Tag: Dorina Basarab

exinaart:

Daily Quotes #1082

Masks by Karen Chance

Dory and Dorina – what happens when you’ve been cut off from half of yourself for 500 years

redorblue:

(Not sure
whether it’s right to write about Dorina and Dory as two different characters
when we still know so little about Dorina, but anyway, here goes)

When
reading Fury’s Kiss for the first time, there were these passages that
frustrated me immensely. I can see why Dory naturally assumed that it was
Dorina attacking her in her own mind – she’s only ever “seen” Dorina that one
time at Radu’s estate, plus some jumbled memories from before the divide – and then
there’s the waking up surrounded by bodies thing… But I didn’t wanna believe
Dory. Because those few glimpses we get from Dorina’s POV just don’t fit the
picture of the bloodthirsty maniac that Dory has of her other half. Sure, she’s
good at what she’s doing, which in the situations we see her in is mainly
fighting, and also killing when necessary (no one to mourn there, though). But
so is Dory herself, and Louis-Césare, and loads of other characters.

Dory fears
Dorina based on very little actual proof, namely on her surroundings when
waking up and on what’s probably nothing more than hearsay. I doubt that Dory
has ever talked to anyone who met Dorina and lived to tell her about it except
for Mircea, and of course Dorina doesn’t react all too well to him as he is the
one who imprisoned her in her own head (with good cause, insists my inner
Mircea fan, but does Dorina know that?). And even given his, and later
Louis-Césares, scant experiences with Dorina under very stressful
circumstances, they don’t think she’s irrational, or cruel, or bloodthirsty, or
any of the things Dory assumes about Dorina. Just… good at what she’s doing…
So I wonder, as Dory was so spectacularly wrong about Dorina based on little
evidence, what was/is Dorina’s take on Dory based on pretty much nothing at
all?

Dory
speculates on this at some point, but given the situation she was in at that
point and her generally skewed perspective on this, I doubt that her views are
all that accurate. This is going into speculation territory fast, so let’s see
what Dory thinks are Dorina’s feelings about the person she shares a mind with:

“Maybe she
hated my weakness, my humanness, as much as I hated her vampire-ness […]
Maybe instead of a crawling bug, she viewed me as a more insidious kind – a leech,
taking her strength, her energy, her prowess, and squandering them.”

First of
all, Dorina doesn’t seem as preoccupied with Dory as vice versa. She doesn’t
think at all about her alter ego, which for me is something that contradicts
Dory’s assumption that Dorina has nothing but contempt for her. When Dorina
takes over their body for her nightly trips in search of the angel child, she
shows no sign of hate or anger at Dory for being handed a damaged body. She
just… rolls with it, I guess. Which she’s certainly capable of. So that
speaks against Dory’s theory that Dorina views her as something “usurping” her
body and then giving it back broken because she’s so utterly incapable. I’m not
sure how aware Dorina is while Dory is in control (although I think there must
be something subconscious going on because she fights harder to get out when
they are in danger?), but it doesn’t seem to be enough to always know what Dory’s
up to and why, so she can’t know what Dory does with their body while she’s
absent. She doesn’t seem to be too interested, either, never makes an effort to
get an explanation for the situation she’s been put in. So I think indifference
would be a better description for Dorina’s attitude toward Dory than contempt
or hate. And then there’s the fact that in Fury’s Kiss, Dorina always brings
back their body before the night is over, although she’s not technically forced
to, not being bound by the sun cycle and all. So maybe I’m over-interpreting
this, but I think it shows that Dorina tries not to mess up Dory’s life too
much and sees Dory’s goals as important, too.

“Living a life
no master vampire would have considered for so much as a moment, with no
family, no servants, no respect.”

We know
that Dorina does want a family, which is why she tried so hard to rescue the angel
child she found at the beginning of Fury’s Kiss. We also know that she tends to
look down on others, regardless of their race, and that she’s especially
suspicious and to a degree contemptuous towards vampires. But I think Dory gets
it wrong here. Dorina wants a family not/less for the prestige and power that
it brings, but because she’s lonely. Those times she comes out, she never has
the opportunity to form bonds with anyone, and most of the time she’s locked up
inside her head, so no chance at finding someone to belong with. I don’t know
what kind of power the child might have had, but it’s obvious that she doesn’t
try to find it because of what it might do to improve her status. She does it
because she feels protective, and because she hopes there might finally be
someone who doesn’t freeze in terror at the sight of her (and is therefore weak
and unattractive to her), treats her with contempt or threatens her with
imprisonment or worse.

