Just a reminder that Cassian lends Nesta, the consummate book lover, his favorite book, The Dance of Battle. And Nesta proceeds to inhale it and later discuss it with him, along with reading more books like it, when she realizes its subject is a common interest of hers too.

That alongside the sex and the training, these two also became friends.

(And you know the moment Nesta realized Cass left his personal copy of that book for her, some part of her was a goner, even if she did try to deny it for a while longer, bless her.)

Nothing is as validating as getting DMs of people finishing HOFAS and say that all the actual signs point to ACOTAR5 being Azriel's book.

Oh? Sarah told you all twice since ACOSF that she thinks it's pretty obvious, she'll make it obvious she won't hide the next MC 🥸

HOFAS makes it even more obvious. I'm pretty excited to talk about potential plot points for ACOTAR5 and the implications of the crossover! There's a lot to unpack with Azriel alone.

We'll come back to that eventually I still have some HOFAS posts and then it's time to reread ACOSF!

ACOTAR 6 Theory

Here's my crack theory in it's barest form. This is meant to be fun, since now we know magic beans exist, so nothing matters anymore. But here is what my mind has been churning around since my CC reread and preview on SJMs website.:

(Spoilers for CC2, ACOSF, and the Prologue and First Chapter of HOFAS)

The girls in Koschei's lake are mystics and he's using them to glean information about the trove via going into people's minds or outright spying inside spaces that should otherwise be warded. Hence, "shadows can be blinded". I think he needs some combination of the Trove and Truth Teller to break his confines (for what? Here's where I'm not sure. At present, I do think he is Asteri, which is another word for Daglan and Death God, and he was entrapped by one of the OG fae rebellion who threw the Asteri out. Yes, this means his "siblings" the Bone Carver & Weaver would also be diminished Asteri not at their full powers)

Rigelus drops hints about having a masterful plan that he completely orchestrated via manipulating every event to work into what the Asteri need. This includes "tugging" people to do what he wanted (Hunt & Bryce joining the rebellion to activate their gifts etc) without them even realizing what was happening. He was aware of everyone's actions, because of the mystics. So nobody willingly betrayed Bryce/Hunt/Ruhn & co. It happened because he simply had access to that information and he played them like chess pieces on a game he was always going to win.

My theory banks entirely on Koschei playing the same game, which I believe was hinted to us via the "I've been preparing for you for a long time" line in ACOSF. Bearing that in mind, if he does truly want Truth Teller and the trove, who else is conveniently looking for information about the trove? Merrill. Who conveniently got information about the trove from TWO PEOPLE who were asked NOT to share said information? Merrill. Seems like the type of strings some overarching Big Bad would pull to get the chess pieces to align in such a way to bring the trove to himself without him doing any of the work. **

Also conveniently, what does the IC have at their disposal to also be able to glean information about a shadowed foe? A Seer. Granted, Elain has already said that most of Koschei is all "mist and shadow", but perhaps there will be a way to break through that mist and shadow (maybe using truth teller, which she was able to wield and possibly winnow with........But that's a theory for another time). Perhaps she will need to start shielding her unwarded mind of "tangled vines" to keep him out. Perhaps she can use tangled vines to get through his mist and shadow.

There's other pieces to this theory that I'm not discussing because they involve spoilers for CC3. But I wanted all of this in one place so I can come back to it later and adjust/erase/refine as needed once I have the actual book in my hands tomorrow <3

** The Merrill-is-Compromised Theory has already been discussed by several other beautiful people in this fandom, and if you can tag them in the comments, I'll add to this post. TY!!!

Nesta rolled her eyes and the gesture was so normal that Cassian's smile became more genuine, edged now with relief.

You wear your heart for all to see, brother, Rhys said without turning Cassian's way.

Cassian only shrugged. He was past caring.

—ACOSF, ch. 37

"Nesta had never heard a voice like Gwyn's—by turns trained and wild, as if there was so much sound fighting to break free of Gwyn that she couldn't quite contain it all. As if the sound needed to be loose in the world."

This is how Sarah J. Maas writes artistic expression in her main characters. Aelin. Feyre. Bryce. Nesta. A description of them like this is in every one of their book arcs—where artistic expression originating from that character needs to be in the world.

