ACOTAR: The Cauldron Deep Dive | It’s Powers, It’s Depths, and What Really Happened when it Broke

0:00 The Cauldron is forging her, forging her brittle bones until they were fresh steel. It is a star being bored. Yes, the Cauldron is obviously off on Radia. We have all these made characters who still have this living thorn with it, right? It's in play still. It's in play. Hurricane Fern Now that we're naming winter storms, I can't decouple them from hurricanes in my head. Yeah, I was like you said, Hurricane Fern. I'm like, wait, this isn't a hurricane, it's a Blizzard winter.

0:41 Storm. To me, it's a hurricane because it has a name. What a delightful name Fern is too very. Very lovely. I know someone in the discord was like Fern sounds grumpy. I was like really? Fern to me sounds adorable. Just a delightful older woman who's got butterscotch candies in her purse. I mean, it's great.

0:58 Are you so happy? Are you thriving? But. This is, I mean, this is my dream. This is my dream. I'm living my dream right now. I'm looking, I have a window right here. We're like really getting dumped on. I think in the last like 3 hours. I'm looking at our like, there's a banister right outside this window that has like, yeah, this much snow on it. We have all these pine trees in our backyard, which like I didn't even really think about when we bought this place because it's by the beach.

1:30 So I'm thinking about using it for the beach. But when it snows, it's just, I'll send you a picture tomorrow. Maybe I'll put it on this court. It's just like these gorgeous pine trees covered in snow. It's like a winter Wonderland. I'm like, oh, I love it here. I love you so much. I'm I'm supposed to be in an A-frame in the middle of a wooded fur filled area.

1:49 Yeah, for at each of Vermont for. Fir fur trees, not for a few are. I don't know what it is. This winter has just made me so. We've had just so much precipitation. We've had so much snow. It's been so great. I'm like, oh, this is what winter's supposed to be. And like Fluffy about it, yeah. Yeah, I don't know what's going on or what's in the air. I've got, I've actually got the window cracked open. I'm like, I want it to be a little cold, but that's also a product of New York City.

2:21 Yeah. And the fact that it's always radiator, like steam radiator heating. I don't know how many of our listeners live in New York, but there is a phenomenon in New York. And so if you don't live in New York, you probably think that this is insane. But there's a phenomenon in which you're building controls your heat.

2:39 And so they will just turn on the heat. And then however many radiators are in your apartment, they're just on. And so you're built, your apartment could be 85° in the middle of winter, so you could be opening windows, running your window AC unit. I did discover luckily pretty early on that you can in fact turn radiators off, which has been a game changer for me.

3:03 We at our place in DC, it's the same thing. I think it's like an older East Coast city thing. I think it's like an East Coast. Buildings. Pre war buildings. Exactly, it's the same thing. We have our radiators off, but whatever the configuration of the apartment is, the water pipes are in our walls, the hot water pipes. So in the winter we literally sleep with the air conditioning on because it is so hot.

3:26 I'm like, oh, this is terrible. Yeah. But then when we're up here, we're all electric. Everything is electric. So if we lose power during this storm, we're going to freeze to death. I don't know what we're going to do because we can't go anywhere. So I literally did all this shopping on Friday to like prepare for the storm. And then we got home and I was thinking about it and I was like, we need to cook all of this. If the power goes out, we can't eat any of this. Like this is all like pasta and like eggs and stuff Like. So I went back to the store and just got like crackers. I got a lot of Andy's cheddar bunnies, but basically just like.

4:04 Crackers, protein bars, I don't know. You know I can't eat protein bars anymore. OK, but if you were dying and you needed macros and calories. I got cans of tuna fish. OK, fine, I'd. Literally rather eat a can of tuna fish at this point. You'd rather literally fork fork a can of plain tuna fish than eat a. Cookie, I have onions, I have lemons. I could do a lot with a can of tuna fish. There's a lot of options.

4:34 I actually made myself coffee, which I don't like to drink 2 cups of coffee in a day because I was like on the couch bundled in a blanket reading a book and I was like, oh, I'm so comfy right now. I actually feel like I'm a little bit and I need to like wake up because we're about to record. So here is the coffee.

4:52 I know I might need to get like tea or something during our break but that might make me too comfy and needs to be caffeinated tea. I was doing some research into our podcast just to like understand stats and stuff. You know, we're data girls and I was looking at this site and I was looking at ours and it's like and there's fought for sponsors and this will be a real throwback.

5:16 If you guys know what we're talking about then you're a fucking real 1. He said sponsors Coca-Cola and I just took a screenshot of it. I laughed so hard. I said to to Ronnie, I'm like, This is why you don't rely on AI to build your data sets because. No. This was a joke. We were joking. Coca-Cola does not sponsor this podcast.

5:39 But once again, Coca-Cola, if you're listening and if you would like to, we are open to it. Small indie beverage brand. Small indie beverage brand? Yes, that's what the in stands for in in Bev. Yes, I've already said that joke. But anyway. I think on maybe that exact that exact episode. Yeah, probably.

5:57 We had a couple. We had a couple. Of them, there was a stretch where I was coming. It was summertime. And guys, when summer hits again, I will be arriving at every single episode with a crispy Diet Coke. Crispy Diet Coke. But there were like 5 episodes in a row where I was arriving with different formats of crispy diet cokes trying to optimize for crisp. Yeah, yeah.

6:16 OK. Well anyways, hi I'm Ronnie, I'm Abby and this is Dragons in the Details, the podcast that helps you better understand your favorite get to see books over the course of an undetermined number of episodes we're. Piloting a new tagline? Let us know if you like it. You didn't have to announce it, but you did.

6:37 But you did. We are currently covering A Court of Thorns and Roses, the series also known as Acatar by Sarah J Mass Disclaimer These episodes will contain spoilers for the entire Acatar series. We will announce any other Mass for spoilers ahead of time, and we keep them to the second-half. Disclaimer, This podcast is rated R.

6:58 We don't recommend you listen to it with your children, but we have learned that rated R means, you know, accompanied by a parent or guardian. So I guess if you're together, doesn't really matter. Proceed at your own risk. Rated R. These are spicy books. We are adults. We curse. Each week we dive into a specific topic in depth.

7:13 This week we are digging into Prythian's big boiling pot of trouble, The Cauldron. Yay. You know that song is in my head now from Harry Potter. I mean, bubble bubble coil in trouble. Obviously. I never associated that song with Harry Potter of any kind until they sang it in. No, it's. Shakespeare.

7:35 I think it's Goblet of Fire, but yeah, it's a Shakespeare quote that they just shoved into a Harry Potter. They really did. With some toes. Yeah, with some toes. With some toads that they were holding come with receipts. We have quotes to back up any theory so you can follow along if you are skeptical.

7:54 Announcements, Abby. All right, deep dive music as always, brought to you by Schwidley. That is SCHWOODLEY. He has also started doing our sound editing. We love you, Schwidley. Thank you very much. Thanks, Derek. Thank you, Derek. All right, last week we announced this, but I'm going to make it an announcement moving forward for the rest of this season so that you guys know what's going on. Season 3, it's coming soon.

8:19 We are wrapping up our Agatar season, guys. There's only so much to talk about, okay? And we have gone on for 20 plus episodes of getting niche. We are getting real fucking niche, which is great. We love it. I for what I'm super excited about the episodes we're recording today, but next season, you guys have spoken. Unsurprisingly, we are keeping it in the mass first family. Next season is going to be on Crescent City. If you have not started reading Crescent City and if you want to continue to listen to this podcast, I recommend starting today.

8:51 These are long books. I think most of you have probably. I think most of you have probably started reading them with this season. I know a lot of you have been reading the Mass first. Awesome for that. So thank you so much. We love that and you're coming back and listening to these episodes. So amazing, guys.

9:07 Thank you so much. But if you want to keep going on this journey with us, we would love to have you. We love you guys. Crescent City is our next season also. We will be taking some kind of break. We do not know what that looks like at this time. We do not know how long it will be. It will not be too long, I promise you that, but there will be a brief respite in between seasons so that Ronnie and I can reread these books, gather ourselves, maybe take a little break.

9:34 For you as well. Yeah, it'll just be good for everyone, guys. Like it's gonna be great, maybe. Some audio books in the meantime. I. Was not directed at you. I did not expect you to listen to audiobooks. Yeah, so that's season. Three we did get. We've been getting a few. I will cry if Throne of Glass is not next comments. The reason that we are not covering Throne of Glass, Abby has said this in the past, is because we love unfinished series.

10:03 We do theories on this podcast. Crescent City is unfinished. Throne of Glass, from what we know and understand, is finished. We will do Throne of Glass one day we think, but Crescent City makes sense to us to do next. So for those of you who have messaged me on TikTok saying that you will cry if we don't do Throne of Glass next, I am very sorry. We are sorry, but we will do it at some point we will. And the plan for that is, and as always, we reserve the right to change our minds and change our plans. But the plan for that is for it to be a full Mass first season. Because even though Throne of Glass is done, and I'm putting that in quotes because you never know with Sarah, the Mass first certainly is not right.

10:44 And we there's been a lot of chatter at least on Instagram this week about the fourth series that she is planning to do and how that could potentially tie into everything. So we definitely think there's stuff there to talk about. We're just going to talk about Crescent City 1st and then and then hopefully, hopefully we're going to bring it back to in period land and then hopefully we'll bring it back to Agatzar and then we'll talk about throwing a glass.

11:04 But that is out of our hands. We're going to have to see on all that. Everyone just cross your fingers that our favorite authors here release books. I'll just leave it there, Rebecca. Yaris looked at our Instagram story this weekend anyway, OK? She did. All right, last thing, if you like what we do, if you're fans of ours, if you enjoy our content, we would ask from the bottom of our hearts that you like, comment, subscribe, pretty please.

11:32 Ronnie's making a very cute face right now if you're not watching on video on Spotify. Guys, I just was looking at the data here. There are almost 4000 of you subscribed to us, which is absolutely fucking amazing. Thank you so much, we love that. That being said, we only have 250 ratings, OK, that's a very low ratio.

11:49 So if you like us enough to subscribe, maybe throw us a couple stars if you feel so inclined. It takes about two seconds. It's very easy to do, helps more people find us, helps us out a lot. We just, we're just trying to grow. Anything you can do, anything you feel so inclined to do, we would greatly appreciate it. So thank you so much in advance.

12:06 A last plug, but I think we've kind of plugged it at this point, given what we've been talking about. We encourage you to read the Mass first. We encourage you to read Crescent City. We encourage you to read Throne of Glass. We know a lot of you are doing this. Obviously, we're going to be covering the entire Mass first throughout the lifetime of this podcast.

12:22 So that's it. I think that's it for announcements. I feel like the majority of you are mostly on the fence about Crescent City. We know it's in a different setting, we know it's Durban fantasies, but it's super fun, guys. Here's what I tell, Here's what I will tell you. Here's my promise to you. I have not gotten a single person DM me comment, message anything saying I am so upset that you guys told me to read the Mass first.

12:47 What the fuck is this steaming pile of horseshit? OK I haven't gotten a single one of those messages. And especially when you read the Mass 1st and go back and listen to our episodes, specifically our nest episodes and our recently deep dive episodes. I think those episodes like really kind of tie it all together.

13:06 I would argue that Crescent City is what I see the most circulating social media as the most underrated series of the masters. So that is what I see. I'm not saying that that's necessarily my direct opinion. I mean, it might be my opinion, but it's like what I see as the opinions of others. So. And that's my plug, all right. Corrections, omissions and social media shout outs. Actor Only Abby, do you have any to share? Yeah, I have one and I apologize. I should have done this last episode when we were maybe 2 episodes ago when we were still talking about the death gods. But we got an A comment on our Bone Carver episode that seems so obvious at the time that I can't believe I didn't think about it.

13:47 This is from Miss Katie on Spotify. If you will recall, our fun question for the Bone Carver episode was what would be the Bone Carver's favorite TV show? And she's said the Bone Carver's favorite TV show would be dot dot dot Bones. I was like, of course it would be Bones. Why didn't we think of Bones?

14:03 So, Miss KT, you're totally right. It would be Bones. We didn't think about it, Bones. Was a great show. Love Bones. Bones checks out. Bones checks out. Carver Yes. So thank you, Miss. KT thank you, Miss KT Right? Fun question for this week. I couldn't think of one directly cauldron related, but I figured cauldron is kind of like a bowl. So, fun question for this week, what kind of soup do you like to imagine that Farrah made for Reese in A Court of Mist and Fury Chapter 54?

14:37 I just went so diabolical in my mind and I was like, what if he made her broccoli cheddar soup and they were both just like so gassy during Chapter 15. I don't think it was that. I don't know. I really don't know. You don't picture anything like you have not a guy in your mind's eye. That's like, I'll be honest with you. Do you remember the Stew that, like, swept social media a couple years ago?

15:04 I think it's an Allison Roman. Roman. I don't know how you say your last name recipe. It's like, it's like coconut milk with chickpeas and stuff. It's delicious. But I don't know. I always pictured something with chickpeas for some reason. Interesting. OK. I don't know why. I don't know why. All right. But also, this whole picture, this whole thing was so weird to me.

15:24 Like, doesn't she take a can out and like open it with a can opener? I'm like, yeah, what time period are we? I mean, there's. Also a badminton here. So there's badminton, there's yeah, there's badminton. Pharaoh's wearing leggings. I have a real issue with like the time period of Acatar. I don't know what we're dealing with.

