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ljwritesThe final chapter in the Shadow saga. I had been going over and over the events of this chapter for over a year, and it took quite a bit of fiddling but came out mostly as envisioned. I had a feeling as though I had come home to find it an unfamiliar place, much as I felt with Chapter 18 (the Agni Kai chapter) except more intensely: This was what I had dreamed and worked toward for a long time, and the shape of the thing and most of the trappings were what I'd expected. Yet I found myself seeing with different eyes, ascribing meanings I had not thought of before, and for that reason it felt different. Maybe it was better, I don't know, it certainly felt deeper.
Two Traitors Return
I enjoy the irony that Shun's noblest moment in the story is also one of his most selfish. Sure there was the time he chose to betray Zuko, but at least then he could still plead coercion by Azula. But here, as confirmed by his later admission, he's a willing participant in a plan that he knows will deeply hurt Zuko. In fact that's the point, since that pain is what will drive Zuko to work for Shun's own agenda. He's manipulating and breaking Zuko just as much as Azula is, basically piggybacking on her plan and looking good in the process because he gets to play the part of the vassal giving his life for the liege.
And yeah, laying down one's life is often the hallmark of a noble soul, but the catch is that life needs to be worth something in order to be a meaningful sacrifice. That's not true for Shun because he's made it clear both in Chapter 19 when he told Zuko about his past and multiple times in this chapter that his life means nothing to him anymore. It's probably a combination of things that drove him to devalue his own life so badly; he was a child soldier who never expected to live to see his twentieth year, and had it drilled into him that his individual life meant nothing except as part of a greater whole. Then he lost that when his unit was wiped out, and a campaign of nihilistic violence did nothing to fill the void. His attachment to Zuko is, in many ways, a struggle to reclaim meaning.
So Shun was basically giving something that meant very little to him (life) to claim something else that meant everything (meaning and connection). That's why his It Has Been an Honor moment seems less like a noble sacrifice to me than a shrewdly calculated trade-off, one that compromised a child's well-being in the process. Not only was Zuko psychologically wounded by these events, he became much more likely to take unreasonable risks driven by his once-friend's last words. That, too, was a part of Shun's calculation, as seen in his later internal monologue.
Given how horrible the man is, I am both amused and gratified that so many readers like Shun. Maybe it's because I am under no illusions about how selfish, abusive, and manipulative the character is, and therefore neither is the story. This may, paradoxically, free readers to focus on what is sympathetic about him since they don't have to spend energy arguing with the story about how immoral his actions are. Or maybe I'm flattering myself and people just like cool swords and tragic inner conflicts. :D
One thing I always kept in mind in writing Shun is that the guy does not laugh or smile. I could have slipped up a time or two, and certainly he's made jokes and horsed around especially with Zuko, but his smiling days are long behind him. The sad part is that he used to be this most exuberant kid there was--and also a war criminal, but still. And here, for the first time in a long time he laughs, finally freed of his empty grief. I'm sure it scared the heck out of everyone around him.
In my mind I've always called this moment "The Kiss." Not in a romantic or sexual way because that's not what these two are about, but in the sense of an intimacy that remakes one's life. Translating Korean poetry comparing political allegiance to romantic love was part of my project of understanding this dynamic, and in fact it struck me later on that Shun and Zuko's parting in this scene closely paralleled this line from The Silence of My Beloved (translated here):
Come to think of it the whole poem works surprisingly well as a Shunko anthem. Of course the sentiments take a correspondingly dark tone if read that way, becoming the story of a boy driven by undeserved guilt to achieve power at all costs
Zuko boards his ship
Aaaand Zuko predictably gets off on the wrong foot with Ji. Azula would be proud. Since I made Zuko and Ji pretty much political soulmates in this story, I had to drive some kind of wedge between them to create the adversarial relationship in "The Storm." Then it occurred to me that must be Azula's goal, hence the tone of her later scene in the chapter.