I don't think SJM gifts this experience, this need to express artistically, to women characters if she doesn't plan to give them the space to tell their own story, where typically artistic expression is a key into who her main characters are and what they need.

In ACOSF, SJM writes about the priestesses training to be Valkyries with Gwyn, Emerie, and Nesta, as though SJM has an entire future plot for all of them already in her head as she wrote it.

Probably not a controversial observation for most of us, but it bears saying because, wow, it's so clear to me as a reader, I'd be shocked if they aren't central to one of the future books.

I just had a revelation as I continue to reread ACOSF post-HOFAS...

The bargain between Nesta and Cassian, that produces their eight-pointed star bargain tattoos, is what finally causes Nesta to start training.

(HOFAS spoilers after the break)

I know this sounds obvious. I've read ACOSF a bazillion times at this point.

But in the past, whenever I thought about their bargain, I have always had at the forefront of my mind the personal impact of the bargain on both of them — how much it means to Cassian that she give training a try, and the fact that Nesta calls in her side of the bargain as part of their lovers' quarrel about their mating bond.

But without this bargain (i.e., Nesta trains for one hour in exchange for a favor from Cassian), Nesta Archeron would not have begun to train.

And if she had not begun to train, the priestesses, Gwyn, and Emerie would not have begun to train.

And (you see where I'm heading with this), this means that without this bargain, the Valkyries would never have been reformed.

The fact that in HOFAS, Bryce connects Nesta's eight-pointed star bargain tattoo to Gwydion/the Starsword, and challenges Nesta to go find out what they may have to do with each other... 🤯

And also given the fate-laden way the scene where Gwyn cuts the ribbon is written, as a turning point that everyone senses but can't fully understand yet...

I'm one of those readers that absolutely thinks the Mother / Urd is a deity who acts in and through the lives of those in these stories. (I would probably be a priestess if I lived in Prythian...)

I'm just in awe and totally hyped to see, on this post-HOFAS reread of ACOSF, all the ways SJM has imbued Nesta's personal story of healing with significance related to the wider magical conflict.

And maybe part of what Nesta will find out is that the eight-pointed star tattoo represents the moment she made a choice that would change everything, and that maybe the Mother made the tattoo that shape to both honor and reveal that change.

Not me just crying and crying every time I reread the moment Gwyn signs up for training (at the end of "Novice"), and the precious, delicate scene that follows (at the start of "Blade") in which she exits the House of Wind for the first time in years, enters the training ring in her robes, hands shaking, eyes soaking in every sunlit detail, and Nesta and Cassian are buzzing with excitement but are also just so open and responsive to whatever she needs because they believe in the training as a thing that can help a person feel strong and no longer helpless, and as they get started they just get it right (meaning, there is no judgment, only openness, from both of them, toward Gwyn, striking the exact balance of respect and care) and everything about this stretch of scenes just makes me cry because I love all three of these characters so much and it's SJM's writing at it's best as far as I'm concerned 🥹😭🥹😭🥹

And when I can manage to zoom out of my comfort place that is the ACOSF story, it's evident to me that the treatment Gwyn gets by SJM in this story, in which Gwyn is first introduced to us through her friendship with Nesta, screams of an investment in a character whose full story she plans to tell in the future.

The way Sarah J. Maas writes Nesta working through her anxiety, fear, and PTSD triggered by the sound of a fire crackling...the scene in ACOSF ch. 56 where Nesta asks the House to light a fire so Nesta can work through her responses to the sound, and begin to retrain her brain to accept the discomfort and separate the sound from her memory of her father's death......

This is written in a way that tells me SJM has probably experienced something like this before. It's accurate in a way that exceptionally matches my lived experience of having to work through these same things.

And it means the world to me to read a strong, badass main character experience this same thing I do.

It's remarkable and almost breathtaking the trust Nesta has in Cassian.

In ACOSF chapter 47, Nesta is approaching the lowest she's ever been in her life, running through Velaris away from a confrontation in which she hurt her sister and herself in the short span of a few minutes.

That Nesta allows Cassian to swoop down from the sky and carry her up and away, flying for hours curled in his arms, when she's feeling how she feels in this moment of her life...

