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Summary: Chapter 3
Matthias watches as Kaz and Wylan run into Smeet, who doesn’t recognize them, and he surreptitiously returns the dog whistle to his pocket. The three go to the gang’s temporary hideout at the tombs of Black Veil Island, an abandoned cemetery. Matthias is relieved to see Nina and feels torn between attraction to and concern for her tired appearance, as she’s still struggling with her withdrawal from parem. Jesper reveals that there are Shu warships in the harbor. Zemeni, Kaelish, Ravkan, and Fjerdan soldiers and officials are in Ketterdam as well, all looking for Kuwei. Kuwei wants to go to Ravka to work on an antidote to parem as soon as possible because he is worried that someone else will figure out the formula. But Kaz forbids him to leave and threatens to kill him if he does.
The gang hatches a plan to rescue Inej from Van Eck, which takes place the following night at midnight. Two other members of the Dregs, Rotty and Specht, inform the gang that they haven’t yet been connected with the raid at the Ice Court or parem. Pekka Rollins, another criminal boss in the Barrel and Kaz’s arch enemy, has kept quiet, but Kaz believes he’ll talk in time. Matthias finds out that the man who took his place in Hellgate, Muzzen, who was fabricated to look like Matthias, was killed in the infirmary by the drüskelle. The death of Muzzen-as-Matthias has serious implications: Matthias now knows that his brothers-in-arms want to murder him, but, having killed the disguised Muzzen, they now believe that Matthias is dead. Matthias is upset he forgot Muzzen’s name and that his own brothers would want to kill him. Rotty and Specht also tell Jesper that his father has been looking for him at the university.
Summary: Chapter 4
Inej, who was kidnapped by Van Eck in Six of Crows, is bound and blindfolded in a windowless room. During her captivity, her only visitor is Bajan, a young Suli music teacher who brings her food and tries to engage her in conversation. Inej is constantly on guard and refuses to speak or eat, but as she weakens physically, so does her resolve. One day, Bajan asks about her family, saying Van Eck can reunite her with them. She is tempted by this proposal but knows that Van Eck is lying. She knocks her food plate on the floor, and Bajan mistakenly assumes the clumsy gesture is a result of her weakness. But he has underestimated her: once he leaves, Inej uses a shard of the broken bowl to cut her restraints and then shimmies through a vent.
After she crawls through the shaft, she finds herself in a theater, surrounded by Van Eck and his men. They tie her to a surgical table and threaten to torture her if she doesn’t reveal Kaz’s hideouts. When she says she knows nothing, Van Eck instructs his torturer to break Inej’s legs. Her resolve falters and in terror she screams that if he does so, Kaz will never trade for her. The torturer shatters the metal table beneath Inej, and they return her to her cell, warning her that next time she will not be so lucky. Inej curses Bajan and internally vows to get revenge on Van Eck. She is worried that Kaz may decide that it’s more practical to replace her than to save her.
Analysis
Throughout the novel, family is both a source of destruction and of solace. For example, when Bajan mentions Inej’s family, her resolve to resist his temptations wavers. The thought of her family comforts her so greatly that she considers risking everything for the chance to see them again. However, she also remembers her father’s guidance about fear, which helps her to remain calm even when she is panicking. Instead of running from fear or trying to suppress it, Inej learns to listen carefully to what fear might have to teach her. In this instance, listening to fear helps her to realize that she needs to take action to protect herself, prompting her to attempt to escape. Though she’s not successful, the attempt is important for her sense of hope and her ability to trust in her own strength and perseverance. Though Inej’s desire to see her family makes her susceptible to Van Eck’s manipulations, the wisdom she has acquired from them enables her to remain valiant in the face of despair.
The setting of Inej’s torture reflects the way that violence is often performed in the novel to make a statement. She is tortured on a theater stage in a set made up of a surgical table and equipment for an audience of Van Eck’s men. This performance is as much a spectacle of Van Eck’s power as it is an ordeal for Inej. Van Eck threatens her with the physical injury that would destroy her life, for if her legs were shattered beyond repair, she would be unable to work or enjoy the pleasures of her acrobatic skills. Van Eck couldn’t care less about Inej or her legs, and he performs this show of violence to send a message to her, to Kaz, and to everyone else that he is the kind of man who will stop at nothing to get what he wants.
The gang hides from their enemies in Black Veil, a cemetery, a location that emphasizes the recurring theme of death. Throughout the novel, death hovers over everything: the gang fears for their lives as their enemies close in, they all fear for Inej’s fate when she’s imprisoned by Van Eck, and the threat of parem is an existential threat to society itself. It’s appropriate, then, that the gang takes cover in the cemetery, which is described as an eerie “miniature city” filled with statues representing many different nations. In a sense, the Black Veil is a shadow version of Ketterdam: it is a “city” of death that, ironically, serves to protect the Dregs. Throughout the novel, when the characters’ lives are threatened, they find power and refuge in death.