Time to start
I can't find the specific trope for what Shun did to get Cheng out, though I've seen it often enough--almost always it's a male character for a female one, and usually takes the form of him saying "you'll only get in the way, so get lost." The closest equivalent would be More Hero Than Thou Type 3 (using trickery and force), but that's not really it either since it wasn't "don't do this" but rather "I'll do this with you." And of course, Shun is a jerk even when he's trying to be a gentleman. Or maybe especially when he is.
This is the second and last time Shun's chi-blocking makes an appearance. It's not exactly a Chekov's Skill since we don't see him training at it, but hey, I did foreshadow it. And I am afraid I've turned Jien's jian skill into an Informed Attribute since we never see her fighting with the blade after all, though she was in plenty of physical action. I'm comfortable with that, since security and investigation are Cheng's true work; the sword is a toy and a last resort.
Azula's fear
I think Amy summed it up perfectly when she said of this scene that Zuko is as much a bad guy to Azula as Azula is to Zuko, and she is the hero of her own story. I mean obviously Azula's means were beyond the pale which is what makes her the villain of the two, but from her extremely far-seeing point of view she may be right about her observations.
I also made Ursa a central piece of motivation for Azula, just as she is for Zuko. To me the loss of Ursa is very present in every aspect of the story, from the royal family's poisoned interactions to Zuko's original actions in Tamalan. Ozai has this entire tortured logic that makes everything Iroh's fault, and this pattern repeats itself down the generation with Azula and Zuko, with even higher stakes since Zuko is more vulnerable than Iroh and Azula craftier than Ozai.
I can't believe there aren't more stories where Azula is grieving Ursa's departure and taking it out on Zuko. Do people really buy her monstrous act so much that they think she doesn't feel Ursas's absence? I mean yes, Azula is monstrous, but she's also eleven and if anything her grief is more destructive because of who she is. She can't just honestly hurt that her mother abandoned her because that would be showing vulnerability, so she externalizes it instead into someone's failure or fault. The failure can't be her own, since her own perfection is increasingly the basis of her sanity, it has to be Zuko's and he must pay. As an added bonus she gets to pose it as a public service instead of vengeance or blame.
And yet, why does it feel like she's lost even when she's won? Zuko is no match for her, yet it's Zuko that people flock to, Zuko whom they love enough to brave danger, dishonor, and death. It's Ursa all over again, and she doesn't understand why. It's a mystery that will be her unravelling.
Shun's last stand
Just because the action of the story is winding down doesn't mean I can't wallow in gratuitous violence, especially after going without for almost two chapters. And who better for pointless violence than Shun, particularly when he doesn't give a crap anymore? Yay! This scene is also an homage to numerous last stand sequences, particularly from Korean period dramas right down to refusing to fall while the liege might be watching.
Meanwhile, in Tamalan
It felt like fitting closure to show Tamalan one last time before the story ended. Lao Tai knows the truth, of course, as stated in Chapter 20, which is why he's crying all over the place. It occurs to me that I'm having men do a lot of stereotypically feminine things--Lao Tai is weeping (though he's also doing the "dust in my eye" thing, it's not for his pride but to keep the secret) while Sanwai watches over him like a mother hen. This is partly my cultural background, where taking care of an elder is considered a man's job at least during the times they spend together. The other households also pitch in, of course, but Sanwai considers Lao Tai an uncle, almost a father.
And yes, of course they have rhino jerky from the dead rhinos back in the battle in Chapter 6. Why let good meat go to waste? I'm pretty sure they didn't go so far as to slaughter the live and healthy rhinos, though, and these were probably returned to Zhen along with the soldiers.
In a way this scene is all about what Zuko was fighting for when he decided to side with Tamalan: This old man gets to spend the last of his days in the comfort he's always known, surrounded by family and friends. It's a transient victory, maybe a small one, maybe not worth everything it ended up costing--but that's what it comes down to. I think Zuko would find the tradeoff worthwhile, too, at least if he weren't too busy stomping around being Bratty McShoutyFace to hapless sea captains.
