In general, the state of our titular band mates at the beginning. The Glory Days are behind them, some REALLY bad decisions have screwed many of them over, and they're all Feeling Their Age.
Golden Gabe, their once glorious leader, is a total washout. When we first see him, he's an absolute wreck barely able to hold it together emotionally due to his daughter going out into the Heartwyld to face the biggest horde yet. He has a laundry's list of debts that got so bad he sold a priceless sword entrusted to him to settle them, his wife separated from him for encouraging their daughter to become just like him, and on top of that, nobody wants to help him due to the suicidal nature of the mission.
Clay arguably has it the least bad, having found a loving wife and daughter in retirement, but you can't deny his current life is infinitely duller than what he used to have. Also, as the rest of this page will demonstrate, he's got a ton of emotional baggage that was there long before he was Gabe's right-hand man.
Moog is fruitlessly working away at finding a cure for the rot, a deadly disease from the Heartwyld that took the life of his beloved husband, Fredrick. All while the rest of the world dismisses him as a joke. Oh, and he has the rot too. But he's resigned himself to either dying in the same way his husband did, or finding that elusive cure.
Matrick may be a king, but he's known far and wide for having no heirs of his own. All of his children were sired by his queen Lilith and almost every other handsome man she could find. And she treats him and her own kids like dirt. Safe to say, poor Matrick is in a Gilded Cage where the only saving grace is that his subjects and children are fond of him.
Ganelon got thrown into the Quarry after he got caught killing a royal who frankly deserved it (for context, it was a Narmeeri prince who burned a woman at the stake because Ganelon killed his whole garrison after saving her from being raped by him. And Saga did NOTHING to help due to their own baggage. And for twenty years, he was alone, petrified, AND AWAKE through it all. Small wonder he's in Tranquil Fury mode most of the time once he's freed. All of Saga is convinced that he hates them for leaving him high and dry. They outta be thankful he's only mildly bitter.
Clay's Dark and Troubled Past. He spent his childhood living under the shadow of his alcoholic father Leif, who frequently tried to get him accustomed to killing things while beating his poor wife every time he got drunk. Then there's the subject of the boy's first ever kill...Leif. The man beat Clay's mom Talia so bad one day that the kid buried an axe in him out of both self-defense and righteous anger. Despite Leif being such an Asshole Victim, the act haunts Clay even now. And from there, he proceeded to bury it all by killing even more, albeit it was monsters and villains this time.
And even after disbanding from Saga, Clay couldn't stop fighting. The need to hit something persisted, as did the trauma that comes naturally from constantly fighting horrifying creatures and violent people.
Wherever there was smoke, Clay saw fire.
Even after subduing his bloodlust due to meeting Ginny, Clay had an incident in which he brutalized a man to the point of making him amnesiac. His crime? Comparing him to his father. Ginny very nearly left him until she asked him...
"Which are you, the monster or the man?"
Towards the beginning of the story, he and Gabe come across the ruined remains of his childhood home, where his mother lay buried. It's heavily implied that Clay buried her himself as a kid.
While it's somewhat Played for Laughs, you can't help but feel Clay's anger when Gabe reveals that he sold Velichor, a sword entrusted to him by the dying Archon of the Druin. This man screwed up so many times he basically betrayed someone's dying wish. Sure, part of it was Valery's idea, but still.
Clay is at first unwilling to go along with rescuing Gabe's daughter on account of having too much to lose. As Gabe leaves graciously, he asks what would happen if Tally was in Rose's place, and unintentionally throttles the man's resolve by saying he's a good man. Already shook by words that feel dubious with him rejecting a mission to save his friend's daughter, Clay finds himself unable to say no anymore when Tally asks him if he'd brave the Heartwyld if it were her who was in danger. The poor father can only tearfully tell her that this may be the last time they see each other before he leaves.
For that matter, Clay and Ginny's last reaction before he takes off. It's clear that neither expect him to survive, but it's the right thing nonetheless.
