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i_read_whatLast chapter, a shit ton of people acted like idiots in swift succession, Aislinn may still be possessed or brainwashed, and I got to yell at Carillon and Finn to get a room.
That last bit was nice, but also a rather grim reminder of the one time this series was readable.
If you recall, we last left off with Donal and Evan going drinking. And while normally I wouldn't judge that, since having your wife suddenly scream racist epithets at you is a perfectly good reason to drink, I haven't seen any mention that Donal has:
a) tried to inform Carillon that his would-be assassin was Homanan and therefore stop the war Carillon has declared on Solinde, or
b) tried to inform anyone at all about his wife's apparent psychotic break.
The first is really the more heinous omission, to be fair, because a lot of people might die that shouldn't have to. The second just annoys me on principle.
But well, the first paragraph indicates that drinking may not have gone well:
The Cheysuli were not brawlers ordinarily. They were warriors, bred in adversity and trained to slay quickly and effortlessly in order to protect kin, clan and king. To fight for the sheer enjoyment of such things seemed utter foolishness. Yet Donal, who had imbibed so much harsh wine he no longer saw anything without a blurred halo surrounding it, found himself embroiled in the midst of a tavern brawl.
He did not precisely recall how it began. Merely that somehow he had discerned an insult to his person and his race, and that redress was necessary. He dimly recalled the offending man had gone down easily enough—and then everyone else in the common room joined in the affray.
It's hard here, because obviously I think the racists should get the shit kicked out of them. But as heir to the throne, I feel like Donal, just maybe, ought to avoid fights that could get him killed?
At least Evan's helping out. And they've caused more than enough damage between them:
The tavern was a shambles. Groaning bodies sprawled under tables and fallen benches, counting bruises and fingering cuts. Other bodies, limply strewn in corners of the room, did not move at all. Donal was dimly aware he and Evan had accounted for all the wreckage; the knowledge made him groggily happy. He was upholding the honor of his race.
...I hope you're planning to pay for the damage, dude. Unless the tavern keeper was one of the racist assholes. But if he wasn't, then he didn't deserve you destroying his bar.
Okay, I didn't give him enough credit. He does promise to pay for the damages.
A short, squat man wearing the rough woolen tunic and breeches of a dalesman pushed his way through the wreckage and stopped before Donal. He was thickset, a common sort, with small brown eyes and a small, pursed mouth. The mouth formed his words oddly, twisted by his thick dalesman’s dialect.
He stared up into Donal’s battered face. “Shapechangers be not welcome here.” He spat on Donal’s boot.
Donal swallowed. “I was,” he said, “before the Homanans began to lose.”
Well, that and you destroyed the dude's bar. It's nice that you'll pay for it, but I can't completely blame the guy for being upset. But of course, this can't JUST be about that. We have to make sure Donal has the moral high ground here:
Small brown piglet eyes, malignant and unblinking. “Shaine the Mujhar put purge on your sort, shapechanger. Years ago, ’twas…and those of us’n here still be holdin’ with’t.”
Donal was dizzy and disoriented, but the mists were clearing from his head. He stared at the pig-eyed man in dazed amazement. “Shaine is dead. Carillon is the Mujhar.”
“Demon-spawn,” the short man said clearly. “Your kind’ll be burnin’ in the name of good an’ clean Homanan gods, unspoiled by the foulness of shapechanger demons.”
So who ARE the Homanan gods? We know more about the Ellasian religion than Homana's. Anyway, this dude declares that he serves the memory of the rightful Mujhar, and calls Carillon a weakling king bespelled by Cheysuli magic.
I think maybe one of the big problems in this book is that there's SO MUCH going on. We have the genuinely interesting plot of a Cheysuli heir to the throne in a kingdom that was happy to commit genocide as early as one generation ago. There's so much story there: the political ramifications. The reaction of the common folk. The arranged marriage is also interesting in that context. Aislinn SHOULD be an important political link to a conquered realm. But there's no indication that Carillon ever used her as such. There's a lot about Electra's importance and influence and how he dared not kill her. But Carillon's got the last descendant of the Solindish ruling family that he COULD be using instead.
So we've got a lot of potentially great stuff here, and it's all wrapped up in amateurish idiot plots. Aislinn's mind control/brainwashing plot is so frustrating because it requires everyone to be a fucking idiot. Donal's whole love triangle plot just makes him look like a total asshole. And we've spent so long on Donal's fucking whining about pointless stuff that we've barely touched on the aspects that should make Donal sympathetic.
