StarMan Sporking: Part Five

[pangolin20]

The next chapter is called “The Repository of the Gods”, as opposed to the Book Depository of the Gods, and opens with the Sentinels. All of them are present including Zara, who has still received precisely zero characterisation and hasn’t had a single line in the entire book so far. Apparently Yr is going to visit a place called the Repository of the Gods, which I maintain is both dull and silly sounding. Apparently she’s the youngest and most “vital” of the Sentinels, so she goes first. They stand in a line and dramatically proclaim that it’s “time”, and then the Prophet shows up. This time he actually gets a description, and surprise surprise, he’s an Icarii Enchanter. Because, y’know, he’s WolfStar. But we’re not supposed to have figured that out yet for some reason. Now for some damn reason he’s wearing “a close-fitting silver suit” like something out of a science fiction movie, and his wings are silver rather than gold, also glowing. I’m picturing something off an album cover.

WolfStar gets teary because the Sentinels have done such a great job, and we get yet another mention of his “violet eyes”. He gives Jackass his cue, and Jackass obligingly makes a little speech. It’s very dramatic, and contains this memorably stupid line:

“Our entire service has been for this point, which will, in turn, lead us to the final conflagration.”

…conflagration?! No, it doesn’t say “confrontation”. It’s definitely “conflagration”. I read it three times just to be sure. What the hell is that supposed to mean?? Word choice, author! Word choice!

Now Yr makes a speech as well. It’s just as overwritten as Douglass’ speeches generally are, as she declares that she “harbour[s] myriad regrets”. And bad mistakes, she’s made a few, she’s had her share of sand kicked in her face, but she’s come through.

She adds that she’s enjoyed her life in the “OverWorld”, and has made friends (…such as?) who she’s going to miss. What friends are those, exactly? The only character she’s ever been shown having a friendship with was Faraday – she barely even spoke to anyone else. She adds that she’s “learned to love a little”, and that someone named Hesketh will miss her. Wait, who the hell is Hesketh? Is this the latest guy she’s sleeping with? This comes right the hell out of nowhere!

Either way it’ll never be important, so who cares! Everyone starts crying like a little bitch and kissing her goodbye, and WolfStar tells her how great she is, and gives her a power boost to help her along. Then Yr turns to the magical lake they’re standing by, takes her clothes off, and prays to some never before mentioned deity called “Sister Moon”, asking her to show her the way.

Cut to Azhure stirring and mumbling in her sleep, and then the moonlight does a spyglass thingy where it concentrates its light on one spot in the water. And I’m sure Azhure had nothing to do with it, cough.

Yr dives into the water and swims downward, following the moonlight, and apparently this thing is really fuck-off deep.

Then we cut to a bit of lore. Apparently the Charonites have a legend about a pantheon of gods even older than the Star Gods (about whom we still know nothing). Apparently during a storm “that lasted many days and nights” with fire raining from the sky and such, people took shelter underground and emerged again to find the magical lakes had appeared. Supposedly “the ancients themselves lay sleeping in the depths of the Sacred Lakes”.

Well, okay then. At least this is relatively interesting and creative, even by Douglass’ usual low standards.

Cut back to Yr. She keeps swimming, and at the bottom of the lake she finds the “Repository”. It’s, uh… well, it’s a spaceship, basically. No, really. It’s “smooth and grey” and has a bunch of blinky lights on it, and in order to get in Yr has to push some buttons in the correct order. Sure, they’re referred to as “multicoloured gems”, but they’re still buttons. They even make noises when pressed. You got sci fi in my fantasy! No, you got fantasy in my sci fi!

Yr enters the alien spaceship (seriously), and passes through another door which is locked by a voice key thingy – she has to speak a few words in “a strange language”. After that she passes “many strange things”. What strange things are they, you may be wondering? They’re “chambers, caverns, closets and yet more corridors”.

Since when were generic enclosed spaces “strange”? I’m sitting in a “chamber” right now. My home has a closet in it, too. Neither are mysterious in any way shape or form, unless you count the smell. The author just dropped a sunken alien spaceship into her epic fantasy novel, and she can’t even come up with anything interesting to put in the background.