When they get robbed, Clay discovers that the only things in Gabe's pack are a bunch of rocks. Gabe explains that they're ones that Rose used to collect at the beach...that he plans on burrying her with in case she's really dead. Clay immediately feels like a dick for assuming something sillier.
Just the fact that no one, Gabe included, is all that hopeful of Rose's survival. It really hammers in how Gabe has nothing to lose at this point.
The situation regarding the Druin. An ancient race of elf-like beings, they came from another realm altogether and very nearly conquered the world...until they ended up in a civil war that only got worse with their attempts at recruiting monsters to fight for them. And even worse, their breeding ability is so stunted that they can only have a single child each. Combined with their already small number and the monsters being out of their control, they found themselves reduced to a handful in the realm. And the story regarding the royal family gets SO much worse as the story goes on...
The awful way Lilith treats her children in front of Matrick and everyone else. Clay's jaw almost literally hits the floor as she casually insults them and drives them to tears (save for the eldest, who's all too used to it).
Upon seeing the Heartwyld Horde converge on Castia through Moog's crystal ball, Gabe flies into a despair-induced rage, and violently destroys the ball before throwing it into the river. He spends several hours convinced that his daughter is done for until Clay snaps him out of it.
In Coinbarrow, Gabe's kobold friend Fender tells him that his wife Oozilk got captured and sent to the Maxithon arena. It leaves him feeling quite down and blaming himself, as it was he who convinced the creatures to move to the streets above their original sewer home. Clay can tell that it's yet another mistake he can add to the plethora he's made since Saga fell apart.
Ganelon's backstory makes it a small wonder people say he was bred only for violence. It's implied he was a child of rape, and that his mother, a Narmeeri brothel woman, killed his father immediately after his conception. He was then orphaned at eleven years and made a mercenary at fourteen. The rest is history.
While the destruction of the Riot House is hillarious for how no one can agree as to how it happened, the chapter ends somberly noting that it's one casualty is it's most loyal worker and a friend of Saga, Pete. The words on his tombstone are rather poignant for such a joke character.
WHEN WE SEEK TO RULE ONLY OURSELVES, WE ARE EACH OF US KINGS.
On the Old Glory, Vanguard's own Piglet reveals to Moog that his father Hog died of the rot. Moog offers his condolences, and that's when Matrick, his closest friend, discovers that the wizard has the rot too. He pins him in a fit of grief, demanding to know why he isn't back in his tower finding a cure. Moog can only meekly state there none while Matrick screams otherwise before devolving into total sorrow. The next day, he's still drunk from trying to forget it.
The first thing Moog killed was his own dog, Sir Fluffy, after it died of old age and Came Back Wrong when he tried using necromancy for the first and only time.
Before they leave after raiding Kallorek's mansion, Valery states that she always knew that Gabe would choose Vellichor over her in a scratch-induced delirium. However, she then begs him to return with Rose and helps by bringing up Kal's skyship.
If Kit's recounting of Larkspur/Sabbatha's backstory is to believed, the feared bounty hunter spent her childhood at a monastery meant to break her. She ended up killing almost everyone there and turning it into her personal fortress.
Related to that, when she's with Saga as Sabbatha, Taino's mudweed causes her to relive memories of her father trying to kill her and her mother before leaving her to die in the snow. And how everyone in the village bullied her and saw her as a lowly harpy. She killed them all horribly in retaliation, but it's clear she didn't enjoy it. The following night, her village was torched and her parents brutally executed. With all of this in mind, despite faking her amnesia, who's to say she's not just allowing herself to revert to the scared outcast she was before? Either way, Clay relates to her on account of both feeling like monsters in their pasts.
The story of Grandual's Gods, the Holy Tetrea. The Summer Lord, after banishing a being of darkness, sired two children with his wife, the Autumn Son known as Vail and the Spring Maiden named Glif. But Vail was a sickly and resentful while Glif's mother died conceiving her. Vail, now the Heathen, gave his life so that his mother may live. Unfortunately, she came back as the vengeful and cold Winter Queen. And thus, the cycle continues every year.
