Chapter Seven is titled "Schemes." This should be good...
We switch to Shandrazel, the king's surviving son, to open this chapter. He's flying away from his brother's funeral and indulging in some internal monologue along the way.
The most difficult thing to swallow was how plainly he'd been warned that this moment would come. Since he'd been a fledgling, he'd been taught the ceremony of succession. He'd witnessed the drama unfold over the years as one by one his older brothers vanished, banished from the kingdom, or disappearing in shame into the libraries of the biologians. Why had he never accepted that this would be his fate? Why had he been so certain that he, alone, among countless generations of royalty, could break the chains of superstition and introduce a new age of reason?
Denial -- not just a river in Egypt. *is slapped for the terrible joke* Ow... sorry.
Anyhow, Shandie does raise a good point here. The succession ceremony is stupid, and even some of the dragons themselves recognize it. Still, just because a character acknowledges in-universe that something is stupid doesn't excuse lousy world-building. Poking fun at your own flaws or your work's flaws is at least acknowledging your problems, but doesn't actually fix said problems.
Shandie looks around, trying to find a star to guide his way, but realizes the stars are blotted out... which means something's flying overhead and blocking them out. Turns out it's Zanzie, flying in for a collision course. Just how big is Zanzie that he can block out the freakin' stars?
Shandie dodges, but Zanzie uses his whip to tangle him up and force him to crash. Fiction writers, y'all need to research how whips really work. Even TVTropes acknowledges that they're pretty impractical weapons. Anyhow, Zanzie holds a knife to Shandie's throat and starts threatening him.
"You're working with the wizard, aren't you?" hissed Zanzeroth. "You're up to your eyeballs in this. You could have won the contest fairly... Instead you comspired to have your brother killed."
I didn't add those ellipses, they're in the text. Ellipses tend to indicate someone's voice or train of thought is trailing off, so having them in the middle of speech like this is awkward.
Shandie insists that's insane, but Zanzie retorts "who profits more from your brother's death?" Shandie points out that he begged his father to appoint Bodiel as king, which is a really good point, but Zanzie says that's a clever cover. Shandie really is the only dragon with any common sense, isn't he? Everyone else seems insistent in pursuing stupid trains of thought without considering all the evidence.
Shandie fights back and overpowers Zanzie, calling him a "senile old idiot." Thank you, Shandie, for calling him out. You're now my favorite character in this book.
Zanzie says he could have killed Shandie if he'd really wanted to. Shandie replies the same, and Zanzie admits that Shandie "never lacked ability as a warrior. Only bloodlust." Also he fights with his brain, not his heart. Is... that a bad thing?
"You didn't chase me down to critique my fighting techniques," said Shandrazel.
"Didn't I? I honestly believed you planned Bodiel's murder. But if you had, would I still be alive? You'd have killed me to silence me. I'm disappointed, not for the first time tonight. I guess you might be innocent after all."
Huh... that was suspiciously easy. But it turns out Zanzie's disappointed because he was hoping Shandie was a schemer and killer... because he's hoping he'll come back and kill Azkaban and become king. Do these dragons REALLY want a scheming, lying, murderous monarch on their throne? This just seems idiotic. I get that this is a different species and their sense of morality is going to be skewed from what humans see as proper morality -- Blue and Orange Morality as opposed to Black and White Morality -- but putting a dishonest scheming murderer on the throne just sounds like a recipe for disaster.
"You're his oldest friend," said Shandrazel. "How can you wish such a thing?"
"What is the future you envision? A world where your father grows increasingly old and feeble until death claims him in his sleep? This is not an honorable way to die. In his decline, the kingdom would crumble. A loving son would sever his jugular while he still enjoys life."
Yes, Maxey, we get it, your dragons are an entire race of chaotic evil beings, move on!
As if to hammer home that Shandie really is one of the few decent dragons out there and the rest of the species is sadistic, Zanzie throws two objects at Shandie's feet -- the severed heads of Cron and Tulk, described in loving gory detail that I'll spare you readers because ewwww. If you're expecting Shandie to react in horror at this sight, think again.
"Cron," said Zanzeroth, "and Tulk."
Shandrazel supposed it to be true. The faces were too distorted by death to be recognizable.
"Did you think you would spare them last night by not hunting?" Zanzeroth asked.
Shandrazel shrugged. "I hadn't given their ultimate fates a great deal of thought. But yes, part of me hoped they'd be forgotten in the confusion."
