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olenvasynyt · 29 days

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Parallels between Gwyn and Az

People don’t often realize this, but Gwyn and Az have a lot of things in common. And imo, it points to Gwynriel. So let’s talk about it!

Dynamics with Nesta

They have similar dynamic with Nesta. It’s not identical but neither of them shy away from her bluntness like others do. They both seem to admire it and at some points, it gets Gwyn and Az to open up.

Page 251 of ACOSF: “Nesta watched the shadowsinger with a frankness that most people shied from. Azriel returned the look with the stillness that most people ran from.”

Page 114 of ACOSF: “ I don’t need to be coddled. Only spoken to like a person.” “I doubt you’ll enjoy the way I speak to most people.” Nesta said. “Gwyn snorted. “Try me.” Nesta looked at her from under lowered brows again. “Get out of my sight.” Gwyn grinned, a broad, bright thing that showed up most of her teeth and made her eyes sparkle in a way Nesta knew her own never had. “Oh, you’re good.” Gwyn turned back to the stacks. “Really good.”

Page 101 of ACOSF: “I hope you’re not giving my brother a hard time.”“Is that a threat, Shadowinger?” Azriel said coolly, “I don’t need to resort to threats.” Nesta gave him a smile, holding his stare. “Neither do I.”

Page 348 of ACOSF: “Nesta scowled, and Az offered her a slight smile. They could be allies, that smile seemed to say. Against Cassian’s utter insanity. She found herself answering Azriel with a slight smile of her own.”

Competitiveness

They’re both competitive. Cassian says that Az gets really competitive, and you can see the competitiveness in the bonus chapter where he has his plot to win the snowball fight.

Page 254 of ACOSF: “Azriel had a vicious competitive streak. Wasn’t boastful or arrogant… or possessive and terrifying…No, it was quiet and cruel and utterly lethal.”

Gwyn is super competitive with cutting the ribbon and when the Valkyries are doing the obstacle courses.

Page 624 of ACOSF: “Roslin, Ananke, and Deirdre were close on their heels, propelling Gwyn to push her group harder. She wanted to be the first. Wanted Nesta and Emerie and her to be the ones who wiped the smirks from Azriel’s and Cassian’s faces. Especially Azriel.”

Knowledge

They both get pretty fascinated by things, they both like to learn stuff. Cassian said that Az was really fascinated by the solar system and other-worldly stuff Rhys likes to research.

Page 37 of ACOSF: “At the far end of the room, a little dias led into a broad raised alcove…and in its center, a massive, working model of their world, the stars and planets around it…Az, of course, had been fascinated.”

Trauma / light and darkness

Quote page 113 of ACOSF: “If marks of trauma lingered, any evidence was hidden by her robe. But Nesta knew how invisible wounds could be how they could scars deeply and badly as any physical breaking.”

This is a really big one: Gwyn’s healing seems like the kind of healing Az had. Az was hidden in darkness and he was brought to the Illyrian camps which might have been the first time he saw true light in a while. He found Cassian and Rhys who took him in and they trained together. And Gwyn hid herself in the library for years and saw true light for the first time in a while and trained with Nesta and Emerie and found true healing and confidence in herself.

This quote really got me:

Quote page 272 of ACOSF: “Gwyn’s hands were shaking as she took another step into the ring and peered into the open bowl of the sky. The first time she’d been outside—truly outside—in years. She met Nesta’s gaze and smiled. "I forgot how it feels to have the full sun upon my head. Forgive me if I spend some time gawking at the sky.”

I can just imagine Az having a similar reaction when he’s at the Illyrian camps for the first time. A little 11 year old unsure of how to hold his wings up right just…looking up at the sky. And he’s hiding his hands.

The main difference with this is Az was locked up in the darkness and Gwyn chose to be in the darkness, but I think the fact that light and darkness are key parts of their healing process is important to note.

Fear of making mistakes, and their loyalty to loved ones

Another super significant thing about them is their sense of loyalty to the people who took them in, and their fear of making mistakes and failing.

This quote from Gwyn really got me because it just screams Azriel to me.

Quote page 148 of ACOSF: “because I don’t like to fail I can’t…” Gwyn shook her head. “I don’t want to make any more mistakes.” “These females took me in. Give me shelter and healing and family.” Again, her large eyes darkened. “I cannot stand to fail them in anything.”

That just seems so much like Az. Rhys and Cassian took him in, gave him shelter and healing and family, so he’s super loyal and he hates when he fails them. Az seems to often feel guilty when one of the plans goes wrong; he thinks he didn’t do as much as he could have.

Page 346 of ACOWAR: ”Hybern had made its grand move at last. And we had not anticipated it. I knew Azriel would take the blame upon himself. One look at the shadowsinger…told me he already did.”

Unworthiness

Another thing is they feel unworthy. You can see this with Gwyn and her invoking stone she says she doesn’t deserve to wear it, she is ashamed of her history and is afraid of people finding out things that she hates about herself.

