#liliet reads pgte

[lilietsblog]

“I think I might hate you a little,” Indrani finally said. My throat tightened but I would not argue or beg. It was fair, and her right. I nodded back against the crook of her neck, staying there and breathing in the scent of leather and steel and warm skin. “I never learned how to do this gently,” I admitted, the apology hanging between us. “Some nights I’m not sure I learned to do it at all.” “That I could forgive,” she said, then hesitated. She sighed. “Will,” she corrected, firmly. “Will forgive.” “Then?” “You took a part of me,” she softly said. “By being who you are, you took it in hand. Claimed it. And I won’t get it back even if I try.” I felt her tighten against me, like a bowstring gone taut. “It’s a little like being a prisoner, isn’t it?” she said. “Loving someone.” Indrani laughed, and at my silence the tension in her shoulders loosened. “Every time we speak raw, I understand the Lady a little better,” she said. “Why she left. I wonder if that was what she figured out: that if she lingered, she’d end up never leaving at all.” She wasn’t speaking of being in love with me. That would have been… it wasn’t who we were, to each other. Skin didn’t change that, I knew it for certain since the months we’d taken to that kind of intimacy. Wasn’t sure she could be like that, even with how she looked at Masego – though much of what lay there was still veiled to me, it was true. Sometimes I wasn’t sure I had it in me either, to be like that. I thought of Kilian and what had been shared there. What hadn’t, too. Even now the compromises that would have kept us tied were nothing less than abhorrent to me. Not a brew I would ever be willing to drink. How strange it was that you could care so much for someone and yet find them to be such a stranger in the end. No, it wasn’t that kind of love. But for the two of us, I wondered if what she was speaking of wasn’t more precious. She’d called the Woe wild animals, once, that I’d let into my home. She’d done it while castigating me for being unable to see past my part of our story – but she’d done the same, in her own way. Assuming that there’d been anything to me but plans before I met them. Like I’d not been just as much of a stray, starved for everything they had to give. Being in love, it was a fickle thing. Fragile. And skin only ever meant what you let it. I’d never felt either of those things in a way I wasn’t willing to lose. I closed my eyes, letting Indrani’s warmth seep into me. This, I was not willing to lose. Not with her, not with any of the others.

Guide has pretty much ruined most of other fiction for me :)

[lilietsblog]

anyway I’m just going to put this here.

Full text copy-pasted under the cut.

I've put 'tinfoil' in the title, because I find it highly implausible that I actually cracked Erratic's intent here, but... still: I can't believe it took me this long to put this together. We've had the pieces for a while now.

Bard is an utterly unscrutable entity, whose intentions, plans and opinions are as opaque as they are confusing. We do, however, know of two things that were explicitly the results of her plans, and intended ones at that:

- Second Liesse; - the formation of the League of Free Cities.

Second Liesse is an event that Bard engineered both the formation and the outcome of. She prevented the elves from killing Akua before she could implement it, and she fucked with Black's head in the Free Cities to ensure the exact thing happens as a result that, in fact, did.

(I believe there's more to her intent with Black than that, but more on that later)

The immediate direct result of Liesse happening, and ending the way it did, was... the crystallization of the idea of Liesse Accords: an utterly unprecedented pact between Good and Evil, allowing Evil's continued existence yet limiting the damage it can do to its surroundings, borne out of the unique circumstances post-Conquest and Catherine's unique position between Callow an Praes and between Good and Evil.

Except is it really? Unprecedented, that is?

Book 3 Epilogue

“Oh, that touch was probably just a drop of arsenic in the wine,” Aoede shrugged. “But I made your Name, sweetcakes. Back in the days before I knew better.”

“Prokopia Lakene was rightfully elected,” the Hierarch frowned.

“Right’s a pretty broad word, when it comes down to it,” the Bard said. “She was silvertongued like you wouldn’t believe, true, but that’s where I went wrong. The moment the tongue was gone, so was the Name.”

“The League survived her,” he said.

“The League’s skin deep,” the Bard said. “None of the forces behind moved any differently after it was formed.”

There has already been an attempt to bind Good, Evil and Neutral to work together. The League of Free Cities is a unique entity on Calernia, with polities of multiple alignments forming a single larger one ready to defend itself from outsiders and willing to all listen to one Named if such emerges.

