bloedgeas reblogged your post “Something that started out as a rant and wound up turning into a character analysis about Avallac’h. It really bugs me…”
#CLAPS APPRECIATIVELY#NOW WHERE’S THE EREDIN ONE#SINCE I’M TIRED OF THE POWER HUNGRY TRAIT CARELESSLY THROWN AROUND :^)
Man, I agree with that, but there’s like… nothing to analyse, because there’s nothing ambiguous about it.
Avallac’h spells it out to us: Eredin was desperate to save the Aen Elle, that’s why he killed the king and started stalking poor Ciri.
As you say, it had nothing to do with grabbing power for the sake of power. Auberon was an ineffective ruler who tended to sit around and do nothing, the White Frost was encroaching, and someone had to do something.
So Eredin and Avallac’h, who both pretty much ruled for Auberon, both took action.
The action they took happened to be different – Avallac’h wanted to train Ciri to defeat the White Frost, since a new heir of Lara Dorren wasn’t likely to happen now. And Eredin wanted to capture her to exploit her, at the cost of her own life – and any hope of defeating the White Frost once and for all (since once Ciri died, that was pretty much it for Lara’s bloodline).
That cost didn’t bother Eredin because he believed, unlike Avallac’h, that it would be impossible for the White Frost to be defeated with the way things stood. And it was hurting their people even as TW3 was happening; you can find a letter talking about how the Aen Elle had to be evacuated from various colonies and how others had been lost. They were already dying. Eredin, as he saw himself, would have been the king who did what was necessary to save his people.
But he’s a villain. Not because he didn’t have ultimately altruistic motives, but because he’d do anything in his desperation to achieve them, even if it meant torturing and murdering anyone he had to. He’s a foil to Avallac’h that way; Avallac’h has lived in despair since Lara left him and died, but he still had enough hope to put his hatred of humans and Cregan aside to mentor and train the human heir who could save them. Eredin’s had a decent enough life, even tried to help Ciri bear the heir they depended on her to have, but after she left he was overcome with hopelessness and gave in to it.
It had nothing to do with power for it’s own sake. He’d have killed Auberon ages ago if that were the case.
It had everything to do with the power to save his people, no matter the cost.
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