It's been a few days since I completed the Veilguard and I am going feral about the dynamics between Mythal, Solas and Lavellan...
It's just a bittersweet kind of pain when I think of them and I want to get my thoughts out before I am overwhelmed by them. Also, this post took way longer than expected to write!
Detailed deep-dive under the cut (to avoid spoilers)
Colour-coded because my brain is weird like that!
Also this is a loooooong post... you have been warned!
On Mythal:
It is clear right from the start (of when we discover the memories of the Dread Wolf) that Mythal is an integral part of who Solas was... Or should I say, who Fen'Harel was/is.
Solas, as a spirit had no desire to take a body and took one for the love of Mythal.
And when I say love, I do not see it as something purely romantic... It goes above and beyond that and not always in the right way.
She sought to mould him into someone she could use. She saw it as Benevolence (the attribute that her spirit is supposed to represent), but I think her purpose had been corrupted even then, even before Solas gets his body at her behest.
The reason I believe it's so is because, true Benevolence doesn't discriminate and denotes a desire to do good for others. Compassion is that desire enacted.
Mythal's benevolence was conditional. Her benevolence came at the cost of suffering for the Titans. So, there was a sliver of selfishness to her purpose. This isn't necessarily bad but this means that she is no longer truly what her Spirit was supposed to depict, not completely. And this sliver of selfishness is what permeates the entire relationship she has with Solas.
We, as the player, have only ever seen Mythal either through the very rosy lens of the Elvhen who worshipped her very much like the way Solas does, or through Flemeth. The latter is no longer the Mythal that Solas knew. She is a fragment of the original who has gained the wisdom and experience of millennia through the hosts she inhabited.
The truest depiction of what Mythal must really have been like is the fragment we encounter in the Crossroads. She honestly, isn't as likeable as Flemeth/Morrigan was/is.
She is openly haughty, expecting her petitioners to convince her of the dangers to the world outside, and sounds almost bitter that her most ardent devotee hasn't visited her once since she was killed and the remnant of her essence was extracted from the dagger to reside in the Crossroads. She faults Solas to an extent for her fate, and clearly doesn't hold him as beholden as he does her.
So, it felt weird to me that she would be so willing to release him from her service, even more so if you had to fight her for the fragment (as I had to).
The only way I can see her being moved to help convince Solas (especially if we fought her in her dragon form) is that she was observing the world outside the crossroads when she is in Rook's possession, the way Rook interacted with Solas, and even more so the way the Inquisitor speaks of her friend/vhenan.
On Solas:
Solas... the man, the myth, the legend! Where do I even begin to unravel the mess that he is!
Originally, a spirit of Wisdom, tied to Mythal in a way that has him put through the thumbscrews of War and Strife, so much so that I see his transformation into Pride as something like a callus that forms over skin that has been rubbed a few times too many.
His love for Mythal was the start of his doom, and right there, his purpose was changed from Wisdom. Because, wisdom would have remained a Spirit.
Now, the nature of that love is up for debate. Again, I don't see it as something that is purely romantic. Though, I think the way he feels for her is different from the way Mythal feels about him. There is more devotion on his side. He says that he will follow wherever she goes and takes on a physical form for her.
And then, slowly, one step after another, he strays away from the path of wisdom - crafting the Lyrium dagger, making the Titans tranquil, allowing the other Evanuris to claim godhood, letting Mythal persuade him to each of these steps, his regrets have her face.
Remember the following dialog he has with the Inquisitor after they drink from the Well of Sorrows? When he asks them how they will ensure the Inquisition doesn't fail, and when the following dialogue ensues...
Let me present you with evidence on how much he was hurt by that.
INQUISITOR: I trust my friends.
SOLAS: I know that mistake well enough to carve the angles of her face from memory.
We had already posited that the 'her' in the dialogue above was about Mythal. But back then, we had assumed it was because of the trust Mythal had in the evanuris that caused her death. What if it wasn't so? What if he was speaking of the trust HE had in HER?! He trusted Mythal to stand by him as he had stood by her. And she had failed him.
It could be that this is after her death, but something tells me this was before. Because Felassan's response to Mythal not joining them would be different if it was because she was dead.
So, we've established just how hung up he is about Mythal, because he has this vision of hers that might not even be true. He views her through the lens of adoration and worship that ends up putting her on a pedestal rather than view her as the flawed person she is. He could never be truly free unless he sets aside these feelings he has for her.
I also found it interesting that he has refused to visit the fragment of Mythal that was stuck to the dagger when she was killed. That fragment is the truest version of his friend as she was when she died. He refuses to acknowlege Flemeth and even Morrigan as Mythal.
Even in the end, it is this fragment of Mythal that he knows and remembers that releases him from her service. Because he wouldn't accept it from anyone else!
And with that established, let's move to the final part of this triptych.
The Inquisitor is a tricky one to analyse because they can be so many different things depending on the player. But for this essay, I will be focussing on Lavellan who romanced Solas and sought to change his heart.
On the Inquisitor:
She is everything that Solas believes is wrong with the veiled world his actions resulted in. A shadow of his people, tranquils with no connection to the Fade (especially true if Lavellan is not a mage). He also begins to believe that the anchor is what makes her who she is. That has to be the case, because any other explanation would make his future plans questionable!
But then, she walks into his life, curious and bright, kind and caring, asking him questions with an open heart! The first thing she does is assure him she would protect him from prosecution. She changes everything!
He tries to justify his feelings for her by assuming that the anchor has changed her. But nope! She shoots that down as well. She is truly herself, with or without the anchor. A rare and marvelous spirit.
Lavellan sees him for who he truly yearns to be seen as. Wisdom. She seeks to understand him and asks nothing in return. She is ready to help him whenever he asks for it, and even when he doesn't. She tells him he does not need to mourn alone, when his spirit friend passes!
His one true fear: Dying Alone... and she allays it by promising to be with him, no questions asked.
He almost decides to give it all up and stay with her... as just Solas. To be with the one true person who truly saw him beyond the cool and collected mask he wears. But he doesn't... In another world perhaps but not this one.
And so, he leaves her in the end, because his regrets are too much to be set aside so easily. He also sees bringing down the veil as an act of self-sacrifice, now more necessary than ever because this would mean She would live on happily in a world where his mistakes don't exist anymore. Also, he doesn't want her to see what he would become.
But she perseveres. Every time he pulls away, she reaches out. The parallels between the Solas/Mythal and Lavellan/Solas relationship is just *Chef's kiss*!
She represents Hope for me. And I'd say, she is true to her purpose that way. Even when things don't go the way she wishes it did, she still hopes. Her Hope springs eternal. And that is what saves her, Solas and the entirety of Thedas!
So, towards the end, her Hope burns bright against his Regret. But he is unable to see it until he sets his own regrets aside. And for that to happen, he needed Mythal to release him.
Mythal was his past. But Lavellan is his eternal future. It was up to him to move from one to the other.
Once he was free from that bondage, he could look towards Hope.
Only then could he truly see it... that she had seen him as he truly was, and she loved him... that she loves him still.
In the end, her love did endure, and how!
'Var lath vir Suledin' indeed!
