“What is this astonishing foolishness, that shines brighter than all my father’s gold? Can you teach me to be such a fool too Caz?”
“Oh,” breathed Cazaril, “I’m sure of it.”
- The Curse of Chalion, Lois McMaster Bujold
[I have been in a bit of a slump. And in other news, water is wet. Work has been a bit of a drain, and sometimes, you get in a funk where none of the things you used to enjoy doing seem to give you the same joy anymore. For almost a whole month, I barely read anything, preferring instead to stare at the ceiling and watch the same five YouTube videos over and over again. I do blame reading People We Meet on Vacations by Emily Henry as the source for this funk, but that’s not any fault of the poor book, and all the fault of my fragile mental health. Until further notice, or until I locate another therapist, I am keeping off romances.]
Quickly moving on from that.
Does it ever amaze you just how easy it is to read? Just how easy is it to drown out the world — the chaotic, inconstant world — and turn your attention to a fictional land, with fictional people, and their fictional problems? With a good story at the right time, reading is as much a respite from life, as it is an education. We read fiction — lies wrapped in stories — to learn about real things. Half the things I know of people I have learnt from the books. Perhaps that is why I find myself gravitating towards intensely character-driven, long-winded stories where the crux of the action is spread over so many people, each of them playing a little part into the formation of the bigger picture.
Political fantasy brings together the threads of all the things I love, at one place: of people, of their politicking, of neverlands and of a pragmatic view of the world. Bonus points if it derives its source materials from medieval Europe, since my love affair with that particular five hundred-0r-so years — all plague, war, natural calamity and devastation — goes back a long way. I know there is a general sense of weariness with fantasy set in medieval Europe, but I think the disillusionment comes from the overuse of the couple of same tropes and settings, from the far too many trips along the road laid down by JRR Tolkein, all those years ago.
But it does not have to be this way, does it?
The amount of devious politicking, backstabbing and treason-mongering that medieval Europe saw is otherwise a goldmine, for stories after stories, to keep you up at night, reading breathlessly about the exploits of moustache-twirling lords and strong-willed heirs.
It is a vast time period, both alive in the facts, in the mythos, and in the stories where the lines blur. See the wars and the dragons, from the eyes of the conquering general, but also from the terrified villagers whose houses are burning. See the queen beheaded, understand the crowd’s stunning silence of the moment, but also, with a prophet’s eye, look upon the next fifty years and the bloodshed it is going to bring to the little country. As a reader of history, historical fiction and of fantasy, you are given the gift of both foresight and hindsight. It allows you to see their past, and your future.
The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison was one such book who understood the assignment perfectly, as the kids say.
The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold is another such tale.
—
A man broken in body and spirit, Cazaril, has returned to the noble household he once served as page, and is named, to his great surprise, as the secretary-tutor to the beautiful, strong-willed sister of the impetuous boy who is next in line to rule.
It is an assignment Cazaril dreads, for it will ultimately lead him to the place he fears most, the royal court of Cardegoss, where the powerful enemies, who once placed him in chains, now occupy lofty positions. In addition to the traitorous intrigues of villains, Cazaril and the Royesse Iselle, are faced with a sinister curse that hangs like a sword over the entire blighted House of Chalion and all who stand in their circle. Only by employing the darkest, most forbidden of magics, can Cazaril hope to protect his royal charge—an act that will mark the loyal, damaged servant as a tool of the miraculous, and trap him, flesh and soul, in a maze of demonic paradox, damnation, and death.
[From Goodreads]
Reading The Curse of Chalion was a hypnotizing experience. The day I sat down and read the longest chunk of the story, it was an evening of heavy, torrential downpour. I had been tasked with the preparation of dinner, which consisted of khichdi, an Indian admixture of rice, pulses and vegetables. It takes a long time to boil, and you are supposed to stir it every five minutes or so, to ensure the stuff does not stick to the bottom of the pot.
So that is what I did. Go up, stir the pot. Come back, sit down, read five more pages. Go up, stir. Come back, read.
The story had extended its unseen tendrils and gripped me so hard, that everything else had fallen away. I had no need to check my phone, no need to see the faces of my family, or look any further than five inches away from myself. All I cared about was the perils of the Zangre, and the fate of Chalion’s Royacy, as it was shaping up, both by the machinations of the good guys and the bad ones.
At the heart of Chalion, lies the question of power, as is the constituent of very many political fantasies. Every move, every conversation, every clandestine rendezvous, every little move by every character, frames the board, constitutes one move forward. Or in some cases, they are one move backward. But the game is always on.
Also intertwined in this game, are the plans laid out by the gods for the men. In between the prayers, the eponymous curse, the demons and the miracles, the story mulls over fascinating philosophical questions that seize both the characters in the story and have plagued humanity for eons: if we exist as a vassal of God’s plan, where then, lies free will? Can any action truly be free? Or does every step of ours lends us one step closer to the path that has already been charted for us? In the end, are we just fooling ourselves by claiming men create their own destinies?
“How long have I been walking on this road?”
—-
Emerge Cazaril, an ex-soldier, a man truly broken by the ravages of the war. He makes his way, achingly and not-without-struggle, to his old employment, with the formidable Provincara of Valenda, in the hopes of getting a place in her household. By his luck, his capabilities, and no few parts due to the goodwill of his former employer, he finds himself becoming the Secretary-Tutor to the Royesse Iselle, a princess of the house of Chalion, and from here, the story rushes forward, in a tale of power, loyalty, heroism and glory.
Cazaril, like Maia from The Goblin Emperor, is inherently a good man at heart. He is a likeable, resilient, clever protagonist who watches, observes, struggles, and learns the way of the Roya, of the people, of the intangible, unseen threads of influence and wealth that extend and wrap them around the people at the court of Zangre.
In an ocean of morally ambiguous, jaded antiheroes, it was refreshing to read about a man who has been broken in body and mind, but not in spirit. The ravages of the war have not eroded away his morals. Rather, as we learn throughout the story, these moments of true despair and loss have only provided him a mantle to prove the goodness of his character, over and over and over again. He is an imperfect man, defined by his unfailing desire to ultimately do good, come what may.
“Any man can be kind when he is comfortable. I’d always thought kindness a trivial virtue, therefore. But when we were hungry, thirsty, sick, frightened, with our deaths shouting at us, in horror, you were still as unfailingly courteous as a gentleman at ease before his own hearth.”
The characters that surround him are all memorable, all playing their parts in the story perfectly. It was fascinating to especially see Royesse Iselle — whose relation to the throne of Chalion lies at the heart of the story — transform from being a naive, tempestuous young girl, to someone worth rooting for as the wielder of this otherwise-devastating power-play.
The quiet, intelligent character-work extends to all the players in the story, even the smaller ones, even the ones who don’t get much to say. You get the feeling that this is a vast world, Chalion, Ibra, Roknari, Baocia, all occupied by a vast variety of people, each with their own motivations, stories, desires and lives. Every character was so beautifully fleshed out, that it was impossible to not have an attachment, or an opinion at the very least, about every one of them. The antagonists were truly loathsome, and their ploys truly kept me glued to the page, all till the last moment.
—
The Curse of Chalion might just be the best book I have read this year. It goes into the shelf of complicated, character-driven, meandering, twisting speculative fiction that I have amassed over all these years. One of these days, I might just make a list.
That’s all for today, folks.
Wordsmithery. 