#to straight-up copy their allegiance descriptions:

[puppypaw-wc]

chesspaw's great to me because his name makes it sound like he used to be a kittypet or smth n was named chess then but it's actually just that his original name from the allegiances generator was fritillarypaw, n fritillary's a name for a flower called the chess flower, so i renamed him chesspaw-

i'm pretty sure it was meant to be as in the fritillary butterfly cuz it's red n he's a red classic tabby but none of the other names for it sounded nice n i'm attached to him being named chesspaw now-

[neuxue]

Wheel of Time liveblogging: The Gathering Storm ch 41

EGWENE!!!!!!! And excellent use of outsider POV! And could Gawyn be more irritating? And EGWENE!!!!!

Chapter 41: A Fount of Power

Ah, the unique and entirely self-inflicted frustration of having to pause for three weeks in the middle of a major battle…

Gawyn continues to exist in this sequence and I am irritated. You’d better impede the awesome, Gawyn.

But we all know what Gawyn’s track record at the Tower looks like, so I’m not holding out a great deal of hope here.

The White Tower itself seemed to burn. It lit a daunting profile in the sky, all white and red, outlined by flames. Smoke boiled toward the midnight clouds above, fires blazed in many Tower windows, and a glare at the base indicated that outlying buildings and trees were also alight.

It’s such a great image, the once-untouchable White Tower burning against the night sky. And on a more symbolic level, it’s as if the truth is finally made visible: the Tower is burning, wounded, vulnerable, and it’s there for anyone to see.

Though right now Gawyn and the soldiers with him are more interested in seeing that there is in fact a secret entrance. And here I was hoping Gawyn might have to resort to banging really hard on the stone wall and shouting for someone to let him in, and eventually Egwene would notice him and shout down to him while lighting a to’raken on fire that she might need to take a rain check on tonight’s date, this really isn’t the best time, she has to go wash her hair.

At least he was finally doing something to help Egwene.

IS HE THOUGH?

Not all princesses want to be rescued from their fiery towers beset by dragons, Gawyn. Some of them might rather like it there. Standing in a badass hero pose, silhouetted against the night sky, surrounded by power, with their hair blowing in the wind.

She’s doing far more to help herself than you are to help her, is what I’m getting at here, Gawyn.

They were gliding directly into a war zone where both sides were stronger than they were, both sides had little reason to like them, and both sides were wielding the One Power. It took a special kind of man to stare those odds in the eyes.

‘Special’ is not exactly the word I would use.

But this frames the whole situation quite nicely: they’re heading straight into a battle in which they are hideously outmatched, with very little idea of what’s going on, for no reason but to rescue someone who has specifically asked not to be rescued. WHY.

They’ve brought a hundred soldiers with them? Again…why? What do they think that will possibly do against a Seanchan attack mounted on dragons and wielding the One Power? It’s too many for stealth, and not enough to actually have an effect. I’m just so confused as to why they’re doing this at all. You’re all going to die and to what purpose?

I suppose disguising themselves as Tower guards helps a bit on the stealth front, but still. Everything about this plan seems terrible.

“It’s always a good idea to have a few copies of your enemy’s uniform.”

“It’s not proper,” Siuan said, folding her arms. “Serving on the Tower Guard is a sacred duty. They—”

“They’re your enemy, Siuan,” Bryne said sternly.

Are they?

How long can they look at the Tower as their enemy before it becomes insurmountable truth? This is why Egwene does not want to be rescued; this is what she has learned in her time as a supposed captive of the Tower. She came here as a result of her own declaration of war against them, true, but that’s a part of this whole arc for her, realising that the Tower and the Aes Sedai there are not her enemies, that she cannot afford for them to be her enemies, even if Elaida is. That the solution must somehow be unity, not war.

Gawyn, Siuan and Bryne took up positions at the front—Gawyn and the general walking just ahead of Siuan, as if they were Warders

Gawyn Trakand, the things you do not notice could literally fill books.

All in all, the illusion was very good. On first glance, Gawyn himself would have bought the disguise.

Yeah, sorry, that’s really not a high bar.

The billowing smoke reflected red firelight, enveloping the Tower in a menacing crimson haze. Holes and gashes broke the walls of the once-majestic building; fires blazed within several of them.

It’s so starkly different from how the Tower has always been described up until now; it’s the sort of language that would much more naturally be associated with, say, Dragonmount. But the illusion of a pure white structure, beautiful and untouchable and eternal, a monument and a lasting symbol of strength, has been shattered, and beneath it is…this. A nightmare of fire and a crumbling structure and chaos, burning.

I just love the contrast, because up until now the descriptions of the Tower have been so consistent, so perfectly crafted to suit an entity that presents only and exactly the image it chooses, never changing, never faltering, never letting anyone see what is truly there. In hindsight, all those descriptions feel a bit like looping a single piece of film across CCTV footage while carrying out a bank robbery. Too perfect, too still. And so to now get these descriptions instead is perfect in its suddenness, jarring in the way a shattering is as the illusion is forcibly broken away.

Up above, near the middle of the Tower, several gashes were spewing fireballs and lighting back out at the invaders.

EGWENE! Maybe Gawyn will see her as the absolute fucking badass that she is and will realise that she is way, way out of his league, and will give up and go home and leave Egwene to be awesome in peace.

“Now what?” Gawyn whispered.

Great plan, guys.

“We find Egwene,” Siuan answered. “We start at the base, then head down to the basement floors. She was locked down there somewhere earlier today, and it’s probably the first place we should look.”

Oh, ye of little faith. How can even you, Siuan, have so little confidence in her? You’ve seen her take on a Hall that treated her like a puppet, you’ve sent her to hunt the Black Ajah as little more than a novice, you know her strength and resourcefulness and ability.

Gawyn, she’s supposed to be the woman you love, and therefore someone you should have confidence in, and assume competence of. That’s how it works, right?

Bryne, you swore allegiance to her when, again, she was to all appearances just a girl raised Amyrlin so that it would be easy to pull her strings. You gave her an army and trusted that she would know what to do with it.

And yet NONE OF YOU look at the battle taking place, and think that maybe Egwene is in the middle of it, that maybe Egwene has done what she does and found a way to turn an impossible situation to her advantage, or at least found a way to fight back. Give her some credit already!

I know, I know, based on the information they have, her situation is Hashtag Not Great, but…come on, this is Egwene we’re talking about! Even if ‘ah she’s probably found a way to be badass and claim the Amyrlin’s authority at least as a battlefield commission in order to get shit done when no one else can and save the Tower’ isn’t the default assumption, they should at least entertain the possibility that she’s managed to figure something out, that she’s found a way to fight back.

Though in Siuan’s case, I wonder if there’s an element of…projection? After all, she was a clever and capable and powerful Amyrlin, but she was dancing on thin ice for a long time with the coming of the Dragon Reborn and the secrets she held and the course she was trying to take, and she did not see the coup coming, and for all her own resourcefulness and strength she was unable to save herself from it. So from her I wonder if it’s not so much a lack of confidence in Egwene as a sense of something almost like déjà vu, of looking at this situation and being terrified that it’s happening again, that what happened to her will happen to Egwene because even the most capable can be brought down.

Gawyn has no excuse though. He’s had many, many opportunities to give his girlfriend a single vote of confidence and he always seems to…not do that. It’s very frustrating.

Oh thank the Light it’s a POV switch.

I should have known it would be Saerin trying to actually implement some sort of strategy. Or one of that group, anyway; they’re some of the few who have managed bipartisan talks cooperation and effective work towards an actual goal lately.

Around her, the room was in virtual chaos.

I think this is a case of somewhere the word ‘literal’ would actually be appropriate…

Moradri was a long-limbed Mayener with dark skin, and she was trailed by two handsome Warders, both also Mayener. Rumours said that they were her brothers, come to the White Tower to defend their sister

Okay I know we’re in the middle of a battle here but this is such an interesting little aside! On the one hand, I’m almost surprised we haven’t seen instances of the Warder bond being used between siblings, but on the other hand, speaking as someone who has a sibling…wow. That would be uh. Interesting. And yet it also makes a lot of sense, given that it is by definition an incredibly close bond requiring a great deal of trust and a long partnership…but also two brothers as Warders. What a family! I suddenly want all of the backstory here.

No Greens to be found. We know where Adelorna is, at least, but it’s really not all that surprising, if you think about it.

“A pity,” Saerin said. “They like to call themselves the Battle Ajah, after all. Well, that leaves me to organise the fighting.”

They’re the Battle Ajah, but I think that the Tower’s long tendencies towards secrecy, isolation and insulation, noninterference between sisters, and manipulation rather than outright participation in any sort of war or battle has not just had an impact on the Greens’ ability to work as anything resembling a cohesive group, but is also a set of attitudes that would end up forcing tactics over strategy in a battle situation.

Whereas someone like Saerin, or really any of the Brown Ajah who have made war and strategy a part of their studies might well be better suited to the more administrative – but oh so massively underrated and vitally important – aspects of fighting.

Saerin eyed the Green sister, then tapped the map. “Mark the locations, Moradri. You can go back to the fighting soon enough, but your knowledge is more important right now.”

Yes, exactly this. Moradri wants to be out there fighting, because that’s what her Ajah’s attitude is or has become. And because if they all see themselves as individuals acting separately, of course the impulse is to go out and fight directly, rather than recognise that they’ll actually be more successful if they coordinate, and that all of them just throwing all their firepower at whatever they can reach is not the most efficient approach.

They have fighting skills, it seems, but they don’t know how to function as any sort of military force. Because the Tower’s attitudes haven’t allowed for that sort of thinking or cohesiveness to ever emerge.

So you need the people who can stand back rather than rushing straight in to where the fighting is thickest, who can pull out the maps and watch what’s happening and bring some level of organisation to the chaos, and send out those who do have the actual hands-on fighting ability but may lack the mindset for looking at the bigger picture.

Which of course is just another of the already myriad reasons the Ajahs need to work together and maybe, I don’t know, communicate and recognise that they all have valuable but different skills to contribute and that they’re stronger and more capable as a whole than as a disparate set of individuals, but…well, that’s sort of the whole point of the Tower’s story, isn’t it? United we stand, divided we fall, and all that.

“Captain, our most important task is to form a centre of operations. Aes Sedai and soldiers alike are scrambling about independently, acting like rats faced by wolves. We need to stand together.”

Couldn’t have said it better myself. Not that that’s ever stopped me from spending a few hundred words trying…

It’s not just that they need to stand together, though. It’s that they need to work together, and delegate tasks, and understand that it’s not just about firepower here. That they need a centre of operations, and that means some of them hanging back from the fighting, in order to make that fighting more efficient.

And I like that it isn’t Egwene organising this. Because Egwene is so much better suited to doing exactly what she’s doing: leading from the front, by example, and demonstrating in highly effective fashion the importance of having battle-ready tacticians who can hold their own in the middle of a fight and respond quickly. Egwene is somewhat more of a tactician than a strategist, and in a way she’s an example of what the Green Ajah could and should be, because she doesn’t only consider herself, and she doesn’t approach the fight as an individual but rather as a leader, taking into account the other people around her and how they can have the most impact.

But she goes straight for the front lines; Egwene is not exactly a character to hold herself back from…anything, really. She’s not the sort of person who would be in Saerin’s role—before or after a battle, maybe, but not during one. So I like that we get to see the importance of both. That Egwene gets to be badass as the Amyrlin in battle, but we also get this quiet emphasis on how important it is for the rest of the Tower to come together, to figure out how to strategise as a whole rather than a bunch of individuals. Egwene is fighting for the Tower, but the Tower also needs to learn how to fight for itself in order to back her up, and follow that lead. And for that, they need not just a leader like Egwene, but people like Saerin who can fill those desperately needed administrative and strategic roles, and look beyond the divisions as Egwene has been trying so hard to get them to do.

I also like that Saerin explicitly acknowledges Egwene in her thoughts, because Egwene isn’t here—and shouldn’t be; she’s doing just fine right where she is—but this is largely due to her influence. She can’t play every role herself, and what she’s doing right now is probably the best thing she could possibly be doing, but this is why she’s been trying to get them to break down those barriers between the Ajahs and even between the sisters themselves. Because Tarmon Gai’don is coming, and they need all of those skills—not just the fighters, or the healers, or the strategists, or the historians, but all of them, contributing their individual strengths. Just as we see Saerin doing here.

“This is a disaster!” an angry voice shouted.

Katerine, at least fifteen minutes late and not even bringing Starbucks.

“How dare they strike here!” Katerine continued.

Yes, Katerine, we see what you’re doing. It’s something the Black Ajah has been frighteningly successful at: sowing this sort of discord and inward-looking righteous anger and doing everything in their power to keep the Tower, and the Aes Sedai within it, from looking past themselves and their status and superiority.

