History Literature / Deverry

* PoliticalHostage: Prince Mael of Aberwyn spent about twenty years of his life as one. He was captured during his first campaign as a soldier during the Time of Troubles, and not ransomed back for decades because the King of Cerrmor felt that the secure border he gained by having a royal hostage was far more valuable than the gold he'd get by returning him. The young prince, with nothing to do all that time but read in his tower cell, ended up becoming a philosopher, who would be come known as Mael the Seer, or Mael y Gwaedd (later contracted to Maelwaedd).

* DeliberateValuesDissonance Being in a pseudo-medieval setting based on Celtic culture, this shows up in many things. One of the most jarring, though, is in the 843-850 storyline, where Prince Maryn is considered the perfect virtuous prince while at the same time being a faithless husband to Belyrra and an aggressive, emotionally manipulative partner to his mistress Lillorigga. [[spoiler: Maryn never sees what he is doing wrong, even when his appaling conduct drives his wife to suicide.]] Towards the end Nevyn belatedly realizes that while spending a decade raising Maryn to be the perfect warrior prince to end a three-way SuccessionCrisis that had been tearing the country apart for a century, he has neglected Maryn's education in matters not directly related to war and statecraft, [[spoiler:and after Bella's suicide he leaves Maryn's court in disgust]].

** Prince Mael of Aberwyn is locked up in a tower for twenty years, ultimately [[StockholmSyndrome deciding he doesn't want to leave]] and that this limited environment will be his home for the rest of his life. The moment he makes this decision, he is set free, having "learned" the wisdom of accepting that which is and not striving against it.

* PoliticalHostage: Prince Mael of Aberwyn spent about twenty years of his life in one. He was captured during his first campaign as a soldier during the Time of Troubles, and not ransomed back for decades because the King of Cerrmor felt that the secure border he gained by having a royal hostage was far more valuable than the gold he'd get by returning him. The young prince, with nothing to do all that time but read in his tower cell, ended up becoming a philosopher, who would be come known as Mael the Seer, or Mael y Gwaedd (later contracted to Maelwaedd).

* HostageSituation: Prince Mael of Aberwyn spent about twenty years of his life in one. He was captured during his first campaign as a soldier during the Time of Troubles, and not ransomed back for decades because the King of Cerrmor felt that the secure border he gained by having a royal hostage was far more valuable than the gold he'd get by returning him. The young prince, with nothing to do all that time but read in his tower cell, ended up becoming a philosopher, who would be come known as Mael the Seer, or Mael y Gwaedd (later contracted to Maelwaedd).

* BlackMagic: The dark dweomer, which takes the enlightened practices of normal dweomer and turns them to twisted, selfish ends. Unusually, it seems to be in many ways ''weaker'' than regular magic, since it's fighting the natural order of things, but it does let you do things like extend your lifespan through blood sacrifice.

* WhipItGood: Subverted at one point when Raena attacks Rhodry with a whip, for no apparent reason other than to continue her theme of trying and failing to be a [[TheBaroness stereotypical sexy villainess.]] Turns out, a whip isn't a particularly practical weapon, especially when you've no particular training with one, and Raena keeps getting it tangled up.

* ReincarnationRomance: After an ancient tragedy, Brangwen and Blaen are drawn together romantically in every life afterwards in whivh they meet. The main point of the first four books is to snap their current incarnations Jill and Rhodry out of it.

** In the civil war storyline, the male Branoic turnds out to be one of the incarnations of [[spoiler:Brangwen/Jill]], who is female in all other incarnations we meet in the series.

%%* {{Reincarnation}}: Central to both the themes and plots.
%%* ReincarnationRomance: The main point of the first four books is to snap Jill and Rhodry out of theirs.

* BalefulPolymorph: Discussed but never actually performed. Shapeshifting is a difficult enough process when doing it to one's self, so performing it on an unwilling subject would be even less likely to work without killing the subject (and there are easier ways to kill a man with magic). Besides, as discussed in-universe, none of the stories involving this trope mention anything about the resultant frog being big enough to ride.

