Excuses, Excuses (ACOMAF Re-read)

A victim of his creator

 

Chapter 55 is probably the most well-known chapter in the entire series.  I'm not going to go in to why, but while I will say that what I found kinda hot 3 years ago, I can barely stomach listening to/reading now.

So while chapter 55 is infamous, I think Chapter 54 might actually be the most important one in the entire series, certainly the first two books.  Tamlin's retcon had been slowly building since page one of ACOMAF, it's Chapter 54 that really buries him.

It's basically a pages long explanation of why Rhys isn't anything like what we knew of him in book one, setting up the smut to come in the next chapter (because how could our heroine ever fuck a guys that isn't perfect).

Long story short, he knew of Feyre before she ever came to Prythian, he loved her from the first, and every last thing Rhys ever did was done with the express purpose of being near her, or being with her, or whatever.  I forget.  My brain got addled from all the eye-rolling.

It's obviously supposed to be some grand, romantic thing (it's destiny! it's fate!), but it also reveals what a lot of the fandom already suspects about him - that he's a manipulative, self-centered....prick.

SJM methodically tries to tie up every loose end imaginable with regard to Rhys's true character, but I am still left with so many unanswered questions.

1. Rhys is the most powerful high lord in history.  He's over 400 years old by the time of Amarantha's curse.  He gets tricked by Amarantha though?  Tamlin knows not to let his people drink the toast, but Rhys gets tricked somehow, yet still has enough power to protect Velaris, erase a bunch of minds and communicate his plans to the IC all in the space of seconds?  But he doesn't have enough forethought to read minds and somehow discern that it was a fucking trap?  Rhys's power, which we're reminded of every other page, doesn't jive with what needs to transpire in order to have him UTM as an unwilling ally of Amarantha's.  He mentions that his power belonged "wholly to Amarantha" but he has enough left in those spare seconds to shield Velaris?  He can break into Clare's mind to help her and do any number of other things?  Makes. no. sense.
2. Not one thing Rhys did UTM is left unexplained, and there's an excuse for literally everything.  The bargain? It wasn't Rhys being selfish (though he does admit to wanting to stick it to Tamlin), it was also a message of hope to "those that knew how to read the signs."  Because he couldn't just use his mind powers to communicate?  We know he has them enough to help Clare, but not enough to communicate to the other High Lords that he was acting, or even to use them to try and plot an escape, over the course of 50 years?  But Tamlin was the one being lazy that whole time 🙄
3. Getting back to Clare, of course Rhys used his mind powers to not make her suffer, and he swears up and down that he had no idea Feyre didn't make up the name.  So why give Amarantha a fake name? He claims he didn't know she'd go after her, but why the hell would she even want to know who she is then?  Why need to know who someone is if you're not going to do something to them, plus if you're fucking telling her that she's with Tamlin and could potentially break the curse (that he already said Amarantha was increasingly paranoid about).
4. Rhys is a petty bitch too.  For all his power, for all his wealth and worldliness, his top priority remains, with most things, sticking it to Tamlin.  Breaking in to the manor and making him beg? The tattoo? Kissing Feyre to "save" her the night before the last task? Making her give him lap dances every night (and drugging her)?  All to upset Tamlin.  Seems to me that if Rhys devoted even half the time he did to upsetting Tamlin as he could have to trying to develop a plan to get out, he would have escaped by then.  Especially considering the woman he loved was now at stake.  Plus, all through this explanation to Feyre, it's amazing to me that he still devotes time to shit-talking Tamlin and what an asshole he was.
5. I'm not even going to mention that for all Rhys hates Tamlin, he trusts his opinion of Amarantha enough to know she's bad news?  Oh wait, I just did.  Why do they automatically assume he's not doing anything to actively work against her, and then automatically assume the worst with regard to his bargain with Hybern?
6. And let's not forget that he knew how much Feyre was sufferring at the hands of big, bad, Tamlin, yet he continued to let her go back, when telling her about the mating bond he's now 100% sure of would get around any fairy rules he'd break by doing so?  The excuse that he couldn't force the bond on her wouldn't even apply, since we're just talking about honesty here (something Rhys really isn't capable of). What's the worst that could happen? She hates him and thinks he's lying and goes back to Tamlin, who's hurting her?  Guess what fucker, she's already doing that anyway, so why not risk it, especially if you love her so much and worry for her safety.  Plus, Feyre might not have believed they were mates, but surely Tamlin would  have if Rhys had told him (Azriel can smell the bond between Lucien and Elain even though Elain hasn't accepted or acknowledge it).  That right there would have been powerful enough to put the whole situation with Tamlin to rest, especially since it would have been Rhys's right at that point to invoke a blood duel if Tamlin had tried to ignore it.

And the crazy thing about this all is, the mere chapter before, Feyre excuses Rhys's lies of omission by saying she can't even blame him for it because she "never gave him the chance" to explain the truth to her?  Because she told him he's unlovable and he got sad?  Feyre is essentially shouldering the blame for Rhys's lies.

Look, I think once the concept of mates came into play, Tamlin never had a chance - but this doesn't explain the way SJM saw this need to tear his character down to the point she did in order to get Feyre into Rhys's arms.  It would have been okay to have her fall out of love with him, or leave him the way she did and just go to Rhys anyway.  It's almost like she's slut-shaming her heroine, saying that she has to be justified in sleeping with Rhys so soon after Tamlin, when she's already established that Tam is abusing her by locking her in.  For all Rhys's alleged woke feminism, SJM herself can't even let a woman do whatever she wants - and Feyre has every right to sleep with whoever the fuck she wants to, whenever she wants, so she didn't need Rhys's excuse soup to do so.