So she comes into this ad-hoc centre of operations trying to rile them all up, because that’s the best way to ensure that they continue to face this threat as no more than an angry set of individuals, rather than putting aside insult or anger or fear for a while in order to fight back.

“We need to scour the Tower and eliminate each of them!”

It’s such a transparent attempt to divide them, and yet they’re all so divided already that would probably work, if Saerin weren’t here to immediately stomp out the bullshit.

Saerin raised an eyebrow. “Since when did the Mistress of Novices outrank a Sitter in the Hall, Katerine?”

Katerine tries to play the Red vs Brown angle but Saerin’s response is excellent not just because Katerine is a pain in our collective arses and it’s nice to see someone give her the verbal slap in the face she so deserves, but because it completely…not just ignores but takes all the relevance out of their difference in Ajahs. Saerin is a Sitter and Katerine is not and they’re under attack and it doesn’t matter what Ajah they are.

It reminds me, really, of Egwene telling Adelorna that for now, Adelorna and the others must call her Mother and accept her authority (also can I just say as an aside how much I love that the title of authority claimed by a leader in the midst of battle is Mother? Like what a way to quietly and without even addressing it subvert military and battle gender expectations and stereotypes). Saerin’s doing a similar thing in the…centre of operations, such as it is. She claims authority through competence, and for now they have to just accept that.

This battle isn’t really about the Seanchan so much as it’s about the Tower having to confront some hard truths about itself, which means it’s a time when characters like Egwene but also characters like Saerin get a chance to shine.

Another boom sounded outside.

“Where do those keep coming from?” Saerin asked in annoyance. “Haven’t they made enough holes?”

They?

“No, Aes Sedai!” the guard said. “I think it was a blast thrown from within the Tower, launched from one of the upper floors out at the flying creatures.” “Well at least someone else is fighting back,” Saerin said.

OH YOU HAVE NO IDEA.

She doesn’t, does she? Of course she wouldn’t. Because the Tower is a mess and there’s so little communication and even those like Egwene and Saerin who are trying to coordinate an actual defence—either by enacting it with whatever resources they can reach, or by trying to form a central command hub—are isolated from one another, and no one knows what’s going on.

“It appears that there’s a second rallying point for the defence, and it’s doing very well.”

YOU DON’T SAY. Tell us more, Captain. Paint us a picture of Egwene being a force of light, a rallying point for the Tower.

Have I mentioned I love outsider POV? We’re not even seeing Egwene through any of these characters’ eyes but that almost makes it better, because as the reader you know who they’re talking about even when they don’t. You can watch them try in wonder and surprise to work it out, or to see Saerin take it in stride but also with a clear sense of relief and even excitement, and you know who is causing that, who is having that kind of impact. There’s a particular kind of delight as a reader in seeing other characters in some form of awe or respect or even just surprise or relief at what you know to be another character’s actions, but their reaction isn’t for the character, it’s for what the character has done. It’s for the awesome, even when they don’t know the source of the awesome, but as a reader you do and it’s wonderful. This is maybe a weirdly specific thing to love, but love it I do.  

“Where?” Saerin asked eagerly. “Specifically?”

“The twenty-second, Aes Sedai. Northeastern quarter.”

“What?” Katerine asked. “The Brown Ajah sections?”

No. That was what had been there before. Now, with the swapping of the Tower’s corridors, that area of the Tower was…

THIS IS EVERYTHING I WANTED IT TO BE.

This slow realisation, the amazement first at the fact that there’s a strong defence at all, and then wondering who and how, and then this gradual realisation that wait, wait…

It’s not suspense, exactly, because as a reader you know exactly who and how, but watching other characters realise is just delicious.

“The novices’ quarters?” Saerin said. That seemed even more ridiculous. “How in the world…” She trailed off, eyes widening slightly. “Egwene.”

I LOVE EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS SO MUCH.

This, this is why I absolutely adore outsider POV. It’s that sense of…triumph by proxy, that thrill of other characters realising, and really seeing Egwene for the first time in a new light, even when she’s not actually there. Perhaps even because she’s not actually there. Those moments when characters recognise something in another that you’ve known all along but seeing it through new eyes it’s almost like getting to see it again for the first time.

Also okay, I’m just a simple girl with simple needs, and so if you give me a character breathing another character’s name in astonishment and realisation, I will be happy.

It’s especially effective because this is what Egwene has been working towards for so long, and we’ve seen bits and pieces of it—of the way the other Aes Sedai see her shifting—but this is where it really seems to happen. Where someone like Saerin fully understands that this girl is no novice, that she’s not a wilfull child or a puppet manipulated into declaring herself Amyrlin. This is where, again perhaps because Egwene isn’t actually there, she and maybe the others can look past Egwene’s youth and her novice dress and see what they’ve been unable or unwilling to see before. That this woman is the Amyrlin, and she is a force to be reckoned with, and she will save the Tower by sheer force of will if she has to.

I also like how that realisation is coming right on the heels of a very different mood of outsider-POV-realisations-about-a-character with Rand. Mostly in seeing him through Tuon’s eyes, but even seeing him through Min’s when he burned Natrin’s Barrow. There, it was watching other characters finally realise just how terrifying he has become—or in Tuon’s case, you get the same impression because it’s her first time meeting him and what she sees and thinks about shows Rand in a very different light, seen through the eyes of someone who has not been watching him all along and doesn’t still see, at least a little bit, the boy from Emond’s Field.

And now you get the same thing with Egwene—the realisation that she is not just a girl from Emond’s Field claiming authority she doesn’t have, and that she is a force to be reckoned with, and that she’s so much more than they assumed her to be—but in every other aspect it’s opposite to what we see with Rand. And yet conveyed through the same techniques, and even with the Seanchan as backdrop, to some extent.

Now over to Egwene herself!

Egwene stood at an open hole in the side of the White Tower, wind pulling at her white dress, tugging at her hair, howling as if in accompaniment to her rage.

I do love these…Hero Pose Portraits we get of her. Egwene at the heart of the storm, wind in her hair and fire in her eyes. It’s a strong visual, and a very recognisable one. This is absolutely and immediately recognisable as a Hero Pose, and I suppose it’s a good example of how some tropes are tropes because damn it they work.

Her anger was not out of control. It was cold and distilled. The Tower was burning.

Are you tired of me drawing parallels and contrasts between her and Rand yet? Yes? Well, too bad.

‘Cold’ is definitely a description pretty strongly associated with Rand at this point, cold and hard and emotionless. And right at this moment, yes, Egwene is cold and calm and ruthless. She’s in the middle of a battle; she has to be. She has to be able to order the novices to form circles and fight with her, she has to be able to strike to kill, to bring down raken that may be carrying Aes Sedai captives. She has to be able to think, and to respond to the Seanchan’s attacks, and plan her own.

But the difference between her and Rand here is that Egwene uses that as a temporary state, and even then she doesn’t deny her emotions, or push them down so far that they end up stabbing her to death from the inside with their tiny spiteful knives (don’t lie to me, Rand, that’s exactly what’s going on and we both know it).

It’s like when she told herself steel yourself, Egwene, before reading through the list of dead ladies Black Ajah members. There are times when a measure of cold is needed. There are times to put emotion aside for later. But she doesn’t try to become that cold. She doesn’t try to become steel. She can harden herself to battle when she has to, and she does a bloody good job of it, but she’s not trying to flay herself into  a permanent state of it as a way of dealing with what she must do.

She can embrace pain, but embracing it also means accepting and acknowledging and feeling it, and understanding that her aims are simply more important than the pain. She can steel herself to harsh truth, but she also takes a few moments to work through the emotional turmoil it causes.

It’s an issue of moderation; Egwene seems to have found a balance of sorts, where Rand has gone to an extreme. She can access that place of calm, cold determination, but she doesn’t have to take up permanent residence there (which is good because wow, here I thought America’s citizenship path was demanding). And she has a very clear sense of why she’s doing this; it’s something she has chosen, and something she will fight for because she believes it is worth fighting for. The fact that she cares is what enables her to do this at all, whereas Rand feels like he has to not care about anything in order to reach a state where he can do anything.

She directed her anger—the anger of justice, the wrath of the Amyrlin.

She can be cold in the midst of battle, but she’s channelling her anger into that rather than denying it. She is not unfeeling, here; this is not like Rand so calmly and so quietly erasing a fortress with balefire, knowing it should terrify him and yet feeling nothing at all. She is angry and she accepts that anger and both the power and the consequences of it.

And I think maybe it comes down to choices, again. Egwene can kill for the Tower because she chose her role; she may not actually want to kill people but it doesn’t threaten to destroy her when she has to, because she accepts it as part of the path and cause and role she has chosen. Not that she specifically chose the killing people part, or necessarily would have, but I think she doesn’t see it as a duty she is forced to bear, a role she is forced to play, blood that is demanded of her. She chose the Tower and she chose to be Amyrlin and she chose to leave Emond’s Field and she chose to be the person she is now and give herself to this cause, and so if this is part of it, well, then, that is what she will do. It feels like one of those lines that is both vast and yet so small, just a matter of perspective and nuance, and yet it makes such a huge difference to almost everything.

She was a fount of Power, drawn from deep within the fluted rod in her hands, channelled through a group of novices and Accepted hiding in the room behind, bound to her in circle. Egwene was part of the fires that burned in the Tower, bloodying the sky with their flames, painting the air with their smoke. She almost seemed not a being of flesh, but one of pure Power, sending judgement to those who had dared bring war to the Tower itself. Blasts of lightning stormed from the sky, the clouds churning above. Fire sprouted from her hands.

This is absolutely beautiful, and so, so similar to how Rand was described, as a force of Light, a being seemingly made of light and Power rather than flesh, channelling through a ter’angreal that shone in his hands. And at the end, fire.

It’s such an eerily similar description, and it carries the same beauty and power, and yet the context and therefore feeling it evokes is so completely different. These are the parallels I love, where the scenes are almost mirrors of each other, where the actions or situations are almost identical, and yet a simple shift in perspective or sense of agency or reasoning can make it look completely and utterly opposite.

With Rand, this image was one to evoke a sense of quiet horror, beauty and yet terror, a pause before the step across a line, the sort of silence and blinding power and then act that leaves no breath or words for making sense of what has just happened. But now, the almost identical image is one of wrath and justice and power and triumph—there’s a harshness to it, yes, but it’s all for a purpose, and there is no silent gaping absence of emotion, no moment where it seems the whole world is drawing in in horror before the release.

With Rand, the eeriness came in part from the complete absence of violence in the description. It was just beauty and power and then…that. Whereas with Egwene the violence is a part of it; the description is beautiful and she is a being of power but we have fires the burned the Tower and bloodying the sky and painting the air with their smoke and blasts and churned. There is no denial of violence here, just as there is no denial of the emotional aspect of it. This isn’t quiet the way Rand’s scene was, because nothing is being muted or suppressed here. There isn’t a sense of absence, or of something vital missing. There’s just violent, terrible, beautiful power and triumph and anger and desperate defense and vengeance and justice. No, it’s not kind. But it’s not meant to be. And so it has none of the eeriness of A Force of Light, none of the growing horror at how soft and quiet everything was contrasted with what it was.

And I like the nod here to the Amyrlin being one with the Tower, in the way we’re always given the Dragon as one with the land.

Perhaps she should have feared breaking the Three Oaths. But she did not. This was a fight that needed to be fought, and she did not lust for death—though, perhaps, her rage against the sul’dam approached it. The soldiers and damane were unfortunate casualties.

The White Tower, the sacred dwelling of the Aes Sedai, was under attack. They were all in dagner, a danger greater than death. Those silvery collars were far worse. Egwene defended herself and each woman in the Tower.

Okay, I’m glad we at least got some acknowledgement that this is on the fuzzy side of compliance with the Three Oaths, though I’m still surprised Adelorna didn’t even think about it.

For the record, I have absolutely no problems with what Egwene is doing; the Seanchan attacked first, and they’re attacking to capture or kill, and if Egwene can spin that into defending her life and the lives of all the Aes Sedai in the Tower in order to comply with the oath against using the Power as a weapon, great. But it is definitely in a slightly grey area of that particular oath, so I’m glad we’re seeing some awareness of that.

And…yeah, she’s not killing because killing is fun, but she’s also not going to be torturing herself with the blood on her hands after this. Would she have chosen this battle? No. But it’s here and this is the role she has chosen, and so this is a part of what that means, and she can accept that. Even somewhat coldly, in the moment—but again I don’t think it’s a complete absence of feeling so much as an acceptance, and a lack of…heaping unnecessary pain on herself because of the things that she has to do.

(And I’m just going to continue to ignore the ‘worse than death’ thing because I said so).

The attackers prepared weaves to strike her down, but each time Egwene struck first, either deflecting the balls of fire with a blast of air or simply bringing down the to’raken who carried the women trying to kill her.

A one-woman anti-aircraft gun.