* DeliberateValuesDissonance Being in a pseudo-medieval setting based on Celtic culture, this shows up in many things. One of the most jarring, though, is in the 843-850 storyline, where Prince Maryn is considered the perfect virtuous prince while at the same time being a faithless husband to Belyrra and an aggressive, emotionally manipulative partner to his mistress Lillorigga. [[spoiler: Maryn never sees what he is doing wrong, even when his appaling conduct drived his wife to suicide.]] Towards the end Nevyn belatedly realized that while spending a decade raising Maryn to be the perfect warrior prince to end a three-way SuccessionCrisis that had been tearing the country apart for a century, he had neglected Maryn's education in matters not directly related to war and statecraft, [[spoiler:and after Bella's suicide he left Maryn's court in disgust]].

** Prince Loddlaen was gifted in magic, but the narrative stresses that he should never have been taught any, since he was mentally/emotionally unstable due to something his mother had done while pregnant with him. It's repeatedly stressed Deverry dweomer places incredible strain on the mind, and opening the door a little inevitably results in the door opening as fully as possible for that person. If the person's mind is not very strong, you get what happened to Loddlaen -a slow descent into madness.

* EncyclopediaExposita: Quotes from genuine 9th century Welsh poetry and the fictional ''The Secret Book of Cadwallon the Druid''

** Galrion to Nevyn -from prince to no one at all.

* NameAmnesia: Prince Galrion is stripped of his rank, wealth and even his name by his father. His father issues a decree that ever after Galrion is to only be called "Nevyn". That's not a name. It's a word that quite literally means 'no-one'.

** The most obvious one is that Lord Corbyn "can never be slain in battle except by sword, but he'll never be slain by any man's hand." Nevyn knows an elven swordsman would work, but there's no time to get one, and he doesn't know about local skilled swordsman[[spoiler: Rhodry's ]]true ancestry yet. But there's Jill, trained by the best swordsman in Deverry...

* WhamEpisode: The end of The Fire Dragon, which is also the source of most of the spoiler tags on this page.

* ShapeShifting: Much more natural to elven dweomermasters, but at least humans can learn it as well. [[spoiler: The "Water" race, Dwergi]], also have a natural form of shapeshifting.

* ExactWords: In "The Lass From Far Away", Nevyn protects Evy from the spirits she had been offered to by pointing out that they had only been offered ''her'', not her unborn child. [[spoiler:They return to claim their due shortly after the child's birth.]

* ImmortalityBeginsAtTwenty: Elves age normally through childhood and adolescence into adulthood, then stop aging until a year or so before they're about to die of old age.

** Pertyc Maelwaedd, with a bit of OfferedTheCrown mixed in. As the descendant of a common-born wife, he has no claim to the Elddid throne, especially after Deverry conquers Elddid. But [[spoiler:when the rebellion starts and the only other claimant is caught by the king... Once the rebellion is over, his holding for the existing king and the death of the rebellious former gwerbret gets him unexpectedly promoted from lord of a minor border seaport to Gwerbret Aberwyn.]]

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: There are four major time periods and seven minor ones, and over twenty characters who reincarnate in more than one of them (Not to mention Nevyn appearing in person in many of them). And then there are those characters who are only in one time period.

* HalfHumanHybrid: Most often half-elves, but there are hybrids of all the non-human races.

* CultureClash: Between the [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Gel da'thae]] and the alliance besieging Zakh Gral.

** Similarly, Rhodry's transformation [[spoiler:into a dragon]] makes him practically invulnerable, but drives him mad.
* DecadentCourt: The Cantrae faction during the Time of Troubles.

%%* CharmPerson: Often described as "spinning" the target's aura.

* ColourCodedForYourConvenience: The auras on the Ethereal plane.

* DreamWeaver: Dalla, possibly others.