What it Sounds Like: The Valkyries & Musical Imagery
I’ve been seeing a lot of discussions about which characters are associated with musical imagery in ACOTAR. While I was excited to see SJM use 💖🎶💖 in her instagram announcement post, I wasn’t necessarily surprised … and the same goes for the leak which seems to indicate that the title page of ACOTAR 6 labels the text as “A Book in Four Movements” … clearly a poetic use of musical language to illustrate her “one book told in four parts” approach to what’s coming.
There have been a lot of takes about what this might mean. Yes, the mating bond has been described as the music between souls; so perhaps the romantic plots will focus on multiple mated couples in these next installments. Or perhaps we’ll be focusing on characters and a plot which deal directly with music. We already know that Nesta has deep, constitutive ties to music. That thread was woven all throughout her novel. Music is the emotional language of her ACOSF arc, from its beginning to its resolution.
Beyond Nesta, the text has also shown us on page that the other two characters who are specifically tied to music are Azriel and Gwyn. This was made explicit in the most recent ACOTAR book and in SJM’s most recent book (HOFAS). This is where SJM’s clear authorial intention is at most recently.
This is all great, and I love exploring these ideas and hearing others talk about where this might lead as we learn more in the coming months. But there’s one detail that I don’t think is being discussed enough amid all of this:
The musical imagery surrounding the Valkyries as a unit.
Not necessarily Gwyn or Nesta individually (since they both have such clear individual musical imagery associations), but the three Valkyries together as a collective whose formation, bonding, training, survival, and defining moments are consistently and repeatedly described in musical terms.
THE FIRST NOTES: Gwyn’s Voice
Across the hushed, cavernous space, it was easy to hear Gwyn’s soft singing as she flitted from table to table . . . Nesta allowed herself to listen—to savor the pure, sweet voice that rose and fell with sinuous ease.
This is one of the earliest moments between Nesta and Gwyn. They are not yet friends, but Nesta (who is allowing almost nothing to reach her in this point of her story) stops and allows herself to listen. Savors Gwyn’s voice, actually. It seems as if Gwyn’s voice might actually be breaking through Nesta’s armor before anything else does.
Then, as their early acquaintance grows and as Nesta begins to notice Gwyn more, we get this:
Occasionally, Nesta heard a lovely, soaring snippet of song from some distant corner of the library—the sole indicator that Gwyn was near.
I love this. The sole indicator that Gwyn was near.
On the surface, it’s simply a description of the setting and Nesta’s observations. But I’d argue it’s establishing Nesta’s awareness of Gwyn’s presence … her nearness. And it’s registered musically. Before Nesta can even see her, the sound arrives first, because Nesta has now learned to recognize it.
Perhaps this is the beginning of attunement between sisters: one person learning the specific signature of another, but through musical terms.
Basically, what I’m getting at, is that in the early days of what will become a significant bond among these females, music is already the language through which Gwyn reaches Nesta … and in which Nesta allows herself to be reached. The foundation of the Valkyrie sisterhood is being laid here, in song.
THE SECOND MOVEMENT: The Foundation Deepens
By the time Nesta asks about attending the evening service, something has started to shift after the appearance of the ribbon as part of the Valkyries’ training. That foundation, built by early trust and offers of friendship, solidifies when Nesta chooses to be vulnerable about what she needs: music.
“It’s a long story, and not one worth telling, but through it all, I picked taverns and pleasure halls to frequent because of the music. I’ve always loved music.” She braced herself for the damning judgment. But only sorrow filled Gwyn’s face. . . . “The drinking, the males—I don’t miss any of it. But the music … that I miss.” Nesta waved a hand, as if she could banish the vulnerability she’d offered up. . . . “I was hoping you meant it when you said I could come to one of your services. Just so I can hear some music again.”
Nesta braces for judgment; but she gets this instead:
“Your story is worth telling, you know.” . . . “It is. But yes—if you want music, then come to the services. We will be glad to have you. I will be glad to have you.” . . . “Come to the service this evening,” Gwyn said. “Listen to the music.” She squeezed her hand again. “You’ll always be welcome to join me, Nesta.”
Nesta hadn’t realized how badly she needed to hear it. She squeezed Gwyn’s hand back.
This is after Nesta stopped to savor Gwyn’s voice in the library, after the ribbon has been set up, and after these females are beginning to understand what they are trying to build together. And Gwyn is showing here that she is unafraid of Nesta and Nesta’s past, and she offers an invitation to Nesta. The bond forming between them strengthens because of this invitation made in music.
Gwyn is offering Nesta an opportunity to hear music, yes. But she’s also offering Nesta the sound of her presence and the knowledge of being welcomed without condition. Nesta hadn’t realized how badly she needed to hear it.
MUSIC-FILLED COMPANIONSHIP: The Bracelets
After Solstice, Nesta, Gwyn, and Emerie make friendship bracelets together:
They worked in music-filled companionship, idle chatter bouncing between them, Emerie and Gwyn occasionally laughing at Nesta’s awful workmanship. “Now,” Gwyn said when they were halfway through, “we make wishes for each other.” . . .
“Wait,” Nesta said, catching Gwyn’s hand before it could touch the charm. . . . “Let me make a wish for all of us,” she explained, gathering the three charms. A small gift—for the friends who had become like sisters.
A chosen family. Like the one Feyre had found for herself.
The Symphonia is playing here and music fills the space while their sisterhood is sealed in it. Nesta gathers all three charms and makes a wish for the three of them: for courage and for finding their way back to each other, no matter what. And then Nesta “could have sworn the coins glowed faintly.”
As we then remember that image of the bonding, and the bracelets, and magic of the charms … we can hold it against this moment, during the Blood Rite:
Emerie shuddered. “The Mother watched over us.”