Zuko's resolve
One Important Haircut, coming right up! This scene links up with one of Zuko's first appearances in the show where he called the Avatar a coward. It's not an unreasonable stance to take since, for all everyone knew the Avatar either couldn't, or wouldn't, step in to end the war. I think the enmity can work even with an anti-war Zuko, since he was still denying the need for a regime change and assumed he could solve things within the system. His second war meeting a few years later would disabuse him of that notion.
Sa Ye's dream
To me this was the only character who could adequately end the story, the one who really started it all and the one who can give voice to the people for whom Zuko became a symbol of hope. As reviewers have pointed out, one of the things Shadow fills in is a background for Zuko having a political base after spending a fourth of his life in exile. Children like Lijin and Sa Ye's child are going to grow up with coded references to "the Dragon King," and there are entire swathes of the adult population who risked much for him and are waiting for his return.
I purposefully created Sa Ye to be a character who is traditionally feminine but is still strong and effective, and Amy Raine, perceptive as always, noticed it too. Too often the message seems to be that while women can be heroic, traditional femininity is still icky. That just seems a new form of sexism to me. Of course I agree with the idea that women can fulfill traditionally male roles just as well as men, and I write and enjoy plenty of women characters who do just that. However, I strongly object to the idea that women have to do traditionally male things in order to be interesting or worthwhile. Or that men who do traditionally feminine things are somehow less, for that matter.
Though the drama required that Sa Ye name her unborn baby at the ending, the traditional part of me was uneasy with her calling him by his birth name. Koreans usually call the unborn by their "womb names," and it's considered bad luck to make it a fancy one since it might attract bad spirits. To call an unborn baby by not one name but two? One of them his true name at that? Oh now that's just asking for it.
"Jinha" and "Jinlong" are actually not the same language. The former is the Korean pronunciation of 珍荷, while the second is the Mandarin pronunciation of 進龍/進龙. If I were to read them consistently it would be either "Jinha" and "Jinryong," or "Zhenhe" and "Jinlong." I just chose the ones that were easiest to pronounce. Also, incidentally, since the Chinese and Korean word for "mint" is 薄荷, literally "thin lotus," she's actually calling him "Lotus Treasure." I wonder if she knows about the White Lotus or if the name is is an accident, though I have no doubt Ty Sian will have her all up in the Order's business in no time. She's already proved she can be loyal to the point of fanaticism.
Speaking of fanaticism, I wonder if anyone got a bad taste in their mouth that Sa Ye is already dedicating her son to "the cause," especially after the child's father died for the same cause. I know I do, and much like Shun's veneer of heroism I can't help but wonder if I'm looking at a badly damaged woman who'd do anything in her search for meaning, a mirror image of Shun.
On the other hand, this wasn't an age where people just made their own way in the world (if such an age ever existed)--you needed factions and family ties to get anywhere, and in a way Sa Ye is giving her son the best foundation in life she can by identifying him with a group that can give him connections and resources. She's rolling the dice, sure, but isn't that true of any investment?
Also, the invocation of the surname Dao was to show that Jinha and Khoujin are descendants of Roku on the male side, or at least part of that clan. So Zuko ended up helping his kinsmen without knowing it, and it was important to me that he not know: The point is not that he helped his relatives, but that he could just as easily have abandoned them.
Finally, I wonder if anyone noticed that all three parts of the story conclude with a parent-child relationship: Iroh and Zuko in Part 1, Ozai and Azula in Part 2, and Sa Ye with her unborn child in Part 3. To me Shadow is very much the story of family--the interlocking stories of several families, all within the giant family that is the nation. Also, really finally, if you circle back from the end of Chapter 21 to the epigraph at the beginning of Chapter 1 you can see a certain thematic connection.
