#rayla thinking she has to sacrifice something/herself yet again to free her parents

[raayllum]

i'm scared fam

[beautifulterriblequeen]

Rayla’s catalyst

Ethari is Rayla’s emotional catalyst. Once she visits him in the Silvergrove, she begins to suffer a lot of grief and guilt over Runaan, her failure on his mission, and getting ghosted like her parents were. And she also begins to admit her feelings for Callum. All because her soft dad is soft with her, and she hasn’t had anyone be truly soft with her since before she left home. The home where she lived happily with her two dads who loved each other very much and supported her in every way they knew how. The home where she may have felt like she lived on the fringe, but she definitely belonged in the Silvergrove.

Rayla never speaks to Callum of her guilt and grief over getting Runaan and the other assassins killed. But coming face to face with Ethari and realizing that it’s her fault that his husband perished shakes her up hard. Still, Ethari forgave her once he understood, because he loves her very much. Giving her his pendant to keep her safe was a sign of his love and understanding for her. And she knows what that pendant means to her dads. Which is why it also prompted her to consider her emotions for Callum. 

She’s seen how her dads are together--loyal, affectionate, soft, supportive, and balanced. Her parents are the same way, so Rayla understands what a healthy relationship looks like. Unfortunately for her, the object that reminds her of that powerful romantic bond also reminds her of her own failure, and she can’t separate the two.

this post is ridiculously long

There’s a lot of staring at this pendant, and it starts with Ethari. He’s been wearing it all this time, but he takes a moment to study it, to feel what it means to him--what it used to mean to him--and what he wants it to mean to Rayla.

It’s a symbol of his love and protection. And he offers it to her.

She bends down to accept it, but she already can’t look away. She was right there when Runaan had to crush his own pendant. That’s where her mind has gone. She sees her own failure in the middle of Ethari’s gift to her.

She studies the pendant, too. Feels its weight. Remembers all the times she saw Runaan and Ethari wearing these. She’s wearing the symbol of a love that’s lasted longer than the life it was tied to, a life she feels responsible for ending. This pendant is a tangle of emotions for her. But mostly love and guilt. She’s not really able to process that it’s meant to protect her yet.

Maybe Ethari picks up on that. He wants her to know what it means, in case she wasn’t aware. It seems they wore these pendants all the time, but Rayla may never have understood exactly what it meant to Ethari to give one of them to Runaan.

And he wants her to know what it means for him to give it to her, too. He just wants her to be safe. She’s come back to him, against all odds. And he doesn’t want her to be lost or hurt again, not if he can protect her.

This look kills me, though. She’s shook. She just got another layer of understanding on the pendant that Runaan had to destroy to keep her alive, even after she’d lied to him and endangered the whole team. Runaan knew what the cost of Rayla’s actions would be. It cost his pendant, and his life, and his team’s lives. And he paid it all, for her. Despite what she’d done. 

Ethari loved an elf who sacrificed everything for Rayla. And now she’s taking Ethari’s own pendant for her own mission. Will she sacrifice everything, too?

GODS, all the BIG FEELS

Rayla literally can’t handle it. Between all those feels and the ghost spell reasserting itself, she can’t look at Ethari. He’s not really Ethari without his big brown eyes, anyway. It’s a face of anonymity, of rejection. Of distance. And she doesn’t want to acknowledge that he ghosted her. Not after he just gave her such a precious gift, and mounts to speed her on her way.

Runaan was always focused on his mission no matter what, and Rayla retreats from her feels to try the same here. She can’t handle her feels, so she holds onto the one thing she can handle: getting Zym home. And that means looking ahead toward her journey, not behind at what she may never get to experience again.

But she carries her big messy feelings with her anyway, and she’s not dealing with them. The next day, she wears a distant, thoughtful, sad expression. She’s distracted, worried, introspective. Callum notices. He’s felt that way before.

Callum was raised to be more in touch with his feelings than Rayla seems to have been. Or at least, he’s far more willing to admit to them when he and Rayla have only known each other a short time. He trusts Rayla with his feels, but she clearly doesn’t trust him with hers, judging by her expression.

She snaps at him and rides ahead when he tries to prompt her to talk about how she feels. When he tries to tell her that he’ll accept however she’s feeling, because those feels are a part of who she is. She’s still processing, vulnerable, and struggling. She’s not ready yet.

They get through meeting Nyx, and that gives Rayla something to focus on for a while. But once she has some free time aboard the ambler, she finds herself staring sadly again at Ethari’s pendant. Her ears are droopy, too. She’s feeling vulnerable, but not in a good way.

I like this shot of the pendant in her hand. It mirrors Runaan’s grip on his own pendant right before he crushed it, but here Rayla is holding this one protectively, as if she’s afraid it’ll get damaged out in the world. It also foreshadows Callum holding it later and cracking it open before he casts Historia Viventem. Rayla’s the only person who clutches either of the pendants protectively. Ethari’s let go of it, but it’s meant to be used, and Runaan and Callum both broke theirs--to help others instead of themselves, which is how Rayla operates, too. Man, I love these pendants.