Anyway, Evan is utterly bewildered that anyone would try to slay a man because of his race, which is sweet in one sense, implying good things about Ellasian culture in general. But also seems painfully naive for a guy who supposedly grew up on Lachlan's stories. I really doubt Lachlan would have omitted the whole purge and genocide part of events.
Anyway, Harbin thinks Carillon's bespelled, plotting to give Homana back to "the paws" of his demon spawn masters. They can't reach Carillon, but they can kill the Cheysuli.
Yet again, Evan has the idiot ball, pointing out that Donal is the prince of Homana. Um dude, why would you think that would HELP this situation? You've just told them that Donal is exactly the person they need to kill to avoid a Cheysuli monarch.
So Harbin wants to burn Donal. He does make a point of reassuring Evan that he need not fear for his own life. They only burn demons. So things start getting pretty terrifying:
Donal felt fingers dig into his arms, broken and grimy nails scoring bare, vulnerable flesh. He bared his teeth at the closest man and saw him fall back in terror. But the others bore him to the table.
Fingers hooked into the heavy bands on either arm. He felt the nails cut as they twisted into his flesh. The lir-gold was forcibly dragged from his arms until he was naked without either band. But when a man set hand to the earring, Donal tried to jerk away.
“Lay him down!” Harbin shouted. “Pin him to the wood!”
Donal's got a lot of self-recrimination right now. He should have stayed with Aislinn. He shouldn't have left his lir behind. And why did he do that? But anyway, happily, a ruddy wolf and a bird of prey burst through the window and attack. Donal also takes wolf shape and there's a whole hell of a lot of death.
Evan calls him back to his senses:
“Donal,” Evan gasped breathlessly. “There is no more need to fight. Look around you!”
The wolf moved away from the man who huddled pitifully against an overturned bench, crying and shaking. For a moment the wolf stared fixedly at the Ellasian, yellow man-eyes eerie and half-mad. But then he seemed to understand. The animal shape slid out of focus, blurring to leave a void in the air. Then Donal stood in its place. Blood ran from his mouth and painted his naked arms, but he was whole, and wholly human.
Four men had escaped. Evan held three against the wall. Five lay dead and two more badly wounded. Donal, standing in the middle of the tavern, shuddered once, and was still.
...damnit. Obviously I can't be too sad about racist deaths, but I feel like this can't possibly help your PR problem, dude.
Donal tells the survivors that if he were a man like Harbin, he'd order their deaths. But instead:
He shook his head. “No. I will not slay them. I will not besmirch my race and name.” Again, he pushed dampened hair from his battered face. “But I will let them see what it is to be Cheysuli.” He moved toward the three men Evan held in the corner. “Step away from them, Ellasian. This does not concern you.”
So what is he doing?
We claim three gifts,” he told them clearly. “One is the gift of lir-shape, which you call the shapechange. A second is that of healing, which you refuse to believe, believing instead we are demon-spawn and evil. And the third, the final gift, is truly terrible.” Donal drew in an unsteady breath. “It gives us the power to force a man’s will, to replace it with our own. It is the gift of compulsion.” His voice was a whiplash of sound. “Look at me.”
They looked. They could do nothing else.
Donal held them all. “Take your wounded and care for them. Tell your women and children what you have done this night, and what you meant to do, and what both things have earned you. And know that you will never again lay hands upon a Cheysuli with ill intent.” He stared at their blank, slack faces; their empty eyes. He had taken will and initiative from them, putting his own in the places left empty by his magic. The surge of anger within him was so powerful he wanted only to break them all, destroying their minds with a single, savage thought, but he did not. “Go from here,” he said thickly, and turned away to lean against the table that had nearly been his bier.
I suppose that's probably the best solution. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but I can't really think of anything better that Donal could do here.
Well, actually, he COULD have them arrested. But maybe that would inflame people like Harbin more?
Donal and Evan share a nice moment.
The men gathered up their dead, their wounded, one by one, and carried them from the tavern. When they were done, leaving Donal alone with Evan and the lir, he set a hand to his aching head. “Now—you have seen what it is to be Cheysuli.”
Evan, slowly sitting down on a righted stool, nodded. “I have seen it.”