Seriously? SERIOUSLY? You were setting Shandie up to be one of the few decent dragons in this book and then you went and ruined it! He defied his father and broke centuries' worth of tradition to spare these humans and then doesn't even blink in shock when they end up dead anyhow? Not cool... just not cool. If Maxey intended to show that Shandie cares about humans and is actually a sympathetic character, he just shot himself in the foot with this scene. Give us at least one moment of shock, not a "meh" and a shrug.
Zanzie tells Shandie that his father intends to kill all the humans. Shandie retorts that he doesn't believe him, and Zanzie gives us this quote.
"The beauty of truth is that belief plays no part in whether it happens or not."
This may be the one quote I actually like in this book. It's not exactly an original thought, but it's a good quote nonetheless. Cherish it, folks, we ain't gonna get many of these...
Shandie asks why his father would do such a thing, Zanzie replies "does it matter?" and says nothing will save the humans except maybe a new king, then leaves. Sorry, after Shandie's great big "meh" just a few paragraphs ago I'm not going to believe he cares what happens to the humans at this point. Show, don't tell, Maxey.
We switch to Zanzie's POV, where he's bruised and numb from Shandie fighting him off. He thinks that "if Shandrazel grew a spine, he would be a formidable match for his father." He also thinks that he doesn't give a damn about the human race, but if Azeroth kills all the humans he'll never get revenge against the one who took his eye, so he's going to encourage Shandie to overthrow the king and save the humans so he can keep that human alive and get revenge. Okay then... sounds needlessly complicated. Why not just ask the king to keep that one human alive so you can kill him personally? Why help Shandie pull a Starscream gambit?
Yes, any excuse to throw Transformers images
into the spork
Then we switch BACK to Shandie. That POV switch only took up two paragraphs -- not even joking. Maxey switches POV a LOT in this story, and it gets confusing at points keeping track of all the characters. Stick to a handful of POV characters and cool it with the switches, dude.
Shandie's flying day and night to escape the kingdom, because apparently he has twenty-four hours to get the heck out of Dodge before all the kingdom's citizens are duty-bound to kill him. This tradition just gets stupider and stupider -- how has the royal line not wiped itself out entirely by this point? Especially since it was established earlier that dragons don't reproduce as often as humans? The sun-dragons should have driven themselves to extinction by this point.
Apparently most of Shandie's brothers fled to the Ghostlands to the north, but Shandie's going south to someplace called the College of Spires. And just as the name suggests, it's a city of hundreds of copper spires where the smartest dragons gather to study and learn. He's hoping his mentor, Chapelion (slightly less silly than the other dragon names), will give him sanctuary, since he's a dragon of reason and is against a lot of the superstitions of the dragon's mythology. This book really does like to get its digs in against religion whenever it can, which makes the ultra-Christian "prolog" all the more confusing.
Shandie lands in a courtyard with a fountain and is greeted by a bunch of sky-dragons, including Chapelion, who's "draped in the green silk scarves that denoted his rank among the scholars." It's hard to picture a dragon wearing clothes, but at least I appreciate Maxey trying to establish a bit of culture among his dragons, even if it seems silly for wvyern-like dragons to use weapons and wear clothes like humans.
Surprisingly few pictures of dragons in scarves came up in
Google search... but this one was cute
"Shandrazel!... You've come back!" [Yes, I added those ellipses because I trimmed out the non-dialogue part of the sentence.]
"An interesting assertion," said Shandrazel, falling back into the ongoing joke he shared with his former mentor. "I admit there's anecdotal testimony to support your claim, but do you have any physical evidence?"
Chapelion hits him -- not because of the bad joke, but because Shandie was stupid to come here. He says that in a few minutes he and every other dragon in the college will be bound by law to slay him. Whoops... not a good idea you had there, Shandie.
"You, sir, are the dragon who taught me that an unjust law may be disobeyed in good conscious. [Don't you mean conscience, Shanzie? Insert "you keep using that word" meme here...] This is no gamble. I've come here to seek sanctuary and your advice."
"You'll receive neither," said Chapelion.
"Please," said Shandrazel. "If you'll listen to me, I-"
"No!" snapped Chapelion, his scaly brow furrowing until his eyes were mere slits. "Your presence here dooms us all! We are scholars, not warriors. If Albekizan's armies come here, there are no walls to protect us, no gates to defend."
"He need not learn I'm here," said Shandrazel. "Is there a dragon among this crowd who would betray me? I know I can count on your loyalty. We citizens of the college are bound with a camaraderie that may endure any test."
"You fool!" said Chapelion. "Did I teach you nothing in your years here? You dare speak of camaraderie when your reckless action could mean the death of every student before you. You speak of loyalty yet apparently give no care that Albekizan may torch these hallowed spires and render to ash the accumulated wisdom of three hundred generations. Leave this place!"