Instead, the only specific thing that’s actually in here is something called the “Well of Power”. It sings just like the Star Gate Atlantis, apparently. It’s also “ringed with light”. Cue a description of the thing. It’s got “waist high” walls which “glow[ed] golden with the Power they contained”. Why Is Power Capitalised? Does This Add Anything To The Story? Wait, No It Doesn’t. Now I’m going to drink some Water out of my Tin Mug. The Tin Mug is Important Now. Even though literally all it does is hold liquids for me to drink.

Yr sticks her head in the well, and comes back out of the lake a while later with her eyes “glittering strangely, brilliant with Power”. Whatever the fuck that’s supposed to mean. I hate to break it to you, but “power” is an incredibly non-specific word. By itself it means pretty much nothing. You have to get specific if you want it to mean something in the context of your story. Political power, magic power, physical power, spiritual power, horsepower… which is it, author? Do you even know, or are you just pulling this out of your butt as per usual?

Apparently none of the other Sentinels can touch her now without dying, so they all just walk off and she follows in the rear. And so begins the process of their slow and horrible deaths. Yippee! Also, remember way back at the beginning of the first book spork when I said this thing was memorable for the sheer what the CHRIST factor? Yeah, now it’s really coming on hard and fast.

The next chapter returns to Axis for more Sue praise, hooray. He’s leaving Carlon and everyone’s throwing a big celebration for him, and as usual we get a big list of his moronic titles – “great lord Axis, StarMan of all Tencendor”, blah blah blah Axis is the best thing since sliced bread. His army is waiting outside and they’re all super duper proud to “fight to the death for his StarMan” (seriously), and blah blah blah they’re “impressively uniformed in grey” with Axis’ stupid sun symbol. Grey is not an “impressive” colour. (Hell, it’s not even a colour. It’s a shade. And there are fifty of them, apparently). We’re informed that the uniforms are a “miracle”, because Azhure wasn’t able to have enough of them made in time… then had a dream about how that frustrated her, and everyone woke up to find they had a uniform now.

Yup, she’s casting ludicrously powerful spells in her sleep. Again. On finding out about this, Axis, the jackass, told her to dream about him having “a great victory”. Fuck off and die, Axis.

Meanwhile cut to Azhure. She’s with Rivkah and Belial’s underage wife, Cazna. Supposedly Azhure has become “fond” of the kid, told not shown as usual (and just wait and see how she treats her later on), and we learn that Rivkah and Margarita are now formally married at last, and cue an infodump about that before we randomly jump back to talking about Cazna. Apparently she’s “a beautiful girl, greatly resembling Azhure”. Might I add, we’re with Azhure’s POV right now. Which means she essentially just thought “she’s so pretty – just like me!” Fucking narcissist.

Axis shows up with Belial, Margarita and Demi Moore, and Rimmer taking up the rear. Axis thinks about how “he did not know if he would ever see [Azhure] again”, bawww, and then rides off on his fancy pants special stallion. I still don’t know why the author bothered to give the horse a name; it’s not as if the thing plays any role in the story other than carrying Axis around. I’m reminded of the bit in Game of Thrones (book, not TV show) where we learn that Jaime Lannister doesn’t bother to give his horses names the way he used to, because he’s had so many of them killed beneath him that he figures it’s not worth the effort. Just one of GRRM’s many little touches of cynical realism.

Azhure watches King Asshole ride off, hopefully never to be seen again, and then goes inside. And OH GOD – the moment she steps inside, this happens:

“When she lifted her eyes, Azhure saw that StarDrifter stood in the doorway, staring at her.”

 

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And then the chapter ends. Seriously, this is like something out of a horror movie. The only thing that’s missing is Azhure’s last bloodcurdling scream of terror and someone finding her dismembered remains hanging from the ceiling a few scenes later. Sara Douglass, what the HELL were you THINKING?

