Black Jewels: Don't You Dare Be Afraid, Or Else

[beroli]

 

     The beginning of Part II introduces a new character, the housekeeper of SaDiablo Hall. She was apparently hired without ever meeting Saetan (probably by Draka, who will show up later). She's tough and strong-willed and afraid enough of Saetan to "pale" when she realizes it's him, but in a way that largely gets brushed over, since she's a completely positive character. She curtsies to Saetan twice. The second time, the book says, "Having been born in the slums of Draega, Hayll's capital, as the son of an indifferent whore, he'd never expected or wanted servants to grovel in his presence. He didn't mention this to Helene because, if he read her right, that was the last curtsy he would ever receive."

     Wait, what? Where does he get this? The book doesn't try to earn it or make it make sense. Helene, the housekeeper, is a minor character; the subject of her curtsying never comes up again.

     Saetan also notes that, "His bad leg still stiffened if he walked too long, but he no longer needed that damned cane. He laughed softly. Jaenelle was a bracing tonic in more ways than one." Is the implication meant to be that she's literally been feeding him rejuvenating tonics (something she definitely will do later, but if it's the case already it makes Saetan look alarmingly incurious that the subject of where she's learning magic he doesn't know and isn't teaching her isn't even worth a sentence to mention that he's wondering about it), or that her presence rejuvenates him?

     Cut to Surreal. Tersa shows up at her apartment and tells her, "Tell him to beware of the High Priest of the Hourglass. He's not a forgiving man when someone threatens what is his. Tell him to beware of the Priest."

     Okay, so. Saetan is a threat to Daemon because of ownership of Jaenelle. This is not a moral issue in the eyes of any character in the novel, but Daemon should be careful because Saetan's dangerous. Surreal reflects that she doesn't want to go anywhere near Daemon--I can't imagine why--but she still feels indebted to him. She's also worried that he'll throw Tersa out if he shows up. Apparently he still owns the apartment Surreal is living in. This doesn't make any sense. She doesn't like him. She fears him. She's rich. She's staying in a two-bedroom apartment owned by Daemon, worrying that Daemon will show up and be mad Tersa is sleeping in his bed. Apparently a woman is not allowed to take easy, obvious steps to avoid a man she's afraid of for excellent reasons, if he's officially a "good" man. (Cassandra took steps to avoid Saetan, and the book treated it as a horrifying betrayal.)

     Then we cut to Jaenelle, who is being sent to a mental institution because she talks about things the adults around her don't believe in. Her uncle, Phillip, "sincerely hoped that this time would be the last time." How many times has she been sent to the institution, Briarwood, then? You'll understand why this is a meaningful question, and why the implication that it's been more than once strains plausibility by itself, later.

     Back to Kaeleer: Jaenelle (being stuck in Briarwood...for three months? That's...a really long time, I'll explain later) has not shown up at the Hall. Helene calls her a "hoyden," and Saetan snaps at her and tells her that if Jaenelle didn't show up, she had her reasons. Weeks later, Char comes to Saetan and tells him that new demon-dead children have been coming to the cildru dyathe's island, not through the Gates or by riding the Winds, but across what Saetan recognizes as a new a permanent bridge between the Realms.

     Cassandra comes in to help with exposition and be a verbal punching bag some more. Saetan explains to her that Jaenelle created a permanent bridge from Terreille to Hell; she protests that "the Realms can't be spanned that way," and suggests that Saetan's inability to find Briarwood on a map may be because Briarwood is the name of "just a place" rather than a village. In an unheralded switch from their earlier roles which still keeps all the authority sympathy with Saetan, Saetan is now the one who resents the psychic mist blocking Beldon Mor, Cassandra the one who suggests that Jaenelle is trying to protect herself. Saetan, characteristically, responds to the suggestion that it might make sense for Jaenelle to be afraid of him by implicitly threatening Cassandra and, when she moves to put the table between them, reflecting that the table wouldn't stop him. "It's not just you, Saetan. Don't you understand?" She opened her arms, pleading. "It's me and Andulvar and Prothvar and Mephis, too."

     "They wouldn't harm her," he said coldly. "I won't speak for you."

     So often, for Saetan, there's no substitute for simply quoting his words and thoughts.

     Cassandra points out that Jaenelle's family might freak out if the High Lord of Hell shows up on their doorstep and asks, "What if they desert her?"

     "She can live with me," he snarled.

     Cassandra asks if Saetan is really suggesting Jaenelle should grow up in Hell playing with dead children, and Saetan replies, "We could live in Kaeleer."