And Bard's problem with it? It's too ineffectual for her tastes.

I believe Catherine's plan, and her currently being well on her way to achieving it, to be Bard's second attempt at doing the same thing. Oh, she'll butt heads with Catherine yet: not only does she have a knack for manipulating people into doing what she wants by positioning herself as an antagonist, but also her methods are... Catherine would much have preferred had Liesse not happened at all, and all that. That's going to be interesting to see.

I'm aware this theory has a lot of questionable points, and I'm going to address those one by one.

Q: Isn't Bard "the sound of lash in the dark"? Didn't Hierarch say that?

A: He did, and I'm utterly unsurprised at that. We know Bard has extremely mixed allegiances and extremely questionable methods. This is some of her chickens coming home to roost, and the universe finding a way to turn the whole free will thing against her as it has against every single other player at the table. It doesn't mean she doesn't have good intentions; Anaxares isn't exactly a paragon of clear thinking and infallible reason, god bless him and his sleeping hole.

Q: What makes you think Bard has the free will to do things like this? Isn't she a servant of Above and Below at the same time, and thus twice as bound as every other Named?

A: First of all, see: League of Free Cities. That's not my theory that she made that, that's canon text. Second, Above and Below are fairly hands off with their representatives, as we've seen. They apply tentative pushes - Above's moral guidelines, Below's propensity for strife - to prevent their Named from actually promoting the philosophy of the other side (though Catherine manages to anyway, god bless her), but don't interfere much beyond that. Choirs are distinct from Gods Above and fairly independent, or Neshamah wouldn't have said Bard's the closest to those, considering Heroes of Mercy are known to get literal constant whispers from Ophanim in their ears. Meanwhile Bard serves both Above and Below, and so doesn't even have those limitations. We've seen enough of her POV to know that while she chafes at her external restraints, all her will and saltiness are her own. Having to run errands for Above and Below doesn't preclude her ability to do shit on her own, she is a Named for a reason after all. They're known for pulling off the impossible.

Q: So what the fuck do you think is up with her and Black?

A: I believe a large part of Bard's current plan is to push Team Practical Evil away from the "Evil" part. She can't flip Cat, but she can with a bit of effort flip Black - he's too efficient a servant of Below to be allowed to continue to be such, and pulling him over to the side of Good will not only help right the balance - which has recently been skewed in Below's favor so badly heroes are going for "let it go all the way and wait for the inevitable backlash" as a strategy - but also help cement the alliance/cooperation, given that he and Cat are going to keep being the same side in this regardless of what their Names are.

This hypothesis explains a lot of Bard's seemingly random alignment/attitude flips by binding them together as parts of a fairly specific plan.

Villainous Interlude: Calamity III

“I’d say sorry, but you brought this down on yourself,” the Bard said. “I could probably destroy you in full, big guy, but that would take time. And effort. So I’m going to give you advice, instead.”

The Wandering Bard leapt down from the rooftop, half-falling. She came close, kneeling at his side.

“Go home,” she said. “Murder your little friend in the Tower and reign until someone puts a knife in your back. You’re not as good at this game as you thought you were.”

Hatred, Amadeus thought, was pointless. A bias that brought no benefit. And yet.

“But you won’t, will you?” the other Named sighed. “You don’t negotiate.”

She rose back to her feet, brushing away walnut shards.

“I doubt we’ll meet again,” she said. “And fucking Kairos slipped one by me, so I’ll have my hands full.”

The Wandering Bard looked down at him, shoving her hands in her pockets.

“This one feels like a sin, doesn’t it?” she mused. “Remember that, when the gears start turning.”

Giving "advice" to him to be more evil, that he's now even less likely to follow than before just because she said that, then planting the suggestion for him to be more aware of the concept of "sin" and allow it to influence more of his thinking?

Yeah. Yeah, that's planting the seeds not just for his reaction to Liesse, but also for further alignment drift down the line.

Book 4 Epilogue

“Catherine got herself killed again,” the Bard casually said. “And let me tell you, now that was a show. You don’t often see that calibre of foolishness slugging it out no holds barred.”