Callum comes over to see her. He can see she’s broody again. But she looks away. She doesn’t want to admit she’s a mess.

And she lies about her feelings. I had an ask about Rayla and lying recently. At this point, she’s still trying to cover for her “flaws,” but she still doesn’t have a good enough distraction to fool Callum. And that’s a good thing.

Rayla gazes sadly at her new pendant again at the oasis. Of course their mounts are paying attention to her--they know her--but the way Ethari’s Shadowpaw is studying Rayla here, it’s like it can sense her distress and it’s watching out for her. It gives me a weird vibe like Ethari can sense Rayla’s emotional struggle from afar, and maybe he knew she’d have to go through this, but he hopes she’ll get to a good place in the end.

These three faces Rayla makes as she processes Nyx’s “two blankets or just one” comment are a delight, especially because she’s hiding them from Callum. First she’s shocked at suddenly having to think about snuggling with Callum. Then she catches herself playing with her hair. And the third pic--the way she gets habsolutely hurious at herself--tells me that Rayla playing with her hair like that is a sign of emotional interest. She’s got eight tons of emotional baggage rn, but her heart’s still gonna daydream, and she hates how messy she feels.

Rayla can keep her feelings bottled up while she’s awake, but it overwhelms her at night. She’s crying, and she can’t stop.

Callum, soft-hearted boy that he is, reaches out again, concerned. Maybe he wakes Rayla from a crying sleep, or maybe she was already awake.

Rayla’s really broken up, though. She’s devastated after her visit to the Silvergrove, and all her feels are pouring out.

She tells Callum to get away from her because she’s desperate for distance. She can’t keep her feels inside anymore. She’s had a day and a half to process, and the things she’s realizing are breaking her. And the only way to preserve the illusion of her remaining in control is to go where Callum can’t see her tears.

The hood comes up again. She’s hiding her emotions, trying to stuff them down deep like Runaan trained her to. But they won’t go away. Runaan is part of why she has such wrenching feels now. Rayla’s reaching a breakdown point, and that’s not something Moonshadows show to someone they haven’t trusted with their true feelings. So she’s trying to hide everything at once.

And she knows it isn’t working. So her self-doubt comes out, as well. That overdeveloped sense of failure.

Callum focuses on reassuring her, because that’s how he was raised: to reach out to those who are hurting. But all Rayla hears is an illusion she knows she can’t maintain. She’s not okay. And finally, she blurts out everything that’s weighing on her heart.

Rayla’s acknowledgment of her loss of stability--her social support system, critical to community-minded Moonshadows--is followed by a list of every single negative core belief she has. They just tumble out of her one after another. Everything she fears is true, all the ways she’s not good enough. And on some level, Callum instinctively senses that Rayla’s spiraling because she feels alone. She’ll keep falling if no one catches her. 

So Callum catches her. He stops her spiral. He just wedges himself into her rant and takes it over, because he’s having none of that terrible negativity from her. He knows none of that is true. Negative core beliefs are never true.

you heard me, Rayla

Callum replaces Rayla’s negative rant with a positive one. He matches her in emotional intensity, and she’s completely caught off guard by it.

She’s really not buying into this “you’re really good” bit, though. She’s struggled with that for a while--she didn’t believe Runaan either, when he said she was the fastest and the strongest of his assassins.

But Callum, unlike Runaan, is looking at Rayla when he’s talking to her, so he sees her reaction and acts to reinforce it with supportive touch. Touch is a big Moonshadow language, and one Rayla’s got to be familiar with after living in Runaan’s house for so many years. Callum’s touch says even more than is words do, and it’s really gotten Rayla’s attention.

Their body language here is key. Facing directly, close, he’s still holding her hand, full eye contact, soft expression. This is how you talk to someone when you’re emotionally open. Everything about Callum is saying “Listen, this topic is important to me.” And his topic is Rayla.

He talks her up, gets her to laugh. He’s intent on keeping her downward emotional spiral interrupted, and it’s working. So he sums up by telling Rayla that she knows he’s right. She’s not all the things she said. She’s the things he’s saying about her.

And then he takes her hood down. That’s assassin for “let me see your feelings.” Rayla thinks she knows exactly what he’s saying, but Callum doesn’t speak assassin. He doesn’t know what her hood’s actual purpose is.

No wonder she’s not quite prepared. Lookit those cute high eyebrows of shock. She thinks Callum’s inviting her to be fully emotionally open with him, as he’s just been with her. De-hooding an assassin is an invitation to be soft. It’s probably a very romantic thing under certain circumstances.  She may have seen Ethari take down Runaan’s hood a time or two as a way to encourage him to embrace softer feels and open up. So Rayla feels she’s being invited to do the same. 

And she wants to. Look at this face!

Rayla’s feeling supported, understood, encouraged, and emotionally safe. She thinks she’s just been invited to share her true feelings, since Callum was just so open and complimentary, and since he pulled down her hood. So she does. And in true Moonshadow fashion, she chooses to express herself through touch instead of words. She kisses him!

