Kingfisher’s The Sworn Soldier follows Easton through multiple encounters with supernatural forces that subvert conventional perspectives on monstrosity and victimhood. Across the novellas, Kingfisher repeatedly complicates the moral definition of a “monster” by presenting entities that are simultaneously sentient, ignorant, and dangerous rather than inherently malicious. These encounters also alter how the characters—namely Easton and Denton—view their circumstances, revealing how trauma alters perception and judgment.

In What Moves the Dead (2022), Easton and Denton confront a parasitic fungal organism described as both deadly and ignorant—"it was childlike in its way: as innocent as any newborn serpent, and far more dangerous” (119). The fungus is capable of “puppeting” and animating bodies of both the living and dead, dissolving boundary between parasite and host. By framing the fungus as sentient yet unaware of the harm it causes, Kingfisher resists morally condemning it.

This moral ambiguity deepens in What Feasts at Night (2024), the second novella, in which Easton and Angus confront a moroi—a spirit that steals the breath from the living. Although the creature’s attacks are violent and horrifying, the narrative roots her existence in injustice—the result of murder and improper burial. Once again, the supernatural threat emerges not from inherent evil but from suffering.

What Stalks the Deep continues this trajectory, revisiting the moral logic of the first novella while emphasizing the lingering impacts of the traumas Denton and Easton previously faced. The text draws several parallels between the sentient fungus and the Wholeness. Both entities use fragmentation and mimicry to operate within the human world. Easton remembers how the fungus “sent out bits of itself to possess the bodies of hares and… other things… which then returned to the dark water to rejoin the larger body” (131), a pattern echoed in the separation of the Sentry and Fragment from the Wholeness.

These similarities trigger both Denton and Easton, demonstrating how their past traumas influence their present opinions. Denton, in particular, exhibits heightened vigilance and suspicion compared to his friends. While speaking with Easton, Ingold clarifies that Denton’s trauma is compounded by his time in war—”‘It brought many memories back for him, of the war’” (98). Easton’s narration likewise reflects trauma-informed perception. Though outwardly measured, their internal reflections repeatedly return to catastrophic thinking and comparisons with the deadly fungus and. For both characters, trauma has predisposed them to expect the worst.

However, What Stalks the Deep refuses to let trauma dictate the moral outcome. Unlike the fungus, which consumed and animated bodies, seeking to learn without recognizing the harm it caused, the Wholeness and Fragment do not seek infiltration into the human world. Even the Sentry, although undeniably deadly, is portrayed as warped by isolation rather than driven by bad intentions. By emphasizing this loneliness over the Sentry’s predatory behavior, Kingfisher invites both the characters and the reader to respond with empathy.

Through the deliberate similarities and differences between What Moves the Dead and What Stalks the Deep, the novel suggests that the Wholeness’s resemblance to the fungus does not justify eradication. Instead, Kingfisher proposes that connection and empathy can interrupt trauma-informed thinking, allowing characters to distinguish between resemblance and genuine threat.