15:43 We have can openers, but we also have courts and I don't really know. I don't really know. Yeah, yeah, I do picture like a bad Campbells vegetable soup. Yeah, I think she specifies. I don't remember whether it's exactly a can opener, but I think there's something around like her clarifying that she's not cooking, she's just heating it. Right.

16:04 She's like, I'm just heating it. So I picture like shitty Campbell's vegetable soup and her just plopping it into like a copper pot and like. A nice can of like creamy clam chowder. It's like and Clam. I said vegetable soup. I know, I know. I'm going with the dairy. I'm being Yeah, you're really you're laying on the cream. Gross.

16:28 No, I think a nice clear soup is probably the right answer to keep them live and limbo for 55 activities. Yeah, like. Everything in spaghetti OS equivalent is what I'm. And it just spells out you're my mate like alphabet soup. Which obviously this was this is what I picture her dumping in the pot and cooking.

16:50 And then later, she's obviously like just standing there and he eats every single bite of it to the bottom of the bowl, which makes it, which makes the selection like whatever you picture even more important. Chapter 54 is great and chapter 55 is great, but that little in between makes almost no sense.

17:11 Like fuck the soup race. I guess he has to eat it though. Yeah, I think it's, I feel like it is important to him that he eats, that he eats every. Bite of this like gross bland vegetable Campbell's soup. I feel like it has to be bad. Whatever it is, it's not good. I agree. I agree. All right. Good stuff. Shall we eat that?

17:31 Yes. OK, Abby, what is the power of the Cauldron? All right, so let's start at the beginning with the Bone Carver, who's already shouted out once in this episode, but that's OK, we'll talk about him again. So the Bone Carver tells us that the Cauldron is, quote, pure energy and pure power, just pure power.

17:55 So I kind of think anything is on the table here. However, let's go through what we've actually seen the Cauldron do what we think it can do. So quotes we have about its powers we have we have very big powers right from the get go. So the cauldron is for remaking worlds is in Akawa Chapter 9. I believe that's from one of the gross incest twins from harbor from Hyburn, right. So remaking worlds we have Pharah speculating that perhaps quote the entire universe came from it. This is Akimath chapter 62.

18:26 Inside the cauldron was nothing but inky swirling black. Perhaps the entire universe had come from it. We have the the cauldron was absence and presence, darkness and whatever the darkness had come from, but not life, not joy or light or hope. So we have absence and presence, darkness and the birth of darkness.

18:46 But then I think it's interesting that she says not life, because we're also told it's where all the life comes from. So I think that's kind of like an interesting quote. Like how is it that the cauldron is for birthing the universe, remaking worlds? But then also we have this line that it's not life.

19:01 So all of that is a little interesting. Powers we have explicitly seen from the cauldron. We have seen it raise the dead, right? So Jurian was able to come back from the dead with a full body from nothing but his eyeball and a finger using the cauldron that happens off screen. But we are told and given no reason to believe that it is not the cauldron.

19:20 It can make people into new species. So Elaine and Nesta become Faye after going into the cauldron. It shatters the wall that's being that's between the human and the fae land. So we have this quote about it and this does happen off screen, but we have the quote with the cauldron. You could do other things than raise the dead. You could shatter the wall.

19:40 That's Akromat chapter 18. It can break wards. So it breaks the wards around Valeris. When the King of Highborn is able to bring his army in and attack Valeris. The cauldron was the one that broke those wards. It can imbue things. So let's kind of go through the list of things that it has imbued or given. Kind of unclear which one it is, right? For Nesta, she takes the power of death from it, which manifests a silver flame.

20:05 Elaine, it gifts the power of being a seer. We're also told it finds Elaine lovely, which is kind of interesting, right? That implies a bit of a sentience to it, which we'll get into later. It can also imbue weapons with power both directly and indirectly. So directly we are told that the great sword Gwidian was dipped into the cauldron and given power. So the quote we have for that, this is Silver Flames. As Reel said, Nesta created a new magic sword. Yes.

20:39 Ameren said only the great powers could do that. Gwydian was given its power when the High Priestess Oleana dipped it into the cauldron during its crafting. So we have a sword that was dipped into the cauldron and it came out with powers. What are those powers? We do not know, but it's a magic legendary sword.

20:55 And then indirectly, obviously we have Nesta making her trove of made weapons again with the power from the cauldron, but this time it's indirectly through Nesta. So the quote we have for that is Ameren's brows flattened. The Dread trove was forged by the Cauldron. Nesta possesses the Cauldron powers, so anything she crafts and imbues with her power becomes a new trove.

21:16 At this point I wouldn't so much as eat a piece of bread if if she toasted it. So Nesta was made by the Cauldron. Nesta made these swords, therefore the cauldron imbued the swords with this power basically. So we have Nesta making her trove of made weapons. We. Covered the Dread Trove in the same quote but.

21:34 I did cover the Dread Trove. I do want to go into the Dread Trove a little bit, just briefly. Our next episode is going to be on the Dread Trove, so we don't have to dive into it too much. But I think it's interesting because every power that we have from the Dread Trove, we've actually seen the Cauldron be able to do as well, which I think is kind of cool. So the quote we have for that, The Cauldron made many objects of power long ago, forging weapons of unrivaled might. Most were lost to history and war. And when I went into the prison, only three remained at the time. Some claimed there were four or that the 4th had been unmade, but today's legends tell of three. So we have the mask which can

22:11 raise the dead, which we saw the Cauldron do with Jurian basically right command the dead. And we saw the cauldron resurrect Jurian. We have the harp opening any door, physical or otherwise. When the Cauldron kidnaps Elaine in the King of Highlands war camp, which we'll also talk about later, it transports her from where she is in the Night Court war camp to to the King of Hybrids war camp, right? So we have that power of the harp with the Cauldron, which I think is fun.

22:41 We also have seen the harp. Maybe we're not sure what was happening with Nesta, but we have maybe seen the harp try to separate a soul from my body. Nesta speculates that it might have been trying to fuse her soul with this, with the floor of the prison. We have this quote from Farrah at the end of Akawar, when she is kind of like riding along with the cauldron to see the King of Highburn die.

23:05 We have the quote. Time seemed to slow and warp, the dark power of the king speared toward us, towards that clearing where I was neither seen nor heard, where I was nothing but a scrap of soul carried on a black wind. So like in Pharaoh's description, it's basically taken her soul along with it, right?

23:21 Which I think is interesting given the given the heart. And then we have the crown, which can influence anyone, even piercing through the mightiest of mental Shields. It's only flaw is that it requires close physical proximity. So we see Pharaoh get controlled by the cauldron at the end of Acawar right?

23:39 When she touches the cauldron, it basically like controls her and and forces her to put the two halves of the Book of Breathings together, which is what the crown would do as well. I also think it's interesting here, and we've talked about this before, right? But the description of the crown's power is sinking its claws into people.

23:58 The description of Reese's power is. He leaned back in his seat as our eyes met. Sharp claws caressed my mind, and his voice whispered inside my head. It's true, isn't it? I jolted back, my chair groaning. Stop that. But my butt, those claws now dug in, and my entire body, my heart, my lungs, my blood yielded to his grip, utterly at his command.

24:17 As he said, the fashion of the Night Court suits you, so that's missed. Inferior chapter 6 when he's training her how to use her mental shield. So we have again the Cauldron seeking its claws into its victims, and we have Reese's power being described as claws. Other powers that the Cauldron has.

24:35 It sends people dreams. We have Reese speculating about this, and we know this actually is true. So Reese claims that the cauldron is the one that sent him the dreams about Pharah. This is chapter 54 as we were talking about in our soup discussion. The quote we have for that is 3 years ago. He said quietly. I began to have these dreams.

24:53 At first they were glimpses, as if I were staring through someone else's eyes. A crackling hearth and a dark home, a Bale of hay in a barn, a Warren of rabbits. The images were foggy, like looking through cloudy glass. They were a flash here and there every few months. I thought nothing of them until one of the images was of a hand, this beautiful human hand holding a brush, painting flowers on a table. I decided then and there that I was going to fight, and I would fight dirty and kill and torture and manipulate, but I was going to fight.

25:21 If there was a shot of freeing us from Amarantha, you were at, I thought. I thought the Cauldron had been sending me these dreams to tell me that you would be the one to save us, save my people. So he thinks this is the Cauldron, and we'll talk about this later, I think. But there is is this kind of religious aspect to the Cauldron as well, with the Fae worshipping it.

25:39 So he might have meant that kind of facetiously, but we'd later know that the Cauldron actually sends favorite a dream, right? So this is that same scene where Elaine is kidnapped by the Cauldron and brought to the King of Hyburn. We have this quote. I dreamed about the cereal bleeding out and smiling. I dreamed of the weavers open mouth ripping into I Anthe while she still screamed.

26:00 I dreamed of Lord Grayson, so mortal and young, standing at the edge of the camp, beckoning to Elaine, telling her he'd come for her to come home with him, that he'd found a way to undo what had been done to her, to make her human again. I dreamed of that cauldron in the King of Hybrids were tense, so dark and slumbering, awakening as Nesta and I stood there invisible, unseen, how it had watched back on us.

26:21 So Nesta was crying for the Cauldron and found it in the King of Hardman's warp camp. And Farrah kind of broke into her mind to try to break the connection, but the Cauldron saw them, right? And then Farrah thinks basically the Cauldron is kind of sending her this dream in their war camp and then it kidnaps a lane, right?

26:39 So we so I think this is a real power basically, and it also has this death white light. So when it kind of like emits its power, it's a death white light. This is the light that takes out an entire legion of Illyrian warriors. The quote for that is this is again, the battle against Hyburn. For it was from the rocky outcropping that a battering ram of death white light hurled for our army just about level with the Illyrian legion in the sky. So that's the death white light it seems to have a heartbeat so the quote for that is but a throbbing like blood pulse through the room, like the cauldron had a heartbeat like calls to light.

27:17 I move towards it more was at my back but didn't stop me as I stepped up onto the dais. This is again at the end of sorry the end of Akimath when they're in the King of Hybrids palace. So Feyra is saying she said so senses a heartbeat. We have also seen a heartbeat in the House of Wind, with Nesta feeling the heartbeat in the walls. And we have not a heartbeat, but a sense of breathing, a sense of aliveness and sentience at the passive Analius in Ramiel. Right.

27:44 So the quote for that is no, not someone. This is Nesta. Though she could have sworn she felt warmth and breath. She'd hit the archway of stone. They'd fallen all the way back to down to the passive Analius, dangerously close to the males who pursued them. So we have the cauldron that seems to be alive.

28:00 And now we have to at least two, maybe more places in Prythian that also seem to be alive. So are these places connected to the Cauldron or is this just a turn of phrase that Sarah likes to use? I'm not sure it has something like a sentience. We do have the king of Hyburn's Ravens in Akawar telling us that it doesn't have a sentience, but then Pharaoh literally hears the Cauldron speaking, so I don't think that's true. So they they say, but the cauldron, oh, it knew that something had been taken from it, not sentient, but it knew it was furious.

28:35 And when that young queen went in dot dot dot and that's Aqua chapter 31. But in Akama chapter 64, we have the cauldron saying to Pharah about the king of hybrids seemingly kill him, kill him, kill him. I could not tell if that voice was mine or the cauldrons. I didn't care. I unleashed myself, which I think is interesting that the Cauldron wanted her to kill the King of Highburn right? Like that implies that it was not really thrilled with how it was being used, what the situation was. Sure.

29:04 Sarah J Maas seems to go back and forth between whether this cauldron has a voice. And I also think the fact that the Book of Breathings is kind of always around muddies the waters too. Because in Act War chapter 73, when Pharaoh is like being transported, like when her consciousness is being transported by the cauldron, she says the cauldron did not answer.

29:27 It had no voice, no consciousness save some base need to take back with that which had been stolen. It's like it's not clear whether the cauldron truly has ascensions or whether it just has this like magnet towards the power that has been separated from it. Yeah, we're also, but we are also told that the Cauldron purrs and favors presence though by the King of Highburn, so it certainly has. Like an animal.

29:56 Opinions about people. Yeah, Like a little pet. Yeah. And we have that line about it accompanying Nesta or following Nesta like a hound, basically, right. So like, there's definitely something animalistic about it. All right, so when it captures a lane, which I've referenced a couple times out, there's a couple interesting, really interesting things that the Cauldron does that we never see it do again.

30:17 Right? So it impersonates someone. It literally takes on like a corporeal form, or at least makes Elaine think that it is taking on a corporeal form. I don't know how it's doing this, but it lures Elaine out of her tent by pretending to be Grayson, right? Her fiance. It sings with a voice both male and female, young and old, haunting and alluring.

30:39 We know that because we Farah and Nesta and Ameren all hear that voice and Azrael hears the wind react to the voice, right? So I think that that does point to sentience, right? Like it's, it's people can hear it. And the I don't think the Book of Breathing is doing that in that case. I I read this as rather than taking a corporeal form, if it's able to send dreams and visions, I assumed it was that. It could be that, Yeah, everybody who's capable of quote.

31:06 Hearing it yeah, right. So it's it's could be definitely the the dream sending. We also have this interesting quote and somewhere in this help hit, this was when Feyra's in the hybrid war camp. And somewhere in this help hit Elaine, had the cauldron presented her to the king, or was she in some in between, trapped in whatever Dark World the cauldron occupied, which I thought was an interesting line.

