A Discovery of Witches - The Evolution of The Witch

This is the sixth "chapter" of the series...

So I have names to go with “Knox’s ‘personal witch’” and “Matthew’s relative”. Satu, somewhat aligning with Gerbert (we see that it doesn’t go well), can fly. Knox cannot. So Satu is the one who grabs Diana and dumps her in the middle of castle ruins (La Pierre) not too far from Ysabeau and Matthew’s ancestral home (Marthe, Ysabeau’s sister, and Ysabeau discuss how witches that fly cannot go too far before having to land), with Gerbert wanting her for himself once she’s done. Satu wants to know Diana’s “secrets”, to see just how powerful she is. Diana’s power at that point is still largely dormant and still harnessed due to her life of inactivity. So Satu can use her magic to lift Diana off the ground, turning her upside down. While upside down, Diana (trying just to withstand the suffering that soon follows) tries to tell Satu that there are no secrets to pursue. Using her spellcasting, Satu “brands” Diana, burning a mark into her back as she proceeds to attempt futilely to draw whatever might be hidden. Satu fails. Not only that, but Satu “exhausts” her own powers in trying to draw out Diana’s. So what is left Satu uses to toss Diana down an empty hole (similar to a well) in Gerbert’s castle. Satu is moved to another room by a frustrated Gerbert, introduced to the decapitated head of a witch, imprisoned in a box for quite a long time. While Gerbert leaves to confront Diana, Satu realizes that the head of the witch, alive but turned vampire, has a great deal of power. Now an ongoing warning from the head in the box is beware of the witch with blood from the lion and the wolf. Satu “releases” the vampirism from the head in the box after learning that she is the powerful witch, Meridiana (Chloé Dumas) and conjures a fire that engulfs her, allowing her to finally be free. It just gets worse for Gerbert.

Satu, Diana's rival, Knox's protege

Matthew will not adhere to The Congregation’s demands to retrieve Diana and bring her to them for interrogation (and punishment due to her voluntary break of The Covenant and decision to oppose her own kind), when brother, Baldwin (Trystan Gravelle), demands her surrender to him. Baldwin, though, swore an oath to Matthew (mentions of wars fought together down through the centuries are used to try and state each other’s cases), so he will return to The Congregation empty-handed. Baldwin, though, warns Matthew and Diana that The Congregation will not be held off long. That they will “need their strength” in the future.

When Diana is in the hole, she dreams of her parents (or perhaps they are a vision?) urging her to “fly”. Flying is a talent some witches have and other witches don’t. Diana had never flown. But in order to escape the hole (a long way down, with Matthew (using Baldwin’s helicopter to chopper into the ruins of La Pierre) unable to leap into the hole since he can’t fly, either), she will need to. And she does! Seriously hurt due to the fall to the ground inside the hole and Satu’s torture, Diana is tended to by Matthew, careful and delicate, while Ysabeau and Marthe look on with concern. The mark of a “spellcaster” is often considered unfortunate because witches with that brand often go mad and are considered a serious danger. In this episode, Diana sure has had a lot to absorb. Tortured by Satu, the potential of harm from Gerbert, dumped in a long hole in the castle, injured by the fall, having to fly for the first time, and learning that she has been branded a spellcaster. The Congregation wants her and Matthew’s defiance to be with her places both of them in serious peril.

Gerbert, Satu, Peter Knox

Baldwin, Matthew's brother

Gillian, Diana's friend, not a vampire fan

A subplot that has gotten a few minutes here and there concerns demon, Agatha (representative of The Congregation), her son, Nathaniel (Daniel Ezra), and Nathaniel’s pregnant wife, Sophie (Aisling Loftus). Sophie has been “receiving visions” of Diana, needing to give her a statue. Sophie claims she is a demon “created by witches”. Agatha and Nathaniel have to come to terms with Sophie having a baby who is a probably witch. Agatha, despite what The Covenant clearly criminalizes in terms of interspecies relations, tells her son and daughter-in-law that they are her #1 priority. So not only Diana and Matthew are breaking The Covenant.

The opening in the ruins, with the fire line burning down Diana’s back while she is levitated upside down and the ring of fire encircling Satu as she summons all her powers in her efforts to learn what her secrets are is my personal favorite part of the episode. The gradual evolution of Diana’s inner witch has led to this episode, with her withstanding Satu’s persistent torture, surviving a fall down a hole, and learning to fly. At this point, Diana was viewed as weak by Ysabeau and Marthe due in large part to her nurturing the human life at the near dissolution of the witch she destined to become.

Congregation gathering

A small detail among all the suffering Diana endures is a lie told to her by Satu: that Matthew had killed Gillian. A trick that doesn’t work because Diana trusts Matthew implicitly, as Satu is reminded of how she’s just Knox’s patsy. Matthew is upfront, though, in telling Diana once she’s back at his and Ysabeau’s chateau that if Gillian betrayed her again he wouldn’t be so lenient in sparing her life. Or anybody else that would betray the woman he loves.

So the stage is set for further melodramatics.
[3/5]