Something I really like about this fight is that it doesn’t shy away from the fact that Egwene is in battle, with a body count, aiming to kill. It’s something that often is…avoided…with female protagonists. Implied, sometimes, but often euphemised or glossed over or never really verified on-screen. A bit like how we see Aviendha, actually; she’s a former Maiden of the Spear and it’s kind of assumed that she has been in fights and has killed people, but it’s definitely told more than shown. So you get a fair amount of that (and then there’s Tamora Pierce, doing the Good Work and providing all kinds of Ladies With Swords content), but this is definitely more rare.

And yet Egwene gets to have that, and it’s not written as a stain on her character, or as something that’s going to cause an existential crisis. It’s just who and where she is: she is the Amyrlin and the Tower is under attack and she is on the front lines defending, and that means she is in a battle, and she is fighting and fighting to kill. Just as Mat and Perrin and Rand have been. And it’s not written differently because she’s a woman, or even written in such a way as to highlight that at all. It’s just written as a powerful main character in a battle for her life and the cause she’s defending.

Between Falme and Cairhien and now this, she’s probably in the running for second-highest body count after Rand (maybe third; Mat is almost certainly higher and it’s hard to say with Perrin), but it’s not made into a Thing any more than it is for any of them. Nor is she the seductress/femme-fatale type you often see with women who have blood on their hands. She’s just…a powerful character in a position that means she sees battle, and she’s really not treated any differently in that sense than the male characters in similar positions. Which I really, really appreciate.

Some would escape. But they would pay dearly. That was another goal. She had to make certain they never attacked the Tower again.

This raid had to cost them.

And this is the other thing I like: that she’s allowed to have this edge. She is fighting on the defensive, and out of necessity, but she is also approaching it as a tactician, and it is a battle, and could turn into an ongoing war. So she’s doing what she can to prevent that, which means making it cost them—which means killing them. She’s allowed that ruthlessness, just as she has always been allowed ambition; two traits that are sometimes hard to find in non-villain female characters.

Over to Bryne now, who is busy dodging a burning raken. Probably Egwene’s welcome gift to him; she’s a bit busy to send flowers.

It’s a shame Bashere isn’t here; he’d probably commandeer one and honestly I want nothing more.

Were the Seanchan running away from something or just looking for a fight?

Not something, Bryne. They are absolutely fleeing someone and I cannot wait for you to work it out. Because watching people work out how very capable and frankly terrifying Egwene is has been the best part of these chapters.

Well, aside from Egwene herself, of course.

I don’t want Bryne to admire Gawyn’s swordsmanship because that means I have to accept that Gawyn’s good with a sword and—okay, this sentence was actually going somewhere but it got derailed when I realised I was just diving headfirst into truly awful innuendo. Ow. Well, whatever Gawyn, Galad is still the better swordsman and Mat could take both of you with a stick and Lan could probably take all three of you without breaking a sweat and—yeah, no, that sentence wasn’t any better. I give up.

Gawyn unsheathed his own blade, on edge. “Look up there,” he said, and pointed with his sword. […] “By the Light…” Bryne whispered, focusing on the gap. A solitary figure wearing white stood in the Tower’s rent.

AW YEAH.

The theme of this chapter is whispered awe at the sight or even realisation of Egwene and I am here for it.

And yes, Bryne. By the Light indeed. Even more so than you meant it, I think.

It’s just SUCH A GOOD IMAGE, a solitary figure in white, alone and yet the essence of the Tower itself, as it should be; the Amyrlin even dressed as a novice, standing in a fracture in the Tower because she is the one holding it together, holding its attackers at bay.

It was too distant to make out her face, even with the spyglass, but whoever she was

ARE YOU SHITTING ME. ‘Whoever she was’? Surely one of you at least has a fleeting suspicion at this point?

Whoever she was, she was certainly doing some damage to the Seanchan. Her arms were upraised with fire glowing between  her hands, the burning light throwing shadows across the outer Tower wall around her.

Setting aside the fact that her boyfriend and her general can’t seem to recognise her, I love all these glimpses we get of her throughout the battle. We only see briefly from her POV, but to those who see her…the descriptions are all in this mode of the heroic bordering almost on the divine. A force of light and power, a solitary figure in white, arms upraised and fire in her hands, a symbol of strength and determination and everything the Tower should be. And she is always met with awe and almost wonder; it’s such a great way to show a character coming well and truly into her own in the eyes of those around her.

Except, apparently, for Bryne and Gawyn, who still don’t even consider that it could be her. WHO THE FUCK ELSE WOULD IT BE?

I am Disgruntled.

(Also, the burning light throwing shadows is again so similar to the description of Rand in A Force of Light that it’s almost hard to tell the quotes apart…and yet while the visual imagery is the same, almost nothing else is. On the one hand destruction, and on the other, salvation).

The badly wounded would be abandoned into enemy hands, but they had been warned of that possibility before coming on this mission. Recovering the Amyrlin outweighed all other concerns.

Except by ‘enemy’ he means the Tower and not the Seanchan, and he looks at the whole battle against the Seanchan as a distraction from their real purpose, and really none of them should be enemies and he just saw the Amyrlin and she certainly did not need recovering and really…everything is wrong here. None of them should be fighting, and yet they are, and all sides or contingents involved have a different thought as to who the enemy even is, and it’s just confusion and chaos because none of this should be happening at all.

“And if you’d been recognised?” he demanded. “Siuan, these people tried to execute you!”

She sniffed. “Moiraine herself wouldn’t recognise me with this face.”

Wow, okay, I’m not sure why this hit me the way it did but something about the fact that she so reflexively uses Moiraine as the reference point her …as far as Siuan knows, Moiraine is dead, and yet she has for so long been the person Siuan was closest to, the one other person who shared their secret for twenty years, her best friend and onetime lover and just the way she says it, ‘Moiraine herself’, without seeming to even think about it…I don’t know, it came out of nowhere and yet of course that’s what she would say and suddenly I’m a little bit sad.

There are a lot of reunions—or even first-time meetings—I’m hoping for before the end, but Moiraine and Siuan are very high on the list. They are the only ones left of the ones who began this, and I just want them to have a moment to see one another again and be able to share that knowledge of how far they have come and all they have done, even if it’s bittersweet, and maybe even get to finally lay that duty down and look ahead to a life in this world they’ve given so much of their lives to save.

Anyway she’s found a novice who should at least be able to tell them what’s going on, and by ‘what’s going on’ I mean ‘that Egwene is a badass and they don’t need to rescue her because she’s busy rescuing the entire Tower, so maybe they could just go help her out with that’.

“The Amyrlin, Egwene al’Vere,” the novice said in a quivering voice. “She was released from the cells earlier today and allowed to return to the novices’ quarters.”

And the novices’ quarters aren’t where they were, so there’s still some reason for Siuan and the others to not immediately put two and two together to make ‘Egwene is a badass and they don’t need to rescue her because she’s busy rescuing the Tower, so maybe they culd just go help her out with that’ but the fact that still none of them have even considered the possibility is DRIVING ME MAD.

“But she’s probably up on the twenty-first or twenty-second level somewhere. That’s where the novices’ quarters are now.”

Okay, no more excuses.

AND YET. THEY STILL. DO NOT EVEN THINK. THAT MAYBE THE GLORIOUS AND TERRIBLE WOMAN WITH FIRE IN HER HANDS AND A WHITE NOVICE DRESS IS THEIR AMYRLIN.

I am, of course, most disappointed in Gawyn who should be the one going ‘Wait! What if that was Egwene! My girlfriend is awesome and capable and maybe she’s managed to find a way to fight!’ but instead goes straight for ‘We’ve got to reach her!’

He was the one who pointed her out, even. Worst Boyfriend of the Year.

I cannot believe I have been forced to a point where I wish that, if she had to choose one of the Brothers Arthurian, she had chosen Galad. I resent this.

“You’re here to rescue her, aren’t you?” The novice sounded eager.

Bryne eyed the girl. Child, I wish you hadn’t made that connection.

What, you thought there was even a slight chance that she wouldn’t? With you storming into the Tower and talking about Egwene and immediately saying you have to go and find her? Just because you three are all being as dense as bricks about what’s right in front of you doesn’t mean everyone else is.

As much as I loved the way Saerin’s realisation that Egwene was the one organising the fight against the Seanchan, the astonishment as she said Egwene’s name and understood what was happening? That’s how much I’m annoyed at seeing Bryne and Gawyn and Siuan fail to realise the same thing.

Especially because really, they have just as much information as Saerin did, and she worked it out. More information, even; they’ve actually seen Egwene, even if they couldn’t make out her face. *Shakes head* I’m not mad; I’m just very disappointed in the three of you.

Pause for a quick Healing break because this lot have brought swords to a One Power fight.

Would [the Tower] ever be the same again, or had a seemingly eternal monument fallen this evening? Was he proud or grieved to have witnessed it?

This, I like, because it’s one of the threads running through this whole chapter—and, really, through most of the series, especially since The Shadow Rising. Now, though, the cracks that have spidered their way up the Tower are made plain for the world to see, thrown open beyond anyone’s ability to hide. It’s that destruction of the illusion of invincibility, which can utterly flip entire worldviews. The realisation that something once considered untouchable is just as vulnerable as anywhere else, and I am…somewhat put in mind of an aspect of a nation’s response to fall of another (set of) tower(s); a lot has been written about the realisation of vulnerability that caused, and the effect it’s had on the sociopolitical landscape of the entire country pretty much since then. There’s definitely a paradigm shift that occurs with that sort of realisation or fracturing of worldview.

I like Bryne’s…confusion isn’t the word I want but it’ll have to do…at whether he feels proud or grieved to be seeing this. He’s not really a part of the Tower—I mean, he serves a claimant to the Amyrlin Seat and he’s bonded now to a former Amyrlin and his focus has been on fighting to reclaim the Tower, so okay, he’s got some ties there, but he’s not Aes Sedai, and he’s not from Tar Valon, and for most of his life he has been no more tied to the Tower than anyone on this continent. But it’s been a constant throughout all that time; love it or hate it or fear it, the Tower has been the Tower for as long as anyone alive can remember. So to watch this…there could be a sense of pride, or perhaps of justice or vindication in seeing the arrogance of the Aes Sedai brought low. But at the same time…it has been a constant, and while the Aes Sedai are far from perfect, what does it mean for the world if they are show to be truly fallible? If the Tower can break, what else will follow? It’s the sense of an ending; it’s one thing to know Tarmon Gaidon is coming, but another to watch as a symbol of your time is destroyed.

No time for philosophical pondering, though, because he has to go stab a guy.

Was this one of the Bloodknives? It certainly looks to be; pity that didn’t help him against a Warder’s reflexes.

Assassins. They always seemed to look the same, regardless of the culture.

This feels like an author poking fun, and I had to laugh.

“Min,” Siuan said, sounding tired. Those Healings seemed to have taken a lot out of her. “She said I had to stay near you.” She paused. “If you hadn’t come tonight, I would have died.”

“Well,” Bryne said, “I am your Warder. I suspect it won’t be the only time I save you.” Why had it grown so warm all of a sudden.

“Yes,” Siuan said, standing up. “But this is different. Min said I’d die, and…No, wait. That’s not what Min said exactly. She said that if I didn’t stay close to you, we’d both die.”

And she proceeds to pull a poisoned needle out of his arm. So Min was right, but her viewing only ended up being true because she told Siuan about it, because if she hadn’t, then Siuan wouldn’t have paused to think about it and about the other half of it, which implies that—okay, no, that way lies brain-pain. Do Not Think Too Hard About Foretellings And Prophecies: rule number one of reading fantasy (without falling into an infinite loop).

“But I wouldn’t have been poisoned if I hadn’t come!” “Don’t try to apply logic to a viewing or Foretelling like this”

It’s like you read my mind, Siuan. Or, more likely, Sanderson. A little nod to the nature of the genre, there?

Egwene sat, exhausted, on a pile of rubble, staring out of the hole in the White Tower, watching fires burn below.

I love that this is how we begin her POV here. We’ve seen her glorious in battle, full of cold anger and justice and determination, we’ve seen other characters look to her in awe, and the Seanchan have fled from her…

And, in victory, all we see is exhaustion. Exhaustion and the aftermath—the Tower is still broken, the fires still burn. They have won, but there is a price.

It’s such an excellent contrast to the imagery and mood from the battle itself, and it’s perfect in the way so many of the battle-aftermath scenes have been in this series. It’s that sense of…only a battle lost is sadder than a battle won.

She has fought, and she has won, but while there was a sense of triumph and strength in the moment, now there’s just…exhaustion and rubble. They’ve won, but it has taken so much, and they’ve taken wounds, and it’s not truly over. And like so many battles in the series, it wasn’t even against the Shadow; it was against those who should not be enemies and yet are, because they cannot find common ground.