I resisted writing these notes for some time because releasing these thoughts felt like letting go of the experience and I wasn't ready. I guess it's time, though, now that I'm starting on another big project. I still wonder at the intensity I felt while writing Shadow. Where did it come from? Does it have implications for a future in writing, or was it just a fluke? I guess there's only one way to find out.
Two Traitors Return
I enjoy the irony that Shun's noblest moment in the story is also one of his most selfish. Sure there was the time he chose to betray Zuko, but at least then he could still plead coercion by Azula. But here, as confirmed by his later admission, he's a willing participant in a plan that he knows will deeply hurt Zuko. In fact that's the point, since that pain is what will drive Zuko to work for Shun's own agenda. He's manipulating and breaking Zuko just as much as Azula is, basically piggybacking on her plan and looking good in the process because he gets to play the part of the vassal giving his life for the liege.
And yeah, laying down one's life is often the hallmark of a noble soul, but the catch is that life needs to be worth something in order to be a meaningful sacrifice. That's not true for Shun because he's made it clear both in Chapter 19 when he told Zuko about his past and multiple times in this chapter that his life means nothing to him anymore. It's probably a combination of things that drove him to devalue his own life so badly; he was a child soldier who never expected to live to see his twentieth year, and had it drilled into him that his individual life meant nothing except as part of a greater whole. Then he lost that when his unit was wiped out, and a campaign of nihilistic violence did nothing to fill the void. His attachment to Zuko is, in many ways, a struggle to reclaim meaning.
So Shun was basically giving something that meant very little to him (life) to claim something else that meant everything (meaning and connection). That's why his It Has Been an Honor moment seems less like a noble sacrifice to me than a shrewdly calculated trade-off, one that compromised a child's well-being in the process. Not only was Zuko psychologically wounded by these events, he became much more likely to take unreasonable risks driven by his once-friend's last words. That, too, was a part of Shun's calculation, as seen in his later internal monologue.
Given how horrible the man is, I am both amused and gratified that so many readers like Shun. Maybe it's because I am under no illusions about how selfish, abusive, and manipulative the character is, and therefore neither is the story. This may, paradoxically, free readers to focus on what is sympathetic about him since they don't have to spend energy arguing with the story about how immoral his actions are. Or maybe I'm flattering myself and people just like cool swords and tragic inner conflicts. :D
"Yes!" Shun threw his head back in a laugh that sounded like a howl of pain, then leaned in to touch his forehead to Zuko's. "I knew it."
One thing I always kept in mind in writing Shun is that the guy does not laugh or smile. I could have slipped up a time or two, and certainly he's made jokes and horsed around especially with Zuko, but his smiling days are long behind him. The sad part is that he used to be this most exuberant kid there was--and also a war criminal, but still. And here, for the first time in a long time he laughs, finally freed of his empty grief. I'm sure it scared the heck out of everyone around him.
In my mind I've always called this moment "The Kiss." Not in a romantic or sexual way because that's not what these two are about, but in the sense of an intimacy that remakes one's life. Translating Korean poetry comparing political allegiance to romantic love was part of my project of understanding this dynamic, and in fact it struck me later on that Shun and Zuko's parting in this scene closely paralleled this line from The Silence of My Beloved (translated here):
The memory of that first sharp kiss turned the compass of my destiny and backed away, step by fading step.
Come to think of it the whole poem works surprisingly well as a Shunko anthem. Of course the sentiments take a correspondingly dark tone if read that way, becoming the story of a boy driven by undeserved guilt to achieve power at all costs
Zuko boards his ship
Aaaand Zuko predictably gets off on the wrong foot with Ji. Azula would be proud. Since I made Zuko and Ji pretty much political soulmates in this story, I had to drive some kind of wedge between them to create the adversarial relationship in "The Storm." Then it occurred to me that must be Azula's goal, hence the tone of her later scene in the chapter.
