User blog comment:SaynaSLuke/Seven Tears Shed/@comment-2142396-20161115185449

Chapter 26 turned out shorter than you usually make them, so I read it and chapter 27 at once. ;) Oh dear, now I’m just going to sit there with my hand plastered to my face as Grath and the others head straight into the dragon’s jaws. Yeah, I know they have their reasons for such an approach, but it doesn’t make seeing it any less painful. :( Inbar is probably the one I feel most sorry for – he went on this quest to protect his holt from the pirates, and now he ended up unwillingly exposing them… Though on the other hand I can’t deny I almost enjoyed that Sampetrians turned out to be way smarter and more observant than the woodlanders expected them to be. Still, just how could they mistake Hood for a rabbit? :D And despite the circumstances, I can’t help but feeling like shipping Welko and Craklyn, maybe because they seem to be interacting with each other more.

And that’s right, Clecky is not a stupid rabbit, he is a stupid hare! Clecky is seriously starting to be awesome from there and I love it. I admit I didn’t exactly take him seriously before, viewing him more as a comic relief – but then, that’s a mistake a lot of beasts make in-story regarding hares. ;) I wonder how they camouflaged Tansy, too – I mean, her spikes would be a dead giveaway, so I thought she would have to cover them with shawl or cloak, but in the picture you drew with her, Clecky and Merith she wears just tunic and vest… Seems like Merith is one of those ‘small role, big impact’ characters, isn’t she? I mean, on her own she is just a greedy conniving barmaid, but if it weren’t for her, Clecky and Tansy wouldn’t have known where to go, would have got completely lost in the city and probably blown their cover sooner or later and got caught – despite his many good qualities, Clecky isn’t very good in blending in. But he stays true to himself whatever happens – even when they are in a hostile city on a deadly mission where they all can die, Clecky is still going to eat all the food he can get his paws on. :D

Now when you revealed some of Ublaz’s backstory, his interactions with Grath become so much more insightful. I mean, before I knew that something shady had happened to him, but now seeing how much of a strain for him just seeing Grath is makes me almost sorry for him. No, it doesn’t, though; I’m sorry for the young beast who suffered so much, but I have no pity for somebeast who fostered and nurtured his hatred till it poisoned him. Still, it makes me sad that holt Lutra were not so innocent of blame as Grath believes them to be… Still, their interactions are fascinating, and that comes from both sides – not only Ublaz delivers a depreciatory speech to Grath, but Grath’s response to him as she cuts short his attempts to justify his tyranny is worth the respect.

It’s true that after Grath and Inbar, Hood is in the worst position among the captives, though Ublaz didn’t seem to be really angry about him siding with woodlanders. But Ublaz had always been a practical beast, thinking about gaining an advantage above everything else. Maybe that’s why his words about wanting to build a better world for vermin against the abuse and prejudice of woodlanders didn’t seem very sincere to me – when he was speaking with Grath, it was personal for him, I could feel his anger and his frustration. During his conversation with Hood, Ublaz maintained control over his emotions… and so even though I knew of Ublaz’s tragic past, his ‘for the greater good’ speech gave me impression of a lie used to mask his own egoism and lust for power. His plan sounds especially hypocritical considering that: a. from what I get, Icetor had actually managed to achieve peace between vermin and woodlanders; b. there were a lot of instances when vermin went in war with vermin, including Ublaz himself wiping out Empress Meili’s lineage.

Oh my, it’s Hood’s own brother who gave him those scars? :o I remember you mentioned a feud for the throne in one of your comments, but this is more tragic than I expected. And Hood blames himself for it while still despising his family… You know, for some reason it seems to me that his status of exile and outcast is self-imposed. :( Okay, and it seems that Ublaz had met his match in Hood as neither of them show many emotions in their confrontation. I really liked the moment when Hood tells Ublaz that the world doesn’t revolve around him, as well as the one when Hoods said that he wouldn’t beg for his friends’ lives because Ublaz would kill them anyway – in fact, it reminded me of the scene from ‘Redwall’ when Abbot Mortimer tells Cluny that he would’ve knelt before him if that meant that Cluny would spare the other Redwallers, but he knows that he wouldn’t, and therefore wouldn’t bow to him. Also, the Flowers affected Hood more than I expected. I thought that after living among them, the effect would be similar to what Timbal had in TPF – greater strength and endurance, ability not to fall ill and probably even heal faster, but I didn’t expect that their influence would be strong enough to actually close the wounds almost immediately. And Ublaz just had to cross the line there, didn’t he? Otherwise he wouldn’t have been Ublaz. Luckily, it seems that Hood had enough residue magic left in his body to stop him from dying…

It’s not that surprising to see that Shui begins to bond with Val, they seem so much alike in their attitude, and Shui is the least hostile toward vermin, though I suspect it’s due to her less serious nature. By the way, it’s staggering and yet interesting to see the lizards’ ‘we don’t have anything against you on personal level, but we are going to kill most of you anyway because of politics’ approach. I’m also a bit confused regarding the lizards’ relations to each other. Shui and Jian are siblings, and Lord Isan is their father, but Rocks and Drip also refer to him as ‘father’ – so I guess Isan adopted them as well as Lutran? Or as a variation I think it possible for all lizards in Isan’s tribe to refer to him as ‘father’ in a sense that he, as the leader, is a father to all his tribe… And just to clarify, does Isan have wings like Jian’s? Shui mentions him along with her brother when talking of Linshi later, but he wasn’t described as having wings before.

I loved the insight into the dragon culture, since that’s something I wondered about for a long time. That explains a lot of things, particularly the origin of the ferals and their relation to the civilized dragons. It’s heartwarming to see that the alliance with Scound brought something good to the dragons for a change after the havoc vermin usually wreak wherever they go, but it also made their turn to darkness sadder, considering that the dragons already faced the similar situation with the ferals. Jeez, and to hear that even the dragons are worried about the threat of the ferals is pretty chilling – and if what they say is right, Ublaz not only bent the Monitors’ will to his own, but somehow made a way to mutate and twist them into something else? By the way, the dragons seem to be strangely okay with that part where Ublaz basically enslaves a part of their own species and turns them into biological weapon of sort, his own zombie soldiers, in fact. I mean, the dragons don’t view the ferals as their own people anymore, but if I were them, I would’ve been completely freaked out by the perspective, especially considering that the ferals were once sentient and speaking creatures just like them, even if that was generations ago. :o

I liked Romsca’s reflections on the situation; it sounds grave, but I liked seeing her being so self-critical. Arashi is right when she says that Romsca should remember all the things she managed to do right and the beasts she had saved instead of blaming herself for everything she failed in, but Romsca’s guilt-tripping herself makes for great development. ;) Lord Isan’s demand that Romsca and the others have to kill the ratguards to prove their loyalty seems to be quite cruel, since they would have to turn against their own people… and yet, it’s a necessity if the dragons were ever to trust them, so I can see their reasoning for such a test. Doesn’t make it easier for Romsca and crew, though…