Nesta needs to save herself — no one else can do it but her.

But to me there is no question her relationship with Cassian transforms her and pushes her to grow in the ways she needs so that she can save herself.

(And while the physical combat training is a great metaphor for what I'm referring to, it isn't precisely what I mean when I say "save herself" — I mean having the courage to face her mistakes, realize she cannot be perfect, that this fact is okay, and that choosing to live and not dissociate is the braver, stronger choice, even when doing so makes her feel weak and broken sometimes. It's coming when they reach the lake in three chapters, and then continues through the rest of the book, but it begins here with a safe person with which to begin walking toward those truths...)

Having a person like Cassian in Nesta's life who has the strength to create a scaffold of support around her at her lowest and most vulnerable...

It is a treasure and a gift. (I am speaking from personal experience here as well.)

Because as we will see as they begin to hike in the Sleeping Mountains, Nesta's will is beaten to the ground by her own broken thoughts, to the point where she isn't able to decode the world around her accurately. She requires care and a firm, loving accompaniment through the darkness she needs to traverse to get to the other side. That person for her is Cassian.

Nesta and the Cauldron 💫 - a list of questions and puzzle pieces post-HOFAS

"... Wrapped in black eternity, Nesta and the Cauldron twined, burning through the darkness like a newborn star."

—from "Beginning," the prologue of A Court of Silver Flames

(HOFAS spoilers after the break)

I began rereading ACOSF post-HOFAS and boy was I shocked and delighted by what I found in the very first scene of the book, which is also one of my favorite scenes in all of SJM canon...

Here's a screenshot of the last part of the prologue to ACOSF, called "Beginning".

After reading HOFAS, and learning what we did from the Starborn Princess Silene, along with the events of that book as well as those in ACOSF and going all the way back to ACOMAF,

I have new questions!

What could it mean that Nesta and Elain, both humans, were submerged in the Cauldron in the same way the magical objects of the Fae like Gwydion, Truthteller, and the Dread Trove items were? Does the fact that they were alive themselves first, and human at that, make a difference? (We know from the Blood Rite magic that Nesta is not recognized as a Made magical object in the Rite because her magic is suppressed like everyone else's...)

Was the Cauldron in Hybern different (more corrupt, perhaps from Fionn's death and his potential link to the health of the world in which Prythian resides), than it was when it Made Gwydion, Truthteller, and the Trove items? Or was its corruption (wrongness) the same kind that originates from the Daglan poisoning it before Gwydion and the Trove were Made?

When Nesta stole a large portion of the Cauldron's "raw power," was there more to the power besides its connection to Death, that somehow ties in to either the Starborn power that originates and thrives in the island of the Prison, or perhaps instead to the ancient Fae power that predates the seasonal and solar elemental power affinities that evolved after the time of High King Fionn? Is it similar or different to the way the Starsword/Gwydion and its imbued Made power has an affinity for the Staborn line of Fae?

We know at the end of ACOSF and from HOFAS that the Mother prevents all of Nesta's stolen power from leaving her when she bargains with the Cauldron and the Mother to save Feyre - and here in the ACOSF prologue Nesta and the Cauldron together are described as a newborn star. In being Made by the Cauldron, then first stealing its power but later being gifted back with some of it by the Mother - is there a connection or affinity here also to the power of the land on which the Prison sits that was forged through this process?

Regarding Nesta's bargain tattoo, which was an eight pointed star, the symbol of the Starborn power and its people - is the Mother (Urd in Midgardian parlance) the source of bargain magic in Prythian? As Bryce asks to Nesta - Why was Nesta's bargain tattoo with Cassian an eight pointed star? And also, why do the Illyrians (who were created by the Daglan but led by their ancester Enalius in alliance with the Fae in defeating those same Daglan) have a sword technique and sequence that takes this shape too? And what do any of these details have to do with 1) Gwydion and its Making in the Cauldron, and/or 2) Nesta and HER Making in the Cauldron?

And don't think I've forgotten about Elain - the longtime question of What happened when she went in the Cauldron? remains but with the added layer of how her own experience in the Cauldron and its gifting of Seer powers may or may not be similar or different to not only how the ancient Fae Made objects were imbued with power but also how her sister Nesta was imbued with (that same?) power?