And…I just realised something. This was Egwene’s parallel to A Force of Light (well, parallel and inversion) but it was also her Dumai’s Wells. The Seanchan are, in a way, her Shaido; the Shaido were the catalyst for much of Rand’s early arc and steps along the path that led him to where he is now, and at Dumai’s Wells he broke free from the box he was kept in and found himself surrounded by them and thought They will pay. I am the Lord of the Morning. And then he destroyed them—or, commanded and witnessed their destruction until he couldn’t take it anymore and they fled—in a vicious battle that ended in definitive but pyrrhic victory, as well as Aes Sedai swearing fealty to him.

Meanwhile, the Seanchan were the catalyst for much of Egwene’s early arc and steps along the path that have led her to where she is, and now she has just been freed from the box-like prison cell where she was held and beaten, and she finds herself surrounded by the Seanchan and thinks They would pay dearly. This raid had to cost them, and destroys them with fire and the One Power resulting in victory, but one that comes at the high cost to the nearly-destroyed Tower, but has led to Aes Sedai accepting her authority and seems likely to lead to Aes Sedai acknowledging her as Amyrlin.

Though, of course, there’s the usual inversion of tone to a certain extent; this doesn’t feel like Egwene’s darkest hour, even with the exhaustion and destruction that follows. But I think the point is that it so easily could have been, that so much depends on perception.

It’s also just a really cool set of parallels.

A few sisters weaving Air or Water could make short work of the flames, preserving the Tower. What was left of it.

Egwene closed her eyes and lay back, resting against the fragments of a wall, feeling the fresh breeze blow across her.

Here, again, we get a sense almost of the Amyrlin as one with the Tower. Victorious, technically, but beaten and exhausted and still burning, unable to do anything but lie back against the fragments of what was. With the wind, of course. Of course a wind rises, here.

Egwene wanted to help. A part of her did, at least. A sliver. But Light, she was tired! She couldn’t channel another trickle, not even using the sa’angreal. She’d pushed the limits of what she could manage. But she was so worn out now that she woudn’t be able to embrace the Source if she tried.

Oh, Egwene. It is a heavy mountain to carry, even if it is one she has largely chosen, or believes she has chosen. But she has been through so much in the last…well, twelve books but particularly the last few weeks, and she just faced the strength of the Seanchan while barely able to channel unaided, and still the Tower is broken and still there is more to do and she wants to help but there are limits and she is far past them.

Not that that always stops her, but…there’s a sense here not quite of despair but I guess that she’s been doing too much of this alone for too long. She’s held the Tower together and defended it all while those within it have tried to break her even as the Tower itself was breaking—the Tower is one with the Amyrlin and the Amyrlin is one with the Tower—and maybe now it’s up to some of them to put the fires out. To begin the repair. To help her hold the Tower together, because there’s no point if they don’t join her; there’s no point in her holding it up if the Aes Sedai don’t rally to the same cause.

And so perhaps it’s not up to her to help, here. She has done what she can for them, and she will continue to do more, but right now it’s time for them to take some steps of their own, to decide whether the Tower will in fact be saved, or whether they will let it fall.

She’d fought. She’d been glorious and destructive, the Amyrlin of judgement and fury, Green Ajah to the core. And still, the Tower had burned.

This is so, so lovely. I love that glorious and destructive are the words she chooses. There is absolutely a salvation/destruction duality to what she has done here, and I’m not even going to parallel it with Rand’s own entire character and story of salvation and destruction, but instead I just think it’s perfect for her situation and for the Tower itself.

She fought, and fought beautifully, and despite all her power and determination, the Tower burned. Because it can’t just be her; for the Tower to stand, it has to be unified. There is only so much she can do alone, and until the others truly join her and decide for themselves to save the Tower, she can only just hold it together, no matter how strong she is. She can lead, but only if they decide to follow. Otherwise she is holding together an empty shell of a memory of a possibility.

I just love aftermath scenes.

So much.

Especially the way they’re done in this series. Joyful or despairing, gloriously alive or exhausted, bittersweet or just bitter, triumphant or anticlimactic, they’re so varied and yet so perfectly suited to what they follow.

Egwene has done everything she possibly can and more, and yet the Tower is still crumbling around her, and so this almost-despairing exaustion is perfect, because what more can she do? Alone, nothing. And yet she can’t give up, can’t stop trying.

The White Tower was broken, physically now as well as spiritually. They’d need a strong leader to rebuild. The next few days would be pivotal. It made her more than exhausted to consider the work she’d need to do.

I’ve talked a lot about how Egwene is a hero-by-choice rather than a Chosen One, but I like that she gets to have these moments where…despite all of that, sometimes it’s really fucking hard. She belives in what she is doing, and embraces her role, and has a sense of agency that many heroes lack because she did choose, but that doesn’t mean she can’t be pushed past the limits of her own endurance. It doesn’t mean she is immune to despair or to doubt or to sheer tiredness. So much has been asked of her, and she has taken so much upon herself, and there’s still so much more to do, and she’ll do it, but right now…well, I can’t blame her for wanting just a few moments to rest.

She had protected many. She had resisted and fought. But this day would still mark one of the greatest disasters in the history of the Aes Sedai.

Can’t think of that, she told herself. Have to focus on what to do to fix things…

You can almost see her all but physically dragging herself out of that beckoning despair. She’s done everything, and still it’s not enough.

She has saved many but what will be remembered is the destruction, and oh, how familiar that sounds. It’s Rand after so many battles, after so much death and pain and people who hate him for tearing nations apart because it’s the only way to save the world. It’s Rand as a figure, hated and feared and yet the world’s hope for salvation. Seen as a monster but demanded as a saviour. It’s the duality not just of salvation and destruction but of perception and reality, of achievement and cost.

She fought and was glorious and still today will be remembered as a disaster, and how easy it would be to give in to that, to let it drag her down, but she can’t and so she pulls herself back up because if she doesn’t, then they are all lost.

She would get up soon. She would lead the novices and Aes Sedai on thse upper floors as they cleaned up and assessed the damage. She would be strong and capable. The others would be tempted to fall into despair, and she needed to be positive. For them.

And for herself. In a moment, she will be the Amyrlin again…

But she could take a few minutes. She just needed to rest for a little while…

And remember a girl named Egwene al’Vere…

Oh, Egwene. You can only do so much alone.

She barely noticed when someone picked her up.

NO. NO NO NO NO NO.

She tiredly opened her eyes, and—thought numb of mind—was astonished to find that she was being carried by Gawyn Trakand.

I DO NOT WANT THIS.

“I’ve got you, Egwene,” he said, glancing down. “I’ll protect you.”

DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT SHE HAS DONE? DO YOU? ‘I’ll protect you’ IT’S A LITTLE LATE FOR THAT, SHE’S ALREADY SEEN TO THAT HERSELF. And not just protecting herself but the whole damn Tower. That’s why she’s tired, Gawyn, or hadn’t you noticed? Do you think she just…decided to nap through the battle or have you finally figured it out?

And she doesn’t want to be ‘rescued’ but she’s too tired to say anything and I’m so very indignant on her behalf.

“They just left her there, Siuan,” Gawyn said. His voice was so nice to hear.

IS IT THOUGH? He still assumes she was just…left there. That she did nothing. That she was in need of rescue because of course she couldn’t possible be tired from having basically fought the entire damn battle on her own.

“Defenceless in the hallway! Anyone could have come upon her like that. What if the Seanchan had discovered her?”

WHAT IF

THE SEANCHAN

HAD DISCOVERED HER

I can barely breathe I’m laughing so hard at the wall of unintentional irony upon which I am now going to hit my head repeatedly.

Gawyn you idiot.

Seriously, the degree to which I find it frustrating when characters’ achievements go unrecognised by those around them is entirely proportional to the degree to which I love watching those around them realise or see those achievements. It is possible I am projecting just a little bit here, but I hate it when this happens—when a character does something astonishing but no one who is with them sees or knows or realises, and so they all assume that character is less than they truly are.

I destroyed them, she thought with a smile, thoughts slipping away from her. I was a burning warrior, a hero called by the Horn. They won’t dare face me again.

This contrast here, between his complete lack of even the slightest thought that maybe she was involved—he doesn’t even consider it, just as usual goes straight for the option that accords her the least agency or competence possible, because what more would someone want in a boyfriend—and her unspoken response. The knowledge that the Seanchan sure as hell discovered her, and it was to their grief that they did.

His denial of her competence and her own certainty of it, her own quiet triumph that goes unrecognised by her own strongest allies.

But not by those in the Tower; Saerin realised who she was, and the novices she was with know, and Adelorna was with her. They know what she has done. And Egwene herself knows, and holds to that knowledge.

I like that she gets to have that line, too. That she gets to take pride in what she has done, even if parts of it were terrible, even if she is so tired she can barely think, even if the Tower is broken despite all her efforts. I like that she gets to have that kind of confidence and that she doesn’t have to belittle her accomplishments. Because she was fucking awesome, and she should get to say so.

Called by the Horn is an interesting thought for her to have, by the way.

She distantly heard Siuan’s voice. “What’s this? Light, Egwene! Where did you get this? This is the most powerful one in the Tower!”

“What is it, Siuan?”  Bryne’s voice asked.

“Our way out,” Siuan said distantly.

It’s also really the last puzzle piece you should need, to work out what exactly Egwene’s role in all of this was. Seriously, Siuan, if you and all your political and pattern-finding skill can’t put it together, I’m disappointed. Hm, I wonder what Egwene—who has been given forkroot and so can’t channel strongly—would be doing with the most powerful sa’angreal in the Tower, wearing a white dress and on the same floor of the Tower where Gawyn pointed out a woman throwing fire at the Seanchan. Probably just left ‘defenceless in the hallway’ to have a nap. Yep, sounds about right.

No! Egwene thought, clawing through her drowsiness, forcing her eyes open. I’m winning, don’t you see?

But they don’t see. Because for all that these three are the ones who should believe in you the most strongly—and two of them have shown themselves to be exactly that in the past, by helping you become Amyrlin in truth and acknowledging you as such, and by giving you the army and accepting your true authority—they apparently still see a defenceless prisoner in need of rescue.

It’s especially weird coming from Siuan—enough so that it almost seems out of character—because that’s really not so different from how Egwene appeared, to most, when she was with the rebels. At least until the declaration of war, she gave every outward impression of being the puppet child Amyrlin they wanted, naïve and powerless against the Hall and set up to take the fall if it all went wrong. And Siuan knew how much truth there was to that illusion.

Sigh.

Well, as soon as she wakes up I look forward to her giving them an earful.

And breaking up with Gawyn.

A GIRL CAN DREAM, OKAY?

I must say, though, that this chapter has made excellent use of outsider POV, across its whole range. We’ve had those moments of realisation from those who have seen Egwene, and even from Gawyn and Bryne who didn’t recognise her but were still awed by her, and last chapter from Adelorna who almost immediately understood and accepted her authority. And then we’ve had, too, the misperception of her as helpless, by those who found her after the battle had already been won when she’s too tired to do anything more. It’s a great way of showing the effect perception can have, and it also lends it this…kind of bittersweet sense of extraordinary accomplishment and the awe from characters like Saerin, but also the complete ignorance of characters like Gawyn, who don’t even know what an incredible thing she’s done.

It’s very well done, and such an interesting way to play it, even in the times when it’s INCREDIBLY FRUSTRATING.

All in all, a truly excellent battle. I sort of wondered whether, under Sanderson, the battles would continue in the standard of excellence but each in their own entirely unique way, because it’s something I’ve really, really loved about the series so far. And in this book, at least, that standard has continued.

Anyway, back to Saerin, who is also very tired.

There were a frightful number of dead, including over twenty Aes Sedai so far.

Yeah, I think this might have been what Min’s vision was about, back in TSR. I assumed it was the coup, when that happened, but I don’t think the death toll was nearly so high then. That’s impressive manipulation of foreshadowing and deception, if so.

And also, once again we’re seeing the cost of the victory. They’ve won, but not without a high price.

Saerin has definitely taken command of the administrative side of this battle and its aftermath, and seems to be doing a good job of it. I like it when relatively minor characters get a chance to shine this way.

It also feels like the beginning of…exactly what Tower needs, which is others stepping up to help—well, not just to help Egwene, but to help the Tower itself. To help her help the Tower. She cannot do it all herself, but now there are those who are finally following the example she has tried to set, and the unity she has tried so hard to foster. It’s the beginning of the Tower saving itself.

Where under the Light was Elaida?

Yeah, good question.

Also, where has Alviarin been in all of this? We saw Katerine, but Alviarin’s been conspicuously absent. Where was Mesaana?

Nobody had seen anything of the Amyrlin during the battle

On the contrary, Saerin. Many saw her. The Seanchan certainly did, by the light of the fireballs she was throwing in their faces.

