History Literature / CodexAlera

** Navaris, is regarded as possibly the single most deadly swordsman in Alera (Araris, the ''other'' single most deadly swordsman in Alera, gave any fair fight between them a 50/50 chance of going either way), but is motivated solely by bloodlust and a need to prove herself better than ''everybody''.

** Aldrick ex Gladius. "ex Gladius" literally means "of the sword," and when he is introduced Fidelias exlicitly states that he is known throughout Alera as "the sword."

* CuteLittleFangs: Kitai has these.

** Captain Demos is a slaver and a pirate, theoretically an enemy of the Aleran government, but he frequently talks about how much he loves working with the Cursor's, the spies and assassins of that same government. As he explains it, the Cursors pay on time and almost never [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness try to kill him once the job is completed]].

* FriendlyEnemy: The Canim term ''gadara'' pretty much means this. They even see a ''gadara'' as worth more than a friend: a friend can always disappoint you, but your gadara is always your enemy. However, Tavi and various Canim always make it a point to explain that they ''are'' still an enemy, and in a conflict will do their best to kill one another.

* TheJorEl: Nobody believes Bernard about the threat the Vord pose. He eventually just gives up on trying to convince [[ObstructiveBureaucrat the idiots]] and starts fortifying the Calderon Valley instead, but Ehren believes that Bernard ''had'' convinced the First Lord and had been operating under secret orders to prepare for an invasion.

* GuysSmashGirlsShoot: Inverted with Bernard and Amara, the most long-term BattleCouple. Though Bernard has an earthcrafters strength and carries a [[AnAxeToGrind battle axe]], he is primarily an archer, while Amara is a swordswoman.
* HalfHumanHybrid: [[spoiler: Tavi]] and [[spoiler: Kitai]]'s son. Technically also [[spoiler: the prime Vord queen]], thanks to [[spoiler: absorbing blood from both Tavi and Kitai during her "birth" which altered her biology.]]

* InterspeciesRomance: Tavi, a human, and Kitai, a Marat. Of course, the Marat are pretty much humans that are taller, have higher body heat and are less "civilized," so it is easy to overlook. They can also [[spoiler: interbreed with humans]], though mutual longstanding hostility between them means non knows this is possible.

* InterspeciesRomance: Tavi, a human, and Kitai, a Marat. Of course, the Marat are pretty much humans that are taller, have higher body heat and are less "civilized," so it is easy to overlook.

* ShoutOut: Tavi, whose name is remarkably similar to Rikki Tikki Tavi, a mongoose that regularly overcomes greater foes with cunning and skill in the works of Rudyard Kipling.

* MemeticBadass: Araris Valerian [[spoiler: a.k.a. Fade]] in universe, and boy is it [[JustifiedTrope justified]].

* ShoutOut:
** Tavi, whose name is remarkably similar to Rikki Tikki Tavi, a mongoose that regularly overcomes greater foes with cunning and skill in the works of Rudyard Kipling.
** The entrapment of [[spoiler Araris by the Vord]] in Book 6, when he is encased in the Croach. Since Butcher heavily references Star Wars in his other series, ''TheDresdenFiles'', it is safe to say that this a high fantasy version of Han Solo and the Carbonite.

* ShoutOut: Tavi, whose name is remarkably similar to Rikki Tikki Tavi, a mongoose that regularly overcomes greater foes with cunning and skill in the works of Rudyard Kipling.

* CaptainErsatz / ShoutOut: High Lady Placida bears a striking resemblance, personally and physically, to one [[VorkosiganSaga Cordelia Vorkosigan.]] WordOfGod says that this (as well as High Lord Placida's similar resemblance to Aral Vorkosigan) is deliberate.

** Tavi, whose name is remarkably similar to Rikki Tikki Tavi, a mongoose that regularly overcomes greater foes with cunning and skill in the works of Rudyard Kipling.

