As someone who will openly admit to thinking that most of the heroes involved in the Crusade are dumb losers, everyone involved would have to get lobotomies to allow that to happen.

It's hard to imagine the whole Plague having been planned, given what it cost him and what it's now doing to his legions, but it's annoyingly still possible.

Again, everyone would have to lose their minds to bring Black before the Highest Assembly, much less let him speak there, especially after months of him murdering Procerans. There's absolutely no benefit to doing so and a lot of risk, though admittedly, the same is true of leaving him alive at all.

Surrenduring wouldn't do anything, by the way; Saint and Pilgrim were both willing to kill Cat under a banner of truce, they just stopped because they lost their minds for a minute.

Also, it's not like Cordelia, and pretty much everyone involved, hasn't sacrificed people before; sacrificing a small fishing village to destroy the army that had been burning up Procer from the inside for months would probably be seen as a fair price even if they did tell everyone, though Cordelia's enemies might complain. It's also laughably easy to swing and no one is on Black's side here, because he's been killing their people for awhile now. Two Princes have lost cities to him.

 

I'm gonna be very disappointed if they kept him alive. There's literally no reason to.

 

Honestly, I think he should've died before the story even started. Early on the Calamities seemed way too OP. When Black taught Cat about maintaining the myth of the Calamities being unbeatable, I wasn't sure it was actually a myth. Losing the immortal super killer would make them a bit less horrendously powerful. If a heroic counter to Assassin had shown up, killed him, and Black covered it all up, then the question of why isn't every important enemy dead doesn't need to be asked, and the world working in Good's favor feels more real. Even with Assassin being alive, has he done anything in the story that couldn't have been done with regular assassins? The only thing that springs to mind is him being the bait and switch for Black in the last book, and that was just weird.

 

My thought, before the reveal, was that Assassin never existed, but they kind of used that up with the aside about the Eyes. The whole thing with Black and him was ten types of stupid.

 

So Masego's parents kept things from him not because they didn't think of him as a son but because they were worried about him, as everyone with a brain knew. Like, the reveal dropped and I was thunderstruck by a complete and utter absence of surprise, because yeah, fucking obviously.

Masego is outraged that his parents were keeping secrets from him and didn't tell him he was adopted how to turn into a zombie, because we're seriously doing this plotline, huh? My parents/my friends/Captain America/fucking Dumbledore didn't tell me everything because they were worried how I would react; damn them all, those bastards. Not gonna lie, there have been a decent number of Young Adult moments in this series, but I didn't Masego to dip so far into it. 'My parents won't let me become a vampire! Er, I mean a vampire! Wait, I mean a vampire! Now, I mean a vampire. No, I mean a zombie...Fuck it, I mean a vampire.'

Long story short, this chapter has two halves. The first half is barely comprehensible magibabble, where they talk about how they need to do stuff for reasons. The second half, I swear to fucking god I have read in a hundred different stories and fics. I could have closed my eyes and guessed everything that happened it was so predictable--but that doesn't mean I don't think it was dumb.

If this is what results in the break up between Masego and his parents, which has been a looming, emotionally charged part of this story for as long as we knew it was almost inevitable, I'm gonna be disappoint.

 

So if I understand correctly, the plan is to take Shatha's Maze and blow it up. Shatha's Maze, a sorcerous wonder that has never failed through any fault of it's own, dating back to one of the rare golden ages of Praes. One based on wards, something that the current Warlock is a specialist on. And the best he can do is turn it into a bomb. Why.

And are we sure the Ashurans brought no heroes with them? That seems pretty dumb. Granted, any hero they'd be able to bring would be leagues weaker than Warlock and Hierophant at this point, but you'd think that Ashur would pop out some naval-based Named to come with the fleet.

Not the most annoying part of the chapter though, because I guess this is the new angle on Catherine. Why does she have to literally be a different person after Second Liesse? What's wrong with just metaphorical? This is going to turn into so much angst, and it might not even be correct.

-Book 4, Chapter 12: Cambre

If Catherine is no longer the Sovereign of Moonless Nights, she goes back to being Catherine Foundling. We know this is going to be the case. While magic is fiat in this world, this points to Masego's theory over Warlock's. Cat's soul was merged with the power of Winter, and thanks to Saint bullshittery they can be separated. Based on Wekesa's theory, Cat doesn't have a soul to separate out, and so she should've just disappeared while the mantle reconstituted.

