#done book 1

[lucky-clover-gazette]

captive prince book 1 highlights & annotations

chapter 13 & final notes

indented text is from the book. some quotes have commentary, some do not. some comments are serious, and some are definitely not. most of them will only make sense to people who have read the series. and, like, there are spoilers. so please read the books first if you're interested!

also: part of the reason i'm doing such a close reading is to study cs pacat's style, especially in terms of how she does romance and erotica. there are "craft notes" that might seem weird, like i'm being redundant or restating something rather than analyzing, but those are more things that i want to remember/take away from the writing!

i'm going to tag these longer posts with "sam reads capri" in case anyone wants to read them all at once.

this is a google doc i wrote with overall content warnings for the captive prince series. it's not perfect, but i do think it's important to include.

It was true; it was somehow not even a surprise, more like a truth that had grown for some time on the edge of his awareness, now brought into sharp relief.

some damen brain insight! he’s not stupid or oblivious. he just ends up distracted, often, due to the more pressing things in front of him and/or subconscious avoidance.

‘You can’t go to Delfeur,’ Damen said. ‘It’s a death trap.’

YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYY damen doesn’t want laurent dead!!!! 🎉

‘Is your reputation so far in the dirt that you think the Council will choose your uncle for the throne anyway, unless you prove yourself?’ ‘You are right on the edge of what I will allow from you,’ said Laurent.

but he does allow SOMETHING, which is new

‘Take me with you to Delfeur,’ said Damen. ‘No.’ ‘Akielos is my country. Do you think I want her overrun by your uncle’s troops? I will do anything in my power to prevent war. Take me with you. You will need someone you can trust.’ Speaking those last words, he almost winced, immediately regretting them. Laurent had asked him for trust last night, and he had thrown the words back in his face. He would receive the same treatment. Laurent just gave him a blankly curious look. ‘Why would I need that?’

context: laurent is delusional about his capability to overcome near-insurmountable odds alone. this frustrates and concerns damen, and he isn’t able to let it go, even though he hates laurent. his values and honor come first. laurent is both confused and mildly amused by damen’s concern, because he doesn’t expect anyone—especially not damen—to actually care about his well-being.

Damen stared at him, suddenly aware that if he asked, ‘Do you think you can juggle attempts on your life, military command, and your uncle’s tricks and traps by yourself?’ the answer was going to be: Yes.

i love laurent. i love that his stubborn determination is very much a virtue, but also something that occasionally makes him act like a total idiot. and damen sees this, and understands this, for better and/or for worse.

‘He asked me to bed you, then report back to him.’ Damen was forthright. ‘Not in those words.’ ‘And your answer?’ That, unreasonably, annoyed him. ‘If I’d bedded you, you’d know it.’ There was a dangerous, narrow-eyed pause. Eventually: ‘Yes. Your style of grabbing your partner and kicking their legs open does stand out in the memory.’

the fact that laurent allowed this kind of banter to happen at all is kind of a big deal. he was definitely close to smacking damen about it, but went for a half-hearted insult instead. for laurent, that’s basically a white flag. and it’s even more meaningful, since the exchange was related to sex, which has proven to be a vulnerable topic.

‘My dear brute,’ said Laurent, ‘I want you to rot here.’

context: laurent is exhausted, stressed, and delusional about his immediate future. damen wants him to survive (for now), to see things realistically, and feel the urgency of his circumstances. i don’t think laurent cares if damen rots—he just wants him to stop saying true and helpful things.

also, this is just kind of a hot thing to say. something about the conflicting affection and contempt. i don’t know.

‘Are you that sure of yourself?’ Damen called after him. ‘I think if you could beat your uncle on your own, you would have done it already.’ Laurent stopped in the doorway. Damen saw the cupped yellow of his head, the straight line of his back and shoulders. But Laurent didn’t turn back to face him; the hesitation only lasted for a moment before he continued out the door.

he’s right! laurent knows he’s right! he’s just too proud and delusional to admit it!

probably because to laurent, admitting weakness only results in vulnerability and pain. he wouldn’t believe that anyone would actually want to offer him help without an ulterior motive. so his guard stays up, and he does what he needs to do alone.