Magical Roman Legionnaires straight out of ''AvatarTheLastAirbender'' versus the [[{{Starcraft}} Zerg]], [[WolfMan wolfmen]] with BloodMagic, telepathic [[BigfootSasquatchAndYeti yetis]] and [[WhiteHairedPrettyGirl white-haired]] [[OurElvesAreBetter elves]]. Riding [[EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs ground sloths and terror birds]]. Sometimes, the Legionnaires fight each other, too.

* StuffBlowingUp: Every other scene.

** Tavi, likewise, mentions at one point that "if he had his way, he would never engage in a fair fight ever again."

-->'''Araris:''': [Aldrick had] more than a hundred duels to his credit. He used to hire out as a champion, before [[spoiler: he took up service with [Septimus]. ]]That one got a lot of attention. We went for about ten hours, all the way around Garden Lane and Craft Lane both. Must have been fifty or sixty thousand people that came down to see it.

** ''Academ's Fury'' is full of this. Tavi uses the ''First Lord's sword'' to cut down the Taken Canim warrior in Gaius' meditation chamber, and he makes a comment about having his own personal legion while bathing with Max.

* ItsWhatIDo: Inverted--It's what ''he'' does--when Tavi and Nasaug discuss Varg and why he is imprisoned in the Aleran capital. Nasaug states that Varg is imprisoned unjustly since he did not act dishonorably, and when Tavi asks what makes Nasaug think that, he simply replies that, "He is Varg."
** The Vord seem to have some sort of genetic imperative to destroy all other living species on the planet. [[spoiler:In the end, the Queen tells Tavi that it was never personal; she was just doing a Vord Queen is supposed to do.]]
** As of ''Princeps' Fury'', High Lord Antillus Raucus has spent huge chunks of his life locked in constant battle with the Icemen. He's obviously emotionally, mentally and physically exhausted by the constant strain, but he gamely carries on with it, because "it's what one did".

-->'''Max:''' Actually, the room they had me in was quite a bit nicer than any I've ever had to myself.
-->'''Killian:''' Mmmm. Gaius Secundus had a prison suite installed when he arrested the wife of Lord Rhodes, eight hundred years ago. She was charged with treason, but never tried or convicted, despite interrogation sessions with the First Lord, three times a week for fifteen years.
-->'''Killian:''' It avoided civil war. For that matter, the records suggest that she actually ''was'' a traitor to the throne. Which makes the affair either more puzzling or more understandable. I'm not sure which.

** Amara is the first introduced character of the series and, though she never has the same ''power'' as the various High Lords of Alera, she has the training and skill (And exceptional speed due to her windcrafting) to hold her own throughout all six books.

* AdHominem: Lord Aquitaine, [[EstablishingCharacterMoment in his first appearance]], points out that ''ad hominem'' "is a notoriously weak logical argument. And is usually used to distract the focus of a discussion:- to move it from an indefensible point and to attack the opponent."

** Varg, who holds the rank of Warmaster amongst his Range (Nation) and killed a Vord-controlled Cane (With superior strength and resistance to pain) singlehandedly and unarmed.

* AuthorityEqualsAsskicking: An Aleran freeman can become a Citizen through several different means, but all of them (With the exception of appointment to a government position or marriage to a Citizen) involve combat in some way. The laws of the land ensure that the most capable and most powerful furycrafters end up at the top of the social order.

* BadassArmy: The First Aleran, particularly the Battlecrows. They started out as a bunch of half-trained recruits and "veterans" no one wanted in their army, eventually becoming the single most competent Legion in Alera (Excepting ''maybe'' the Antillan and Phrygian Legions).

* BondCreatures: The Marat can do this with any animal and call their Bond Creatures "chala;" they gain not just communication with their animal, but actually begin to gain some of their physical attributes. [[spoiler: This works in reverse, too; Tavi's general endurance and his senses all improve after being bound to Kitai for a while.]]