All this does is exacerbate existential dread that Cat already has, creates problems about fae interference that are already there, and adds motivation to do something we already knew she was planning on doing. Sure, there's a philosophical debate about personhood buried in there, but the Guide isn't built for that. This is fine, I still like the story, but stick to your damn wheelhouse.

I guess it's too early to call it pointless, but it sure seems that way. It's drama for the sake of drama and upping an ante that was already plenty high. There's more words to be had about the whole "let's make the metaphor literal" thing, but it's late enough as is. Goddammit.

 

In a story rich with interesting side characters with interesting perspectives, ones in particular which we WANT to hear more about (Pilgrim, Dead King, Tyrant, Hanno, Klaus Papenheim, any Goblin matron), why in fuck are we hearing about some jackoff naval battle which we we've only been told and not shown is important?

Even worse, instead of even getting the naval battle and the interesting Ashuran sea magic (which for all of Wekesa's sneering actually sounded interesting as fuck to witness), we only got told about it. Unless there's a giant wrench about to be thrown at their proposed plan (which I doubt, since Warlock and Hierophant are much too useful as story-solving devices to get schwacked offhand like that), there's no good reason their magibabble theory lecture couldn't have been happening over-top of the (actually interesting) battle actually happening, like Red Flower Vales.

Next we get to the big betrayal reveal which...isn't one? That Warlock very rightly concealed a third of the Dead King's personal diary, which he reveals previously turned an entire ass Dread Emperor into a monstrosity just by reading it? The Dead King who all of creation including Bard agrees is scary as fuck? Not that I actually thought the big secret Masego found to start this was that big - that what, your devil father who we know is old as fuck is, in fact, older than fuck?

And then Masego throws a pisser because he wasn't automatically told about it, by the right of what, being interested? This is the equivalent of a senator's son who's a fan of conspiracy theories throwing a tantrum because he's not automatically allowed to read NSA Top Secret files. A grown-ass man here, ladies and gentlemen.

Then the cherry on top: Warlock says hey, maybe all that fuckton of mind-altering Winter power turned your friend into a huge monster and you should watch out about that?

Masego: NAH POPS, HOW CAN CHARACTER CHANGE BE REAL IF OUR PERSONALITIES AREN'T REAL.

tl;dr Lone Swordsman, I miss you.

 

I'll start with the extra chapter, solely because I saw it first and thought it was the main one, until I remembered the date. Truth be told, I've got a lot of mixed feelings about it, because Ivah's perspective was interesting, but the entire chapter was up on it's own dick. This is, perhaps, to be expected, just given that he talked to Indrani and Akua, but we get shit like this:

And it just feels like she's jerking herself off. Leaving aside the fact that this is bullshit because it depends on the culture, supposedly, it's also bullshit because Sve Noc and these drow fuckers have done utterly, absurdly monstrous shit and made it a literal way of life. Also, I have to wonder if Archer remembers how that happened, because I do; it involved Cat getting her asskicked and being used as someone else's tool.

Similarly, Akua tells the story of the Meizans, and it's actually really, really interesting:

But while a nice story, and very informative, it's also fairly clear Akua doesn't like the fact that her nation was a historical foot note. By all accounts, the Meizans utterly dominated Praes and were only driven out after their Empire was broken and they'd left only a small garrison behind--and even then, it required all the Nation's of Praes to come together. These guys were doing things two thousand years ago that Praes still thinks is impossible, and they responded to the greatest nation in that part of Calernia, the Orcs, by utterly breaking them.

So while neat, hearing her say this:

Kind of feels not right. Especially when Cat's been a punk this whole time.

On the other hand, this happens:

So it kind of feels like we'll be making a return to the stupid, worthless drow and doing our best to forget that this city can and should slaughter Cat like an animal. I assume the Mighty will submit when she returns for them, because the narrative rules in this series only benefit the people it likes.

Speaking of which, onto the actual chapter; another Interlude, focused on Warlock:

I'm not surprised, I'm just disappointed. I assume there will be some dumb reason for this or another.

Somewhat more interestingly, Masego's demon dad goes more into why pursuing the Dead King's knowledge is a horrible idea, and you have to wonder why he doesn't just, you know, tell Masego that. 'I refuse to tell you about the Dead King!' 'Why!?' 'Because I have reason to suspect the knowledge is dangerous!' 'Oh, okay.'

Like, this isn't new. Remember, there are things Masego doesn't know for exactly this reason; doing the math needed to understand specifics about Demons of Corruption, for example, can drive people and the world around them insane, and Warlock deemed even observing Demons of Time as too dangerous to attempt. Like, I understand that communication between parents and children is a real issue, but this really feels like a post-it note could resolve this drama.

