macklanae

[macklanae]

everyday i wake up and think about the wizard steel

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every single school teacher should get paid $300,000 a year minimum and ICE agents should all die simultaneously in agony. this is my congressional budget plan

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[mouthful of almonds] what is the nature of evil

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Holy fuck this is good

Inflict wounds

[macklanae]

These thoughts remind me of all that Suvi is feeling when casting counterspell for the first time— and Brennan reflects back:

“You know in this moment, the corruption of this place runs deep. The Sword of the Citadel is bent on an unworthy task.

You are a truer heir to what this place should and could mean than she, that legacy of which you are not alone, lives on in you.”

Her understanding of this institution is a betrayal to what it could be. What Soft and Stone dreamed the Citadel could be lives in Suvi.

But I mean yeah, she certainly is consistent.

I’m having a hard time finding the right word to describe the Steel situation.

My instinct is to call it all a “betrayal.” It feels like a betrayal. But I always hit a weird wall when I try to use that word. I’ve found myself using words like “secrets” and “lying” and “murder,” obviously. “Awful,” “reprehensible,” “bad.” The “reveal” or “her true colors.” But I’m struggling to call the killing of Soft and Stone a cut and dry betrayal.

Steel is an immovable object in a lot of ways. We’ve known this. Grandma Wren told Ame that she could always trust Steel to do what she thought was best for the Citadel. With that being such an apparent truth, prioritizing the will of the Citadel over the will of her friends doesn’t sound exactly like a betrayal to me. It sounds like consistency.

I want to say killing Soft and Stone violated an alliance. They almost certainly had a pact, or even just an unspoken familial trust that they would have each other’s backs. But Steel believes* she successfully protected Soft and Stone from themselves.

Steel believes she ended their stories for their own sake, for the sake of their memory, for the sake of their unspoiled state of heroism. In her mind she never stopped being on their side.

She never changed sides. They did.

Soft and Stone technically betrayed the Citadel, or at least planned to. They wanted to dismantle the project in Lucent Court even after they knew it was sanctioned by the leadership of the Citadel.

Meanwhile Steel never diverged from the path she was on. And she never hid her alliances. The more I think about it, Soft and Stone’s perception of their allegiance to the Citadel may have differed from Steel’s. Soft and Stone may have seen themselves as loyal to the people of the Citadel, which wouldn’t conflict with the goal of dismantling the project. But Steel’s loyalty was almost certainly to the leadership of the Citadel, which she believed also knew what was best for its people. The Citadel as a home vs. The Citadel as a project.

Maybe none of them changed paths. They just realized their paths were never perfectly parallel.

Maybe I just need to reframe the word “betrayal” in my mind? Because Steel’s action has all the marks of a betrayal. It has the surprise, the shattered bonds, the pain, the shame. But I don’t think Steel was intentionally secretive about what mattered most to her. I just think she was (and is) (horrifically) misguided.

However! While the vocabulary of the murder of Soft and Stone is difficult for me to navigate, there is something I can say with more confidence:

Steel betrayed Suvi.

She betrayed Suvi’s trust over and over again. She lied to Suvi every day after that summer. She used Suvi. And when she agreed to show Suvi her whole hand, she didn’t own up to any of that.

So much of what Steel did after killing Soft and Stone was duplicitous. I like to think it was a turning point for her. But the act itself, I don’t know. I’m not exactly sure what to call it yet.

*I think it’s likely that Steel is only telling herself she killed them for their own sake to make herself feel better. I don’t think it was a part of her original motivations but I think she’s too scared to accept that fact. I think she’s terrified to allow a reality in which she “betrayed” her friends to exist, and that’s why she constructed that rationalization after the fact (either intentionally or unintentionally). Anywhere in the range of “Yes, that’s definitely why I’m going to do it,” to “That’s an impulse I was probably following, even if I hadn’t articulated it into a conscious idea at the time.” She’s covered her bases and made it difficult to use the word “betrayal” even when you have the whole picture.

[macklanae]

Really love that Aabria asked about this and how it relates to his experience as a parent. What a solid question!!!

Gonna cry about Soft and Stone, Brennan identifying with them and crying about Suvi "picking" Steel and not knowing them is so real and hurtful I loved this whole section

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Oh Ame, I couldn’t love a character more 🥹

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Re listening to ep 54 and Brennan and Taylor have a cutie little intro now

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Slayyyyy called it!!!

With the information we have gotten in episode, I wonder what steels true feelings are about Ame. She likely sees Ame as the influence who has taken her indoctrinated daughter away from her, the influence who destroyed her years of hard work manipulating Suvi to see the picture she wanted painted.

Also it’s looking more like Steal as every moment passes 👀

[macklanae]

Slay called it

I don’t know how they might pull it off but my guess is Ame, Suvi, and Eursulon will end up on a train to Tefmet and the book will end 💭

[macklanae]

I really wish that when Sammie played his final song in Sinners, Stack got to see Smoke. I feel like that would have been such a perfect moment.

Damn, even Mary seeing her mom.

[macklanae]

Saaaame same sammmmme

there are so many things i want to see happen in book 2 but the biggest one is suvi dyeing her hair red.

[macklanae]

STOOOOOP WHATTTTT

Suvi in CA Ep 1 and Ep 54: fleeing the citadel in the middle of a fight to save it, teleporting with her parents magic

Eursulon in CA Ep 1 and Ep 54: a knight in a golden pauldron speaks to a spirit about honor and protecting those who can't protect themselves, and the spirit crosses over to the mortal world

Ame in CA Ep 1 and Ep 54: welcoming new guests into her house that need shelter, and they will become part of her Home

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Sometimes I think of like Emily Axford or Matt Mercer listening to WBN and talking about it w their friends and gosh I’d love to be a fly on the wall for that

[macklanae]

God fucking damn

Obsessed with the contrast between Suvi "touching the world changes you" and Steel "No. We touch the world. We change it."

It immediately made me think of the end of Arc 2, when Suvi says:

"I cast mage armor. And the light that reflects and refracts off of her, over her, if you knew, if you watched the interplay of Aurora Borealis lights dancing across the invisible glass, you would know that that is Steel's armor. This is a wizard of the Citadel, and she is coming, with all the strength of her home behind her, and she looks out and forward, and any bit of snow that touches her clothing, or her face, or her hair melts away immediately, I will not be touched by this world, or any other, without my permission again."

When Suvi tried to avoid being touched by the world, it is specifically Steel's armor that she dons. Well before we knew explicitly that that was Steel's worldview, it was being demonstrated by the actions of the characters. This is a) such an interesting ideological divide, and b) an incredible demonstration of the way this group of storytellers is building their characters, other characters, and the world itself in parallel through their choices. I'll never get over how incredible this storytelling is.

[macklanae]

The Wizard The Witch and The Wild One is one of the single greatest pieces of media I have ever witnessed. This is my Lord Of The Rings I will refuse to ever be anything but honest about this podcast and I mean it from the bottom of my heart that this is straight up improved my every day. from the fireside to the podcast. And I’m so hyped for anything and everything to come

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Chills

Queen of Swords

Spoilers for Episode 53 of @worldsbeyondpod