Put differently, is this newborn star imagery (experience?) of Nesta and the Cauldron unique to Nesta because of the amount (and kind) of raw power she took, or is it shared among all humans who have been immersed in the Cauldron (of which we know of three - Nesta, Elain, and Briallyn, though Briallyn is now Unmade - and Jurian we can assume was brought back using the Cauldron with his eye but from what we can tell he has come back human and not Fae, and so we can presume while he was brought back from a terrible half existence, he wasn't Made, at least we have no evidence he has been...)

I'm just really, really interested in the following puzzle pieces:

-Gwydion, Truthteller, and the Trove were Made in the Cauldron

-Nesta and Elain were also Made in the Cauldron, but when Nesta was made she stole raw power from the essence of the Cauldron itself, enough to disable it for a time

-This transfer of power from the Cauldron to Nesta reminds me of how Silene talks about the power of the ancient Fae of Prythian including the Starborn power, and the material way Theia's Star power gets divided into three parts that are reunited by Bryce but that had actual physical locations for thousands of years (pointing out as well that the Cauldron has also always had a physical, material location throughout history)

-The Mother gifted Nesta with some of the power she had stolen then offered back in a bargain to save Feyre - we see that gifted power in action in HOFAS to great effect

-Nesta's bargain tattoo with Cassian was the symbol of the Staborn people and their power and also the symbol of an Illyrian sword technique

-Bryce, Starborn Heir, thinks these things connect Nesta to Gwydion, which was Made by the Cauldron just like Nesta was and which can be wielded by those who possess the Starborn power in some capacity

-Nesta can move through the wards in the Prison in a way no one else in Prythian seems to be able to, and in a way Bryce (Starborn line descendent) could too

I'm not going to actually predict any concrete theories from all of this. But we also know SJM committed to the existence of a multi-verse when KoA was published, after which HOEAB was published, followed by ACOSF....lots of time to think through how she was going to describe Nesta stealing power from the Cauldron in this scene.

I think there's meaning in this ACOSF prologue we are only just beginning to understand, about what the consequences of this tangling between Nesta and the Cauldron will in fact be. 💫

(And, it's the year of our Lord 2024 and there are new things to write and think about Nesta and the Cauldron - what a time to be alive 💃)

Cassian dreaming of Gwydion and foreshadowing Ataraxia and his own HEA 😭🙌🏻

[Cassian observing Ataraxia on Rhys's desk]

"The great sword's hilt was a simple cross guard, the pommel a rounded bit of metal.

Gwydion, the last of the magic swords, had been dark as night and as beautiful.

How many games had Cassian played as a child with Rhys and Azriel, where a long stick had been a stand-in for Gwydion? How many adventures had they imagined, sharing that mythical sword between them, as they slew wyrms and rescued damsels?

Never mind that Rhys's particular damsel had slain a wyrm herself and rescued him instead."

—ACOSF, ch. 42

My absolute favorite HOFAS spoiler after the break as I lose my mind over this moment in ACOSF after having read HOFAS 🥹

I am screaming at how this moment is in ACOSF, Nessian's book — then cut to HOFAS where Cassian's badass mate Nesta slays a damned wyrm with the same magical sword he's looking at here (which she herself Made by the way 💁🏼‍♀️), the same one that makes him think of Gwydion, which in fact is in his very same mate's possession by the end of HOFAS 😭🙌🏻‼️

All the times I read this before HOFAS, there was always something kind of bittersweet and sad about the way Cass's train of thought here ends on Rhys and Feyre and how badass his High Lady is, and how grateful Cass clearly is for the way she saves his brother by loving him...

I always assumed SJM was partly leaning into the fairytale trope of dragon slaying by looking back to that very first book in the series where she brought the Middengard Wyrm onto the page and used it to further characterize her main heroine at the time, Feyre.

Little did we know SJM, with this moment in ACOSF, was also pointing to the future and, for Cassian in particular, creating an echo simultaneously forward and back in time to when his own mate would go on to not only slay the same kind of wyrm, but would do it wielding the immense power of the very same new magical sword, Ataraxia, on the table before him — and only because he loves her and trains her to wield it 😭🙌🏻

Cass is filled with such longing in this moment. I'm floored in the most amazing SJM-induced way that this longing ABSOLUTELY gets fulfilled.