“And do Lachlan’s lays exaggerate?”
“No.” Evan smiled faintly. “I think even Lachlan cannot capture what it is to see a man shift his shape into that of an animal. But I think also the magic exacts a price from the men who know it fully.”
Evan's such a nice guy. And he's right. Donal's barely on his feet. He and Evan talk a little more about Homana. There's a pretty funny moment here:
“They wish me well,” Donal told him. “They wish I might have kept myself from the encounter. They wish I had not seen fit to go out with an Ellasian princeling when I might have remained at Homana-Mujhar instead, and safe from such violence.” He smiled. “They wish me nothing I do not already wish for myself.”
“I could not have said the evening would end like this!” Evan was clearly affronted. “In Ellas, we do not have madmen out to sacrifice others for their blood.”
Ellas will never matter again after this book. It's a shame, because it's by far the best place in the series.
Donal explains the situation:
“In Homana,” he said, “we have two races vying for a single throne. A Cheysuli throne, once—we gave it up to the Homanans four hundred years ago. For peace. Because they feared our magic. And now, because of Shaine, they fear us again, and seek to usurp us.”
Then he asks Evan to see him home, and passes the fuck out.
--
We get some nice italicized cryptic bits, which comprise three days in which Donal lives like a wolf, bathes in pool of sand and so on. It's I'toshaa-ni, the cleansing ritual.
I don't blame Donal for needing to undergo his purification. The problem is, per Rowan, he apparently didn't TELL anyone what he was doing.
“Five days,” Rowan said. “You might have told the Mujhar.”
Donal, holding Ian in his arms as he stood before his pavilion, met Rowan’s eyes levelly. “There was a thing I had to do.”
A muscle ticked in Rowan’s jaw. “You might have told the Mujhar,” he repeated implacably. “The Ellasian prince came back telling a tale of near-murder and violence…and yet you see fit to leave the city without a word to anyone.”
...question. Did Donal really go for five days without sending word to Carillon that he's blaming the wrong people for the attempted assassination? Y'know. To avoid a fucking war?
Donal gives Rowan attitude:
“There is ever a choice, for me.” Donal did not smile. “I did not flee, general. I did not run from Carillon’s wrath. I came home to my Keep because there was a thing I had to do. A form of expiation.” His face still bore traces of the tavern beating, though most of the soreness had passed. “I’toshaa-ni, Rowan…or do your Homanan ways preclude you from comprehension?”
He also turns down the offer of a horse, claiming he "might prefer lir shape".
Yeah, but um. Rowan can't? It's really hard not to see this as a fucking insult.
And much to my joy, Rowan does not let that shit pass. He lets Donal fucking HAVE it.
“Do you challenge me?” Rowan’s voice gained emotion. There was anger in it, raw, rising anger. “Do you challenge me?” He cut off the beginnings of Donal’s answer with a sharp gesture. A Cheysuli gesture, quite rude, demanding the silence of another. “Aye, I know what you do, my lord. You look down from your Cheysuli pride and arrogance and count me an ignorant man. Unblessed, am I?—a man without a lir? Do you think I do not know? Do you think I do not feel your opinion of me?” Rowan stared at Donal with a predator’s challenge; with the unwavering stare of a dominant wolf facing a younger cub wishing to fight for the rule of the pack. “Lirless I may be, Donal, but—by the gods!—I am Carillon’s man! What I do, I do for Homana. You would be better to think of me as someone who means you well, rather than your keeper.”
Donal protests that he needed cleansing. Rowan, awesomely, has no patience for that shit:
“No doubt you will need it twice or thrice before this war is done.” Rowan swung up on his horse, pulling his crimson cloak into place across the glossy rump of his tall white stallion. He looked down upon Donal, and his face was very grim. “Carillon has no more time for the follies of youth in his heir. And neither, I think, do I.”
THANK YOU. (I mean, I do genuinely sympathize with Donal's need to cope with the trauma of what happened, but it sounds like he did it in the most thoughtless and self-absorbed way possible! You're the heir to the fucking throne, you fuckhead.)
It gets even better, when Donal tries to be a little dickwad.
“You!” Donal mounted and spun his horse to face Rowan squarely. “You are not of my clan—my kin—you are not even a proper warrior. Aye, I look down on you from Cheysuli arrogance—how can I not? You are a lirless man, and yet you live. You live, while the lir you might have had is dead all these long, long years.”