“I wondered how
she’d felt about [dhampirs not having status]. How she’d liked having even baby
vampires look down on us, watching them insult us, denigrate us […] knowing
that we – that she – were perfectly capable of destroying the lot of them.”

Here’s
something that Dory might have gotten right because it’s something that they
share. Dorina surfaces when she senses Louis-Césare acting disrespectfully and treating
her as if she was weak, and is placated by his apology and gesture of
subordinance. Dory gets angry, too, when vampires don’t treat her as the very
capable and potentially dangerous person she is, like when she went to see
Mircea and slammed that arrogant guard through a wall. They both hate it that
they’re treated the way they are by vampire society, and they both react
accordingly, although Dory naturally assumes that Dorina’s reaction is way
worse than her own. So, the starting point for this assumption is probably correct,
but her conclusion is not. Again, I’m guessing, but as is evident from the end
of Fury’s Kiss, Dorina not only doesn’t seem to hate Dory, but develop some
kind of tentative… respect, maybe? for her other half. They cooperate when
fighting Lawrence (which is a survival necessity, yes, being of one body and
also mind, more or less) and instead of trying to subdue Dory, or in any other
way even making contact with her, Dorina vanishes after the fight, maybe
mourning her own losses. There’s no hate or contempt there, just a profound
feeling of being estranged. Which, considering the last five hundred years,
seems like a good starting point to try and move toward each other again after
being cut off from half their selves for so long.

[Top]

[Top]

slightlybitchyclairvoyant:

Dorina Basarab Appreciation Week – Free Day

The Basarab Family

Nobody ever said the family didn’t know how to hold a grudge.

[Top]

babyfairybaekhyun:

Favorite OTP Aesthetic: Dorina Basarab/Louis-Cesare de Bourbon

[Top]

windsurfingthroughhell:

Things To Do In Las Vegas When You’re Dead

[Top]

windsurfingthroughhell:

Cassie Palmer fancast – Part 1 

Part 2

[Top]

windsurfingthroughhell:

“I could talk to some people about a lot of things, but only to him about everything.” – Casskin + Aesthetic 

[Top]

pritkinsprettydick:

Pritkin + Hunt the Moon Aesthetic

[Top]

Repost of Ride the Storm review

By Clare Kidwell-Arnese 

Ride the Storm Book Review: I received an ARC (advanced readers copy) from Karen Chance in exchange for writing a spoiler free review and that’s going to be difficult let me tell you because this book is 608 pages of non-stop action, plot twists and fantastic dialog! When this book comes out on August 1st don’t buy one copy, BUY TWO; you’ll need them because this book is so good you wont be able to put it down even for a minute! Your children will run amok, you’ll burn dinner two nights in a row, the dog will stare forlornly at you from next to his leash and your husband will wonder if you’ve finally lost your mind because you will bump into walls walking with the book in front of your face; you’ll trip over shoes and toys and forget to eat because you cant stop! You have to find out what happens on the next page!! And that second copy? you need it for when you inevitably take the book to the bath tub after the children are in bed and you drop the first one because NO! THAT DID NOT JUST HAPPEN!! 😀 Karen Chance is a Master wordsmith and proves it once again with book 8 in the Cassandra Palmer series. Her writing just gets better and better. If there were a Senate of Authors, Chance would be the Consul. Her words are that powerful; the action scenes so intense you’ll find yourself leaping up from the couch or pacing frantically around the room as you devour them because you can feel them right down to your bones. You just know if you don’t move, leap right along with them, do SOMETHING they might not make it! Like one of Cassie’s visions you are sucked in and jerked along for a 600 page tornado ride that sucks everything from the first 8 books up in its maw and spins them wildly, throwing everything you thought you knew in a whole new light and nothing will ever be the same, and you’ll love every minute of it!!!! The only thing I can say is Bring on Book 9!!!! After riding this Storm I can’t wait for MORE!!!!!

[Top]