If I remember correctly, I think what we were laughing about was Gen saying he didn’t have time to go back for “another lamp and pry bar” (p127) after he lost the first pry bar Pol gave him in the labyrinth. How many pry bars does he think Pol has?
A critical analysis would imply that the magus and Pol had picked one up recently in one of the towns they bought supplies from or Pol was just carrying it the whole time in his pack. They probably specifically brought one for Gen and as a useful tool in general, but I doubt they brought more than one.
I do love comparing Pol-prepared-with-prybar to Costis-prepared-with-sewing-needle. Those soldier boys!
Haven’t drawn some queen’s thief in a while. Please accept this scribble of Costis being unnecessarily beaten up by his grumpy king. (Don’t worry, he’s fine)
So on my latest reread of KoA, I noticed on p. 77 when Eugenides is scaring the living piss out of the tax evading baron:
In the bed beside the baron there was a sleepy murmur, not his wife, thank the gods, his wife would have been awakened by the whispered conversation. His bedfellow stirred beside the baron and sat up.
Then later in chapter 9 (p. 187):
It was Legarus who had been the ostensible cause of their sudden promotion, an arrangement by some lover in the palace, everyone had assumed. Nepotism had only been a disguise […] His lover had used Legarus and left him to die.
Considering Megan doesn’t use gender identifying pronouns and that must be deliberate, I’m convinced Legarus was the baron’s lover.
Furthermore, this Artadorus was clearly in contact with the Erondites family as Sejanus’s father was the one to suggest the tax fraud to begin with. The assassination was planned by Sejanus with the aid of Sounis and Nahuseresh. Artadorus appears to have assisted the plot by getting the neophyte guards promoted. He did think that Erondites had set him up by informing the king of his tax scheme, so it makes sense Artadorus would’ve gone against Erondites’s plan to control the king with a mistress and sided with Sejanus on the regicide plan. It all makes sense!
There’s also this line… “…leaning close enough that the baron could have taken him in his arms, had he been a lover instead of a murderer.” That’s pretty suggestive that he’s been with male lovers.
Since we don’t know what happened at Helen’s wedding, there’s room for the possibility that Gen may have been determined enough to prove to a happily drunk Irene that weddings ought to be fun
Anyway y'all please wish me luck through uni deadline hell after which I’ll come back to this wip
So I normally don’t really write fanfic or, if I do, post it here, but I’m rather proud of this one because. uh. it’s basically a homeric hymn for a fandom that heavily borrows from ancient greek literature. So i’m sharing it regardless, because i’m actually quite proud at how i managed to mimic my favourite genre’s style. It’s a standalone story, so if you haven’t read the queen’s thief, it’s still enjoyable and spoils very little!
HYMN TO EUGENIDES
Of the Annux I sing, Lord Eugenides who was Attolis, he
who united the lands of Hephestia and repelled the Mede,
Prince of Eddis, King of Kings, beloved of the gods.
Sing of when he stole stern Ornon’s sheep, and leave no word unsung.
“To those watching, it didn’t seem possible that he could succeed, but with one hand, and no visible effort, he defied the laws of the natural world. Phresine, the queen’s senior attendant, watched them from behind the throne as her queen danced like a flame in the wind, and the mercurial king like the weight at the center of the earth.”
also tqt was just like…yes our protagonist has plot armour (the plans of the gods) and BOY is it heavy! boy does it chafe! He survives everything by divine ordinance but he did NOT opt in! This lazer-like focus on one mere mortal is wholly unnatural and unbearable despite its perks!
“If Attolia could look like a queen, Eugenides was like a god revealed, transformed into something wholly unfamiliar, surrounded by the cloth-of-gold bedcover like a deity on an altar, passionless and calculating.”
