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antishurtugal_reborn2021-06-15 11:11 pm
Sinner Sporking: Part Five
In the next chapter we mercifully move away from WolfStar’s rapey bullshit, and unmercifully move onto… even more goddamn politics. Let’s see if I can keep this brief. There’s a big gathering in the unimaginatively named Great Hall of Sigholt with lots of self-important officials and such. “StarSon Caelum” (ugh) shows up wearing all black and looking “careworn”, and is joined by the heads of the Five Families. You might remember that in the last trilogy Axis McDouchebag elevated five people to rulership positions in charge of different parts of the country. Well, these are their descendants. We’ve got Askam aka Borneheld 2.0, FreeFall, Isfrael, and Sodomy the Ravensbund leader, plus someone with the absurd name of Yllgaine, who I’m assuming is the heir of Baron Ysgriff aka “Griff” from the last book.
With that out of the way Caelum starts talking about this whole taxes business between Askam and Cosmo. It’s exactly as boring as it sounds. Askam and Cosmo end up getting into a verbal slapfight, and I ended up skimming the next several pages as everyone else starts arguing as well. Eventually Caelum steps in and says he’s decided Askam’s spite tax is unreasonable and has to go, but instead he’ll get his debts paid off by means of a different tax which Cosmo finds outrageous. We’re almost a quarter of the way in, by the way.
After even more arguing, Caelum calls Leagion in. Oh goodie. She shows up wearing a fancy dress and looking pretty sickly. Which is quickly justified when Caelum announces that no, they can’t get married. Too bad, so sad. Cosmo starts yelling about how unfair that is, and then taunts Askam, who Borneheld-like flies off the handle and tries to attack him. Caelum yells at everyone to pull their heads in and tells the guards to take Leagion out of the room, which Cosmo reacts to as if he’d just ordered her to be sent to the gallows (if only). Having melodramatically shouted his girlfriend’s name a bit, he then tells Caelum he can’t end the meeting just yet because it’s time to discuss – significant pause – “restoring the throne of Achar”. GASP!
And then the chapter melodramatically cuts off there.
The next chapter picks up where the last one left off, with everyone staring in stunned silence. Askam calls Cosmo a traitor, but Cosmo counters that he just wants the human race to have a proper ruler again so they can recover some pride. Askam isn’t having it, of course, because it would mean losing most of his lands, but Cosmo makes a speech to try and change everyone’s minds. Naturally the speech includes some Borneheld bashing (what else did you expect?), as he claims the guy only made things worse and that Axis killed him in “a fair duel”. Naturally he leaves out the bit where Axis ripped his heart out while he was still alive and fed it to his pet eagle.
Like I said, after that scene no-one will ever mention it again.
Moving on, Cosmo complains that when Axis created the new governing system he let every race keep their ruler except for the humans and that it’s stripped them of their identity and it’s time for them to stop paying the price for what their ancestors did. If you’ll forgive me for bringing current real world issues into this, he sounds like some whiny MAGA hat complaining about how the BLM protests are offensive to white people because wah wah we didn’t personally enslave anyone and it’s not fair that we should have to feel guilty about it, thus spectacularly missing the point.
He goes on to say the humans are “feeling persecuted” and this won’t go anywhere good unless they get their King back, and it’s barely one step away from a threat. Eventually FreeFall says Axis should have seen this coming. Too bad that guy is a blithering moron, then. Isfrael the Avar leader steps in and has a go at Cosmo, pointing out that the humans have no right to be whining about feeling persecuted given that both the Avar and Icarii were genuinely oppressed for centuries. And he absolutely has a point.
Finally Caelum asks Cosmo if he wants to be King, pointing out that the royal line died with Borneheld. Cosmo shoots back that no, he’s the heir because his parents’ secret teen wedding was legit. Caelum reacts to that by getting irritable, but asks everyone else for their opinions. Sodomy the Ravensbund is okay with it. FreeFall has a think and says no. Isfrael says nay as well, and so does Yllgaine Migraine, the Nors leader.
Caelum mentally curses Rivkah “for producing an heir to the line when by rights she should have been too old to breed”. What a nice guy he is. Just like his daddy! Who by the way basically caused all this by screwing Faraday over. If he hadn’t so successfully pissed her off, she wouldn’t have given Rivkah her fertility back.
So Caelum? Suck it.
