Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Six of Crows, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Greed
Friendship and Difference
Trauma, the Past, and Moving Forward
Identity, Values, and Growing Up
Summary
Analysis
Matthias is overcome with guilt when he catches sight of his country again. After a night on the still ship, Nina approaches Matthias with the key to his shackles and explains that Kaz wants her to tailor Matthias so he’s less recognizable. Matthias doesn’t like it, but he allows Nina to darken his hair and lashes. As she leans in and cups his cheek, he observes that he doesn’t smell like roses anymore—she smells like toffee. She offers him one and pops another in her mouth, clearly relishing the taste. Matthias realizes he could watch her eat all day. When she’s finished coloring his eyes, he asks what she’s going to do about Bo Yul-Bayur: she certainly isn’t going to let the Merchant Council have him. She ignores him.
Nina enjoys and savors life in a way that Matthias’s uptight nature doesn’t allow him to (her pleasure at eating the toffee, for instance, mirrors how happily she ate the cakes when Kaz visited her for the first time in the novel). Still, Matthias seems to appreciate this quality about her, even as he doesn’t share it, suggesting one way he might begin to change as the novel progresses. Then, he appeals to her sense of duty and loyalty to the Grisha as he asks her about Yul-Bayur. For different reasons, they’d both like him to be dead.
Themes
Inej, Jesper, and Kaz leave their beloved knives, revolvers, and cane on the Ferolind, but everyone still looks back at the ship longingly—it’s their last connection to (and their way back) home. But it’s satisfying for Matthias to be home and to see the “canal rats” shiver. Matthias, the only one used to walking in crusted snow, takes the lead and tells everyone to put their goggles on. The first day of walking is quiet and feels peaceful to Matthias. The second day, Kaz begins digging into the plan. As he listens, Matthias thinks that Brum would betray the Dregs to the guards at the prison, but all Matthias wants is to be home.
Matthias is in a difficult and lonely situation. He’s home in that he’s back on Fjerdan soil, but he’s here to betray his country. Thus, this passage highlights how his values and his desires are beginning to change. The old Matthias would betray the Dregs without a single thought, as Brum would want him to. But the current Matthias is too caught up in the Dregs—and too interested, perhaps, in just enjoying being in Fjerda—to feel okay doing that.
Themes
The Dregs will enter with other prisoners, break out of the holding cell, gather supplies, search for Bo Yul-Bayur, and meet in the laundry. Inej will climb the incinerator and bring everyone up behind her. From the roof, they can skip the checkpoints, steal clothes and Yul-Bayur, and waltz out the embassy gate. Still, Wylan and Jesper need to be prepared with bombs, since they’ll have to travel seven miles of road between the Ice Court and the harbor. They may need to blow up a bridge along the way. Neither Nina nor Matthias like the plan—or the fact that they’ll work together for most of it. Everyone grills Matthias on details about the Ice Court, but Matthias can’t stop thinking about the first time he and Nina walked this path, after the Fjerdan ship carrying them sank.
As the plan starts to take shape, it becomes clear that every member of the crew has an important part to play, from Kaz planning the whole thing to Inej’s climbing and Matthias’s knowledge of the Ice Court. While this setup is common in heist novels in general, it also suggests what makes a good, cohesive team: celebrating one another’s strengths and accepting others’ weaknesses.
Themes
The Fjerdan ship sank in a nighttime storm, and Matthias came to in the icy water—in Nina’s arms. He realized she was keeping him warm enough to stay alive, so he hung onto her and kicked. He didn’t believe her when she said she saved him because he was human; Grisha are all “deceivers and spies.” They kept each other going with taunts and made it to shore by morning. When Matthias realized that Nina had saved him and that he now owed her a blood debt, he helped her up and they walked until they found a deserted lodge. While Matthias got a fire going, Nina took her soaking clothes off and wrapped herself in a reindeer skin, much to Matthias’s embarrassment and anger. Nina convinced Matthias to strip and lie down with her to stay warm. He wouldn’t admit it, but he was attracted to her.
In this flashback, Nina and Matthias—who are mortal enemies—are thrown together and forced to rely on each other to survive. And significantly, Nina demonstrates immense humanity and compassion here when she saves him because he’s a fellow person. Even though he’d like to see her dead, she still insists that saving him is the right thing to do. In many regards, this makes her more human than Matthias (who believes at this point that Grisha aren’t human). Matthias has essentially given up his humanity as he learned to embrace the drüskelle cause.
Themes
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Back in the present, Matthias realizes he’s still attracted to Nina. But then, the group reaches the top of a hill and he isn’t able to stop them before the others catch sight of the pyre on the bluff, with three blackened bodies still smoldering. Nina explains to Wylan that this is what Fjerdans do to Grisha, and then they hear one of the bodies moan. Nina is crying too hard to kill the person, so Jesper shoots. Kaz complains that Jesper gave away their position as Nina runs ahead, sobbing. Matthias runs after her, and they argue about whether the Fjerdan persecution of Grisha is right. Matthias asks whether it’s right for Grisha to exist at all. Nina suggests the drüskelle will one day go on trial for their crimes.
Just as in the flashback, Nina’s humanity and compassion shine through here—but now it contrasts with Kaz’s callous complaint that Jesper’s mercy killing has compromised the crew’s position. Even though Matthias cares for Nina, he hasn’t yet given up his dehumanizing beliefs about Grisha, namely that they shouldn’t exist. He still has a long way to go as he discovers who he wants to be, and what’s most important to him.
Themes
