Blood of the Silvers
The Silvers stand in opposition to the Reds. Their blood is silver and their powers are mighty. And, according to the narrator, something of much greater metaphorical significance:
“Their blood is a threat, a warning, a promise. We are not the same and never will be.”
Rohr, of House of Rhambos
The narrator describes Rohr-of the House of Rhambos, mind you—as the tiniest girl she’s ever seen. But you know what they say about things that come in small packages:
“Below us, little Rohr destroys the floor in a whirlwind, turning statues into pulverized piles of dust while she cracks the ground beneath her feet. She’s like an earthquake in tiny human form, breaking apart anything and everything in her way.”
A Done Deal: Metaphorically Speaking
The narrator has become a royal bride, promised to the king’s second son. The position affords her a bit of bargaining power and she strikes a deal to save her brothers and friend. At the king’s almost instantaneous one-word assent, “Done,” she thinks:
“It sounds less like a pardon and more like a death sentence.”
Death Sentence for the Devil
Circumstances prevail upon the narrator to the point at which it is she who becomes the object of the king’s pronouncement of a death sentence. Not exactly a forgiving type is the king, whose decree makes it clear how badly things have broken down since the deal was done:
“As for the Red girl, the trickster [she is informed] She will have no weapons at all and die like the devil she is.”
Metaphorical Juxtaposition
The novel closes on a poetically constructed metaphorical image that is subtly juxtaposed with the unpleasant imagery of the sweaty, smelly high heat of summer with which the story opens:
“A strange warmth falls over me, a warmth like the sun though we are deep underground. It’s as familiar to me as my own lightning, reaching out to envelop me in an embrace we can’t have.”