“Would you rather have me dead?” Rowan’s hand caught the reins of Donal’s horse. “By the gods, boy, you may be Duncan’s son, but you have none of his sensitivity. I hear more of Finn in you—too quick to judge another man by what feelings are in yourself.” Still he held the fretting stallion. Dust rose into the air. “Do you think I feel nothing? Do you consider me little more than Carillon’s puppet, titled out of courtesy?” Rowan’s lips drew back. “Ku’reshtin!—you should know better. I earned what rank I hold, which is more than you can claim. No—” Again, the sharp gesture cut Donal off. “I was born, as you were, to the clan. But Shaine’s qu’mahlin raged, and my life was endangered the moment I drew breath. My kin, in running, were slain, and I was left to the Ellasians who found me. Am I less a man for that? Am I less a man because I claim no lir?” His eyes held Donal’s without flinching. “Less a warrior, aye, as you would count a warrior—but not less a man than you. I am what I have made myself. And I am content with that.” For a moment, his hand tightened on the reins of Donal’s horse. “Homanan puppet, some men call me. But what will they call you? You claim the Homanan blood…while I am all Cheysuli.”
I love this so much. Maybe a bit more of this and Donal can become a tolerable character. Because Rowan's right.
Donal actually has a fairly privileged life. Obviously, he has difficulties that come of being Cheysuli in Homana. And he's had some childhood trauma. But he wasn't alive for Shaine's reign. He got to bypass the worst of the qu-mahlin. He was protected by his mother and father, and later his uncle and Carillon. Donal's the chosen of the gods and the heir to the throne, and that comes with some perks by way of personal support. Rowan's had nothing of that. Rowan built his entire life from nothing, living AMONG the very people who wanted to see him dead because his own race will have nothing to do with him.
That said, I call bullshit on Duncan's supposed "sensitivity". As I recall, he was just as dismissive about Rowan as Finn was. Finn just said it out loud.
Donal protests that he has the favor of the gods. And Rowan has one last dig to make.
Rowan laughed. The sound rang out raucously, and he threw the leather rein back at Donal. “Do you, now? Are you better, then, than others?” But he stopped laughing. The ironic humor left his voice. Donal saw the tautness in Rowan’s mouth and heard the too-smooth note of elaborate condescension in his tone. “And does your divinity preclude you from lying with your wife?”
...heheheh.
Donal sees faint disgust in Rowan's face, and now he wonders frantically what Aislinn said. Rowan just says he'll have to ask that of Carillon.
This is actually a little beautiful. It really is. Because Donal is such a self-absorbed idiot that he set himself up here.
Remember the chain of events:
1. Wedding night. Aislinn freaked out, acted insane. Shouted racist bullshit one minute, and turned confused and frightened the next.
Donal just LEAVES HER THERE.
2. Evan, having no idea what happened, invites Donal out. At no point does Donal tell Evan what happened. Nor does he tell any of the palace staff what happened. Nor does he fetch a healer. Or Finn, a telepath.
3. Donal gets into a bar fight and almost gets sacrificed. This part obviously is not his fault.
4. Donal decides he needs ritual cleansing. Okay, fair enough. BUT
5. HE DOESN'T BOTHER TO TELL ANYONE WHAT HE'S DOING. NOT EVEN A NOTE.
So as far as anyone knows: Donal skipped town on his wedding night and vanished for five days. And god knows WHAT Aislinn's mental state is at this time. Or what she remembers about what happened. She could be completely possessed by Electra for all we know. But because Donal didn't bother to talk to anyone about what happened, Aislinn had five days to say whatever the fuck she wants.
There is no indication that at any point in the five days since the wedding that Donal even thought about the poor sixteen year old child that he abandoned alone, knowing that her mother fucked with her brain. It serves him right that now he's going to have to deal with the mess he abandoned.
#TeamRowan. #TeamAislinn.
I don't really remember this part, but I'm going to hazard a guess that Carillon will believe Donal over Aislinn anyway, because thus far he's shown exactly no concern or consideration for the daughter that he supposedly dotes on. But I'll enjoy even these fleeting moments of tension. Grow fucking up, Donal.
Thankfully for my nerves and sanity, the chapter ends here.
That last bit was nice, but also a rather grim reminder of the one time this series was readable.
