The Priory of the Orange Tree

One of the three protagonists of the novel, Ead is a courageous, gifted mage with a gift for secrecy. Her many powers include the ability to drive away wyrms, produce fire, create “barriers of protection” (497), move like a shadow, and “make metal sing of death like no knight ever could” (497). Ead also heals more quickly than most people. Despite possessing these extraordinary powers, Ead uses them sparingly, both to preserve her magic and escape detection. The ability to keep her powers hidden marks Ead as someone with great self-restraint. At the beginning of the novel, Ead is pretending to be a lady-in-waiting at Queen Sabran’s court, keeping her real faith a secret. Her actual name is Eadaz du Zāla uq-Nāra, and she is a member of the Priory of the Orange Tree, a society of mages dedicated to fighting evil (especially wyrms). Her birth mother, Zāla uq-Nāra, was killed when Ead was six; since then, she has been brought up at the Priory under the guardianship of her foster father, Chassar.

Ead is a dynamic character who evolves over the course of the narrative. While at the onset she is judgmental about Queen Sabran’s privilege, she gradually begins to realize that Sabran is bound by the weight of traditions.