Time to start
I can't find the specific trope for what Shun did to get Cheng out, though I've seen it often enough--almost always it's a male character for a female one, and usually takes the form of him saying "you'll only get in the way, so get lost." The closest equivalent would be More Hero Than Thou Type 3 (using trickery and force), but that's not really it either since it wasn't "don't do this" but rather "I'll do this with you." And of course, Shun is a jerk even when he's trying to be a gentleman. Or maybe especially when he is.
This is the second and last time Shun's chi-blocking makes an appearance. It's not exactly a Chekov's Skill since we don't see him training at it, but hey, I did foreshadow it. And I am afraid I've turned Jien's jian skill into an Informed Attribute since we never see her fighting with the blade after all, though she was in plenty of physical action. I'm comfortable with that, since security and investigation are Cheng's true work; the sword is a toy and a last resort.
Azula's fear
I think Amy summed it up perfectly when she said of this scene that Zuko is as much a bad guy to Azula as Azula is to Zuko, and she is the hero of her own story. I mean obviously Azula's means were beyond the pale which is what makes her the villain of the two, but from her extremely far-seeing point of view she may be right about her observations.
I also made Ursa a central piece of motivation for Azula, just as she is for Zuko. To me the loss of Ursa is very present in every aspect of the story, from the royal family's poisoned interactions to Zuko's original actions in Tamalan. Ozai has this entire tortured logic that makes everything Iroh's fault, and this pattern repeats itself down the generation with Azula and Zuko, with even higher stakes since Zuko is more vulnerable than Iroh and Azula craftier than Ozai.
I can't believe there aren't more stories where Azula is grieving Ursa's departure and taking it out on Zuko. Do people really buy her monstrous act so much that they think she doesn't feel Ursas's absence? I mean yes, Azula is monstrous, but she's also eleven and if anything her grief is more destructive because of who she is. She can't just honestly hurt that her mother abandoned her because that would be showing vulnerability, so she externalizes it instead into someone's failure or fault. The failure can't be her own, since her own perfection is increasingly the basis of her sanity, it has to be Zuko's and he must pay. As an added bonus she gets to pose it as a public service instead of vengeance or blame.
And yet, why does it feel like she's lost even when she's won? Zuko is no match for her, yet it's Zuko that people flock to, Zuko whom they love enough to brave danger, dishonor, and death. It's Ursa all over again, and she doesn't understand why. It's a mystery that will be her unravelling.
Shun's last stand
Just because the action of the story is winding down doesn't mean I can't wallow in gratuitous violence, especially after going without for almost two chapters. And who better for pointless violence than Shun, particularly when he doesn't give a crap anymore? Yay! This scene is also an homage to numerous last stand sequences, particularly from Korean period dramas right down to refusing to fall while the liege might be watching.
Meanwhile, in Tamalan
It felt like fitting closure to show Tamalan one last time before the story ended. Lao Tai knows the truth, of course, as stated in Chapter 20, which is why he's crying all over the place. It occurs to me that I'm having men do a lot of stereotypically feminine things--Lao Tai is weeping (though he's also doing the "dust in my eye" thing, it's not for his pride but to keep the secret) while Sanwai watches over him like a mother hen. This is partly my cultural background, where taking care of an elder is considered a man's job at least during the times they spend together. The other households also pitch in, of course, but Sanwai considers Lao Tai an uncle, almost a father.
And yes, of course they have rhino jerky from the dead rhinos back in the battle in Chapter 6. Why let good meat go to waste? I'm pretty sure they didn't go so far as to slaughter the live and healthy rhinos, though, and these were probably returned to Zhen along with the soldiers.
In a way this scene is all about what Zuko was fighting for when he decided to side with Tamalan: This old man gets to spend the last of his days in the comfort he's always known, surrounded by family and friends. It's a transient victory, maybe a small one, maybe not worth everything it ended up costing--but that's what it comes down to. I think Zuko would find the tradeoff worthwhile, too, at least if he weren't too busy stomping around being Bratty McShoutyFace to hapless sea captains.
