#evitbt

[eclipsecrowned]

hc: evi & the lopen, perhaps.. // @nectaric

For some overlap with my chosen FC, I actually write Evi as not being wholly Riran! She has a Shin grandfather hidden back on the family tree. She has never brought this up since fleeing East, because she doesn't need to deal with that while already handling Alethi xenophobia. Was mildly afraid that her children would give it away and be crem-sized --

Evi is a creative! I don't know if she registers herself as such, but she does have some artistic pursuits. She picked up a knack for storytelling when she was traveling, which we later see her carry on with Ren. She also likes to paint, but prefers landscapes to portrait work. She sees storytelling as something collaborative with her audience, and her painting as collaboration with the earth and the forces that occupy it. She fears describing it as 'art' properly somehow solemnizes acts she takes plain joy in.

She dealt with depression on and off throughout her life. From fleeing her homeland in the night to the very end of her story, she's been dealt a hard hand the whole way through. Evi has her own personal fixes for when she feels herself going 'away,' long walks, time with her boys when she can handle it, her hobbies, but sometimes it still presses against the surface of her stillwater facade. It spiked most noticeably after her eldest was born, as the one two punch of 'my son will never know my half of his heritage' and 'my husband is leaving me alone again,' to a point she struggled to function and others took note.

Evi truly wanted a daughter, someone to be gentle to, someone the ways of war and conquest could not take from her. Evi never would have forgiven herself if she had given birth to a daughter. She never wanted to bring anyone into the back-biting society that made her feel so small, to raise her treasure to hide her hand and her desires and her truths.

Ialai lied. Evi was not some wanton, exotic scandal waiting to swallow her betrothed whole. However, she did think the safehand thing was a little funny, and delighted in teasing her husband with it. Before the boys were born, she'd sometimes freehand in their private chambers, and laugh at how she could fluster the man all others feared. She had to laugh. She had to see him as something else to cope, and he was so easily ruled by the mere glimpse of skin that to her still seemed so innocent.

It has been a minute since I read through the scene where the Lopen's family is all together, but I like to imagine he just has a ton of sisters. I don't know if he's an only son, but he's definitely outnumbered. I also think he's the baby of his family, which helped him get so smug and bold in life.

Spent a bit of time in his childhood being 'The Man of The House' whenever his father went out looking for work. Depending on the state of his Alethkar, work for immigrants could be in short supply. So clearly all his older cousins should listen to him, on account of his being so mature and important.

I think the lost his arm/made a slave plotlines actually overlap. 'Being Annoying' is an explanation for why his people wanted him gone, but would not be a valid enough reason for him to get the boot from superiors, unless the xenophobia in-universe is way darker than what is depicted on page. Between his immediate family being well established in the Camp as well as the estimate of his slave brands age, I think he was one of those teenage boys trying to make something of himself in war and got eaten alive, whether as a soldier or in some support role. Got injured. Survived, but not with his arm intact. See, now he's annoying and no longer able-bodied. It's the perfect storm for his squad to turn on him and literally sell him upriver a few years prior to canon -- and for the loss to be recent enough he hasn't internalized his status as an amputee.

Smarter emotionally than he -- or anyone -- gives him credit for. Can be short-sighted about his own behavior and its impact, but is particularly adroit about other people. He has a knack for coming around and helping Ax's Kal, for instance, or getting Pupper's Szeth to actually let down at least one wall. He recognizes there's men from the original crew that need to confront and work through their lingering feelings towards Gaz to keep the peace between respective Orders in he future.

Most likely to turn to locker room talk. Not in the sense of degradation or reducing someone to what he finds attractive, but more 'I have no filter and I'm about to educate you naco.' At present his record is giving one of my OCs a thorough understanding of techniques when on weapon maintenance duty and having sent Ax's Kal zooming off in mortification in separate incidents --

[eclipsecrowned]

it's that she spent so much of her life as a refugee it's that she traded happiness for stability it's that she never gave up but she was so tired of having to fight it's how she saw the best in others but they would never let it surface it's about how she loved her sons and without her they were launched into a domestic hell it's about she died at 39 and didn't just die but went down like that at the hands of a man she was dying for anyway he just didn't let it be a metaphor anymore it's that he was so broken by the loss of her by his own mistakes that he had to forget her it's the way she was unmourned by all but the sons she loved so dearly i am not joking sedate me --

