#Pheris

[asmywhimseytakesme]

Awhile back I was blocked by someone who said that my depiction of Pheris in my Return of the Thief illustrations was ableist because I made him too young. This person claimed I was assuming he is younger and therefore less capable because of his disability, and that in the book he was clearly older than I depicted him, and therefore my depiction is ableist.

It’s totally cool for people to block me for whatever reason they believe warrants it, and to interpret a book differently where no absolute answer is given in the text. I do of course try not to be ableist in my depictions, especially for a character whose disability is such a large part of their story, so it did bother me… I did feel that Pheris was quite young in the book as I read it, however there was nothing to point to to say who was “right”.

I had forgotten this happened until yesterday when I started re-listening to the Return of the Thief audiobook after having a long break from the series.

It is very tricky when the author specifically avoids giving an actual figure for someone’s age, and I think that whatever age YOU think Pheris is is valid and I’m not trying to say you have to imagine a child where previously you didn’t. But I did find myself noting MANY hints that can support my reading of Pheris as being a fairly young/small child at the beginning of the book. Many of these are VERY open to interpretation, I just think they suggest together that you CAN assume from the text that Pheris is young/a child at this point in the story (regardless of his disability)—that is all.

I’m currently 16% through, so these examples come from only that section of the book.

Melisande calling him her “Little Pheris” (could just be an endearment but still worth noting)

The simple fact that Pheris was chosen to be raised in the palace because he is “young enough” to be raised away from the malignant tendencies of the Erondites clan. To me, this suggests pre-teen.

The fact that Pheris can crawl under the banquet table and MOVE AROUND without bumping people or being noticed.

In fact, he is constantly squeezing himself into very small spaces—under a couch when the king rushes into a side room to be sick, under a chair when avoiding the attention of attendants, between the hedges of the queens garden. Personally, I see a teenager having a much harder time doing this simply due to size.

Also during the incident where the king rushes into the side room, Pheris observes that he can see “nothing but the backside of the man ahead of me.” This suggests to me that Pheris standing is about butt-height to an adult. (I suppose you could interpret “backside” as referring simply to the back of a person… I generally read it as somebody’s butt though.)

When the king chooses Pheris as a companion to go with him into the temple, he observes that Pheris is “hardly even half of one.” I don’t read this as the king, a disabled man himself, suggesting that Pheris is half a person because of his disability. I think it merely suggests that Pheris is half as tall as most adults…a child.

That’s as far as I’ve gotten in my reading and I don’t know that I’ll keep noting these references to Pheris age/size. I’m not saying that the only way to interpret these passages is the way I do. I just feel like the text could be read to suggest that Pheris is a child and that this isn’t due to assuming him less capable and therefore young because of his disability.

Read it how you want though! I absolutely love that these books are open to interpretation and respect that readers will pay attention to the text and make their own inferences.

#queens thief #the queens thief #the return of the thief #megan whalen turner #pheris

[nimium-amatrix-ingenii-sui]

Here is your answer then, humblest of mortals

The reader may believe a goddess came bearing a message for the king or believe it was only the effect of the smoke from the braziers. The acolyte can offer no corroboration. From the slightly bored expression on her face, I gathered that she saw only the king lying on the floor, not Moira bending over him, the pattern on her shawl changing in the dim and uneven light. "Eugenides," said Moira, and I heard for the first time what the Oracle's voice only echoed. "Tell me again why you pester the Great Goddess?" [...] She crouched beside him and pushed his hair to one side, tucking it behind his ear so that she might whisper softly into it. "Here is your answer then, humblest of mortals. You will fall, as your kind always fall, when your god lets you go." She patted him on the shoulder. "Now you know what many men do not." ~Megan Whalen Turner, Return of the Thief

Me, tackling yet another scene where the complicated lighting situation is explicitly described: There better not be any fecking complicated lighting in there

But the temple scene has been living rent-free in my head ever since I first read RotT, and after the tentative lifting of the most recent bout of art block (also known as Too Much Stuff Going On), I thought it was a good idea to tackle it at last. Although I cannot reccommend taking on illustration ideas clearly above one's skill level when one is also lacking the time and motivation to do it justice, sometimes a half-assed exorcism is better than none. Or, in this case, a half-assed invocation. I guess. Please do not ask me about the perspective or proportions. Let's blame it all on the coleus smoke, OK?