*

Mercifully, the next chapter cuts to Faraday. She and Embeth have travelled to Embeth’s home in Tare, but Faraday only stayed a couple of days because there were too many reminders of Axis. So she left Embeth behind and is now on her own, apparently for the first time in her life, and suffering a lot of loneliness. Yup, she’s still the only person in this book I can sympathise with. I live alone, work alone, and am fully aware that I will eventually die alone. I know what loneliness feels like. I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating: the reader sympathises with a character’s difficulties, not their victories. Because we relate to other people’s problems. Think about real life. When a friend of yours was having a tough time of it, you felt empathy for them, right? But when the same friend wins the lottery, you don’t empathise with that. You can’t. They just got lucky, which is neither admirable nor particularly interesting. Axis and Azhure are the friend who wins the lottery. Constantly. And the more they win the lottery and then flaunt the shit out of it, the less you like them. Faraday is the friend whose boyfriend just dumped her, trying to carry on despite her emotional pain and money troubles, and she doesn’t whine about it. And the more you see that, the more you like, admire and sympathise with her.

It’s really not that complicated, y’know. If you want us to like a character, give them problems and don’t take them away for free, even if you don’t like seeing them suffer. Deal with it – you’re their author, not their mother.

True to form, Faraday chides herself for feeling self-pity (unlike Azhure, who regularly and shamelessly wallows in it), and stoically carries on. After this she meets up with a trio of Icarii Enchanters. They get names despite the fact that they’ll probably never appear again.

In the interests of ridiculousness and getting a cheap laugh: their names are BrightStar FeatherNest, StarShine EvenHeart and PaleStar SnapWing. Still not making any of these up, guys.

Faraday hangs out with them for a while and they tell her they’ve been working on recovering the lost Icarii cities and invite her to stay if she’s in the area again. And then they fly off.

Finally Faraday reaches the Silent Woman Woods. She’s now flat-out depressed and has to force herself to keep going despite having lost the will to even eat. Poor, poor Faraday. No author favour for you – you’re obliged to be an actual character instead. Not easy, but at least I actually like you.

She stops at the edge of the woods, right where Jackass originally told her she was the (groan) Tree Friend. She almost doesn’t go in, but the donkeys shove her on (because they’re secretly not donkeys at all, spoiler alert). She goes in and the trees are… uh, singing, and it’s all nice and welcoming. Faraday feels better and declares “you are beautiful!” and that one day most of the eastern part of the country will “sing like this”. Faraday. Dude. You’re a grown woman. Stop acting like you’re twelve.

But nope, she starts “skipping” while the trees “[sing] joyously for her” and it’s like something out of an old Disney movie. Tralalalala, Spring is in the air! And I am a minor Sue, with nothing interesting to say.

Snow White- uh, I mean Faraday reaches the golden shiny lake Axis dipped his hands in like an idiot in the first book. She checks that out, then takes a look at the Keep where Ogden and Veremund used to live. Wow, this is a real trip down memory lane, huh? She unsaddles the donkeys and heads inside, and we get a massive wad of description of the interior. It’s pretty damn cozy. Actually it sounds really nice and just the sort of place I’d like to live in. Big comfy armchairs, lots of books, a nice bed with a quilt, a kitchen range – the works. Also the place magically provides free food and puts the kettle on for you. Nice. I wish this place was real and I owned it so I could give it to my dear old mum to retire in.

Faraday goes to bed fully clothed because she’s so tired, and wakes up to find she’s now wearing – oh for gods’ sakes – really? “A warm flannel nightgown and pink bedsocks”.

Flannel was invented in the 17^th century, Ms Professional Historian. And “socks” weren’t a Thing in Ye Medival Times either. I looked that up too. “Pink bedsocks” sure as hell weren’t a thing. Can we please try and stick to some sort of coherent time period? PLEASE?

The next morning she has magically appearing “scrambled eggs and bacon” for breakfast. With toast. And I’m willing to lay money that this wasn’t a Thing in medieval Britain either, but I can’t be bothered to look it up. Because if the author didn’t bother, why should I?

