fortemps brothers that live rent free in my head because sure yeah, artoirel's status as The Oldest & The Heir can heavily haunt his dynamic with his brothers on account of one being The Favorite & The Bastard and the other being Irresponsible & The Spare. in order, they're sons born from duty (artoirel), love (haurchefant) and precaution (emmanellain)
we all know how haurchefant reacted to Everything thanks to the novel and we can easily assume how artoirel might've reacted but i cant help but look at emmanellain and think. yeah ofc he gives ignored neglected & neglectful attention seeking gossiping irresponsible socialite vibes. he has two insanely capable brothers that overshadow him in every aspect that matters within the noble families of ishgard
but he also just. picked up a fucking kid off the streets, taught him how to read and do maths and then sort of adopted him as his main servant? which is incredibly fun for me to think about considering how emannellain acts during heavensward. his responsibility as honoroit's guardian doesnt register until after honoroit is physically injured as a result of his actions. so why did he even reach out to teach him in the first place? their own dynamic highlights his immaturity and neglect for the lower classes and his impact on them, yes. but why did he even do it in the first place?
the silver fuller got his spurs, the freedom and distance that camp dragonhead offers, after saving an 11 year old francel. if emmanellain can passively pretend to act like someone befit his station (the good way, the correct way, the artoirel way) then he can too follow haurchefants footsteps in his own misguided way. theyre his brothers after all, theyre his betters and whatnot. they know better while he knows absolutely fucking nothing
him reaching out to help honoroit on a whim because it required minimal effort from his part to teach an orphan child math and literature. because his entire family says youre supposed to serve others. because he saw himself in an unwanted child. to see if he can recreate what haurchefant had with francel to earn his own freedom from being "the third and spare heir should anything happen to artoirel". it makes the fact that emmanellain later gets his shit rocked with lessons that both of his brothers knew by heart already and then gets stationed in camp dragonhead honoring haurchefant is much more compelling to me than the idea of emmanellain being THAT selfless when he reached out to honoroit
the youngest son being isolated and overlooked by virtue of being the last. the youngest son fumbling to find the same success as his older brothers by half heartedly and playfully following their footsteps, because everyone in the world (including himself) already kind of assumed he wouldnt have it in him to Truly Be Like Them, so surely it isnt that serious. he can afford to fail, because artoirel and haurchefant are there. its the safety and the burden of knowing his older brothers are good at everything that he gave up on and will never have bc he stopped trying. emannellain realizing that choosing to be good and wield your power in a way that matters takes so fucking much out of you. that it will eventually kill you. that it is by absolute luck that his father and brothers kept coming back from each battle. that the men he admired and was jealous of arent as invincible as he believed them to be. that he himself wasnt as much of a lost cause as he originally thought
and even then, he's still filling in for someone else's shoes. he's still living under someone else's shadow, the portrait looms behind a desk that will never be truly his to command. he too had to see edmont collapse with grief after haurchefaunt's death and wonder if his own father wouldve reacted the same if he was the one to die out there