#queen's thief spoilers #return of the thief #queen's thief fanart #my stuff #watercolour #moira #eugenides #pheris #let's also ignore the mechanical damage at the top of the sheet because i'm a cheapskate who will use scratched paper >_>

[shrimpchipsss]

for once, relius was speechless

#the queen's thief #pheris #relius of the archives #pheris mostrus erondites #i guess i can also tag #teleus #tqt

[bloody-wonder]

trying to understand costis/kamet family situation post canon makes me feel like the conspiracy guy meme

#moira's pen #moira's pen spoilers #costis #costis ormentiedes #kamet #kamet kingnamer #pheris #pheris mostrus erondites #the queen's thief #i'm still kinda ambivalent about this tbh #i'm all for chaotic queer non monogamous non heteronormative lifestyles #however comma #when you don't explain what those lifestyles are exactly #you're walking a fine line between revolutionary poly rep #and just adding nameless women for nohomo #ambiguity is good when it's queer but ambiguity for ambiguity's sake hmmm #idk about that #actually you know what #funny how we know the names of all the men in this graph and none of the women #we don't know costis' sister but we know dumonius who runs the estate #all the kids we know by name are boys for some reason #really makes you think huh

[mothsartart]

ugh that feeling when you have to wait for your friend to stop badly flirting with the owner of the flower shop

!! drew pheris a bit in the flower shop au by my friend @fishmaid

#pheris #qt #tqt #return of the thief #mwt #pheris erondites #modern au #The Queen's Thief #queen's thief #flower shop au #my art

[oodlesodoodles]

#I forgot that last year i said i would upload the full pic of this and i didnt!! #Queens thief series #Relius #Teleus #Pheris #The care of peeling an orange for someone who has a hard time doing so #happy pride 🌈

[incorrectqueensthiefquotes]

Hector: I’ve been in the Prince business so long, now that it’s over, I don’t know what to do with the rest of my life.

Pheris: Have you ever considered piracy? You’d make a wonderful Accidental Pirate King Sophos.

#accidental pirate king sophos...he returns! #pheris #queen's thief #qtq #source: the princess bride #submission #submission: stitchlingbelle

[opifex-nobillima]

#queen's thief #return of the thief #Pheris #megan whalen turner

[doodle-dog-diary]

I like how everyone immediately upon meeting pheris is like "this is my son now. Hello my boy would you like a snack. You are so smart here I made a codex of words specially for you. It has a picture of you on it. You remind me of my little brothers back home. Have a sweet. You can share my room. Stop yelling so loud you're scaring him 🥺. Here are some new notebooks for you to practice handwriting in.

#pheris #return of the thief #tqt #the queens thief #halfway through the book sure hope nothing stressful happens to him ever 🙂

[maraneedscoffee]

I'm in the middle of Return of the Thief and I just love Pheris!

And of course, Sophos.

#queen's thief #sophos #pheris

[tenebrius-excellium]

Did anyone else think Pheris was a girl at first...or wished he was???

He was refreshingly relatable, although a bit sensitive. He felt very girly and I'd hate to attribute that to his painful disability or to his young age. I'm so torn about him. It's nice to see a boy NOT be a trained fighter from birth in the Attolian society...

On the other hand, that same society needed him to be a boy. A girl wouldn't have been sent to Eugenides' court as the firstborn heir of Erondites simply because that would not have been in the nature of her father. Although if she had been sent, - as an even more cruel mockery of Gen's command - , she'd probably parallel Attolia's story of an unlikely woman becoming Queen, and she may have served as one of the Queen's assistants too. Idk I would have liked a female's first person narration sooo much, since we never got Attolia's!!!

And I'm not suggesting that anything else should change - the disability and the treatment of Pheris should stay exactly the same!

Given that canon!Pheris is a boy, I'm annoyed by that. I'm also surprised to find myself relating so hard to his general invisibility... and I admire his endurance as well as his bravery.

#tqt #the queen's thief #return of the thief #pheris #pheris mostrus erondites #wherethekiteflies #tqt fandom #the queen's thief fandom

[dragoneyes618]

Five Erondites

There were five who bore the name Pheris Mostrus Erondites:

1. Pheris Mostrus Erondites, known as Pheris Monstrous Erondites, or simply Pheris, the chronicler of Return of the Thief.

2. Pheris Mostrus Erondites, his grandfather, the Baron Erondites, also known as Pheris Monstrous Erondites, but for a different reason than his grandson.

3. Pheris Mostrus Erondites, Baron Erondites’ firstborn son, born with the same infirmity as his nephew was, who was killed by his own father.

4. Pheris Mostrus Erondites, known as Dite, Baron Erondites’ second son, who was given the same name as his father and brother, since his older brother could not be the heir.

5. Pheris Mostrus Erondites, the father of Baron Erondites, who had enough respect for him not to get rid of his firstborn son while he lived. Baron Erondites’ son Pheris was found dead in his bed the day after Baron Erondites’ father died.

#queen's thief #the queen's thief #return of the thief #pheris #pheris erondites #pheris mostrus erondites #baron erondites #erondites #dite #erondites family #eugenides

[nimium-amatrix-ingenii-sui]

"They are just dummies"

They wrapped me in sheeting, and one of them carried me down narrow hallways to drop me on a mattress laid out on the floor. I struggled free of the constricting fabric, only to find myself surrounded by headless people. Hearing the thin, whistling sound of my terror, the man standing nearby laughed. I do not remember now who it was, nor do I want to. I do remember Philologos, though, for his kindness. "He's frightened," Philo said from the doorway. "You stay with him, if you want," said the other attendant, brushing past. Philo crouched down to reassure me. "They are just dummies," he said, "made of stuffing. They hold the king's coats." Encouraged, I looked more closely and saw that he was right. The dim figures only appeared to be shifting in the flickering lamplight from the hallway. I had not been cast into an underworld dungeon with headless monsters. I was in a closet. "He has a lot of coats," said Philologos soberly. ~ Megan Whalen Turner, Return of the Thief

