66 pages • 2-hour read
Immortal Consequences
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Symbols & Motifs
Content Warning: This section of the guide contains discussion of graphic violence, illness and death, emotional abuse, and physical abuse.
The Forgetting
The Forgetting is a recurring motif that represents the ultimate loss of identity, a fate the students at Blackwood Academy fear most. The novel frames this as an existential threat greater than death itself—which they have already experienced as dead souls in purgatory—as the Forgetting removes all evidence of their existence from the memories of others. A such, the threat of Forgetting becomes the primary engine of the plot, driving the characters’ desperate ambition to win the Decennial and secure their memories. Structurally, this jeopardy fills the place of mortal death in a novel where the students have already died. When Oliver confesses his fear of the Forgetting, he describes “a dark nothingness taking root in his brain, slowly devouring everything that made him him” (63), drawing on imagery of mortal decline and death to emphasize the parallel. The Forgetting is a darkly deliberate and cynical version of the real-world life-cycle, described as “Blackwood’s way of keeping itself in balance (12). In purging older students to make room for new ones, the Forgetting mimics “the natural order” (12): In this, it may be a social critique on the COVID-19 pandemic—a strong influence on Dark Academia—especially on lasting debates around intergenerational value and communal versus survival-of-the-fittest models.
The motif also argues that lasting posterity in the form of love and remembrance is a strongly positive human experience, and a form of continuation and consolation. Wren, haunted by night terrors, still understands that painful feelings are preferable to their oblivion. The narrative argues that a life devoid of personal history is no life at all, making memory the most valuable and fiercely protected human possession, even in the afterlife. The six students, shown overcoming their challenges through the power of emotional and practical connections, reinforces the idea that humanity is defined by the accumulation of emotional bonds, with both joyful and painful results. In doing so, the novel invites its young readers to navigate their feelings around emotional vulnerability, the nature of death, and the legacy of deceased loved ones on those who survive them.
Blackwood Academy
Blackwood Academy is a symbol of corrupt institutional power, presenting itself as a structured sanctuary for lost souls while concealing a foundation of deception and sacrifice. The academy initially appears to be a place of order and tradition, offering students the opportunity to move into an eternal existence. However, this benevolent facade crumbles with the revelation that the Decennial Festival, its most prestigious tradition, is actually a ritualistic culling designed to appease the Ether. This discovery forces the protagonists to navigate a moral landscape where Blackwood’s ultimate authority, Headmaster Silas, leads a system that demands their destruction. As such, Blackwood itself embodies the theme of The Tension between Collaboration and Competition, challenging the characters to interrogate the established rules and forge their own ethical compass in a world where morality has been compromised to maintain those with power. In making the symbol of Blackwood Academy central to the novel’s life-or-death threat, the novel presents corruption as a kind of moral death, asking whether it is better compromise one’s safety and survival or one’s principles.
Pain and Healing
The motif of pain and healing is crucial in supporting the novel’s presentation of threat and in creating empathy for the six main characters. For most of their existence at Blackwood, students are invulnerable, unable to feel pain and capable of healing magically. This state of being is a function of their status as souls in purgatory but must be removed by the narrative in order that the nominees are placed in significant danger, and that their physical and psychological experiences are relatable to the reader. Accordingly, during the Decennial trials, Silas reveals that “Pain has always been a part of the Decennial trials” (178), reintroducing mortality and consequence as a tool of the competition. This shift demonstrates Blackwood’s absolute power over the students’ physical reality, turning their invulnerability on and off to serve its own corrupt ends. By reintroducing pain, the academy transforms from a school into a deadly arena, raising the stakes from academic rivalry to a brutal fight for survival. This control over pain and healing is the ultimate expression of the academy’s duplicity, proving that both the students’ safety and their suffering are entirely subject to the whims of the institution.
Shadow Magic
Shadow magic is an evolving symbol that represents the breakdown of Blackwood Academy’s rigid moral order and the inherent ambiguity of good and evil. Initially, it is presented as a corrupting, forbidden power exclusively wielded by the Demien Order, a faction positioned as the novel’s antagonistic force. Characters discuss it as the ultimate loss of self, a force that corrodes the soul until one is “left more shadow than human” (11). This initial depiction aligns with Headmaster Silas’s narrative, which establishes a simple dichotomy: Blackwood’s sanctioned magic is good, while Demien shadow magic is evil. This framework provides a false sense of moral clarity, encouraging students to trust the institution’s authority and fear the “other” that exists beyond its gates, thereby reinforcing Silas’s control. Within the framework of the novel’s moral conventions, this too-simple value system also invites the reader to predict that its apparent superiority will be dismantled as the novel progresses, creating tension and dramatic irony.
This suggestion is reinforced early on in the novel, with the arrival of Louise, in Chapter 4. When August realizes, “Those shadows…are coming from her” (54), the foundational moral logic of Blackwood is challenged for the students, and for the reader. As Louise’s ability proves that shadow magic is not as Silas has presented it, this revelation is the catalyst that forces the protagonists to question the institution’s official narrative of good and evil. Shadow magic thus evolves into a symbol of moral ambiguity, suggesting that the relative virtue or corruption of power is defined by context and intent.
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