31:31 Like what? What do you mean whatever Dark World the cauldron occupied? Like what realm of existence, plane of reality is the cauldron occupying? And then I think this one's really interesting, especially given our Cochet discussion a couple weeks ago. It winnowed Elaine, right? It know Delaine without her, without her doing it basically right.

31:49 So when Farrah is talking to Jurian in Hybrid's war tent, we get. I tried not to scowl. Where is she? Safe? Untouched. My chest gave in at the word. Not for long. Jurian said it gave him a shock when she appeared before the Cauldron. He had her contained. Came here to brood over what to do with her and how to make you pay for it.

32:08 That's Akwar Chapter 65 S Elaine appeared out of nowhere in front of the King of Byron, right? And the Cauldron just just took her, which is what we've talked about crochet being able to do as well. So I think that's really interesting. That's all the kind of physical powers that I have. And then we have the kind of like religious iconography that we get with the Cauldron.

32:30 Do you want to talk any more about other powers before I get into that? You talked about the trove and Gwidian and all that stuff, but the bone Carver, I just found it interesting that he defined the cauldrons power as the ability to forge things. And then I think the the other thing that the bone Carver said that was of note was that it can't be destroyed for it had made all things and if it were broken than life would cease to be.

32:59 So not only did it seemingly make everything and it has the ability to create and the ability to destroy, but it can't be destroyed or it would destroy everything. So its power is like intrinsically tied to Corinthian, which is kind of fucking important, obviously. And that's why, yeah, it's like absconded away to Creedia, yeah.

33:20 Which we see at the end of Aqua too, right? I mean, favor and Reese have to and the word is forged. The word that is used is I'm. I'm reforging the cauldron. To other just like interesting physical powers the cauldron seems to have the ability to. I don't know whether this means anything or not. It's on the paper though, so I'm just going to say it out loud. Maintain bonds with people.

33:41 So in back or chapter 75, Ferris, as I snap back into my body, my hand remained atop the cauldron, a living bond. I don't know what that means, whether the cauldron can just actually maintain a bond with another human being. It seems like that is what it has with Elaine and with Nesta, right? Because Nesta can like, feel when the Cauldron is about to do something, that's how she's able to tell that it's like about to strike.

34:06 And she calls Cassine away. And that's how Elaine hears it when nobody else hears it. Like, does Farrah now have this bond with it too? I don't know. And does Brie Allen? Does Brie Allen right? Only certain people seem to have like a living direct bond with the cauldron. But it just struck me as interesting. And then this isn't really a power of the cauldron. But Amron directly says, and we should have talked about this more in our in our bone cover bone Carver episode. But Amron says that because Farrah faced the herb Oris, she knew that Farrah could control the cauldron alone. Yeah, I've been thinking about this quote a lot. I don't know what that means, right? Something about Pharaoh looking

34:52 at the Uroboros and surviving and being sane meant that Pharaoh by herself could control the Cauldron and help her. Guys, go back and listen to our Bone Carver episode, our Shriek episode. But we know that Pharaoh was able to look into the Euro Burroughs and not go insane, not lose her mind. And because of that, Amber knew that Pharaoh could touch the Cauldron and handle all the power by herself, basically. So why?

35:18 What links the Arab Burroughs to the Cauldron? I don't know. But I did read that quote and I thought about it and I'm like, are we going to talk about the Arab Burroughs again? But we did, and I'm so glad. Yeah, and if I, if I recall correctly, I think at the end of Akimath, when she goes to Highburn and tries to do something with the cauldron and touches it, she like almost dies and then she passed. And then she looks into the Arab Earth in Akor to get the Bone Carver to fight for them.

35:47 And then she's able to touch the cauldron and like fly with it and like survive and do all this crazy shit with Ameren. So like what happened between when Farrah touched the cauldron in Akimaph and almost died and touched the cauldron in Aquawar and was able to control it? Looking in the herb oris, which Amarin apparently says means something like what happened?

36:08 Yeah, something, very something, something. So the only other thing I was going to say is it is also worshipped as as we previously mentioned. So the first time we hear about the Cauldron is early in Aqatar Actor Aqatar chapter 6, and that is from Lucian. So the quote is I barely made it a few steps before Lucian growled. That's the hand the Cauldron thought to deal us. She brought Andres down.

36:30 We never should have sent him out there. None of them should have been out there. It was a fool. Submissions. There's kind of like 2 instances of the cauldron with an AC guitar in my mind. There was like the religious version. Like I don't think Lucian literally means the cauldron brought Pharaoh to us unless he does. But like, he doesn't even know at this point that the cauldron is a real thing, right?

36:50 So it's kind of become this like religious symbol standing in for fate. But then there is also a physical cauldron with real powers that could really, really do things. All right, Ronnie, next question. What happens when someone or something goes into the cauldron? It depends on who goes in, yes. So the Cauldron is physically described as the size of a bathtub forged of dark iron, and it's 3 legs crafted like creeping branches covered in thorns, which means that people can actually go in it.

37:22 It's kind of critical to the plot. So a few people and one thing sort of go into the cauldron over the course of the series. That is Elaine, Nesta, Briellen Ameren, and the Book of Breathings. I say sort of on the Book of Breathings because we really just fair kind of chucked that into a broken cauldron.

37:43 Like God knows, really knows. But yeah, we'll get into that. So let's talk through each of them. Elaine is submersion to the cauldron. She doesn't come up immediately. And when she does come out, she is glowing slightly and she's clearly fae. So that is an Acrimat chapter 65. And the King of Hybrid basically says put the prettier one in first, which is kind of a crazy thing to say.

38:04 So that passage is Elaine's foot hit the water and she screamed, screamed in terror. That hit me so deep I began sobbing. Please, I said to none of them. Nesta was still fighting, still roaring through her gag. Elaine, who Nesta would have killed and hoard and stolen for. Elaine, who had been gentle and sweet.

38:20 Elaine, who was to marry a Lord's son who hated fairies. The garage shove my sister into the cauldron in a single movement. My cry hadn't finished sounding before Elaine head went under. She did not come up. Nesta screaming was the only sound. Cassie and blindly lurched toward it, toward her, moaning in pain. The King of Hyburn bowed slightly to the Queen's. Behold, Reese, a wall of guards still cleaving us, curled his fingers into a fist.

38:45 But he did not move as more and I did not dare move, not with Azrael's life dangling in the King's grasp. And as if it had been tipped by invisible hands, the cauldron turned on its side. So the cauldron is literally just like, like nothing's just the cauldron of its own accord. It's just more water than seemed possible, dumped out in a cascade. Black smoke coated water and Elaine, as if she'd been thrown by a wave, washed onto the stones, face down. Her legs were so pale, so delicate, I couldn't remember the last time I'd seen them bare. The Queen's push forward.

39:20 Alive. She had to be alive, had to want to live, blah blah blah. So she rose from the ground onto her elbows. Pale skin started to glow. Her face had somehow become more beautiful, infinitely beautiful. And her ears, Elaine's ears were now pointed beneath her sodden hair. So Elaine is the first person that we see in the entire series to go into the Cauldron.

39:41 She's basically goes in so the king of hybrid to prove to the Queens that hey, you can go in here and come out and you're going to be beautiful and fae and immortal and it's all going to be OK. And we of course learn like kind of throughout the series of the Cauldron loves Elaine, hers and her presence and it gifts her this beauty, this immortality.

40:01 And Elaine comes out and she's glowing and she's. Say Lucian clocks her as his mate right after she comes out, and she also becomes a seer. I'm going to put an asterisk on the word seer because we haven't seen any seers in this world before. Like Azrael says you're a seer, but I don't know how Azrael knows that she's a seer because I don't know what other seers we're basing her powers off of.

40:27 And it seems like the only powers that we've seen that are comparable to hers are that of the Cauldron and of the surreal. And that's it. And for more on that, check out our Elaine Deep. Dive. Check out the Elaine deep dive. Yeah, it's a good one. So that is Elaine. She goes into the Cauldron. That's what happens to her when she comes in.

40:44 Then we have Nesta in quick succession. It's a very different experience. We get 2 perspectives for Nesta, the third person approach and the first person POV. So she goes in putting up a fight similar to Elaine but more successfully I'll say. And we also get insight into what she actually experienced, and it seems like she went into some kind of realm of its own.

41:07 So we can start by reading Pharaoh's POV and then we'll get into Nesta's, but we won't spend too much time on Pharaoh's because it's mostly just Nesta being pissed off. Nesta fought every step of the way. She did not make it easy for them. She clawed and kicked and bucked and it was not enough and we were not enough to save her. Nesta, I'm skipping a bunch.

41:26 Nesta shouts. Her raging Nesta was shoved into the water up to her shoulders. She bucked even as the water sprayed. She clawed and screamed. Her rage, her defiance put her under the King Hist. The guards straining, shoved her slender shoulders, her brown gold head. Think about this image, right?

41:43 Like there's a bunch of soldiers and there's this like thin human woman and they are like struggling to get her into this like bathtub sized cauldron. OK, it's kind of a drawing image. And as they pushed her head down, she thrashed one last time, freeing her long pale arm, teeth bared, Nest appointed one finger at the King of Hybrid.

42:03 One finger, a curse and a damning, a promise. And as Nest, as head was forced under the water, as that head was violently shoved down, the King of Hybrid had the good sense to look somewhat unnerved. Water. So the water is dark. Lapped for a moment, the surface went flat. There is vomiting now. The cauldron again. The cauldron again tilted.

42:23 Water poured forth. Lucians comforting Elaine like everyone's mess. No one's doing well Cauldron tilts Nesta comes out from However Elaine had been made. Nesta was different even before she took her first breath. I felt it as if the cauldron in making her have been forced to give more than it wanted. As if Nesta had fought even after she went under and had decided that if she was to be dragged into hell, she was taking that cauldron with her.

42:51 As if that finger she pointed was now a death promise to the king of Hybrid. Nestor took a breath. And when I beheld my sister with her somehow magnified beauty, her ears, when Nesta looked to me, rage power coming and then it was gone. And then she was a mess. So Nesta's experience very different.

43:08 Like it looks like Nesta fought the cauldron and won. Like Elaine was miserable, sad, gifted something glowed, came out with like this like consolation prize basically because like poor, poor Elaine was put through this ordeal. Nesta was like, fuck you cauldron, I'm coming out the victor. And it seemed like she she did.

43:29 Nesta's count is the Accord of Silver Flames prologue. She goes into the Cauldron, she's recounting her experience in the Cauldron, and she's basically wrestling in what seems to be what I consider to be like space, like outer space, like a void. The black water nipping at her thrashing heels was freezing. Not the bite of winter chill or even the burn of solid ice, but something colder, deeper.

43:52 The cold of the gaps between stars, the cold of a world before light. The cold of hell through hell. She realized that she bucked against the strong hands trying to shove her into that cauldron. Which I think, sorry, can I cut out real quick? I think it's very interesting because typically hell is described as hot, right?

44:15 Like typically with hell, you get fire imagery, you get heat, you get burning coals. But here we're getting the cold of hell. Yeah, I think it's interesting. Yes, the icy water bitten to the soles of her feet. It was a kiss of venom, a death so permanent that every inch of her roared in defiance. It checks out right, Because this death power that she gets is, is icy, is cold.

44:34 It's like. Yeah. Cold flames, and that is the place that she goes to and the power that she takes from. She laughed at the fear that crept into the King's eyes just before the water devoured her whole. And then she's in the cauldron, right? And then it says in the beginning and in the end there was darkness and nothing more.

44:53 Which, as a reminder, is what we hear in chapter 77 when she stops time when she. Stops time, yeah. So whatever happened when she stops time, wherever she went, whatever she felt, apparently that's happening also when she goes into the Cauldron, she did not feel the cold as she sank into a sea that had no bottom, no horizon, no surface.

45:15 But she felt the burning. So there is burning in this hell that she's in. Immortality was not a serene youth, it was fire. So there's fire. Cold fire. It was molten ore pouring into her veins, boiling her human blood until it was nothing but steam, forging her brittle bones until they were fresh steel.

45:34 And when she opened her mouth to scream, when the pain ripped her very self into, there was no sound. There was nothing in this place but darkness and agony and power. They would pay, all of them. Starting with this cauldron. Starting now. She tore into the darkness with talons and teeth. Kind of Reese imagery, kind of. Isn't it interesting that we get forging, we get the bone Carver calls the Cauldron, like everything was forged from it? And we have this scene of Nesta have I know you said it's cold fire, but it seems to be very hot forge like imagery, at least within the Cauldron, Right.

46:10 And then then she has talents, then she has claws, then she has teeth. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And a lot of things about, like, Reece seem to be made also. We've talked about how he, like, has this connection to the Cauldron, even though he, you know, seems to not have a connection to the Cauldron at all. And she's being forged, right?

46:27 That's what she's being forged, right? Cauldron forges things. It also, this is the only first hand account that we have of anyone going into the cauldron, right? The Cauldron is forging her in this moment we're we're like feeling her being forged, forging her brittle bones until they were fresh steel and the dark eternity around her shuttered, bucked, thrashed.

46:47 She laughed as it recoiled, laughed around the mouthful of raw power she ripped out and swallowed whole. She is swallowing power from this cauldron. The fuck does that mean she's doing it? Laughed at the fistfuls of Eternity she shoved into her heart, her veins. The cauldron struggled like a bird under a cat's paw. She refused to relent.