FURTHER POST to say that even though it’s tragic that we didn’t get any gen pov in the final book, the fact that the last of gen’s pov that we DO get is at the end of the queen of attolia, and the last scene of that book is when irene finally accepts his proposal.. like literally the last time we are WITH gen is at the moment he becomes king… and so like of course we can never have his pov again, because the fate of kings is to seen always through the eyes of others, to never be alone with their own thoughts, to never be free of the distorting powers of rumor, myth, and legend…. and so we are with costis as he learns the king, and then sophos, and then kamet and then pheris… but all of them have different relationships with the king and different stories to tell about him… and even when, as in pheris’s case, their accounts are specifically about the king, they are also using the king as a mirror through which to reflect themselves… it’s so interesting how mwt plays with gen’s power and agency throughout the series bc like. yes history is written by the winners and so return of the thief is written by the king’s historian because gen ultimately succeeds in uniting the nations of the peninsula, but the king’s historian is not the king himself… the only time gen tells his own story in his own words is when he is the thief… whereas when he is king he has the power to shape nations, to command armies, but he can no longer give his own account of himself, because he has become something more than a person, and his office and his mythos are both co-created with people outside of himself,,, and so he gains all this power but he is no longer his own person and as such cannot tell his own story…. and how the fact that we never return to gen’s pov implies that whatever he gave up in becoming king he can never get back….. loving it here
Once upright, Eugenides was facing Nahuseresh, who stood looking on, much amused. White-hot hatred burned through Eugenides. If he was still without hope, at least he could think clearly again.
one thing that i LOVE about the queen’s thief series is that MWT really took the time to make sure that we all understand that the protagonist is a weird, whiny little shit. like, she could have said “oh gen was just PRETENDING to be whiny and insufferable in The Thief, he’s actually cool and suave!!”
but no. she establishes that he’s a genius who’s been running a con the whole time, and ALSO he’s whiny and insufferable.
anyway i finished a conspiracy of kings last night and woke up thinking about sophos visiting nomenus in his cell after imprisoning him because he ‘wanted to have a very clear idea of what he had done to him’ vs eugenides in the king of attolia visiting relius in the hospital after convicting him of treason and pardoning him against the will of everyone else in court and keeping him company and telling him stories while he recovered… thinking of eugenides being taken to visit eddsian soldiers who had lost limbs in the war and going outside to throw up vs sophos opening the box to find the second gun, knowing he would have to kill someone, and putting his head down on the table to cry… thinking of both gen and sophos being disgusted at how easy it was to kill when they first had to do so… like it’s not necessarily that they never wanted to be kings, because they both chose the throne in their own way even if their choices were limited, but neither of them ever wanted to be fighters or hurt other people, and you can’t rule a kingdom without doing harm… but it’s really the way that even as they feel forced to do things that go against their very nature, they both make a point to see with their own eyes the suffering they’ve caused… they don’t look away even as they disgust themselves with the things they do in the name of being king….. im not well
“If Attolia could look like a queen, Eugenides was like a god revealed, transformed into something wholly unfamiliar, surrounded by the cloth-of-gold bedcover like a deity on an altar, passionless and calculating.”
I have been re-reading the Queen’s Thief series by M.W. Turner lately because I’m still salty about the delay of the last book (…I’d already ordered it! from Germany because they don’t sell it here! I had already paid and had to cancel!) and it made me wonder about a few issues the fandom has been speculating about. I have my own theories and I’m going to make several posts about it.
Firstly - who will be the next Thief?
Many readers seem to think it will be Costis because he has already acted as the Thief by stealing Kamet from the Mede in ‘Thick as Thieves’. I don’t really agree with this theory and here’s why:
1. In general, Costis „doesn’t have the temperament” (to use Helene’s words) to be the Thief. Thieves of Eddis are independent souls and outsiders – Costis is a team player at heart. He didn’t take it well when Gen separated him from the rest of his squad in the Royal Guard.
2. Thieves of Eddis like to play by their own rules – Costis is a natural follower. When he stole Kamet from the Mede he was following his King’s orders. What’s more, while Thieves of Eddis act on behalf of their monarchs they swear no oaths and might choose to go against the throne should they consider the person sitting on it unworthy. Costis, on the other hand, has already sworn an oath of loyalty and takes it so seriously that he couldn’t act against Gen even when he’d hated him and considered him the worst king ever.