And again, in past readings of ACOSF that fulfillment was legible in part by how at the end of ACOSF Nes finally claims Cass as her mate then literally saves him when she erupts and Un-Makes Briallyn, in whose thrall he is trapped. That was always amazing enough, a beautiful HEA in its own right.........

BUT TO THIS CASS OF ACOSF CH. 42 I SAY: YOU HAVE NO IDEA OF THE RICHES OF DREAMS FULFILLED YOUR HAPPILY EVERY AFTER WITH NESTA HAS IN STORE 😭 JUST YOU WAIT MY DUDE

(Can you even imagine how Cassian must have felt, what his reaction was when Nesta came home after her adventures with Bryce in the tunnels under Prythian, and he learned what Nesta did to that wyrm with Ataraxia? He must have melted into a mated puddle of goo to the tune of "That's my fucking mate, y'all!" 🥹)

"Nesta began."

Nesta Week 2024 ~ Day 2: Metamorphosis ~ @nestaarcheronweek

{a short meta about ACOSF Ch. 50 meant to capture a little of my thinking about the most significant metamorphosis Nesta undergoes in her story}

My experience of reading ACOSF Ch. 50 is one of metamorphosis: both as a reader because I am transformed every time I read it, and in seeing Nesta undergo the most essential, vital transformation of her life so far, during the span of this scene.

It isn't caused by magic, or trauma, or things happening to her in the plot.

Instead, it's the transformation from someone who does not believe themselves to be worthy of love, into someone with the bravery to try to believe they are.

Cassian drew the Illyrian blade from down his back. It gleamed with moonlight as he extended it to her hilt-first. “Take it.” Blinking, eyes still puffy with tears, she did. The blade dipped as she wrapped her hands around it, as if she didn’t expect its weight after so long with the wooden practice swords. Cassian stepped back. Then said, “Show me the eight-pointed star.” She studied the blade, then swallowed. Her features were open, fearful but so trusting that he nearly went to his knees. He nodded toward the blade. “Show me, Nesta.” Whatever she sought in his face, she found it. She widened her stance, bracing her feet on the stones. Cassian held his breath as she took up the first position. Nesta lifted the sword and executed a perfect arcing slash. Her weight shifted to her legs just as she flipped the blade, leading with the hilt, and brought up her arm against an invisible blow. Another shift and the sword swept down, a brutal slash that would have sliced an opponent in half. Each slice was perfect. Like that eight-pointed star was stamped on her very heart. The sword was an extension of her arm, a part of her as much as her hair or breath. Every movement bloomed with purpose and precision. In the moonlight, before the silvered lake, she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. Nesta finished the eighth maneuver, and returned the sword to center. The light in her eyes shone brighter than the moon overhead. Such light, and clarity, that he could only whisper, “Again.” With a soft smile that Cassian had never seen before, standing on the moon-washed shores of the lake, Nesta began.

This beautiful, vulnerable, powerful moment at the end of ACOSF Ch. 50 comes after the harrowing experience of Nesta finally speaking aloud to her trusted person what she feels about herself.

And of course—I say this all the time—SJM is a romance writer, which means Nesta's trusted person, Cassian, is who she finally cracks herself wide open with. I believe Nesta would not have been capable of finally voicing these things if not for the trust and care that had grown between her and Cassian, as both friends and lovers, leading up to this scene.

And his response to what she says about herself helps her to see light and hope again by persistently reframing her own jagged (mis)understanding of herself and her capability as instead an experience that can be honored as difficult, then walked through to a better, more light-filled existence on the other side:

"What you feel, this guilt and pain and self-loathing—you will get through it. But only if you are willing to fight. Only if you are willing to face it, and embrace it, and walk through it, to emerge on the other side of it. And maybe you will still feel that tinge of pain, but there is another side. A better side.” She pulled back from his chest then. Found his gaze lined with silver. “I don’t know how to get there. I don’t think I’m capable of it.” His eyes glimmered with pain for her. “You are. I’ve seen it—I’ve seen what you can do when you are willing to fight for the people you love. Why not apply that same bravery and loyalty to yourself?"