Only three novices in Egwene’s group of over sixty had died? And only one sister out of some forty she had gathered? Ten Seanchan channellers captured, over thirty raken blown from the air? Light! That made Saerin’s own efforts seem downright amateur by comparison. And this was the woman Elaida kept trying to insist was simply a novice?

Salvation and destruction, all in one neat report.

Can you forward that report on to Gawyn and Bryne and Siuan, Saerin?

Oh shit is Elaida dead?

“The entire wall burst in, Saerin Sedai.”

Yeah, walls and rooftops are dangerous enemies in this series.

Oh. Okay. No, Elaida is not dead.

She’s on a raken with an a’dam around her neck.

That’s…uh…

Huh.

I’m not completely sure how I feel about that, actually.

On the one hand, there’s a certain sense of balance to both claimants to the Amyrlin Seat being taken against their will from the Tower at the end of the battle, with none realising until afterwards. In that sense, maybe it’s a way of handing the fate of the Tower to the Hall—Elaida has done her damage and Egwene has done what she can to heal it and now the Tower stands shaken and poised to tip one way or the other and it is up to the Aes Sedai themselves to decide whether the Tower will be saved or destroyed.

On the other hand…what a weird way for Elaida to exit that storyline, after so much has been built up there.

I’ll wait and reserve judgement on this until I see what comes of it, but that’s…an interesting development, for sure.

Also I really, really want to be a fly on the wall when Egwene wakes up.

Next (TGS ch 42) Previous (TGS ch 40)

[schoolcalidity]

Its all about the Tent

The Significance of Kerbogha’s Tent

Kerbogha’s tent would have arrived by the time the council began. The Hystoria de via et recuperatione Antiochae atque Ierusolymarum states that the tent was sent to Bari by sea and left Antioch straight after the battle, on the 28th of June (D’Angelo, 2009: 89, chap. 13.57). The council opened at the beginning of October and three months would have been ample time for such a journey, especially given that the summer months were optimal for sailing (Eadmer, 1964: 108–14; Protospatarius, 1724: 197). John Pryor (1992: 117) has shown that commercial vessels were able to travel from the West to the Holy Land and back within a single sailing season (from March until late autumn), sometimes setting out as late as early August and still making it back to their home port before winter. Because of the prevailing winds in the Mediterranean, it was always slower to travel from East to West than vice versa. However, a journey from the Eastern Mediterranean to Italy could have been made comfortably within three months. In the 12th century, most voyages between the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem and the ports of Italy took between four and eight weeks (Menache, 1996: 151, note 34). In the 9th century, Bernard the Monk travelled from Jaffa to Rome in 60 days (Wilkinson, 2002: 268), and Frederick II made a similar voyage in the summer of 1229, from Acre to Brindisi, in 40 days (Menache, 1996: 151). When the news of Bohemond’s great victory at Antioch reached Bari, together with the impressive tent that he had taken from his enemy, it must have caused excitement that would have been heightened by the arrival of Urban II, the instigator of the crusade. It is easy and logical to imagine that the tent would have been displayed in the church during and after the council. Eadmer tells us that the council took place ‘before the body of St Nicholas’, which might imply that it was held in the crypt, but that is impossible (Eadmer, 1964: 108–14). The crypt is nowhere near large enough to accommodate all the delegates, who must have numbered at least 200. Probably the discussions were held in the upper church, begun nine years earlier. Although the structure may have been in place, it is doubtful that the church was much more than a shell. All additional ornament would have been welcome. Although we have no evidence of how the tent was used in Bari, it is interesting to speculate. Perhaps the tent was erected in the space of the nave or outside the church, in order to provide a temporary shelter for the council. Another possibility is that it was cut up and used as carpeting or wall hangings within the half-finished building.

The symbolic value of Bohemond’s donation can be contextualised with other examples of tents being used as gifts. During the crusaders’ stay in Constantinople in June of 1097, before they travelled into the Holy Land, they were required to pay homage to the emperor. Bohemond’s nephew Tancred was more reluctant to comply than the others, but did so, begrudgingly. After he had sworn the oath of allegiance, Emperor Alexius offered him a gift of his choice, expecting that Tancred would ask for gold or something of monetary value. Instead, Tancred requested the emperor’s tent, despite the fact that it was cumbersome, requiring 20 camels to move, and would have been a hindrance to Tancred on the crusade. Alexius was very angry and refused. The tent was perceived to be akin to the emperor’s palace, and the request was seen as symbolic of Tancred’s ambition to usurp the emperor, who stated that the tent was part of his insignia and responded, ‘he desires nothing other than my palace, which is unique in the world. What more can he ask except to take the diadem off my head and place it on his own?’ (Ralph of Caen, 2005: chap. 18). A second illuminating parallel comes from a century later. During the Battle of Navas de Tolosa in 1212, King Alfonso VIII of Castile captured the tent of the Almohad caliph, al-Nasir. Alfonso donated part of the tent to the Abbey of Las Huelgas de Burgos and the other part to Pope Innocent III, along with the caliph’s lance, standard and a letter describing the battle (Ali-de-Unzaga, 2014). The pope ordered that the letter be read publicly in Rome, and the standard was hung in St Peter’s Basilica (O’Callaghan, 2003: 72). These two examples demonstrate the significance of the tent in medieval culture as highly symbolic of kingship. The Spanish example also shows the importance of donations to churches. It seems likely that the arrival of Kerbogha’s tent in Bari would have been similar to the arrival of al-Nasir’s tent in Rome: it would have been accompanied by a description of Bohemond’s victory that would have been read aloud during the council, in the presence of the pope, and the tent itself would have been displayed in the church.

Figure 7

The Fall of Antioch in 969 from the Chronicle of John Skylitzes, cod. Vitr. 26–2, fol. 153, Madrid National Library. By Unknown, 12th/13th century author [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. Available at: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Fall_of_Antioch_in_969.png (Last accessed 1 May 2018).

What Did Kerbogha’s Tent Look Like?

Frustratingly for art historians, Fulcher of Chartres and Albert of Aachen tell us only that the tent was an impressive, large, fairly complex structure and that at least part of it was made of multicoloured silk. Therefore, we must look at examples of other medieval tents to attempt a reconstruction. Most tents in the central Middle Ages seem to have been circular bell tents, with a pole through the centre. Seljuq tents like Kerbogha’s were usually domed pavilions of this type (Redford, 2012). This kind of tent can be seen in multiple images in the Madrid Skylitzes manuscript (Codex Matrit Bib. Nat. Vitr. 26.2), which is an illuminated copy of a Byzantine chronicle, full of military scenes, produced in the Sicilian royal chancery during the reign of King Roger II (Boeck, 2015; Cavallo, 1982: 35–6). The manuscript depicts 33 circular bell tents, all decorated with curved bands of ornament, either at the top, bottom or halfway up the sides (Figure 7). Both Byzantine and Arab tents are represented, and although the Arab tents are slightly more ornate, there is no difference between the two (Mullett, 2013: 277).  The tents of prominent Islamic military leaders like Kerbogha were richly decorated with animals, ornamental designs and sometimes figurative and narrative scenes (Golombek, 1988: 31–2). Both Byzantine and Arab tents were sometimes embroidered with inscriptions, and sometimes with poetry or good wishes for the owner (Mullett, 2013: 277). Jeffrey Anderson and Michael Jeffreys (1994) have suggested that short poems were sometimes embroidered onto tents. We have two excellent examples of Arabic and pseudo-Arabic inscriptions on circular tents, both from 13th century manuscripts. Al Hariri’s Maqamat (St Petersburg Institute for Oriental Studies ms c-23, folio 43b), painted in Baghdad in the 1220s, depicts a pilgrimage scene with two inscribed tents (Figure 8). The tent on the right has an inscription running around the top of the tent, where the roof joins the side. The tent on the left has a pseudo-inscription in the same position. Another example can be seen in Alfonso X of Castile’s Book of Games, which features a scene in which two figures play chess within a tent inscribed with a band of Arabic. Therefore, it is entirely plausible that Kerbogha’s tent (or part of the complex structure that made up the ‘tent city’) was circular and that the hem of the fabric was decorated with a pseudo-Arabic motif, like the one we find on the semi-circular mosaic pavement at San Nicola.

https://olh.openlibhums.org/articles/10.16995/olh.252/

[crystal-siren]

Dark Horizon (Obi-Wan x Reader) Pt.1

A Bright Beginning ( Read me first)

Other Worlds (Read me second)

@stuck-as-me, as promised  :)

The last of three stories requested by the amazing @dovies666. They have been a pleasure to write. I hope they have lived up to your expectations :)

I don’t spare my loyalty lightly. To me, it’s not a superficial gesture or an expectation but a hard-won privilege that must be bled and fought for. But earn my allegiance and you’ve got it for good - a devoted friend and guardian who would break bones to protect you. ~ Beau Taplin // Blood Brother

The Capital was the one place that Y/N had believed the war would not come to. Now, as she wove her starfighter through a mess of explosions and streams of fire from the gunships that hovered just above Coruscant’s atmosphere, she realised just how naive she had been. It had all been a matter of time.

“If we die, I’m going to spend the rest of our afterlife reminding you that this was all your fault.” Y/N spoke into her earpiece and narrowly dodged the blast from a vulture droid that had its sights set on her.

“That’s cool, I wouldn’t mind having company while being a ghost,” Anakin’s amused tone filtered through her com.

Shaking her head, Y/N circled her fighter back and aimed her cannons at the droid that formally been hot on her tail. “Take that you mechanical piece of-”

“Language young lady,” Anakin’s voice cut her off.

“Are you seriously picking on my language right now?” Y/N replied, slight annoyance dripping into her tone. “And besides, I’m older than you!”

“Yeah, but only by a couple of years.”

Somehow managing to avoid crashing into the enemy gunships, Y/N managed to shoot back, “a couple? Make that ten.”

“Still a couple,” her friend’s smug voice made her grind her teeth.

“Just how is that?” Y/N pulled up short thus dodging an errant blast from a Republic cruiser.

“Well, you see-” Anakin started to reply when he was cut off.

“Can we stop bickering like children for just a minute and focus on the mission?” Obi-Wan interrupted. His no-nonsense tone filtering through both their earpieces.

Narrowing her eyes in concentration, Y/N soon found the two starfighters that were currently being piloted by her two best friends. “I’d love to.”

Within moments all three were aligned.

“Master, the General’s ship is straight ahead.” Anakin’s tone became serious.

“You do know that he isn’t your Master anymore yeah?” Y/N couldn’t help herself, a grin tugging at the edges of her mouth.

“Its called respect Y/N,” Anakin tried and failed to sound irritated.

“Whatever you say,” Y/N replied, her e/c eyes sparkling with amusement.

“Children, please.” Obi-Wan sighed. Those two never passed up an opportunity to poke at each other.

“It’s the one crawling with vulture droids,” Anakin continued with his earlier description.

Y/N’s keen eyes soon locked onto the ship and groaned. “Oh joy.”

“I see it. Oh this is going to be easy,” the false optimism in Obi-Wan’s voice made Y/N grin.

“Not a word I’d use to describe our current situation.” Y/N shrugged her shoulders against her safety harness and looked to her right. When her eyes locked with his, she nodded and smiled what she hoped was an encouraging smile.

“Ahem,” Anakin faked coughed into their earpiece. “You may want to pay some attention. The fun is about to begin. Ten vulture droids straight ahead and coming down the left side.”

“Yippee,” Y/N tone dripped with sarcasm. Gripping the yoke of her fighter with one hand and the triggers with the other, she settled against her seat and took a deep breath.

“Add five Tri-fighters to the right,” Obi-Wan’s statement made her cringe.

“This just keeps getting better and better,” Y/N murmured to herself. “I never should have let them talk me into this.”

“I heard that,” both Obi-Wan and Anakin spoke at the same time.

“Now that your hearing capabilities have been established, shall we continue?” She looked from side to side and received a thumbs-up from Anakin and nod from Obi-Wan.

“I’ll handle the Tri-fighters,” Y/N impulsively decided and surged forward before the other two could say anything.

“She’s going to get herself killed if she’s not careful,” Obi-Wan said to Anakin as they watched Y/N’s starfighter shoot forward.

“Well,” Anakin’s voice floated over the com. “We can’t let her have all the fun, can we?”

~ ~ ~

Grievous’s reptilian eyes had followed the three Jedi starfighters for quite sometime now. Skywalker, Kenobi and Y/L/N. Those three had quickly become the bane of the Separatist’s existence. Separate them and they were dangerous, put them together and they became lethal.

So it made perfect sense for the Senate to send their best to retrieve their precious Chancellor.

Then, one of the three broke away from the others and shot towards the oncoming Tri-fighers. Grievous watched that one closely. Skywalker no doubt. Who else would face such an enemy head-on ? His eyes soon caught onto the the remaining two, who soon followed. Kenobi and Y/L/N. Those two were never far from their mutual friend. Where one was, the other two would be close by.