47:11 Everything it had stolen from her, from Elaine, she would take from it. Wrapped in black Eternity, Nesta and the Cauldron twined, burning through the darkness like a newborn * So she goes elsewhere, like this is all happening in this bathtub. In a bathtub. This Bath club size cauldron, No, not like she.

47:31 She goes somewhere else. This cauldron, whatever it is, takes her somewhere else, allows her to be somewhere else that seems to have nothing but also darkness. Also power. Power that's forging her, but power that's also there for her to take. She's fighting against it and she's winning, which is insane.

47:49 Yeah, and I mean the imagery, and she even calls it out at the end. And I didn't have this written down, but you're reading it. To me it seems very obvious. It is. It is a star. It is a star being born. And who do we know who has all this star imagery? Ronnie. Reese. Reese. Yeah, so very interesting things here.

48:06 I'm sure it's not pound for pound what happens when other people go into the Cauldron. We'll talk about the other people who've gone into the cauldron in just a second. There might be one other person that did something like this. That is what happened when Duster went into the Cauldron and she was forged, but she also fought and won something that the Cauldron did not want to give up.

48:24 Yeah. So that's another one. Brie Allen. You don't need to belabor Brie Allen, but this is kind of a major plot line. Brie Allen goes in right after Nesta comes out, Right? So Elaine and Nesta are these proof points for the Queens that like, hey, you can go in and you can survive. Brie Allen goes in right after Nesta, Right?

48:41 And the Cauldron at this point has just lost something. So it's pissed off, right? It's mad. Briellen goes in and the Cauldron basically takes it out on her and takes what Briellen values the most, which is her youth. So Briellen is fae, Briellen is immortal. Briellen sort of gets what she wants, but she loses the thing that she values the most, which is her youth. And so she comes out a crown and then she's pissed about it and she proceeds to take out all of it on Nesto over the subsequent novels.

49:09 So the Cauldron has the ability to feel vengeance as well. I want to talk about Ameren. Ameren going into the Cauldron is probably in my opinion the second most interesting account that we have, even though it is a third person account. And this is at the end of Aqua War when Ameren basically tricks Farrah and has an ulterior motive that is quite noble to go into the cauldron to unbind herself and take everyone out.

49:31 So in Aqua War Chapter 75, Cameron grabbed my wrist. I'm Farrah. I am Farrah. Do you picture yourself as the protagonist when you read books? Every time. Every time. Yeah. I always trouble with Throat of Glass though because she's so blonde, but yeah. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. And she's also just, like, far bolder than I am, but I don't know. Anyways, Amarin grabbed my wrist and swung herself into the cauldron.

49:58 I fought, fought with every breath to get through the spell, my arm half submerged in the cauldron as Amarin went under the dark water that had filled it. I said the words with my tongue, said them with my heart and blood and bones screamed them. Her hand vanished from my arm, melting away like dew under the morning sun.

50:15 The spell ended, shuttering out of me, and I snapped back, losing my hold on the cauldron. Varian caught me before I fell and gripped me hard as we gazed back. Gazed at the black mass of the cauldron, the still surface. He breathed as she it started far, far beneath us, as if she had gone to the earth. Score.

50:32 Which is interesting because like, we don't know where they go when they go in the cauldron. I let Varian haul me a few steps away as the ripple thundered up through the ground, Spearing for us the cauldron. We had only enough time to throw ourselves behind the nearest rock when it hit us. The cauldron shattered into three pieces, peeling apart like a blossoming flower. And then she came.

50:55 She exploded from that mortal shell, light blinding us, light and fire. She was roaring in victory and rage and pain and I could have sworn I saw great burning wings. Go listen to the Amran episode if you yada yada yada red. She's an Angel, OK? She's male. And then up on the rock, utter quiet. We'll, we'll talk about this obviously later.

51:16 We've got a whole question on what happens when the cauldron breaks. But this is, this is wild, right? Because Amarin goes into the cauldron to unbind herself. A spell is required. So it's a spell. It's not like the cauldron can just, it's not like Amarin can just hop into the cauldron for like a nice bath and she and the cauldron can just like have a conversation and then she's unbound.

51:37 There is a spell required with the cauldron to make this happen. But when she is unbounded, whatever she is, whatever is happening in there, she breaks it. She breaks the cauldron. Yeah. And so when you think about Nesta's experience in the cauldron and kind of where she went, which obviously we don't find out until afterwards, like what about Ameren could have broken the confines of this hell realm that Nesta was in at this time.

52:06 It's interesting to think about Ameren. Whatever Ameren is broke this cauldron, split this cauldron, and was reverted to her true form. The combination of whatever power is available on the cauldron and Pharah speaking this spell in this language from the Book of Readings allowed that to happen.

52:24 Yeah. Which, to be fair, was created by whoever created the cauldron. Or the same from the same type of beings. Yeah, same ore, same metal. Yeah. So yes. And then we have an entire question about the kind of void that opens up when the cauldron breaks. But I just want to call out like, because this is a question about what happens when something goes into the cauldron that we kind of have an open question in this area, which is that Farrah in a blind rage, tosses the Book of Breathings into the cauldron. And Reese kind of says, OK, well, that's one way to try and resolve this issue.

53:03 And we do not see that book again in Prithean. Yeah, Yep. So interesting too that Ameren are are you about? Are you going to talk more about Ameren I? Don't know how much more I can talk about Ameren. I just think it's interesting that she comes back through the cauldron. Through the cauldron. Why?

53:21 Why? So I think it's I mean, it's kind of worth talking about, right? Let's let's poke down this half a little bit, right? So she comes out. She. She does her thing. She comes out in her true form, she kills everyone. She goes off into the distance. She seems to die. Yeah, it's like a it's like the end of Batman where it's like she basically burns up.

53:41 She sets off the nuke over the ocean. Right, like that's, she said. Body is over there. Her body is not in the cauldron anymore. Her body is over there, but her mortal body was left in the cauldron. Her mortal body was cauldron. So whatever happened to her mortal body that was last seen in the cauldron? I don't know what that means.

53:59 I don't know where. Like, I don't know whether that holds up, but that is where we last saw it, right? And then her like true form comes Spearing out of the cauldron. Okay. But then of course, like Reese is dead. The cauldron needs to be healed. Reese gives up his life horse to heal it. Then he reaches out.

54:16 He basically says somebody fish and run out of the cauldron. Yeah. I saw her when I was dying and chose to came back and she might want to come back. So would somebody please go get her out of the cauldron? And then they pull her out of the cauldron. And so for whatever reason, Ameren's life was able to return to the mortal body that was left in whatever realm the cauldron goes to. Yeah.

54:40 And could be pulled back out of the cauldron, which is super in between. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. What is what is Nesta call it? It's like a gap between stars. Between the stars, yeah. Cold of a world before life, so is. It and we have yeah, we have the the quote from Pharaoh and Aqua war chip chapter 65 or was she in some in between trapped in whatever Dark World the cauldron occupied?

55:04 So I think it is some kind of other Dark World, right? Like, yeah, I think it's interesting too. We talked about the cauldron being able to potentially sever souls from bodies, right? We have the heart potentially being able to do that. Is that what happened to Ameren? Was that actually a manifestation of her soul that went off? And obviously that would kill her? I mean, Dementor style, that would kill you, right? So, yeah, interesting.

55:30 Interesting. I remember thinking about that and I was like, how the fuck did she come back through the Cauldron when she was over there? She. Was over there. She was over there. Yeah. It made me think of, do you remember when Ron from Harry Potter was really having trouble with the time Turner? And he was like, you were over there.

55:50 Yeah. But then I mean, she did leave her mortal body and whatever, whatever the cauldron is. I didn't think of it as a separate body, but it must have been. I mean, that's, that's what makes sense, right? She left her mortal body behind, just her mortal body and then her immortal body. And like, is that even how that works?

56:10 I don't know. She said she bound. I mean, what the cauldron is doing is unbinding her, right? Because she said she bound herself to this form, right? So then I kind of pictured it like a snake shedding its. Skin shedding a situation, yeah, but then I guess she could return to it somehow. Just. Put her right back in there. I don't know, like a PETA pocket? Just shoved herself right back in. I don't know.

56:33 My big thing, yeah, I mean, the what NASA experiences going into the Cauldron is so interesting when you think of the Cauldron as occupying a different world, a cold, Dark World basically, which is what the language that fairy uses. I mean, basically it comes down to making and unmaking, right? Like it makes Nesta Elaine and Brie Allen, it makes and then Ameren, it kind of unmakes, but then it kind of makes her again, right? It makes her Faye again when she comes back out of it. So it's kind of just those are the those are the two things that can do.

57:04 And then it can take on various forms within that, basically. Yeah, yeah. Cool, cool. The only other thing I'll add, I thought this was actually a nice touch of consistency is we get all this, we get the water imagery with the culture, right? Obviously there's water in it, and the bargain that Nesta makes with the cauldron.

57:24 The tattoo is like a crashing wave, right? Which I think works really well. I also have a little ACOTAR precog here. This is this is a little off off topic but we have had now 2 Archer on sisters make or attempt to make a bargain with the cauldron right? Because Faera at the end of Akawar tries to make a bargain with the cauldron to spare Nesta and then Elaine kills the king of Hyburn instead. And obviously Nesta did make a bargain with the cauldron at the end of Silver flames.

57:54 So are we going to have Elaine also making a bargain with the cauldron? Like yes, the cauldron is obviously off on Kridia and hidden and not really in play, but we have all these made characters who still have this living bond with it, right? So it's it's in play still. It's in play. All right, well that concludes our Aqatar only section. So if you have not read all of Crescent City and all of Throne of Glass, and this is where we suggest you leave us because you will be spoiled.

58:24 We are about to start talking about spoilers for all of the Crescent City books and all of the Throne of Glass books. So if you are running to find your phone, running to yell at Siri to pause the podcast, this is the right time to do so. We are going to start talking about spoilers and three, two, all right, spoilers 4, the entire mass verse Abby, mass verse cosms. Do you have any to share with class? A friendly reminder a steri translates to star. Just going to put that one out there. So when fair or when Nesta says what do people forget? I don't know when Nesta says she is like a newborn star. She's she's a newborn of Steri.

59:02 That is what's happening here. She is. I think she is taking a Steri power from the cauldron. That is my best guess at this moment. The other one, this is also about Nesta. I forgot this line from Ameren. Some of you may remember way back in our Cassian episode, I had a theory that the reason why Nesta, or why Cassian is able to kind of resist the crown and kind of break free of its influence just a little bit, is because Nesta imbued some of her maid essence into Cassian via sex. The way that Bryce imbues some of her maid essence, her Starborn essence, into Hunt via sex. I forgot that we had this line from Ameren, which is, I'd be careful when you're fucking her.

59:43 Ameren added, lips curling in a sneer. Who knows what she might transform you into when her emotions are high, which I think kind of confirms this theory that she made. She did make him just a little bit when they were having sex like I. Am with you but that command was just kill it was he. Definitely was just kill, but there's a moment where he he like says something and Brie Allen is like what what did like how how is this possible? There's definitely a moment where he is fighting the crown's influence.

1:00:12 Oh yeah, yeah, earlier on, yeah, the command is just killed. Brie Allen was not specific enough with her wording, which she should know better but she's new to being but she. Doesn't last very long, so. She doesn't last very long. Maybe she should. Yeah. No, there's yeah. There is a moment where where Cassian could seemingly kind of resist the the crown.

1:00:37 And I think, I think it's sex magic. That's what I think, yes. And then the only other one I had, but I'm sure we'll talk about this more, is the the Cauldron having a heartbeat. We have a lot of descriptions of Wordstone having a heartbeat. So I guess I'll just put that out there for now. We'll see where it goes.

1:00:53 We'll see where that takes us. Yeah, yeah, Yep. Cool. I have a couple. It's joint omission. Social media shoutout. Social media shoutout led to an omission on our Striga episode. Debbie Turk 9241 who is a frequent YouTube comment so I love all your comments. Debbie also commented on biology. Striga STRSTRIGA is also a genus of parasitic flowering plants, which is super interesting from an Asteria perspective, obviously because of the whole parasitic angle. But you know what's even Wilder, Debbie, is that when I looked this up, it's also commonly known as. Witchweed, which is wild.

1:01:40 I love you Sarah. So Striga. STRIGA plant genus is commonly known as witchweed which I think is very fun and also further moves me into the Striga is mother of witches. Mother of witches. I just wish she blood blue and not black but you know, we can't have it all. So that was 1 omission and social media shout out. Thank you Debbie.

1:02:02 Well. If she if she's the mother of witches, she could be the Valk in the Valk Faye equation. Yes, Right. Yeah. And it still works. It does, yeah. Yeah. It's just interesting because you always imagined that the Valg Faye equation had a woman Faye and a male Valg. But. You did, but it doesn't happen. It doesn't have.

1:02:24 To Strega is breaking the mold, yeah. Feminism. Feminism cool. And then CGS 9787 left a nice note and a fun precog but I think a lot of a lot of folks have have had like various forms of but I thought it was fun to shout out they wrote thank you for yet another fabulous episode Abby and Ronnie as a fan.

1:02:49 I have a comment and a question that I love to hear your thoughts on. I'll talk about the question in a second comment. My precog. There are three sister peaks and Pharah has her trial under the mountain Nestas was the right on Romney also could Elaine's be the prism She hears the heartbeats in the stone could be the prism could also be the House of wind, but we haven't really talked about that much. She hears Vasa who is kept with Cache who is linked with the prism, and her two besties are shadow rates who can squeeze in those spaces in the stone.