Nesta could have sworn the charms on their bracelets let out a soft, singing hum at that.
The physical symbols of their sisterhood, the objects they made together in music-filled companionship, sing. And not only do they sing, but they sing at the moment of their greatest trial and at the moment the Mother watches over them.
Even the objects representing their bond are musically alive. A super intentional choice, if you ask me.
Although a small detail, it’s one that I didn’t want to gloss over or leave out. The House of Wind … where Nesta lives, where Gwyn lives and works in the library below, where the three Valkyries train together, where they have sleepovers and read romance novels and become sisters … has been transformed.
In fact, Amren even notices it:
Amren’s eyes became lined with silver, a hint of how they had once been. “I went poking about the House when we arrived an hour ago. I saw what you did to this place.”
Nesta’s brow furrowed. She hadn’t changed anything.
Amren grabbed Nesta under the shoulder, hauling her up. “The House sings. I can hear it in the stone. And when I spoke to it, it answered. Granted, it gave me a pile of romance novels by the end of it, but … you caused this House to come alive, girl.”
The space the Valkyries inhabit together sings. It’s been made musically alive by what is being built within it, by Nesta … and her chosen sisters share in that space with her. We are not shown this happening for any other grouping of characters in the novel. The House of Wind, specifically the place where these women are becoming who they are meant to be, sings.
THE BODY & THE WIND BECOME A SONG
Cassian describes what it feels like when movement is truly right:
But he knew she [Nesta] liked the punches. The kicks. A light shone in her face as her body flowed through the motions, a slingshot of strength all narrowing to a point of impact. He’d always felt that way when he did the movements correctly, like his body and mind and soul had lined up and begun singing.
I love this so much, the idea of body, mind, and soul singing together … especially because SJM returns to this language at a significant moment in the Valkyrie arc in ACOSF.
It is Gwyn who uncovers the history of the Valkyries and brings it to the group. Her research, knowledge, and initiative gives their training a deeper purpose and new direction. And when Nesta proposes combining Valkyrie and Illyrian techniques, something that makes fate seem to sit up and pay attention, what they are reaching for is exactly what Cassian describes above.
And then Gwyn eventually steps up to the ribbon:
Azriel went wholly still, as if he, too, had felt the shift. As if he, too, were aware that far larger forces peered into that training ring as Gwyn moved.
Smooth as the Sidra, swift as the wind off the Illyrian Mountains, her entire body working in singing harmony, Gwyn lunged toward the ribbon, twirled, and as she spun, her arm opened up, executing a perfect backhanded slice that cut the winter morning itself.
Half the ribbon fluttered to the red stone.
Her entire body working in singing harmony.
This is what Cassian was describing, and this is what alignment of body, mind, and soul produces … it’s not just a technically correct movement that cuts a ribbon, but something that sings. The language that SJM uses here at the moment Gwyn becomes the first Valkyrie reborn is the same language she uses to describe what perfect movement feels like from inside it: articulated by the trainer and embodied by the Valkyrie student.
And then at Ramiel, exhausted, injured, helping each other up a nearly unclimbable mountain, the three Valkyries find it again:
“We’re winning this fucking thing,” Nesta said, bending to grab Gwyn’s legs. Teeth gritted, Nesta hoisted Gwyn onto her back.
The muscles in her thighs strained, but held. Her knees did not buckle.
Her gaze lay on the terrain ahead. She would not look behind.
So Nesta began to climb, Emerie limping beside her.
With the wind as their song, Nesta and Emerie found their rhythm. They climbed, squeezing and slitering and hauling their weight. As the males fell behind, like the mountain was silently whispering, Go, go, go.
The wind becomes their song, the mountain whispers, and larger forces are watching and urging them forward. The alignment that Cassian described (body, mind, soul) is here expressed collectively amongst the Valkyries as the three of them find their rhythm together and move as a unit.
SJM doesn’t utilize this language by accident, because it becomes clear that this is the language she has established for what it looks like when the Valkyries are most fully themselves (individually and together) … the body, mind, and soul line up and begin to sing, often times when the Mother or larger forces also seem to be watching them.
SJM uses music as core thematic language of Valkyrie identity: their formation begins in music, their bond is built in music-filled companionship, their physical symbols hum, their home sings, their training sings when it aligns, and the wind is their song. On top of this, their defining moments as Valkyries (the ribbon, Ramiel) are described in musical terms.
So, am I saying that the 💖🎶💖 and the “Book in Four Movements” language is about the Valkyries? Maybe? Yes and No.
What I primarily want to get at is that if we are going to have a conversation about which characters carry musical imagery in ACOTAR, then the Valkyries as a unit deserve to be part of it. The text puts them there repeatedly, deliberately, and at their most significant moments.
I’ve said many times (and I continue to believe) that SJM is not finished with the Valkyries. The amount of careful, deliberate intent put into building this group in ACOSF doesn’t exist to be tidied away as a background detail in future installments, in my opinion.
Why? Because Gwyn returns to the library with her oath at Ramiel deferred and her story’s bowstring pulled back. Emerie becomes the first Illyrian female winner of the Blood Rite. Nesta’s romantic arc may have been completed, but we see in HOFAS that her contributions to the overall story are not over. These are the opposite of conclusions.
Additionally, I’ve argued over and over that the runway has been built for Azriel since ACOFAS and through the crossover material in HOSAB and HOFAS. SJM has been on record how excited she is to tell his story, and she has confirmed that we will hear him sing. He’s ready. And the texts have made it clear that his story intersects with the Valkyries too. So if his story is coming, then it likely will involve these women in some capacity … and how fitting that music imagery is not only tied to Azriel, but to the Valks too. 💖🎶💖
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