YMMV / The Witchlands

• Alternate Character Interpretation: The High Council of Nubrevna: A bunch of sexist jackasses who deny Vivia her crown because of her gender? Cautious administrators who want to ensure that the princess hasn't inherited the former queen's mental instability before handing her complete power over their people? Pragmatists who'd much rather have the battle-hardened king-regent lead them in a time of war rather than the untried queen-in-waiting? Or a combination of the above, depending on the councilor?
• Fridge Brilliance:
  • In Bloodwitch, Safi realizes that no matter what she'd done, Eron's plan went on without a hitch; somehow, she theorizes, Eron, Mathew, and Habim knew that she was going to end up in Marstok and planned accordingly. In Sightwitch, we see that Eron, Mathew, and Habim visited the Sightwitch Sister Convent one year before the events of Truthwitch. Sightwitches can see into the future. You do the math.
  • Salamander fibers are so rare that not even a Carawen outpost has them in stock. Yet Mathew and Habim somehow had a salamander fiber cloak, a carriage covered in salamander fiber curtains, and a salamander fiber blanket at the ready as soon as Safi and Iseult drew Aeduan's attention — almost as if they'd been expecting that one day they'd have to counter a Bloodwitch's power to track anyone, anywhere.
• Genius Bonus: Vaness is the only character whose nose bleeds every time she overexerts herself with her magic. Real world royalty and high-ranking nobility were often affected by haemophilia (also known as "the royal disease"), a hereditary genetic disorder that prevents a person's blood from clotting, leading to uncontrollable bleeding from even the tiniest wound.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • In Truthwitch, the good guys (save Evrane and Leopold) quite casually call Aeduan a demon. Later books make it clear that he's been facing this kind of discrimination his entire life, and it's why he's taken to a mercenary life with no attachments to others.
  • In Truthwitch Merik and Evrane consider Vivia a monstrous, power-hungry bitch, which is compounded by Vivia's actions (namely, leaving her brother to die at the hands of their enemies). Vivia gets POV chapters in later books, and it's revealed that her more morally reprehensible actions are her father's influence and that Serafin has been emotionally manipulating her all her life.
  • Dom fon Grieg's cameo in Truthwitch has him boasting about having three children in the Hell-Bard Brigade, which is a huge honor in Cartorran society. We later meet one of them, Caden Fitz Grieg, and he explains that being a Hell-Bard is not sunshine and roses —quite the opposite, in fact.

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