1:03:15 If Nestas powers are described as pure death and Elanes are predicted to be pure life, can she bring back to life whatever is dying there that prevents the Pegasus and other creatures from thriving? You said we need to get Lucian to the prison. Maybe he follows Elaine somehow. Also, Nesta has always protected Elaine.

1:03:30 Maybe fate has been working together to save the dust court. They also ask what guilty pleasure moments we're most looking forward to and act our six We're going to do predictions episode at some point at the end of the season. I love the idea that the sister peaks are correlated with the Archeron sisters. I think that I think that's not going to be a hard I. Agree, but I don't think we're done with Romeo. I don't think so, that's exactly what I exactly what I have. Like I think Nesta has much more to claim from Romeo. We haven't been under it.

1:03:58 Nesta did not touch the stone. I also refuse to believe the blood right in which a bunch of Valyrians die is not some method of like siphoning power off into that mountain somehow. There's no way that doesn't happen. They literally wear fucking siphons. So like, there's no way that's not related as well.

1:04:14 And I also think like, we have a lot of work to do still to get Elaine more connected to the prison. I think she's going to. But like, Nesta has more of a link to the prison at this point than Elaine does. And I think she like Elaine has more of a link to life. And she seems well set up to breathe life back into this prison once Nesta finds a way to like harp away all the prisoners into like some hell realm or something, hopefully.

1:04:40 Fingers crossed, but I think we have some work to do to get there, but I hope that's the case. Yeah, I mean, just to speak on that, just for a little more context, I think we talked about this in our Bone Carver episode, Bryce. Bryce has the opportunity to restore the prison to what it was in House of Flame and Shadow. She says the prison is talking to it. She says basically she could, like, reach out and like, touch its soul and it would become what it once was. But if she does that, all of the prison inmates will be freed. So she chooses not to.

1:05:12 She chooses to leave it the way it is, and then she pieces the fuck out. So could Elaine do that too? Could Nesta do that too? Potentially, in theory, We don't really know. We've talked about this. We don't really know why Bryce can hear the island and Nesta can't, and Reese can't write. Reese especially should be able to since he is also a descendant of Thea and this is Thea's court. But exactly what Ronnie said.

1:05:35 We need to do something about all the inmates before we return the Dust Court to its former glory, essentially. Yeah, maybe that sword knife need to open a portal to nowhere so we can just shove them all into it, but it. Was so brutal Oh my God. What else are we going to do with them? What do we do with these women?

1:05:55 Give them to Baron, enlist them in a war I don't know. Not all of them are like the bone curve or we don't even think he was a prisoner. Yeah, but CGS 9787, I like it. Thank you for the comment. Cool. All right, Abby, what is the power of the Cauldron Mass Verse Edition? OK, we know that the Esteri imbued the cauldron with their powers.

1:06:19 However, the cauldron itself seems very hell. Very, very, very hell. Right? So let's just start at the beginning. What we know of the Cauldron from Celine's vision. This is in House of Flame and Shadow Chapter 19. The snows around raw meal parted, revealing a massive bowl of iron at the foot of the monolith.

1:06:40 Even through the vision, its presence leaked into the world, a heavy, ominous thing. The Cauldron. Nesta said, dread lacing her voice. The Cauldron was of our world, our heritage. But upon arriving here, the Daglin captured it and used their powers to warp it, to turn it from what it had been into something deadly There no longer just a tool of creation, but of destruction and the horrors it produced.

1:07:03 Those two, my parents would turn to their advantage. So Celine says the college room was of our world. By the way, the fucking gymnastics Sarah has done to not name this planet, to not give this planet a name like Prythian is the name of the island. Not the word. We do not know. Yeah, We have Prithean, We have hybrid, We have the continent. We do not know the name of this planet. I don't know if that's intentional. I don't know what that means.

1:07:28 I'm assuming our world is the world that contains Prithean. We know the Asteri warped it using their powers. And after the Asteri warped it, it became a tool of destruction. So I just want to point this out here and I'm going to come back to it later. We have no longer just a tool of creation, but of destruction. Irene's powers, the death Maidens powers are described word for word.

1:07:51 The power of creation and destruction. That's what lay with in her life Giver World Maker, which is world maker is the Cauldron, right? That is the Cauldron too. So let's just park that to the side for one second. But I think it's kind of crazy, the idea that Irene might have the same powers as the Cauldron.

1:08:09 And then from Vasperus we get we pulled our power and imbued those gifts into the Cauldron so that it would work our well. We made the trove from it and then found the very essence of the cauldron to the soul of this world. So we have Celine saying that the Cauldron was originally of this world, but the Esteri are the ones who made it the kill switch as they call it, right? They pulled their power.

1:08:32 So in theory, we don't know because there is Fay power in there too. It is of this world. But in theory, all of the power that we've seen the Cauldron do could have been a starry power. The death white light certainly fits right. We don't we don't we don't really know others. But I mean, sorry, we're going to do a Crescent city season. I did not do a deep dive on a steri power to prep for this episode, but let's just kind of put that to the side for the second when Nesta goes into the cauldron. We've read a lot of these quotes already, but it is so hell like right.

1:09:03 So just to remind everyone what Ronnie just read. The black water nipping at her thrashing kills was freezing. Not the bite of winter chill or even the burn of solid ice, but something colder, deeper. The cold of the gaps between the stars, the cold of a the world before light. The cold of hell. True hell.

1:09:20 The cold of hell. OK, she realizes she bucked against the strong hands trying to shove her into that cauldron. Descriptions we have of hell, of Princess of Hell. When Adis comes to Bryce's apartment and Crescent City One we get, the temperature in the room begins to drop rapidly. Ice formed in the room, no clothing could protect against the cold this demon brought with him.

1:09:42 It pierced through every layer, snatching the breath from Hunt's chest with clawed fingers. Clawed fingers. How many times have we heard the cauldron's power described as claws? A shuddering inhale was the only sign of Bryce's discomfort as she remained facing the circle on the other side of the room. The male now contained inside its dark border. The cold burned Hunts lungs.

1:10:03 This could last only minutes at this temp Sorry, they could all last only minutes at this temperature before their healing ability started churning. And despite Bryce's Faye blood, there was a good chance that she might not recover at all without having made the drop. The frostbite would be permanent for Bryce, as would any digits or limbs loss.

1:10:18 So we're freezing, freezing, freezing temperatures and then when the Mystics go to hell in Crescent City two we get what's happening. Fairy on shouted down below. Ice crept over the other two Mystics and their tubs. Ice exploded across the walls, crusting over submerged Mystics. The machines groaned, planets flickering, and then Ethan launched himself over the rail and aimed for the male's iced over tub. He landed gracefully, balancing his feet on the platform, icing over.

1:10:44 Cold, cold, cold, cold, cold, cold, dark. That's pretty much key for hell in this world. This could also be obviously the void. It's kind of described more as the void, which as ever just remind everyone the Princess of hell were burst from the void and chaos. But we're also told Apollyons power is the void. So it's still kind of pointing in the hell direction right? Some kind of the cauldron seems to have some kind of connection to hell here in my mind.

1:11:13 And then of course, we know that NASA ends up with Deanna's powers after going into the cauldron. So we somehow have, we definitely have a Steri powers, we seem to have hell powers, and we seem to have Throne of Glass God powers all within this cauldron. Whether you believe Throne of Glass Gods are Steri or not, let's just put they're in there too, right?

1:11:34 How much of this is just inherent to the cauldron because it is the source of all life? I don't know. We're told that the cauldron is inherent to Prithean, but is that is that actually true? Is it is it actually inherent to Prithean or is it actually the birth of all life? All powers are in there and that's why we have these hell like powers. That's why we have these God like powers. I don't know, and I think I'm going to get into that more late later in our last question too.

1:12:03 And then we also have this from Helion when he's describing the mask, but the mask was made by the Asteria used in the Cauldron, right? So the quote is it affects you that much? Helion says. Doesn't it rake it's cold claws down your senses? Helion asked. So we have those cold claws again, which are very hell like. We also obviously have Maeve's power being described as claws a lot of the time, and Reese's power is being described as claws a lot of the times.

1:12:28 But the cold claws specifically the fact that they're cold kind of point me towards towards hell, you know? So I don't know it's even very hell like. It feels like it goes to a void like you said. What the hell? The void is linked to hell. I also think that there's a good chance that some of, if not all of Deanna's power is in hell as well.

1:12:57 And the reason that I think that could be the case is, and this is there's a little bit of gymnastics involved in here. So just like, bear with me while I try to talk through this. You'll get it. But like I'm going to over explain a little bit. If you don't know why we think that Nesta has Deanna's powers, you need to go listen to our Nesta. So.

1:13:15 But she has the power of silver flames. And Deanna's power when she possesses Aylan also is the power of silver flames. And when Aylan banishes the gods right, she rips a hole right into a world she had only seen once. Had accidentally opened a portal into one night in a stone castle. Distant bang house cracks from the bleak Gray expanse.

1:13:37 A portal into a hell realm, a door noun thrown open. Hell realm could be whatever. But that hole that she had, that like world she had only seen once was opened in chapter 44 of Crown of Midnight, right? And there's a whole bunch of things in there that are hell, like, right? It's an endless void. But the smoking gun was her bloody palm slapped against the stones, and a greenish light flared beneath her fingers. Right like hell in Crescent City has green light in Crescent City.

1:14:05 The black boat that Aid has LED Bryson Hunt into was between the one that had brought them into a fallen and this ones that carried bodies to the Bone Quarter. But in lieu of a stag's head, it was a stag skull at the prow, greenish flame dancing in his eyes as it stailed through The Cave. So Aylan's portal that she opened in Crown of Midnight that she opened again when she shoved the gods and to their world and open that portal was to that same hell that's in Crescent City.

1:14:32 And that beast that came out of that portal that she opened, Incredible. Midnight had white skin and like Milky eyes and like all the same shit as the Crystallis, right? So she opened a portal to the same hell. So if the Cauldron does go to hell and Deanna was shoved into a world that had a rift to hell open in it, then like it's totally possible that the power the Nesta clawed out of this place was Deanna's still. Still Deanna on us, Yeah.

1:14:57 So I think it could still work. I mean, I so I think we are saying slightly different things and I think we should talk about it. I don't know how to reconcile the fact that she seems to be underwater. Oh yeah. With underwater. Yeah, with the idea that she's in hell or the void. Right. So like I think I'm more saying that the cauldron also cauldron be from hell imbued or made from hell power versus it is a portal to hell, yeah.

1:15:28 I think that can work too, yeah. In which case, like, yeah, there's not really a great explanation for how Deanna's powers in it, unless like she's involved in Hell too in that way, because like, we know that she was shoved into a world that had a RIP to hell in it. I feel pretty good about that at least. I feel pretty good about that, too. I think right now we don't have enough to say how this happened. Yeah.

1:15:48 But I'm, like, fairly confident in saying that the hell the Princess of hell have laid a finger on this cauldron at some point, have done something to this cauldron. Yeah, for sure. For sure. And depths, yeah. And we'll talk more about that in our Trove episode, actually. The rim is icy, guys. The rim is icy. Yeah.

1:16:12 Yeah. It's also called iron here. So like, is it made from word stone? I don't know. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know that that word stone is like a recognized word in Prithean. What would they call it? Yeah, I don't. Know cool. All right, any more on that one? Nope. Cool. So Asteri and Hell, All right, Green, help Ronnie.

1:16:32 What happened when Farrah broke the cauldron? Yes, more hell and other stuff and other stuff. So we already touched on this a bit in the actor only section, but to paraphrase, Ameren goes into the cauldron, Farrah says a spell that unbinds her, and then the cauldron fractures into three pieces. So Farrah goes to investigate it in Aquawar chapter 76. And this is that passage.

1:16:58 And it's so long, so I'm going to try to skip around as much as I can, but it is like a lot of this is pretty important. I managed to stand to take one step before I felt it. The thing in the cauldron, or lack of it, it was lack and substance, absence and presence. You said this already and it was leaking into the world. I dare to step toward it.

1:17:19 And what I beheld in those ruins of the cauldron, it was a void. A void. It was a void. But also not avoid a growth. It did not belong here, belong anywhere. So the cauldron breaks and opens a void, right? The cauldron could never be destroyed. I skipped a bit. We had been warned because our very world was bound to it.

1:17:39 If the cauldron were destroyed, we would be too made, made and unmade. I had broken and I could remake it again. I ran for the book, flinging open the pages, but the gold was engraved with symbols. I skipped a bunch again but the gold was engraved with symbols only. Only one being on this earth knew how to read and she was gone.

1:17:59 I hurled the damn thing into the voice inside the cauldron of vanished and did not appear again. Well that's one way to try reset. So this is fair. Just like chucking the book of reading from the cauldron. She was just like fuck this. Reese is funny. The book driver was right about that. Reese is funny.

1:18:15 So then Reese looks at the ruins and he says Ameren said you were a conduit to Farrah. Farrah nods. So be 1 again, remake the cauldron, forge it anew and Pharaoh says with what power? Reese says mine. It was a whole airless no life could exist here, No light. It was it was what had existed at the beginning, before all things had exploded from it. It did not belong here.

1:18:40 Maybe one day, when the earth had grown old and died, when the stars had vanished too, maybe then we would return to this place. Not today. I was both form and nothing, and behind me, Reese's power was a tether and unending lightning strike that surged me into this place to be shaped as I willed it, made and unmade.

