51 pages • 1 hour read
Opal ReyneA Soul to Keep
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2021A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Reia’s Gift/Horn Decorations
The gift of the horn decoration that Reia crafts for Orpheus is a symbol that represents Reia and Orpheus’s romantic relationship. She first wants to make him a gift after she sees the first protective trinket she made displayed above his bed. When she offers to make him a gift, “[b]right flamingo pink [takes] over [Orpheus’s] floating orbs” (261). Later, Orpheus and Reia realize that when Orpheus’s eyes turn pink, he is experiencing love. When Reia first suggests a gift in the abstract, he experiences love. Reia spends a lot of time on the gift. She “remade his gift multiple times because she’d hated everything until she finally came up with her final idea” (270). The amount of thought that Reia puts into the gift reflects how deeply she feels for Orpheus. When she finally gives Orpheus the gift after they visit the demon village, his eyes turn pink again, and it inspires them to consummate their relationship physically. When Orpheus sees Katerina again, she breaks one of the bells on the decoration. This is an attempt to damage his relationship with Reia and cause him pain. She does not fully break the decoration or both bells, though. Reia repairs it easily after she becomes a phantom, which demonstrates the strength of their relationship.
The Protective Amulet Diadem
The diadem with the protective amulet is symbolic of various types of protection. The Witch Owl gives it to Orpheus to protect his human companions. As his mother, she wanted to help him find companionship and love, so she used her magic to craft an item that could keep his humans alive. The diadem is then originally symbolic of the Witch Owl’s protection of her children, the Mavka. Orpheus then gives the diadem to Reia to keep her safe, and it becomes symbolic of his protection of her. When outside, she wears it, but there are two notable moments when the diadem is removed. It falls from Reia’s head when she slips into the Arachnid Demon of Sorrows’ trap. Jabez the Demon King rips the amulet off Reia’s head when he kidnaps her. Each time, something bad happens to Reia as soon as the circlet is off of her head, and each removal of the amulet stems from an instance in which Reia steps outside of Orpheus’s protection. The first time, Reia willingly steps outside of the protection by trying to leave. The second time, Jabez tears it from her head, a violent act that rips the jewelry and protection away from her. When the protection is taken away, Orpheus fears the worst: “He opened his hand to stare down at the amulet in sadness and loss, his sight turning blue” (423). When Orpheus cannot provide protection for her, he grieves. Eventually, Reia no longer needs that specific protection. After Reia’s transformation into a phantom, the Witch Owl asks her to give the amulet to the unnamed Mavka whenever he finds a human companion. The protection then shifts back to the Witch Owl’s maternal protection for her children, coming full circle in its symbolism.
The Wedding Dresses
The wedding dresses are a motif that supports the theme of The Impact of Loneliness and Isolation. After her first bath, when Reia looks for clothing to wear, all she finds is wedding dresses. She thinks, “Disturbingly, [the closet] was filled with white dresses similar to the one she’d worn here. There were no other colours, no pants, shirts, or skirts. Just wedding dresses” (90). The banality of a closet of all-white wedding dresses represents Orpheus’s loneliness and the repetitive cycle of gaining and losing companions that led to his isolation. The lack of color is a particularly striking image; color is typically associated with emotion, as demonstrated by Orpheus’s eyes changing color depending on how he’s feeling. The clothing of all Orpheus’s previous companions is white and colorless, showing how they felt nothing for him. Reia, in contrast, seeks to add color to the dresses using food dye on her first full day in the Veil. She does not want a colorless existence of displaying no feelings toward Orpheus; whether consciously or not, she seeks to break the pattern of past companions. As their relationship develops and her feelings for Orpheus grow deeper, her clothing becomes more colorful. She is able to purchase “proper dyes” in the demon village, which makes her clothes far more colorful than the food dyes as her relationship with Orpheus becomes more emotionally and physically intimate.