And in the moment before she realizes that wasn’t exactly what he was inviting her to do, this is her expression. She’s utterly content. Not mushy, not weepy, but balanced again. She had all these big feels revolving around guilt and abandonment. She felt alone. Moonshadows should never be alone. But now... Now she has Callum. Rayla’s not alone anymore. She found her balance, by holding onto him.

Eventually, they get around to confessing their feelings at the same time, and this is the first thing they do after those first happy smooches. They fall asleep together, touching, relaxed, and vulnerable. It’s so very soft and sweet that they touch even in their sleep. Rayla’s probably the one who kept holding onto Callum, and he was absolutely willing to stay right by her side and fall asleep on her shoulder. Rayla’s absorbing all the Not Alone Anymore vibes she can--she needs the emotional support, and Callum’s heart is deep enough to give her everything she needs.

And then, once Rayla’s feeling more balanced, she starts initiating contact. Sometimes it’s serious handholding, like in front of Avizandum’s statue. But they also get adorably silly, and we get to see Rayla’s playful, romantic side. She finally feels comfortable touching Callum with casual intimacy

Ever since Rayla admitted her feelings for Callum and realized she wasn’t alone and abandoned, she’s stopped staring at the pendant. She accepts it as a part of her, like Runaan and Ethari did. She can finally come to terms with Ethari being able to love her despite what she did, because Callum loves her despite what she did. 

The only other time Rayla looks at the pendant is right before she gives it away. She wants to protect Callum, to let him run with Zym to safety. She’s gonna give him the pendant, but as she reaches for it, she’s choosing to protect someone else instead of herself. She finally understands what it means to love someone more than life. 

Just like Ethari loves her and Runaan.

That’s why her goodbye kiss to Callum mirrors Runaan’s goodbye kiss to Ethari. She comes full circle, from the Silvergrove and back to it, from one family to another family, from being loved unconditionally to loving someone else unconditionally. Rayla’s passed through all the phases of her moon, and she finally understands what Ethari knew about love.

Because Callum has become her heart. And Ethari--his love, his gift--helped her understand that.

[raayllum]

I'm a little confused because someone who didn't do anything to Rayla (Marcos) is very different from someone who will do bad things (Aaravos). And Rayla is willing to kill those she thinks fall in the latter category (as with Viren), yet it seems like Rayla could choose to let Aaravos do terrible things over harming Callum (like she implied in 4x07). So if Aaravos is released as a result of Rayla's choice, was that not already foreshadowed?

Again: that's the tricky thing. On the one hand, Rayla refusing to sacrifice Callum is a sign of growth, for someone who's regularly put herself and her wants and loved ones (her parents in S5, leaving Callum during the timeskip no matter how much she wanted to stay and even though she knew it would hurt him) on the back burner. On the other hand, Rayla framing it as only her taking this Risk to get him back, that it doesn't matter what Aaravos-Callum does to her so long as she saves him, is her same old pattern of behaviour.

But even if Rayla does refuse to kill Callum, and that does lead to Aaravos being released, all that means is that Callum's choices - to save her all the way back in 2x07, and to double down on it in 5x08, and possibly to choose to knowingly engage in a scenario that would leave him vulnerable to being possessed again (as we don't know how that'd work without the mirror as an instigator) - have likewise led him to actually free Aaravos. The worst project partner team ever, tbh, because they both fumbled the bag by choosing each other over the world.

S5 made them pretty blatant callbacks to Bloodmoon Huntress' emotional core, not only in bringing in Kim'Dael, but also the whole "stronger together" theme and Rayllum's parallels to Ruthari / these panels.

E: Who I love, where I love, what I love, these are all specific. But to Runaan and those like your parents... Love is rooted in all families, in all creatures. Souls like that feel called to protect everyone as fiercely as those they hold close. [...] Sometimes helping others requires great feats of strength, Rayla. But you are right. Sometimes an act of caring is as simple as being there when it seems no one else is. Both are necessary. 

If 5x08 is Callum's equivalent of 'leaving' in TTM, then he also needs an in-show equivalent to Rayla trying to save him from possession. (Which literally everything indicates she will, ultimately, do so successfully; whether it'll be too late is what's up for speculation). We've seen this a little bit in Chasing Shadows already in terms of themes of loss of sense of self due to sacrifice/trauma + remembrance of self due to Callum and Rayla's bond but like

Literally every sign and plot point thus far has indicated that Callum will only be put into a position where, if he is the one freeing Aaravos, it'll be because he did something for Rayla. Whether that's the coins and the adjourning star magic being more complicated than usual leading to possession, or a more conscious choice regardless of brainwashing... These two and their arc and bond have been interwoven from the very start.

This is also why I've posited I could easily see a scenario where Rayla breaks Callum free of the brainwashing (reinstating her identity as "That's what makes her a hero, that's what makes her Rayla") but is hurt ("Or hurt people I care about" while it pans directly to Rayla / everything about 5x08) or captured or something, and that leads to Callum playing into Aaravos' hands anyway.

"Rayla sparing Callum will be responsible for freeing Aaravos" leaves out the fact that Callum is the one trying to free Aaravos (under possession), after all. Callum's choice was already made; Rayla's will just be a response to it

Callum and Rayla are gonna doom the world, and they're gonna do it together, lmao