While explaining how he doesn't hate Saga anymore for leaving him to be imprisoned in the Quarry, Ganelon reveals that he felt he deserved it if someone as admirable as Clay would let him rot in there. To only himself, Clay confesses that at that point, he was just tired of it. ALL of it. Of Saga's egos, of all the killing, and to some degree he did think Ganelon deserved the Quarry on account of killing so many for the crimes of one.
Moog discovering that the mudweed that Taino gave everyone has amazing healing powers, including the ability to cure rot. At first, he's rightfully amazed at achieving his life-long goal...but then it gives way to immense grief at being unable to save Fred before that. Saga gives the poor wizard space as he unloads nineteen years of sobbing regret in front of everybody. Thankfully, he gets over it later that night, and honor's his husband's memory by utilizing his newfound knowledge for everyone.
During a rest, Matrick confesses that, for all of Lilith's blatant villainy, he can't help but wonder if it's all because he didn't meet her expectations. Plus, he misses his kids regardless if they're his own or not.
The druin nomad Shadow reveals to Saga the Awful Truth about the Holy Tetrea. As it turns out, not only were they druin, but the Summer King, in fact Gabe's old friend Vespian, was the one who basically ensured that Lastleaf, his son and the Heathen himself, went on the path of villainy, and doomed his entire race to near-extinction.
To elaborate, Vespian couldn't bear his wife Astra dying upon conceiving their daughter. Driven by grief, he forged Tamarat, a sword that could bring her back...at the cost of another druin's life. In this case, ''he went for his own daughter.'' There was no Heroic Sacrifice on Vail's part. Just plain madness-induced infanticide. Naturally, Astra was devastated and infuriated that her own husband would resort to such necromancy, and killed herself. But Vespian just kept bringing her back until she was but a shell of her former self, and she bacame a necromancer herself. This led to all-out civil war, with the other Exarch's turning on Vespian. Lastleaf was born with an instinctive hatred of his father and a need to end this wretched cycle. And everyone is feeling the consequences of it all to this day.
Saga's reactions to...all of that. Being told that your Gods are the same beings that enslaved your own kind cannot be fun.
While Shadow turned on them due to wanting Vellichor to be in druin hands, as well as his own admittance to liking Lastleaf's plan, Gabe doesn't want to kill him on account of him being one of the very few remaining druin in the world. Sabbatha does so anyway. All Saga can do is bury him with the rocks meant for Rose.
Once again, a means of contacting Rose brings more heartache to Gabe. Though at least this time, he gets to actually talk with her and tell her that he's coming. However, Rose keeps insisting that he goes home instead. She's so sure that she and her band are going to die, she can't fathom her father throwing himself and the rest into the carnage to come. Ouch.
After killing the owlbear that menaces them at the Emperor's Mantle, Moog adopts the cubs, one of which looks at Clay in a way that he interprets as Why did you kill my mother?
Sabbatha betraying Saga by reverting to Larkspur and all but revealing that she was Faking Amnesia. She claims Sabbatha is dead as she sends Clay falling to his seeming demise by lopping off his hand.
Not only does Clay wake up broken and battered at the bottom of a mountain, but Gregor/Dane is there too. The former is already dead, and Dane follows suite thinking it's all a peaceful dream.
Lastleaf ultimately loses hard. But his death is rather pitiful. Instead of some glorious send-off, he's unceremoniously pushed into a lava pit by a blind minotaur baited by Clay. And after barely surviving that, getting trampled by his retreating horde remnants does the job. He ultimately kills himself to resurrect his mother one last time for no other reason other than a final "fuck you" to humanity. A life defined by betrayal and spite, this one was.
After all is said and done, Ganelon returns to the Quarry, feeling that the world is not for someone like him. He requests that he be woken up when "she" comes back. What makes it so bittersweet is that Larkspur sired a son, no doubt his own, and he doesn't know it.