If you recall, we last left off with Donal and Evan going drinking. And while normally I wouldn't judge that, since having your wife suddenly scream racist epithets at you is a perfectly good reason to drink, I haven't seen any mention that Donal has:
a) tried to inform Carillon that his would-be assassin was Homanan and therefore stop the war Carillon has declared on Solinde, or
b) tried to inform anyone at all about his wife's apparent psychotic break.
The first is really the more heinous omission, to be fair, because a lot of people might die that shouldn't have to. The second just annoys me on principle.
But well, the first paragraph indicates that drinking may not have gone well:
The Cheysuli were not brawlers ordinarily. They were warriors, bred in adversity and trained to slay quickly and effortlessly in order to protect kin, clan and king. To fight for the sheer enjoyment of such things seemed utter foolishness. Yet Donal, who had imbibed so much harsh wine he no longer saw anything without a blurred halo surrounding it, found himself embroiled in the midst of a tavern brawl.
He did not precisely recall how it began. Merely that somehow he had discerned an insult to his person and his race, and that redress was necessary. He dimly recalled the offending man had gone down easily enough—and then everyone else in the common room joined in the affray.
It's hard here, because obviously I think the racists should get the shit kicked out of them. But as heir to the throne, I feel like Donal, just maybe, ought to avoid fights that could get him killed?
At least Evan's helping out. And they've caused more than enough damage between them:
The tavern was a shambles. Groaning bodies sprawled under tables and fallen benches, counting bruises and fingering cuts. Other bodies, limply strewn in corners of the room, did not move at all. Donal was dimly aware he and Evan had accounted for all the wreckage; the knowledge made him groggily happy. He was upholding the honor of his race.
...I hope you're planning to pay for the damage, dude. Unless the tavern keeper was one of the racist assholes. But if he wasn't, then he didn't deserve you destroying his bar.
Okay, I didn't give him enough credit. He does promise to pay for the damages.
A short, squat man wearing the rough woolen tunic and breeches of a dalesman pushed his way through the wreckage and stopped before Donal. He was thickset, a common sort, with small brown eyes and a small, pursed mouth. The mouth formed his words oddly, twisted by his thick dalesman’s dialect.
He stared up into Donal’s battered face. “Shapechangers be not welcome here.” He spat on Donal’s boot.
Donal swallowed. “I was,” he said, “before the Homanans began to lose.”
Well, that and you destroyed the dude's bar. It's nice that you'll pay for it, but I can't completely blame the guy for being upset. But of course, this can't JUST be about that. We have to make sure Donal has the moral high ground here:
Small brown piglet eyes, malignant and unblinking. “Shaine the Mujhar put purge on your sort, shapechanger. Years ago, ’twas…and those of us’n here still be holdin’ with’t.”
Donal was dizzy and disoriented, but the mists were clearing from his head. He stared at the pig-eyed man in dazed amazement. “Shaine is dead. Carillon is the Mujhar.”
“Demon-spawn,” the short man said clearly. “Your kind’ll be burnin’ in the name of good an’ clean Homanan gods, unspoiled by the foulness of shapechanger demons.”
So who ARE the Homanan gods? We know more about the Ellasian religion than Homana's. Anyway, this dude declares that he serves the memory of the rightful Mujhar, and calls Carillon a weakling king bespelled by Cheysuli magic.
I think maybe one of the big problems in this book is that there's SO MUCH going on. We have the genuinely interesting plot of a Cheysuli heir to the throne in a kingdom that was happy to commit genocide as early as one generation ago. There's so much story there: the political ramifications. The reaction of the common folk. The arranged marriage is also interesting in that context. Aislinn SHOULD be an important political link to a conquered realm. But there's no indication that Carillon ever used her as such. There's a lot about Electra's importance and influence and how he dared not kill her. But Carillon's got the last descendant of the Solindish ruling family that he COULD be using instead.
So we've got a lot of potentially great stuff here, and it's all wrapped up in amateurish idiot plots. Aislinn's mind control/brainwashing plot is so frustrating because it requires everyone to be a fucking idiot. Donal's whole love triangle plot just makes him look like a total asshole. And we've spent so long on Donal's fucking whining about pointless stuff that we've barely touched on the aspects that should make Donal sympathetic.
Anyway, Evan is utterly bewildered that anyone would try to slay a man because of his race, which is sweet in one sense, implying good things about Ellasian culture in general. But also seems painfully naive for a guy who supposedly grew up on Lachlan's stories. I really doubt Lachlan would have omitted the whole purge and genocide part of events.
