History Literature / Spellbinder1996

* ArtisticLicenseHistory: When Thea goes on a rant to Eric about the school Halloween decorations depicting torture devices, she points out a replica of an IronMaiden, asking Eric if he knows they were actually real and were used to torture and kill innocent people. There's actually little evidence that iron maidens were a real medieval torture device; the first records of them date back to only the late 1700s and the only physical examples are supposed replicas built for museums in the 19th century. Iron maidens appear to have been invented by later historians, or potentially confused with similar but not identical torture devices. Thea ''is'' right about breaking wheels being used to execute people, though.

''Spellbinder'' (published as ''Enchantress'' in some countries) is a young adult ParanormalRomance[=/=]UrbanFantasy novel by Creator/LJSmith. It's the third book in the ''Literature/NightWorld'' series and was published in October 1996. It was later reissued in the omnibus ''Night World 1'', along with ''Literature/SecretVampire'' and ''Daughters of Darkness''.

** ** Early in the story, it's mentioned there used to be three 'circles' witches could belong: Circle Twilight, Circle Midnight and Circle Daybreak, but that Circle Daybreak was long since disbanded following the Burning Times (Circle Daybreak allowed humans to join and tried to encourage harmony between the species, with the {{Van Helsing Hate Crime}}s and FantasticRacism putting a serious damper on that). [[spoiler:In the end, Aradia says she's heard rumors some witches are trying to restart Circle Daybreak, and suggests Thea and Eric seek them out. The reformed Circle Daybreak goes on to play a major role in the series]].

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:Thea manages to send back Suzanne's ghost and the Inner Circle is accepting of her relationship with Eric, but still have no choice but to essentially banish Thea for breaking Night World law (their other option is to ''kill'' them both, which they're highly reluctant to do). Blaise is able to arrange things so that Thea doesn't have to lose her memories (with it being implied that the Inner Circle is in on it), although she still has to be separated from her family and witch society. Eric's family takes Thea in, she can pursue her dream of studying zoology, and she and Eric also discuss finding the Night People Aradia mentioned who have been trying to restart Circle Daybreak]].
* ChekhovsGun: Blaise brings up the Cup of Lethe, a powerful memory potion which is forbidden for ordinary witches to use. Blaise jokes about swapping it out for something else to fool around with. [[spoiler:Thea suggests to the Inner Circle that they use it to make her and Eric forget about the Night World, and they later realize Blaise swapped it with iced tea so they can keep their memories]].

* ShootTheDog: When Thea confides in Blaise she believes she and Eric are soulmates, she and Blaise are both afraid of what will happen to Thea if it's discovered she has broken one of the Night World's cardinal laws. Blaise decides she'll just have to get rid of Eric, either by killing him or by making him fall in love with her instead; despite a horrified Thea pleading with and threatening Blaise in an attempt to spare Etic, Blaise insists it's the only way to protect Thea and that she won't let some human endanger her 'sister'.

** This happened to a 17th century French witch named Suzanne Blanchet and her siblings: after they were torturing into confessing to witchcraft, Suzanne was ForcedToWatch as her [[WouldHurtAChild young siblings were burnt at the stake]] before being [[CruelAndUnusualDeath burnt alive herself]]. It's unsurprising [[spoiler:her ghost has a [[MurderedIntoMisanthropy murderous grudge]] against humans]].

* CircleOfStandingStones: Thea and Eric find a natural stone circle in the Nevada desert and choose it as the location to [[spoiler:perform Suzanne's banishing ritual, as circles are ideal places to perform spells]].

* BaitAndSwitch: Blaise uses a magical necklace to hypnotize Eric into becoming infatuated with her; Thea watches in despair as he stares silently at Blaise, seemingly enthralled by her. Thea quickly tosses a potion to break the spell over them both, causing Blaise to stomp off and Eric to snap out of it. However...[[spoiler:Eric then explains to a stunned Thea that Eric was just standing there quietly because he found the situation awkward and was desperately trying to think of a polite way to tell Blaise he wasn't interested in her; the necklace didn't work on him ''at all'']].

* AbuseMistake: Thea tells Eric's little sister Roz the story of Hellewise Hearth-Woman and the witches' origins to cheer her up; although she's forbidden to tell humans the witches' history, she figures that Roz will just think of it as a fairytale. However, when Thea realizes Eric and his mother overheard, she flees from the house in a panic. When Eric persuades her to return, Mrs Ross is deeply concerned and asks if Thea's grandmother is saying things to "scare [her]" and says she can stay with them if she has problems at home. Thea is able to handwave it away, but realizes that Mrs Ross likely thinks her grandmother is part of some kind of cult and has more than a few screws loose.

* RedHerring: Blaise gets stalked by her obsessive former boyfriend Randy, who is seriously unstable and violent towards people, especially Blaise's latest admirers. [[spoiler:When one of these admirers turns up strangled to death, everyone initially blames Randy, but Thea soon realizes the vengeful ghost she freed is actually responsible]].

* DidTheyOrDidntThey: In there's a scene late in the book where Eric and Thea end up falling into each other arms in a secluded spot near the desert after declaring their love for each other. It's mentioned that "some time" passes before the action picks up again and they're lying in each other's arms by this point; although it's never made explicitly clear that anything sexual happened, it's quite easy to interpret it this way.

* MarketBasedTitle: In the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand it was published under the title Enchantress.
* NiceMeanAndInBetween: In regards to the three original main witch circles, as opposed to individuals. Circle Daybreak was the most peaceful and open-minded, being dedicated to harmony between humans and witches, forbidding the harming of humans and even trying to teach humans spells. Circle Midnight is the most malevolent; they most closely follow the Night World creed of seeing humans as vermin they can treat however they want and have few taboos about using darker magics. Circle Twilight is more moderate than Midnight but not as open-minded as Daybreak; they don't encourage associating with humans and look down on them, but frown upon intentionally harming them and tend to shun dark magic. Circle Daybreak officially no longer exists because of the Burning Times [[spoiler:although Thea later learns some witches are trying to revive it]].