Quote page 173 of ACOSF: “Why don’t you wear that stone on your head like the others?” Gwyn pocketed the gem. “Because I don’t deserve to.”

Page 521 of ACOSF: “I understand,” Gwyn repeated, “what it is to fail the people who mean the most. To live in fear of people finding out. I dread you and Emerie learning my history. I know that once you do, you’ll never look at me the same again.”

Page 696 of ACOSF: “But even training these months hasn’t erased the fact that I let my sister die. You asked me once why I don’t wear the hood of the Invoking Stone. That stone is a sign of holiness. How can someone like me wear it?”

That’s just so similar to Az I feel like, specifically this quote in the bonus chapter where he feels like his hands are tainted and that he’s unworthy of touching her.

ACOSF bonus chapter: “She looked up at him, her face so trusting and hopeful and open that he knew she had no idea that he had done unspeakable things that sullied his hands far beyond their scars. Such terrible things that it was a sacrilege for his fingers to skin, tainting her with his presence.

He also feels guilty for not doing enough, to fail the people around him. You see this with Mor a lot.

Page 429 of ACOWAR: ”As Azriel turned his face toward me—The frozen rage rooted me to the spot. But beneath it, I could almost see the images that haunted him: the hand Mor had yanked away, her weeping, distraught face as she had screamed at Rhys.”

Now kind of diverting from the topic: I see people make debates about why Gwyn thinks she’s unworthy. There are theories that she’s actually an inside spy for Koschei and maybe she feels guilty for that but there’s literally a quote that says she thinks she let her sister die and that she’s guilty that she lived and her sister didn’t. I dislike the evil Gwyn theories, I think they’re gross. I also kind of think her SA made her felt tainted, that’s a very common thing among SA survivors.

Coping skills / being unbreakable

And this is kind of a looser connection than the others I mentioned but we see moments from both where they tell themselves that they are unbreakable or hard to break. When Gwyn cut the ribbon, she quoted the Valkyrie mindstilling technique:

Page 621 of ACOSF: “I am the rock against which the surf crashes. Nothing can break me.”

"Nothing can break me" is something that Gwyn added, it was not part of the original Valkyrie passage. And it reminded me of something that Az says to Feyre when they are doing their flying lessons in ACOWAR.

Azriel tells Feyre Page 305 ACOWAR: “You’re immortal. You’re very hard to break. That’s what I told myself.”

The Blood Rite, friendships, and healing journey

And this similarty pertains to the Valkyries and the batboys in general, not solely Az and Gwyn, but the Valkyries during the blood rite is a reflection of the batboys during their blood rite. It was the beginning of their journey when it came to healing and finding their strength and proving people wrong. It was a pivotal point in their friendships, both groups fought like hell to reach each other.

Page 693 of ACOSF: “I don’t want to take the safe road. I want to take that road. To prove to them, to everyone, that something new and different might triumph over their rules and regulations.”

And this is the start of Gwyn’s journey, this is the start of her friendship with Nesta and Emerie, who have become very important to her. She’s still struggling with her fears, she tells Nesta that she might come out of the library to go to her mating ceremony.

And Az is kind of similar. He has had centuries to heal and be with his brothers. But he is absolutely still healing, he’s got tons of issues to sort out still. You can say they’re aloof and they lock themselves up in a similar way: he doesn’t seem to want to go out to bars and parties unless his friends go.

Page 377 of ACOMAF: “And when I pointed out that he did go to Rita’s with her whenever she asked, Mor simply informed me that it had taken her four centuries to get him to do that.”

He seems content to brood but he opens up because of his friends.

Differences

There are obviously tons of differences, I think the main ones being Gwyn is significantly more joyful than Az, she smiles and laughs a lot while it’s very rare to see Az smile or laugh. He’s super broody and aloof. Gwyn seems to open up a lot more easily. She has a lot of hope. She doesn’t seem to want to suppress herself. Even though she struggles she is trying to break free.

Page 524 of ACOSF: “ Nesta had never heard a voice like Gwyn’s—by turns trained and wild, as if there was so much sound fighting to break free of Gwyn, but she couldn’t quite contain it all. As if the sound needed to be loose in the world.”

And with Az: literally impossible to get him to confess anything. There are a lot of things that Cassian doesn’t know about his brother. He is content to brood. He shuts his feelings down until they build up to a point where they almost explode sometimes. There are some points where he suppresses his shadows on purpose, I feel like. I don’t know how his shadows work but he can control them at some points.

I feel like whether or not you believe these parallels point to Gwynriel, you can’t deny that they are very similar and can be very good friends and heal together because of that.

But also, Gwynriel is endgame 🤷‍♀️

#pro gwynriel #gwyneth berdara #gwynriel #professor layton and the azran legacy #acotar

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