His fingers tightened. Breathe in, breathe out. Control. The moment he lost control, the creature would make use of him for whatever purpose she needed. It might be time to consider smashing his head into the ground until he fell unconscious.

“It’s fascinating, watching you take that paternal feeling by the throat and just…” Marguerite snapped her fingers, “There goes the neck. Back into the box it goes.”

This comment of Bard's is not exactly accurate. What part of "okay, I don't know for sure that she's telling the truth, nor do I think it necessarily means Catherine isn't okay even if she is, but I'm -this- close to just smashing my head against the rock until I fall unconscious again and miss my one chance to escape, just because of how much emotion hearing this is making me feel" is "taking paternal feeling by the throat and snapping the neck"?

But it's influence. It pushes Overton's window, subtly nudges Amadeus's own frame of reference - towards being more emotional, away from the cold rationality of gears.

And it's entirely in line with what she said last time they met, when you look at the direction it pushes him in and not what she literally said.

And, y'know...

“Claimant,” the Wandering Bard said. “You can have your second shot at it, you’re owed that. But if you really want it?”

She drank deep, then wiped her mouth.

“Well, there’s always a price isn’t there?” she shrugged. “So tell me, Amadeus of the Green Stretch…”

She smiled, crooked and wide under moonlight.

“What do you think is right?” she asked.

She leaned forward.

“How far are you willing to go, to see it done?”

I don't think the "it" that he is owed a second shot at and the "it" that she's hinting he might really want are the same "it", considering the "but" there.

And she's being vague about it for the exact reason she was giving bullshit advice the previous time: Amadeus is likely to do opposite things just to spite her, so let him figure out what he actually wants himself. That's more reliable.

Q: Why do you think Above and Below would allow this? Don't they want the game to continue as it is?

A: Actually, the main reason for us thinking that they wouldn't is Bard's speech to William about preferring Heiress's victory to Squire's any day. Considering how that one went... not exactly a reliable source of information. That entire premise might be wrong.

And whatever their private opinions on how the game should go, I think Above and Below would allow whatever the fuck. Below has spared Black's life as payment for his service, and he's literally devoted his life to making Praes less Evil. Above has Laurence de fucking Montfort and the precious Rafaella. They give general guidelines, have rules about how they themselves intervene, and beyond that allow mortals to do whatever they feel like doing. They're the ones settling the wager of Fate, after all.

Q: But what about the whole free will thing? Doesn't Bard being the ultimate mastermind behind Catherine's actions kind of undermine her as a protagonist?

A: Nah.

Bard's more strictly limited than any other Named. Unlike the rest, she can't make things happen just by wishing so, she's limited by others' agency. There's a reason it took so long between the formation of the League and now: Bard needed a possibility, first, Named who could be influenced to do what she wants. Black's plan to marry Praes and Callow gave her an opening she couldn't make herself, and Catherine was one failed Name transition away from coming up with the Accords - those things matter on their own, and they're not Bard's doing, they're what she needs. That's ultimately the essence of her limitation: she can only shove around things that were already plausibly likely to happen thanks to other players at the table. Catherine's far more potent than her, in terms of agency, and Bard's more a backdrop she acts in front of than anything.

Q: What about "eat the baby"? What the fuck does that even mean, anyway?

A: One of two things, I think.

Either Bard and Neshamah are close buddies who understand each other well and are genuinely straightforward with each other, in which case Bard is giving him advice that he can pretty much go all out here while still remaining a side dish, plot-wise, to the main course of the alliance being eventually gathered to push him back into Keter. He's going to gain more than he loses, and then go back in his bottle, which was inevitable anyway.

Or their friendliness is surface deep, and Bard's giving him "advice" to overextend himself and actually expose himself to being genuinely vanquished by plot backlash on a permanent basis. Which Neshamah would catch and absolutely not do, which Bard would know and have as the actual planned for outcome anyway. Making the whole exchange pointless, so y'know, I favor that first interpretation.

Either way, Bard's advice changes little about the fact that Neshamah coming out is the very reason the Accords have a chance of working. He's the leverage Cat can use to twist everyone else's arm into agreeing to them, and as it always is with Guide and characters in it getting lucky breaks, No Coincidences Were Involved (tm).

Q: What about William? Didn't he want him to beat Catherine?

