#DragonSlayer Debriefing: The Revenant

I'm going to have a photo, and then do a cut, so if you haven't finished Dragon Slayer, you won't accidently be spoiled on the main blog page. Spoilers below, proceed at your own risk! 

Anyone who's read across my body of work will probably know by this point that I like putting shadowy, mysterious figures in dark hoods. It's just an aesthetic choice. But in this instance, our mysterious, hooded figure turns out to be a familiar face, and it's the one plot point I tried to keep quiet about before the book came out, but which, knowing me, I most likely spoiled anyway. 

Let's talk about Kolya. 

“How long was I dead?” he’d asked in his ruined voice.

Liam had taken a careful sip of his tea and set his cup down slow, face warm with apology. “Seventy-five years.”

“Oh.”

“Your memories will begin to return in time. That’s at least been my experience with this sort of thing. Some will return naturally – gradually. And others will be jolted to the surface by some stimulus. In time, you will remember exactly who you are. But until then, I think it’s best if you stayed close with us. We’ll be going to America soon, and you’ll need to learn to speak English.”

“What are we speaking now?”

“Russian. You are Russian, Kolya. We are in Volgograd.” A pause. “You would have known it in your time as Stalingrad.”

Stalingrad. Drone of Luftwaffe. Thunder of bombs. Screams. Rubble. Blood. A lab; a steel table. A boy, howling. Fingers digging into muscle, pushing back. Let go of me, let go! They’re killing him! Sasha!

He blinked and he was on the floor, crouched low like an animal, his head in his hands. 

Liam crouched down in front of him. “What did you remember?”

“Who’s Sasha?” he croaked.

“One of your friends from before. One of the ones who is still alive. You’ll get to meet him soon.”

But first, we have to talk about Liam. 

I've blogged about the vampires and wolves in this series in the Compendium, but I realize now that we haven't touched on mages. I need to rectify that soon. In this series, it's important to me that the magic not be an exact science. This is not a wave-a-wand, say-the-right-word kind of prescription magic of wizards and sorcerers. This is an elemental, hard to control, unpredictable, individual kind of magic. It's genetic; it takes a massive toll on the wielder of the magic, and it presents differently in each mage. Some mages are incredibly powerful - Liam, Lily, Red - and some are weak - Philippe. So far, we've seen Red use her magic to heal fresh wounds, and to lessen pain. We've seen, briefly, Lily help a plant to flourish. And we know they can wield fire. 

Liam is a necromancer. I cannot wait for him to demonstrate that in real time, as it were. 

“So you made yourself a poppet. My uncle can do that, too. He wants to destroy half of humanity with them.”

Liam’s smile never slipped. “You’re mistaken, your grace. Your uncle’s – affliction, I guess you could say – eats a person’s soul out of their body, leaving only disease and mindless violence. You call it the Absence, yes? Well, he’s only a vampire, after all, playing at being a mage. I can assure you that when I raise someone from the dead, I bring their soul back as well.”

Vlad looked again at the dead man, still poised for a fight.

Liam said, “Show them your face, Kolya.”

The man stilled. He sheathed his knives at the small of his back, an efficient movement, and then reached up to push his hood back.

Fulk had seen the videos of the Absence-afflicted creatures in the desert. Mindless destruction; worse than animals – as an animal himself, he could attest that a creature’s species had no bearing on its intelligence. Those things were, as Vlad had stated, poppets.

But this man, the skin of his face laced with scars, was very much present, if quiet and expressionless. Dark eyes; intelligent eyes…but lost. His hair hung shaggy and unkempt past his chin. He stood at attention, unmoving, like a soldier, like a –

Oh. Oh no.

“This,” Liam said, “is Kolya Dyomin of Moscow. A Chekist under the command of Captain Nikita Baskin.”

But. Given he has this ability, the plan was always to have him arrive at Blackmere with a revenant in tow. It was to be a new character, one hopelessly lost, confused, scarred, and searching for his old memories. But I realized quickly that a new character would carry no weight with readers or with our existing characters. An opportunity presented itself; I missed Kolya, he could serve a real purpose in the narrative, and now he's back.

And I'm loving his new journey. 

I love all of the original Russian pack, but Kolya was the loss that hurt the most. But coming back from the dead is a big deal. I don't want to use it as a plot point; I want to dig into all the ugly, messy fallout. As his memories return, they'll bring with them this massive sense of displacement. He'll have more than a few demons to exorcise.

Kolya pressed his hands flat over the hilts of the knives, and the faint tremors in his arms stilled. Soft, just a whisper: “I used to work for some really bad people.”

“Yes, you did.”

When he lifted his head this time, he seemed more deeply rooted in himself. More of the real him filling out the shell of his body. “I don’t want to do that anymore.”

And then there's his friends. Travelling to New York in Val's entourage, he's about to come face to face with Nik and Sasha, and that is going to be...interesting. To say the least. 

This is one of those surprises that I hope was a good one. I'm excited about what he can contribute going forward; about all the themes we can explore with him. He has a place in this new, growing found family, and I can't wait to dig into more of it in Golden Eagle.