What I havent seen yet in discussing why Thjazi doesn’t really accept Bolaire’s personhood after finding out the truth is that in order for Bolaire to live someone else must lose their own life and existence.
We saw the corpse left behind by the mask. There is no surviving becoming Bolaire. You are simply gone. Free will stripped. Thjazi’s view of Thimble is regularly brought into the discussion and I think it is just as important in this point. The first thing he says to her is along the lines of “do you want this.” He wants it to be her choice. There wasn’t really a choice in Bolaire’s mask taking over for the guy who attacked him.
I do think Bolaire did not tell the full truth about him and Thjazi’s relationship. I don’t think Thjazi was perfect and not at all cruel in the situation, but I don’t believe it was as simple as “he found out I was a mask and weapon so stopped seeing me as living but rather a tool.” Mr. “I rebelled against my wife for freedom of the people” doesn’t seem like the type to just blindly use something sentient as his own plaything.
The morality of Bolaire’s continued existence could have easily been a sticking point. It’s one thing for him to pilot a willing person for what he was designed for, or even a willing person who is alright with him living a life he wants, but that is (at least in the current body) not what’s happening. I feel like Thjazi’s issue was not whether or not Bolaire is a person but rather if he deserves to be at the cost of others. What gives his life more value? Still fucked. Still cruel. A much more nuanced arc than just “he didn’t like I was an object first”
