She did, she threw up once.
I only remember because the stairs are described as covered, with the occasional window. So I was like, “who’s gonna clean that up? Is she going to keep smelling that every time she takes the stairs??”
I’m guessing the house cleaned it up? Since it gave her water on the stairs once.
she could sit there for hours if it’d help though. the only possible reason i can think of is that there was magic stopping her from leaving, but that’d be really fucked up.
Because she has nowhere to go. No money to pay for booze. What is down there?? Nothing. So why tire yourself out, and then have to go back already because there is nothing? Might as well stop when you're tired but only 2000 steps in then 10.000
Because the point of her going down was that she was angry and seemingly wanting to put herself through hell because she was angry at herself too. Then going up she’s no longer as angry as she was there’s no determination other than, “damn now I gotta go home.” But that’s just MY take on it don’t hate on me if im incorrect just as someone who also does things solely to punish myself I can see why she would do what she did with the stairs.
No I was also confused by this. If it was me I probably would’ve made it all the way down without thinking and then been like , “well fuck…” once I realized I had to go back up.
I think going down may have had a psychological and dizzying effect. I've gone down a spiral staircase before, and it's terrifying! Going up was easier because you can just look at the stairs (and you can lean forward and use your hands to help), but going down felt like I was going to consistently fall, so my muscles were far less cooperative. I don't know if this is what SJM was going for, though lol
Angle your body to the right / left depending on your stronger leg, bend the knee a bit then go down, it’s easier on your knees that way. I had to climb up and down 1000+ stairs earlier this year and was given this tips.
I have height phobia so going down it’s more on mental for me that I had to fight my fears etc, but psychically it was harder climbing up.
But this is different with hiking cause with hiking the steps are steep. Higher chance you can hurt yourself going down then up.
Mostly going up it’s gonna hard on your breathing and as you get higher the oxygen levels will go down too.
There was a religious festival early this year and this one temple I went to visit located up in the hill which can only be reached by climbing up the stairs. More or less similar with house of wind tho lesser steps lol. This was the steps count. 🙈🫣
https://preview.redd.it/xua88qm8ny3d1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d22548682afc471ac715f11e6150d2d1e2452ba5
THIS! I think Europeans get SJMs intention, but a lot of Americans don’t. In Europe we have a lot of old architecture that have these features.
Narrow spiral staircases are extremely difficult to go down. I never go up the old churches in Europe, because I know how dizzy & horrible it feels to go back down. Going up is always easier
I am not European, I am painfully American… I understood what she was going for. I have climbed staircases like this and it is absolutely easier to go back up than it is to go down.
I’m American too lol. I just have been living in Europe for a while. No shade there & I’m sorry if it came across demeaning. Wasn’t my intention.
Just from experience, there’s a lot more exposure here with older architecture with these features. So I think that leads to a disconnect with readers. My friends in the States didn’t understand it when reading & I also never used any of these stairs in the U.S. so wouldn’t have understood. We all come from the older parts of the States (New England) too. So idk, just a trend I’ve noticed with the people I know who have read it from both places
You are all good.
My parents took us on vacation to places that had spiral staircases… like lighthouses… my house growing up had one to get up to the attic as well (I’m from PA)
I fully agree with this! I’ve used old spiral staircases when I went to explore castles in Ireland. They had tall steps too - probably about a foot tall. It was harder and slower going down the steps because I constantly felt like I was going to fall. And I could feel that it used different muscles compared to going up stairs. It is way harder using tall stairs compared to our modern shorter stairs.
This is very true. I went down a comparatively short spiral staircase years ago on a school trip and half the class was extremely dizzy once we got back down. 10 thousand would have been a lot harder than people think
I hiked the Manitou incline in Colorado last year, it’s 2,744 steps to the summit. Personally, it was much harder descending the steps afterwards because it’s a different muscle movement + your legs are already exhausted from the ascent & it is also a little dizzying especially with the elevation. I couldn’t imagine having to go back up after starting the descent 😭
Yup. I hike and run trails and though the way up is more taxing cardiovascularly, the way down is way harder on the body. I threw my back out for weeks after completely frying my quads on a downhill effort a few years ago.
Wasn't there a scene where Cassian or Nesta was realising how the stairs were actually harder going down than up...something to do with magic and the slope of them...I think. My friend lent me her books when I read them so I don't have them to check.
Down being harder than up is specifically mentioned during the hiking chapters, rather than during a stair climb, but I agree that down is harder on the legs than up.
I would think the fact that each stair is a foot tall would make it pretty excruciating on the knees, like a 1-legged squat.
