#so i'm going to reblog when people might actually see it skjdfkdj

[widonotts]

the crux of it all is that caleb may have been that man—he was cruel and ruthless; he tortured, and killed, and burned his family alive—but he is not that man anymore. and similarly, essek may reach a similar point to caleb, but he is not there yet. so while caleb quite understandably hears veth and beau’s lack of forgiveness as a condemnation of his younger self, caleb has atoned and regretted and is actively working towards a positive change in the world. veth and beau cannot be asked to immediately forgive when essek is not at all there yet.

caleb and essek are not at a similar level. caleb might think so, because he is a tragic figure, a man who loathes himself and believes few, if any, could be worse. but caleb was not responsible for the death of thousands for personal enlightenment. caleb did not torture veth’s husband.

essek is a beautiful, morally dark gray character—and when beau asked what it was like to see the dynasty’s prisoner in chains instead of him, essek said it was freeing. that is antithetical to caleb’s worldview (and yasha’s as well); it’s an incredible moment which highlights that, despite the moving dynamic, they are not, in fact, the same. essek considers a weight off his shoulders, but he does not yet seem to be considering a new weight—the weight of trying to do good.

while it was clear they weren’t conscious of the depth of caleb’s projection onto essek, especially as nott was talking (half of it being sam joking), they were not being evil and disgusting for the concept of justice itself. look me in the eye and tell me that veth the brave, whose husband was tortured by essek and whose city was razed because of him, should be able to forgive in an instant.

i, too, found caleb’s dynamic with essek so fascinating this episode—but specifically because matt is doing such an incredible job of distinguishing essek as someone not only quite similar to but also extremely difficult from caleb. and one of my favorite aspects of this episode was caleb in general struggling with his own self-worth—while trying to support the others, but also while hearing things that, because of the way he equivocates himself and every other perpetrator of a Wrong Thing, make guilt and shame and self-loathing bubble up inside him. but as much as violent revenge isn’t actually the solution, and veth’s tendency towards it is a well-established, complex flaw, aspiring towards justice in general is not this reprehensible thing.

tldr; caleb’s vast conflict is extremely poignant and heavy and meaningful to a lot of us, and it’s hard to see moments where he’s struggling. but please, can we not only offer the other characters that same empathy, but also acknolwedge that much of caleb’s struggle is not because of his friends being terrible and inconsiderate, but because of emotional patterns that he struggles to deal with, much less articulate to them.

tldr for the tldr; this whole group is everything. their stories are so important, and their dynamics are so important, and those two things are one because the nein are integral to each other’s stories. it’s beautiful. i would like to see every character offered that same recognition of beauty and complexity and wondrous poignancy.