i’m literally so sick and tired of these nesta antis in the nesta tag. get out of the tag and tag correctly or i’m just assuming you need some attention for your lame ass takes
i’m so done with having to read shitty takes just because people don’t tag correctly. by all means spam the ‘anti nesta’ tag with all the hate you want but literally stay out of the nesta tag please and thank you
“Rhysand really gave this sword to me of his own free will?” Nesta asked Cassian the next morning as they hiked the mossy, rock-strewn side of the towering mountain known as the Prison.
The sword is literally hers. The fact that she even asks this is ridiculous. You can’t read this book and say everything was for her own good when she was just being controlled the whole time. She shouldn’t be shocked that she can have the sword she made. She shouldn’t have information about her own body kept from her. She shouldn’t be forced to train or work in the library.
Rhysand isn’t allowed to have a say in anything concerning her or her belongings.
nesta: ‘She would not be mastered by anything again. She was the master of herself.’
also nesta: asks to be given her OWN SWORD that SHE MADE to use
‘you’ve been given an order. you know the consequences. if you don’t get off that fucking rock by the end of this week, what happens next is out of my hands’
not cassian threatening to send nesta to her death in the human lands if she doesn’t do what he says and follow his orders every time i try to get past my passionate hatred for acosf cassian i remember him threatening nesta and i become more convinced that the cauldron punished nesta for stealing it’s power by giving her cassian as a mate
i just know nesta sleeps beside cassian with one eye open knowing he could lock her up in a house at any moment, could take her on a hike and revel in her punishment until she faints after a couple days due to exhaustion and dehydration, and is in danger of having her life threatened by his besties with zero chance of cassian standing up for her
What if I tell you what the rock and darkness and sea beyond whispered to me, Lord of Bloodshed? How they shuddered in fear, on that island across the sea. How they trembled when she emerged. She took something - something precious. She ripped it out with her teeth. What did you wake that day in Hybern, Prince of Bastards? What came out was not what went in. How lovely she is - new as a fawn and yet ancient as the sea. How she calls to you. A queen, as my sister once was. Terrible and proud; beautiful as a winter sunrise. Nesta. Nes-ta. How the wind moans her name. Can you hear it, too? Nesta. Nesta. Nesta. What did she do, drowning in the ageless dark? What did she take?
What if I tell you what the rock and darkness and sea beyond whispered to me, Lord of Bloodshed? How they shuddered in fear, on that island across the sea. How they trembled when she emerged. She took something - something precious. She ripped it out with her teeth. What did you wake that day in Hybern, Prince of Bastards? What came out was not what went in. How lovely she is - new as a fawn and yet ancient as the sea. How she calls to you. A queen, as my sister once was. Terrible and proud; beautiful as a winter sunrise. Nesta. Nes-ta. How the wind moans her name. Can you hear it, too? Nesta. Nesta. Nesta. What did she do, drowning in the ageless dark? What did she take?
Nesta in ACOSF if she’d gained weight and not lost it, and no — she wouldn’t lose it by the end of the book! Just wish more authors would let their traumatized characters gain weight. If I see any fat phobia on this post, you’re getting blocked
Nesta in ACOSF if she’d gained weight and not lost it, and no — she wouldn’t lose it by the end of the book! Just wish more authors would let their traumatized characters gain weight. If I see any fat phobia on this post, you’re getting blocked
theres something so personal about Aelin wanting to be a healer when she was young and Chaol saying that a healer would make a great queen and then also Yrene being Aelins mirror and also Chaol loving them both for who they are
i usually stay very far out of fandom discourse for a thousand reasons, one of which being that i don’t like drama or confrontation and like to let people have their own opinions about characters and books. however, this one i just can’t really let go. i’m not going to go full meta on this post because i plan to do one on this topic and aelin’s mental health in the future but here is just some of the stuff on my mind with this one.
i want to start by saying i respect your opinions of chaol. if you like him, that’s fantastic.
however, chaol did not love aelin for who she was.
he spends a lot of crown of midnight brooding over the fact that she is an assassin and the kings champion after he literally coached her through that competition with the goal to win it. he seemed to kind of come to terms with her being an assassin but he later throws that in he face as well.
the second he finds out he’s fae, he starts judging her. the second he finds out about her magic and finds out that she’s aelin galathynius, he’s judging her. all of becomes very evident in heir of fire, when dorian has this conversation with him
“You cannot pick and choose which parts of her to love.” and “You do not have the right to wish she were not what she is.” Also note here that dorian says chaol can’t pick and choose which parts of him to love, either.
moving onto queen of shadows, he treats her like absolute garbage.
Chaol is judging her here for both being an assassin and for having magic, calls her a monster and insinuates that nothing could keep her power in check. not to mention throws killing those guards at endovier in her face, like they didn’t straight up deserve it for the way they treated those innocent people in those mines.
Here he even admits to Yrene that he saw her as a monster and admitted he was afraid of her.
i could keep going but i’m tired and it’s been a long week, but chaol never loved her for who she was. it was okay for dorian and yrene to have magic, but not okay for aelin to have magic. he threw her past in her face over and over (which she had no choice in, by the way) and despite all that aelin was the one that continued to save his life and love him despite his faults. it was not the other way around.