The General watched in angered fascination as they decimated and outmaneuvered the droids that Grievous had dispatched. Turning away from the view port, he left the bridge, coughing as he went. Sooner or later they would make their way to his ship, and when they did, he would be ready.

~ ~ ~

Y/N considered herself lucky. Tri-fighters were notoriously difficult to destroy.

“The General’s Command ship is dead ahead,” Anakin’s voice crackled in her earpiece. “Head for the hanger.”

Y/N bit back a snide remark when Obi-Wan’s slightly panicked voice sounded in her ear. “Have you noticed that the shields are still up?!”

Upon closer inspection, Y/N noticed that he was right. “Anakin? You and me, lets go.” Signalling to her friend, she shot forward with canons blazing, Anakin following suit and Obi-Wan not far behind.

The shield generators were destroyed with the first few blasts and soon the hanger’s blast doors began to close with a terrifying speed. All three Jedi punched their thrusters to maximum.

Y/N held her breath as they narrowly missed being crushed by the doors. All three starfighters crash land in a show of sparks, their pilots wasting no time in leaping out of them.

“Next time the galaxy loses it’s mind,” Y/N called over the commotion of fending off the droids that had surrounded them. “Count me out.”

“Not going to happen,” Anakin replied, sauntering over to her after they had dispatched the last of the droids.

Before she could think of a reply, Obi-Wan walked over to them and turned his attention to Artoo who had followed Anakin. “Artoo locate the Chancellor.”

“Tap into the Ship’s computers,” Anakin further instructed and winked mischievously at Y/N before following the little astromech.

Sighing and shaking her head, Y/N made to follow the two when she felt a hand on her arm. Looking down, she smiled when she saw who the hand belonged to.

“Are you alright?” Those familiar sea-shaded eyes searched her e/c ones.

Nodding, she placed a gentle hand on his. “Yeah. I think so.”

The momentary silence was broken when four battle droids approached. Turning to face them, Y/N and Obi-Wan drew and ignited their lightsabers. Behind them, the sounds of Artoo hacking into the ship’s mainframe were accompanied by Anakin’s small encouragements.

It did not take long to take care of their attackers. In that moment Artoo managed to display a complete hologram of the entire ship.

“Where do you suppose they’re holding the Chancellor?” Y/N’s eyes fixated on the ship’s tall spire and she hoped she was wrong. Heights were never really her thing.

“His signal seems to be coming from there.” Obi-Wan pointed to very place that Y/N had been staring at. “The observation platform at the top of that spire.”

“Y/N?” Anakin’s worried tone broke through her thoughts, “you ok? You look a little pale.”

“Yeah,” she smiled at both of them and nodded, “I’m fine.”

Neither of them looked the least bit convinced but decided not to push the matter.

Then Anakin said something that Y/N wished she didn’t have to hear. “I sense Count Dooku.”

Honestly, she thought to herself, could the day get any worse ?

Obi-Wan narrowed his eyes slightly, “I sense a trap.”

This only made Anakin smile, “next move?”

Obi-Wan answered with a grin of his own, “spring the trap.”

Those two were incorrigible, Y/N thought to herself as she followed them to the nearest elevator.

~ ~ ~

Their arrival had not gone entirely unnoticed. General Grievous stalked onto the ship’s bridge and addressed the Neimoidian that sat at the helm. “What’s the situation Captain?”

“Three Jedi have landed in the main hanger bay,” he replied. “We’re tracking them.”

Grievous turned to one of the screens and coughed in place of a laugh. “Just as Count Dooku predicted.” In reality Dooku only expected two, but one addition should prove little trouble.

~ ~ ~

Even the elevator ride proved to be eventful. The moment the three of them has set foot in one, they were once again faced with more than ten battle droids.

They made quick work of them, but that was not the end of it. The elevator screeched to a sudden stop, causing all three to look at each other in confusion.

Obi-Wan turned to Anakin, “did you press the stop button?”

Anakin, in turn shook his head, “no, did you?” To which Obi-Wan also shook his head.

“Y/N did you?”

“Really Anakin, why would I do that?” Y/N glared at him with her hands on her hips.

“Well, there’s more than one way out of here,” Anakin said while looking up. Before either Y/N or Obi-Wan could react, he ignited his weapon.

“We don’t want to get out,” Obi-Wan reminded his friend, “we want to get moving.” Taking out his comlink, he tried to get through to Anakin’s faithful little astromech, “Artoo..Artoo? Do you copy? Activate elevator,” he stopped talking as he examined the instrument panel in front of him, “31174.”

Y/N only rolled her eyes when Anakin disregarded those words and sliced a hole in the elevator ceiling and jumped out.

“Show off,” she called up through the hole. “What if we start moving ?”

“Not going to happen,” Anakin called back, sounding much too confident.

“Such faith you have in your little friend,” Y/N shot back, “I’m sure he’ll be thrilled once I tell him.”

“Don’t you dare-” Anakin’s words were cut off when the elevator began moving rapidly downwards.

“Stop, stop! Artoo,” Obi-Wan spoke, much too calmly, into the comlink. “We need to be going up not down.”

Anakin, for his part, was hanging by his fingertips off the narrow edge of the elevator shaft. Y/N’s words kept running loops in his mind, she wouldn’t let him live this one down.

His attention was drawn to the elevator door just above him as it was pried open. Two battle droids aimed their blasters at him.

Y/N’s panic was quite literally brought to a halt as the elevator jolted to a rough stop.

Standing up, she smoothed her hair and robes and saw Obi-Wan do the same as he spoke into the comlink. “Now that’s better,” as the elevator began to move up again.

Looking down, Anakin saw the very same elevator moving towards him with terrifying speed.

Landing smoothly atop the racing elevator, Anakin dropped down, startling both it’s occupants. Their lightsabers at the ready.

“Oh it’s you,” Obi-Wan said with a degree of relief.

Y/N, meanwhile shot her friend a smug smile. “Not going to happen huh?”

Not gracing her with an answer, Anakin pointedly ignored her and turned to Obi-Wan. “What was that about?”

“Well, Artoo has been..” Obi-Wan started before Anakin cut him off.

“No loose wire jokes,” Anakin said rather defensively, “he’s doing the best he can.”

“Did I say anything?” Obi-Wan protested, making Y/N smile.

“He’s trying!” Anakin was becoming more defensive of his little droid.

 “I didn’t say anything!”

Their argument is brought to an end when the elevator doors opened to reveal the viewing platform. Y/N tried not to think of high up they were.

Three pairs of eyes immediately locked onto the Chancellor, who sat not too far from where they stood.

Approaching him, they bowed respectfully.

While Y/N and Obi-Wan simply addressed him, Anakin enquired after his well being.

The answer the Chancellor gave made Y/N curl her lip in disgust. “Count Dooku.”

How she loathed that name and the man it was attached to. Not bothering to hide her feelings concerning the man, she turned to face him. Behind her, Anakin and Obi-Wan strategised, but she only had eyes for the man in front of her.

The Count was equally surprised to see her. “Young Y/N. What an unexpected pleasure.”

Her e/c eyes glittered with the deepest loathing. Her hand gripped the handle of her lightsaber in an effort to control her emotions. “I cannot say I feel the same way.”

“Get help,” the Chancellor spoke from behind her, “you’re no match for him. He’s a Sith Lord.”

“Oh, I know,” Y/N murmured before shrugging off her robe and igniting her weapon.

“Y/N? What are you doing?”

“Y/N. Stop.”

Her friends’s protests did nothing to quell the emotions that now ran rampant in her system. No one would take this opportunity away from her.

The two Jedi watched in horrified fascination as Y/N launched into a series of attacks that took the Count by surprise. Her attacks were fluid but held a startling amount of aggression.

This loss of emotional control combined with aggression, led Y/N to become unaware of her surroundings.

Dooku used this to his advantage.

Obi-Wan watched her closely, never had he seen her lose control like that in a fight before. Usually an elegant fighter, Y/N hardly ever relied on strength and aggression.

It all happened so fast. Suddenly Y/N could no longer feel solid ground beneath her feet. Managing to prevent her head from hitting the ground, Y/N hit the hard ground with a loud thud. Her sword arm was not so lucky. Despite being horribly winded, she tried to get up and immediately hissed at the pain that shot through her right wrist.

Convinced that she wouldn’t be causing him anymore trouble, Dooku made his way to the two remaining Jedi.

Just as Y/N had done moments before, Anakin and Obi-Wan shrugged off their robes and stood their ground. The latter had to restrain himself from looking in her direction and making sure she was alright.

“Gentleman, your swords please,” Dooku spoke as he approached them. “We don’t want to make a mess of things in front of the Chancellor.” If he thought to get a rise out of them, he was wrong.

Anakin and Obi-Wan, with weapons ignited, moved towards him. “You won’t get away this time, Dooku.” Obi-Wan said to him.

The fight that ensued was beautiful. At least, that’s how it appeared to Y/N. Her eyes followed her friends as they fought and worked together against their enemy.

“I’ve been looking forward to this,” Dooku remarked, making Y/N want to tear that irritating smirk from his face.

“My powers have doubled since the last time we met Count,” Anakin spoke confidently and Y/N felt her heart swell with pride.

“Good,” Dooku sounded somewhat please, “twice the pride, double the fall.” His smug tone elicited a snarl from Y/N.

Her hard e/c eyes followed the group as the fight continued. It soon became apparent that Anakin was the stronger fighter. Both Dooku and Obi-Wan were tiring and Y/N began to worry, she knew all too well what happened if one tired during a fight.

A horrified gasp left her lips as she watched Dooku lift Obi-Wan into the air and then throw him off to the side while managing to land a hard kick on Anakin. Ignoring the pain in her arm, she pushed herself off the floor and limped her way to where he lay unconscious.

Shaking her head in denial, she felt for a pulse and felt relief course through her when she found one.

Anakin, meanwhile continued to rain blow after blow down on the Count. Their lightsabers lock, blue becomes entangled with red.

“I sense great fear in you Skywalker.” Dooku taunted him, “you have hate. You have anger. But you don’t use them.”

Pushing away from him, Anakin struck again with new ferocity. He struggled to keep a tight reign on his emotions. But as the Count continued to strike, his anger grew and therefore, his strength.

Y/N felt her eyes widen as she watched the fight. Her jaw almost dropped as Anakin severed the Count’s hands in one swift move. Her eyes followed his lightsaber as Anakin caught it and activated it, along with his own. She held her breath as he held both weapons at the Count’s neck.

“Good, Anakin, good. I knew you could do it.” The Chancellor’s words surprised all those listening. “Kill him. Kill him now.”

Y/N couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Neither, it seemed, could Anakin. “I shouldn’t...” he sounded so unsure.”

“Do it,” in that moment, Y/N swore he sounded like someone else.

Before she could even blink, Anakin severed Dooku’s head and she watched in a stunned silence as her friend freed the Chancellor.

Accepting Anakin’s help, she stood up.

Suddenly the ship tilted to one side, helping Anakin to make a decision. Lifting a still unconscious Obi-Wan onto his shoulders, Anakin motioned for Y/N and the Chancellor to follow him.

When they arrived at the elevators however, they found them not to be working. As the ship continued to tip to one side, Anakin forced open a set of elevator doors and entered the empty elevator shaft.

Y/N didn’t think twice. Clutching her injured limb to her chest, she followed her friend down the shaft as the ship continued to lose its balance.

Unbeknownst to the trio, the ship’s crew worked quickly in order to right the ship once more. They were successful.

Oh no, Y/N thought to herself as she felt the ship right itself. Of all the places she could have been at that moment, stuck in an elevator shaft with a broken arm was not one of them.

Of course, Obi-Wan had to choose that moment to wake up. Quickly taking in his surroundings, he scrambled to get a better hold on Anakin, who was hanging tight to a small cable.

“Um, guys,” Y/N called from not far above. “We kinda need to move, now.” Her words were emphasised by the sound of an elevator rushing down towards them.

Letting go of their respective handholds, the three Jedi and the Chancellor tumbled down the elevator shaft before unraveling the grappling hooks from their utility belts and using them to swing through an open door just as the elevator rushed past.

“I’m never doing anything like that ever again,” Y/N muttered to herself as Anakin and Obi-Wan glanced at her. “And you two,” she pointed at them with her good hand, “can’t convince me to.”

~ ~ ~

On the bridge, the location of the Jedi and the freed Chancellor had been discovered. A co-pilot spoke up, addressing the General. “General, we found the Jedi. They’re in Hallway 328.”

Excellent, Grievous thought to himself. “Activate Ray shields.”

~ ~ ~

The four skidded to a halt as ray shields appeared around them. Y/N groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose.

“Wait a minute! How did this happen? We’re smarter than this!” Obi-Wan spoke up, clearly confused.

“Apparently not,” Anakin replied and Y/N found herself agreeing with him.

