The books are mostly non-stop hilarity, but on the rare occasions the hilarity does stop, the story can get genuinely sad at times.
- Dalbry may be a Con Man, but (both in the present and in his Back Story) he tries to be generous with his wealth and help people in need on multiple occasions, which makes it sad watching him get remorselessly cheated by people who view his charitable nature with contempt.
- Tremayne's party of knights becomes a Dwindling Party as his rules on chivalry demand that they fight the dragon one-on-one, and they take turns heading off for battles they know they can't win while their friends watch sadly. Morgan’s death is especially sad as Cullin looks at all the notches on his sword and thinks about how Morgan always wanted to tell the stories of those notches but kept being interrupted, and now he wishes they'd let him talk.
- Affonyl and Cullin have a lot of Ship Tease, which makes it painful for both of them when he kills a real dragon and feels obligated to claim a Standard Hero Reward to honor the men who died trying to claim it, even though he does still care about her. Fortunately, he comes to his senses.
