What Feasts at Night

Kingfisher frequently employs allusion to situate the novella within a broader literary and cultural tradition. For instance, the author makes an early reference to fairy tales when Easton asserts, “If this was a fairy tale, it was the kind where everyone gets eaten […] not the sentimental kind” (1), and this statement immediately signals Kingfisher’s subversion of traditional narrative expectations. Rather than invoking the conventions of comforting or moralistic folklore, Kingfisher alludes to the darker, cautionary roots of fairy tales, aligning the novella with an older, more brutal storytelling tradition. This allusion therefore acts as a warning that this narrative shaped by dread, ambiguity, and the inevitability of suffering. This type of allusion also reinforces the book’s thematic focus on The Tension between Folk Belief and Rational Inquiry. Easton’s invocation of fairy tales functions both as humor and as meta-commentary, acknowledging that ka is stepping into a narrative archetype even as Easton’s words seek to resist it.

Kingfisher frequently employs personification appears throughout the novella, imbuing natural and inanimate elements with intention, personality, and mood. This device reinforces Gallacia’s uncanny atmosphere and deepens Easton’s emotional connection to kan surroundings. Hob, for instance, is consistently personified as an empathic individual with near-human sensibilities, as when Easton notes, “Hob clearly sensed my anxiety [but was] too well-mannered […] to make anything out of it” (5). Later, Easton notes, “Hob did not appreciate being used to pull things […] he explained to me that he was not a draft horse” (99). By treating the horse as a human character, these moments lend humor and warmth to the narrative while subtly reinforcing the theme of caretaking as a reciprocal relationship.

Personification also intensifies the Gothic tone, particularly when the silence is portrayed as an active force. As Easton states, “The silence of the woods was disquieting, but the silence of a horse […] is eloquent” (14). This pattern is intensified later when Easton asserts, “The silence laughed at my feeble efforts” (119). As time goes on, the silence gains a predatory presence, contributing to the blending of Easton’s psychological and supernatural dread. By personifying the silence, Kingfisher strategically blurs the line between Easton’s trauma and the moroi’s haunting, rendering the environment itself complicit in stoking Easton’s fears.