father’s sake rather than my brother’s.
a) fuck you Donal. Yes, I'm not being fair. No, I don't care.
b) The Aislinn-Ian plot thread is so interesting and the main reason I regret that this book is in first person. Niall is pretty self-absorbed, which is understandable given his age and the pressure he's under, but it also means that there's a lot that we don't see.
I'm also pretty annoyed that we never got to see Aislinn and Donal adapt to having Ian and Isolde living with them. I don't think Donal was wrong to bring them to the palace, but it's a massive adjustment. And his and Aislinn's relationship was so fraught that it can't have helped to add a traumatized child into the mix. (Isolde was an infant, but Ian was old enough to have some idea of what happened.)
Donal asks after Ian, and we learn about a Cheysuli practice that becomes more important in these later books:
“Ian is—at Clankeep.” I saw the minute twitch of surprise in his face. “He said he required—cleansing… and that you would understand.”
“I’toshaa-ni.” My father turned away from me as if to hide his thoughts and feelings. But when he turned again I saw a residue of a fear I could not comprehend. “Is he all right?”
“Well enough,” I answered. “Tasha is mostly recovered and so Ian is more himself, but—” I could not avoid the truth any longer, and so I would not “—he is not the warrior I knew before we left for Atvia.”
“No. Not if he is in need of i’toshaa-ni.” Troubled, my father looked more grim than I could expect of a man who knew both of his sons were alive when he had believed them lost.
1) I'toshaa-ni is a really interesting concept to me. I'm not sure we ever get a clear look at what it entails, but it's going to come up more and more often as a character beat. Different characters have different views on the practice.
2) It's possible that we've seen it, or at least seen it alluded to before. I'm thinking of when Finn attacked/was attacked by Electra the first time and fled the castle. There was mention of him being gone for a few weeks. Carillon, not being Cheysuli, wouldn't likely be aware of the details.
3) This also gives us a bit of a glimpse of an ongoing cultural issue, also very briefly introduced in Song of Homana which is that the Cheysuli are VERY bad when it comes to disability and also mental health. To give Roberson credit, however, I think it's a deliberate piece of values dissonance. We're not supposed to see the excommunication of a man who loses a hand, or the claustrophobic man constantly berate himself in disgust, or the father afraid for his non-neurotypical son's competence as good things. The Cheysuli culture is in many ways harsh and unforgiving and has its ugly sides as well.
So anyway, Aislinn is puzzled by this and asks what could be keeping Ian away from his family. Donal gives us an explanation.
“A ritual of cleansing,” my father said, patently reluctant to speak of it at all. “It—is a private thing…when a warrior feels his spirit soiled by something he has done—or by what others have done to him—he seeks to cleanse himself through i’toshaa-ni.” He made a gesture of subtle finality and I knew the subject was closed.
Still not terribly enlightening. It's also very sad. And I'm not really sure a practice that re-enforces the idea that a rape victim must be cleansed of what was done to him is really all that conducive to recovery. But at least it's something, I suppose.
And then Gisella enters the room. And everyone is shocked, not in the least of which, because Gisella is pregnant. Okay, and this is bullshit.
“Niall,” There was no hesitation on my father’s part, no careful search for diplomacy. “She is as well come as your cheysula ever could be…but what your jehana means to say is that the Homanans will claim the child is not your own.”
“Does it matter what they claim?” Beneath my hands, Gisella trembled. “When have you ever cared?”
He did not smile, my father, being less than pleased with me. “On the day when I at last understood what my tahlmorra truly entailed, I was made to care. But you may not have that chance.” He did not so much as look at Gisella, being too intent on me. “Even now there are growing numbers of Homanans who rally around a faceless, nameless bastard, known only as Carillon’s son. Not his grandson, Niall—his son. And as those numbers grow, so does the threat to you. So does the threat to the Lion. And, by the gods!—so does the threat to the prophecy of the Firstborn!”
Okay, wait one FUCKING minute here, Donal. (And Ms. Roberson.)
a) Niall and Gisella are ALREADY MARRIED. That was the whole point of the fucking proxy marriage. Otherwise, he could have just married Deirdre, a woman who has almost all the necessary blood of the prophecy (one MORE than Gisella) and isn't an incestuous blood relation!
b) Niall has been gone for fourteen months! Why on Earth would anyone think the kid isn't his?! No one needs to know the full details of his captivity. Claim he stayed in Atvia until his wife conceived.
c) While it isn't Donal's fault that the Carillon's bastard exists, I seem to recall that there's a faction of Cheysuli who are more than happy to offer a different candidate to the throne. One that Donal DID have a part in creating. So fuck off, Donal.
d) It's a fine thing for the man with a wife and a mistress to get angry at his son for having sex with his wife. Obviously, he doesn't know what we know: that Niall wasn't in his right mind when the sex happened. But still. Fuck off, Donal.
“No, Aislinn. He will have to know the truth.” He moved closer to me, confronting me squarely, still ignoring Gisella. “On the day our kinsman has you slain in the name of Homanan rule, will you ask then if it matters what the Homanans claim?” His face, like his voice, was taut with suppressed emotion. And now he did look at Gisella. “Will you ask it when they have slain her as well, because she bears a child who might become a threat to them? Think of that, Niall, if not of yourself.” He smiled, but there was no humor in it. “And now—ask me again.”