@highqueenofelfhame - I am like you and really hesitate to participate in discourse for the same reason, so I hope it’s clear that I respect your decision to hate Chaol, just wanted to throw in my two cents with yours! :)
I get where you are coming from that Chaol was afraid of aelin, judged her and didn’t accept her for who she was. Can you blame him though? I personally think that he was right to fear magic at the time. He had grown up to fear it, it was ingrained in him. I actually love the scene you posted where Dorian calls Chaol out. It was a huge turning point for him. I think of Chaol as one of the only mere humans in the series who did things out of fear and an intense desire to keep his human people safe. It was his duty as captain of the guard. He made a lot of choices that went against Aelin because he was afraid. It really made me relate to him. I think about Nesta’s character. She was terrified of Fae and judged them entirely for 3 books. She came around and realized she was wrong and came to love them. I think her and Chaol are very similar here. Chaol learned to love Yrene and her magic, and if that isn’t a testiment to his growth, i don’t know what is.
Before I continue, I am going to note that I am a huge Nesta, Rowan and Lorcan fan. So when I mention them, it’s not to throw shade, but just to make a point!
I appreciate that Chaol still helped Aelin despite being afraid and them being in a disagreement about killing Dorian (book 4 he went to the fighting pits to protect her, went to keep watch at after her dinner with aerobyn etc). None of that was to his benefit. You mention that Celeana saved his life a few times, but he saved her life a few times too (in the portal, as a champion and his sacrifice end of book 4). The relationship was a rocky one that may not have been founded on trust alone, but they cared a lot about eachother.
You do make a good point about him coaching celeana to be an assassin, but being afraid of her for it. I personally felt like he did that out of love for her. He was told to take her out of Endovier to fight by Dorian, but fell in love with her and didn’t want her to die. Btw, I am definitely Rowaelin and not at all Chaoleana, just making a point.
I agree that Chaol made mistakes, but I like him because of his arc and how he realized he was wrong and the things he did to make it right. I think his sacrifice at the end of Queen of Shadows speaks a lot to that.
One point I’d like to make is that I think that a lot of fans forgive other SJM characters for far worse things. Like Lorcan calling back Maeve in Eos and resulting in a lot of deaths and aelin being straight up captured, Rowan literally beating the shit out of aelin in training and calling her horrible names and pre-judging her as a snobby princess and nesta’s character in general). I don’t expect people to forgive Chaol if they don’t want to, but I feel they did that for many other characters who did far worse.
Another example is that many people hate Chaol because of his loyalty to the king at the beginning. Obviously we as readers know it was misplaced loyalty, but all Chaol knew was the king’s army took him in when his father kicked him out, he was his best friends dad and it was all he knew at the time. Don’t forget he is like what 19 years old? Yet Rowan had loyalty to Maeve for 500 years and killed thousands for her and decimated entire cities when he knew all along she was evil? Like I said, I love Rowan, but just trying to provide another example where folks can forgive certain characters for doing the same things. Rowan broke from Maeve and we applaud him, but not Chaol?
I love most of the characters (the not evil ones tho, Erawan can straight up eat it) in SJM world because they are so flawed. I love seeing what they do despite it. I personally feel like Chaol is one of those individuals.
I’m your secret snowflake! As such, I commissioned an art of your amazing fic: Like Pristine Glass. You did such a great job portraying what a maternal Nesta would be like. Canon Nesta is a very private person , so I enjoyed how lovingly you wrote her and Cassian’s best traits coming alive in their kids. I tried to make sure that this captured Avery’s loving spirit, Oliver’s sweet shyness, and Nicky with his inquisitive and bold nature. I enjoyed learning about your process and hearing about the things that were going through your head while writing. I think writers put a lot of themselves into their writing, and it takes a lot of courage to share that with the world. So thank you for that.
Even if we are strangers who live miles apart with perhaps simply a fandom in common, I had fun getting to know you (albeit stalkerishly). I admire how you moved around a lot yet still try to see the best of it. I love how passionate you are in all things Nesta. It wasn’t surprising when you told me that you relate a lot to her, because your analyses of her always feel introspective and thoughtful.
And thank you so much for organizing such a fun exchange. I hope you and your family have a wonderful end of the year with a lot of joy to look forward to in the next.
This commission was done by the ever talented @girraffle. She’d never read the series, and I really wanted to get the physical details right, so may have overworked her lol. But she took all the changes in stride. :)
She wrote a threesome for ACOSF but then deleted it because she didn’t think she could face her family after it because it was so dirty. But she also said that it would have pulled emotional strings for those characters in ways that she didn’t want to deal with the consequences of. Only SJM and her editor only know about who is in it. Not even Josh. She promises that “if a Meteor was going to strike us (or Donald Trump and his goons stage a coup)”, she will release the scene.
She said she still has a lot she wants to tell in the ToG world. She also has about 60 pages of Aelin/Rowen scenes from Heir of fire that didn’t make it in the book. For instance, she wrote the scene where Maeve sends Rowan (over all the rest of the cadre) to train Aelin. Also, in the end of HoF, when they are in the cold pool after Aelin tells Rowan her whole story, she wrote a sexy scene that didn’t make it in there:
Josh: How is a cold pool sexy? SJM:Nipples Josh: Sure but the guy gets shrinkage SJM:Rowan would never have shrinkage Josh: Rowans like a turtle
I’m rereading acosf cause I should be studying and I need you all to remember this scene, thanks for your attention
Cassian pulled back, and remained that way long enough that she opened her eyes again to find his face inches from her own. “You’re not going to marry Eris,” he said roughly.
“No,” she breathed.
His eyes blazed. “There will be no one else. For either of us.”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Ever,” he promised.
Nesta laid a hand on his muscled chest, letting the thunderous beating of the heart beneath echo into her palm. Let it travel down her arm, into her own chest, her own heart. “Ever,” she swore.
It was all he needed. All she needed.
Cassian’s mouth met hers, and the world ceased to exist.