Anyway, Harbin thinks Carillon's bespelled, plotting to give Homana back to "the paws" of his demon spawn masters. They can't reach Carillon, but they can kill the Cheysuli.
Yet again, Evan has the idiot ball, pointing out that Donal is the prince of Homana. Um dude, why would you think that would HELP this situation? You've just told them that Donal is exactly the person they need to kill to avoid a Cheysuli monarch.
So Harbin wants to burn Donal. He does make a point of reassuring Evan that he need not fear for his own life. They only burn demons. So things start getting pretty terrifying:
Donal felt fingers dig into his arms, broken and grimy nails scoring bare, vulnerable flesh. He bared his teeth at the closest man and saw him fall back in terror. But the others bore him to the table.
Fingers hooked into the heavy bands on either arm. He felt the nails cut as they twisted into his flesh. The lir-gold was forcibly dragged from his arms until he was naked without either band. But when a man set hand to the earring, Donal tried to jerk away.
“Lay him down!” Harbin shouted. “Pin him to the wood!”
Donal's got a lot of self-recrimination right now. He should have stayed with Aislinn. He shouldn't have left his lir behind. And why did he do that? But anyway, happily, a ruddy wolf and a bird of prey burst through the window and attack. Donal also takes wolf shape and there's a whole hell of a lot of death.
Evan calls him back to his senses:
“Donal,” Evan gasped breathlessly. “There is no more need to fight. Look around you!”
The wolf moved away from the man who huddled pitifully against an overturned bench, crying and shaking. For a moment the wolf stared fixedly at the Ellasian, yellow man-eyes eerie and half-mad. But then he seemed to understand. The animal shape slid out of focus, blurring to leave a void in the air. Then Donal stood in its place. Blood ran from his mouth and painted his naked arms, but he was whole, and wholly human.
Four men had escaped. Evan held three against the wall. Five lay dead and two more badly wounded. Donal, standing in the middle of the tavern, shuddered once, and was still.
...damnit. Obviously I can't be too sad about racist deaths, but I feel like this can't possibly help your PR problem, dude.
Donal tells the survivors that if he were a man like Harbin, he'd order their deaths. But instead:
He shook his head. “No. I will not slay them. I will not besmirch my race and name.” Again, he pushed dampened hair from his battered face. “But I will let them see what it is to be Cheysuli.” He moved toward the three men Evan held in the corner. “Step away from them, Ellasian. This does not concern you.”
So what is he doing?
We claim three gifts,” he told them clearly. “One is the gift of lir-shape, which you call the shapechange. A second is that of healing, which you refuse to believe, believing instead we are demon-spawn and evil. And the third, the final gift, is truly terrible.” Donal drew in an unsteady breath. “It gives us the power to force a man’s will, to replace it with our own. It is the gift of compulsion.” His voice was a whiplash of sound. “Look at me.”
They looked. They could do nothing else.
Donal held them all. “Take your wounded and care for them. Tell your women and children what you have done this night, and what you meant to do, and what both things have earned you. And know that you will never again lay hands upon a Cheysuli with ill intent.” He stared at their blank, slack faces; their empty eyes. He had taken will and initiative from them, putting his own in the places left empty by his magic. The surge of anger within him was so powerful he wanted only to break them all, destroying their minds with a single, savage thought, but he did not. “Go from here,” he said thickly, and turned away to lean against the table that had nearly been his bier.
I suppose that's probably the best solution. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but I can't really think of anything better that Donal could do here.
Well, actually, he COULD have them arrested. But maybe that would inflame people like Harbin more?
Donal and Evan share a nice moment.
The men gathered up their dead, their wounded, one by one, and carried them from the tavern. When they were done, leaving Donal alone with Evan and the lir, he set a hand to his aching head. “Now—you have seen what it is to be Cheysuli.”
Evan, slowly sitting down on a righted stool, nodded. “I have seen it.”
“And do Lachlan’s lays exaggerate?”
“No.” Evan smiled faintly. “I think even Lachlan cannot capture what it is to see a man shift his shape into that of an animal. But I think also the magic exacts a price from the men who know it fully.”
