Today, Mare gets ready for the big ball amidst much angst about how her clothes are silken chains and she’s not allowed to show fear. Honestly, I don’t mind it, but only because it’s so short and I just really, really want Mare to hold onto any vestige of her “these damn rich people” attitude. But at the same time I don’t like it because OMG can we please do something different with clothes?

She goes out in the hall to meet Maven and they have a mutual anxiety fest over what’s about to happen at the ball, i.e., lots of deadness.

They meet up with the king and queen, and Maven acts all whiny asking how long he has to stay so that the queen won’t get suspicious and start poking through their heads. But…wasn’t Cal the one that was squirrely about doing his princely duties, and Maven was the more dutiful prince? Does the book just not realize there’s more than one way to react to a state function?

it takes me off guard. This is a woman who invaded my thoughts, who took me away from my life, who I hate, and still there’s something good.

I really hate that the book keeps doing this. Keeps presenting it like this is some sort of shocking development. OMG, you mean the rich people…actually like other rich people? Say it isn’t so!

Mare watches Maven interact with his parents and thinks it’s similar to the way she interacted with hers, all disapproving parents and self-loathing. I still don’t care. Partly because they’re teens and they’d think that about anything, especially since this is the first friction we’ve seen between Maven and the king.

Cal and Evangeline show up, there’s some shipper drama I don’t care about, and they all go into the ball. (Most of her twittering is about how “omg kissed him when Maven is my betrothed and he’s betrothed and there’s just so much betrothal going on” and I just don’t care about two arranged marriages that no one is invested in. I mean, she and Maven might as well be siblings for all the spark there is between them, the marriage is a political farce, so it’s just really hard for me to get any sense of emotional betrayal here.)

Mare stands in a receiving line with the other royals and keeps an eye out for the four people who are the targets in the attack.

I still don’t understand why they need targets if they’re doing this so publicly. The idea is that these people are “too big to ignore,” but I think that attacking literally anyone in front of the entire nobility will be too big to ignore as well. I mean, you could kill Lord Joe Shmoe and as long as it’s in front of the right audience, there, mission accomplished. The only reason to take out targets is if they leave strategic holes in the enemy’s lines, which these targets will (or at least the colonel will) in which case you really don’t need to break into what is undoubtedly the most heavily guarded party of the year in order to do it.

Really, what do they think will happen if someone other than those four die tonight? “What, rebels were in the ballroom and shooting people? Oh, well, it was only George that died, and he had heart problems anyway, ya know?”

Evangeline will have lost a brother, just like me. Even though I know that pain firsthand, I can’t bring myself to feel sorry for her. Especially not with the way she holds on to Cal.

What the fuck, book? Seriously, just what the fuck? “Yeah, I would feel sorry for being part of killing her brother and all, but she likes the same guy as me so NOPE, HAVE SOME HEARTSHATTERING PAIN.”

Reynald Iral, her cousin. Maven told me he’s a financial adviser, a genius who keeps the army funded with taxes and trade schemes. If he dies, so does the money, and so will the war.

Um…unless this army is really hard to fund and/or the war is really unpopular, I don’t see this happening. Presumably the tax structures are already in place and will continue to funnel money into the military, and it’s not like there’s only one guy in the world that can handle this job. Sure, they may not be as good as Reynald, but that doesn’t mean the position will go just flat vacant. There might be some upset while the position changes hands, but at the same time, surely the guy has a staff? The staff would at least keep present policies running, right?

I like where your head’s at, book, but you stopped a few steps short of making this goal work. This needs to be the first chink in the financial armor, not the killblow.

The colonel comes up and is friendly, so that makes Mare sad.

I still think they should have at least considered recruiting her.

Maybe they could even have some sort of off-shoot of the Red Guard, some sister group for Silvers that gets them involved. Maven could run it. They could recruit Silvers, give them a more palatable option than just full-on joining the Red Guard, maybe being duplicitous about the connection between the two groups. They could both be working toward the same goal, just using more varied methods so that the entire revolution isn’t solely resting on bombs.

The last guy is a pudgy, smiling diplomat with twin four-year-old boys with him, and Mare gets all angsty about being involved in leaving such young kids fatherless. (Well, not really involved, because she isn’t. But knowing about it, at least.)

I partially don’t mind this bit of angst, because throughout the scene she does keep reminding herself that these deaths have strategic importance and they aren’t going to die for no good reason and it will all mean something good in the end, at least if things go according to plan. But also she’s sad because it’s a lot easier to plan someone’s death than to look them in the face. And I’m okay with that.

But I do wish we had a bit more from Mare’s end to offset it. She’s had plenty of personal experience on the other end of Silver oppression. She’s seen young Red children left parentless. She’s seen the ravages of war left on her family and friends and felt that impending doom in her own life. She’s seen the effects of oppression on her town and her friends. And all she has to argue with in this scene is cold logistics?

Why not say “this is sad, but I remember the alternative is worse” or even a bit of “now your oppressive policies are going to make you suffer, too.”

Maven notices her getting too stressed and makes excuses about the excitement being too much and pulling her away. Mare starts going on about how “oh no, I can’t do this” and once again I have to point out…she’s not doing anything. Like, she had literally no part in this plan and she has no part in the execution of it either. Maven starts going on about how they can’t really make an omelet without breaking eggs, even though he doesn’t like it either.

Cal comes to get them, there’s a bit of shipper angst, and then it’s time for dancing. Where there is more shipper moments.

Suddenly, a wild Kilorn appears! Dressed as a servant and offering drinks. I keep seeing the “go in as waitstaff” option for stuff like this, but it’s not (shouldn’t be) this easy. If anyone could just sneak into a servant uniform, wouldn’t they be doing that to dodge the draft?

Kilorn says everything is in place, and Maven says go ahead and set things off. And then four shots ring out, so apparently this was all being done by sniper fire. Good, I approve, snipers were probably the best tactical option here.