[eclipsecrowned]

pulls down the conspiracy board.

i genuinely don't think evi was fridged.

she's dead. don't mistake me on that. i don't even think her spirit was reaching out through the old pumpernickel dipper or whatever the fuck it was in ob, i think d*linar was just having a catharsis moment. he heard what he needed to hear, or else finally had some understanding of the woman he married and how she would behave and wove it into his big spiritual moment. she's too woven into the narrative not just in how she died, but how she lived, too. we just don't see it clearly until ob, i feel.

she haunts the narrative. her peace flows through her sons, her love and her hope. she is far more a ghost to her husband, something just out of sight and mind -- literally -- but also the specter of what he was and what he did. we already see how the truth of her death is tearing at the narrative, giving her influence even after she's gone beyond what i've outlined. i think she's going to have more impact than 'beautiful but sad woman who died for man pain/character development.' i simply think it's too early in the series for us to get the full scope of her beyond 'tragically murdered wife to our protagonist.' i'm holding out for r*narin book to give us insight and prove me right.

now excuse me, doctor says i'm late for my pills <3

[eclipsecrowned]

getting deep into the weeds w evi and motherhood as i peck away at bio. tw for mental health/depression/etc.

'ppd arc' for evi yes, everything hits all at once. her husband is given marching orders the same day their first son is born, she's alone in a xenophobic nationalistic environment realizing everything her baby will never have of his maternal heritage, of the pieces of her culture he can't hold. feeling more and more isolated and not being able to really talk about it because of the state of mental health in-setting.

and then her waiting to fall back into that same dark place when her second son is born, to come totally untethered from the life she's built... and it doesn't happen. she's calm. she's able to be totally focused on ren, and lin, present for them, calm. rationalizing it didn't have to be as bad the first time, that circumstances piled up one after the other.

being so close and protective towards the son she was able to bond with from the start, and also coming to terms with just how exhausted she is with her husband's people. there's no bricks through windows, that's not her style, but there is a certain understanding that she is done playing. teaching her sons about where she came from, her mother tongue, the world beyond this nation. teaching them to be better, to live up to the ideal of a father that doesn't exist. ren's name. resistance. a gentle rebellion. evi finding her line in the sand and standing firm with it when it comes to her sons. whether those around her can recognize it is another question entirely.

[eclipsecrowned]

living for the amount of secrets ax's n*vani is privy to re: evi and that she just. politely keeps to herself.

like the whole 'tried to ditch her own wedding and had to be dragged back by her brother.' or 'went a little mad after her eldest was born.' she really said 'you know what that is none of my business and i am going to keep it right here until i die and nobody's husband has to know about it.'

[eclipsecrowned]

anyway while we're discussing evi vs alethkar can we also discuss how weird a strictly gendered society must have been for her? like she traveled from one end of the continent to the other, she has to have lived other cultures even in passing. she must have lived a myriad experience during that time. but most importantly i don't think she really had that vorin gender division that alethkar so clings to bck home? imagine her trying to just bond with her husband or even his men as their highprincess and people just looking at her like she has lost her damn mind as she's learning the ropes.

no wonder she raised her boys to be 'weird' she's trying to keep them functional and not a ball of neuroses about what is and isn't acceptable --

eviphobia is canon and i love seeing other people comment on it --

[eclipsecrowned]

it's about the angel and the devil on dalinar's shoulder. evi who sees a good man at war with a terrible one. gavilar who wants to sharpen dalinar to a horrific edge just to point him at other nations, and never mind the cost to his brother. how evi was pacifism til it hurt, til it killed her, always reaching out to make a connection, how gavilar was always the warmonger, always wanting force to create his ideal world and damn the cost, who would abandon family and realm alike for personal glory. how they haunt him. always endings and beginnings.

how the loss of evi compels him to be the ruin that gavilar wanted him to be. how the loss of gavilar sets him on the path to become the man evi saw in him. the counterbalance between them. one needs the other to have their way. dalinar pursuing non-confrontation as an option as evi would but also bartering with forces his brother sought to subdue. only one influence can and will win.

i am very scared for book 5.

making connections i don't think sanderson intended for me to make.