Evan's such a nice guy. And he's right. Donal's barely on his feet. He and Evan talk a little more about Homana. There's a pretty funny moment here:
“They wish me well,” Donal told him. “They wish I might have kept myself from the encounter. They wish I had not seen fit to go out with an Ellasian princeling when I might have remained at Homana-Mujhar instead, and safe from such violence.” He smiled. “They wish me nothing I do not already wish for myself.”
“I could not have said the evening would end like this!” Evan was clearly affronted. “In Ellas, we do not have madmen out to sacrifice others for their blood.”
Ellas will never matter again after this book. It's a shame, because it's by far the best place in the series.
Donal explains the situation:
“In Homana,” he said, “we have two races vying for a single throne. A Cheysuli throne, once—we gave it up to the Homanans four hundred years ago. For peace. Because they feared our magic. And now, because of Shaine, they fear us again, and seek to usurp us.”
Then he asks Evan to see him home, and passes the fuck out.
--
We get some nice italicized cryptic bits, which comprise three days in which Donal lives like a wolf, bathes in pool of sand and so on. It's I'toshaa-ni, the cleansing ritual.
I don't blame Donal for needing to undergo his purification. The problem is, per Rowan, he apparently didn't TELL anyone what he was doing.
“Five days,” Rowan said. “You might have told the Mujhar.”
Donal, holding Ian in his arms as he stood before his pavilion, met Rowan’s eyes levelly. “There was a thing I had to do.”
A muscle ticked in Rowan’s jaw. “You might have told the Mujhar,” he repeated implacably. “The Ellasian prince came back telling a tale of near-murder and violence…and yet you see fit to leave the city without a word to anyone.”
...question. Did Donal really go for five days without sending word to Carillon that he's blaming the wrong people for the attempted assassination? Y'know. To avoid a fucking war?
Donal gives Rowan attitude:
“There is ever a choice, for me.” Donal did not smile. “I did not flee, general. I did not run from Carillon’s wrath. I came home to my Keep because there was a thing I had to do. A form of expiation.” His face still bore traces of the tavern beating, though most of the soreness had passed. “I’toshaa-ni, Rowan…or do your Homanan ways preclude you from comprehension?”
He also turns down the offer of a horse, claiming he "might prefer lir shape".
Yeah, but um. Rowan can't? It's really hard not to see this as a fucking insult.
And much to my joy, Rowan does not let that shit pass. He lets Donal fucking HAVE it.
“Do you challenge me?” Rowan’s voice gained emotion. There was anger in it, raw, rising anger. “Do you challenge me?” He cut off the beginnings of Donal’s answer with a sharp gesture. A Cheysuli gesture, quite rude, demanding the silence of another. “Aye, I know what you do, my lord. You look down from your Cheysuli pride and arrogance and count me an ignorant man. Unblessed, am I?—a man without a lir? Do you think I do not know? Do you think I do not feel your opinion of me?” Rowan stared at Donal with a predator’s challenge; with the unwavering stare of a dominant wolf facing a younger cub wishing to fight for the rule of the pack. “Lirless I may be, Donal, but—by the gods!—I am Carillon’s man! What I do, I do for Homana. You would be better to think of me as someone who means you well, rather than your keeper.”
Donal protests that he needed cleansing. Rowan, awesomely, has no patience for that shit:
“No doubt you will need it twice or thrice before this war is done.” Rowan swung up on his horse, pulling his crimson cloak into place across the glossy rump of his tall white stallion. He looked down upon Donal, and his face was very grim. “Carillon has no more time for the follies of youth in his heir. And neither, I think, do I.”
THANK YOU. (I mean, I do genuinely sympathize with Donal's need to cope with the trauma of what happened, but it sounds like he did it in the most thoughtless and self-absorbed way possible! You're the heir to the fucking throne, you fuckhead.)
It gets even better, when Donal tries to be a little dickwad.
“You!” Donal mounted and spun his horse to face Rowan squarely. “You are not of my clan—my kin—you are not even a proper warrior. Aye, I look down on you from Cheysuli arrogance—how can I not? You are a lirless man, and yet you live. You live, while the lir you might have had is dead all these long, long years.”
