Daughter of Damnation Ch. 6 - Reflection

This was a little bit of a tough chapter to write. See, when I'm planning books, I often have a perfectly clear image of what the ending looks like, and then I work backwards from there. I frequently use Book One of SaS as a good example of this.

The Book needed to end with Amara and Vee fighting, so I needed to spend the entire book building up how and why that happens. With that in mind, I'm able to break down each different plot point so I can build each piece of the final conflict. So, like, we need to understand all of Amara's powers. We need to see that Enochian magic makes her a little angry. We need to see Vee growing more and more isolated, and more determined to stop The Demon. Then, all the pieces come together and we get a big exciting fight.

Sometimes, this process makes the penultimate chapter really easy to write. Often, this chapter is also a great time to give the heroes time to breathe one last time before the chaos of the finale. However, Daughter of Damnation is a bit of a different beast.

It's much shorter, and the story is paced very differently. I don't have enough chapters to give Evelyn, Zadkiel, and Vince a little moment of peaceful relaxation, I need plot to happen!

In 2000, we've just learned that witches are tracking Zadkiel. This means that I need to use this chapter to show exactly what the means, and how the vibes of the road trip change now that Evelyn knows they're being followed.

Of course, since they're in a car, I do have the perfect opportunity for more of my favorite thing: lofty philosophical conversations between Evelyn and Zadkiel. I swear I didn't intend for so much of the book to be those conversations, but they keep feeling like such natural extensions of the characters, and I have SO much fun writing them.

What's important, however, is what's changed. During this conversation, Zadkiel seems a bit more introspective about their actions, and curious about Evelyn's point of view. This is obviously not indicative of anything, and they're clearly just testing their own faith, so please don't look for any deeper subtext in this conversation. There's none, I promise. Zilch. Nada. Goose Egg.

I'm very happy with how this conversation played out, however. Zadkiel's slow evolution through the course of the book has been fascinating, and I'm really happy with how I managed to pace it.

I also get to tease that Evelyn has a small memento from Vince. This is the first time I've brought it up, but is also represents one of the rare times I made explicit references to the 1938 section of the book. While it's obvious to us, as readers, that the events of the two time periods are deeply intertwined, we never actually see Evelyn reference such formative events all that often.

The existentialism does eventually come to a close, and it's time to revisit our witchy friends back at the motel. From here on out, I tried really hard to make the roadtrip feel like a slow, agonizing pursuit across the country. I don't spend too much time on this section, all things considered, but I'm happy with the way it builds tension going into the final chapter. Hopefully, readers finishing this scene are prepped for an exciting finale where Evelyn and Zadkiel must narrowly dodge Tabitha and Cassandra before making it to their final destination in The Wilds.

However, it's time to return to 1938 so we can follow through on last chapters clilffhanger.

Vince now knows what Evelyn is, and we need to figure out what that means for their future. By now, I've established that Evelyn has decided she wants to be a part of this world, ideally with Vince, but we also know that she's bitter about how different she is from everyone else. This idea, that Evelyn doesn't truly have peers, isn't one I explicitly planned for the series, but I think it works really well. I love the dynamic it sets up with Vince, how she's eager to meet him on his level, despite how much more powerful she is in the grand scheme of things.

It's also a great chance to learn more about Vince. In the main series, other than Vee, most people have been pretty chill about Amara's demonic status. Multiple people have been psyched about it, eager to go for a ride, but very few people have been legitimately terrified of what her presence means.

Now, while I wasn't alive in 1938, I tend to believe that religion was a bit more commonplace back then. I never once pictured a reality where Vince was immediately on board with Evelyn's demonic nature, and I did my best to capture those insecurities. What is he afraid of? Well, he's scared for himself and Rosie, obviously, but he also fears that his feelings for Evelyn weren't genuine. In a perfect world, we understand his fears, see that they come from a place of belief, but we also see those ideas conflict with his prior experiences with Evelyn.

After their reintroduction, which was SO much fun to write, it's time to jump into montage mode. This is a form of writing I have practically no experience in, and the whole time I was working on this section I was pretty nervous. I'm normally the first person to advocate for longer stories, more downtime, but I knew I wanted to keep DoD a quick 7 chapters.

Which meant I needed to show, essentially, their entire romance on fast forward. Again, I'm pretty nervous about this part.

The hope was that all the time we spent with Vince and Evelyn helps give context to their actions over the many months we skip through. We understand that they like each other, and now it's just a matter of Evelyn proving how serious she's being when she says she wants to be with Vince. After showing how nervous Vince was, I knew the process of him coming around would take a really long time.

In many ways, I was also trying to channel various romance stories. The kind of romance where love isn't proven through one big gesture, but through a million tiny moment over a long period of time. I love the idea of Evelyn slowly chipping away at Vince's doubt, at Vince slowly coming to believe that Evelyn truly means it when she says she wants to be with him.

I also need to show Evelyn slowly piecing together the kind of life she ends up living for the next 60-70 years. With her true form returned to her, she can't avoid consuming souls anymore, so what does she do?

Well, she finds terrible people in the hopes of putting good into the world. Is this an excuse to tear down the CEO of a major company who's exploiting the workers, thus giving me and my readers a bit of catharsis? Surely not, I'm a good little capitalist. Surely there's no satisfaction whatsoever in someone forcing a company to stop being shitty to their employees.

Importantly, however, we also get some really interesting insight into a process we've never seen before: enthrallment. We directly see how Evelyn does it, and what effects it has on her victims. For longtime readers of SaS, this is certainly an interesting piece of lore to add to the pile. Is Amara consuming souls when she feeds? Does consuming souls automatically enthrall people, or does that take conscious effort?

All good questions.

I'm also very fond of the little conversation Evelyn and Vince have over and over. When they first met, and they have their little "I run warm, not that warm," conversation, I instantly knew I wanted to make that a core part of their courting here. I think it's adorable, and I loved being able to play with the different ways they both brought those words back.

I also get to tease why Evelyn gets started in practicing law! I'm really excited to have a way to start tying the time time periods together.

I'll admit it, I cried when everything finally came together. Rosie learning about Evelyn's true form, Vince and Evelyn kissing again, finding happiness with each other. I'm such a sucker for romance stories, and since I made myself emotional writing it, I tend to take that as a good sign that I've done something right.

Of course, I've laid small hints throughout the book that Evelyn's adventures in 1938 don't necessarily have happy endings. You might also remember, way back in chapter two I believe, that World War II looms on the horizon.

After only a few months of happiness, Evelyn is forced to confront her nature once again. Now, instead of being scared of revealing it to someone, she's finally thinking about how her position affects the greater world around her. Her experiences here on Earth have changed her, and she can't help but think about how bad Hell might get if any one demon gets their claws on the millions of souls destined to end up there.

In many ways, the 1938 section of DoD is a tragedy. Evelyn finds true happiness as she slowly develops into a better person, and yet being a better person is also what forces her to leave Vince and Rosie.

It's not the last we'll see of them, however, there's still one chapter left!

I wonder if it will have a happy ending...

Nyx ♥