The Beatryce Prophecy

“‘Is he made so?’ she asked. ‘With only one eye?’

‘No,’ said the tutor. ‘Some trauma happened, I suppose.’

‘It’s broken!’ shouted Asop.”

This passage comes from the recurring dream Beatryce has while she is unconscious after the attack on her home and the death of her brothers. This is the moment right before the attack, which is like any other in Beatryce’s life—the change to come is not foreshadowed or announced. The seahorse’s missing eye nods to the book’s theme of Coping with Trauma, and the discussion of the creature’s fate shows how trauma is often overlooked by those who have not lived it. The tutor points out that the seahorse likely underwent some trauma, to which Beatryce’s brother says the creature is broken, a more simplistic interpretation.

“He wished, often, that his letters illuminated a manuscript less grim, less full of beheadings and treachery and war and prophecies of doom and suffering.

Brother Edik was very sick, supremely sick, of war and violence.

Yet it was war and violence that had brought him the child.”

Edik illuminates the Chronicles of Sorrowing and thinks about the juxtaposition of color and light against a book full of grim predictions and histories. At first, the two seem contrary; however, the rest of this quotation supports the idea that there cannot be light without darkness. Edik uses Beatryce as an example of how good things can come from bad situations. He is tired of war and violence because he wants the suffering they cause to stop, but he realizes that, without war and violence, he never would have crossed paths with Beatryce, who has given him the sense of purpose he lacked. Further, Beatryce feels safe enough to wake under Edik’s care, but when she does, she has no memories, showing how bad things can come from good situations.

“So she climbed willfully out of the clutches of the fever and left everything behind her: her brothers, the tutor, the seahorse, and whatever it was that had happened when the seahorse at last hit the floor.

She gave those memories to the fever. She offered the forgetting as a gift, as a way out, a way to survive.”

This passage is the moment where Beatryce chooses to repress the memories of the attack on her home, and it illustrates how the mind works to protect people from traumatic experiences. The fever and unconsciousness Beatryce has experienced up until this point are her body’s way of defending her. She isn’t ready to remember what happened, so she keeps returning to the last moment when things were okay, refusing to move past this moment into the terrible events that followed. While part of Beatryce’s mind knows this keeps her safe, another part knows that she cannot live like this and wants to move forward and live. However, the only way to do this is if she locks the frightening memories away, which is one step in Beatryce’s healing process and shows how moving forward is a choice that must be taken willingly, not forced upon someone.

“‘Answelica,’ said Beatryce, ‘It is not at all the name I expected.’

‘What name did you expect?’

‘I had settled upon Morelich as the most likely.’

‘Morelich?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why Morelich?’ asked Brother Edik.

‘Because she did not answer to Massop,’ said Beatryce. ‘Or Blechdor.’”

Beatryce has just told Edik that she would rather write stories than prophecies because stories have joy and lessons. Beatryce makes up this tale of the horse and angel on the spot, showing again that her mind is sharp despite her repressing her memories. Unlike her faulty logic in discovering Answelica’s name, this passage shows that Beatryce’s ability to create is boundless. She quickly comes up with a tale that is both magical and uplifting and does not struggle to include details or find the proper words for things. The ease with which she does this highlights the importance she places on stories. The horse waking the king to good deeds also foreshadows Cannoc’s return, the crowning of a new monarch, and getting rid of the false king who has perpetrated crimes against Beatryce’s family.

“Do you know the story of the angel and the horse, and how in some trick of destiny, the angel was given hooves and the horse given wings, and the angel danced upon the roof of the palace with her hooves and so woke the king to good deeds, and the horse flapped his wings and flew from this world to another and did not once look behind him?”

Beatryce has just told Edik that she would rather write stories than prophecies because stories have joy and lessons. Beatryce makes up this tale of the horse and angel on the spot, showing again that her mind is sharp despite her repressing her memories. Unlike her faulty logic in discovering Answelica’s name, this passage shows that Beatryce’s ability to create is boundless. She quickly comes up with a tale that is both magical and uplifting and does not struggle to include details or find the proper words for things. The ease with which she does this highlights the importance she places on stories. The horse waking the king to good deeds also foreshadows Cannoc’s return, the crowning of a new monarch, and getting rid of the false king who has perpetrated crimes against Beatryce’s family.

