#savil's cut-off cry for :VAN—: has haunted me ever since I read this book years ago

[softlysilverfountainsfall]

Savil's death was the most devastating one in the entire Herald Mage Trilogy and I will die on this hill.

"I [Vanyel] can take care of it tomorrow. It's not that urgent...It can wait until morning. He watched the fire through half-closed eyes, listening to Stef breathe, and waited for sleep to take him. Then the peace of the evening shattered.

:VANYEL!:

He was out of bed and grabbing his clothes before Stef woke.

:VAN—:

Savil's cry was cut off, abruptly, and Vanyel doubled up and fell to the floor—Pain—knives of fire [...] Then, nothing—" (Ch 15, Magic's Price)

You can hear her screaming through the all-caps mindspeech. You can hear her desperately calling out to Vanyel, her beloved nephew and protégée for help, the strongest herald-mage in Valdemar and now the last.

You know exactly when she dies because her cry for help is brutally cut off in the middle of Vanyel's name.

"Savil's door was locked; Vanyel kicked it open. His aunt lay in the center of a circle of destruction; furniture overturned, lamps knocked over, papers scattered. Blood everywhere. [...] Claw and teeth marks on Savil's throat and torso showed that she'd put up a fight. A trail of greenish ichor and a broken-bladed knife told that her enemy had not escaped unscathed.

"Not that it mattered to him. The damage was already done, and this time Vanyel's hard-won detachment failed entirely. While the others checked the locks, and looked for clues or any sign of what had attacked her, he sank down to his knees beside the body, and took one limp hand in his—and wept.

Oh, gods—Savil, you were right, and I didn't listen to you. Now you're gone, and it's all my fault. . . ."

"'She was afraid she was going to be next; she asked me to help her, and I just thought she was being hysterical. I promised to strengthen her wards, and I didn't; I forgot. This is all my fault—'"

You are devastated by Vanyel's heartbreak as he curses himself for not listening to her, for putting it off when she said someone was targeting the herald mages and asked him to help her.

"She's never going to sit there in her chair and expound at me again. I can't ever ask her for advice. She'll never take on Father for me—she was my mother in everything but flesh, and I failed her, I failed her, when I'd promised to help her. He hung his head, and closed his eyes, choking down the sob that rose and cut off his breathing" (emphasis mine).

Savil was a rock for Vanyel and thus for the reader throughout the trilogy (and her death is near the end of the last book & the catalyst for the end). She was very human and fallible but steady, devoted, and talented mentor and mage.

But what about Tylendel?, you say. Yes, Tylendel's death was awful, but it doesn't get nearly the lengthy treatment that Savil's does, and...there was a lot of other stuff going on. But what about Vanyel?, you say. Well, there is a reason that I put off reading the last part of Magic's Price, and it's because Vanyel's death is horribly devastating, but also victorious, and he gets his happy afterlife.

"Savil, Savil, I'm so sorry—and sorry isn't enough. Sorry won't bring you back. Tears escaped from under his closed eyelids, and etched their way down his cheeks. He couldn't swallow; he could hardly breathe." (Ch 15, Magic's Price)

She called for him. The last thing Savil ever did was call Vanyel for help. He was down the hall from her and much, much too far away.