Kings of the Wyld

“Life […] wasn’t a circle; you didn’t go round and round again. It was an arc, its course as inexorable as the sun’s trek across the sky, destined at its highest, brightest moment to begin its fall.”

This image of the trajectory of life as the course of a day, with the peak moment also being the beginning of the descent toward night and death, reflects Clay’s feelings about the trajectory of his life, and his past glory, at the beginning of the book. This assumption that his days of glory are behind him will prove ironic as his greater accomplishment will be his role in the quest to rescue Rose.

“He did his best to be a man worthy of a woman like Ginny, and of their daughter, his darling girl, who was his most precious legacy, the speck of gold siphoned from the clouded river of his soul.”

This image of his daughter, Tally, as gold panned from Clay’s murky life confirms that, while he places little value on his own character, Clay prizes his daughter’s innocence. The description of her as his legacy introduces the theme of Choosing a Legacy of Kindness.

“What sort of legacy will I leave behind? I’ve got no family, no friends, except for you guys. What have I done that’s worth anything?”

Moog’s question about legacy furthers this question about what constitutes a meaningful legacy. As events will show, what motivates the members of Saga is not the promise of glory or heroic deeds for their own sake, but the fact that they prize personal connections and the fight for justice as their legacy.

“Of course I’ll come […] You shits are the only real family I’ve got.”

Matrick’s ready acquiescence to rejoining the band, which means leaving his cold and unfaithful wife, confirms the book’s definition of family as defined by bonds of affection and loyalty, not biological inheritance. Working together for a common cause unites the bandmates and confirms the novel’s message that family, and not glory or fame, are the true rewards of life.

“We are each what the past has made of us. You would do well to remember what has come and gone before. Time is a circle, history a turning wheel.”

Lastleaf’s speech uses the metaphor of the repeating circle to envision the passage of time, a contrast to Clay’s perception of his life as an arc. Lastleaf’s claim about the reach of the past into the present is a foreshadowing that proves true in multiple respects, while his description of history as a wheel foreshadows the cycles of death and rebirth that characterize his family. This idea of resurrection bears on the implications of what Lastleaf’s death at the end means for this world.

“They are wild things, fey creatures. They are everything you fear and many things you would fear to know.”

The Heartwyld Horde, in addition to playing the role of antagonist as the army laying siege to Castia, also supports the novel’s examination of The Blurred Line Between Human and Monster. Here, Lastleaf says the Horde serves as a metaphor for human fear and dread, hinting that their uncontrollable aspect is part of the terror they inspire.

“Castia was a mighty city, or so [Clay] had been told. It was the farthest outpost of human civilization, a testament to the indomitable spirit of those who had built the city of their dreams in a place beyond nightmares.”

This image poses Castia not just as a plot device and a story goal but as a symbol for human civilization and accomplishment, a triumph over the greatest of obstacles. This stages the attack on Castia as a battle between the monstrous and the human, one of the novel’s themes. This passage appears when Gabe looks into Moog’s crystal ball and sees that their quest appears hopeless, which raises tension and suspense over whether they will succeed.

“The truth, he knew, was that the world needed his kind of monster. It was a brutal place. It was unfair. And Clay Cooper, such as he was, was quite simply the right kind of wrong.”

The defining question that Clay has to wrestle with, posed by his wife, is whether his violent tendencies will get the better of him, or whether his protective instincts will win. In the middle ground during the events of the book, Clay sees a use for his talents; ultimately, he comes to understand that his strength is best used in protecting the innocent, which means his actions cannot be considered monstrous even if the result is murder.

“Pressed to describe the difference between slaying a creature in the wild versus doing so on an arena floor, [Clay] might have said that the former seemed, to his mind at least, more honest.”

Clay finds that the new way of fighting monsters lacks authenticity. This distinction plays out the premise of the novel that “classic” ways of doing things, now considered old-fashioned, are superior to contemporary practice.

“[Clay] wouldn’t have called it excitement, since excitement implied an optimism he didn’t particularly feel about what awaited them in the arena, but there was, admittedly, something undeniably thrilling about hearing their name on the lips of so many thousands of people.”

Clay’s reaction at hearing the crowd in the Maxithon arena clamor for Saga touches on the novel’s themes about glory and reputation, though this also poses a moment of ironic tension as Clay isn’t looking forward to the battle. Fighting the chimera becomes a pivotal dramatic moment as it bonds the band in their new form and shows them that age has not diminished their skills.

“The world used to be a scary place, remember? We were trying to make it better. Well, most of us, anyway.”

This statement by Ashe, a member of the band Vanguard, offers a motive for the mercenary life, further explaining what Clay felt was honest or more authentic about it. The question of public safety poses a distinction between vengeance and justice that the novel continues to explore. This passage further probes the nostalgia for days past and offers the reflection—common among each generation—that the world is a different place now.

“Look here at a warrior born, a scion of power and poverty whose purpose is manifold: to shatter shackles, to murder monarchs, and to demonstrate that even the forces of good must sometimes enlist the services of big, bad motherfuckers. His is an ancient soul destined to die young.”