“She could not think about what she had forgotten, but she could think about its great absence, the dark hole where all the knowledge of who she was should be.

For minutes at a time, she forgot this hole, and then she remembered it again, suddenly and terrifyingly—as if some wind had come upon her and caught at her feet and tugged her violently toward the abyss of not-knowing, not-remembering.”

Beatryce’s resolution to move forward disguised as a monk within The Order of the Chronicles of Sorrowing shows how her mind works around the block she has placed in it. She is mostly content to live in this new life, but as soon as she remembers that she has forgotten something, her mind wants her to remember, even if she consciously does not want to think about those memories. The feeling of wind tugging at her represents two things—her desire to know what happened to her and her fear of learning the truth. Though it frightens her, she knows that part of her is missing, and she wants that part back. However, she also knows she isn’t yet ready to learn the truth, but she feels compelled toward what her mind is hiding, which terrifies her because she can sense that it is dark and disturbing.

“That people went from one place to another to avoid the wars and the king’s men was not news to her, and it was not interesting. In fact, it made her weary to consider it—the constant need of people to run from one thing to another, thinking that they would avoid some sorrow, when sorrow was waiting for them no matter where they went.”

These lines come from the thoughts of the older woman who takes in Jack Dory after the death of his parents. Jack has just run from the dark woods to tell her how his family was running from sorrow, and this woman notes that people always try to run from sorrow, only to find more of it when they reach their destination. Her words support the idea that sorrow is within us, not within the world. Sorrow is a choice, and if a person chooses to create it, it doesn’t matter where the person goes—sorrow will be there because it was brought there. Similarly, happiness is a choice. If a person chooses to be happy, happiness will follow, even when bad things happen. In Beatryce’s world, it is not a crime to be happy while bad things happen because, as was pointed out in Chapter 2, it is almost always a time of darkness (war).

“The man wished suddenly that he were a bag of turnips, for that way he would have no soul to account for, no sins for which to atone. Turnips were blameless, guilty of nothing but being turnips.”

When the soldier arrives at the inn in Part 2, he is overcome with guilt for what he’s done (killing Beatryce’s family), and he finds that living with guilt is the most painful thing he’s ever done. To cope, he wishes he were a turnip because then he would not feel the guilt and pain of his actions. The soldier didn’t think twice about carrying out the king’s order to kill the girl who threatened his reign, but now that the soldier believes he has accomplished this deed, he realizes what he’s done—namely, end the lives of innocent people. He is overcome with regret, but he cannot undo his actions, which offers a lesson about consequences.

“He heard laughter, and then a clear voice said, ‘You outwitted her. I did not know she could be outwitted.’

He turned and saw a robed and hooded figure.

‘Aye, I outstepped her and I outwitted her.’”

Jack has just arrived at the monastery and been greeted by a charging Answelica. To avoid getting headbutted by the goat, Jack sidestepped, leaving Answelica to continue charging into the field, which prompts Beatryce to observe that she’d never witnessed Answelica being outwitted. Answelica is fiercely protective, which means she is single-minded about eliminating threats, and once she’s on a course, she does not deviate from it. Jack’s reaction shows how he thinks. He doesn’t immediately recognize that he outwitted a goat. He simply thinks that he moved from harm’s way, only realizing he outwitted Answelica when Beatryce points it out.

“And then he was gone, and it was just Beatryce and the soldier and Answelica in a dark room on the upper story of an inn, in a village beside a dark wood, not far from a monastery, near a castle where a counselor spoke to a king.”

Beatryce has just arrived in the soldier’s room at the inn to take his last confession. Jack leaves, and this paragraph fills in a transition from Beatryce to a conversation between the king and his counselor, showing how events intertwine. Beatryce is the protagonist of the novel, and this paragraph begins with her position in the story, which is not far from the counselor—the man who set her story arc into motion. From the inn, this paragraph moves, somewhat like a camera, over the dark woods where Beatryce goes next and then to the castle where she ultimately ends up. This passage shows how the greatest threats are often close by and foreshadows everything Beatryce must face before her story is complete.

