52 pages • 1 hour read
Mark LawrencePrince of Thorns
Mark LawrenceFiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2011A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 10-13Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 10 Summary
One of Marclos’s escorts, Sir Renton, is still alive. Although the knight insists he will tell Jorg nothing, Jorg is confident that Renton will reveal everything he knows before being burned by the village’s survivors.
After some back and forth between Renton, Gomst, and Jorg, the young prince tells Renton how he once interrogated Bishop Murillo. Jorg hammered nails into the Bishop’s brain, one by one, literally killing parts of the man’s mind. When Jorg then displays a nail in one of his hands, Renton tells Jorg everything and is then turned over to the peasants and burned.
Chapter 11 Summary
Four years earlier, Jorg follows Lundist out of the classroom and into the open air. His father’s dungeons are stuffed with criminals to be publicly executed the next day, and Lundist instructs him about the use of terror and spectacle in ruling a populace.
Jorg and Lundist encounter Makin drilling boys in the courtyard; he has just been promoted to Captain of the Guard. Makin invites Jorg to spar with the trainees. Jorg insists on fighting the biggest boy in the group and manages to deck him with a single shot to the throat.
When one of the trainees complains that Jorg cheated, Jorg turns to Makin, saying “It’s not a game, Sir Makin. You teach these boys to play by the rules, and they’re going to lose. It’s not a game” (83). Jorg then has Lundist take him to the dungeons to see the condemned.
Chapter 12 Summary
Lundist attempts to dissuade Jorg from visiting the dungeons, but the boy shrugs off his concerns. Jorg goes into a torture chamber in which a large, dark-skinned man has been chained to a table and is being stuck with a hot poker.
When Jorg asks why they are torturing the man, one of the torturers says that it’s because Nubans, a dark-skinned people, all have the devil in them. Lundist clarifies that the men set to be executed in the morning are all captured bandits. Jorg moves close to the Nuban and, when the Nuban confirms that he is a dangerous man, Jorg releases one of his wrist shackles.
Chapter 13 Summary
The two torturers are quickly dispatched to the prisoners’ cheers. The Nuban tells Lundist to take Jorg and go, but when Jorg hears the Nuban refer to the other bandits as Brothers, he is intrigued and insists on leaving with the bandits in hopes that they offer an avenue to taking revenge on Renar.
Lundist tries to dissuade Jorg but is knocked out by one of the bandits. While the men are released, Jorg thinks about the changes in personality he has undergone since the assassination. The Nuban gives Jorg one more chance to stay, but Jorg steps over Lundist’s body to follow the brothers.
Chapters 10-13 Analysis
In these chapters the reader learns how Jorg left his life as a Prince in Tall Castle and joined the brothers on the road. Along the way, Jorg displays his willingness to ignore protocol and standard of conduct, punching a sparring partner in the throat instead of dueling as instructed.
His instinctive desire to see the prisoners in the dungeon, a choice that he does not know will determine his fate, seems to provide further evidence of the pull that dark emotions such as fear, hate, and anger have on him. This pull may also be represented by his immediate fixation on the Nuban; he only becomes more interested when the torturers claim that the Nubans are all possessed by the devil.
Jorg displays a rare moment of moral conflict when deciding whether to leave Tutor Lundist, whom he seems to genuinely like, on the floor of the dungeon. It is a critical moment for him. If he gives in to the tender feelings he has for Lundist, it will mean remaining in the castle and forgoing the opportunity to take vengeance on Renar. Instead, Jorg chooses, for the first time, to “sacrifice a piece,” a key part of his strategic philosophy.
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