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
Once again, Matthias is dreaming of Nina. He hunts her in all his dreams. In the good ones, he kills her. In the bad ones, he kisses her. He hates himself for wanting her and for betraying his country. Tonight, he’s having a terrible dream in which she kisses him. But when he realizes it’s really happening, remembers he killed wolves earlier, and sees Nina is kneeling over him, he throws her to the ground and tries to strangle her. Someone puts a gun to his neck, but he doesn’t care. He must kill her. But Kaz hits him with a cane with a crow’s head and says Matthias must keep it together since he’s getting out tonight. Just then, screaming starts above, and Matthias says they opened the animals’ cages.
Getting into Matthias’s perspective confirms that he has extremely conflicted feelings about Nina: he both desires her and hates her enough to want to kill her. Additionally, Matthias hates himself due to his feelings for Nina, and the novel implies that he feels this way because his country (Fjerda) taught him to hate, not love, Grisha like Nina. Put simply, things are very complicated and uncomfortable for Matthias. And just like everyone else the novel has introduced so far, he’s dealing with immense trauma (though in his case, it seems mostly due to beliefs he learned early on).
Themes
Kaz offers Matthias a gloved hand, and Matthias takes it. Inej puts a cloak and a mask on him, and they all head back toward the arena. Matthias tries to dive into the crowd, but Kaz pulls him back. Ignoring the mayhem in the arena, Kaz leads them toward the cages—but the desert lizard runs at them, and Inej kills it easily. Matthias is impressed. At the end of the tunnel, they emerge on a rocky beach where Jesper is sitting in a boat. As Jesper and Nina banter, Matthias makes his plan to kill them all and escape with the boat—but when he lunges at Inej, she trips him easily. Nina tries to help Matthias up, but he scoots away and calls her a witch. Kaz instructs Nina to put Matthias under.
Keep in mind that Matthias has no idea why Kaz is breaking him out, so Matthias feels he has little incentive to stay loyal to Kaz (or Nina, for that matter). Kaz makes Matthias trust him and wait for more information, just the same as he does with everyone else.
Themes
Now, Matthias is listening to Kaz, whom he’s heard called Dirtyhands because he’s so immoral, talk about using Matthias to break into the Ice Court. He ignores Nina, though he can almost taste her perfume, and focuses only on the wild story Kaz tells about jurda parem. When Kaz is done, Matthias refuses to participate. Nobody can break into Fjerda’s Ice Court, which is actually an impenetrable compound, and Matthias won’t commit treason again. Kaz tries to sway Matthias by mentioning that they must get Yul-Bayur so the secret of jurda parem doesn’t land in the wrong hands, and by mentioning his four million kruge cut. Remembering advice from his mentor, Brum, Matthias says he’ll make a deal: he’ll help if he gets to kill Nina.
The job is wild enough on its own, but for Matthias, it’s emotionally fraught: the job will ask him to commit treason and betray his country. Noting that this would be the second time he does so creates some mystery as to what Matthias did the first time. Matthias’s attempt to negotiate killing Nina suggests that while he takes issue with Kaz’s immorality, Matthias is perhaps similarly morally bankrupt. Readers are nudged to see Grisha as people who deserve to live, for one, so his desire to kill Nina goes against what the book suggests is right.
Themes
Kaz says he can offer better: Matthias can be a drüskelle again. He hands Matthias a piece of paper, which reads that Matthias is pardoned for trafficking slaves and will be escorted wherever he chooses. Nina, Kaz explains, will recant her accusations and go to prison for two months. At this, Matthias laughs—Nina’s “Grisha keepers” will probably get her out of it. But going home is still tempting, though Matthias is certain Fjerda will have already killed Bo Yul-Bayur. Kaz promises that Matthias will still get to go home in that case. Matthias wonders whether he can betray his country—Brum certainly wouldn’t. But Matthias sees how important it is that Yul-Bayur be stopped, so he decides to join Kaz, become a drüskelle again, and kill Nina the first chance he gets.
Here, Kaz demonstrates that he understands people aren’t motivated solely by money. Matthias, he seems to instinctively know, wants to return to Fjerda and to his old life as a drüskelle. And interestingly, Kaz seems fully willing to facilitate that happening for Matthias, despite what seems like Kaz’s belief that Grisha shouldn’t be hunted and killed. Again, then, the novel highlights how Kaz works only for himself, and anything he does for others is simply also convenient for him.
Themes
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As Kaz pockets the pardon, he introduces Matthias to the rest of the crew: Nina, Inej, Jesper, and finally, Wylan, their “demolitions expert.” Inej and Jesper both scoff that another man in town is better, and Kaz admits that Wylan is new. Matthias thinks Wylan looks about 15 years old on a good day. What kind of crew is this? They’ll probably all die before he can commit treason. As the others continue to argue about Wylan, Kaz says Wylan has another purpose: he’s Wylan Van Eck, their “insurance” to make sure Van Eck pays up.
As Kaz assembles the crew for the first time, it highlights that the members all bring something unique to the table: Inej brings her ghostlike abilities, Nina is a Heartrender, Matthias has information, and Wylan is a convenient hostage. As the group discusses Wylan, it’s clear that Inej and Jesper, at least, aren’t here to make friends: they want the most successful team, not the friendliest one.
Themes
