The Irresistible Urge to Fall for Your Enemy

Society’s dominant perceptions of Osric and Aurienne’s respective Orders are essential to the pair’s shifting dynamics throughout the novel. Fyren assassins like Osric are often summarily deemed evil because of their unapologetic embrace of their murderous profession, while Haelans like Aurienne are celebrated for their healing abilities and their commitment to helping the community. However, the pattern of the narrative raises implicit challenges to the simplistic categorization of Fyrens as “evil” and Haelans as “good,” suggesting instead that an individual’s moral status depends on their actions. Even the question of whether an action is good or evil depends largely on the context, and in several significant scenarios, the Haelan Order’s vaunted “goodness” is tarnished by selfish concerns—just as the Fyrens’ reputation for undiluted evil is mitigated when Osric takes one life to save many others.

The author exposes the nuances of this moral quandary by describing Aurienne’s shifting opinion of Osric. Although this aspect of the novel is intended to align with the enemies-to-lovers trope, Knightley also uses the evolution of Aurienne’s views to critique her otherwise rigid perspective on morality. Initially, Aurienne’s introspective narration shows her belief that she holds the moral high ground over Osric, and she consciously stereotypes him based on her poor opinion of his Order. For example, when she catches sight of him, she thinks derisively, “Yes: there he was. Lurking. That was what his sort did. Lurk, and murder innocents for money” (45). Osric is the first Fyren she has ever encountered, but Aurienne is quick to judge him despite knowing nothing of his circumstances—other than his fatal illness. In the opening chapters, Osric does nothing to indicate that he is anything more than an assassin-for-hire; he even openly mocks her and opines that having “a conscience must be such a burden” (252). Thus, the protagonists’ initial encounters are designed to uphold society’s simplistic judgments on the Fyren and Haelan Orders.

While Osric and Aurienne’s diverging standpoints on murder are fundamental to the tension between them, Knightley does not attempt to redeem Osric’s profession. Instead, she implicitly questions whether all dealings in death should necessarily be considered evil. This challenge to Aurienne’s binary view of morality comes to the fore when Osric murders Brythe in order to save Aurienne and her Order. Although his means are immoral, Osric’s altruistic motivation suggests that taking the life of one ill-intentioned man to safeguard the lives of numerous healers is a fundamentally moral action, given that those healers will go on to save countless other lives as well. When Aurienne is faced with the reasons for Osric’s actions, she must confront the uncomfortable reality that there may be some logical exceptions to the Haelan maxim, “Harm to none” (77). This situation forces her to reexamine and adjust her compartmentalized view of the world. Although her core personality traits would never permit her to endorse murder, Osric’s actions force her to acknowledge realize that, as he puts it, “sometimes violence really is the answer” (303).

The ethical implications of this conundrum are taken one step farther when Aurienne herself causes the death of Wellesley, however unintentional this outcome may have been. Her immediate urge to wallow in guilt and self-recrimination despite Wellesley’s nefarious actions speaks to her innate desire to heal others rather than harm them, no matter the circumstances. However, when she explains the incident to her mentor, Xanthe dismisses Aurienne’s concerns entirely, stating that the protagonist was only acting in self-defense. Xanthe’s pragmatic view of the issue indicates that even amongst the Haelans, Aurienne has taken on an illogically rigid view of morality and must learn to modify her perspective in the face of life’s extenuating circumstances.