Laurent was leaving tomorrow. Laurent, infuriating, intolerable Laurent, was pursuing the worst possible course, and there was nothing Damen could do to stop him.

“i hope she fries / i’m free if that bitch dies / i’d better help her out” (buffy the vampire slayer, once more with feeling)

It was easier to blame the death of a boy on mischance than that of a young man about to ascend to the throne. Damen could see no reason why boy-Laurent should have escaped that fate. Perhaps familial loyalty had held the Regent back . . . until Laurent had blossomed into poisonous maturity, sly-natured and unfit to rule.

context: the regent kept laurent alive as a child and teenager so he could [redacted] >:(

Laurent could inspire homicidal tendencies simply by breathing. Kastor, he thought, had no idea what lay across the border. Kastor had embraced an alliance with Vere. He was vulnerable, ill-equipped to fight a war, the bonds within his own country showing cracks to which a foreign power had only to apply pressure.

the dramatic irony here is insaaaaaaaane. damen your cognitive dissonance is showing

Did Laurent really believe he could do this alone? Laurent would need every weapon at his disposal in order to navigate this course alive. Yet Damen had not been able to persuade him of that. He was aware, not for the first time, of a fundamental inability to communicate with Laurent. It was not only that he was navigating a foreign language. It was as though Laurent was an entirely other species of animal.

romance is two strong-willed and competent people communicating despite the odds, becoming stronger and more competent together than they would be apart. also doing improv comedy to survive the horrors

He touched the starburst pattern at his shoulder. He was dressed in Laurent’s colours, and bearing his insignia. That was a strange feeling.

kinda hot. like the collar and cuffs, but they actually earned it.

submission vs. respect theme, etc.

He was to serve and obey, as any man.

but NOT, notably, as a slave.

‘Sleeping in his tent?’ ‘Where else?’ He passed a hand over his face. Laurent had agreed to this?

i love how damen’s follow-up question isn’t necessarily, “do i agree with this?” but “how the fuck did LAURENT agree to this?”

After a long moment, Damen said, ‘Whatever else you think, I don’t share his bed.’ It was not a new insinuation. Damen wasn’t sure why it rankled so much now.

probably because there is something resembling mutual respect developing between damen and laurent, so the implication that their interactions are entirely sexual is offensive. submission vs. respect again!

‘If I’d sent them after you,’ said Laurent, ‘I would have told them you went out the only way you knew, through the courtyard off the northern training arena. Did you?’ ‘Yes,’ said Damen.

hot.

The pre-dawn light bleached Laurent’s hair from gold to something paler and finer; the bones of his face appeared as delicate as the calamus of a feather. He was relaxed against the doorway of the stables as though he’d been there quite a while, which would explain the colour of Jord’s face.

laurent lean #9. smug eavesdropping.

And he did not need gilt to be recognised under a parade standard, only the uncovered bright of his hair.

i’m counting this as damen likes blondes mention #6. implies that laurent is “parade standard” simply because of his pretty hair.

Laurent paced forward. His eyes passed over Damen in turn, displaying jagged distaste. Seeing him in armour seemed to have drawn something unpleasant from the depths. ‘Too civilised?’ ‘Hardly,’ said Laurent.

context: “i cannot fucking believe i’m dressing up my brother’s barbaric killer like a veretian and letting him join my traveling party”

‘What is he doing here?’ ‘Captaining the Guard.’ ‘What?’ ‘Yes, it’s an interesting arrangement, isn’t it?’ said Laurent.

oh, he’s SEETHING. humor as deflection.

‘You should throw him a pet to keep him off the men,’ said Jord. ‘No,’ said Laurent, after a moment. He said it thoughtfully.

context: mainly i think laurent knows that govart’s unsatisfied libido is likely to make him screw up. but also i’d like to believe that he’s just super over the pet stuff

Laurent took it without saying anything. He tucked it carefully into a fold of his riding clothes. Then after a moment, he reached out, and touched Nicaise’s chin with one knuckle. ‘You look better without all the paint,’ said Laurent.

oh he cares about this kid so much, and clearly values his gift. this is the most affectionate we’ve seen laurent in the entire book.

