“It’s the Great Rite, Cauldron boil me! Didn’t anyone tell you what it is?” My silence was answer enough. I could almost see the drumbeats pulsing against his skin, beckoning him to rejoin the crowd.
….
“You’re lucky I found you when I did, though,” he said. “Because he would have smelled you, and claimed you, but it wouldn’t have been Tamlin who brought you into that cave.” His eyes met mine, and a chill went over me. “And I don’t think you would have liked it. Tonight is not for lovemaking.”
I swallowed my nausea.
“I should go,” Lucien said, gazing at the hills. “I need to return before he arrives at the cave—at least to try to control him when he smells you and can’t find you in the crowd.”
It made me sick—the thought of Tamlin forcing me, that magic could strip away any sense of self, of right or wrong. But hearing that … that some feral part of him wanted me … My breath was painful.
“Stay in your room tonight, Feyre,” Lucien said, walking to the garden doors. “No matter who comes knocking, keep the door locked. Don’t come out until morning.”
This was another thing that sent of warning bells for me when I read ACOTAR first time round and it still bothers me now. Feyre repeatedly asked Tamlin to explain Calamnai and the Great Rite to her. Several times she explicitly asked him what it was, what would happen, what he would have to do. He never gave her a straight answer. He never took the time to explain. He just told her to stay inside (sound familiar from ACOMAF?)
At the time it bothered me slightly (and I think it ties into him not teaching her to read either but doing it for her; the same with the way he protects her. He doesn’t give her the tools to look after/educate herself because that strips him of his purpose to do those things for her - he just does them for her and expects her to meekly go along with that) the fact that he was refusing to give her information but with hindsight it’s a hundred times worse.
Not only did he refuse to give her information about the ceremony and wilfully kept her ignorant (which is something he does an awful lot; it takes quite a while for her to tease the truth about him caring for her family and exactly what that looks like from him which causes her a lot of distress - the glamours, manipulating who and what she sees and how - making decisions for her well-being without ever considering her) but he kept her ignorant about something that directly threatened her safety.
It’s one thing putting a glamour on her to stop her seeing everyone the way they are and freaking out and running away (which is bad and unhealthy) but this is something else. Feyre’s ignorance here might have resulted in her being raped by Tamlin but he still chose not to explain things to her; still chose to keep her in the dark despite the fact her having this information was incredibly relevant to her safety/well-being.
I think this is one of the first indicators that Tamlin’s form of protection doesn’t work with Feyre. Locking her up and not letting her understand what’s going on on the pretext of protecting her is something he does a lot in ACOMAF and it becomes incredibly unhealthy. I think this is the first time we see that Tamlin ‘protecting’ Feyre in this way just does her more harm than good.
But it’s not a mistake Tamlin learns from and It’s not even something he recognises as a mistake since he blames her for what happens. He doesn’t consider that him keeping her ignorant and just trying to keep her inside is the reason she was in danger. He blames her and removes all accountability from himself but I’ll talk about that more when I hit that line because it infuriates me to no end.
Everything that happened in ACOMAF, all of Tamlin’s behaviours were all foreshadowed and set-up for us in ACOTAR.
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