“Is it better to be the king or to be the man behind the king? That is, is it better to be the puppet or the puppet master? Answer me that question, Beatryce, you who always had an answer for every question. Beatryce of Abelard, can you answer that question for me?”

After conversing with the king about the prophecy that should allow him to stay on the throne by eliminating Beatryce (the threat to his reign), the counselor retreats to stare out at Beatryce’s castle home. This moment foreshadows that he knows Beatryce personally and that her family motivated his deceptions and desire for revenge. The question he poses is not necessarily meant for Beatryce, but it does offer a debate about power and who truly holds it—the king or the man who has controlled the king’s ascent to royalty. At this moment, the counselor feels it is better to be the puppet master because it has given him the influence to fulfill his desires and also because he recognizes that the current king is meaningless. These lines also show that the counselor envies Beatryce’s intelligence. She always had answers, which made the counselor uncomfortable because she seemed smarter than him.

“‘I am someone who gave up his name quite some time ago.’ The man smiled. He stroked his beard.

‘In truth, I gave up everything quite some time ago. But you may call me…let’s see…Cannoc. Yes, Cannoc. It is easier, I suppose, to have a name than not.’”

Beatryce, Jack, and Answelica have just met Cannoc. The former king states that he willingly gave up his name and everything about himself a long time ago, which is not entirely dissimilar to Beatryce giving up her memories. In both situations, the relinquishing was a choice born of self-preservation—Beatryce unable to remember without causing herself emotional harm and Cannoc feeling as though he was losing himself to a position he didn’t want. The greatest difference is in the level of awareness and the circumstances surrounding each decision. Cannoc gave up his old self, knowing who he was and what he was giving up, which made the choice fully and truly his. By contrast, Beatryce’s choice was entirely about survival. She wasn’t yet strong enough to live with what happened, and the only way for her to move on was to forget.

“They were in a tree again.

Not in the branches of a tree, but in the trunk of it. They had walked through a door hewn into the side of a massive tree, and they were inside it now.

For the rest of his life, Jack Dory would remember the wonder of it: what it was like to open a door and enter another world, a world hidden inside of the world he already knew--the impossibility of it, the rightness of it.”

This moment is a nod to many fantasy tales that came before The Beatryce Prophecy. Jack’s experience here alludes to those of characters like Lewis Carroll’s Alice of Alice in Wonderland. Like Alice, Jack has his world suddenly and irrevocably changed by the idea of worlds within worlds. Up until this point, Jack has viewed the dark woods where Cannoc lives as a bad place because it’s where his parents were killed. That, coupled with the strangeness of a home within a tree, change Jack’s outlook, making this moment one of the key points in his character arc. The impossibility and rightness of a different world existing inside a familiar one speaks to the escapist desires that all people share. This idea calls to Jack because, whether he’s aware of it or not, he has sought a way to escape the world where his parents were killed, and finding that escape here makes him view his world in new ways.

“I kept walking. I walked into the forest, and the ground beneath my feet felt wondrous—better even than the wood of the drawbridge. I thought: I will keep walking.

I walked unaccompanied. I walked without being accosted. I walked without anyone needing anything of me. It was glorious.” 

These lines are part of Cannoc’s explanation for how he left his old life behind. He has just revealed that he was once the king and left the palace one day, not realizing he wouldn’t return. His experience walking away from the palace, like Jack’s upon finding a new world inside a tree, is different from any Cannoc knew before, which made the idea of seeking a new life all the more tantalizing. These lines also highlight the loneliness and stress of power, as well as how power does not mean freedom. As king, Cannoc’s life was not his own. Though he was in charge, he was constantly surrounded by people who needed or wanted something from him, and as the one with the power to grant those requests, he was the only one who could consider the questions put to him. It wasn’t until he left the palace that he experienced what it meant to be his own person and to have power over his life, which is ironic because when he was king, he had power over everyone but himself.

“The boy must learn not to fear so much. Do not take him a light. Do not ever bring him a light when he calls for it. Let him scream. He will get over it soon enough.”

