Heat of the Everflame

“The memories of my life somersaulted around me, reframed by an impossible new reality. My mother, Auralie Bellator, was the leader of the ruthless, violent rebels preparing to raise a bloody war against the Descended. Against me. My mother, who had made her career working for the Descended as a healer in the Emarion Army. My mother, who must have slept with a Descended man to become pregnant with me.”

Diem Bellator’s discoveries about her mother introduce the novel’s motif of secrets and its explorations of The Challenges of Claiming Identity and Autonomy. Throughout the Kindred’s Curse Saga, Diem has been searching for familial restoration to better understand herself. When she learns her mother is the leader of the Guardians of the Everflame, she struggles to reconcile with what this truth means about her identity. Her use of anaphora—beginning multiple sentences with “my mother”—enacts her attempt to make sense of who Auralie is and who she (Diem) might be as a result.

“But I had almost given up once before, and it had nearly cost me everything. Since then, I’d sworn to never be weak again. With or without my magic, I would not stop fighting—not now, not ever.”

Diem’s internal monologue in this passage captures her innately determined spirit. Diem is still reconciling with her new role as Lumnos’s Queen but she is reminding herself that she is capable and strong no matter the challenges she faces. She wants to rise to the occasion and to serve her people with courage and heart, speaking to the theme of The Implications of Power and Duty.

“I had little faith in gods or men, but I believed in the fearsome dedication of Luther Corbois with every fiber of my being. He had proven that he would give anything, even his own life, to protect me. He would stop at nothing to take me home, help me rescue my mother, and stand by me to stop this war. Together, we could do this. Everything was going to be okay.”

Diem’s slow-burn love affair with Luther Corbois intensifies the stakes of her narrative. Diem is not only fighting for the reunification of Emarion, but for her intimate relationships, too.