Anyway he tells Cosmo no and to drop it or else, and then ends the meeting. I’m getting sleepy. Veeery sleeeepy…
In the next chapter Cosmo meets up with his co-conspirators in secret. He angrily tells them what happened, in great detail, complete with the old classic throwing of a wineglass. One guy tells him they’re still on his side and that they’re okay with rebelling against Caelum. Cosmo mutters that he doesn’t like the idea of becoming “another Borneheld to tear Tencendor apart”. So we’re still pretending the civil war Axis started in the last trilogy was Borneheld’s fault, are we? Good to know. Either way they eventually talk him into it, and they decide to attack some place called Kastaleon while banking on Caelum being unwilling to start a war. Because boohoo he’s not as amazing and special and wonderful as his daddy Axis, who was supposedly “a superb war leader and an equally good peace-time ruler”.
Yeah, I don’t believe you. At all.
End chapter.
The next one is called “Murder!” complete with exclamation mark. Dude, spoilers!
We’re still with Cosmo, who’s restless and homesick. He wants to see Leagion, and decides to go ask Zenith to take a message for him. He finds her looking all upset and mumbling that “I am Zenith!”, but when he asks her what’s wrong she refuses to tell him. At this point Caelum comes running up saying he wants to talk to Zenith, but before this goes anywhere they hear Isfrael upstairs yelling “Murder! Murder! A foul murder!” Oh wow, so it’s not just any murder – it’s a foul one. I see the trademark horribly stilted Douglass dialogue is still going strong. They all rush off to see what’s happened, and find RiverStar in her room, gruesomely stabbed to death. Drago is standing over her holding a kitchen knife with blood on it. Caelum, looking at him, has a flashback to being grabbed by Gorgrael and thinks very clinically about how this time “we will finally do away with you, brother”.
Drago, acting awfully calm himself given the situation, basically says he knows he’s gonna take the fall for this. Well no shit, really? They check out the body, and having decided it’s too late to do anything to save Slutty McSlutSlut they ask Drago what happened. He looks confused and says he doesn’t know – he just heard Isfrael yelling and then suddenly found himself here. Zenith has an uh-oh moment since this sounds a lot like one of her own blackouts, and Caelum not-at-all suspiciously takes a “mocking” tone. Dude, your sister/girlfriend is dead! Is it too much to ask for a reaction? Even a feigned one?
They all start calling Drago a murderer, which he denies, and Caelum declares that he’s going straight to the dungeon. Cosmo stands up for him, whereupon Caelum goes all self-righteous on his ass, snarling about how he suffered “days under Gorgrael’s claws”, boohoo, so how dare anyone else have an opinion on the subject. I note that this is apparently more important than the whole Dead Sister thing. Get over yourself, Caelum.
Zenith tries to step in, only to be told to keep away from her brother, and then… oh no. Oh GOD.
And then Axis and Azhure show up.
Being as they’re gods now they’re wearing robes and look all cool and powerful and whatever. They’re briefly surprised to see the daughter they neglected from birth lying in a pool of blood, before Axis coldly tells Drago about how he wanted to kill him back in the day and now he’s actually going to go ahead and do it. Lovable as always, I see. Azhure has a good cry, and Axis and Caelum hold her a bit before they both start nodding about how they’re going to kill Drago. And then Axis and Azhure just randomly disappear. Please don’t come back. Ever.
I noticed Axis didn’t even bother to use the Song of Recall to replay what happened in the room. Because it’s not as if that would have helped or anything.
The next chapter abruptly cuts to everyone getting ready for the trial. I love how unceremonious all this is. A character was just violently murdered and the rest of them barely even reacted to it. This should have come as a terrible shock, but nobody seems all that shocked, or even surprised. But then Douglass’ characters are generally not good at displaying believable emotions.
We’re with Zenith, who since being sexually assaulted by WolfStar has been having constant dreams about being Niah to the point that she’s started “drinking stimulants” to keep herself awake. In other words coffee and Red Bull. Meanwhile Leagion is all upset because Cosmo has left.
Anyway, Caelum is apparently set to preside over the trial and I call major levels of bullshit. How the fuck are they supposed to have a fair trial when the judge is a relative of the deceased? I mean the outcome is already a foregone conclusion. At the very least someone should raise an objection.
Instead they just bring Drago in, and Caelum takes the opportunity to lecture him about what an awful guy he is in front of everybody. Shouldn’t you be calling witnesses and presenting evidence, Caelum? Or is that too much to ask?