3. Thieves of Eddis need to be sneaky and conniving, and lying bastards at times – Costis is honest. He can lie when he has to but he doesn’t like to and is bad at it. He doesn’t like intrigue and it took him some time to realise someone was trying to kill him and make it look like an accident. He also had to be kept in the dark about some aspects of the „steal Kamet” plan for it to work.
4. Lastly, Costis is too old - Gen started his training when he was still a kid. While Costis’ exact age (nor anyone else’s ) is never stated, I think it’s safe to assume that in ‘King of Attolia’ he must be in his late twenties at least.
To sum it up, I believe that Costis’ role in the ‘Thick as Thieves’ is not to be the Thief in his own right but to be Gen’s proxy – to act on Gen’s behalf, carry out his plans and go where Gen himself cannot go due to his obligations as a monarch. This is even stated in the book: Costis’ earring with his King’s personal coat of arms means that he’s Gen’s man and acts as an extension of Gen’s will.
But if not Costis, then who?
Well, I believe that a suitable candidate for the role has already been introduced. Someone of appropriate age to begin training, someone intelligent (but hiding it behind an obnoxious facade) and thinking „outside the box”; someone who – like Gen – doesn’t have much respect for authority, likes riling people up and yanking their proverbial chains for the heck of it, and who isn’t above snooping around in other people’s correspondence if need be (the need being his curiosity that is).
It’s got all your basic moving parts: Gen and Irene heading up to the crenellations,
Phresine loving on baby Hector while baby Eugenia drops a stolen earring that matches her dad’s (with her mountain goat plushie nearby),
Helen and Sophos just being stupid cute with their wee heir, while the Magus still studies his map and Pol’s sword leans on the wall beneath the three countries’ banners,
Your pantheon of deities, with the Great Goddess at the center,
Teleus and Relius enjoying each other’s company while Pheris (now with mobility aid!) ignores them (also there’s a pigeon),
Costis and bespectacled Kamet with a plate of nut cakes, and a familiar author in the background with her stack of six books,
And, finally, our long-awaited elephant, while two of Gen’s attendants search for their king.
Part 2/2 of the one-two punch that is every scene written by miss Megan Whalen Turner… the Window scene, in this case. I just LOVE tonal shifts, and she writes hers so flawlessly – subtle yet striking. I love it and I want to hug Pheris and I am so happy that now he has several parents now who love him. Also, I’m endlessly in love with the depictions of this scene by Emily and Sheb and you should DEFINITELY check them out
So I’ve been working on THIS monstrosity: one of my favorite scenes of Return of the Thief, it had me and my sisters in fits. It includes so many wonderful things – best bros sophos & gen committing minor acts of harassment to show affection, eugenides pulling a very thiefly parkour move, the attendants being Shook, the royal four having fun, attolia laughing (my heart!!), a striking tonal change at the end, and of course, the reference to Dite’s infamous catchy tune sung loudly & proudly by its main object of ridicule.
Costis didn’t believe for a moment there had ever been a real Klimun, or a real Gerosthenes. He looked at Phresine for some understanding of the king’s distress, but Phresine was looking into space and seemed unaware of the king’s unhappiness.
“So,” she said, “Gerosthenes hit Klimun over the head with the amphora.”
“Ha,” the king snorted in relief. Phresine affected not to notice this any more than his earlier distress. She continued.
***
Post it note art during a meeting that should have been an email. Gerosthenes, I have a few people I’ll need you to hit over a head with an amphora when they open their mouths, please and thank you.
![gen is so [sinbad: legend of the seven seas (original motion picture score)]](https://64.media.tumblr.com/c0f0d16c4fd2c7d72e52bbdfa0e8fb29/93e64338b28b1f0c-5d/s1280x1920/5f9855fb5321f48355ecdde4145a0a2d16b78556.jpg "gen is so [sinbad: legend of the seven seas (original motion picture score)]")
