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Warning : Spoilers for Onyx Storm
Sarah J. Maas’Onyx Stormhas spawned countless fan theories , and one of them , even if it ’s not unfeigned , shows just how badly theEmpyrean Serieswasted its first actually interesting villain . Onyx Stormand its cliffhanger endingwere packed full of new locations , new traditional knowledge , and unexampled characters . That included Theophanie , a new venin antagonist who seemed primed to become the big bad of the series prompt forward .
unluckily , that is ostensibly not the case , as Theophanie was killed off in the climactic fight of the book . As such , Onyx Storm ’s terminate raised more interrogative than it answer , including how Theophanie seemed to know so much about Violet , why she was so heroic to check Violet , how Andarna factored into her plans , and more . However , anewOnyx Stormtheorysuggests that Theophanie actually has much deeper ties to Violet than ever take in , and it ’s both tragic and compelling .
The Theory Posits That Theophanie Was In Love With Asher Sorrengail
It Makes A Strange Amount Of Sense
The theory , which was first posted on Reddit , but has since been deleted , posits that the venin Theophanie had see and fallen in love with Asher Sorrengail at some item in the past . It ’s not crazy to imagine this possibility has some merit , either . A Brobdingnagian part ofOnyx Storm ’s plot involved Violet and her squad traveling to the islands off the glide of Navarre , follow in the pace of her founding father , who had often move to the islands , to track down his journal .
Who is Onyx Storm ’s silver-tongued - haired venin , and what does the newfangled Fourth Wing villain require with Violet and Andarna ? Here ’s everything we bed .
While all the island likeZehyllna fiddle a role inOnyx Storm , Unnbriel is of exceptional grandness : not only did Asher travel there , but he also convey Violet there when she was just a toddler for give her to the goddess , Dunne , at the Temple of Dunne . It ’s not clear on the button why he did , but we know Lilith was n’t happy about it , that Violet did n’t nail her commitment ( hence her haircloth only being part - silver ) , and that it had something to do with Violet being sick . Whether it was her nameless Ehlers - Danlos syndrome or some other unwellness , it appears Asher had his reasons for taking his young daughter to the Temple of Dunne . We also know that , in her past , Theophanie herself was a priestess of the Temple of Dunne on the island of Unnbriel .
It Frames Theophanie’s Hatred Of Lilith Sorrengail In A New Light
She Saw Lilith As Competition In Two Ways
It ’s not out of the doubt to cogitate that at some point in his travel , Asher met Theophanie and the priestess fell in honey with him . Maybe ascertain that Asher was in honey with Lilith , or even simply being turned down before that , is the reason she left her Robert William Service as a temple priestess and turned venin . It would certainly explicate her vicious hate for Lilith Sorrengail . That hatred seemed to simply staunch from the fact that Theophanie saw the general as competitor ; it can be assumed that she and Lilith had clashed during battles and the venin ’s enmity grew out of those confrontations .
Theophanie ’s seething hatred of Lilith and the fact she seems to sleep with a quite a little more about Violet and the Sorrengail family than she should then make sense : she knew Asher a long time ago . And she loved him .
Yet , during the last battle ofOnyx Storm , Violet of a sudden realizes that Theophanie is n’t a lightning wielder like her , but that her signet is storm - exert , just like Lilith . " She ’s the answer to my female parent , " she tell Bodhi , to which an annoyed Theophanie hisses , " She was the answer tome . " Again , at the moment , it take like Theophanie ’s superbia simply rearing its head . Putting it in the context of Theophanie having bed Asher but him hook up with and loving Lilith , however , suddenly , those words take on a deeper signification . Theophanie ’s seething hatred of Lilith and the fact she seems to know a circumstances more about Violet and the Sorrengail family than she should then make signified : she knew Asher a long time ago . And she loved him .
Why The Theophanie Onyx Storm Theory Might Not Work
She’s Probably Too Old For The Timeline To Line Up
That say , while the theory that Theophanie loved Asher is a really interesting one and would explicate a lot , there ’s one way it does n’t make mother wit . We do n’t know how old Theophanie is or how long she ’s been venin , but the context ofOnyx Stormmakes it seem as though she’soldold , too old to have been a contemporary of Asher Sorrengail . While her exact geezerhood is n’t stated , there ’s a common sense that she ’s at least a few hundred eld former , and if that ’s the grammatical case , then the hypothesis apparently does n’t work , as it was explain inOnyx Stormthat venin do n’t feel love – not in the way humankind do , in any case . It ’s unlikely that , if Theophanie were a venin when she crossed path with Asher , she would have fallen in love with a weak human .
It ’s not percipient how sometime the Temple of Dunne on Unnbriel is , but it ’s implied that it ’s ancient ; even if Theophanie was C of age old , it still would have been the same temple that Asher shoot the breeze .
On the other hired man , that only lend credence to the other popular lover hypothesis that Asher Sorrengailwasn’thuman , but venin - and is , in fact , the Sage , whose name was revealed as Berwyn inOnyx Storm . It would explicate why Theophanie is so competitory with the salvia ; hatred that potent ordinarily only stems from thwarted love - or whatever passes for love with the venin . There ’s still so much mystery around Asher Sorrengail ’s history , his travelling , how he died , and why . It ’s not like there is n’t a precedent in theEmpyrean Seriesbooks for a Sorrengail family member faking their own death , after all . So while Theophanie ’s age and the timeline do n’t seem to add up up to brook the hypothesis that she loved Asher , they also do n’t confute it , either .
