okay maybe this is me overthinking but did the dane’s plan in ADSOM actually make any sense? 😂
bc genuinely what was the plan?
1. freak kell out, get him drunk so he accepts the job and smuggles the black stone back to red london (hope he is not curious or looks inside the package at all)
2. when kell gets to red London, send a few mindless, compelled mercenaries after him (hope they can defeat an antari) and retrieve the stone.
3. mercenaries bring stone to astrid-controlled red london citizen. astrid and athos cast a spell together at the same time using the stone halves. barrier comes down.
just WHAT about this required kell being the messenger? why couldn’t holland just go to red london and give the astrid-controlled citizen the stone?
“they were afraid holland might use the stone to break his soul seal” — no, they weren’t. the danes sent holland after kell to retrieve the stone. if they thought holland could use it break the seal, they never would’ve done this.
“they were afraid holland might get caught” caught doing what? smuggling the black stone to red london? have him as travars into a random red london forest with no one around, and have the astrid hand-off happen there. problem solved. holland isn’t getting caught simply transporting a stone, trust.
“they needed plausible deniability if it failed” — if what failed? the smuggling? holland is not failing to simply put a stone in astrid’s hand (see above point.) there are so many easy ways to avoid failing here that are a lot simpler than what they came up with.
remember, kell is NOT the one who was supposed to cast the door-breaking spell. he was never going to be. they can’t implicate him for that. ONLY the smuggling. they used him purely as a delivery service. supposedly because it was the best choice? when in reality, using kell required involving tons of other compelled people, stealing palace guard swords, and creating a huge trail of evidence.
basically there is NO reason for kell to act as the messenger here. holland is fully capable of doing it himself. kell was literally only used for the transfer of the stone between worlds and nothing else. bc they planned to take the stone back from him immediately (within minutes of him returning to red london, in fact). he was a drug mule. but…they…already…had…a…perfectly…good one…in holland ?
using kell just created unnecessary extra steps and complicated/risked their plans.
