History Literature / Deverry

* ''Deverry: Three Tales'' is a short story collection containing:
** "Bargain": A Deverrian peddler meets a Guardian.
** "The Lass from Far Away": What ever became of Sarcyn's beloved sibling Evy?
** "The Honor of the Thing": Centuries after ''The Silver Mage'', an unnamed dweomer master, a collector of those in need, hires the silver dagger Benoic.

---> Kerr: By refusing to marry and provide heirs for the Falcon name, Gerraent has broken one of the primary rules of his social class. He’s allowed his clan to die. Thus it’s his wyrd to one day restore that clan, to make the right choices when it comes to marriage and provide the wife and the heirs that will allow the Falcon to be reborn.

-->"Brangwen, my love, forgive me! If we ever meet again, I swear I'll put this right. I swear to you—I'll never rest until I set this right."

--> Kerr: By refusing to marry and provide heirs for the Falcon name, Gerraent has broken one of the primary rules of his social class. He’s allowed his clan to die. Thus it’s his wyrd to one day restore that clan, to make the right choices when it comes to marriage and provide the wife and the heirs that will allow the Falcon to be reborn.

* MustMakeAmends: Nevyn spends several hundred years trying to get the chance to teach magic to various incarnations of his lover Brangwen after he had caused her death.

* LossOfIdentity: Rhodry in ''The Dragon Revenant'', Laz Moj for a short while in the beginning of ''The Silver Mage''.

* CursedWithAwesome: Nevyn's [[WhoWantsToLiveForever endless life]] makes it possible for him to become a peerless master of magic, but after a few cycles of seeing others reincarnate, he begins to wonder whether he'll ever find the relief of death. [[spoiler:Similarly, Rhodry's transformation into a dragon makes him practically invulnerable, but drives him mad.]]

* TheChainsOfCommanding: Glyn the First.

* ShapeshifterModeLock: In ''The Silver Mage''. Lin Serr was created by powerful dweomer masters over a thousand years ago; its structure means it's surrounded by a vast field of constantly-shifting magical tendrils, dangerous to anyone not in their natural, birth forms. [[spoiler:Laz Moj, his]] heart breaking and in a foolhardy and somewhat desperate state of mind, tries to fly across the field in [[spoiler:raven]] form anyway. It shatters the etheric form that gave them human structure, but their [[spoiler:raven]]-shaped body of light survives, keeping them from dying by giving their physical form something to cling to. But without the human-based etheric form, they can't turn human again.

%%* ShapeshifterModeLock: In ''The Silver Mage''

* MyInstinctsAreShowing: some dweomer masters can shapeshift into birds. "My instincts are showing" is something they ''don't'' want to happen; it's usually a sign they've been shifting too often, staying in animal form too long, or both.
** When Jill has been regularly patrolling in her falcon form, she starts to dive-attack Dallandra's linnet(ish) form before pulling herself back.
** When Salamander spends too much time in magpie form, he starts thinking about stealing and hiding shiny objects. It's not helped by his magic being occasionally unstable due to a relatively recent recovery from insanity.
** Laz Moj spends so much time in raven form, he starts using bird mannerisms in human form. Dallandra is extremely worried when Sidro tells her how often Laz Moj changes, and how he'll fly for days at a time.

A series of {{Fantasy}} novels, notable for its extensive use of {{Reincarnation}} and the resulting highly {{anachronic order}}, written by Katharine Kerr.

** 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...]]

** Ebanyr gets a magpie. When Nevyn laughs on hearing this, Ebany complains "everyone laughs". It does reflect his love for lovely (and shiny) things, the way he talks a lot, and his entertaining nature.

** Ebanyr gets a magpie. When Nevyn laughs on hearing this, Ebany complains "everyone laughs". It does reflect his love for lovely (and shiny), the way he talks a lot, and his entertaining nature.

* {{Animorphism}}: Mortal practitioners can transform into a single animal, which is a reflection of their inner nature.

** The reason Nevyn has a complete conniption about Merodda and Brour using [[spoiler:Lilli]]'s powers for their own benefit, without teaching her even, is because they could have driven the girl mad. Fortunately, she has a strong mind, partially due to her foster parents, and her escape leads her to Nevyn. But [[spoiler:Lilli]]'s scared and Nevyn's furious because the two dragged her so far along the dweomer path [[spoiler:Lilli]] can't go back; it's learn dweomer or go mad ''anyway''.

** Salamander falls in love, gets married, finds a career in line with his gerthddyn talents, and decides to just drop his dweomer studies -he's still at a journeyman level after all these years- and have a normal life. The result? [[spoiler:The loss of his wife and family when his wife loses her love for him, his children lose all respect for him, and choose to stay behind when Salamander heads back to the Westlands for healing; only his youngest son accompanies him. Even once he's sane again, overuse of magic has the potential to damage his mind again.]]

* 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 the tropes below, none of the stories involving this trope mention anything about the resultant frog being big enough to ride.

* UnexpectedSuccessor: Pertyc Maelwaedd, with a bit of OfferedTheCrown mixed in. Maryn, in the Time of Troubles (being from a fourth faction that didn't even exist when the wars began).

* SpareToTheThrone: Nevyn was once the third heir out of four. Rhodry was the youngest of three sons, and outlived both his brothers. Yraen was the younger son of a younger son.

* {{Retcon}}: ''Daggerspell'' and ''Darkspell'' were later released in a revised edition. Changes to the former are minimal, but there are considerable changes to the latter, especially the character of Sarcyn, who was rewritten to be more in line with how Kerr originally envisioned him.

* NoManOfWomanBorn: 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." A frequently used one is any reference to no one. Since that is the literal translation of Nevyn's name. There's also a sequence which is set up to make you think a woman is going to kill the bad guy. It turns out to be a male character who is part elf (and therefore not a "man" in the human sense).

* ImportantHaircut: Jill, after leaving her home village with her father; Lilli (twice), first when running away from her mother, and later when mourning for [[spoiler:Branoic]].

* MarriageBeforeRomance: Sevinna and Dwaen, in ''Days of Air and Darkness''. In order to save Sevinna's life, Jill put her in a situation that winds up being very dishonorable for a noble woman of the age, which situation default betroths Sevinna to Dwaen. While Sevinna is at first unhappy with this situation, she learns Dwaen is the kind of man she finds worth marrying.

* MeaningfulRename: Galrion to Nevyn. Also, Dun Hiraedd was not the original name of that city, but the soldiers who were transferred there dubbed it Fort Homesick, and the name stuck.

* LoveMakesYouCrazy: Bellyra, but she's a good enough person not to be in actual {{Yandere}} territory. [[spoiler:She commits suicide instead.]]

* MarriageBeforeRomance: Sevinna and Dwaen, in ''Days of Air and Darkness''.

** 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. So a gift that could be used to help others and make him feel like a valued member of society has to be stifled, possibly throwing the guy's whole life balance off, instead of finding a way to teach him disciplines he can follow that'll allow him to use magic in a beneficial way.

* AnAesop Every once in a while, a lesson in Wyrd (karma). 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.

* AndThatWouldBeWrong: Rori's realization of his suggestion to save only Berwynna and Mic when they first meet. Berwynna and Mic are traveling with a caravan that's under attack by a Horsekin raiding party -''again''. But dragons in the Deverry cycle are only shown carrying two people at most, and there's too many people for Rori to ferry them off to safety in time. Rori realizes that Berwynna is right to reject his suggestion he get just her and Mic to safety, and takes a third option.