They Escape, Things Continue To Be Bad: House of Night Untamed Chapter 33 (Part 2)

Today we read the second half of the last chapter of House of Night: Untamed! Just so we’re all clear on this, it is still unclear what in this story was actually the untamed part.

House of Night Untamed Ending (Chapter 33 continued):

The gang decides that shit is FUBAR’d, what with Neferet releasing rape Satan into the world, which is seriously the direction this story seems to be going in. Like, the word “rape” showed up an absurd number of times in the chapters about the evil god Kalona’s origin story, so… gotta say I’m pretty uncomfortable thinking about the remainder of the books in this series.

Stevie Rae (who is apparently not actually in danger of dying, despite still losing blood from the arrow in her chest? idk anymore) tells everyone they need to leave the House of Night and make it to the tunnels under the city. Aphrodite reminds them they have to keep the circle together, because it’s apparently protecting them from the rest of the chaos going on. Speaking of the rest of the chaos going on, it is unclear if everyone else is currently being eaten by raven-people.

“It’s the Raven Mockers. They have their bodies back, and they’re hungry. They’re feeding on humans,” Aphrodite said. […] “You can’t call attention to us. Not tonight. If you do, we’re finished.”
“You’ve seen this?” I asked.
She nodded. “All this and more. Those who don’t get underground will be their prey.”

So just in case you’ve lost track of all the shit that’s apparently going on simultaneously right now, but nobody is really reacting to:

• Neferet has summoned an evil god to the earth, ordered an undead (which everybody just learned is a thing now) to shoot someone, and also maybe killed the vampyre president, and nobody seems to have realized that maybe Neferet is sort of evil
• All of the students and teachers at the House of Night are just sort of there for this. We have no idea if they’re doing anything, so all we can assume is that they’re just standing there for this
• Vampyre-in-training superstar Zoey is refusing to leave what I can only assume is a protective bubble of magic, which is slowly leaving the exact center of where everyone else is and sneaking away. Unnoticed. Somehow.

Speaking of that last one, here’s how ridiculous it is that they’re just having whole conversations apparently in the middle of all this without apparently being noticed:

“Don’t worry. I know how we move without being seen. I’ve done it before.” […]
Stevie Rae managed to nod weakly.
“Yep, we sure have,” Aphrodite said.
“So what’s the plan?” Damien asked.
“Yeah, let’s get with it,” Erin said.
“Ditto. I’m getting a cramp from smooshing so close to everyone,” Shaunee muttered

Is everyone seriously required to have a line of dialogue? This sneaky escape is taking forever.

Adding another thing to that list of “things that are just happening, I dunno, just roll with it”, apparently Zoey somehow knows that the raven-mockers have flown all over Tulsa and are eating people.

The Raven Mockers were everywhere. It was just after midnight New Year’s Eve, and the creatures had their pickings of tipsy, celebrating humans who poured out of clubs and restaurants

Also apparently it’s been New Year’s Eve this whole time.

What else can House of Night kind of cram into this finale without really explaining? How about, fuck it, everyone gets magic invisibility powers.

“Here’s the plan. We become mist and shadows, night and darkness. We don’t exist. No one sees us. We are the night and the night is us.”

Ok, I guess that counts as a plan by technicality, buuuut how is this a skill that Zoey knows the others can just do? I was under the impression Zoey could become invisible because she’s the specialest vampyre ever. How does she teach everyone else to do this?

“Now you guys do it. Concentrate. It’s no different than when you used to sneak out of the House of Night to meet boyfriends”

…that’s all the explanation we’re ever gonna get about how this skill works, huh.

They sneak to the tunnels. Zoey gives away that they’re going to make it.

I wondered later how we ever made it, and realized the answer even as I wondered. We made it because the guiding hand of Nyx was on us.

Book, I can assure you I never once wondered about this.

The Casts also insert some of their hilarious social commentary into the chaos.

I started hearing police and fire sirens, along with gunshots, which made me smile grimly. This was Oklahoma, and us Okies did love our guns. Yep, we exercise our Second Amendment right with pride and vigor.

My Kindle pointed out this sentence to me because a number of other Kindle users highlighted those sentences. I am very curious what sort of person would be highlighting a pro-guns kinda-joke in a vampire young adult novel.

They get to the tunnels, but before Zoey enters them, she makes two phone calls. The first to Heath, who immediately accepts that Zoey is telling the truth that “something terrible has been released at the House of Night” and that he and his family need to get to safety. I genuinely liked this conversation, because Heath believing her shows (rather than explicitly tells us) how he trusts her, and by extension what part of Zoey he really truly likes. Even though he initially answered with a “What do you want, Zoey?”, because he’s well and truly pissed off at her. The only bit that Zoey explains is when she hands up “before I said something both of us would regret”, which is also pretty good, in terms of just being a subtle window into how these two feel. Good work, House of Night: Untamed! So far there is one page about the last chapter that I genuinely like! That is considerably better than the average.

Zoey also calls her mom and leaves a voicemail warning them too. Thank god. I’m struggling to think of ways this last chapter could be harder to read, and I’m pretty sure “Zoey talks to her zealous Christian stepdad who always acts like a petty dick to her” is rather high up the list.

Zoey and the troops recap what just happened.

“Yeah, it’s bad,” I began. “There’s no denying that. We’re young. We’re alone. We’re hurt. Neferet and Kalona are powerful and, as far as we know, they might have all the rest of the fledglings and vampyres on their side.”

…do we know anything about what the other students at the school are up to? Are we seriously just assuming that the entire student body of the House of Night is suddenly all thinking, “Hm, raven-people have emerged from the earth and are flying around town eating people. Sounds for the best.”

“But we have something they’ll never have. We have love and truth and each other.”

Wow, book four of this supernatural young adult novel about teenagers going to magic school where the worst big bad possible was just returned to the earth is really out-Harry Pottering itself now, huh.

Darius has a quiet moment where he admits how scared he is, between Kalona returning and his fellow warriors not recognizing that this was a bad thing to happen. The Casts have a moment where they go, hm, we haven’t made fun of people with learning disabilities yet.

“Yeah,” said Jack. “We’re here because there’s something different about us.”
“Something special,” Damien said.
“Damn special,” Shaunee said.
“I’m with you on that one, Twin,” Erin said.
“We’re so special, when you look in the dictionary under short bus, there’s a group picture of us,” Stevie Rae said

Wow, I’m glad we’re taking a break from reading House of Night.

They confirm that their next step is to come up with a plan to take back their school. Whatever that means, since their school was always run by a vampyre nazi and apparently all the other students are pretty chill with raven-people monsters eating people. Nyx also gives Zoey her requite gold stars for doing a good job in another book. For whatever it was she did in this book that could apparently be considered “good”.

I felt an awesome tingle spread from my fingertips to cover the palms of my hands, and I knew when I pulled them out of the hand pile I’d find brand-new intricate tattoos decorating each of my palms, like I was an exotic ancient priestess who had been henna-Marked as special by her Goddess.

…fuck it. I’m not unpacking everything in that sentence. I’m done.