55 pages • 1-hour read
Heat of the Everflame
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Part 1, Chapters 12-21Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of graphic violence and death.
Part 1, Chapter 12 Summary
In the morning, Diem and Luther discuss Auralie. Luther explains how they first started working together. He respected Auralie’s healing capacities and knew she sympathized with mortals and half-mortals just like him. She also believed there was “a rare medicine” (103) on Coeurîle that she could harvest and bring back to Lumnos before Luther’s anticipated coronation; this was her mission all these months. Luther gained insight into Auralie’s intentions when he met Diem. Diem wishes Luther had told her about his relationship with Auralie sooner, but lets go of her anger when Luther reiterates his belief in Diem and her mission.
The friends decide to spend one more night at their camp before heading to Arboros City and then back home. Diem spends the day showing her friends wilderness survival skills she learned in Mortal City in childhood.
Part 1, Chapter 13 Summary
Diem and her friends discuss what’s happening back in Lumnos. Luther is still at odds with his biological father Remis, whom the friends fear is power-hungry. Diem is also worried about her advisor Eleanor and believes Taran’s brother Aemonn will overstep her authority in the Royal Guard.
The conversation turns to the recent battle with the Guardians. Diem realizes that she and Luther used the magic compass to find their way back to each other. The compass was a gift to Diem meant to lead her to her heart’s truest desire. She realizes her desire is Luther alone. They share a private moment and profess their love for each other. Suddenly, Vance appears.
Part 1, Chapter 14 Summary
Diem and her friends face off with Vance and his men. Vance threatens to kill Diem’s friends with godstone—a deadly element the Guardians use to make weapons and kill the Descended—if she doesn’t come with him. Diem tries to talk him down, reminding him that she wants to unite the mortals and the Descended without violence. Vance ignores her and attacks Taran.
Diem and Alixe try tending Taran’s wounds but Diem doesn’t know a cure for godstone wounds. Diem settles Taran while privately concocting a plan.
Part 1, Chapter 15 Summary
Diem and Luther discuss the possibilities of healing Taran. Luther insists there is no cure. He researched godstone in the past when he was planning to kill Remis. Later, the friends start moving towards safety, convinced Vance and the Guardians will be back. At their camp that night, Diem prays to the Lumnos Kindred to save Taran.
Part 1, Chapter 16 Summary
Diem and her friends eventually reach Mortal City. The friends worry that the King of Ignios will discover Diem and kill her, as it is forbidden for a Crown to enter another territory without permission from that territory’s ruling Crown. Diem dismisses these concerns, determined to find a cure for Taran. She remembers spotting “herbs in Arboros that might help” (143).
Diem meets with an assembly of mortals in Mortal City. She explains why she is there, where she came from, who she is, and her plans for Emarion. Then she feels a powerful magical force surge through the landscape. The Ignios King’s gryvern appears, which means he knows Diem is there.
Part 1, Chapter 17 Summary
Later that evening, Diem and her friends make a camp and hide. Meanwhile, the Ignios King and his gryvern stalk Diem. Diem assures them everything will be okay. They will soon head out to Umbros for necessary supplies before returning to Lumnos. After everyone goes to sleep, Diem sneaks back to Arboros for the herbs she saw earlier.
Part 1, Chapter 18 Summary
Luther is furious when Diem returns from Arboros. Diem insists she is fine. Then she and Alixe make a poultice with the herbs for Taran’s wounds. Diem stays by his side and settles him before the companions move on.
Part 1, Chapter 19 Summary
The friends continue traveling. Taran is still weak, but the poultice is working. That evening, Diem changes his dressings while the friends talk about love and fate, justice and peace.
The friends approach Umbros. Diem suddenly feels as if she is burning up. The voice inside her head tells her to burn—a command she’s never heard before. She gives in to it and unleashes her magic, emitting flames.
Part 1, Chapter 20 Summary
Diem is stunned when she realizes she is burning everything down around her. She is summoning her magic in a new and powerful way. Suddenly the Ignios King and his gryvern appear. He accuses her and Auralie of being traitors, insisting that Diem isn’t a real queen because her coronation was never completed. Now all of the Crowns want her captured.
