Ysabeau and the Cost of Revenge
Was Ysabeau justified in the vengeance she carried for centuries?
Ysabeau de Clermont is one of the most formidable figures in the All Souls trilogy. Elegant, disciplined, and fiercely loyal to her family, she commands attention the moment she appears on the page. When Diana first arrives at Sept-Tours, Ysabeau is intimidating enough that even Matthew approaches her with caution. Her composure, however, hides a deeper truth about who she is and what has shaped her.
Ysabeau carries a long memory.
She has lived through centuries of human history and through the countless conflicts that shaped the creature world. Like many creatures in Deborah Harkness’s universe, she has witnessed both the best and worst of what humans—and creatures—are capable of. But her distrust of witches runs deeper than simple prejudice or old rivalries.
Part of that distrust began long before Diana ever appeared in her life.
Before she was turned into a vampire, Ysabeau possessed second sight—a rare gift that allowed her to perceive things others could not. That gift vanished the moment she was transformed. Her maker did not turn her out of mercy or love. He changed her because he wanted to possess her.
The transformation took more than her mortality. Ysabeau lost her second sight, her ability to bear children, and the natural human life she might have lived. Immortality brought strength and power, but it also came with losses that could never be undone.
From that moment forward, Ysabeau lived with a complicated relationship to witches. They still possessed magic. They could build families. They could live full lives and eventually die natural deaths—things she could no longer do.
Then came the event that hardened those feelings into something far deeper: the death of Philippe de Clermont.
During the Second World War, Philippe was captured by the Nazis with the help of witches who betrayed him. Their collaboration allowed his enemies to locate and destroy one of the most powerful and respected figures in the creature world. For Ysabeau, this was not simply the loss of a mate. It was a profound betrayal that struck at the center of her family and the world she had built with Philippe over centuries.
She responded the only way she knew how.
Ysabeau hunted the witches responsible—not through the structures meant to govern the creature world, and not through the rules of the Covenant or the authority of the Congregation. She acted according to her own sense of loyalty and grief.
For creatures who measure time in centuries rather than decades, memory does not fade easily. Loss lingers. Betrayal can carry weight across generations.
Yet Ysabeau’s anger toward witches was never about a single moment alone. It was built from layers of loss: the life she might have lived as a human, the second sight she lost when she was turned, and the death of Philippe himself. The knowledge that witches had betrayed him only deepened a resentment that had already taken root long before.
Seen in this light, her hostility toward Diana when they first meet becomes easier to understand. Diana is not simply another witch arriving at Sept-Tours. She represents the very things Ysabeau lost—magic, possibility, and the chance to build a future that includes both love and family.
Over time, however, Ysabeau begins to see something different in Diana. She recognizes strength, loyalty, and a willingness to challenge the old divisions that have governed creatures for centuries. Slowly, the possibility emerges that witches and vampires might build a different kind of future together.
But that realization does not erase the past.
Ysabeau belongs to an older world—one shaped by loyalty to family above all else, and by a belief that betrayal demands a response.
Which raises the question that lingers quietly beneath this part of the story.
Was what Ysabeau did justice, or was it vengeance?
The witches she hunted were responsible for Philippe’s death and had aligned themselves with a regime that brought unimaginable destruction to the world. Yet Ysabeau did not seek judgment from the Congregation or from the structures meant to govern the creature world. She acted on her own.
Perhaps that is part of what makes her such a compelling character. Ysabeau embodies a world shaped by centuries of memory, loyalty, and loss. In the All Souls universe, the past is never truly past—it echoes through every alliance, every betrayal, and every choice creatures make.
And so the question remains.
Was Ysabeau justified in hunting the witches who betrayed Philippe?
Or does vengeance, even when born from loyalty and grief, leave its own kind of legacy—one that lasts just as long as the memories that inspired it?
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Coming Sunday
Next we’ll step inside one of the most famous libraries in the world: the Bodleian Library.
But rather than looking at it simply as a place, we’ll explore how the Bodleian functions almost like a living character in the story — a space that holds centuries of history, connection, and perhaps even a little magic within its stacks.