Heyyy guess who still hasn't learned to either draw teeny tiny postcard paintings OR to put lots of details into a picture but NOT both? That's right, yours truly! Anyway, have some more Queen's Thief fanart because it's a long weekend and I need a break from grading exams! Having finished the series by now (once... or possibly twice or maaaaybe three times) I think Return of the Thief is my favourite, although it's a close margin because they're all so darned good, aren't they. Pheris is one of my favourite characters, at any rate, and here's his first day at court.

#hilarion is looking grumpy because he got soaked during pheris's bath #not sure who the other two attendants are. xikos and medander maybe #queen's thief fanart #my stuff #return of the thief #pheris #queen's thief spoilers #(sort of)

[voidartisan]

Dite and Pheris was all I needed from this book. I can die happy now.

#what are you talking about I didn’t cry even a little #tqt #the queen’s thief #mp spoilers #moira’s pen spoilers #moira’s pen #dite #pheris

[cartograffiti]

The Curse and Right of Thieves

Fandom: The Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner Rating: T Warnings: Major Character Death Word count: 2,401 - Relationships: Eugenides & his family Characters: Eugenides, Pheris Erondites, Hector, Eugenia - "It is the curse of thieves and their right to fall to their deaths, not--not--" [The Queen of Attolia] In which Eugenides arranges matters to his satisfaction, and his family holds each other up.

Written between the releases of Return of the Thief and Moira's Pen.

This fic was posted in 2020. I'm sharing it now because I want my Tumblr to have a nicely organized link to each of my fics. Some I've shared with such inconsistent tags I can't find the links myself, and many I've never blogged about at all!

#SpaceJackalope #fanfiction #this was a classic case of needing to write the sad thing because I knew it would upset everyone in a good way #we didn't even know Moira's Pen was coming yet so I made up a bunch of family facts and some of them are funny now #Queen's Thief #QT #Eugenides #Pheris #Hector & Eugenia

[soldier-poet-king]

So I'm doing my first full qt reread since rott, and also my first audiobook listen, and was listening to the thief on the way home today and had Some Thoughts.

In the conversation about Gen being named after Eugenides the god, and how Gen's mother was a thief but his father wanted him to be a soldier, Sophos is surprised, either that Gen's father was a soldier or that Gen knows his father. And Gen, replies, perhaps a bit acidly, that no he's not illegitimate, and yes he even has siblings from the same father, and yes his siblings are all in respectable professions.

Which of course, given the rumours and speculation about Gen's parentage in rott raises a few questions. If we take as fact the belief that Gen rarely lies outright (but rather gives partial truths and lets people fill in the blanks in a way that suits him), what does this say about how Gen views the MoW? And vice versa? That despite rumours, despite what must've been a complex and at times painful situation, that they viewed the other as their "real" father/son? We already knew Hektor cares for Gen deeply, he funds Gen's heist in The Thief to save Gen's life (though of course we only find out the truth of this in rott), and I've always thought part of the reason he pushed Gen towards being a soldier rather than The Thief of Eddis, was to protect Gen from the isolation of the thieves, their ultimate death in falling, and from the Eddisian court which already viewed Gen with suspicion that could be life threatening as it was after Lader's death. Idk. I was struck by that convo with Sophos in a way I wasn't before.

And then further, I've noticed that in the myths told by Gen and the Magus so far, Eugenides the god is always referred to as "Earth's son", and the "woodcutter's son", despite the fact that his origin tale focuses on the woodcutter's wife's desire for a child (and presumably Eugenides the god was raised by the woodcutter and his wife, we hear of Earth visiting only in disguise to see her son). So, in a way, the god Eugenides also has three parents, just as Gen the thief does. And each Eugenides is deeply loved and wanted by his non-biological (or suspected non-biological) parent. Another similarity between Gen and his god?

I really dk where I was going with this. Just. Thinking My Silly Little Thoughts.

#queen's thief #qt meta #eugenides #sorry if this is SOOO obvious maybe im just stupid #also like. rott left me with so much grief alongside all its hope #i loved it. pheris is the most dear to me #but smthn about the recontextualizing of gens past grieved me #his relationship with eddis the country. with helen. with his father. #with the events that led up to him going in the quest in the thief #idk why it wounded me. it complicated my emotions. its not a bad thing. it just is #and so rereading (or listening) now its just. hm. thinking #idk what my conclusions are im just thinking #idk if its deliberate even! #i mean mwt is a mastercraft in plotting obvs #but also like. the thief came out the year i was born. this series is as old as i am #and ive been following it since aged 11. #so maybe my heart is the one seeking certainty and allusion where there is none #either way. this is a hektor/mow appreciation blog always #im just. smthn smthn father figures and its complicated but its love