‘Do you think a compliment will impress me?’ said Nicaise. ‘It won’t. I get them all the time.’ ‘I know you do,’ said Laurent.

“so did i.”

‘I’m coming back,’ said Laurent. ‘Is that what you think?’

context: this is meant as a comfort to nicaise, but nicaise hears it as a threat.

neither of them believes that they would ever deserve or receive protection.

‘I’m coming back,’ said Laurent. ‘To keep me as a pet?’ said Nicaise. ‘You’d love that. To make me your servant.’ Dawn passed over the courtyard. Colours changed. A sparrow landed on one of the stable posts close by him, but lifted off again at the sound of one of the men dropping an armful of tack. ‘I would never ask you to do anything you found distasteful,’ said Laurent.

context: this is the truth.

It didn’t surprise Damen that Laurent was popular with the townspeople. He looked the part, all bright hair and astonishing profile. A golden prince was easy to love if you did not have to watch him picking wings off flies. Straight-backed and effortless in the saddle, he had an exquisite seat, when he was not killing his horse.

NICE VS. GOOD THEME! damen thinks that if the townspeople saw laurent as he does—a bitch—they would realize that he isn’t good. because he still believes, most of the time, that niceness equates to goodness. and so every pleasant quality laurent possesses—his appearance, his title, and his skills—is in opposition with his unpleasant behavior. laurent’s unpleasant actions and qualities are, simply, Not Good. and damen is too distracted by laurent’s more tasteful qualities to consider how his distasteful decisions could be more ethical than they appear (for example, mercy killing the horse his uncle poisoned).

inversely, we have damen and akielion slavery. damen knows the gentle submission of slaves in ios, and the way their masters “honor” them—in that, he sees goodness. but when he sees the cruel way veretians treat akielion slaves, he sees wrongness, which he then advocates against. but what he can’t see, is that “palatable slavery” (gag) is still slavery, and just as wrong in akielos as it is in vere. and it is just as evil of akielos to partake in the institution, if not more evil since it’s their institution in the first place, than whatever is going on in vere. 

damen has moral integrity. he has a mind and he uses it. but he also has a massive blind spot, because he believes that everyone else in the world is as honorable as he is.

laurent has the opposite blind spot. he doesn’t expect anyone to be honorable, ever. least of all his brother’s killer.

the two of them make a good team.

final notes

damen likes blondes mentions: 6

laurent leans: 9

(nice)

character elements to watch out for: 

laurent perspective context (knowing what i know, what sense can i make?)

laurent & nicaise

laurent coping mechanisms (pretending, delusion)

damen coping mechanisms (avoidance, distraction)

damen reconsidering the ethics of akielios

mutual moral arbitration

series themes: 

niceness vs. goodness

submission vs. respect - “there is no honour in obedience”

suffering alone vs. fighting together

pain and humor

honor and integrity

sex, power, innocence, violence

trauma, desire, consent

[pineapple-frenzy]

Book 2 au with Zuko and Katara Lee and Huamei

Katara is separated from her friends, and so she's left to travel the earth kingdom on her own. She stumbles across Zuko, who is similarly travelling on his own. They decide that pairing up and travelling together would be best

[teiasviago]

— Chapter 13, ROMANCING MISTER BRIDGERTON

[why-the-heck-not]

the saturday-sunday night diabolical "life is falling apart"- to do list followed by a mad scramble

[carefulzombie]

rewatching atla and seeing what sets katara off and inadvertently kicks off the plot will never not tickle me silly

[cn-alastair-lite]

[deoidesign]

I met the me who made different choices

[marzipanandminutiae]

so help me god if I tanked the chance for a well-paid job with full medical benefits, sick leave, paid vacation time, etc. because I hardly ever do machine seam-finishing

I'm going to be. really really really upset

[getyinyusedtoit]

that brief passage during the banyue arc where the book is like "the two became immersed in a serious discussion on stars and the night sky" is so important to me because how many times over the past centuries have they looked up at the stars separately and made individual wishes from the bottom of their hearts and now they're standing together beneath the stars, bonding over their shared knowledge like they've been doing this forever.