...how the fuck is ANY of this Niall's fault, you fucking asshole?
Anyway, Niall is chastised and agrees that the wedding should be very soon. Even though the whole point of the proxy wedding was to forego that need. Also, fucking lie, you morons. Claim they married in Atvia. Alaric wants to see his daughter on the throne of Homana, so he'll back you up. Stop being fucking morons.
Aislinn, meanwhile, is angsting about the fact that her beloved father sired a bastard that is giving them so much trouble. Oh, honey. Carillon was terrible. It is what it is.
And then of course, there's Gisella, who asks if Donal is the Mujhar:
Color came into her waxen face. Some of the weariness dropped away. “Donal of Homana! My father speaks of you.”
My father’s smile was wry. “Aye, no doubt he does. And does he speak of me with kindness?”
He did not expect her to answer honestly. He expected embarrassed prevarication. But then, he did not know Gisella.
“No,” she said, with all the guilelessness of a child. “He says you are a leech upon the treasury of Atvia, and that one day he will squash you.”
I am rather fond of Alaric. Anyway, Donal is good humored about that, and basically just says that Alaric created his own position and Gisella can tell him that when she sees him. Dude, it's not her fault.
Gisella rambles a bit about being needed here. Then remembers that there's a thing she has to do. She starts to curtsey, then:
Immediately he stepped forward. “Gisella, there is no need for that—”
—and she was up, clawing godfire from the air with her left hand while her right hand clawed for his face.
No. Not clawed. Her hand was filled with a knife.
...is it wrong that I'm kind of cheering for Gisella?
Anyway, it's pretty chaotic. Niall holds Gisella back as she chants the word dead over and over again. He shouts at them to leave her alone, claiming that it's weariness over the child. I'm not sure if this is lingering mind control or denial, and the book doesn't really give us a hint here.
Donal and Aislinn are rather understandably pretty fucking upset/angry right now. Gisella's pretty clearly insane after all. And when Donal wonders aloud if this was something Lillith did to her, Gisella again identifies Lillith as her mother. And tells them point blank that her father shot her mother out of the sky.
“My father slew my mother,” she said brightly, and sucked on a piece of hair.
“Gods,” my father choked. “That ku’reshtin murdered Bronwyn, but it was I who sent her there.”
“Donal, no, do not blame yourself!” My mother’s hands were on his arm. “I beg you; do not do this to yourself—”
“I gave her in marriage to that man…I made her wed him when she wanted nothing of it!”
I won't lie, I do find Donal's pain entertaining. Fuck you, dude. But it's essentially the same thing we saw over and over again in Legacy of the Sword. Donal isn't mentally ill. He's capable of guilt and empathy. He just does this shit ANYWAY.
I'm not happy to see Aislinn bend over backward to excuse him either, but I do appreciate her clear appraisal of the situation:
My mother looked at Gisella. “You cannot marry that.”
“He has to,” my father said wearily. “The prophecy requires it.”
It really doesn't!
The prophecy requires the blood of four warring kingdoms and two magical races! Gisella is Niall's first cousin! She has the same blood he does! The only difference is that Gisella has Atvian blood through her father and Niall has Solindish blood through his mother.
DEIRDRE ALSO has Atvian blood! Moreover, she has Erinnish blood too! That's the fourth warring nation! (Homana + Solinde + Atvia + Erinn) They're a generation ahead of schedule!
I know I ranted about this before, but it's still fucking true!
(I'm not a fan of Aislinn's dehumanization of Gisella there, though.)
Oh, and by the way, Donal's still an asshole.
“She just tried to slay you!”
“And once, you tried to do the same.”
It was clear she had made herself forget that once she had been no less a tool for murder than Gisella. That once Tynstar, through Electra, had set a compulsion within her mind: to slay the man she was meant to wed. I knew the story. My father had told me once.
“Oh gods,” she said brokenly, and tried to turn away.
But my father did not let her. “Shansu,” he said, “it is over. A long time over.”
Go fuck yourself, Donal. Do it with a rusty rake and die of tetanus.
Aislinn, wisely, asks what if Gisella tries again. Donal, stupidly, points out that Aislinn only tried once. Aislinn points out that this was because they had Finn get the bullshit out of her head. Gisella, on the other hand, was raised by parents who specifically hate Donal, and thus doesn't really need to be mentally boobytrapped to try to murder him.
Donal is a fucking idiot.
No, really, look at this:
“Donal, have sense! Gisella has spent her life with an Ihlini witch as well as with a father who despises you. Do you think she will not try again?”
“Not if I defuse the trap-link…if there is a trap-link.” He looked at me. “Niall, you know what I must do.”
"IF" there is a trap-link. THERE MIGHT NOT BE. Aislinn has a point here. Gisella is mentally handicapped girl raised by people who hate Donal. She doesn't need to be mind-controlled to hate him!
