Theoryland of the Wheel of Time

I didn't originally intend for Hrathen to have a Seon. However, as I was working on this chapter, I realized how much sense it made. It lends a bit of hypocrisy to the Derethi religion, and I found that I liked that a great deal. The Seon also allowed me to move more quickly with Hrathen's plans. I couldn't have made the storyline nearly as compact if Hrathen didn't have access to a Seon.

As a side note, I'm planning this Seon here to make an appearance in the sequel (if I write one.) She would be Adien's own Seon, as he would probably be the hero of the sequel. (Along with his brother and sister.) For those of you who think I didn't deal enough with the Seons in this book—the sequel would have strong focus on them. In fact, I'm tempted to make this Seon a viewpoint character. However, that would bump me up to four characters, which wouldn't let me use the chapter triad system.

Those of you who've read the book before should recognize the case study Raoden mentions in this chapter. The woman who was miss-healed by the Elantrian is none other than Dilaf's wife—he speaks of her near the end of the book. This event—the madness and death of the woman he loved—is what drives his hatred of Elantris, and therefore Arelon and Teod.

My biggest challenge in this chapter was to make it believable to a reader that the characters would accept Sarene as an Elantrian. The plotting of this section of the book relies on Sarene thinking that she's actually been transformed—otherwise, she would try to escape, and I wouldn't be able to have the short interlude in Elantris I have here. It's vital to Raoden's plotting, and to the relationship between the two of them, that they have some time to think and to get to know one another.

I had a couple things going for me in creating this suspension of disbelief regarding Sarene's nature as an Elantrian. First, she doesn't really know what an Elantrian should be like—she doesn't realize that her heartbeat or her tears betray her. Secondly, as Raoden will point out in a bit, Sarene has come during the time of New Elantris. There is food, there is shelter, and the pain has mostly been overcome. The differences between an Elantrian and a non-Elantrian, then, are less obvious.

Even still, there are a couple of things I had to explain. The first is Ashe's existance. This is a major clue to Sarene and company that she's not really an Elantrian. Sarene's bodily changes—or lack thereof—are going to be more and more obvious the longer she stays in Elantris. Obviously, I wouldn't be able to pull this plotting off for very long, but hopefully it works for now.