The Butcher as Janus

So, I am formatting this emotionally intimate scene between Boudica and Gideon (aka The Butcher), which was a real breakthrough moment for her in distracting him from war to focus on life, when I realized something interesting to me about his injury to his left eye, which he had since probably the fourth chapter.

In the scene, she is looking into his healthy eye trying to read and understand him. It is like he is a Janus with two faces, one of war (his injured left eye that is closed to her) and another that is what? What he might become after the war if he chooses to live, the man she wants him to be.

Per Wikipedia, “Janus presided over the beginning and ending of conflict, and hence war and peace.” Within Boudica and The Butcher, Gideon is the man who chose to become a monster in order to end the war. Okay, so I didn’t plan that connection, initially I just wanted to create a visual representation of his psychological injuries from the war. Credit to my subconscious for making surprising connects without my conscious intent.

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I’m Jaycee

Currently, I am a drafter and plodding editor of my own fiction stories. Looking towards the future when edited stories turn into published ones.

Here I am starting to bare my soul to give you a preview of what I have been working on.

See “Harvest of Blood” in this site’s menu bar for a preview of a draft chapter from Boudica and The Butcher, a novel set in a future Second American Civil War.

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