al1457

Hero

I will be following Kylar for this project. Many of the supporting characters also follow the Hero's Journey (even a few that might be unexpected), but Kylar is clearly the main character, and for me, is the most interesting. Also, the "Freedom to Live" section limits things somewhat since, as you might expect in a book about assassins and wars, not everyone ends up alive at all, let alone free to live.

Plot Summary

This trilogy centers around a young wetboy (a magical assassin) named Kylar Stern (well, originally Azoth, but only for a few chapters) and his fight against the Khalidoran armies which are trying to take over the world. It is more complicated than that, of course, and the first book spends most of its time focusing on Kylar's training under his master, Durzo Blint, and introducing supporting characters and the world itself. Among those supporting characters are Logan Gyre, initially the son of one of the most respected noblemen in the country, Momma K, an ex-courtesan who is much more, and the black ka'kari, arguably the most powerful magical artifact in the world, and semi-sentient to boot. There are others, of course, but I do not want to spoil anything. While the plot itself is obviously very important, the role character finds his or herself in and their responses to those roles really drive the action, and the character development over the three books is fantastic, as we watch Kylar go from a young boy to a young man with the power to literally kill a goddess.

Departure

Call to Adventure:  Kylar does not really get called. More accurately, he hunts down someone to call him.  He grows up (as Azoth) in a street gang in the slums, and does not get along at all with his gang's leader, Rat, who he knows will kill him as soon as Rat's superior leaves or dies. When Rat's superior gets very ill and Rat begins to take more power, Kylar's situation declines, so he tracks down Durzo Blint, the city's best wetboy, and all but begs to be his apprentice. After initially declining repeatedly, Durzo agrees to teach him, provided he pass a test first.

Refusal of the Call: Despite being the one to seek the call, Kylar does initially, if not refuse, at least delay when faced with the call. Durzo's one condition on his acceptance of Kylar is that he kill Rat within the week. He hesitates at first, until Rat mutilates his friend. At that point, he completes his task, and in doing so, stops refusing the call.

Supernatural Aid: Because I am looking at the whole trilogy as one story, this can be various things at different times. However, his main supernatural aid comes from the uber-Talented Durzo, who teaches him the tricks of the wetboy trade while attempting to open up Kylar's Talent, the thing that lets certain people use magic. While he is unsuccessful at that particular task, Durzo does ensure that Kylar has the skills and resources necessary to face just about anything that can be thrown at him. Later, while Durzo remains a mentor to Kylar, his supernatural aid is the black ka'kari, which will be addressed in Crossing the Threshold.

Crossing the Threshold: Kylar arguably crosses several thresholds over the course of the trilogy, but the main one is when he accidentally obtains the black ka'kari from Durzo. The semi-sentient ka'kari chooses who it bonds with, and it abandoned Durzo because of some of his actions. It then bonded with Kylar, meaning he moved into a realm where he had powers most people would kill for, but one that also came with some serious responsibilities, and the world of those responsibilities is the "unknown" at this point. An alternate interpretation (based more on just the first book) would be a literal threshold, when Kylar first enters Durzo's training center.

Belly of the Whale: The newly magical (and incredibly so) world Kylar enters when he bonds the black ka'kari is the Belly of the Whale.  He finds the world completely changed. Where before, he was very talented but would almost always be beaten by anyone with even a modicum of Talent, he now finds himself not only talented, but also more Talented by far than anyone else (other than Durzo). However, having that much power, along with literal immortality (though it comes at a steep price) from the ka'kari leads to new questions Kylar never had to face before: How should he use his power? Can he maintain his relationships knowing he will outlive all of his friends, and knowing that simply knowing them could get them killed? And, perhaps most importantly, what changes does he need to make in order to think more long-term?

Initiation

Road of Trials: Using the series-long interpretation of the threshold, the Road of Trials is incredibly long, but begins immediately after receiving the ka'kari when he is forced to fight Durzo. From his perspective, at least, he passes that test, and several others (getting his love interest and Durzo's daughter both out of the castle being invaded, "dealing with" certain invading forces, and many others), but also fails quite frequently. He is unable to save his closest childhood friend from an assassin, he lets Durzo's daughter (who he was raising) get kidnapped, and generally fails (at least for now) to make a choice as to whether his own desires and loves are more important than the rest of the world.

Meeting with the Goddess: This is an oddity for The Night Angel Trilogy, because Kylar meets his goddess before even being called, and his goddess is also his temptress. His childhood friend (the one mutilated by Rat) grows up to be his love interest, and he shows a willingness time and time again to give everything up for her. He claims she makes him feel like a normal person, and one who wants to better himself to make her proud, just as if he were a child and she his mother. To further muddy the waters of this stage, Kylar also meets a (near) literal goddess, since she is the one behind the devastation of the world, and is forced to try to kill her.

Woman as Temptress: As was mentioned, Elene (Kylar's "goddess") is also his temptress. He wants so badly to live up to her pacifistic expectations that he completely leaves his home city to its fate, travelling with her, selling his sword (which even he calls his inheritance/birthright), and trying to ignore the world around him, all for her. This is truly a failure for him, since his is one of only a few people who could make a difference, but he gives in to the temptation of a wholesome life with someone he loves.