And:

“But I still don’t know how to fix myself.” “There’s nothing broken to be fixed,” he said fiercely. “You are helping yourself. Healing the parts of you that hurt too much—and perhaps hurt others, too.”

(I've said this about other scenes in ACOSF too, but I believe in my bones, my heart, and my soul, that this is written by someone (SJM) who has said these very same things to her own person (Josh). I have in fact said these things to my person - "I don't think I'm capable of it" was torn right from my own mouth and life. This is spot on for accuracy about what this kind of breaking open is like for someone who does not believe they are worthy of love where the person who loves them then debunks that falsehood in just the ways Cassian does here. I've said it before and I'll say it again; It's so powerful to see my lived experience on the page like this, y'all.)

There is security on the shores of the lake for Nesta, which is just the set of delicate circumstances needed to allow what we see at the very end of the chapter to blossom:

With a soft smile that Cassian had never seen before, standing on the moon-washed shores of the lake, Nesta began.

The last stretch of this chapter is in Cassian's pov. I love that it is, because the love he feels for her, the depth it expands to in response to seeing her trust, and try, and become who she is meant to be—not a magical queen, but a person who knows they are loved and is beginning to also know they deserve to be—saturates everything about this moment and scene beside the lake.

"Your story is worth telling, you know."

Just sobbing on this my billionth time reading this book and reaching these precious words offered by Gwyn to Nesta in ACOSF ch. 51. 😭

A prediction for ACOTAR 5 about the Valkyries and the Illyrians

Coming atcha from the middle of my post-HOFAS reread of ACOSF.

(HOFAS spoilers after the break)

From ACOSF, ch. 38, when Gwyn is telling Nesta and Emerie about Mind-Stilling:

"It involved deep breathing and becoming aware of one's body, then learning to let go. They [the original Valkyries] used it to remain calm in the face of their fears, to settle themselves after a hard battle, and to fight whatever inner demons they possessed."

"Illyrian warriors do no such thing," Emerie murmured. "Their heads are full of rage and battle. It's only gotten worse since the last war. Now that they're rebuilding their ranks."

What if the rebirth of the Valkyries, under Nesta, Gwyn, and Emerie, will have a direct positive effect on the Illyrians as they contend with the discovery of their origins as creations of the Daglan?

The whole second half of ACOSF, culminating in Gwyn and Emerie winning the Blood Rite and achieving the Carynthian rank and Nesta the Oristian rank, has woven into it the idea that the Valkyries reborn, under the training and tutelage of two Carynthian Illyrian warriors in Cassian and Azriel, are not quite Illyrian in technique and not wholly Valkyrie in technique, but something completely new that blends the two.

But what if, it's not only the new Valkyries that are going to benefit from the cross-pollination of fighting techniques? What if, as Azriel inevitably contends with his loathing of his own Illyrian people in ACOTAR 5, and clearly Nesta has been set up in HOFAS to play a big role in ACOTAR 5 as well (and with Nesta comes Gwyn and Emerie) — what if part of how both Az and, by extension, the Illyrians as a whole, come to terms with the fact that they were created to be almost monstrous soldier grunts for their even more monstrous Daglan overlords, and overcome the negative effects of that heritage, is to absorb the healthier approach to fighting and battle espoused by the Valkyries?

What if Az, with the Valkyrie trio and Cassian, help the Illyrians in part by showing them there is another way to be a warrior culture that doesn't cause harm to themselves (vis a vis misogyny and a rage-fueled approach to fighting), a la the Valkyries?

It seems both groups — Illyrians and Valkyries reborn — stand to gain and learn from each other, and it seems like the set up for ACOTAR 5 is the perfect opportunity to tell a story that features a symbiotic relationship between these two cultures.

(I also both wish and predict in tandem with this healing process that past clippings of female Illyrians' wings, centering Emerie but radiating out to them all, get healed and reversed through some intense creative (firstlight core under Ramiel?) magic. 👀)

It is going to be years until we get the full story (most likely in ACOTAR6), but given all the world-crossing lore we got in HOFAS, I cannot wait to get the story behind the sibling trio of Koschei, the Bone Carver, and the Weaver.