freekart

[greatshell-rider]

mmmmmmmmmmm fuckin. signi! she hears the castle women singing the andahi lament while beating flax and it is a triple whammo of Bad Memories cuz 1) reminds her of her venn homeland 2) reminds her similar customs are for venns and marlovans 3) the lament is a direct response to the war between this people whom she lives among now and the people she was born from, the people who exiled her, the people and land she can never return to. signi’s never liked war and violence, all of her actions have only ever been for peace in nonviolent actions. her whole thing is tdor’s “making nets”, not breaking them. the lament is a fuckin slap to the face and knife to the heart at the same time, yet signi goes to tau’s theater (another attempt besides signi for a foreigner to meld with marlovan culture, with...not so great success) and does her dance in time to the lament. these lines “But where there is life, there is hope, and the possibility of joy. And she always, always, expressed joy in dance” followed by “What creatures we are...We make poems and music to celebrate beauty, and we train to kill, and call it art” stick out to me in particular. the lament will be remembered and so women will be remembered . . . signi’s life has been upturned and ruined so many times now. (failed the final hel dancer test and was disowned by her family. tortured by erkric and lost ability to do magic because of damage to her hands. seeking a life with inda but not fully fitting in with the marlovan castle structure and having her mission to go to sartor.) she danced the lament with “the aches, the shortened steps, the gnarled pull where once she’d moved without effort” of a body bearing the scars resulting from erkric’s wars and ambitions, fully encompassing the message and meaning behind the andahi lament. dags and magic aren’t for war. signi was never supposed to be caught up in it. the venn’s attempted invasion would never have happened had it not been for erkric wanting the throne. andahi castle never would have undergone that three day siege ending with the death of every single woman, the orphaning of every single child. that war was never supposed to happen. it was useless. and signi got the blame for it and the punishment for it and she was never even supposed to be there! but because she was, inda’s still alive. marlovans survived the invasion. brit valda escaped erkric and could keep fighting his control over rajnir. she is the fuckin savior of the books and no one even knows it. this lament will be remembered and so the women will be remembered