** Both Doroga and Kitai remark that Alerans must get bored out of their minds repeatedly practicing their maneuvers (For combat and singing) over and over again, but Bernard and Tavi point out that they seem impressed by the results.

* CallBack: After Isana uses a river to defeat someone in book one, she goes "My river." [[spoiler:In the last book, after the Aleran forces repel a Vord thrust, Bernard goes "My Valley."]]

* CapitalCity: Alera Imperia, a series of concentric rings with gates to the higher levels on opposite sides from the gate on the level before that. At the peak lies the First Lord's monolithic Citadel. [[spoiler: It gets destroyed by Gaius Sextus' when he [[TakingYouWithMe unleashes a volcanic Great Fury on the Vord armies]]. Appia becomes the new capital under Gaius Octavian.]]

-->'''Lord Phrygius:''' Brilliant last words, that. We'll put them on your tombstone. Right next to "He died stating the obvious."

** The longest delay was [[spoiler:the fact that the Calderon Valley contains the Great Furies Garados and Thana, introduced in the beginning of the first book and are of great importance in the climax of the final book.]]

** At the beginning of ''Cursor's Fury'', Tavi and Magnus are testing out a catapult they made based on old Roman documents. It promptly gets smashed when an irate Max almost gets hit by a rock and chucks it back at them. No more mention is made, and it seems to be a funny but irrelevant side-note. [[spoiler: Until the last book, when we learn that Tavi wrote home to his uncle about it, and Bernard set up over a hundred of the things as part of the defenses in the Calderon Valley. Loaded, at Tavi's suggestion, with glass spheres full of fire furies that explode when they break. They do more damage than the ''High Lords'' when they are turned on the Vord army, and the ammo is easy enough to manufacture that they can outlast them, too.]]

* TheDeadHaveNames: After a pair of Hunters are killed in battle with the Vord, Tavi asks their leader what their names were, and offers to sing a Blood Song (Canim funerary ritual) for them.

** The Canim sing a "Blood Song" for fallen warriors. Warriors who become Hunters (Spies, assassins and saboteurs) have their blood songs sung when they make the transition, because their old life is over.

** Any sufficiently power watercrafter can feel the emotions of surrounding people. One compares a visit to any sufficiently-sized city as:

* EurekaMoment: After ''Fures of Calderon'', every novel contains a scene where a character realizes that [[spoiler: Tavi is Gaius Octavian]] when they receive some final bit of information and put it together with what they already knew.

** The Vord queen. In a twist, however, she knows that there is something fundamental about humanity that she is not understanding, and she keeps trying to learn what it is. She observes families, interrogates humans as to what "[[WhatIsThisThingYouCallLove love]]" means, and even tries to replicate the traditions of everyday life (Family meals). Despite all this, she never does learn what it is that makes people tick.
* EvilSorcerer: The Canim Ritualists are generally considered to be this, though only some of them are as bad as they are made out to be: the blood they need for their rituals can as easily be taken from already-dead corpses as from live sacrifices. In fact, the old school of ritualists do not believe in using anyone's blood but their ''own''; Marok, in ''First Lord's Fury,'' demonstrates how decent this type can be. However, [[TheStarscream Sarl]]: and later Khral: embrace the trope thoroughly.

-->'''Araris:''': [Aldrick had] more than a hundred duels to his credit. He used to hire out as a champion, before [[spoiler: he took up service with your father]]. That one got a lot of attention. We went for about ten hours, all the way around Garden Lane and Craft Lane both. Must have been fifty or sixty thousand people that came down to see it.

* GondorCallsForAid: In ''First Lord's Fury'' [[spoiler:The Marat join the Alerans in the battle to defend the Calderon Valley and the Canim fight beside Tavi throughout his campaign.]]

* TheGoodTheBadAndTheEvil: At first, the three main heirs to the throne- Tavi is the good, Aquitaine is the bad, and Kalarus is the evil. Later on, you have Tavi as the good, Aquitaine as the bad, and the Vord as the evil.