Atonement with the Father: As with many of the stages in the journey, this happens for Kylar several times, with the father figure almost always being Durzo. For Durzo, who was once in essentially the exact position Kylar finds himself in, with the black ka'kari and immortality, it is very much an effort to initiate Kylar into the set of beliefs and ideas that guided him for the past 700 years. He even initiates Kylar with an oath. Beyond that, he is able to tell Kylar a significant amount more about what he can and cannot do, and how his new power works.

Apotheosis: This is another stage which has some oddities to it: namely, Kylar dies all the time, and the black ka'kari brings him back. However, there is one death in particular that acts as his Apotheosis. After several deaths, Kylar all but forces his best friend (now the King) to put him to death painfully (yes, it's a long story). At that point, in the magical room he often enters when he dies, his is told the actual price of his immortality, and that one death and rebirth alone makes him take his powers more seriously, and respect the price they take. This death and rebirth also act as the introduction to the final act of the last book.

Ultimate Boon: Kylar actually receives one Ultimate Boon near the conclusion of the first book, since the ka'kari gives both immortality and near-limitless power. However, the real Ultimate Boon of the series as a whole is not an actual tangible item, but is more of a mindset. After Kylar's apotheosis, he knows what his very existence costs, and what the price of another death will be. Nonetheless, he realizes that he is the only one who can help the world in the way he can, and acts accordingly. That certainty, even in the face of all of the information about the danger, is really what Kylar needed. He already had the things granted by a traditional Boon, but the confidence and surety gave him the personal power to use them as he felt appropriate.

Return

Refusal of the Return: There is no series-wide refusal of the return for several reasons. First, Kylar would like nothing more than to be done with everything. His unknown world is a world of responsibilities, and he will do his part (largely) without complaint, but there is no indication that he will mind when the war is over. Second, while the new world for Kylar is, yes, more magical, his own magic will not go away once the conflict is over, but he will have a whole lot less magic directed at him. In truth, he does at several points show a willingness to completely give up the ka'kari and go back all the way to his largely powerless state if it will help end his time with the responsibility and power for waging a war.

Magic Flight: Again, because the unknown world for Kylar is not a physically new world, nor can he leave behind his new powers, there really is no magic flight. There is a rush towards the end of the unknown world, but it is not because he is being chased or fleeing; rather, he is doing the chasing.

Rescue from Without: Kylar's Rescue is twofold. First, Durzo saves him again, this time from being crushed by a giant dead body (it isn't as odd as it sounds). Second, and most importantly, Kylar's love interest saves him by taking the evil goddess into her own body, and then making Kylar kill her with his magical sword, permanently severing the goddess' connection to the world (she was previously mortal, and never truly a goddess). While this is a terrible ordeal for Kylar, he had no other way of defeating her, even with all of his power, so he truly is rescued in this manner.

Crossing the Return Threshold: Even with the false goddess dead, the heroes are surrounded by hordes and hordes of the enemy. Working together in a climactic use of magic that reads like a vocal symphony, they work the largest spell in the history of their world, and turn all of the krul into plants and buildings, turning the near-wasteland where they were fighting into a livable city. Kylar meets again with the person in the Antechamber of Mystery (where he sometimes goes when he dies), and is told that no, he was not dead, merely unconscious, and that, essentially, good had triumphed over evil. He then wakes up, and the war is over.

Master of Two Worlds: Kylar is at this point the single most powerful person alive (though you could make an argument that Durzo is still more powerful, at least for the time being).  He knows how to act in war, and feels the weight of the responsibility of his immortality and powers, but also has peace where he needs it, now that the war is over.

Freedom to Live: Kylar is completely free to live.  In the literal sense, the only way to stop him from living would be to continually kill him, watch him come back to life, and kill him again. More broadly speaking, Kylar is acknowledged for his role in ending the conflict, and while many of his friends become kings and queens, and in the words printed in the book itself, "will be welcomed wherever you go in this guise." Now, there are of course hints that not everything will be absolutely perfect for him, but Kylar can begin living his long, long life and face the future as it comes.

Final Thoughts

As a whole, this was significantly harder than I thought it would be. I picked an epic fantasy series, which are famous/notorious for following the Journey of a Hero fairly closely, and did not expect to have the problems I did. The main problem, I think, was that I chose to do the series as a whole.  That meant that the ultimate boon from the first book was really just crossing the threshold for the series as a whole, and splitting things up like that to maintain a series-wide perspective took some effort in several places that could have different interpretations.  It also made deciding which part was the "unknown" world difficult, and made everything in the "Return" section fit less-than-perfectly, since Kylar really does not return in the usual sense.

I have been a follower of Campbell for a long while, and the Journey of the Hero even before I was formally introduced to it, so I do take note when it shows up (which, to be fair, is in almost every piece of fiction, and much of real life as well). I really think that it acts as a sort of introduction/familiarizer for most stories. Once you see the beginnings of the Journey, you can have some expectation as to what will come next, and that lets you settle into the story a little more.