He finally does get FreeFall and the others to describe what happened, but doesn’t let Zenith elaborate when she starts expressing doubts, and then screams at Drago to say whether they’re telling the truth or not. Drago insists that he can’t remember but doesn’t believe he could have done it, which Caelum mocks. Isfrael points out that the real killer could plausibly have flown out the window or used magic to disappear, so Caelum asks Drago if he saw anyone else. Drago repeats that he can’t remember, which Caelum also mocks.
Finally Zenith steps in and states the bleeding obvious: just use the damn Song of Recall already. Caelum tries it, but claims it isn’t working because Drago has somehow “placed a block in his memory”, which shouldn’t be possible because Azhure took all his magic away.
But who should show up just then but – ugh – WolfStar. Needless to say the author waxes lyrical about how OMG Beautiful and sexy he is. Again. Meanwhile Zenith flips out because she half wants to run away in horror and half wants to jump his bones. Arrrgh.
WolfStar offers to try the song himself. It’s a challenge for him too, but he eventually screams “No-one bests me, manling!” Oh goodie, more horribly stilted dialogue. But that apparently did the trick, because a vision appears of RiverStar and Drago. She mocks him until he gets pissed off and stabs her in the lungs. And then laughs evilly for good measure.
Drago, Zenith and Leagion all scream, and Caelum and WolfStar have a mental conversation. Caelum is all too happy to dispose of his brother, and WolfStar wonders how the hell the guy managed to put up a mental block that strong.
Drago keeps insisting that the memory isn’t real, but Caelum just sentences him to death anyway by means of “An arrow to the heart”. Which sounds like an awfully inefficient method of execution to me, but whatever – it’s not going to happen anyway, because main characters in fantasy novels who are scheduled for execution in the morning never actually get executed. It’s the rules.
Poor Drago is taken away, and the chapter ends.
The next chapter is with Zenith, who’s still freaking out. The mind of Niah is getting stronger and trying harder to take control and has even started talking to her. Zenith lets fly with the hoary old cliché of Her Whole Life Being a Lie, and wonders who can help her. Not Caelum, obviously. She concentrates on Drago’s problems to distract herself, while Niah creepily whispers about how much she’s going to luuurve being raped by WolfStar. She manages to reach the conclusion that she doesn’t believe the vision of Drago killing RiverStar was real because Wolfy can’t be trusted and is powerful enough to fake it.
She decides to rescue Drago herself. Finally a character who fights against her allotted destiny and is prepared to take risks to help another. Sara Douglass got a clue at last. I mean can you even imagine Axis or Azhure doing this? I certainly can’t.
Zenith manages to get into Drago’s cell because for some idiotic reason there’s only one inept guard on duty. Drago is busy wallowing in self-pity, but she talks him into escaping with her. For some reason the guard has disappeared, and Drago declares that he wants to grab something before they go so he can get some of his “heritage” back. He runs off and comes back with a sack, and they head out to the stupid talking bridge. The bridge recognises Drago and is all like “fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me”, and won’t let him pass. But then WingRidge the weirdo guard in the naval uniform shows up and tells the bridge to let them go because of some confusing BS about “The Maze”. The bridge “grumpily” lets them go, and they run off into the night. End chapter.
In the next chapter Caelum finds out Drago’s gone and of course demands an explanation and-
...what the fuck?
Okay, so remember how in the last three sporks I kept going on about how absurd the Icarii names are? Highlights included PreenDeep, FairEye, and of course the magnificent RuffleCrest JoyFlight.
Well we have a new contestant today.
It’s SkyLazer.
Really.
SkyLazer.
I seriously just can’t even right now. I mean really.
Caelum puts Askam in charge of finding Drago for some reason, and sends SkyLazer – snort – out to help before declaring that he’s gonna have that stupid bridge demolished if it turns out it helped Drago escape. Please do, Caelum. That thing is creepy and annoying as fuck.
Two of the guys who were plotting with Cosmo earlier on go out on the search as well, and we learn one of them is the grandson of Roland the cancer patient, in case you care. They eventually find Drago and Zenith’s tracks, but decide to scuff them up because if Caelum is off hunting for the guy for weeks on end they can exploit it to go ahead with Cosmo’s little revolution. Surprisingly intelligent for Sara Douglass characters.
They go back and lie to Caelum that they didn’t find anything, and then try to persuade him to let them escort Leagion home so they can sneak her off to be with Cosmo. This doesn’t work as Caelum says he’d prefer Zenith to handle it. But oe noes, he soon finds that Zenith is missing.
He calls for WolfStar and demands to know where she is. Wolfy knows nothing, but freaks out on being told Drago is also gone and declares he’ll find the pair of them. Uh-oh.
End chapter.
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