The epic tone in this brief section, which steps out of the third-person point of view to have an omniscient narrator describing the heroes in the style of heroic poetry, contrasts with embedded colloquialisms like “big, bad motherfuckers,” exemplifying Eames’s use of humor and self-awareness to poke fun at the conventions of fantasy literature and heroic narratives, even as he employs those conventions.

“Clay had heard it said that once you’d walked in the Wyld, you could never really leave it behind.”

The Wyld here becomes a metaphor for several things: the wild life Clay led with his band, the toll of his physical battles, and the dark past he is trying to leave behind him, as described in the first passage. The Wyld, as home to monsters, is also a metaphor for Clay’s concern about the monstrous aspects of his own personality.

“What was it about fathers, Clay wondered, that compelled so many of them to test their children? To insist that a daughter, or a son, prove themselves worthy of a love their mother offered without condition?”

Clay’s internal monologue when he speaks with Sabbatha about her past alludes to Clay’s memories of his own father as well as Gabriel’s dedication to saving his daughter. This rhetorical question isn’t answered, but it is part of Clay’s larger reflection on his role as Tally’s father as he moves toward Choosing a Legacy of Kindness.

“Despite their huge size and monstrous appearance, they weren’t particularly inclined toward violence. Sure, if you pissed one off they were real bastards, but like any savage thing it helped if you approached them with kindness instead of open aggression.”

This passage describing the ettin captures the narrator’s voice, a blend of a matter-of-fact tone with ribald humor and elements of irony. The ettin, with two gentle and sensitive personalities combined in one seemingly monstrous body, becomes a metaphor that reflects on the novel’s questions about The Blurred Line Between Human and Monster.

“They lingered on in the hearts of those who loved them, who love them still, their memory nurtured like a sprig of green in an otherwise desolate soul. Which was, [Clay] supposed, a kind of immortality after all.”

This passage offers an example of one of those moments of lyric description that occasionally sprinkle the narrative prose. The image of greenery is a metaphor for rebirth and renewal, and the notion of immortality reflects on the novel’s exploration of legacy, fame, and glory.

“I should have done better. I should have drunk less, eaten less, screwed around less. I was a half-assed king, a shit husband, and now […] What will my children think of me?”

Matrick’s reflection on his lifestyle speaks to the question of legacy, a question each member of Saga considers in their own way. The repetition of words and the simple rhythm of the sentences adds a pathos to this reflection that balances the moments of tension surrounding the band’s current circumstances on a dangerous quest.

“What does a mirror know? What can it show us of ourselves?”

This passage comes when the members of Saga are fighting the shadow versions of themselves created by Shadow the druin, which becomes a metaphor for each character having to fight and overcome his own dark side in order to continue the heroic quest. The philosophical tone of these rhetorical questions contrasts with the light, humorous tone of much of the narrative.

“Clay followed a short time later. Behind him in the empty courtyard, the stones of a distant shore were piled neatly on the druin’s grave. Because even a misspent life, he reasoned, was worth remembering.”

Ironically, the stones Gabe carried into the Heartwyld, which he feared would become Rose’s grave marker, become instead grave markers for Shadow, who turns out to be their enemy. That Clay would give the druin the dignity of marking his burial site shows his innate decency, an argument that he is not the monster he fears.

“The end of Clay’s childhood came suddenly, a wildfire that reduced the brittle forest of his youth to char. It began as such things always begin: with a seemingly innocuous spark.”

This image of a wildfire marking the end of his childhood, which itself is characterized as a forest—in line with his father’s occupation as a woodcutter—hints at the violence that marks this abrupt turn toward maturity. This piece of backstory revisits the foundation of Clay’s fear that he has a monster within him, since he killed his father to avenge his mother’s death.

“He alone was trapped in limbo, stranded between life and death, standing at heaven’s door without a hand to knock.”

Clay’s fall from the ice bridge, after Larkspur cuts off his hand, represents that moment in the dramatic arc of the heroic quest when all seems lost, as this allusion to limbo indicates. This line also contains one of the novel’s many musical references, this time to the song “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” by Bob Dylan.

“This is not a choice between life and death, but life and immortality! Remain here and die in obscurity, or follow me now and live forever!”

Gabe’s speech to rally the war bands gathered at Kaladar uses this exhortation to glory to motivate his listeners, rousing their desire to achieve fame and be remembered, which is phrased as a kind of immortality. Gabe’s speech balances the heroic ideals and gritty language and humor that have been characteristic of the prose throughout.

“A battle, as relayed by a poet, is a glorious thing, full of heroic stands, daring charges, and valiant sacrifice. But a battlefield, as experienced by some poor bastard mired in the thick of it, is something different altogether.”

This observation, made as the battle for Castia begins, contrasts the brutal reality of battle with the ideal of glory that Gabe used to rally the bands. The moment of reflection provides a pause in the narrative that balances the tension of the immediate conflict. This passage offers a further bit of irony if not metafiction as Eames is writing a narrative that takes a heroic tone at times, but also relies on humor and gritty detail to convey realism.