Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Children of Virtue and Vengeance, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Power and Systems of Oppression
Cycles of Violence
Tradition and History
Love vs. Duty
Summary
Analysis
Inan shakes. All that’s left is to tell the nobles and other celebrants in the throne room his decision. He looks up at the new cheetanaire seals that Nehanda designed for his rule. Inan thinks of his bronze coin. He takes in the palace for the last time and thinks that Orïsha will never be the same after today, but it might have a chance to be better. Finally, Inan stands to address the crowd.
Even if Inan is doing the right thing, it doesn’t mean that it’s easy—and so this becomes a major turning point for him in terms of maturity. This is the one time in which Inan does the difficult, hard thing instead of just taking the easy way out, which allows him to finally break the cycle of violence.
Themes
To begin, he recites the story of how Sky Mother gave birth to the gods, which led to the maji. He says the first rulers came about when maji abused their gifts. They lost their ability to perform magic, but they established the monarchy. The mood in the room begins to shift as Inan says that Orïsha’s downfall is linked to its throne, and now, he plans to end the monarchy. As Inan tries to quell angry nobles, booms shake the palace and alarms blare. He shouts for everyone to run as the windows shatter.
By situating his announcement in terms of the long history of maji and monarchy, Inan insists that this isn’t something he’s doing for kicks: he’s doing this because this has been going on for years, and it’s time to stop it. This also makes the nobles present face up to their own complicity in this violent history, though their anger suggests they’re not interested in doing this.
Themes