A: First of all, plans can change. Catherine pre-First Liesse and Catherine pre-Second Liesse are two very different Catherines. Bard thinks on her feet, and the idea could have occured to her after seeing Catherine's "save the city from the devils, then get myself killed for the trouble, then say fuck you to that and get myself resurrected via a heroic story" stunt.

Second, she sentimentally hoped William could survive despite knowing for a fact he wouldn't, because Contrition sucks. That's not the same thing as counting on it as a plan :x

In conclusion, this is going to be fun.

P.S. Found another quote I'd been looking for.

“Seven battles I won on my feet, and lost the war sitting at a table.” – Periander Theodosian, Tyrant of Helike, after the founding of the League of Free Cities

(Book 4 Chapter 18 "Cradle")

P.P.S. I nearly missed this myself, but Bard's Free Cities comment that Amadeus should usurp Malicia and reign as a Dread Emperor himself, followed by a surge of hatred in him? Yeah, that pretty much seals the deal that he's not going to go for Dread Emperor. Even if it's the rational thing to do, Bard has ensured that every single scrap of irrationality he has in him is going to rebel against that, and also incidentally that those scraps are going to have a lot more influence on his actions than they otherwise might have. No Dread Emperor Amadeus in this timeline.

[lilietsblog]

so it’s kind of sad how Cat has the exact kind of trust/control issues that leave her with the courage to take leaps of faith but also immediate backlash in the form of being utterly convinced she will NOT land

just, fuck, rereading early pgte has baby Cat go “there must be a trap, I am not this lucky” and... that never went away. Cat is terrified of the world and doesn’t trust it, but she acts like she isn’t and does, and ain’t that just what the first flashback was about? :x

[lilietsblog]

so there were two whole new chapters, cool! plot! I am really super fucking glad to see Catherine seriously turn cloak on the Below! And to go back to her traditional diplomatic way of ‘bluntly straightforward’!

but all of that pales in the face of

At my father, for being so much less than he could be.

Not only because Catherine says this so casually now and I am dead.

But also, because there’s no fucking way this isn’t foreshadowing for SOMETHING that’s comng.

[lilietsblog]

what I also and especially like is that Akua's help MATTERED

it MATTERS that Akua could win, that Akua WAS winning. That Catherine chose to fold in a winning game, not a losing one. That this was not a gesture of desperation.

Akua gave Catherine grounds to stand on and weight to her sacrifice, and this MATTERS

she really did help

[lilietsblog]

girded with Light and wearing the grim rictuses of individuals carrying out a necessary evil – always without the capital, of course, and preferably phrased as the ‘greater good’ instead

god I love Amadeus though

he’s just... listen. he’s a fucking idealist

he has a very strong idea of what good and evil are, and he judges the fuck out of heroes for every little speck of hypocrisy

he sees himself as selfish because his standards for not that are about on the level of Hanno’s

all that, and he’s having a lot of fun in the process!

[lilietsblog]

Catherine Foundling and Sve Noc: an artist’s rendition

[lilietsblog]

I’d never wanted to deck someone in the face more than I did that man in that moment.

I RELATE TO THIS ON A DEEP SPIRITUAL LEVEL

I WANT TO DECK THIS PARTICULAR MAN IN THE FACE QUITE A LOT

[lilietsblog]

i JUST NOW realized that the title of the chapter refers not only to the epigraph, but more importantly to Catherine's motto

I'm a dumbass

[lilietsblog]

“Powerless you ain’t, Maddie. You know what you are, deep down, you just think it’s beneath you.”

His fingers tightened under the knuckles were white.

“Claimant,” the Wandering Bard said. “You can have your second shot at it, you’re owed that. But if you really want it?”

She drank deep, then wiped her mouth.

“Well, there’s always a price isn’t there?” she shrugged. “So tell me, Amadeus of the Green Stretch…”

She smiled, crooked and wide under moonlight.

“What do you think is right?” she asked.

She leaned forward.

“How far are you willing to go, to see it done?”

