Written by Steven L Sears
Directed by Oley Sassone
While Xena and her former enemy Boadicea join forces to battle Caesar, Gabrielle's life is threatened by worshippers of the evil spirit Dahak.
Tropes
- Ankle Drag: How Dahak gets Gabrielle to the altar.
- Badass Boast: Khrafstar just before the final fight:"You routed Caesar, but Dahak will triumph here as he will triumph everywhere! I know! I am the Deliverer!"
- Bait-and-Switch: All the exposition surrounding the One God religion is to lead the viewer to suspect that it's Judaism . It's really not.
- Better the Devil You Know: Ares makes this argument when encouraging Xena to destroy Dahak's temple."Whatever you might think about us, Xena, you know us. You might love us, you might hate us, but we are not evil. This god is."
- Big Entrance: Boadicea storms in on her chariot.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Khrafstar and Meridian
- Breast Plate: Boadicea
- The Cameo: Discord pops up for a pre-credits scene with Ares.
- Continuity Nod: Ares and Xena mention their last run-in with the Furies.
- Defiled Forever: Gabrielle considers herself this after she's killed for the first time.
- Divide and Conquer: Naturally, in an episode involving Caesar.
- The Dragon: The Deliverer
- Fiery Redhead: Boadicea
- God of Evil: Khrafstar boasts that Dahak will cleanse the world of non-believers and the lesser gods.
- Halfway Plot Switch
- Historical Domain Character: Boudica.
- Horrifying the Horror: Done well here. In all of Ares's appearances he seems perturbed about something and strangely insistant that Xena destroy a particular temple in Brittania.
- Hypocrite: Xena calls Ares on this when he insists Khrafstar's god has no place in this world.Ares: This is a world that we created! Zeus, Athena, Hades, Poseidon! It is our world!
Xena: And before that, it was the world of the Titans. Oh, that's right. Zeus overthrew them, didn't he? - Left Hanging: Right before the climactic battle with Caesar, Xena notices the strange storm over the temple and rushes to help Gabrielle. There is no resolution whatsoever to the Boadicea/Caesar conflict, and in the following episode neither character is even mentioned.
- Man in a Kilt: Khrafstar
- Mystical Pregnancy: Dahak impregnates Gabrielle as she is wrapped in flames above the altar.
- Nothing Is the Same Anymore: "Everything's changed. Everything."
- Ominous Latin Chanting
- Red Herring: Caesar is made out to be the episode's main villain, but he's just the distraction.
- Rewatch Bonus: All of Khrafstar's interactions with Gabrielle suddenly become chilling the second time around. It's possible that the only reason he ever yelled "we will never give into Caesar!" was to get Xena's attention in the first place.
- Title Drop: By Khrafstar after his transformation.
- Unwitting Pawn: Xena and Gabrielle to Dahak's cult.Khrafstar: Thank you for Gabrielle.
Xena: I don't know what you're talking about.
Khrafstar: Look inside yourself. You brought her here. And why did you come? To defeat Caesar. Your hatred brought you here. Dahak appreciates rage. - Wham Episode: The seeds for the Rift arc are planted, while Dahak and his cult are introduced. Additionally, Gabrielle loses her blood innocence, which had been an issue since the show's early days.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: Because she believes Khrafstar's people worship the One God of the Israelites, Xena assumed Ares simply wanted to eliminate a rival religion.