Anyway, we get a chat between the Woe who aren't doing (too much) dumb shit and they expand upon the details of Malicia's bargain some; while Malicia is alive, the Dead King won't turn on Praes and Callow--with hopefully a few additional details to avoid the obvious solutions. Since Callow's gone full evil, this is concerning, because the people of Callow might rebel if she fights the Dead King under those circumstances. This is itself concerning, because as we all know, the opinions of people in Callow matter. The only (bright?) side was that if she means that, we might see some interesting team ups, as it may include the Free Cities and other villainous groups.

Also, they discuss Black. To be fair, they don't know anything for sure, but on the other hand, the reasons they gave are indeed dumb.

There wasn't a single idea suggested there that wasn't moronic. Like, just to begin with, the idea that Cordelia would be going along with this, too, as well as Klaus, because it gives the people a chance to jeer and such. A head on a pike does that just as well and doesn't involve leaving him alive and bringing him into the heart of your country while it's at war and drawing a target on it for most of the deadliest villains on the continent. Last we saw, they were like 'Fuck everything else, it's the Dead King'; the fuck led to this?

Secondly, the idea of using him as bait gets floated like it's a good idea to have Cat, Masego, Wakesa, the Assassin, and everything the Dread Empress and Callow can muster all in one spot when that spot is 'the capital of your fucking country. Like, if any one of those guys gets to pull off any of their tricks, tons of people will die.

Thirdly, the idea that it's a good way to stop Cat from gating around; this is theoretically true in that you could, say, threaten to kill Black if she does. But let's say it happens and you do; then what? And, perhaps more importantly, this doesn't stop her from opening Gates in anyway, it merely shapes how she does so--and, again, means that you've traded possible Gates all across your country for a definite gate into your capital.

God, I hope the Saint at least put his soul in a bottle*, but that would mean not having a completely, utterly idiotic plan.

*By the way, that's an issue worth mentioning, because it's a classic 'have your MCs triumph over an antagonist early on and then reveal more about them' fuck up--which is to say that the more powers are given to the Saint and Pilgrim, the more baffling that Callow didn't lose their fight. Here we learn that the Saint can cut people's souls off.

Listen, Archer surviving a fight with her was baffling enough as is; don't add to it.

 

The Dead King left the Kabbalis Book of Darkness deliberately unfinished to lure in powerful mages who wanted to find and master the full text so he could harvest their bodies as backups. Now that's the clever stuff I like to see.

On the other hand, interesting thing regarding Vivienne:

She's got her confidence back, so Hakram didn't cut off his hand for nothing, but she's kept her hair grown out regardless. She's embracing the regency, then, and leaving Thieving behind for now. Hello there, wayward noble coming home story.

That said, Cat needs the drow less and less by the day. Peacing out will be popular in Callow thanks to the Empress' moves, and that's not a bad thing. It's a rather good one, because Callow could use a spot of peace. She'll need the drow to murder the Sve, because she made a deal with the dwarves and you don't fuck with the dwarves, but after that? Cat'll come back to Laure, have a standard info dump with Juniper and the Woe, and be told she can't do anything with the army she just looted because Praes is off limits and nobody in Callow wants to help out Procer - even against the Dead King - since the Dead King can't hurt them. Best case scenario? She gates down to the Free Cities and hooks up with Tyrant and Hierarch for shenanigans.

Edit:

See Black, not even Warlock had any idea what the fuck you were doing.

 

(QQ)7

RIP the realest.

Spoiler

Though to be fair, he was asking for it harder than anyone since Black’s ‘just as planned’ in B1 with the whole ‘let’s have dinner as a family after this’ schtick. That’s not a death flag, that’s a death 21-gun salute.

 

This chapter was...abrupt? Not bad, really, it's just that a whole bunch of stuff started happening and it...well, that's what it felt like. This happened and this happened and this happened and then, surprise, the witch is dead! For a battle that got very little build up, all told, everything suddenly went crazy this fight, and there's no room to even react before we're onto the next big thing. Apparently all the Crusaders that mattered were on boats this whole time or something.

Okay, pulling it back for a minute--and spoiler warning, go read the chapter before you read this because I'm breaking this down in order.

We open on a monologue from Wakesa which I honestly really enjoy. Even knowing what will come from it, I like seeing his view as a character. He's very focused, very selfish and self-centered, but also bound closely to those he loves and this chapter develops him, how he views his friends, and how those feelings developed over time. Seeing his view on Alaya and seeing him admit his own mistakes was great in a lot of ways, and I really enjoyed this view on them both, just like I enjoyed his view on Black and his goals, on Scribe's devotion, on Hye's selfishness and laziness, and even on Sabah. This chapter alone gave the Calamities as a whole characterization across all their years and it's all good. It talked of their rises and falls, their successes and mistakes, and it's top-notch.