* ImprobableAimingSkills: Anyone with strong woodcrafting ability becomes an incredible archer, among them being Bernard, Fidelias, and any Knight Flora. In ''Academ's Fury'', a group of Knights Flora looses a barrage of arrows that are so precise they can fly between a ''legionaire's'' ear and his shield, or beneath a rising sword arm as the soldier in question strikes out. In ''Captain's Fury'', a woodcrafter named Iris the Hawk is so accurate that she can put arrows into men's heads or throats from four hundred yards, while on the rolling deck of a moving ship. (by comparison, the classic English longbow could ''potentially'' reach those ranges in ideal conditions, but with only inaccurate, arching barrage fire)

* ItsWhatIDo: Inverted (It's what ''he'' does) when Tavi and Nasaug discuss Varg and why he is imprisoned in the Aleran capital. Nasaug states that Varg is imprisoned unjustly since he did not act dishonorably, and when Tavi asks what makes Nasaug think that, he simply replies that "he is Varg."

* PretenderDiss: Aldrick ex Gladius, regarded as one of the greatest swordsmen living, is legendary partly because of his famed duel with Araris Valerian. At multiple points throughout the series he crosses swords with other famed warriors, calmly informing each of them "The only man who has ever matched me in battle was Araris Valerian himself, and you aren't Araris." [[spoiler: When it turns out that [[BecauseImJonesy one of them actually]] ''[[BecauseImJonesy is]]'' [[BecauseImJonesy Araris]], Aldrick [[VillainousBreakdown practically collapses]].]]

* SmithWillSuffice: When Amara sees the full fury of Garados and Thana, she expresses her shock in the standard Aleran swear of "great furies." Placidus Aria simply responds with "two of them."

* SummonBiggerFish: [[spoiler:Tavi's solution to being chased by the Vord Queen? Piss off two Great Furies and [[IndyPloy see what happens]].]]

* TheUnfairSex: When Kitai learns of the complicated rituals of courtship and marriage among the Citizenry of Alera, and that the relationship she has with Tavi is (By those standards) that of a concubine or whore, she becomes infuriated with how Tavi has treated her. Tavi, however, points out that ''she'' was the one who initiated their relationship, barely giving him any choice in the matter, and that by her own Marat customs he has behaved perfectly honorably. [[spoiler:Alera]] [[LampshadeHanging points out that that really is not relevant at all]], and when Tavi accuses her of supporting Kitai simply because she is a woman, Alera agrees.

* WarriorTherapist: See SanityHasAdvantages. Isana also does this against [[spoiler:Antillus Raucus, in an attempt to get him to see sense regarding he negotiations with the Icemen]].

* [[SheIsNotMyGirlfriend We Are Not Mates]]: When Ambassador Varg refers to Tavi and Kitai as "mates," they each (At the same time) state that they are not mates.

** As time goes on, multiple characters (Even those loyal to the First Lord) point out that Gaius could have prevented a lot of the scheming amongst the High Lords by fathering another child after the death of Septimus, or at least designating an heir from one of the nobility. It would not have solved ''everything'', [[spoiler: especially once the reader learns that some of the High Lords ''created'' the problem in the first place by assasinating Septmus]], but it would have resolved the most public crisis of a disputed succession.

-->'''Tavi:''' Max doesn't want to be a High Lord. He'd run screaming within half and hour. He knows it.
-->'''Magnus:''' And yet, he has made allies. He has a power base of influence among several legions, and with several lords--including those in the personal retinue of Gaius himself. Forget your personal knowledge and think of it in terms of an exercise, lad. What if he decided he ''did'' want it?
-->'''Tavi:''' He could do it. If something happened to Crassus, Max would be the only reasonable choice. Even if it didn't, if Antillus' legions favored Max over his little brother, if he had support from the other High Lords and the First Lord, that would be the end of the matter, practically speaking. It wouldn't even be particularly difficult for him.
-->'''Magnus:''' Precicely.
-->'''Tavi:''' But he doesn't want that, Maestro. I know him.
-->'''Magnus:''' You do. But his stepmother doesn't.
* WildCard: Fidelias will sometimes be motivated to help those still loyal to the realm, even if it does not benefit his goals, [[spoiler:and he eventually becomes loyal to Tavi: albeit in a SecretIdentity: upon realising that he would make a better ruler than Aquitaine, as well as being a better man.]]