“I say..patience.” Anakin’s suggestion was met with looks of disbelief from both Y/N and Obi-Wan.

“Patience?” They both asked at once, not believing what he had just said.

“Yes.” Anakin seemed rather sure of himself. “Artoo will be along in a few moments and he’ll release the ray shields.”

“The way you rely on that droid..”Y/N shook her head and held her hands up defensively when Anakin glared at her.

Sure enough, seconds later, Artoo came screeching into the hall. Anakin seemed rather pleased with himself. “See? No problem.”

No sooner had the words left his mouth then more droids appeared.

“Seriously?” Y/N asked no one in particular the same time Obi-Wan turned to Anakin.

“Do you have a plan B?”

Anakin was silent as the droids surrounded them and took them, hands bound, to General Grievous.

To be continued...

Part 2

[serpent-jugheadjones]

You Shook Me All Night Long

Pairing: Jughead Jones x Reader 

Description: Jughead thought he knew all about the Southside when he joined the Serpents. Boy, was he wrong?!

Warnings: Fighting and drinking.

Word count: 2382

A/N: @jugheadxreaderinyourhead thank you for the feedback and help with vocabulary :) I’m forever grateful to Cole for sharing a map of Riverdale’s Southside <3 This fic was sitting in my drafts for a loooong time. I was planning to post the ones for my twin’s challenge but work got in the way. So having this one ready was amazing!

Tag: @southsidejuggie @ju-gg @lostnliterature Anyone else wanna be tagged?

She was a fast machine she kept her motor clean She was the best damn woman that I ever seen She had the sightless eyes telling me no lies

Juggie parks on Y/N’s driveway. It’s a short walk from Sunnyside to her house down at Rose Lane, but it goes by faster in his bike. He kicks the stand down and leans in the motorcycle, watching the girl so focused on repairing her Dyna Wide Glide’s busted chain that her eyes don’t leave the bike. Her Y/H/C locks are in a messy, high ponytail with a few wild hairs framing her face. She doesn't even need to try for him to be all heart-eyes over her. The raven-haired boy walks up to her, still unnoticed, removing his helmet and quickly sliding his beanie on. “Looking good.”, Jug states, slipping his hands inside his jacket’s pocket. “She looks perfect, thank you very much!”, Y/N teases, standing up and taking a white rag from her wornout overall’s front pocket to clean the grease off her hands. “I mean you, not the bike.” Jughead laughs and the girl flushes bright red. Although he is impressed with how much she managed to fix in such a short time since the Ghoulies trashed it.  “Sometimes I think you like that bike better than you do me.”, he teases playfully, grabbing the girls waist and pulling her close. “She’s my baby. You’re my babe.” Y/N brushes her still grease-stained fingers through his chin, making him shiver at the touch. She rests them on the curve of his neck and places a seductive kiss on his lips, biting the lower one and pulling it towards her before releasing it with a smirk. The adrenalized boy takes hold of her thighs, pulling her up on the bike as she wraps her legs around him. Before Jug can slide his hands underneath her shirt, they hear a cough. The smily girl glances over his shoulder to meet her father’s reproving frown. She quickly hops off the bike and Jughead looks as uncomfortable as ever, brushing his hands on the back of his neck nervously.  

Y/N may not live in the trailer park, but she’s in no way in better conditions than the ones who do. The living-room couch has so many rips on it that it’s barely even sittable. The stairs creek with each step and sometimes may even give in a little, so no one can walk with too much strength. Her room’s window is broken for a few years now and the roof has holes, so water leaks in whenever it rains. Still, she wouldn't call any other place home. Jughead waits in her room while she changes and gets her things ready for the night’s event. He’s lazily lying on her bed, reading a beat-up copy of Fahrenheit 451 with some burn marks on the edges. She walks out of her bathroom, wearing skinny black jeans with the knees cut, a white v-cut crop top, classic black converse and her Serpents jacket. “You didn’t bring gloves and mouthguard, did you?”, she asks already knowing the answer. Y/N doesn't get an answer since whenever Jug gets inside a book, the world seems to shut down. The girl snaps the book away form him, earning a ‘heey’ look before the boy can fully take in his new view as he sits up. “I didn't know I was supposed to.” As this is his first time going to one of those. “That’s ok, you can have my brother’s one. He never used it.” She tucks inside the bag her overused gloves and a pristine looking one, that her sibling got from their father. But Y/B/N’s not like the rest of the family. “Do we really have to go?” Jughead stares at Y/N’s exposed flesh, running his hands up her thighs to her hips, making the girl close her eyes and lick her lips. “YES! We have to go. You just pledge allegiance. If you miss your first one, it’s not gonna look good.” She has to use all her self control as not to give in to the temptation. ”Let’s hit the road, Jones.” She kisses him one last time before walking away. 

Knocking me out with those American thighs Taking more than her share Had me fighting for air She told me to come, but I was already there ‘Cause the walls start shaking The earth was quaking My mind was aching And we were making it

Y/N parks next to the other bikes in the gas station across from Southside High. “Couldn't we do this in a more secluded place?”, Jughead asks, dismounting the Dyna and taking off his helmet. "Where’s the fun in that?”, she replies and they are blinded by three headlights coming their way. Fogarty, Pea and Topaz, looking pleased to see Jones there. They all walk in the school’s gymnasium, where other young Serpents are already setting up, some wrapping their fists with tape, others already practicing on each other. Low lights are turned on, not to call too much attention. A circle is formed and Toni steps in the middle. “We all know the rules, but since we have a new member, Jughead Jones...” She’s interrupted by pleased screams and clapping. “It’s like videogames, lose and you pass the joystick. Other than that, just try not to kill each other.”, the pink-haired girl speaks directly to Jug. “Winner gets a free round of drinks. But...” She pauses for dramatic effect. “Tonight I’m rising the stakes. Whoever comes out on top gets to change stakeout duty with me.” Sitting in a bike all night securing Sunnyside isn't anyone’s favorite task, so they’ll give their all. 

Fogarty lands a few punches in his third contestant, making him dizzy. “Toni is not fighting?”, Jughead asks his girlfriend in a whisper, since there have been many fights and the girl has just been passing around the circle watching. “No. Tonight she’s the judge.”, Y/N answers, clapping along her ‘family’ as Fangs knocks down the boy who didn't put up much of a fight. “I thought there were no rules. Why do we need a Judge?” As he inquires, the rattled boy mounts the fallen one. “That’s why.”, she replies, watching the pink-haired Serpent push a reckless Fangs off his opponent. Pea is up next, wearing his too familiar army tag collar, an unmatching pair of gloves and a confident smirk. Wise of him to wait until Fogarty has been through a few rounds already. The tired Serpent still puts up a hell of a fight, but, ultimately, SP wins. “Who’s up next?” Pea turns around the circle energetically waiting for his next contestant. Jug tries to walk into the circle but Y/N is faster. Probably because she knows the boy can’t handle Sweet Pea on a fight. She cracks her neck from side to side, breaths in deep before sliding in her mouthguard, blocking everything else, leaving only her and Sweet Pea in the ring. He strikes but the girl deviates. Almost as if he was expecting that his other hand was waiting on the other side to meet her eye. Pea’s fists are fast but she’s quicker to block the next hits. However, he can’t be blocked forever, managing to hit her stomach and, as she slouches down, her chest. Y/N sees him slacking on his defense and hits him hard straight in the face, one punch after the other, until he falls back, his mouth swollen and probably cut since there’s some blood splattered on her gloves. Toni announces she’s the winner. 

Y/N's white shirt, now soaking wet and stained with a few blood drops from her cut eyebrow, sticks to her skin. She has a hard time breathing now, from all the punches to her chest. The girl tries her hardest to regain a fighting posture, since she just went against one of the strongest guys there. Jughead has a confused face as everyone is staring straight at him. He doesn't think they’ll possibly want him to fight his own girlfriend. “Don’t forget, Jones. This is a fight, not a make-out session.” Fogarty jokes, patting Jug in the back, in a weird way wishing him good luck. He takes off his beanie, tucking it safely on the back pocket of his jeans, before walking in the circle with his fists up, gloves hiding his face. The whole room goes silent, for this is the fight they were waiting for. Jug swings clumsily and misses as the girl ducks, punching him in the side of his abdomen. He blocks a few hits with his elbow. In the exact moment she opens her guard, the boy lands his first punch, followed by two stronger ones. In the heat of the moment, he forgets she’s his girlfriend. However, Y/N’s quick to regain advantage, meeting her gloves to his skin more times than he can count, but still making sure she doesn't hurt him too bad. Jughead stands reactionless, dizzy from the hits. “You survived the initiation and can’t survive Y/N Y/L/N?”, Sweet Pea shouts, in hopes that teasing can get the boy back in the game. “Remind me how you also lost to her just now, Pea?”, Jughead points out sarcastically, his voice sounding muffled from the mouthguard. The girl just chuckles. Jones brings his fists back up and doesn't take his eyes off his girlfriend, for she will strike if he does. Before Jug can even react to her movements, he’s on the floor an she has him on a thigh hold. “Come on, Juggie. Is that all you've got?”, she asks as he taps his hands hard on the ground. 

Jughead gets up, light-headed but otherwise unharmed, and Y/N meets her lips to his cheek in a quick comforting kiss. Some people are disappointed the leader’s son didn't last more than one fight, but they know full well what’s like going against Y/N. “Toni! Let’s bounce.” Sweet Pea points at the flickering blue and red lights getting closer to the school, meaning they were spotted and they can’t afford another trip to the police station. Serpents slither away from the gym. Y/N and Jughead remove their gloves while running towards the gas station. The cops lose the trail on them as they are half way up Hastings Street while the Sheriff car is barely at the corner of Lorimer Street.

Working double time on the seduction line She’s one of a kind, she’s just mine, all mine Wanted no applause it’s just another course Made a meal outta me And come back for more Had to cool me down to take another round Now I’m back in the ring to take another swing

Back at the Wyrm, the house is full. Topaz is getting them all a round of beer. Pea is icing his swollen face since Y/N wasn't as kind to him as she was to Jughead. Fogarty and the guys are praising the girl’s winning moves and the old Serpents are taking note of it all. The young ones have no idea that their leader is fully aware of their little “fight club”. But it’s been going on since FP can remember and he instructed the step-in leader to let it be. Tall Boy won’t endorse it, but deep down he knows it’s training most of them need. Either way, it doesn't take a genius to figure out what’s going on when Serpents show up to the bar with dry blood and black eyes but weren't out on a job. Y/N doesn't usually drink, but since she’s celebrating, a few beers seem like an earned right. That loosens her muscles that are sore from the fights, some spots already bruising from Pea’s hits. Jughead keeps on the cherry cola, making the bartender frown and his girlfriend giggle. They all gather around a pool table and start betting on games. Sweet Pea makes up for his loss on fighting as Y/N isn't as great with a stick as with her fists, but she still has fun playing. Jug wins a few rounds before Fangs shows them how it’s done, winning without even passing his turn. They’re all laughing so much that their faces cramp. Toni seizes the moment to snap a few shots of her ‘family’, and some of her pictures end up on the Wyrm’s mural. The pink-haired girl catches Jug staring at the wall full of Serpents’ moments. She knows why he looks sorrowful gazing at it: in the center of it there’s a Polaroid of FP with a beer bottle in one hand and the other trying to block the camera, but his familiar smirk and frowned brow are still visible. He gives her a half smile and she returns it. They both want the man back more than anything.    

And you shook me all night long Yeah, you shook me all night long It knocked me out I said you Shook me all night long You had me shaking and you Shook me all night long Yeah, you shook me When you took me

Countless games after, Jughead sees fit to take her back home before Y/N gets carried away and ends up having one too many beers. It’s not an easy task to get her out of the bar as everyone who sees her wants to talk or congratulate her, but Jug is persistent and finally manages to get her to the parking lot. He helps her put her jacket and helmet on. Juggie’s the one riding this time, since Y/N spent the night enjoying her win.  He makes sure she’s holding on to him tightly before starting the Dyna. The couple silently walks upstairs to the girl���s room, making sure not to wake up her father (as if the bike parking wasn't loud enough for that - or the clicking key noises from Jug trying to find the right key). Y/N’s leaning on Jughead for stability, not that she’s drunk, but certainly tipsy. 

Her bed now looks like the most comfortable thing in the universe and they both throw themselves on the soft mattress. Jughead instantly pulls her closer and attaches their lips. Y/N retributes by jumping on top of him with her legs straddling him on the bed. Jug’s hands instinctively go to her bare waist, feeling her soft skin against his fingertips. He lifts up, pulling her closer to him. His palms against her back and his lips kissing her neck. He switches places, lying her down slowly. Y/N lets out a few quiet moans. His hands pass through a sensitive spot on her abdomen and she hisses from the pain. “Sorry.”, the aroused boy apologizes, brushing her Y/H/C hair from her face. “Don’t... Be... It’s... good...” She speaks in between kisses to his jaw, neck, earlobe, and finally lips. Jughead smirks as the room feels hotter by the minute. 

