Kingdom of Ash

Rhoe’s shield is a motif for Love as the Ultimate Motivator. From the time Terrasen was conquered by Adarlan, Aedion has carried Aelin’s father’s shield. It is the only thing he grabs “when the news came that his family had been butchered” (391). The shield has been carried by so many of Rhoe’s ancestors and is so old that it has no name; many people in Terrasen—even Darrow—have entirely forgotten its existence. Despite how “worn and simple” the shield appears, it serves as “a reminder of what he’d lost. What he’d defend to his final breath” (391). The shield is a symbol of Aedion’s love for his kingdom, his people, and his family.

When Aedion uses the ancient shield to defend himself at Orynth’s battlements against a Valg prince, it holds against blast after blast of enormous power. The Valg’s strikes bounce “off as if it were a spray of water upon stone” (716). Its resilience embodies the resilience of Terrasen’s people. As Aedion fights against the Valg prince with shield and sword, he leans on the teachings of Rhoe, Quinn, and Cal Lochan—“all his mentors and the warriors he’d admired above all others” (716). The Valg is enraged “that his power could not break that shield” even though its only magic is the memory of a long line of bearers who “had loved their kingdom more than their own lives. Who had carried this shield into battle, into war, to defend Terrasen” (716). The novel implies that the power that keeps the shield together is love. The Valg don’t understand this power because they don’t care for the world or its inhabitants as Aelin and her allies do.