These lines are spoken by Edik’s father in one of Edik’s memories. As a child, Edik experienced emotional abuse from his father, who saw Edik’s gentle and fearful nature as a weakness. Rather than help Edik overcome his fears or meet him where he was, his father took a “tough love” approach, which only served to traumatize the boy, leaving him alone and frightened. Edik’s father represents the danger of being unwilling to change one’s views. The man believed that the only way for Edik to make it in the world was to toughen up and be more like a “man.” He didn’t consider that there might be more than one type of man or that men could have fears and emotions. Edik’s father made up his mind about what was appropriate and proper, which resulted in Edik struggling both to appease the man and to overcome his personality traits that he thought were weaknesses.

“‘These planets, these other worlds,’ said the tutor to her that early morning when she looked through the magic glass, ‘must surely have inhabitants with stories of their own. It is only through ignorance that we do not find our way to them.’”

This passage comes from a snippet of Beatryce’s memories once she chooses to recall them. She remembers a session with her tutor when he gave her a telescope and showed her other planets in the sky. The tutor’s words here are meant for the inhabitants of those planets, but the same principle may be applied to the various cultures and groups of Earth. Groups hold different beliefs and have different histories and stories that come together to make unique cultures. Throughout time, conflicts have grown between groups who believe different things, and as the tutor says here, these conflicts are motivated by ignorance. Rather than learn and understand that not everyone is the same, some groups would rather oppress anyone different, either because they don’t want to understand or because they fear what will happen to their own beliefs if they encounter something new. In this way, ignorance is one of the most destructive forces there is because it keeps people from trying to see from perspectives other than their own.

“Brother Edik had been detained by one of the robbers of the woods. I came upon him just in time, and we soon sorted everything out. Nothing is more terrifying to evil than joy.”

Cannoc has just arrived back at his tree home with Edik in tow. Cannoc found Edik as the same robber who killed Jack’s parents was about to kill him. Cannoc drives the robber away by simply not fearing him, which shows how darkness and hate have no true strength. The robber depends on others fearing and despising him because he takes his ability to torment others from their own emotions. Cannoc chose not to fear or hate the robber, which meant that the robber could not intimidate him, leaving the robber powerless. Cannoc’s observation that evil hates joy is based on this as well. Evil gets its power from the sorrow and anger of others as those emotions grow and spread. Joy counters fear and anger and, thus, strips evil of its power.

“But if she stopped believing, the king would disappear, and there was nothing then but wolf—sharp-clawed and long-toothed—enraged at not being seen for who he truly was.

The girl said to him, ‘I am tired of believing you into existence. It is too much work. You must believe for yourself that you are king.’”

Beatryce remembers this story as she is being brought to the castle by one of the king’s soldiers. This excerpt is from a tale of a king who was turned into a wolf and who could only become human if others remembered who he was. The girl he meets has remembered who he is, something that the wolf-king has not made easy because of his temperament. Because of this, the girl has grown tired, and her dialogue here speaks of the need for a person to believe in oneself. The girl stops playing into the king’s insecurities. If he truly wants to be his old self again, he has the power to make this happen, but as long as someone else does it for him, he won’t do it for himself. This memory mirrors how Beatryce is now alone in the story. Up until now, she has relied on those around her to help keep her frightening memories at bay so she can move forward. Without her friends, she realizes she can do this on her own and that, while she doesn’t need other people, they are nice to have.

“Her head itched. Before they had all gone to sleep in Cannoc’s tree, Brother Edik had told her that this was because her hair was growing back. Were those the last words Brother Edik had spoken to her? And if so, why could they not have been more important words?”

Beatryce sits alone and afraid in the castle dungeon. Her itchy head is a typical physical reaction, but here, it takes on additional meaning because the itching sensation is something she can focus on to cope with her current situation. The itch also reminds her of the seemingly normal conversation she had with Edik about her hair growing back. At the time, she had no idea that would be their last discussion before she was captured, and now, after the fact, it feels strange that such a normal moment could be the last before everything changed. This mirrors Beatryce’s experience following the attack on her family and shows how she has grown. The moment before the attack was an everyday moment that only became significant as she kept dreaming about the seahorse over and over again. Here, Beatryce has experienced another traumatic event (being kidnapped), and instead of having a similar reaction to the attack, she recognizes what’s happening and thinks through the situation.