Niall tries to put off the impending mind rape, pointing out that Gisella is tired, but Donal declares that he won't risk his son or himself to the chance she might be ruled by Ihlini and tells Niall to "prepare her."
You are so fucking gross. Also, she could be "ruled by Ihlini" WITHOUT being mind controlled. THEY RAISED HER.
Anyway, this is a new experience for Niall as well. Apparently, he's never witnessed the non-shapeshifting side of Cheysuli powers. He tries to get Gisella ready and prepare her as much as possible. And for her part, Gisella says something revealing.
I put Gisella to bed, covering the mound of her belly with a silken coverlet as she leaned back against the bolsters. She needed food, rest, sleep. She needed to be rid of the weight of the child.
“Two more months,” I said aloud, splaying my hand across her belly. “Two more, Gisella, and you will be free of this burden.”
Her own hand covered mine. “A baby, Niall. Something that will not drown as my puppies drowned, or break as my kitten broke.”
...yeah, this bodes well. Niall is a bit freaked out by this, but not fucking enough. He just tells her that a baby is nothing like a pet. They talk about the importance of the baby. They're clearly not on the same page, and Gisella very obviously doesn't understand the metaphor of the Lion. (When Niall says that if they have a boy, he'll become the Lion, Gisella thinks he's being literal and laughs. Not even she can shapeshift into a lion.)
She asks if Niall will be the Lion. Not any time soon.
She sighed. “But I want to be a queen.”
A step sounded in the room. “Aislinn has no intention of relinquishing her title for a long time to come,” my father told her bluntly. “Your pride will have to be satisfied by a lesser title.”
For fuck's sake, Donal. She's pretty obviously mentally ill. Don't be a dick.
Donal apparently decides now's the time to bitch at his son as well:
“Is that why you almost never refer to me as jehan?” He was unsmiling. “Is the Cheysuli word so hard for you to say?”
It hurt. I felt the twist in the pit of my belly. “You have Ian to use the Old Tongue.”
“And you for something else?” He shook his head as he moved to Gisella’s bedside. Taj perched himself upon the casement sill as Lorn lay down on the floor at the foot of the bed. “No, now is not the time; my lir remind me of it plainly. You are just home after more than a year away, and reprimands can wait. I apologize.”
An apology from my father. I stared as he sat down across from me on the edge of Gisella’s bed. I could not recall if he had ever offered me an apology before.
Or if I had ever deserved one.
Or if I deserved one now.
WOW. Donal, you really do fucking suck. LOOK at this bullshit!
a) How dare your son refer to you by the language that he's most comfortable with!
b) Either Donal is not aware of Niall's issues vis a vis Cheysuli culture or he just doesn't care. Both options are pretty fucking unforgivable. Niall is NOT SUBTLE about any of this. And you can't tell me that Ian, as conscientious and supportive as he's been all along, wouldn't have tried to talk to Donal about this.
c) Your kid has just come back from fourteen months away, in various captivities. His brother is off going through cleansing. His wife is non compos mentis. You should apologize and back off.
d) The fact that Niall has both never heard an apology from his father in his life, and is uncertain if he deserves one now is lowkey heartbreaking.
You are terrible, Donal.
Anyway, Donal is actually reasonably gentle with Gisella, who is unafraid. As they're both in the mindlink, Niall feels lone and lirless. He thinks about how neither the Homanans nor Cheysuli are happy with him, because he's too Cheysuli for the former, and not Cheysuli enough for the latter.
Eventually, Gisella starts to scream, and Niall tries to break his father's grip, which goes badly. He ends up flying back into the wall.
Donal is frantic, yet victim blamey.
“Niall—oh gods, let the boy be all right!” Hands caught me, pulled me up from the bed and then settled me on the floor with the side of the bed serving as backrest.
“Niall?”
His face was split into sixths; I could make no order of the pieces.
“Niall, can you hear me?”
Blood ran down my chin. “Why? Why—harm—her—?”
One of his hands slipped behind my neck and cradled my wobbly head. “Never, never, touch a Cheysuli in mind-link, Niall. Have you not been warned against it?” His face was in thirds, now. An improvement. And could hear him better.
Ugh.
Anyway, Niall asks what Donal did to Gisella, but Donal insists that what happened was Gisella's doing. He doesn't want to talk in front of her. Niall protests weakly.
Donal fills us in on Gisella's condition. Basically, when Alaric killed Bronwyn, he "slew the girl's wits as well" which seems like a remarkably offensive way to describe brain damage even in this crap setting. Anyway, even Cheysuli magic can't heal her.
There's no traplink at all. No mental meddling in Gisella at least.
Niall on the other hand:
I nodded. “How soon can we have the wedding?” I thought he meant to protest; to make some comment regarding my witlessness. But he did not. Bleakly, he said, “As soon as arrangements are made.”
Again, I nodded. “Things will be better, then.” My father looked at Gisella. But he said nothing at all.
I love how it doesn't occur to Donal to look into his son's mind. He apparently just thinks Niall is a fucking idiot.
I'm sorry Niall, Ian, and Isolde, you all deserve a much better father.
The chapter ends here.