THIS ISN’T COHERENT

THIS ISN’T COHERENT ENOUGH TO ACTUALLY TRACE WHAT BARD IS SAYING

AND I THINK THAT’S DELIBERATE ON HER PART

SHE’S FUCKING WITH AMADEUS’S HEAD

AIMING HIS THOUGHTS IN DIRECTIONS SHE PREDICTS THEY’LL GO WHEN SHE SAYS THAT

she played him like a fiddle the last time they danced, we’ll see if that holds

[lilietsblog]

guide comment section: TOO FEW BAD THINGS ARE HAPPENING TO THE FEMALE PROTAGONIST I CALL BULLSHIT

me with popcorn: i drink your tears for breakfast

[lilietsblog]

I just had the BEST mental image.

There’s this whole THING with the trap heroes prepared for anyone who’d come to rescue Black, Malicia plans to blunder right into it, Masego & the Woe are plotting how to get around it.

Then in the middle of the hubbub Cat just pops in past all the defenses, goes “excuse me I’ll be taking this”, grabs him and absconds.

And everyone is like “what.”

And Masego shrugs like “this was within my predicted parameters too actually. She did promise she would”

[lilietsblog]

anyway, depending of course on what Name he gets, one great option for Amadeus's new Aspects is Fix

it's a verb associated with him from one of his early mission statements and prominent character beats - what it's like, to see a place falling to pieces and want to fix it

and his character development has hopefully being going in a direction of him remembering what it is that he actually wants

and what he actually wants being this

but not just as an end goal, but also as a means of reaching it and a way of operating on every level

because Amadeus definitely doesn't have a clear separation between means and ends in the way he thinks. Just because something is more a side effect of achieving his goals than the original point doens't mean he's not going to care about it and incorporate it into what he is About (see: greenskins' racial equality, Callowan economy, and in a very prominent example Catherine Foundling herself). Yes, he’s made sacrifice and necessary evils into a huge part of his toolbox but that’s what Catherine has been asking him to do less of

so yeah I think Fix would be a very badass Aspect for him to get

[lilietsblog]

“So I should just go around stabbing everyone who does things I don’t agree with?” I replied. “That sounds like a winning plan.”

“If you had a winning plan, I wouldn’t mind,” the doppelganger smiled mirthlessly. “But you’re not trying to win. You’re trying to be right.”

YEAH IT KEEPS BEING FUCKING RELEVANT

and the sheer absolute joke of the fact that it’s Black who ended up smashing into Catherine the lesson that a victory achieved by wrong means is no victory at all if you just lift your head and look at the horizon

I’m pretty sure he didn’t mean to teach her to be a better hero but he always just did his best

[lilietsblog]

He smiled ruefully. “Most of them were killed by their Squire, as it happens. I will not repeat their mistake: I will not deceive you, Catherine, or force your hand. What would be the point? I already have followers and equals – as well as a superior, if only the one. What I want is an apprentice, and an unwilling one would be nothing more than a burden.”

And so, Black embarked on a long and difficult road of trying to do two opposite things at once and sabotaging himself every single time he did or said a thing.

Congratulations, dude! You’re going to get the exact opposite of what you want, also known as the exact thing you were going for from the beginning!

Yes, I also have a headache!

[lilietsblog]

“Catherine got herself killed again,” the Bard casually said. “And let me tell you, now that was a show. You don’t often see that calibre of foolishness slugging it out no holds barred.”

His fingers tightened. Breathe in, breathe out. Control. The moment he lost control, the creature would make use of him for whatever purpose she needed. It might be time to consider smashing his head into the ground until he fell unconscious.

“It’s fascinating, watching you take that paternal feeling by the throat and just…” Marguerite snapped her fingers, “There goes the neck. Back into the box it goes.”

I love how Marguerite is characterizing him as this uncaring monster perfectly in control of his emotions, like Catherine did a while back, and uses the same metaphor too

except Catherine was talking about Black calmly using her as a tool and also planning on killing all his friends probably

while Marguerite is saying this about a situation where he is using breath exercises to keep himself from like. screaming right then and there. and also considering just fucking smashing his head into a rock until he falls unconscious bc it’s better than talking to her

I kind of feel like this is partly an indication of Bard herself losing her humanity? She can’t judge accurately what is normal human level of feelings and control over them bc her own don’t even work like that anymore at all

so she goes by story shit and other people’s observations even when it’s... inaccurate

and this is inaccurate

Amadeus is being more human here than he’s been the entire time we’ve seen him with the Name