Thank you so much!! I'm really glad you're enjoying it and I'm working hard on cleaning up the next part as we speak. Poor Vanyel has really gone much further than he ever had to go in Pawn but I like to think there's a core of Vanyel-ness that can't ever be fully extinguished.
About Tylendel I'm sorry to drop a tl;dr but I've done so so so much reading to try to figure out his charater from the story hints (since alas Lackey never did a lot to fully actualize him instead of dropping moments sob) and I'm really excited to talk about what I'm drawing on, especially since when I started to make notes I found him the opposite of sociopathic-- messed up though, dear god! I don't mean to dump too much rambling on you and it isn't meant as any kind of counter it's just so exciting to me to talk about these weird little details I've been finding and how they fit together haha.
Because when you start to put his timeline together he's actually paralleled to Vanyel -- I mean literally in that Price is a complete parallel where Vanyel steps into Lendel's role (gets cold and heartless and scares Stefen constantly with his seeking revenge for Savil's death), but in Price Vanyel an actually balanced relationship and an actually evil villain to face but. At 12 Lendel's gifts wake up and they include thought-sensing and empathy (as strong a gift as vanyel has, anyway), and at the same time as THAT he's discovered to be shaych and he spends two years with his family hating him and thinking he's cursed and wanting to outcast him while going through the same thing Vanyel does at the end of Pawn - with gifts uncontrolled he'd both be picking up on thoughts and feelings and projecting his own. DURING this time (since he and Staven together discover his mother's body and as soon as Gala shows up Tylendel leaves for Haven) first his father dies, then his mother takes poison. So he develops a total dependence on Staven as his only support and hides the depth of his mindlink out of fear anyone will take it from him. Has huge anger issues from these years, that nobody actually treats other than encouraging Savil to later numb him to them after they notice them. 14 he heads back to Haven, finally shielded, is taught to shield himself, makes friends, starts to connect to others. We know he had exactly one relationship before Vanyel, Nevis, who as soon as they slept together Nevis immediately calls seduction and treats it like an abuse so that must have been pretty fucked up. Nothing else for one year until Vanyel and then as soon as the two get together he gets super excited to just share everything with Vanyel -- the next day he drags Vanyel out to meet Gala and tells him his entire awful backstory but instead of noticing that Lendel is trying to communicate and be on an equal level with him poor messed up Van is just, "Cool! He's telling me things!" lmfao. Meanwhile LENDEL thinks he got through, has no idea that Vanyel is dependant on him (and what does he have to compare to? His relationship with Staven? Yikes)...) and both are approaching it as totally different things. So fucked up. Lendel as a person is just a big teenage nerd who gets excited about linguistics and never stops eating (he's got food in every scene and Savil makes fun of him for getting crumbs and grease on the cushions) with some stuff in his history that's really fucking him up, but Vanyel sees him as a cool mature herald who's so smart and clever because Lendel tried to be a support to him and didn't notice when Lendel tried to switch that over into being people together and Lendel didn't notice that he never made his own issues clear. Then shit goes to hell and Staven loses it and nobody realizes it and I kept wailing while I read like, "Mlackey! YOU PUT ALL THESE DETAILS IN! Why didn't you make this clearer? More solid?! Give us more time in his POV! I know you needed to kill him off for Stefen reincarnation endgame, but make us care!" Ugh I hated him on my first reads and I'm just both in love with and so mad at this book at all times.
/breathes SORRY ABOUT THAT!!1 Anyway so I took all that and I was thinking how like. ok. they have some really basic but not great anger management, so let's assume that goes forward and helps a little. It's two years later, so two years more recovered from his trauma than he is in Pawn, and we do see that time has obviously helped him already even in Pawn. Staven dies because Lendel and Vanyel try to trick Evan Leshara and fail but since Vanyel isn't there, the stalemated settlement is still stalemated and Lendel has been forced to learn to stand down on it. So taking all that unresolved past and his current role how will he fit into this? Is my goal with Lendel's side of things.
sdfj I'm really sorry for rambling I just get excited lmfao.
Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?
About Tylendel I'm sorry to drop a tl;dr but I've done so so so much reading to try to figure out his charater from the story hints (since alas Lackey never did a lot to fully actualize him instead of dropping moments sob) and I'm really excited to talk about what I'm drawing on, especially since when I started to make notes I found him the opposite of sociopathic-- messed up though, dear god! I don't mean to dump too much rambling on you and it isn't meant as any kind of counter it's just so exciting to me to talk about these weird little details I've been finding and how they fit together haha.
Because when you start to put his timeline together he's actually paralleled to Vanyel -- I mean literally in that Price is a complete parallel where Vanyel steps into Lendel's role (gets cold and heartless and scares Stefen constantly with his seeking revenge for Savil's death), but in Price Vanyel an actually balanced relationship and an actually evil villain to face but. At 12 Lendel's gifts wake up and they include thought-sensing and empathy (as strong a gift as vanyel has, anyway), and at the same time as THAT he's discovered to be shaych and he spends two years with his family hating him and thinking he's cursed and wanting to outcast him while going through the same thing Vanyel does at the end of Pawn - with gifts uncontrolled he'd both be picking up on thoughts and feelings and projecting his own. DURING this time (since he and Staven together discover his mother's body and as soon as Gala shows up Tylendel leaves for Haven) first his father dies, then his mother takes poison. So he develops a total dependence on Staven as his only support and hides the depth of his mindlink out of fear anyone will take it from him. Has huge anger issues from these years, that nobody actually treats other than encouraging Savil to later numb him to them after they notice them. 14 he heads back to Haven, finally shielded, is taught to shield himself, makes friends, starts to connect to others. We know he had exactly one relationship before Vanyel, Nevis, who as soon as they slept together Nevis immediately calls seduction and treats it like an abuse so that must have been pretty fucked up. Nothing else for one year until Vanyel and then as soon as the two get together he gets super excited to just share everything with Vanyel -- the next day he drags Vanyel out to meet Gala and tells him his entire awful backstory but instead of noticing that Lendel is trying to communicate and be on an equal level with him poor messed up Van is just, "Cool! He's telling me things!" lmfao. Meanwhile LENDEL thinks he got through, has no idea that Vanyel is dependant on him (and what does he have to compare to? His relationship with Staven? Yikes)...) and both are approaching it as totally different things. So fucked up. Lendel as a person is just a big teenage nerd who gets excited about linguistics and never stops eating (he's got food in every scene and Savil makes fun of him for getting crumbs and grease on the cushions) with some stuff in his history that's really fucking him up, but Vanyel sees him as a cool mature herald who's so smart and clever because Lendel tried to be a support to him and didn't notice when Lendel tried to switch that over into being people together and Lendel didn't notice that he never made his own issues clear. Then shit goes to hell and Staven loses it and nobody realizes it and I kept wailing while I read like, "Mlackey! YOU PUT ALL THESE DETAILS IN! Why didn't you make this clearer? More solid?! Give us more time in his POV! I know you needed to kill him off for Stefen reincarnation endgame, but make us care!" Ugh I hated him on my first reads and I'm just both in love with and so mad at this book at all times.
/breathes SORRY ABOUT THAT!!1 Anyway so I took all that and I was thinking how like. ok. they have some really basic but not great anger management, so let's assume that goes forward and helps a little. It's two years later, so two years more recovered from his trauma than he is in Pawn, and we do see that time has obviously helped him already even in Pawn. Staven dies because Lendel and Vanyel try to trick Evan Leshara and fail but since Vanyel isn't there, the stalemated settlement is still stalemated and Lendel has been forced to learn to stand down on it. So taking all that unresolved past and his current role how will he fit into this? Is my goal with Lendel's side of things.
sdfj I'm really sorry for rambling I just get excited lmfao.