Zuko's resolve
One Important Haircut, coming right up! This scene links up with one of Zuko's first appearances in the show where he called the Avatar a coward. It's not an unreasonable stance to take since, for all everyone knew the Avatar either couldn't, or wouldn't, step in to end the war. I think the enmity can work even with an anti-war Zuko, since he was still denying the need for a regime change and assumed he could solve things within the system. His second war meeting a few years later would disabuse him of that notion.
Sa Ye's dream
To me this was the only character who could adequately end the story, the one who really started it all and the one who can give voice to the people for whom Zuko became a symbol of hope. As reviewers have pointed out, one of the things Shadow fills in is a background for Zuko having a political base after spending a fourth of his life in exile. Children like Lijin and Sa Ye's child are going to grow up with coded references to "the Dragon King," and there are entire swathes of the adult population who risked much for him and are waiting for his return.
I purposefully created Sa Ye to be a character who is traditionally feminine but is still strong and effective, and Amy Raine, perceptive as always, noticed it too. Too often the message seems to be that while women can be heroic, traditional femininity is still icky. That just seems a new form of sexism to me. Of course I agree with the idea that women can fulfill traditionally male roles just as well as men, and I write and enjoy plenty of women characters who do just that. However, I strongly object to the idea that women have to do traditionally male things in order to be interesting or worthwhile. Or that men who do traditionally feminine things are somehow less, for that matter.
Though the drama required that Sa Ye name her unborn baby at the ending, the traditional part of me was uneasy with her calling him by his birth name. Koreans usually call the unborn by their "womb names," and it's considered bad luck to make it a fancy one since it might attract bad spirits. To call an unborn baby by not one name but two? One of them his true name at that? Oh now that's just asking for it.
"Jinha" and "Jinlong" are actually not the same language. The former is the Korean pronunciation of 珍荷, while the second is the Mandarin pronunciation of 進龍/進龙. If I were to read them consistently it would be either "Jinha" and "Jinryong," or "Zhenhe" and "Jinlong." I just chose the ones that were easiest to pronounce. Also, incidentally, since the Chinese and Korean word for "mint" is 薄荷, literally "thin lotus," she's actually calling him "Lotus Treasure." I wonder if she knows about the White Lotus or if the name is is an accident, though I have no doubt Ty Sian will have her all up in the Order's business in no time. She's already proved she can be loyal to the point of fanaticism.
Speaking of fanaticism, I wonder if anyone got a bad taste in their mouth that Sa Ye is already dedicating her son to "the cause," especially after the child's father died for the same cause. I know I do, and much like Shun's veneer of heroism I can't help but wonder if I'm looking at a badly damaged woman who'd do anything in her search for meaning, a mirror image of Shun.
On the other hand, this wasn't an age where people just made their own way in the world (if such an age ever existed)--you needed factions and family ties to get anywhere, and in a way Sa Ye is giving her son the best foundation in life she can by identifying him with a group that can give him connections and resources. She's rolling the dice, sure, but isn't that true of any investment?
Also, the invocation of the surname Dao was to show that Jinha and Khoujin are descendants of Roku on the male side, or at least part of that clan. So Zuko ended up helping his kinsmen without knowing it, and it was important to me that he not know: The point is not that he helped his relatives, but that he could just as easily have abandoned them.
Finally, I wonder if anyone noticed that all three parts of the story conclude with a parent-child relationship: Iroh and Zuko in Part 1, Ozai and Azula in Part 2, and Sa Ye with her unborn child in Part 3. To me Shadow is very much the story of family--the interlocking stories of several families, all within the giant family that is the nation. Also, really finally, if you circle back from the end of Chapter 21 to the epigraph at the beginning of Chapter 1 you can see a certain thematic connection.
I resisted writing these notes for some time because releasing these thoughts felt like letting go of the experience and I wasn't ready. I guess it's time, though, now that I'm starting on another big project. I still wonder at the intensity I felt while writing Shadow. Where did it come from? Does it have implications for a future in writing, or was it just a fluke? I guess there's only one way to find out.
