#random sidenote but for some reason I'm inclined to ship Penryck and Lord Arrin

[myriad-of-things]

Okay, so, the hagsfiend headcanons >:D

First, I am a simple person: I see dragons, I have to at least check out the idea, so when Lasky introduced Penryck "the Sky Dragon" and then did so little with him, I was very disappointed and made up a few headcanons about him:

- in the First Collier it is mentioned that Arryn had a son; my headcanon is that Penryck met Arryn's son first and he, in turn, convinced Arryn to hire Penryck (because I doubt Arryn would've considered hiring hagsfiends all on his own, he would've tried to get an owl warlord on his side instead)

- Penryck is actually better at diplomacy than Arryn, and he was trying to recruit some of Arryn's generals during the second half of The coming of Hoole; that's one of the reasons there are rumours about them going separate ways at the beginning of To be a King (also, his POV in the Coming of Hoole is him mentally rolling eyes at both Arryn's racist shit and his incompetence as a strategist, and I wish there was more of villainous flashbacks because trying to reverse engineer Sklardrog's personality off one pov and a handful of lines is painful)

- A bit more speculative one: Penryck crossed paths with Theo's father and uncle(possibly killed or ordered to kill the latter). Theo asks Grank if he's sure that Penryck killed the high king ‐ why specifically him and not any other warlord? Either Sklardrog's reputation is that scary or Theo had a personal reason to fear him. (This bit never came up again in the books, though, so it stays a speculation)

- Hoole's first time using firesight was a big missed opportunity. Imagine if he saw hagsfiends just living their lives and started doubting what Grank had told him?

- A rather sad one: I thought a lot about Ygreek and Pleek. A lot. (Mostly ranging between "Who hurt you, Grank?" and "Who hurt you, Kathryn?") Because the more I thought about it, the more it felt(at least the translation) like a part of Ygreek's desire to have a child comes from wanting to fit a "proper family" mold; we don't get a similar in-depth introspection about kids from Pleek's point of view, but since Grank picks him out instantly when he looks into the Ember, I headcanon that Pleek comes from a noble family (probably not as rich as Arryn, Siv or Grank himself), and he probably heard plenty of that "your purpose is to have an heir and pass on the family name one day" nonsense before he met Ygreek. So they both have their share of internalised issues about having kids.

(Oof, that got wordy)

I LOVE DRAGONS. I agree, I wish Penryck's character had been explored more. He does seem to be better at diplomacy from his short conversation with Lord Arrin. Lord Arrin's character pretty much boils down to "I want the throne" and "I want a wife," so it makes sense that Penryck was pulling all the strings behind the scenes. In terms of appearance I'd like to think Penryck had claws on his wings, perhaps scaled talons and very long ear-tufts to the point where they looked like horns.

I just think it's funny that owls are convinced hagsfiends are evil when all the hagsfiends in the legends books were hired by owl lords to overthrow King H'rath. The hagsfiends were definitely taking advantage of the situation there, but it's strange that they're considered more villainous than the owl lords who 1) have a gizzard so they know right from wrong, and 2) still chose to do wrong.

I believe it was confirmed that Pleek was a noble lord, which makes me respect his character more because like you pointed out, he probably faced a ton of pressure from his family to have an heir, and also backlash for falling in love with the enemy. When the war starts he would most likely have lost all his noble titles for consorting with a hagsfiend. He gave up so much for Ygryk, and it feels like a further punishment that they can't have a normal family together. Ygryk would probably also feel a lot of guilt for causing her mate to be cut off and shunned by his kind. Pleek and Ygryk may have been horrible parents to Lutta, but they also didn't have the best situation.