* WorthyOpponent: The fifth novel explains that the [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Canim]] as a culture prefer having a WorthyOpponent over having a friend:- a friend can disappoint you, but a WorthyOpponent can always be trusted to try and kill you.

* YouRemindMeOfX: When Phrygius Cyricus threatens to kill Varg if he harms any of the citizens of Phrygia, Varg asks Tavi (In Canish) if Cyricus reminds him of anybody. Tavi, understanding what Varg is referring to, comments that he was holding a knife to Varg's throat at the time.

** In the first book, Garrison's resident ObstructiveBureaucrat uses his official ledger as a bludgeon to fight off Herdbane Marat (after all, this is Alera, where [[RunningGag even the accountants will kick your ass]]).
** In the last book, Varg one-shots an attacking ritualist with what is strongly implied to be a copy of the ''[[JuliusCaesar Commentarii de Bello Gallico]]''.

* CrazyPrepared: Comes up pretty often given the number of Chessmasters in play, but the precedent is set early in the first book when Amara realizes that Gaius Sextus had designed his own son's tomb as a shelter against enemy furies, weapons stockpile, and site for healing. Hidden in plain sight!

* KnifeNut: Ehren hides such an extravagant number of knives on his person that it becomes a RunningGag, and at least one person deduces that he is a Cursor based solely on their presence.

* MauveShirt: Centurion Schultz, Cursor Magnus, Valiar Marcus, Sir Miles and others. The series builds up a large extended cast of supporting characters.

** Tavi. [[spoiler: It is short for Octavian.]] In ''Princeps' Fury'' [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Ambassador Varg]] gives him a [[MeaningfulName Meaningful Nickname]] to boot: "Tavar", a small, vicious, extremely intelligent and very deadly wolverine-like predator native to Canea. The Canim have a saying that, despite its small size, only a fool messes with a tavar.

** Varg dubs Tavi "Tavar." A tavar is a highly intelligent wolverine-like predator, stupidly brave and incredibly dangerous. Varg says he has never heard of less than three Canim taking one down. [[GuileHero Sounds]] [[{{Badass}} about]] [[CrazyAwesome right]].

* RunningGag: Kitai would like to point out that she wanted a ''horse''.

* TimeSkip: A two year one between the first two books, and another (technically two and a half, but the first chapter or two starts about half a year before the rest of the book) two and three. There are about two years between three and four, and about six months between books four and five. It is unclear how much time passes between five and six, but it is long enough to sail from Canea to Alera.

* VillainousValour: When Gaius Sextus unleashes a fearcrafting on Kalarus' Legions the entire force is instantly routed. Many simply die of fright, and the rest are paniced to collapse and flight. However, one single ''legionare'' resists the mental assault and actually raises his sword in defiance. Amara feels pity for him and regrets that the reward for his courage, which was greater than the entire rest of his Legion, is to be killed by the First Lord.

* DefiantToTheEnd: When [[spoiler: Invidia]] has Amara and Bernard at swordpoint, but seems willing to talk for at least a little while, Amara [[GetItOverWith tells her to quit stalling]] and explains that she is just pitiful and pathetic, whose actions have no justification or excuse. When [[spoiler:Invidia]] increduously asks Amara who she thinks she is to talk like that, Amara points out that she is somebody who is willing to give her own life in the service to others, while [[spoiler:Invidia]] is naught but a traitor and coward that will get neiher sympathy or last minute forgiveness from her.