[indelicateink]

as an american, sam reid’s total inability to hide his contempt for overly fake-chipper american journalists, especially ones who Have Not Done The Assigned Reading know and care about the show, will never not be hilarious and iconic to me

[s0undsinmyhead]

If I see one more “they’re platonic soulmates 🥹🥰” comment on a tagged Caryl post I’m gonna go Carol on these mfs.

If you don’t ship it move on. Creeps. Only thing worse is when they follow up with “she’s like his mother. They have a mother-son relationship.” Wtf show are you watching?! They’re the same age??? Carol has adopted many children. None of them were a middle aged man named Daryl who she flirts with a dreams about being married too.

[hyacinthsdiamonds]

Ted saying that no driver has had this level of attention on them since Michael Schumacher...

Gentlemen, a short view into the past; Max's debut season, his Red Bull debut, the literal rule changed as a result of his debut in the sport... oh and everyone and their mother calling Kimi Max 2.0 and Toto's second chance at signing debut!Max since he failed the first time around...

[afsosville]

Ever After High, but make it a PIDW AU.

Imagine how fucked up it would be if Shen Jiu is up there doing the book signing ceremony that seals his destiny of becoming the next 'Shen Qingqiu', and the mirrors display him getting thrown away by his martial siblings at the trial, and his limbs being torn off and other despicable tortures, and being brought down so low that your humanity is stripped away from you, all for an audience to see. And they cheer. The crowd is ecstatic, perhaps even more so than when his father, Shen Qingqiu, was put on trial.

[a-heart-of-kyber]

I can only speak as a person raised Catholic (heh...), but let me present a wild scenario.

Could you imagine the actual Holy Spirit having a clear and direct sentient influence in your child's life?

With this connection to the Holy Spirit, he starts performing absolutely insane miracles that a Child shouldn't be capable of and by the age of 8 God's chosen priest shows up like "Hey kid, have you heard of our lord and savior Jesus Christ? In my day, he was super sexy. You’re special. I'm going to train you and later you should probably go to a religious school."

And then, by age 17ish, Jesus himself shows up like, "Yes, twas me the whole time. Let me train you one on one my child." And then a year later, your son tells you he's sleeping with Jesus?

Like...does this help anyone understand what happened to Gale better? Or does it help that the Mystra analog is depicted as a man? Do you need me to hold your hand and tell you that even if Gale showed interest, it was on Mystra, as the omniscient god with all the power in the relationship and Future sight?!, to not fucking sleep with the mortal who maybe became an adult 5 minutes ago?

[bonefall]

.. opinions on wind runner? i feel like im one of the only ones that genuinely hates her sometimes

If you feel like the only one who genuinely hates her, I think you need to look around more. Wind Runner is a very widely disliked character, because she's often used within the story as a small antagonist who "threatens" the authority of Tall Shadow. Gray Wing dislikes her. Thunder is openly cat-racist to her. She spends several books trying to break through the moor cats' xenophobia to join a group that came to HER LAND.

Then, when Moth Flight is old enough to be a relevant character in Forest Divided, Wind Runner is turned into Yet Another mean mom the very moment Moth displays ADHD. She's contrasted to her mate Gorse Fur, who is a Soft And Good Dad, and ultimately MASSIVELY punished with the harrowing events of Moth Flight's Vision (even though, for most of that book, she's completely right.)

Ask yourself why they're especially harsh on WIND RUNNER for being mean to her child, in the arc with Tom the Fucking Wifebeater and his redemption death, plus Thunder being forced to stop being mad at his abuser Clear Sky, please.

To me, Wind Runner is an intense, ambitious woman who's demonized for it in a way that men just aren't. She's subject to several misogynistic trends within WC, plus a huge helping of xenophobia that goes absolutely unexamined. If DOTC cared at all about women, it would have treated her with the nuance she deserves.

