Today's debriefing is all about the book's last chapter, so there will be spoilers aplenty! All of them under a cut and a big break, so look away if you haven't finished yet!
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Nikita is prickly as a thorn bush, and he likes to make things as difficult as possible whenever possible. It's not his fault; he's an anxious bean. In the early prep stages of the book, I knew that he would need to bind Sasha to him; I also knew that he wasn't going to like that in the least. The process of getting there would be slow, and arduous, and filled with angst. Would Nik have second thoughts afterward? Would he continue to punish himself?
The final piece of the puzzle is what we see in the last chapter. The marriage. Because for Nik, it couldn't be about binding Sasha to him - it had to be about them being bound to one another. It had to be mutual; it had to be a conscious decision.
"Think of it like a marriage," Val says on their couch, just before they go hunting through the mist for one another, and that was when it made sense to Nik. Of course. A marriage. And there needed to be a real marriage, too; a human one, there at the end. Even though they've been together all these decades, and are truly together now, it was important for Nikita to say it out loud; to commit in front of their whole pack. He's not hiding anymore; he's ready to be totally honest with his mate.
The wedding is the biggie, but the entire last chapter is nothing but little character moments; people connecting with one another. Trina and Mia sitting quietly beside the window, reflecting on the violence they've realized themselves capable of - and the ways friendship is possible, despite that.
Nikita getting his son's approval.
And a small thing, but one of my favorite things: Val coming up the hill through the snow to get Sasha. I loved having the chance to echo the first moment of White Wolf. "Are you a prince?" My how things have changed for both of them since then.
When Val first met little Sasha, and then found himself whisked to Philippe's séance parlor, he was still a prisoner; this was before Mia, before Vlad was awake; this was a Val playing the part into which he'd been cast: mischievous villain. He knew he'd appeared to Sasha for a reason, that he was important somehow, but rather than protect his identity, he offers it readily to Philippe. He's bored; he wants to see what happens - wants to see anything happen.
It will be decades - those in which he dream-walks to the now-wolf Sasha, and gets to know him - before he truly loves Sasha, but he very much does by the time he takes off his collar and cuffs in Red Rooster and helps him escape. He'll always feel a twinge of guilt; if not for him, Sasha would never have ended up a wolf. But he's proud, too; he's gotten to watch this young man come into his own. And Sasha will never resent Val's role in all of it. Sasha is delightfully constant in his affection.
I loved giving them that unspoken moment. The callback to their first meeting, and the confirmation of their feeling and trust in one another.
But Nik and Sasha are the heart of this last chapter. Of the whole book, really. It's been a slow burn; it's been a really slow burn! But, boy, has it been rewarding to write. The journey up to this point, and then the payoff. Nikita spent so much time worrying about his past, and his faults, putting Sasha on a pedestal, and all along, Sasha's been pining, too - patient, but ferocious. The confession is something Sasha's been waiting on for a long, long time, and now that he's got it, he won't turn back, not for anything.
You see, Nikita hated the idea of a binding because he worried it would force Sasha into subservience. But they've been equals all along, in every way. They complement one another in every aspect. Not just mates, but soulmates.
Now, if you'll excuse me, there's lint in my eye...
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