(In fact I remember reading somewhere that bacon was promoted as a “breakfast food” in the USA by struggling pork merchants sometime after WW2, and before that it wasn’t a morning staple. So there).

After a week of being effectively looked after by a building, she falls asleep in her chair, wakes up, and senses Azhure “very, very close”. Somehow.

Cut to Queen Sue herself. And now we find out who the hell Hesketh is. He’s the captain of the palace guard, apparently. Whoop-dee-doo. Azhure is also “depressed”, though for far less sympathetic reasons, and asked Hesketh to take her to Spiredore. Apparently her room in the castle is “now lonely and cold” because Axis isn’t there, bawww. By the way, “depression” was not a word used in that sense in Ye Medieval times. I know because I got pulled up by an editor for using it. Why did no-one bother to pull her up? (The word she should have used here is “melancholy”, by the way).

We learn that StarDrifter has been sticking around like a blowfly on shit, and is helping out by training Caelum and the unborn twins. Azhure is “uncomfortable” with this situation because, no shit, she can tell that he still wants to fuck her.

Now she heads off to Spiredore for a little R&R, taking “her delightful son” with her. Great, more Sue Baby praise, just what everyone was asking for. She also takes the murder puppies with her, and along the way she thinks about how Hesketh is in a bad mood lately because he was “deeply emotionally involved” with Yr and now she’s vanished. But of course the author couldn’t be arsed to actually establish any of that beforehand; instead it’s just lazily dropped in here and we’re expected to care about it. Yeah, no, forget it.

Azhure goes inside the tower, and the Sue Baby telepathically asks if they’re going on to the roof. Needless to say neither of them are keen on the idea. The Sue Baby asks what they’re going to do instead, and Azhure boo-hoos about how sad and miserable she is because Axis isn’t there, then asks the stairs to take her to a place where she’ll “find some comfort”.

Cut back to Faraday sensing her presence, and she starts calling to her. Back in Spiredore Azhure hears her and keeps going upstairs for a couple of pages of description. Eventually Azhure arrives at the “keep” where Faraday has been hanging out, and the two of them act like they’re lifelong best friends rather than two people who’ve only met once in their entire lives. Seriously, they hug, “laugh and cry” and are generally super duper happy to see each other.

Then they sit down to enjoy some magically appearing tea, and Faraday asks if she can “cuddle” the Sue Baby. Barf.

Azhure thinks about how they’re acting like “simple housewives”, “talking babies and recipes”, and that “no-one would guess [snip] the shared love for one man that has brought us so much grief.”

Handy tip: if being in a relationship with someone causes you “so much grief”, end the relationship.

Also, “talking babies and recipes” is another anachronism. They’re not talking about recipes anyway, so, y’know, fail. I’m willing to bet neither of them knows how to cook anyway. Hell, pretty much nobody has to do any cooking in this series because there’s always random magically appearing free food. I’m sensing another piece of blatant wish fulfillment.

Faraday asks if Axis did “…?”, and Azhure says yeah, “He married [her] that afternoon”. Predictably, Faraday doesn’t react with “what the everloving fuck were you THINKING?” but rather is all happy that “someone has finally won him”.

**deathly silence**

Then Azhure shows Faraday the One Ring, and Azhure says now people are calling her the Enchantress, but she hopes she won’t be “submerged in the personality of a woman fifteen thousand years dead.”

With hindsight, if you’ve read the sequel trilogy this line becomes painfully ironic, because – spoilers – Azhure goes on to have a daughter who will one day be taken over by the resurrected spirit of Azhure’s dead mother for some damn reason. And Azhure and Axis both know it. They seriously just had a kid so she could become the vessel for a dead person, and have her own identity completely erased.

As I recall, when the daughter confronts them about it, neither of them has an answer for her.

So it’s not okay for Azhure to face the possibility of losing her identity, but it’s okay for her to inflict that on one of her kids. Gotcha. See what I meant before when I talked about what an awful parent she’s going to become?