Aside from the typo up there (I thought Maxey had this edition edited for typos?), Chapelion has a really good point. If all dragons are duty-bound to kill Shandie, and anyone who disobeys can be punished with death, then Shandie being at the college at all puts Chapelion and all the scholars and students in a bad situation. We're probably supposed to hate Chapelion for not giving Shandie sanctuary, but at the same time Chappie has to decide whether one dragon's life is worth all his students' lives. And it makes Shandie look terrible -- well, worse after the incident earlier in the chapter -- when he puts all his supposed friends' lives in danger by assuming they'll hide him among their numbers.
Yes, I'm unsympathetic toward Shandie here. Because Maxey really hasn't given us a reason to care about him by this point.
Chappie orders the students to kill Shandie. Shandie says he doesn't want to hurt anyone, but the students start throwing stones at him. A few charge him, but he drives them back by snapping at them... and then realizes that if he stays he'll be forced to hurt, even kill, other students to save himself. FINALLY he has a sympathetic moment, but by this point I don't even care about him and am kind of rooting for the other dragons to rip him to shreds.
Looking for fighting dragon pics because dangit I want some
actually epic dragon vs. dragon action here...
Shandie finally flies off, and we get another page break... and another POV switch. Goodie, which character I don't care about are we gonna follow now... oh, it's Jandra! The girl raised by dragons, if you forgot already...
Jandra and Vortex are sleeping in a log cabin in the mountains, where they've been hiding for the past two weeks. Wait, what, two weeks? I thought only twenty-four hours had passed since Bodiel kicked the bucket. Did we really have a two-week timeskip just now, or does Maxey just suck at keeping track of his own timeline? If it's the former then why not save this for the next chapter, and if it's the latter why wasn't this caught in editing? Ugh...
Jandra's bored and wants a book -- I know your pain, girl, I want an actually decent book by this point. Vortex is sleeping under a quilt, and there's a stew of squirrel and potatoes boiling on the stove that they've been eating for the past three days. I thought dragons were carnivorous -- why is one eating potatoes? Logic, what's that?
Jandra couldn't help but think back to the feast held at the palace the night before the contest. She imagined the tables piled high with roasts and freshly harvested vegetables and crusty breads frosted with white flour. She could still taste the grilled trout she'd consumed that night; for desert [sic] she'd had fresh strawberries in syrup.
Again... I thought these dragons were carnivores. Maxey hasn't outright stated what their typical diet is, but he HAS established that their jaws look like a crocodile's -- namely, like this:
Those are the teeth of a carnivore -- pointed teeth designed for grabbing and tearing prey. An omnivore would have some incisors and molars as well, for cutting and grinding plants and other vegetable matter. These dragons should not be omnivorous, so why would they be serving veggies and bread and strawberries at their feast? Surely not all for Jandra's benefit if she's the only human there. But Maxey wanted a luxurious medieval-style feast, so he wrote one in despite it not making sense in this context.
Jandra lays down beside Vortex, snuggling under the quilt and resting her head on his shoulder. Um...
Dear bad fiction writers, PLEASE keep the bestiality allusions out of your work. This is weird to read, especially after the earlier passage about girls getting hot for dragons.
Not helping the awkwardness of this scene is Jandra having flashbacks of being a child and having Vortex cradle her. I get that she's supposed to feel some paternal tenderness toward him, but it's still weird to read.
Apparently Jandra's parents died in a fire when she was a baby, and Vortex rescued her and raised her. She's thought about researching to see if she has any surviving family, but Vortex tells her searching is fruitless because her parents were migrants and nobody knows where they came from. This is a little suspicious to me, but we'll see if this pans out into anything later.
Sometimes, in the weightless, dark void of pre-slumber, she could still smell the smoke of that long ago fire that had taken her family, and still see the blue talons reaching down into her crib to rescue her.
If she was a baby, how could she remember this? Most people don't remember being babies... but hey, we need a dramatic and sweet moment here, so forget logic, we're getting one!
Vortex wakes up at that moment and announces he's going to leave for a few hours to meet with another dragon who might help them -- Chakthalla, wife of the dragon who Blasphet killed years ago. Yeesh, Maxey really is in love with his silly names...
Chakthalla might help them, he says, but she also keeps a ton of humans as pets, even breeding them like show dogs. Jandra's disgusted by this, though Vortex points out that this means she has an economical interest in resisting Afghanistan's plot, as well as an emotional stake if Blasphet's involved. And of course, because she's supposed to be our rebellious princess character, Jandra wants to come with Vortex, even though he insists it's dangerous. There's a fine line between making your character a rebellious and spirited character, and making them an idiot.
