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Summary
Chapters 6-10
Chapter 6
Feyre, Rhysand, and Mor make the customary Solstice visit to the Hewn City, where they meet Mor’s father, Keir, and Eris. Their conversation is tense, and Mor struggles to control her anger when she sees her former fiancé. She recalls the brutal end of their engagement. After sleeping with Cassian in order to sabotage the arranged marriage, Mor is brutally beaten on her family’s orders and left at perimeter of the Autumn Court with a note nailed to her stomach disclaiming responsibility for her. Eris, who wanted nothing to do with Mor, leaves her there on the ground, neither taking her back to his family’s court nor assisting her. In the present, Eris makes a cryptic suggestion that Tamlin, whose Spring Court borders the human realms, has done little to secure the border, which could entice the other courts to annex or invade human land.
Chapter 7
Back in Velaris, Rhysand spends a sleepless night reflecting on Eris’s warning. Azriel appears and gives him news regarding the whispers of rebellion in the Illyrian camps. Two women, one a widow and the other the mother of a slain Illyrian soldier, are major sources of the rumors that Rhysand deliberately set Illyrian soldiers up to die. Rhysand reflects on Azriel’s resentment of the Illyrians. A full Illyrian by blood, Azriel was an illegitimate child and was therefore ignored or tormented by his family. He was, for the most part, left in the dark and rarely allowed out or permitted to spend time with the rest of his family, which contributed to the development of his mysterious power to command shadows. His brothers, testing the limits of Azriel’s healing abilities, set fire to his hands with oil, leaving permanent scars. Later, Rhysand notes, Azriel killed his brothers. Rhysand is disturbed by Azriel’s reports from Illyria and promises to keep his eye on the matter.
Rhysand and Azriel discuss other pressing concerns. Jurian, a legendary mortal warrior who was revived by Hybern through the powers of the Cauldron, has gained power over the human realms south of the Spring Court. There, he operates from the estate of Graysen, a human lord, alongside Vassa, a mortal queen who is subject to a spell which binds her to a sorcerer and turns her into a flame-covered bird by day. The other mortal queens, who betrayed Vassa and allied with Hybern against Prythian, remain a threat in the human realms, but Rhysand feels that he cannot oppose them directly, as this would lead the other humans to think of him as a conqueror.
Azriel recommends that Rhysand send Lucien, who now serves as emissary to the humans, to Jurian and Vassa to plan their next move, but Rhysand notes that Lucien is away, spending the Solstice with Tamlin in the Spring Court, who has invited him back despite their earlier conflicts. Rhysand decides to send Lucien, upon his return, to meet with the mortals while he himself goes to the Spring Court to talk to Tamlin, despite their animosity. Before leaving, Azriel asks Rhysand if he should attempt to locate Bryaxis, a powerful monster who was released by Rhysand prior to the battle with Hybern and is now missing. Rhysand decides to leave Bryaxis alone, for now.
Chapter 8
In the Windhaven camp, Cassian cancels all training and other ordinary tasks in preparation for a severe winter storm. He enters a shop and encounters a young Illyrian female with scars across her back. The wings of Illyrian females, Cassian notes, are “clipped” in order to prevent them from flying. He asks the young female, who reminds him of Nesta, for the owner of the store, Proteus. She informs him that Proteus, her father, died in the battle with Hybern. Identifying herself as Emerie, she declares that she now runs the shop. Impressed by her boldness, Cassian purchases a large amount of winter gear and asks her to distribute it among the needy of the camp.
Chapter 9
Bracing herself against the cold, Feyre walks through The Rainbow with a bundle of art supplies. Her plan is to head to Ressina’s gallery to join the group of artists painting there, but she feels anxious and contacts Rhysand through their telepathic link. He tells her that the decision to join the group of artists is her own and then asks if she would like to accompany him to visit Tamlin. She rejects the invitation, still resenting Tamlin. Instead of joining Ressina’s art group, she decides to set up shop in the gallery and studio that formerly belonged to the artist Polina.
Chapter 10
Feyre paints through the evening, stopping to examine her work after the bells of Velaris signal midnight. She has, through several frenzied hours of painting, depicted herself as she once viewed herself in the reflection of a magical mirror called Ouroboros, which shows a viewer their true self. In the painting, she is a ferocious beast, covered in scales and claws. She resolves to leave the painting there overnight and to hide it from others, even Rhysand.
Analysis
These chapters further explore the theme of revenge and the backstories of various members of Rhysand’s Inner Circle. In the Hewn City, Mor reflects upon the centuries-old tensions between her and her family, who treated her with barbaric cruelty when she deliberately sabotaged her strategic engagement to Eris, heir of the Autumn Court. Their violent response to her decision to exercise autonomy suggests that her family regarded her as little more than a tool through which to further bolster their own power in Prythian, rather than an individual with her own goals and desires. Sexism, then, is not limited to Illyrian society, but is common among faeries as well. Mor has little interest in reconciling with her family and longs for the opportunity to get her revenge. Over the centuries, her father has made no attempt to apologize, and Mor has used her power as a representative of the Night Court to taunt him. Nevertheless, when Mor confronts her father and Eris directly, she feels overwhelmed and struggles to remain calm, attesting to the deep emotional wounds left by their betrayal.
In these chapters, Eris emerges as an ambiguous and complex figure. When Mor, brutally injured, was left by her family at the perimeter of the Autumn Court, he refused to lift a finger to help her and even derided her with misogynistic insults. However, he also permitted Mor to dissolve the engagement and leave the Autumn Court and, in the present, offers potentially useful information regarding Tamlin’s activities to Rhysand, though his motives remain unclear.
Mor is not the only character who has suffered as a result of the traditional nature of Prythian society. Just as Cassian and his unwed mother were rejected by their village, Azriel suffered greatly during his childhood because he was an illegitimate son. His Illyrian family placed strict limitations upon his personal freedom, locking him away in the dark and only permitting him brief reprieves from isolation. Like Cassian, he has already taken revenge against those who once tormented him, killing the brothers who burned his hands with oil and flames. These members of Rhysand’s Inner Circle are motivated to bring change to Prythian because they have been victims of the social prejudices that continue to impact the lives of many.
There is hope of change, however. In the Windhaven camp, Cassian is disturbed to meet a young Illyrian female whose wings were cut off at the base, or “clipped,” by her family, but he is impressed to see that she has taken up the family store after the death of her father. For Cassina, Emerie’s bold actions attest to the hunger for change across Prythian, even if many Illyrians still refuse to patronize her shop. The two briefly bond over their shared status as outcasts in their rigid society.
Despite the strong bonds between Feyre and Rhysand, she nevertheless feels that there are some things that she cannot share with him but must instead process privately. For her, the best way of working through difficult feelings is painting. She hesitates before joining Ressina’s group of artists, as she is afraid of the strong emotions that might be unlocked while she paints. Instead of joining the group, she decides to paint in the abandoned studio of an artist who was killed in Hybern’s attack on Velaris.
There, she paints for several hours in a passionate frenzy. For Feyre, art is, above all, a method for exploring one’s own emotions. In fact, she isn’t sure what she intends to paint at first, but instead just allows her feelings to guide her. She stops only after midnight and looks at her painting, which shows herself in a monstrous form, reflecting her lingering feelings of shame and self-loathing. Her decision to conceal then painting suggests that her art is, at times, deeply private and not intended to be seen by others. Instead of seeking to become a famous painter, Feyre uses art in a more therapeutic way, as it allows her to confront thoughts and emotions that she otherwise represses.