1:18:59 From a distant corner of my memory, my human mind, I remembered a mural I had seen at the Spring Court, tucked away in a dusty, unused library. It told the story of Prithean. It told the story of a cauldron. This cauldron, and when it was held by female hands, all life flowed from it. I reached mine out, Reese's power rippling through me, united, joined as one. So they are.

1:19:22 They are carrying them. I'm interpreting this as they are carrying them and refresher for everyone carrying on and throne of glasses. You are compatible with somebody else and their power can flow through you and you can use their power. So Fair is able to use Reese's power to do what she needs to do here.

1:19:40 So she is the conduit. But Reese's supplying the power. And Reese's just obviously fought very, very hard in battle, so he does not have that much left. The fact that he does have enough to fucking repair this cauldron is actually astounding. Ask an answer. I was not afraid. Not with him there. I cut my hands as if the crack thirds of the cauldron could fit into them, the entire universe into the palm of my hand.

1:20:02 I began to speak that last spell. Amron had found us. Speak and think and feel it. Word and breath and blood. Word and breath and blood. Reese's work. Reese's power flowed through me, out of me. The cauldron appeared. Light danced along the fissures where the broken thirds had come together. There, there I would need to forge, to Weld, to bind. I put a hand against the side of the cauldron. Raw, brutal power cascaded out of me. This is all about them.

1:20:28 I don't care about that. It flowed and flowed. A burst dam of night. The cracks fizzled and blurred. That void began to slither back in more. We needed more. He gave it to me. Reese handed over everything. I was a bearer of vessel. A link. Reese is dying. I recited the spell. The first crack healed, then the second I felt some tremble behind me.

1:20:49 Reese is dying. Vomiting Reese is dying. There is doing this. There is healing the cauldron until we gave every OK together. We threw everything in, We gave every last drop until that cauldron was whole. Until the thing it contained. It was in there, locked away. Until I could feel the sun again warming my face, and saw that cauldron squatting before me, beneath my hand.

1:21:16 I ease my fingers from the icy iron brim, gaze down into the inky depths. No cracks, whole. I loosed A shuddering breath. We had done it. And then she turns around and sees Reese dead. So that's unfortunate. It's fine he gets brought back to life, but he did give his life's power to heal this cauldron, to pose these fissures to to reforge this cauldron.

1:21:40 I think that if we got a first person POV of Reese's experience, this scene would have felt a lot like the scene in which Aylan gave up her life force to forge. The lock your gut. It's my precog theory. It's your precog. It's my answer to this whole question. OK, do it. I'm sorry. That's OK. Do it. Do it.

1:22:02 OK Well we can do it together in Kingdom of Ash Chapter 9. There's only like a few excerpts that I'll read, but still more was needed to bind this place, to bind all worlds. He would never forgive her, her mate. Aylan's magic tore out of her, a piece so vital and deep that she cried out, swaying. Her magic arrived, begging her to stop, but she could not, would not.

1:22:22 She barely felt the tears on her face as she fell to her knees as she gave and gave her magic, her very self gone where light and life had flowed within her, there was nothing. Reese calls the cauldron's healing a ceiling. He called he literally calls it a ceiling and Mala calls the gate closing a ceiling as well because he's she says seal the gate fire bringer and Reese and Akwar chapter 77 says she was there when the cauldron was ceiling is talking about Amarin going wherever we go. The cauldron has three feet which can be separated from the base of the cauldron without creating a void because they were separated right?

1:22:57 So are those, are those the keys? I think that opens up another theory as to how Deanna's power ended up in this cauldron. I don't know whether this is where you went. Is this where we. Went to different places. We went to different places, yes. So I can still do it for precog. But yes. The seat, the the similarities between Reese and Farah, reforging the cauldron, because that's the word that is used, right?

1:23:22 Forging. Forging. Yeah. And Alan and Dorian forging the lock to seal the word gate are really similar. I'm going to go somewhere else within precog, but let's talk about your theory. OK, OK, good. I think, I think the cauldron could be a lock and word keys and I think the feet of the cauldron could be the keys and I think the body of the cauldron could be the lock.

1:23:44 I think Reese has caught like called the cauldron ceiling a ceiling Mala called the gate closing a ceiling the three feet for whatever reason when they were broken off the cauldron did not create this fucking void. So it was not a problem when that happened when the lock from Throne of Glass was created, the the Throne of Glass lock had a heart of darkness in the middle, which was actually a teeny tiny witch mirror this big that Rhiannon motherfucking Crockett helped Mala motherfucking Firebringer cast her power into. So in Empire of Storms chapter 65, she had not seen or spoken to her mother since she had left her body to force the lock, since Rhiannon Crockett had helped Mala cast her very essence into it, the mass of its

1:24:32 power contained within the small witch mirror disguised as a bluestone to be unleashed only once. They had never told Elena why, never said it was anything more than a weapon that her father would one day desperately need to wield. The cost her mother's mortal body, the life she'd wanted for herself with Brandon and their children. And Mala is now a God, right?

1:24:51 Like Mala is Deanna's sister, so this happened to Deanna's. This how her power ended up in the Cauldron? Like is it possible that Deanna, whenever it was last locked, helped forge that original lock? And what does it mean then that like Reese and Farrah just forged in again? If that is true, it's a little it's a little crazy.

1:25:12 But like if they like they did just seal a void. So they did just seal a void. We talked about how Deanna's fingerprints are seemingly all over Prythian but she herself is not there, Right? So you're saying it's possible that Deanna was once on Prythian and used and basically sealed the word the word gate that is the cauldron with her immortal self basically. The theory is there is a word gate. The cauldron basically represents a word gate. And the lock was forged at one point by Deanna and that's why her power was there.

1:25:44 The cauldron broke. Aaron broke the cauldron. However, the fuck she did that? I don't know. But then it was broken. Like the lock was broken. So Reese gave his life force. Did like he died. He died, Yeah. So he gave up his life force to reseal it. I don't know what I mean. The power that's in the cauldron now.

1:26:02 If you think about it, if you think, if you go back to our original theory way, way back at the beginning of the season, that the king of Hyburn is Valk, right? And we have these three legs of the cauldron that have been removed, right? Like the three word keys, right? Like the word gate does not open unless you have the three word keys, right? And then the three legs are returned. Yeah.

1:26:24 And he, he is constantly using cauldron. But we also know the cauldron needs to be kind of like re re up its power. Basically. Was he trying to bring a Valg army through this word? Gate the way the. Arrow on was through the Cauldron at some point. I don't know. That's definitely preca. We don't have a lot to go off of there. But I definitely think if you think of the Cauldron as a word gate, as this universe is this world's version of a word gate, then it fits with the three keys and the three feet being cleaved from it.

1:26:53 And then him trying to he's basically he basically did the entire Throne of Glass quest, get the word keys in Ackerman, I think got them back. But yeah, the. King from Throne of Glass is linked to a cauldron. Yeah, one, yeah, yeah. And it's like on all the same notes, like the the feet are hidden.

1:27:15 The cauldron is hidden away from the feet. I definitely think, I definitely think the cauldron could be a word gate. I'm not sure. I'm totally with you on the Deanna forging the lock with her power, but I definitely agree with the word gate parallels, and I will talk about them in precog. I went Crescent City direction with this question because because we have a direct parallel right when when Bryce breaks the void, when Bryce basically destroys the first light core under the Crystal Palace.

1:27:45 Yeah, yeah. So the quotes we get for that, he said Bridgeless says that destroying the first light core will create a void. We had all this void imagery with favorite like that's that is tangibly what happened to you, right? She created a void that would have sucked all of Prythian. And the quote we have for that is in House of Flame and Shadow chapter 96 that core is tied to mid guards very soul. Originalist said.

1:28:09 You destroy it and this entire planet will wink out of existence. Bryce's blood chilled. She might have called bullshit had it not been for vest versus claims about the cauldron. You made the core a kill switch for this world, Bryce. Bryce Lee. Bryce breathed. And if I call your bluff? Bryce demanded, buying whatever time she could to sort out all she'd heard and witnessed and endured.

1:28:31 Then a darkness like none you have ever known shall devour the planet and you will cease to exist, said The Asterio to Ridgeless is right. And then Ridgeless basically confirms that this will create a void. Think very carefully, Bryce Quinlan Ridgel has said, stepping forward with his hands raised.

1:28:47 One bullet from you into the core, and this world and all its innocence will be sucked into a void with no end. The same void. Now we have Capital V Void. The same void that Apollyon had claimed allowed him to devour the Esteri. Laris's body had been sucked into nothing. A void with no end. I think this is really interesting for a couple reasons. We talked about the first one, right? The void is an actual character.

1:29:09 This is the same thing what happens when you put truth teller and the star sword together right And what you need. So what Bryce is talking about with Polaris, his body haven't sucked into nothing. She kills Polaris by stabbing her with who is in a steri by the way, with truth Teller and the star sword and she creates a mini black hole and Hunt has to basically strike Rice with his Hellfire power, his lightning power to close that void.

1:29:38 Reese Reese as a tether behind Pharah is described as a lightning strike, right? That is the word that it's used. So like we're getting Hunt and Reese ties here. But then also it is a polygons power. It is a Prince of Hell's power to create this void in theory. So like how did that? How did the Aseri put a Prince of Hell's power into the cauldron?

1:30:01 That is kind of my question here. Like the mechanics of all of this working quote we have for that is. It had been a gamble, but she'd seen what the Star Sword and True Seller had done to Polaris. They had created a void that had sucked the Esteri in. The only sort of prison that might destroy a being of light.

1:30:18 The only force in the universe that ate light so strong no light could ever escape it. A portal to nowhere, to a black hole. Wasn't that the unholy power that a Polygon possessed? The power of the void, the antithesis of light, the only thing that could kill a planet in one bite? Destroy the Asteria and Midgard with them. The Asteria knew it as well.

1:30:38 They'd also they'd always known it and employed it for their kill switch to be activated upon the destruction of the first light core. So that's I mean, that is what's happening when when the cauldron is destroyed, right? They are, they are opening a void that is going to suck all of Prythian in it via Steri put that power in the cauldron.

1:30:57 And I think the question is in the same way that how did Deanna's power end up in the cauldron, how did a Prince of Hell's power end up being the kill switch for the cauldron, right? With also in the cauldron, right? Like how, how did that happen? I don't know. I don't know. And then I will get into what I think about Reese's Reese's POV in the reforging scene in Precog.

1:31:24 Abby, what is the link between the cauldron Urd and Urd? OK, so we are told pretty explicitly in my opinion, but maybe you'll prove me wrong again. You proved me wrong last week that the Cauldron and the Word and urge are the same things, and I think you're going to prove me wrong. But my question for that if, if we go by what I think versus what Ronnie thinks, we'll find out, does that mean that Celine was lying and the cauldron is not inherently of Prithian, but is in fact of all worlds?

1:31:54 So I'm going to read the quotes that led me to this conclusion, and then Ronnie's going to tell me why I'm not reading this correctly. So from House of Flame and Shadow. Definitely there. I'm not just. A trail is there. OK, all right, so from House of Flame and Shadow, Erd and Nesta murmured. This is when they're talking in the tunnels with Bryce and Nesta and Azrael.

1:32:13 The Fae say the Cauldron holds all our faiths. Maybe it became this Erd, I don't know. Bryce said. I always wondered what happened to the gods of the original worlds when their people crossed into Midgard. Did they follow them? Did I bring Erd or Luna or any of them with me? She gestured to the caves. Are they here or am I alone, stranded in your world? World with no gods to call my own? That's House of Flame and Shadow chapter 16. I had a note here.

1:32:38 I think it's interesting that the Prythian Faye would have brought the idea of the Cauldron with that. If that is what happened, it might not be what happened because it might have been that the Aurelian Fae brought the idea of of word with them and that became Urd, right? But like, the cauldron was a tool of oppression to the Prythian Fae, used by the Esteri to forge like awful, awful weapons, right? To like basically like keep them enslaved. So like the idea that now they have a goddess called Urd who is depicted with a cauldron.

1:33:12 To be fair, only once, but basically depicted holding a cauldron I think is an interesting, interesting idea. But that's neither here nor there for this question. Then we have this quote from the Under King which we read during our mother episode that tells us that Urd and Word are the same thing and highly implies that the cauldron is that.

1:33:30 But I'm waiting for Ronnie to tell me why I'm wrong. So OK. The Under King lounged on a throne beneath A behemoth statue of a figure holding a black metal bowl between her up raise hands. Symbols were carved all over the bowl, continuing down her fingers, her arms, her body. Ethan could only assume it was meant to represent Erd. No other temples ever depicted the goddess. No one even dared.

1:33:52 Most people claim that fate was impossible to portray in anyone form, but it seemed like the dead, unlike the living, had a vision of her. And those symbols running from the bowl onto her skin. They were like tattoos. And she, the under king, went on Jesper, gesturing to that unusual depiction of Herb Towering above them was not a goddess, but a force that governed worlds, a cauldron of life brimming with the language of creation.

1:34:16 If you guys remember Tamlin's mural of the cauldron, which we actually haven't talked about at all this episode, but we talked about long our mother episode. It is poured over from female hands and there are small symbols that are being poured out of it. We're pretty sure there were marks urge. They called her here a bastardized version of her true name word.