Then Azhure the Hypocrite tells Faraday about WolfStar, and about how she’s going to head for the temple soon, then tells her about what happened at Jervois Landing and how Axis has left.

When she gets to the part about how the Sentinels have disappeared, Faraday is shocked and wonders if they left because they were so “upset [by] her recriminations and tears” that they decided to vanish. Don’t give them any credit by assuming they care about other people, Faraday. Because they sure as fuck didn’t give a damn about you.

Then Azhure lets Faraday know about Gilbert, and warns her that they might be a threat to her, all while thinking that “a warning is the best I can do if Axis thinks an armed escort would be inappropriate”, and are you fucking kidding me right now? It’s inappropriate to provide some protection to someone whose death would literally cause THE GODDAMN APOCALYPSE?

These people are too stupid – not to mention selfish – to live.

Faraday just brushes the whole thing off anyway, and then invites Azhure to come and check out the Sacred Grove. They teleport over there together, with the Sue Baby, and of course it’s all very beautiful and such. Azhure makes note of Faraday’s pretty dress and thinks about how here in this place she looks “far, far more lovely”. Are you sure you’re not secretly gay for Faraday, Azhure? Because it’s totally okay if you are.

She asks Faraday if the stag heads will be okay with her being here, given that the Avar rejected her for “my violence”. Faraday says don’t sweat it. The leader of the stag heads shows up, and Faraday introduces Azhure. The stag head is surprised to recognise her, both as the side bitch Axis was fucking earlier on, but also as someone who’s been initiated like a Bane. Azhure remembers the night she accidentally killed Hagen, and how Shra the Avar kid drew some lines on her forehead with blood and said “Accepted”.

Either way this means, all too conveniently, that the “sacrifice was accepted” and that Azhure is now welcome here. To her credit Azhure isn’t happy about it, saying this “act of wanton violence” turned the Avar against her so how could it be her get out of her jail free card now?

The stag head makes a speech about how Shra is going to be one of the most powerful Banes ever, a statement which is completely meaningless because we don’t even know what Banes do, and goes on about how Azhure is “worthy”. She asks how so, and Faraday mentally kisses her ass, thinking about how OMG modest Azhure is, because she supposedly finds “it hard to believe that she was worthy of all the attention, regard and love that had come her way”.  You mean, all the Sue praise? Yeah, no, Azhure has absolutely no problem with being loved and worshipped by everyone she meets. She’s at least as arrogant as Axis, and that’s saying a lot.

The stag head answers – no joke – that she’s worthy “simply because of who you are”. Yup, it’s not because you’ve accomplished anything – you’re just Special. I want to stab the entire cast of this novel in the FACE.

Further Sue praise ensues, and then the stag head announces that the Sue Baby is also welcome because reasons. The stag head declares that the little shit will grow up to be “as compassionate [as Azhure]”. In other words, he’s going to grow up to be a murderer. But given what a horrible person Azhure is, the stag head is actually completely correct about this.

Then the stag head gets angry all of a sudden, and Azhure thinks about how these guys “could kill at the snap of a finger”. Since fuckin’ when, and how does she know that?

Stag Head Guy tells her that she’s forbidden to bring the unborn twins into the Sacred Grove, and they will never be welcome here. Azhure asks why, and is told that “they do not share your compassion” (again, WHAT compassion?) and “may one day do you and yours great harm.”

Spoilers: actually one of them grows up to be a mindless bimbo (think Waivia with wings) who never does anything other than fuck her own brother and then get murdered, and the other will be one of very few actually decent characters in the entire series (unless I’m misremembering, but I remember liking him a fair bit).

Azhure freaks out, as you would expect, but Faraday steps in and says she’d like to introduce her to someone else.

But we don’t actually get to see that, even though it would probably have been kind of important to see how the Mother reacted to meeting Azhure, and vice versa. Instead we just cut to Azhure arriving back at Spiredore and thinking about how it was “a wondrous day” and the friendship with Faraday has “matured and deepened”, and how meeting the Mother was totally amazing, and you’ll just have to take the author’s word for that. And the chapter just ends there.