[lilbreck]

AGoT Chapter 5 - 8

If you want to follow along, I'm tagging my ASoIaF reading as tonya rereads asoiaf. As I said last time, feel free to comment, I'd love to talk about stuff. Point out some things I missed, whatever.

There are a lot of questionable parenting skills in this group of chapters. Robert's a bad king, Jon is angry but still loves his family, and the Starks are fucking northern fools, even Catelyn.

Chapter 4: Eddard

Age 35

Not even gonna lie, Ned's first description of how Robert used to look sounded a bit like he had a crush. No offense, but Ned has bad taste in men. How he looks now… If there's perfume coming off Robert, is it supposed to be Cersei's, does he wear perfume himself, or did he seriously visit some brothels on the way up north? I'd believe any of it. Also, as much as everyone loves Ned… he seriously says he loves Robert because, after fifteen years, the man is still obsessed with his sister?

We get a hint here that the cold (which I commented on in Bran's chapter) is potentially unusual. Though Ned says that late summer snows are common enough, I'm not sure how much to believe that.

You know, the more we see of Robert, the less I like him. I shudder to think what Lyanna would have gone through if she had married him. She may or may not still be alive, but she'd be married to a drunken, abusive (IIRC) ass who sleeps around on her. If Robert had been a better man, I wonder how differently all this would have turned out.

The first Lords of Winterfell had been men hard as the land they ruled. In the centuries before the Dragonlords came over the sea, they had sworn allegiance to no man, styling themselves the Kings in the North.

I just want a story where the ghosts of the first Lords of Winterfell reign down terror on those in the South. Maybe someone who writes ASoIaF/GoT fanfic could write that and link me.

So, I had heard conflicting reports of how the Starks were killed by Aerys. Apparently, Brandon died first (strangled, and just a few days before his wedding!) and I'm assuming his father burned after. We haven't touched on that in this chapter yet.

I'm assuming (and correct me if I'm wrong) that Ned not wanting to trust a child to Tywin has to do with the Targaryen children that died and Ned and Robert's split. It's the only reason I could think of that Ned would think speaking of it would open old wounds.

“They say it grows so cold up here in winter that a man’s laughter freezes in his throat and chokes him to death,” Ned said evenly. “Perhaps that is why the Starks have so little humor.”

The cold seems to give them subtle sass to spare, though. This chapter is full of damn good quotes. I'll leave it off on this one:

For a moment Eddard Stark was filled with a terrible sense of foreboding. This was his place, here in the north. He looked at the stone figures all around them, breathed deep in the chill silence of the crypt. He could feel the eyes of the dead. They were all listening, he knew. And winter was coming.

Chapter 5: Jon

Age 14

Okay, this Jon is a bit different from the serious and solemn young man that we saw in Bran's chapter. Of course, the circumstances are different, so that could be some of it. We do get a lot of description from Jon's POV. I'm going to copy his descriptions here, save Tommen (because he's pretty much a non-entity to Jon) and Tyrion because it says nothing about Jon's perception of the man, just how fascinated he is by his appearance.

< His father helped her up the steps to the dais and led her to her seat, but the queen never so much as looked at him. Even at fourteen, Jon could see through her smile. >

< The king was a great disappointment to Jon. His father had talked of him often: the peerless Robert Baratheon, demon of the Trident, the fiercest warrior of the realm, a giant among princes. Jon saw only a fat man, red-faced under his beard, sweating through his silks. He walked like a man half in his cups. >

< He had the Princess Myrcella on his arm. She was a wisp of a girl, not quite eight, her hair a cascade of golden curls under a jeweled net. Jon noticed the shy looks she gave Robb as they passed between the tables and the timid way she smiled at him. He decided she was insipid. Robb didn’t even have the sense to realize how stupid she was; he was grinning like a fool. >

< Sansa looked radiant as she walked beside him, but Jon did not like Joffrey’s pouty lips or the bored, disdainful way he looked at Winterfell’s Great Hall. >

< Ser Jaime Lannister was twin to Queen Cersei; tall and golden, with flashing green eyes and a smile that cut like a knife. He wore crimson silk, high black boots, a black satin cloak. On the breast of his tunic, the lion of his House was embroidered in gold thread, roaring its defiance. They called him the Lion of Lannister to his face and whispered “Kingslayer” behind his back.

Jon found it hard to look away from him. This is what a king should look like, he thought to himself as the man passed. >

Looking at that, Jaime is the only one who Jon doesn't dismiss in one way or another. I wonder if it's a coincidence that Jaime is getting a kind of (kind of) redemptive arc. I'm not really sure about Tyrion, I'll have to get back to you when I read further.

Also, Jon may or may not have a crush on Jaime.

So, given that Theon ignores Jon, I'm thinking Jon's dislike is also returned. How long has Theon been there, and when did the dislike start? Was there one instance, or did they just take an instant dislike to each other. Is this answered later on? Guess I'll find out.

His eyes stung. Jon rubbed at them savagely, cursing the smoke. He swallowed another gulp of wine and watched his direwolf devour the chicken.

I have a feeling that isn't from the smoke. Fuck, poor Jon. Beyond that, Ghost is out here intimidating dogs three times his size.

Given how very angry and hurting Jon is concerning the fact that he's a bastard, it does say a lot about him that he remains so loyal to his family later on.

Chapter 6: Catelyn

You know, we get a very different view on how political marriages can go in this world. Robert and Cersei have a hellish marriage where she's very obviously not happy and he doesn't care a bit. Meanwhile, we've got Ned and Catelyn who really seem to have a good marriage with, apparently, a satisfying sex life on both their ends.

“Robert would never harm me or any of mine. We were closer than brothers. He loves me. If I refuse him, he will roar and curse and bluster, and in a week we will laugh about it together. I know the man!”

Okay, first off, it's very obvious that Ned has a (potentially willful) blindness to who his friend really is. I also wonder if he thought he was protecting his wife by not telling her about Jon's real parents? Because the Robert we're introduced to, the one Catelyn is obviously very aware of, would not spare his family because they didn't know if he found out Ned had commited the treason of hiding a Targaryen child. Especially if that child was Lyanna's, and he wouldn't care that Lynnna was Ned's sister.

I think this is going to call for a "fucking northern fool" tag. I have a feeling it will come in handy.

I would just like to point something out:

“And in mine,” she blazed, angry now. Why couldn’t he see? “He offers his own son in marriage to our daughter, what else would you call that? Sansa might someday be queen. Her sons could rule from the Wall to the mountains of Dorne. What is so wrong with that?”

“Gods, Catelyn, Sansa is only eleven,” Ned said. “And Joffrey … Joffrey is …”

She finished for him. “… crown prince, and heir to the Iron Throne. And I was only twelve when my father promised me to your brother Brandon.”

Everyone likes to rag on Sansa because she was excited to marry a prince and refused to see what Joffrey was. However, this conversation hints to me — speaking on assumptions from the perspective of a long marriage — that Ned had concerns about Joffrey (or reservations) that he had probably spoken to his wife about. She ignores all that in favor of how Sansa could be queen.

Not in a power grab, mind you, but in the way all mothers want their children to have the best possible chance in life. She would have filled her daughter with stories (as would have everyone around her). They would have told her what an honor it was and how lucky she was. She's eleven and sheltered, just as all the Stark children are, even the bastard boy, of course she's going to cling to it.

I'd also like to point out that Catelyn is so thrown by how scared she feels and how much she knows shit's about to go wrong that she straight up hops out of be naked to the shock of both her husband and the Maester (who has been trying to get out of that damn room of naked and half naked people). I need to find my small amusements where I can.

Just… I have to question what they thought would happen if they found out and were able to prove that Cersei and her family had killed Jon Arryn? Did they think that Sansa would be fine married off to a prince who would probably resent her father? Did they think they could back out of it? You know what, Catelyn is now roped into my "fucking northern fool" tag.

I mean, they didn't have much of a choice, but she didn't even see what dangers could come with all this. Not for a second do we see her think "Hmmm, a boy might not be happy to marry the daughter of the man who got his mother (probably) executed for the murder of The King's Hand, who was also a good friend of the king." For fuck's sake!

Chapter 7: Arya

Age 9

Okay, Arya's resentment of Sansa rings clearly through the first few paragraphs of this chapter. Also, she straight up mentally blames Sansa for attracting the septa's attention… when the septa didn't look away from the princess until Arya raised her voice. Hell, Sansa even tried to placate the septa by saying that they were talking about how happy they were to have the princess there.

Everything in this chapter speaks of her being both overdramatic and jealous of her sister. Down to thinking to herself that no one except Nyperia loves her. Now, I'm not saying that as a dig at Arya. She's 9. This is how she should be. I do have a problem with people who use her very obvious unreliable narrator POV to say that Sansa was somehow in the wrong here. I'm still waiting on this great scene that proves that Sansa is a bully to Arya.

I really do like Jon and Arya's relationship here.

Chapter 8: Bran

So, wait, when does Bran's direwolf get a name? It doesn't matter, that poor direwolf was trying to warn Bran not to climb. I'm assuming that Bran's in-depth knowledge of how to get in and out of Winterfell is going to come in handy. Like I said, it's been more than a while since I've read this.

You know, I'm sitting here laughing about the lengths they're all going to try and get him to stop climbing and he's all "whatevs" about it. But then I remember what's about to happen and I'm sad again. I don't want to read this.

Yeah, shit's only going to go wrong from here.

[worstofwriting-blog]

33. D’Spayr: A Douche in  a Pompous Land - Part 1

           It’s a new year, but the shit is still the same. Another year on this earth means another year of fan fiction, unedited Wattpad stories, and low quality TV and film. As disappointing as it is, I indulge in the schadenfreude of reading and viewing it all. So with that, let’s cover Wattpad. In specific, a story from one of the ten guys on there.

 Wattpad is filled with chick lit, all these women fulfilling their odd fantasies. But what of male power fantasies? Those that brought us Conan the Barbarian, superheroes, and eighties action movies? Well, there’s dick lit for that. Palahniuk is a good example of it, but I found one that’s even better. With a title straight from a nineties antihero comic, D’Spayr: A Knight in the Withered Land is only missing “unleashed,” and it could pass as one of those edgy cash grabs from the nineties and early two thousands.

 But we don’t judge books by the cover right? Well, I do, but that’s beside the point. Let’s cover the real problems. This has one of the worst and most generic premises that I’ve seen in science fiction.

In the spirit of Asimov, the setting is a galactic empire that’s fallen, and a rogue knight who’s lost his allegiance travels the land. But unlike Asimov’s Foundation series, the empire is never covered upon in depth, we’re only given a brief description of its history. It also copies Star Wars in this sense, and honestly just plenty of sci-fi’s. “Galactic Empires” are so overdone. Now mixing an overused premise with the wandering knight trope? Horrible.

 Our story starts us off with backstory on the empire. Apparently this empire spanned the galaxy and was amazing, but then physics broke. Physics broke in this universe. With no actual explanation why, this guy just tells us that time broke, and gravity became inversed all over the place. None of it makes sense, but let’s suspend disbelief for a second, assume that time can actually break.

These mercenaries/former knights are roaming the land for work, and get lured into a town of cannibals.

How do cannibals maintain a society? There’s always tales of small tribes of cannibals in the Amazon, but the writer tells us that there’s at least 400 cannibals here. 400 cannibals maintaining a town; how do they make sure that no one eats anyone else? Are there laws against murder? If so, then how is cannibalism legal? It doesn’t hold up.

The point is, four of them die in this absurdity, and then one gets away.

           This writer annoys me. He’s one of those people who go into a thesaurus, and try to fill every other word with an adjective or adverb. He can’t just simply describe a scene; he feels the need to force a pseudo-poetic description. Fuck off, man. Write like a normal person.

The first part really lacks a plot, it’s just empty exposition. We learn that this knight, just called “The Knight,” rides a reptilian steed, and they hate each other. Is this giant reptile horse thingy smart enough to hate? Are we going to get a zany adventure? Is this going to turn into a buddy cop story?

 The second we get any bit of a plot, any bit of dialogue, the writer goes to exposition, giving everything a description or backstory at once.

             When people think of science fiction and fantasy, they think of pompous romps, filled with pages of empty and self-absorbed description, that all amounts to nothing but some nerd mentally masturbating. Normally, I defend the genres from these thoughts because of how vast and nuanced they are, and my love for them. This story however, is exactly that, and completely indefensible. The only thing that makes it worse is that it’s basically a YA chick lit story, but the edgy protagonist isn’t a woman, it’s some space knight guy. Some edgy teenage nerd went and wrote a power fantasy.

 In my next post, I try to find the plot, and talk about it.