It's followed by a battle that's fucking insane. I'm gonna go over it now, and strap in, because oh boy. If it seems like I'm brushing over things here, trust me, I'm not--it happens at about this pace.

Ashur attacks first, with a wasted shot at the shore where they believe the Maze is being controlled. When it does nothing, they prepare to send a another wave at the shore, intending to make a path for their ships around the Maze. Wakesa waits until they're deep in their ritual before sending his own wave at them, because just pulling out of the ritual means the backlash will kill many. The fleet just goes into the wave, underwater, and throws it back at Wakesa, revealing twist number one: it's not just Ashuran mages there, but Procerans, too, who have a lot of flexibility and which means there are twice as many mages as anticipated.

Wakesa stops the tidal wave, if at some cost, using his first Aspect Link. He then goes immediately into his second Aspect, using Imbricate to turn the sea into acidic, boiling blood, and leads to the second twist; there are also Speakers on board, the Ashuran priests. Without pausing, this leads to a third, greater twist--our first real instance of divine intervention in this war. The Ashuran priests call up one of their Masked...Gods? Angels? Something divine and set it upon Praes. Wakesa laughs and turns his power upon it.

It's not very effective. Seemingly annoyed, God proceeds to break Wakesa on the rocks. 'His bones creaked, his eyes burned and his teeth shattered.' He's neardeath after a word. That's our forth twist, by the way, I guess.

Masego steps in and tell God to shut up, shielding his father and trying to bind it.

It's not very effective. Well, it is, I guess? It makes God go away, and seemingly annoyed by this, God proceeds to break Masego on the rocks. All of a sudden, he's just nearly dead in the water, surrounded by the fleet. Twist number five, I guess?

This will not stand! Papa Wakesa ain't lettin' nobody touch his boy, even if he's half-dead himself. As it happens, we get a call back to Hanno's chapters, because here's the thing--the Gods Below pay their dudes. Like, seriously, these guys have one of the better track records in the series for this shit by this point, and they give him strength. He frees his husband, tells him to run, and is refused. They look at each other, they love each other, they stand by each other--

And they die together.

Also, the battle is over.

And it's good. I'll say that here and now, having had to reread it to be sure on how I felt--this chapter is good. It has a lot of good things in it. But holy fuck does it go fast. We've been here for three Interludes, the upcoming battle being the least important part of what's going on that entire time, and then all of a sudden, everything is going crazy, one shot after another. Like, this battle was built up basically not at all and might be one of the bigger fights we've seen in the series, period, with more twists and turns than most arcs, and there's just no time at all in it to breath or let the impact from one moment sink in before we're onto the next. It's very good, but for what it leads up to, it goes by too fast to even really believe; it's just like all of a sudden, we're onto 'Yeah, he gon die.' I did not expect the Warlock to go out this way, even if it was off-screen, but we just sped right into it, holy shit.

Holy shit, I'm still trying to catch up to how fast this all went down.

(Also, I have a feeling Masego will be less on board with helping the Crusade going forward. Just a hunch.)

 

I agree, it was a lot of build up to an important battle that occurred in very few words. Would've preferred two chapters, but I imagine that it would've also come with a lot of extra magi-babble. I would've liked to have gotten more time to explore the free will bit with Tikoloshe, given that it seems so important to the underlying gambit between the Gods.

I do enjoy how the Gods Below empowered Wekesa to throw the ultimate "no u" through the use of Reflect. Still not sure what exactly happened because of the lack of explanation, but I bet Masego picked up a few nifty tricks by staring at the angelic/godly mask.

 

The Crusaders show Masego the face of god, and he tells it to shut up and tries to capture it as if it's a fucking pokemon. Seriously, the incantation he used is the same one he used to capture Sulia back in Book 3. Now it doesn't work because this is a capital G God and his pokeball isn't strong enough (you gotta weaken it first, ya dolt. Plus toss on a status effect like last time), so instead he just winds up banishing a god. Then Warlock Reflects the divine power back on the Crusaders as a last gasp and single-handedly annihilates the Ashuran Navy. Holy shit.

Back when Cat negotiated rules of engagement with Pilgrim, we all knew she fleeced him with the "no angels for no demons" trade. She wasn't gonna use them anyway, a basic something for nothing. But between this and the divine plague? It's a good thing Pilgrim didn't call her bluff.