     "For how long? Remember who you are, Saetan. How eager will those little friends be to come to the house of the High Lord of Hell."

     Saetan brings out his most compelling counterargument. By which I mean he calls Cassandra a bitch, his voice "shaking in pain" so there's no ambiguity who's in the wrong here. Knowing the rest of the series, I know that Cassandra is factually incorrect here (well, it's more complicated than that, but to what extent she's right it's not because of Jaenelle's friends or anyone who has a viewpoint that Bishop will ever treat as valid), that Jaenelle can live with Saetan in Kaeleer and her friends will be happy to visit. And yet...Bishop clearly doesn't mean for everyone being afraid of Saetan to reflect badly on Saetan in any way, but Jaenelle's changing it doesn't seem to involve any kind of magic. He was the tragically lonely High Lord of Hell for millennia, because people feared him for reasons that were no fault of his, beyond his power to control, completely unrelated to his acting like a superpowered petty bully whenever someone tells him something he doesn't like: that's what the book tells. But even strictly internally, the book seems to show a very different reason for his being isolated.

     "There may be another reason to let her go." Cassandra took a deep breath. "Hekatah came to see me a few days ago." She flinched at Saetan's hiss of anger but continued in a sassy voice, "On the surface, she came to see your newest amusement."

     Saetan stared at her. [...] No, she understood the danger. She just didn't want to deal with his rage. This apparently says something awful about Cassandra.

     That blend of fear and wariness in her eyes was too familiar. He'd seen that look in every woman he'd ever bedded after he began wearing the Black. This clearly indicates something wrong with all of them, not with Saetan; why would they possibly fear the man rather than just the Jewel? But Cassandra was Witch. She wore the Black. At that moment he hated her for being afraid of him. That's logical. I mean, it's not like he's both reflected on and gone out of his way to prove that she's enough weaker than him to be thoroughly vulnerable if he decided to attack her.

     Cassandra relates to Hekatah tried to make Cassandra jealous without realizing that she was Cassandra, and she put her off by implying the relationship between her and Saetan is strictly business.

     "Perhaps I should rectify that impression."

     Cassandra gave him a saucy smile, but there was panic in her eyes. "I don't tumble with just anyone, Prince. What are your credentials?"

     Out of spite, Saetan walked around the table, drew Cassandra to her feet, and gave her a gentle, lingering kiss. "My credentials are the best, Lady," he whispered when he finally lifted his lips from hers.

     So we're clear: Saetan just forced a kiss on Cassandra. Knowing she was terrified. To punish her for being terrified. Out of, explicitly called out, "spite." And yet the narrative sympathizes entirely with Saetan and not at all with Cassandra.

     If you're worried for Cassandra, don't be. The books will never be sympathetic to her, but the scene that just concluded is as bad as it will get for her.

     Ahem! So, I want to discuss something from an unrelated work for a minute. In C. S. Lewis’ novel Prince Caspian, there’s a comically foolish race called the Dufflepuds, who are ruled by a human-looking wizard named Coriakin. In the novel there are plenty of issues there that warrant dissection themselves (which is beyond the scope of this blog entry), but in the movie version, Coriakin has never done anything to justify the Dufflepuds’ fear of him, but they still call him “the Oppressor.” When their leader comes face to face with him on-screen, the Dufflepud leader yells, “The Oppressor!” To which Coriakin replies in a weary voice, “I have never oppressed you.” “But you could!” the Dufflepud leader replies. In the context of the movie, the Dufflepuds’ fear of Coriakin simply because he has magical power is forgivable—ha, those silly Dufflepuds—but not justified: he is no threat to them.

     In the Black Jewels books, the opposite is the case: fearing those who have significantly more powerful magic is justified but not forgivable. The calmest, most benevolent user of magic is still a barely restrained killer, and the greater the magic, the less the control. Saetan is capable of worse things than Cassandra could ever dream of, but because she lets it show that she’s afraid of him, because she does things like faking her death to avoid him, things like the previous scene are justified and the reader is expected to be on Saetan’s side. Saetan accepts, when he first meets Jaenelle, that she’s a small child with enough power to eradicate the universe in an eye-blink, and that if he’s afraid of her, she’ll grow up lacking the human connections that would give her a reason not to do so, and it’ll be his fault, and the fault of the other people who were afraid of her. Bishop is very into this concept of the tragedy of power, which is all about how sad powerful and dangerous people are when those who spend their lives unable to defend themselves, are afraid of them. This is a constant theme through the narrative: it’s a moral wrong to be afraid, whether or not it would make any sense to not be.