1:34:34 We called her in that old world. So under King is basically telling us the cauldron is word is erred and the We just have one quick quote about word. Some books claim the word is the force that holds together and governs Aurilia. And not just Aurilia, countless other worlds too. And then from Dorian we have. I always thought the word was an old term for fate or destiny. So did I, but the word isn't a religion, at least not in the northern parts of the continent.

1:34:58 It's not included in the worship of goddesses or gods. So we have Celine telling us that the Cauldron was of our world, our heritage, but we also have it being compared to Word, which we're told is the force that holds together and governs countless other worlds, right? So not just a really a countless other worlds. And same with ERD.

1:35:21 So is the Cauldron just a manifestation of Word on Prythian or is it not actually of Prythian? Is it actually larger than that? So here's what I think might be going on here. It could what's happening here be that word and word exist everywhere. But we are actually told by the bone Carver that the cauldron has a maker, right? Someone forged the cauldron.

1:35:49 So the quote we have for that is when the cauldron was made, the Carver interrupted its dark maker. Use the last of the molten ore to forge a book, the book of breathings. In it. Written between the carved words are the spells to negate the cauldrons power or control holy. That's in a court of Miss and Fury chapter 18 so we have it's dark maker.

1:36:12 We The phrase dark maker is used a couple different times in the mass verse, but it is always used to describe the Valk, right? So the quote we have for that in Kingdom of Ash, Lorkhan refers to the creator of the Morath demons as dark makers in the battle at Anil. Sorry Anil. I looked up how to pronounce that. If I'm wrong let me know.

1:36:32 So the quote is 1 moment he was handily sending the Morath grunts back to their dark maker. 1 moment he was grinning even as he tasted their vile blood spraying the air. So the Morath grunts are the Valg, they're dark makers, they were made by the Valk, right? So that's Kingdom of Ash chapter 58. And then an air of fire.

1:36:49 We have the Stygian Spider saying Manon did not dare touch Wind Cleaver as she said the world is changing sister, Sister, the spider mused. I suppose we are sisters you and I2, faces of the same dark corn, same dark coin, the same Dark Maker, Sisters in spirit if not in flesh. So there we have both Manon and the Stygian Spiders being created by a Dark Maker, and that Dark Maker we know are the Valk. So was the cauldron made by the Valk? I want to go back to the deaf maiden idea that we talked about way back when hours ago.

1:37:23 I don't know. So we have. I'm going to read this quote again. The cauldron was of our world, our heritage. But upon arriving here, the Daglin captured it and used their powers to warp it, to turn it from what it had been into something deadlier, no longer just a tool of creation, but of destruction. And for Irene, we have the power of creation and destruction. That's what lay within here.

1:37:44 Life giver, world maker. That's Kingdom of Ash chapter 113. The deaf maidens we believe are from the Valk home world. I don't know if they're Valk, but they are at least from the Valk home world. And we have these quotes from Arrow on when he's talking to Irene. How do you think we took the keys in the 1st place? A hateful, horrible smile.

1:38:03 In my world, your kind exists to not healers to us, but executioners. Deaf maidens capable of healing, but also unhealing, unbinding the very fabric of life, of worlds, healing and unhealing, making and unmaking with the cauldron. Right? Like these are pretty similar and Erawan says binding the very fabric of life of worlds. If they can heal and unheal, then I imagine they can also bind the very fabric of life of worlds. And the word that is used to describe Ameren after she goes into the cauldron is that she was unbound, right? So it's like very similar words.

1:38:39 And then the quote the next. What we have is arrow on smart. So we took your kind. Use them to unbind the word gate to RIP three pieces of it from its very essence. Maeve never learned it and never shall. His jagged breath deepened as be savored every word, each step closer. It took all of them to hew the keys from the gate, every one of the healers amongst by kind but you, with your gifts, it would only take you to do it again.

1:39:04 And with the keys now returned to the gate, Maeve thinks I left to kill you, to destroy you. Your little, your little Fire Queen thought so too. She could not conceive that I wanted to find you before Maeve, before any harm could come to you. And now that I have what fun you and I shall have Irene Towers. So seems to me to be implying here that I, green on her own could potentially make a word gate control a word gate that she has the power to do that as a deaf maiden. We just talked about the cauldron potentially being a word gate, right?

1:39:34 So did a deaf maiden create the cauldron? I don't know. Little wackadoodle, little little loose, but the powers line up. Yeah, I don't know if I'm fully on board with a deaf maiden having created the cauldron and it being like quite that physical, but I do think and where like where my skepticism comes from with the cauldron being fully Urd.

1:39:58 And word is yes, we are told by like by the under King, by these like people who. Let's be real. Or just like like people that like Herd and Word and the Cauldron are all the same thing. But in terms of what we observe, like the Mother and the Cauldron are much more active physical beings than Word and Herd ever are, right.

1:40:24 So like the mother acts much more like a throne of glass God. We've talked about this at length in our mother episode and we think that the mother could be Silva, which is the like patron goddess of the death maidens that you just described. And the cauldron is exists like it just like it is literally there. So I struggle with it being completely synonymous with this force that governs worlds.

1:40:51 Not to mention in A Court of Silver Flames Chapter 53, Nesta feels a force that is vaster than the Cauldron or the Mother or the Harp. She literally has something vast or something that stretched into the stars carved all around them. And you think that's word? I think that's word. Like I think that Parthian just doesn't know it. Like I think and that like is consistent with Prithean, kind of like they don't know who created the words around the prison.

1:41:18 They don't know what the symbols etched into the prison mean. Like they just don't know it. And so I don't think that they like recognize it or have an equivalent for word and herd there. And I don't think they brought the cauldron with them because like you said, even though it was a fae item, it was like a bastardization and something that they did not want to bring over.

1:41:41 And like the mother was, the mother was a God. Yeah, I buy that. Right. So it's more like the religious aspect of the cauldron. What the cauldron has been like kind of conflated with with fate and destiny like that. That is word, that is or, but the cauldron itself. Right. Is not, Yeah. It's too physical, yeah.

1:42:04 Yeah, I agree. At least that's like that's where I'm at, based on like what we actually observe in the stories and our first hand accounts of Nesta, which so far have has been the only reliable narrator in my opinion that we've had in this. Yeah, I think I agree, right. Like, I don't, I don't truly believe the Cauldron is the eddies of the cauldron are like the physical cauldron are like determining mates are like pulling on on the strings of fate, right? Like the cauldron has a set number of powers. We listed them at the beginning of this episode. That it can do.

1:42:39 And telling the future. Well, except that Elaine's a seer. But like, fate is not really one of them, right? It can be controlled. Yeah. If you can wield the cauldron, like yeah. And it be the force that governs worlds. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah. And it hadn't even occurred to me about the Silva being the mother thing, but that makes even more sense with the idea that maybe a death maiden. Right.

1:43:02 Forged the cauldron. Yeah. So I like that more. I don't know that I'd buy like any old death maiden, but like maybe Silva. Like maybe, maybe Silva. Yeah. And maybe like the mother when she created Prithian was actually bringing a world through a word gate into the void and like, locked it. Yeah, yeah, because it's very interesting. The description of that, of that creation myth basically, right, is like the Mother poured out the contents of the Cauldron onto this planet.

1:43:35 The contents of the Cauldron were dumped into the void below, pulling on the Earth to form our world. So we have the void, but then we also have like, pulling onto something to form our world. Yeah, very interesting. Yeah. I mean, I agree with you. I don't think that the literal cauldron is word or faith, but I think that the mythification of the cauldron.

1:43:57 And it is interesting that like the faith, Prithean just chose to totally say like, fuck the mother, fuck the cauldron, we're not going to bring any of that to make guard. I don't know, I guess that they came over during during the rule of the Daglin. So I guess the Daglin were who they were worshipping during that time.

1:44:13 So I guess that checks out. Well, yeah, but I mean, it is interesting, right? Like, So what happened to the Mother? Like, why didn't like, because the Mother was not corrupted by the Asterian theory, right. So I know we had a theory that maybe she was, but I don't really think so. Why wouldn't they have brought this concept of the Mother over with them to to Midgard?

1:44:36 Why did they start worshipping Luna? You know, these are my questions. I don't know. I don't know. All right, Ronnie, what are the implications of the cauldron being warped and what do we think it means moving forward? Yeah. OK. This is going to be a lot of speculation, but the Cauldron, as we know, we've read it probably five times on this podcast, and I think at least once in this episode, the Cauldron has been warped by the Asteri, right?

1:45:04 So it was a fate item. Celine confirms it's of our heritage. Celine's not the most reliable, but we're going to take a word for it. And then the Atheri took it and they warped it. The Asteri are also responsible for tying it to Prythian. And that was from Besperis, who I actually do believe. Destroy the Cauldron, you destroy this world.

1:45:21 One cannot exist without the other. Cool. Got it. The world has a kill switch. Protein has a kill switch. We've talked about some things that the cauldron is capable of doing. You said that you don't know whether the cauldron actually determines mating bonds. I think it might. And I think it's, I think it's worth mentioning that anything of the cauldron has done after it was worked by the Astiri might be suspect like might benefit the Astiri. And I think that includes mating bonds potentially and definitely powers that it willingly gives to anyone, cough Elaine. Elaine.

1:45:55 And that's actually consistent with what Reese says about mating bonds, right? But sometimes they're not about love and that they just pair people with what might result in the best offspring. This is Akwar chapter 24, when Fair is pissed off that Elaine and Lucian are mates, when Elaine as real seem to get along and Fair just wants her picture perfect family. And Reese says the mating bond can be rejected. There is choice, And sometimes, yes, the bond picks poorly. Sometimes the bond is nothing more than some preordained guesswork at who will provide the strongest offspring. At its basis level, it's perhaps only that, some natural function, not an indication of true paired souls. So if I'm a steri and I'm trying

1:46:35 to create a population that's producing super powerful offspring so that I can have great food, I would try and breed really powerful pairs. And so I think it's possible that if the cauldron is responsible for mating bonds, which is not confirmed, like that is not Canon, but it's it is implied, like they at least like believe it in a spiritual sentence, then that might be what's happening, right with not just reason Ferrell, like maybe they're just lucky that they do love each other, but like maybe mating bonds kind of across the board. And that's why when Bryce arrives on Prithee and she's like holy shit these people are so fucking powerful. How the fuck are the fake here this powerful? The Cauldron.

1:47:15 But they also haven't had a parasite. Well they haven't teaching off them for 15,000 years. Absolutely they haven't. Yeah, absolutely they have not. But my point being like the Cauldron might be up to no good. And the selected breeding gifts. Gifts Elaine seeing powers. But you know, Elaine has just shown things.

1:47:35 So could the cauldron. We've talked about this before. Could we be set up for the cauldron, potentially showing Elaine things very intentionally? So far the cauldron has not been on our side. For whatever reason it seems to always be on the opposing side and I'm not quite sure why. The cauldron Why this like ultra powerful item is just willing to be wielded?

1:47:56 Yeah, well, he it hates the King of Pyrid, seemingly right. It says kill him, kill him, kill him. Yeah. And like, loves, loves Elaine. Yeah, seems to be willing to like yields to Nesta stalks like a hound at her side. It has preferences, so I think there could be implications to what it does and why it does it because it is warped. At the end of Crescent City, Bryce says something to Nesta that implies there might be a steri to deal with on Perthian, which is weird seeing as we were promised the last of steri on Perthian was dead.

1:48:32 And that is in House of Flame and Shadow Chapter 100. Guys, you really got to start reading. Well you guys are already in Christmas City, but tell your friends who haven't read it. So read it now in chapter 100. Bryce says. So I want you to take the Star sword. Bryce held the blade between them. Gwidian, whatever you call it here, the age of the star born is over on Midgard.

1:48:53 It ends with me. I don't understand. But Bryce began backing toward the portal, taking Hunt's hand and smiled again at the female, at her mate, at their world as the northern rift began to close. I think that 8 pointed star was tattooed on you for a reason and take that sword and go figure out why.

1:49:09 So now both the star sword and the truth teller and truth teller are on Pythian and we know that truth teller can unmake things and together they can also open a void. So is that what we do? We have a few options here, right? Like we've got we've got a corrupted cauldron. My, my opinion is that we're going to need to uncorrupt the cauldron in some way.

1:49:27 Let's put aside the theory that the cauldron is potentially a word gate at this point, because I think that like kind of opens a can of worms. We have the potential to just an old uncorrupted and then destroy it and then the just put it away option. If we open a void and just put it away, maybe the problem goes away forever because nobody's going to be able to deal with it and avoid.

1:49:49 I think that's probably not going to happen because in theory we could do that tomorrow and then there's no story. So I don't think that's what's happening. So are the next main character is going to be Nesta with the Star Sword and that's how Asriel and maybe Elaine are going to get pulled into the storyline where Truth Teller needs to help on make the cauldron in some way.

1:50:08 Maybe that would be interesting. I would like that. Yeah, I had. I had the same so I I had the same thoughts. My thinking is maybe the cauldron is no longer fucked since it was broken and remade right? Maybe we're OK with the cauldron, but the trove certainly certainly fucked certainly riddled with a steri power, right.

1:50:29 So we're going to have to do something with that. And I think maybe yeah, maybe we tossed the items of the trove in to a void, but does feel like we've already gotten that story. So I'm not sure, but it does also feel like we're getting that story again, given that she brought to she brought truth Teller back to Prithian Bright. She being Bryce brought truth Teller back to Prithian and gave Nesta Gwidian for some reason we Gwidian not anorexia, right? Like, I don't know, yeah.

