#same candela thats fucked up

[terramythos]

My commentary on October Daye #10 or "Whodunnit: non-Electric Boogaloo" OR "Golly there sure are a lot of references to book 3 in this one. For some reason. I'm sure it's just a coincidence and theres no reason for that at all".

This is the first one that's just a liveblog, not a reread. And there's 2 more after this one. Which I'm told are just devastating. Woo!

-Holy shit, 10 books in and we got a map!

A map!

An honest to God fantasy map!

-Quentin/Dean is.. cute. Again, I like that Dean will probably get more development now that he's more relevant to the plot.

-So. Yeah. Last book introduced the goddamn cure for elf shot, which is A Big Deal Gamechanger. So this whole book is dedicated to like.. the political implications of that

-High King Aethlin Sollys: *shows up*

Me: well crap

-Aethlin: how dare you go behind my back and use the elf shot cure after I expressly said no

Toby, dear toby, literal changeling street rat: I mean, this whole situation IS technically your fault

Everyone in the room:

Aethlin:

Toby:

Aethlin: that's fair

-Oh yay The Luidaeg is going to be involved in this one. I missed her last volume. And since this is about the whole elf shot cure thing, Walther will ALSO be involved :>>

God I love The Luidaeg.

-Interesting backstory re: Quentin's parents. Which explains why they're so cavalier about a changeling training and raising the fucking crown prince 🤔

-Aethlin: I met the most beautiful woman I had ever seen in my life

Maida: I had pox scars on my face and chicken shit in my hair

Aethlin: you hit me with a broom

Maida: I hit you with a broom.

-Lol @ Colorado being called Highmountain

-its interesting to see monarchs and characters from other parts of the US, since we've pretty much only experienced San Francisco and Portland.

-Power move is Arden acknowledging Tybalt as a King and unsettling all the racist fucks in the audience 👀

-think I found some retcon? Cause according to book 5 connor died to elf shot because he was shot in the heart. But this one is saying that elf shot is fatal to all selkies because they're basically human. Whatisthetruth.png

-The Luidaeg just consistently protects and helps children, huh. Here she's super kind and gentle to Karen even though it briefly cracks her badass intimidation facade in front of a bunch of people. She personally carries one of the kidnapped Undersea kids back home. She uhhh literally helps Toby kill her brother Blind Michael, a literal child predator, way back in book 3. And she rescued Toby when she figured out what Amandine was doing to her. I mean. It all makes sense based on her backstory but BOY is that a consistent trait.

I took this pic on a plane but omg

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-King Antonio: *dies*

Oh no... I uhhh hate when assholes I just met get killed off suddenly

-That being said, getting a glimpse into what it's like to be a Candela with those Merry Dancers as constant, loving companions. Definitely interesting enough that I hope we get more Candela in the series.

-Night haunts night haunts NIGHT HAUNTS their scenes are always cool.

-And Antonio's disoriented "where are my girls?" Talking about the Merry Dancers, when he emerges as a night haunt. That's pretty oof. :(

-OK so night haunts keep the form of the person they eat for as long as that person was alive. So imagine if The Luidaeg had perma died in book 8? The lucky sonofabitch night haunt that got to eat her would have a solid form for tens of thousands of years? That's bonkers. That's bananas.

- That's assuming Firstborn even get eaten @ all. I mean, Blind Michael got killed in book 3 and we haven't seen him with the flock.

- ....... 😳 UH. WAIT. Hold up. Hold the fuck up. No. I'm not exploring that line of thought.

LMFAO SYLVESTER.. *WHAT*

-Neeeeew MONTH NAME! September, Sylvester's dead sister, just got mentioned. I know she's shown up/been mentioned in some of the short stories, buuuuut...

-month names so far: January, April, May, August, September, October

Not introduced (yet): February, March, June, July, November, December

And we still dont know what is with the FUCKING month names. Only connection is they are all female characters and they all seem to be related in some way to Sylvester slash The Torquills. Some (like May) are a stretch there, but...

Oh lore?? OH LORE?

- Simon and Patrick were BFFs? 🤔🤔

-That.. had to have been introduced for a reason. Come on.

-Of course Raj likes romantic comedies. Of course he does

I LOVE the Luidaeg. Have I mentioned. This bit is even funnier knowing she can't lie. Which means she has an actual hierarchy of how much she wants to stab everyone she knows

BIG LUIDAEG LORE.

This is gonna take some unpacking. Most notable here is IS THIS THE SAME RIDE FROM BOOK 3? You know, Blind Michael's Ride, the Halloween horror show where he kidnaps kids and forcibly turns them into monsters? What is this flashback supposed to imply? The Ride used to be something else? The MONARCHS of ancient Faerie actually did kidnap kids like in the stories and Blind Michael took it over when they disappeared? The Ride maybe CAUSED them to disappear? What the fuck?

(Also my vampire crack theory gains more ground. Just look at that first paragraph. And then a couple pages later Toby sees the room covered in her blood and mentions feeling hungry looking @ it. Come on.)

-Support for my theory that this reminds me of: both the Dochas Sidhe we know of have the smell of blood as a part of their magical signature. Toby is initially "cut grass and copper" but as she gains power it becomes "cut grass and bloody copper". Amandine is "blood and roses" (which, interestingly, is what Toby tastes when she wakes up in this scene?) August and Gillian are the only other two characters we know of that have Dochas Sidhe heritage, and who knows what their magic smells like...

-The Luidaeg calling Shakespeare "a fucking dumbass" in a series full of Shakespeare references and motifs is, in fact, hilarious.

-Tybalt getting (basically) mortally wounded, so Toby tastes some of his blood. And sees herself from his perspective and how much he loves her. BIG OOF.

-Also interesting that the more powerful Toby becomes as the series progresses she's now the one saving Tybalt's ass. Was the polar opposite for the first 6 or so books.

-Colorado rep -- Highmountain are the big bads. Lmfao

-Well Toby is *actually* immortal. Like how else do you explain the shit that happens in this series lmao. (Also, turns out being that hard to kill is the shittiest superpower)

-Aw Toby forgave Sylvester... we will see if he actually redeems himself, I guess.

-You can tell Toby is embracing the "hero" role with that whole rousing and surprisingly coherent speech at the end.

This is just a real good character development vignette. We've come so far ;-;

-And of course the cure gets greenlit cause.. of course. But The Luidaeg's line "none of those assholes wanted to think about how confused they'd be if they missed a hundred years of internet memes" is, shall I say, Iconique

-multiple people have asked toby and tybalt to get married @ their house. And now the high king and queen fucking asked. Lmfao

-So this book was... interesting. I liked the political drama aspect. It was another whodunnit which we pretty much got a fill of with book 2. The conflict seemed to just kinda be.. there? I'd call it a filler book, but a lot of like.. lore got established, and we got some of what I assume are big hints/setups. Guess we'll see.

-to be fair books 1 and 2 also seemed like filler and turned out to be Super Fucking Important actually. So

-also there is just straight up a 70 page novella starring Arden at the end so I'll see if anything major happens in it.

-it's mostly a character study of Arden, turns out. But we DO learn that Cassandra, Karen's sister, is also a Seer, which... could be relevant (also I mean come on of course she is, did you see her name). Also Walther and The Luidaeg show up so thats fun.

-And it's funny to see what other characters think of October. Mostly she's a train wreck/practical joke that's somehow become extremely relevant to the surprise of literally everyone

-me seeing the total page count is 420: nice

-Anyway. The next two books sound like a gut punch conga line so let's get reading them