Vortex and Jandra leave the cabin and head down to the river, where Vortex hangs back in the trees with Jandra while sending an illusion of himself into an open area to meet with his contact from Chakthalla's palace, a sky-dragon named Simonex. Did Maxey run out of steam making up silly names for the dragons and just tag "ex" to the end of a human name?
A sky-dragon emerges from the fog... but it's not Simonex. The sky-dragon they're facing is not only holding Simonex's severed head (we're apparently supposed to be horrified by this despite the fact that we never met this dragon), but has wings shredded down to tatters, which is apparently a punishment reserved for dragons who've committed "property crimes such as the murder of humans."
Just how many characters are going to be thrown at us over the course of this book? And we aren't even done yet -- we've got more coming in. Brace yourselves...
More dragons with shredded wings -- tatterwings -- emerge from the forest to surround the fake Vortex, some armed with spears and swords. Again, why do dragons need weapons, especially human-styled weapons? Especially when they don't have hands to carry them in?
"Before your friend died he told us you work for the king," the tatterwing said, sounding smug. "Said there'd be quite the ransom for you. In the meantime, those fancy jewels in your wings will make a good down payment."
The fake Vortex gives a threat, and the tatterwings respond by throwing nets at him. Given that this Vortex is an illusion they pass right through... but one net manages to land right on the real Vortex because we need a cheap conflict right now. The tatterwings freak out and decide Vortex is too dangerous to be held hostage and rush to kill him. Again, cheap conflict is cheap.
Vortex, of course, fights back with magic, turning weapons to ash and burning off the face of one dragon who attacks Jandra. Not describing THAT in detail because again, ewwwww.
Jandra struggled to her feet. She rose to find herself face to face with Vendevorex who said in a firm tone, "None can escape."
Jandra understood. A single survivor could reveal their location to the king.
Understandable... but still brutal. Jandra grabs a spear and stabs a dragon in the back, and we get a loving description of her feeling the spear pierce "hide and muscle and gristle." Maxey, you don't have to describe all the blood and gore for us, some of us just ate...
Jandra breaks down crying because she's never had to kill someone before. Vortex apologizes for not training her to fight, then goes and searches the bodies of the dead dragons. One happens to be carrying a letter from Chakthalla (that name sounds like it belongs in the Black Panther movie, seriously), but before we get to see what it says we get ANOTHER POV switch! Holy crap, how much can we pack into one chapter? How long IS this chapter anyhow?
We get King Idiot this time, waking up from sleep as he senses "an alien presence in the room." Someone strikes a match and lights an oil lamp -- do these dragons not breathe fire? And yes, it's Blasphet in the king's room. This would be a creepy scene if I cared at all what happened to the idiot king by this point...
"Blasphet," Albekizan said, standing, stretching, fighting off the stiffness of interrupted sleep. "It's late. Why did the guards let you in?"
"They didn't. I killed them," Blasphet said with a shrug. "It was depressingly simple. No challenge at all in killing such a dim-witted lot. Try to replace them with something a little brighter next time."
"I assigned all my best guards to cover you," Albekizan said.
"Oh dear," Blasphet said. "I have more bad news for you then."
King Idiot, why are you trusting the insane killer again? This is your cue to throw him back in the dungeon, or just cut his throat already. If I were you I'd be questioning right now if this is really worth it. But nope, Alligator has no common sense and just wants to see what Blasphet's been planning. Idiot.
Turns out Blasphet's plan is to built a Free City for humans to live in. Um... what? Even Alakazam says this is a stupid plan, though not in so many words.
"I asked you to plot the destruction of all mankind and you design a housing project. This is unexpected, even from you..."
"...You can't see it, can you?" Blasphet said. "Let me explain the beauty of this plan."
Albekizan said, "Go on."
And, come the dawn, Albekizan considered the inky paper stretched out before him to be the loveliest thing under all the sky.
We don't get to learn the details of this plan, because we've reached the end of the chapter... and the end of Part I. Whee, we're making progress.
It really is hard to get through this book because so far, none of the characters are likable or sympathetic. I feel like we can't really root for anyone here, even supposedly sympathetic characters like Jandra or Vortex or Shandie. Even the title character has hardly shown up throughout the first third of the book, though perhaps that's for the best because I couldn't stand him in the first place.
I'm seriously considering taking a break from Bitterwood to spork a shorter book, much as I took a break from Revealing Eden to spork Hamlet's Father. Should I do that, or just persevere through Bitterwood and save the shorter book for later? Thoughts anyone?