1:50:56 Is there any need to unlink the cauldron from Prithian? Like is that a thing we need to do? Yeah, I don't know. And how would you even go about doing such a thing? I have no idea. But if the Asteria can do it, then in theory the Asteria can undo it. Right, so do we have an Asteria? You have an Asteri. Unfortunately, the Asteri doesn't know that they're in a staring, so someone's going to need to let him know. Yeah, so he's going to have.

1:51:21 To tell who's going to tell him? Bryce, and if you don't know what we're talking about, go listen to our Reese's Family deep dive. That is also a plug. Someone tell Reese that he's in a staring. Someone also tell Reese that he's from hell. He's got a lot of stuff that he needs to be told. Yeah, it's interesting too, because in theory, if if, if Reese could unfuck the Cauldron, then Bryce can also unfuck the core first light under the sorry, Alice, just just get rid of just on kill switch it. But that's pure speculation.

1:51:49 I don't know. I don't know. Could there be some healing that could be done with the first light under Romeo that I firmly believe is there even though we have? Like so it's no longer a barren mountain. Oh I was thinking if the cauldron is still fucked. I don't know. Oh bring it to a first light core maybe The cauldron is fine actually to your point. But like if if Reese is Asteria, the cauldron is not fine. I don't have an answer for this one. I don't.

1:52:17 I don't. We're going to need to fix the cauldron we're. Going to need. We're going to need. Here are the facts. The facts are these. We're going to need to UN fuck either the Cauldron or the Trove. We have been given the power to create a void on Prythean and we have implications that we are not done with the Asteria on Prythean. Those three things are facts, and that is just a question of where the cards fall, basically.

1:52:42 I think yes. And if we're getting a replay of Crescent City on Prythian, which I'm OK with it. I'm OK with it. I'm fine with it. The Cauldron is in Creedia, The Trove is very much still around. In nightcore, yes can just be summoned. It will like the Uroboros can just NASA can just summon the trove. Probably going to just fly into her hands. Yeah.

1:53:03 Where does she like, where did she pull the mask out of in the tunnels? I don't even. Want pocket ROMs? I don't know. Yeah. Which the Princess of Hell can get into. All right. Yeah. All right. Pre cog corner, Abby, pre cog. All right, So you've already set me up quite nicely for this, which was going to be talking about the cauldron potentially being a word gate and talking about Reese's experience with that from his point of view.

1:53:28 Right. So we have a couple more links, I think, between the idea of the word gate and the cauldron being related. So quotes we have for when Farrah, we, we already read this. Sorry, we already read this, but I want to emphasize different things now. I'm going to read it differently. When Reese and Farrah are fixing the cauldron, she actually gets transported somewhere, right?

1:53:50 She's not on the battleground anymore. She gets transported to the void, right? So it was a whole airless, no life could exist here, no light. It was it was what had existed at the beginning before all things had exploded from it. It did not belong here. Maybe one day when the earth had grown old and died side when the stars had vanished too, maybe then we would return to this place, right. So we are it's definitely the void, but we are also getting beginning and end imagery as we love to get with the cauldron. In the beginning, In the end, there was darkness. This is the darkness by the way, this is the darkness when Dorian and alien are are closing the word gates, which happens over multiple chapters that starts at

1:54:32 94. We get as it had once as it had been once before. So it was again the beginning and and an eternity torrent of light of life that flowed between them, two halves of a cleave bloodline. So we are getting again, we are getting two people sharing their power. Dorian seems to be Karen am with everyone by Karen on with everyone by the way, because he also does this with Irene later. We can talk about that in our throne of last season. But we have as it had been once before. So it was again the beginning and end and eternity, which is what we get with the Cauldron.

1:55:04 Sarah and Dorian might have the same fucking power, but that's a different conversation. That's a different conversation, Yeah. And then we get this again when Dorian senior shows up. Dorian junior says Dorian had nothing to say to him, had hated this man, hated that this man was here at the end and beginning.

1:55:23 So we are getting the beginning and the end again. We also get creation and destruction imagery. We get a well running dry forever more and more and more ripping from them with East each breath creation and destruction, which as we talked about, we had for the culture and as well, right. So in both cases we are forging something. In the case of Alan and Dorian, you are forging the lock. In the case of Reese and Pharaoh, we are forging the key. It takes the power of two people and one of them has to give up all of their power to do it.

1:55:53 And that is Reese for the cauldron, and it is Alan for the word gate. When Alan is coming back to Rowan and when Reese is coming back to Farah. It is also really similar. So the quotes we get for that Rowan's POV when Aylan is dying. By the way, I cried prepping for this, just so you guys know because this breaks my fucking heart. Every time.

1:56:14 It was breaking apart, the mating bond bowed over his knees. Rowan panted, a hand on his chest as the bond freed. He clung to it, wrapped his magic, his soul around it, as if it might keep her wherever she was from going to a place he could not follow. He did not accept it, would never, never accept this fate.

1:56:31 Never. Distantly, he heard Dorian and Kale debating something. He didn't care. The mating bond was breaking and there was nothing he could do but hold on. That is like the most devastating line to me. And then when Pharaoh's, Pharaoh's POV, when Reese is dying for their, the torn scraps of the mating bond floating on a phantom wind inside me.

1:56:51 I grasped at them, tugged at them as if he'd answer. Stay, stay, stay, stay. I clung to those scraps and remnants, clawing at the void that lurked beyond. Stay. So it's very similar, like I'm grasping onto this bond. I'm holding on to it with everything I have. And then the way that Rowan brings Aylen back is by inking their story onto her back, hidden within word marks. We got for that.

1:57:14 Mala had held out her hand again, and an image formed within it of the tattoos across Aylen's back. The new tattoo of spread wings. The story of her and Rowan wit written in the old language amongst the feathers. A flick of Mala's fingers and symbols rose from it, hidden within the words. The feathers.

1:57:30 Word marks. Rowan had hidden word marks in her hat tattoo had ain't word marks all over it A map home, Mala said, the image fading to him. So yes, we have word marks, but we also have the story of Rowan and Alan, and when Reese is dying, Farah tells him their story. Right, So we have. And in the silence, I began to tell him about that first night I'd seen him, when I'd heard that voice beckoning me to the hills, when I couldn't resist it summons.

1:57:56 And now, now I wondered if I had heard him calling for me on Kalan. My if it had been his voice that brought me there that night. I told him how I had fallen in love with him, every glance and pass, note and croak of laughter he coaxed from me. I told him of everything we'd done and what it had meant to me, and all that I still wanted to do, all the life still left before us.

1:58:13 And in return, a thud sounded. So story, The story of their mate is what brings them both back, right? And we know from Aylan's point of view that she feels Rowan we get. And when Aylan looked behind her to the archway into her own world, she indeed could feel them. As if the word marks he'd secretly inked to her were rope, a tether home for Reese's point of view. He tells Feyra at the end of Acawar. He wrapped his arms around my waist and squeeze, breathing me in.

1:58:39 I heard you even in death. It made me look back, made me stay a little longer. So for both of them, they hear them right? Here's the So what? Here's the So what? When Aylan dies, she tumbles through worlds And Reese not only recognizes what she is, but is able to slow her down. We don't know what happened to Reese when she died, but he is not surprised to see Aylan, if this is a word. Gate.

1:59:06 Did Reese also tumble through worlds? Did Reese tumble through worlds? Did someone slow him down? Does he know exactly what Aylan is when he sees her? Because the same thing happened to him six months before. I don't know the exact time, but that's that's my So what here. Like, did Reese do it first before Aylan?

1:59:24 Yeah. I don't know. It's pre con, but there's a lot of similarities between these two scenes, yeah. Yeah, I mean, obviously I agree. Yeah, obviously I agree. Yeah, I agree. I guess also based on that scene, I have two kind of crazy. They were too crazy for the original. Answer 1 is Aylan. When she died, she didn't really die, right, Because Dorian Senior gave up enough of his power that she was able to live. Yeah.

1:59:54 Reese died. Reese died, but Ailing gave up her power. So when she came back, she had nothing left. Reese says that his power remains his own. We don't, like, see a ton of it. So, like, is that really true? I guess is my like question because he's brought back to life by yeah, it's probably still true. Because he's like a fucking asteri and they just give him power and then his power is just like the same, but. Yeah.

2:00:22 That's my question 12 again like crazy, but if there is a lock involved, right and there's a lock that needs to be forged. I talked about the possibility that because Mala put her power into the lock that was forged in Throne of Glass, right? And then obviously that lock was wasted on Air 1 and then Aylan had to force the new one. We are convinced, right that Nesta's flames are Deanna's. What if Nesta's flames are aliens? Aylen forged this lock.

2:00:53 Aylen poured all of her power into this lock. The Cauldron has notes of hell, but also Aylen poured her flames. Yeah, the multiplier. Power into whatever sealed worlds. We don't know when in time this happened, right? Like we don't know at what point any of these stories occurred. I know you just said maybe Reese did the first, maybe he did.

2:01:15 Maybe this happened first. But if it didn't, if Aylan did it first and she poured her flames into like whatever this in between is that seals worlds did Nesta actually take that merged with like whatever hell cocktail is on there, and those are her flames, which is consistent with her like bursting into flames and like the middle of the night and like all that. Yeah, I don't know.

2:01:40 Yeah, I like that. Yeah. Because the the molten fire, the when Nesta is describing the fire, it feels in the cauldron, right In the cauldron, it feels so very. Hot. Aylin Yeah. Mala, Mala. Yeah, I like it. I don't know. Yeah, cool precog precog. Lots to lots to dissect from this scene. That's for sure.

2:02:05 Lots to dissect from that scene. Read those two scenes back-to-back is my message to you. Yeah, the breaking of the cauldron and the ceiling of the word gate. There are a lot of parallels in there. Yeah, I agree. Yeah. And I guess my like my question is like can you seal a word gate without a lock?

2:02:23 Because if not, I don't see how the cauldron doesn't. I don't have one. I don't know scenario. Cool, what are you reading? I am reading The Strength of the Few. Nice. How are you liking it? No. No. It's I definitely have issues with both of these books. The will of the many and the strength of the few. I feel like there are some really good, really high highs like really wow moments like oh, this is really good and the ends of the books always pick up a lot of steam and cover a lot of plot and are really good.

2:02:54 But the middle really fucking drags in my opinion. Like just I don't know. I it's I have issues with it. Strength of the few. Have you gotten to it yet? Are you still in Will of the Many? No, I'm still in the will of the many I honestly read. I almost read the entire Accord of Silver Flames book this week.

2:03:13 Just. Well, that's what I mean. It's will of the many. Strength of the view is really, really complicated. Like, oh really? It's it's a whiteboard book, OK, but I'm not sure that I'm compelled enough by the story or the characters, the characters really to like plot it all out basically. Like it's, it's really complex. I mean, the first time losing track of things, you need to take notes, yeah.

2:03:44 I needed to be like, OK, like let me like create the pyramid and like the numbers I have. I have sticky notes in my copy of Will of the many and for Strength of the few, I just started writing in the margin. So I'm like, OK, fuck, I don't know. But like, if it feels like homework, you know, in a way that doing this for the mass first does not feel like homework.

2:04:06 So I'm still reading it. I'm still going to finish it. But like I'm planning to read The Everlasting, which I've heard really good things about after the strength of the few. And I'm finding myself kind of like itching to pick up the Everlasting. But I don't know, I, I'm going to reserve full judgment until I'm done with it.

2:04:23 I know at this point in some books I'm always like, I don't know, but it's I don't know. It's not my favorite. It's definitely not my favorite. And I know people. Really love it but got it. How about you? How are you feeling? Or do you want to just do yours next episode so we have something to talk about?

2:04:35 How we could do it then, I mean. We always do. What are you reading? And we're recording back-to-back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll talk about how I'm feeling about the will of many next episode. But I like basically took a hiatus because I was prepping for this episode and then I was like, I missed 1/4 of Silver Flames.

2:04:49 Let me just read a little bit and then I just read it almost all. That's the tough thing about prepping for these episodes guys, is like sometimes too, if you don't read enough of the context, you kind of like miss the point. And I end up rereading like a lot of it so. Yeah, whoops. I also reread a lot of Silver Flames for our next episodes.

2:05:11 Yeah, all of the sex scenes. Just going to put that out there, right? Just skipped through to all of them. No, no, I was just like, Oh well, she found the mask and then the next thing that happens in the chapter. And they were pretty close. Yeah, I'm pretty close together. And I'm not going to do all my homework for the mask and then deprive myself of that scene.

2:05:29 That's why would I do. That, yeah. All right. Well, that's all we have for you today and thanks for listening. We are on all your favorite social channels, TikTok, Instagram and YouTube as Dragons in the details pod. If you catch our stuff there, if you see us on your for you page or on your explore page and you don't follow us, you would love if you did.

2:05:50 That'd be awesome. We have an e-mail address dragonsinthedetailspod@gmail.com. We also have a website dragonsinthedetails.com. We have a discord. It is wild Dragons in the details is the server name. They are also doing a mass verse reread. That is the Lettuce Baby Book Club channel on there if you're looking for it. They're doing a mass verse reread in publication order with meetups at various points.

2:06:16 A couple of our lovely discorders are running that. So they've got all the deets on there. But if you want to do a mass verse reread, they're doing an awesome job. That's all I got for you so. We got for this week. Love you. Bye bye.