“Cannoc bent down and picked up the robber’s knife. He held it out so that Jack Dory could see it. ‘Here is the man’s knife,’ said Cannoc. ‘He is nothing without it.’”

Jack, Cannoc, Edik, and Answelica encounter the robber who killed Jack’s parents in the dark woods. Upon seeing the robber, Jack puts his sword to the man’s throat and threatens to kill him. After coping with his trauma, though, Jack no longer has the same single-minded fixation on revenge, and his character growth means he is thinking twice about killing the man. Cannoc’s lines speak to the true sources of power. The robber looms in Jack’s mind because he killed Jack’s parents with his superior strength and his weapon. Without the knife, the robber lacks the tool that gave him power in the past, making him a man like any other man. The robber knows how to use a knife, but without the knife in his possession, this knowledge does him little good. By taking away the knife, the robber is disarmed, literally and metaphorically, of his ability to kill.

“I am a maker of destinies. I made a king. This king was nobody. Do you know how many youngest sons of youngest sons there are? But I made the prophecy come true. I made him king, and now I control him, which means I control everything.”

This excerpt takes place in the dungeon, and the counselor says these lines to Beatryce in a moment that changes several things about how prophecy is viewed. First, the counselor admits that the prophecies he manipulated were not defined by the Chronicles of Sorrowing. The book offered vague statements that the counselor could then bend to his advantage, and he used one of the prophecies to put a randomly chosen youngest son of a youngest son on the throne to use this puppet king to seek revenge on Beatryce’s family. This moment shows that the prophecies are not specific or predestined, and it also makes Beatryce realize that there truly is nothing special about her except for what she believes about herself. Throughout the book, Beatryce uses the idea of a prophecy to motivate her, making her want to bring the king to justice for what he did. Here, she learns that the king was not truly responsible for the attack and that there is no prophecy saying she will bring about justice and change. Beatryce is fully responsible for herself and what she chooses to do.

“‘And yet there was no prophecy written that said I would walk away from my throne. But I did. I did walk away.’

‘And what of Beatryce? Do you believe the prophecy about her? That she will unseat the king?’

‘What will become is what becomes, and that is all I know,’ said Cannoc.”

This conversation between Cannoc and Edik is another exploration of prophecy—both what it is and what it is not. As king, Cannoc relied on the interpretation of prophecy to inform the decisions he made, not realizing that the prophecies in the Chronicles of Sorrowing were meaningless words. After the fact, Cannoc came to realize that the prophecies meant nothing because there were events that came to pass that were not prophesied, such as him leaving his throne. When Edik questions Beatryce’s prophecy, Cannoc answers him with the lessons he’s learned. The prophecies are just words. Beatryce will do whatever Beatryce does, regardless of what is written in a book, and the Chronicles of Sorrowing will not dictate what Beatryce believes is the right path. By leaving his throne in an action not foreseen by prophecy, Cannoc learned that a person’s choices are his own and that they do not belong to anyone else, not even to a book that claims to predict the future.

“And Rosellyn then described the sea for him—how the water changed from blue to green and back again, and how the sun shone through its great depths. She told him of the fish and the plants that grew there. She told him of the seahorses, and how they told story after story, each story more strange and wonderful than the last.

The boy said, ‘I would like to see this magical place.’

‘Will you help me?’ asked Rosellyn. ‘Can you take me there?’

‘Yes,’ said the boy.”

Toward the end of the mermaid story, the mermaid is imprisoned in a tower after the jewels fall off her tail, and the king grows angry that she is no longer lovely to look at. The mermaid wants more than anything to go home, and she recognizes that leaving in the first place was foolish. At the time, she felt as though she was missing something by not knowing what was beyond the sea, but now that she’s been away from her home, she appreciates all the wonders and joys she left behind. Because of this, she describes it to the boy in a way that makes him want to help her, which shows how a person’s love for something will shine through if it is genuine love. The boy sees the yearning the mermaid has to return home, and this inspires him to seek his own way in the world. This part of the mermaid story mirrors how Beatryce is similarly trapped by a king and how she just wants to return to her beautiful, if imperfect, life.