 

Frankly after Cat gets back I'm hoping for a 'well, fuck the rules then' moment for her. It would fit the Dead King's bit of 'they will turn you into the devil they feared all along'. I mean, the Crusaders never intended to fulfill their bargain to begin with - after all, they're the Good Guys.

 

To be fair, the God apparently bitchslapped Masego half to death for that in passing, so.

Hm? That deal never applied outside of that one battle to begin with, though?

 

I thought it was more verbalized as sort of the ROE for Callow vs. the Crusade, considering they were talking about sacking cities in the plural, and prisoner exchanges.

I mean, in the end, neither side broke the rules they put down if we're only encompassing Callow vs the Crusade as opposed to Callow/Praes vs the Crusade.

Cat, admittedly, went off to try and recruit the Dead King (who is definitely above the scope of demons, devils or angels in terms of collateral damage to innocents, which was the original reason those were sworn off), which definitely violates the spirit - but she didn't succeed.

Tightly controlled drow soldiers with Fae titles and bargaining away Good's access to dwarven weaponry is pretty above the belt in terms of warfare when you're considering everything Evil is capable of regarding collateral damage.

Meanwhile, the Crusade is off in Thalassina calling in capital g Gods and annihilating entire townships with divine plague. The only place the Crusade has been keeping those terms is inside Callow - it was the Pilgrim him-fucking-self who dropped that plague on their own villages.

No one has broken the explicit terms of the ROE - but only because they have been violating the absolute shit out of everything that hasn't been covered by them in writing. Which is why I'm hoping that after Cat and friends kill Sve Noc, they gate in somewhere in Procer (probably Black's parade) and just start going absolute ham on everything in sight.

I'm curious to see how Malicia deals with the Warlock dying politically, because Catherine now has a monopoly on Evil Named magic-users who can play in the big leagues. Unless she wants to contract out magic Revenants from the DK (which I'm sure will cost through the nose), she's going to need to mend some bridges with Catherine if she wants to be able to deal with the Witch+Pilgrim+Red Sorcerer+any other misc magic heroes the Crusade has got on something resembling her own terms.

 

Doesn't the destruction here shake Malicias hold on the wasteland? It was stated earlier that if she couldn't protect Thalassina her oldest ally, the Highlords would lose their trust in her and the knives would come out. So is this the beginning of her end as dread Empress? Especially with having lost the Warlock one of her most powerful supporters? Or did I misunderstand that the city was collateral damage?

 

From what I read Thallasina's walls took damage and there was probably flooding but Ashur is getting their fleet back to them as driftwood. Though I'd wager that Malicia would take Warlock over Thallasina because Praes will never revolt under her in the middle of a crusade. Right? Nah, it's Praes.

Made to will grieve like fuck, archer will comfort him there will be major strife between him and Cat all as plot points that will eventually smooth out. Mid to end of this book has Masego pulling out whatever he learned from God while telling him to git gon and getting slapped around.

 

You guys have all basically captured my thoughts on the chapter. Getting Wekeska's view on the Calamities and all of their faults was a refreshing lens on the group. Looking at it from Black is almost like one success after another. Hearing that there was strife and pain and sacrifice grounds the group some, instead of the mythic figures they've been most of the time. His strategies for the battle played out like all of his magic fights, counters on top of counters, and ended because both sides had to call out the big guns. Masego telling a god to shut up and trying to bind it was total big dick energy though. He lost but I think it'll lead to his third aspect, and make it a big one at that.

My biggest issue was that chapter felt too short. I spoke with Ryuugi abit about this on IRC but as a whole this should have been two chapters. Letting it all breathe a bit would have helped out nicely with the overall structure. If the chapter ended with the God being called down and Masego countering it would have really bought the tension. Next chapter being Warlock facing his death and making the sacrifice would have flowed better. Also lets the counters have a little more weight than just A to B to C to D to Gods.

 

Definitely agree with all the above about chapter feeling rushed.

What I found most interesting about this chapter though, was that Warlock's defensive plans failed utterly to the point that they didnt even play a role in the battle. The navy never even made it in range of the explosive wards they cannibalized together after a month of hard work. Considering the constant success the Calamities have been seen or heard stumbling between, its refreshing to see a true failure. Both in how they underestimated the attacking mages and their final defeat at the hands of divine intervention. Provides a nice contrast with the arrogance and complete dismissal of his enemies we've seen from Warlock over the past few interludes.