Diem refuses to comply. Together, she and Luther create a powerful magical shield to fend off Ignios’s assault. The harder Ignios fights her, the more powerful Diem becomes. She realizes that others’ magic strengthens her magic. Finally, the King throws a dagger towards Luther. Diem tries to dive between them.
Part 1, Chapter 21 Summary
A stunned Diem lies on the ground, unable to move. A battle ensues between Luther and Ignios’s men. After Luther kills the men, he swoops to Diem’s side, promising her she will live. Taran appears and assures Luther he will get Diem to safety.
Part 1, Chapters 12-21 Analysis
In the second half of Part 1, escalating tensions between the mortals and the Descended introduce the novel’s theme of Navigating Loyalty and Betrayal During Wartime. As Cordellia reminds Diem in Part 1, Chapter 7, Diem must “come to terms with the sacrifices this war will require before it’s over—from everyone involved” (67). Diem’s ventures between the realms in Chapters 12-21 underscore the veracity of Cordellia’s warning. Diem is not only fighting for equality and justice, but quickly finds herself battling the people she loves most.
For example, when the King of Ignios and the Guardians of the Everflame attack Luther, Taran, and Alixe, Diem encounters a moral quandary. If she fights the Guardians, she is effectively fighting the mortals. Defending her Lumnos friends means betraying her mother, her family, and the people she grew up with. If she sides with the Guardians and complies with Ignios, she would have to forsake her friends and lover. Loyalty and betrayal take on new meanings to Diem as the tensions between the realms escalate. In the coming chapters, she will have to decide where her loyalty lies and what it means to be honest and trustworthy with both her enemies and comrades.
The more questions Diem encounters about good and evil, the more acute The Challenges of Claiming Identity and Autonomy become for her character. For example, Diem wants to exhibit strength and assuredness to her people as she settles into her new royal role. However, she fears that her displays of magical might will compromise her devotion to peace. If she is too compassionate, she conversely fears that her people will “mistake [her] compassion for lack of courage” (105). In moments of such moral conflict and emotional turmoil, Diem must remember who she is at heart. This is where her closest friends and confidants come into play. She must learn to rely on her connections with Luther, Alixe, and Taran, for example, to remain strong in her authentic character. As Luther tells her during one intimate scene of dialogue, “Hate is easy—it’s mercy that requires the greater strength. I’ll be damned if I let you believe that beautiful heart of yours is weakness. Trust your instincts, my Queen—above all else, trust yourself” (105).
Acquiring self-pride and self-assuredness has been an ongoing personal journey for Diem. Throughout the preceding two novels, Diem has fought for her autonomy. In her rise to power, she has worked hard to find and claim her voice. Holding onto this strength sometimes feels challenging to Diem because others have historically underestimated her. They have also tried to control her, compelling her to inhabit their expectations of her rather than believing in her innate courage and heart. A character like Luther, however, values Diem’s authentic spirit and encourages her to be herself whatever the cost. He never asks her to compromise herself, which is one of the reasons why their bond deepens—she feels like she knows who she is with him.
Diem and Luther’s burgeoning love affair consistently helps Diem to find grounding in herself. The image of the compass—“a gift from the Crown of Meros” to Diem at the Ascension Ball (118)—symbolically reiterates Diem’s need to follow her heart, as the compass is an implement that has been “spelled with Kindred magic to lead to whatever one’s heart most desires” (118). Diem is moved when she realizes that the compass leads her to Luther. Diem has resisted committing to Luther in the past, convinced that giving herself over to love is synonymous with forsaking her independence. In the narrative present, Diem begins to realize that owning her love for Luther is in fact a sign of her strength and agency. Accepting love is another lesson Diem is learning as she claims her distinct identity. The physical compass is thus a key symbol that represents Diem’s inner moral and emotional compass—if she stays true to where the compass points, she will be able to follow her instincts.
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