“Would you rather have me dead?” Rowan’s hand caught the reins of Donal’s horse. “By the gods, boy, you may be Duncan’s son, but you have none of his sensitivity. I hear more of Finn in you—too quick to judge another man by what feelings are in yourself.” Still he held the fretting stallion. Dust rose into the air. “Do you think I feel nothing? Do you consider me little more than Carillon’s puppet, titled out of courtesy?” Rowan’s lips drew back. “Ku’reshtin!—you should know better. I earned what rank I hold, which is more than you can claim. No—” Again, the sharp gesture cut Donal off. “I was born, as you were, to the clan. But Shaine’s qu’mahlin raged, and my life was endangered the moment I drew breath. My kin, in running, were slain, and I was left to the Ellasians who found me. Am I less a man for that? Am I less a man because I claim no lir?” His eyes held Donal’s without flinching. “Less a warrior, aye, as you would count a warrior—but not less a man than you. I am what I have made myself. And I am content with that.” For a moment, his hand tightened on the reins of Donal’s horse. “Homanan puppet, some men call me. But what will they call you? You claim the Homanan blood…while I am all Cheysuli.”
I love this so much. Maybe a bit more of this and Donal can become a tolerable character. Because Rowan's right.
Donal actually has a fairly privileged life. Obviously, he has difficulties that come of being Cheysuli in Homana. And he's had some childhood trauma. But he wasn't alive for Shaine's reign. He got to bypass the worst of the qu-mahlin. He was protected by his mother and father, and later his uncle and Carillon. Donal's the chosen of the gods and the heir to the throne, and that comes with some perks by way of personal support. Rowan's had nothing of that. Rowan built his entire life from nothing, living AMONG the very people who wanted to see him dead because his own race will have nothing to do with him.
That said, I call bullshit on Duncan's supposed "sensitivity". As I recall, he was just as dismissive about Rowan as Finn was. Finn just said it out loud.
Donal protests that he has the favor of the gods. And Rowan has one last dig to make.
Rowan laughed. The sound rang out raucously, and he threw the leather rein back at Donal. “Do you, now? Are you better, then, than others?” But he stopped laughing. The ironic humor left his voice. Donal saw the tautness in Rowan’s mouth and heard the too-smooth note of elaborate condescension in his tone. “And does your divinity preclude you from lying with your wife?”
...heheheh.
Donal sees faint disgust in Rowan's face, and now he wonders frantically what Aislinn said. Rowan just says he'll have to ask that of Carillon.
This is actually a little beautiful. It really is. Because Donal is such a self-absorbed idiot that he set himself up here.
Remember the chain of events:
1. Wedding night. Aislinn freaked out, acted insane. Shouted racist bullshit one minute, and turned confused and frightened the next.
Donal just LEAVES HER THERE.
2. Evan, having no idea what happened, invites Donal out. At no point does Donal tell Evan what happened. Nor does he tell any of the palace staff what happened. Nor does he fetch a healer. Or Finn, a telepath.
3. Donal gets into a bar fight and almost gets sacrificed. This part obviously is not his fault.
4. Donal decides he needs ritual cleansing. Okay, fair enough. BUT
5. HE DOESN'T BOTHER TO TELL ANYONE WHAT HE'S DOING. NOT EVEN A NOTE.
So as far as anyone knows: Donal skipped town on his wedding night and vanished for five days. And god knows WHAT Aislinn's mental state is at this time. Or what she remembers about what happened. She could be completely possessed by Electra for all we know. But because Donal didn't bother to talk to anyone about what happened, Aislinn had five days to say whatever the fuck she wants.
There is no indication that at any point in the five days since the wedding that Donal even thought about the poor sixteen year old child that he abandoned alone, knowing that her mother fucked with her brain. It serves him right that now he's going to have to deal with the mess he abandoned.
#TeamRowan. #TeamAislinn.
I don't really remember this part, but I'm going to hazard a guess that Carillon will believe Donal over Aislinn anyway, because thus far he's shown exactly no concern or consideration for the daughter that he supposedly dotes on. But I'll enjoy even these fleeting moments of tension. Grow fucking up, Donal.
Thankfully for my nerves and sanity, the chapter ends here.
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Date: 2021-07-26 09:39 pm (UTC)5. HE DOESN'T BOTHER TO TELL ANYONE WHAT HE'S DOING. NOT EVEN A NOTE.
That's also as stupid as hiding from the public your villainous enemy's existence and then wondering why he is so effective.
I liked the bar brawl, I don't respect racists much either!
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Date: 2021-07-27 03:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-07-28 10:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-09-07 12:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-09-07 06:36 pm (UTC)