Custom image by Yailin Chacon
It Proves Just How Rich Theophanie’s Backstory Could Be (& How She Was Wasted)
She Was Killed Off Way Too Soon
Whether the theory is eventually proven straight or not , it still drives home just how wasted Theophanie was , and it ’s a shame . Onyx Stormjust touch upon her backstory and that there was so much more to her than meets the eye . Unfortunately , Theophanie was unceremoniously killed off just as the book hinted there was a complex and bewitching backstory behind her . It ’s a fall back pattern in theEmpyrean Series- characters are vote out off aright as they start to get interesting ( or are already idle ) , and we either do n’t take anything else about them or we only learn about them posthumously . Asher Sorrengail . Lilith Sorrengail . Naolin . Liam Mairi . Now Theophanie .
Onyx Storm ’s messy plotting created some plot holes and continuity inconsistencies , but one conversation wrecked its entire villain premise .
It ’s a substantial shame , too , as there is so much to explore with Theophanie ’s fib , and it was suggest that she has a connection to Violet ’s half - dedication at the Temple of Dunne . generate up her priestesshood is still clearly a sore subject for her , even after geezerhood . It bothers her , bothers her disadvantageously enough that it throws her off her game during the last combat with Violet and reveals an emotion that ’s not just a venin ’s calculation , boil fury , or taunting :
Custom Image by Yeider Chacon
" I hold my next ten-strike when she appears twenty feet in advance . ' Tell me , do you leave out Unnbriel ? '
Her eyes flame , and she galvanize .
Victory . I gather more and more power , spool it like molten thread . ' Do you not yearn for temple ? ' I use the quarrel the high-pitched priestess had on me .
Custom Image by Ana Nieves
Her fount twists with an emotion that almost await like longing , but it ’s chop-chop masked with anger . ' Do you ? ' she counters . ' Or are you resistant , having only been touched , but not dedicated ? ' She charges forward . ' Do you jazz the infliction of never being take into account to generate , of knowing that it would sever the very thing that ’s keep me inaccessible all these year ? ' "
Onyx Storm – p. 737
With that one exchange , Theophanie upend everything we thought we make out about the emotional landscape of venin , who have been discover in theEmpyrean Seriesas operating almost like psychopaths , feeling nothing for others outside of computing and how to accomplish their ends . A venin who longs for the temple and who openly acknowledges that it causes her cryptic painfulness to be write out off is nigh unheard of . It lead to the doubtfulness : if that bit of knowledge about venin is wrong , then what else have the people of Navarre been ill-timed about ? Or perhaps Theophanie was an anomaly , still able-bodied to palpate human emotions after twelvemonth . And if that ’s the showcase , then it ’s entirely potential that she was also able to feel some form of love .
Custom Image By Yailin Chacon
The Empyrean Series Needs Better & More Fleshed-Out Villains
It’s A Big Problem Three Books In
But Theophanie ’s life being cut poor inOnyx Stormisn’t just frustrative because of the way it stunt her engrossing personal narrative . The bigger issue is that Theophanie was the first actually interesting scoundrel theEmpyrean Serieshas had , and three books in , that ’s a huge problem . The venin have mostly been a nameless , faceless horde aside from the Sage , who only appeared in abbreviated scenes in battle that revealed nothing about him before he was seemingly vote down by Xaden . We know now that he ’s not actually utter , but it ’s not as though that bring out made him any more interesting . He ’s still a white cipher , for the most part .
Theophanie was the first actually interesting villain theEmpyrean Serieshas had , and three books in , that ’s a huge trouble . Simply put , the villains of the Empyrean Series have been tiresome .
The human opponent in the books have also been implausibly one - dimensional , simply because their antagonism towards Violet has been so over - the - top and comically exaggerated that they have had no layers or shade as type . Jack Barlowe simply decided he hated Violet on visual sense and went out of his path to be sadistic , and thevillainous Basgiath leaders , such as Colonel Aetosand Commandant Varrish , are basically standardized in their corrupted immorality .
Empyrean Series Book
Goodreads evaluation
Number of Reviews
Fourth offstage
4.58
2,696,085
Iron Flame
4.37
1,910,235
Onyx Storm
4.29 ( presently )
782,867 ( currently )
plainly put , the villain of theEmpyrean Serieshave beenboring . None of their motivations have been explore beyond an overly simplistic " I need exponent . " They are n’t fleshed out at all and , as such , merely attend to the plot without adding any existent gloss or richness to the taradiddle . Killing off Theophanie , the one scoundrel of the serial publication who showed there was more to her than there seemed to be , who had layer and complicated motivations , was an incredibly goosy move on Sarah J. Maas ' part . Of naturally , the next Scripture afterOnyx Stormcould reveal she ’s not bushed after all . But with a series that has already start out so much flak for repeating the same storylines and plot twists , that would be a problem in and of itself .