Wind Runner is treated with nearly endless suspicion by Gray Wing through books 1 - 3, while he's bending over backwards to suck Clear Sky's toes.

Her wanting to join the group that came TO HER HOME and being a bit pushy about it earns a stronger reaction from Gray Wing than Clear Sky murdering people.

She's pressured into changing her name "to fit in," and it's still not enough. She wanted to join the group so bad she changed her name, at the request of the Mountain Cats, for a chance of being better accepted

This came after she'd already saved Jagged Peak's life when a burrow collapsed on him. She's plenty trustworthy.

She keeps doing shit to try and prove herself to this group of assholes. Remember Bumble being dragged back to her domestic abuser? Gray Wing interprets this as a power struggle, when WIND RUNNER WAS NOT EVEN PART OF THE GROUP AT THE TIME.

From Wind Runner's POV, she did something that the Moor cats wanted done. It was fucking evil. It was committing violence against another member of the out-group the cats see her as.

But who actually has the power here? Tall Shadow does.

Gray Wing said it himself that she could have come up with some excuse for Bumble to stay, and she didn't. In fact, any cat could have spoken up. No one did.

and still. STILL. Wind Runner gets nothing. Her reward is Gray Wing surmising that actually, her doing their sick dirtywork was a political move.

It's more consistent as a motivation with how Wind Runner wants to join their group. The thing she's been doing.

She only actually gets to join the group after Thunder starts publicly hurling slurs at her for suggesting they need to be ready for Clear Sky to attack them. "What do you know about peace? Last time I was here you were NOTHING BUT A ROGUE WITH A ROGUE'S NAME"

Gray Wing even starts purring when she gives birth, because her ambition goes away briefly and she "stops bossing everyone around." this is treated like a sweet thing. god forbid women retain their personalities when they have kids

She loses her first premature child to a seizure and Gray Wing starts proselytizing his religion to her. "Maybe it's a good thing your weakest child died because Jesus has them now" I want to beat him with a hammer

When her second child gets sick, Clear Sky has a bright idea that involves killing it. I refer to this as his "reverse leper colony" suggestion. He only develops a sense of humanity towards the sick when his brother's pregnant wife is in danger. Wind Runner and her kitten barely seem to clock as people to him.

It's only after her SECOND baby succumbs to a horrible, painful death that she decides the moor cats are assholes, and she goes to start her own group. It's LONG overdue. I was extremely excited to see it.

Now. Listen.

I've been treated just like Moth Flight before. I've practically heard the scolding in Book 6 Chapter 3 verbatim. I'm not downplaying anything about Wind Runner being harsh to her; being yelled at like that never fixed the problem.

What I'm saying is that this is the SAME arc that summons the hollowed-out ghost of Storm to coo that Clear Sky "never drove anyone away" with his abusive behavior and gives Tom the Wifebeater a heroic redemption death.

So why is the scolding from Wind Runner treated as unambiguously harsh? What's the difference between her and them?

Why is it that outside of this little bubble of the community, you can get buried in a flood of people crying about how "Clear Sky made Summisteaks Butt he thought it was the right thing :((( He feels bad about shoving Thunder's face in a weeping, pus-filled wound and trying to kill him :((((" but Wind Runner is mean about Moth Flight not catching a rabbit and she should be skinned alive

Why is WIND RUNNER held responsible for the death of Clear Sky's child in Moth Flight's Vision, WHEN IT WAS COMPLETELY HIS OWN FAULT??

So, why should I hate her? Because she's mean to the idiot protagonists? Because she's Yet Another Bad Mom whose actions ARE treated as Bad in the story, in the arc famous for openly weeping whenever someone's mad at their abusive dad?? When she has this whole horrific, unexamined story about how incredibly bigoted The Settlers are towards her and the extremes she goes to in order to please them?

I'm glad she's mean, actually. She should have been even meaner. I think she should have a gun

[marikodraws]

A Knife Cuts Deeper on the Way Out

Part 2 of my accordion book comic project! Part 1 >here<