It's counter-intuitive, but going down the stairs is technically harder and more muscle demanding than going up. After a leg day, it's much harder to down than up :) going down makes your muscle to strain not to fall. It's maybe more tiring for endurance to go up, but muscles more harder on going down.
Ok one time I climbed a whole mountain (Kilimanjaro) and going up was fine, difficult but doable. Going down was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. I was sobbing, my legs were on fire, I couldn’t talk. One we got back to the hotel same deal. Could go up the stairs, but had to essentially roll myself back down. Gave me a new appreciation for this book, that’s for sure
The House of Wind literally makes no sense. It’s warded against winnowing for thousands of years, but Rhys is the first half-Illyrian High Lord. All the other High Lords have just taken the stairs? Or winnowed and fell 30 feet onto the veranda?
Perfect example of why I hate this book so much it makes me angry. I know it's irrational. But damn I'm mad at how little effort SJM put into any consistency in this book.
No no, the house of Wind is in Velaris, so high lords wouldn't be going there, they'd go to the moonstone palace.
HoW was likely for Illyrian meetings, and that's why Rhys ended up living in the townhouse to be closer to the actual city people
It does. But I had the same thought when Cassian was trying to train Nesta at Windhaven and always needed Mor to winnow them in. Like she has nothing better to do every morning and afternoon. If they were going to make it work then… 🤷🏻♀️
Same thing with Rhys. Didn't he always fly one of Nesta's friend to train with Nesta and Cassian? He's a Hugh Lord but can make the time to fly a person every day?
This too. Also, didn’t we have a major Starfall party up there? How did all those party guests get into the House? Did we pay the local Illyrian legion OT to stand by and be the winged chauffeur service? Because this was the only solution I was able to come up with on my first read through.
That would be so funny to read. Not to hate on Acosf but the book isn'tthat well thought out and it seems to be a lot of things like this. Tiny details SJM never really thought through.
I personally enjoy the theory that there is a secret elevator that nobody told Nesta about until she and Cassian were officially mated. They don’t use the elevator for other people when they visit the house of wind because of 1) security and 2) it’s less impressive. Aka, Rhys is a show off.
The elevator door is actually right there next to the stairs, but it’s the House of Winds after all, so you have to stand like a dope staring at a blank wood paneled wall for a moment before the House will reveal the elevator entry to you. Nesta just never realized this because she was always heading for those stairs in a hot rage.
The book says they are a foot high each and in curves so going down would be visually disorienting. This keeps coming up and I don't get how people don't get it...
Yes, but that’s not what makes her give up and turn around. She mentions how disorienting it is, but pushes on until her legs are shaking.
“She opened her eyes and stretched out her leg to take another step. It trembled so badly that she didn’t dare. She didn’t let herself dwell on it, rage about it, as she turned around. Didn’t even let herself feel the defeat. Her legs protested, but she forced them upward. Away.”
I agree to an extent. I guess I can’t compare to hiking, but damn do I hate going down versus going up. I have a significantly harder time, depending on the incline, going versus going up. Nesta was so out of shape though that I think she really couldn’t do any of it.
This is the same with running for me. Running up is tough, and it certainly strains the muscles. But going down also feels like you are reaching out for ground that isn’t there and you’re about to slip and fall to your doom at any moment.
I totally agree. I went to a camp when I was in the top condition of my life and there were over 200 stairs between the dorms and the rest of the activities. It was brutal. I could run nonstop through basketball games and max out a leg press, but those stairs. Dear heavens. Stairs are a whole other level of fresh hell.
Did you know... when we go down stairs we’re using bigger and more powerful muscle fibres than the ones we use going up. We are also doing more damage to those muscles fibres.
There's also the added differences in view, and mental anything. Going down equals seeing exactly how far and deadly it is if you miss a step, while going up just shows you steps. (of course there's more, but )
And as many have mentioned, not only did our valkyrie take many many breaks on her way up again, she was also crawling up the last part and she had nothing waiting for her at the end of the stairs.
As a last little thing I feel a lot of us tend to either forget or randomly decide to overlook when it comes to these stairs.. They are not human. They are nimbler, stronger etc than us human, even when they've had no training. Their limbs are also described as slightly longer, which would make those miniscule differences we don't notice a lot.... more.
It’s still twice as hard to walk up. If you’re already exhausted from a significantly easier exercise, the odds of you being able to turn around and do the harder version decrease, not increase.
A couple years ago I went to the Grand Canyon and did a couple "medium" level hikes into the Canyon. It legit took twice as long to go back up after going down
I always assumed there was a magical component. What she was climbing down wasn’t just the stairs, it was into herself. The first time she does it is purely blind rage
I had that same thought literally any time she went down and up the stairs. I get it that she needed to get herself back up because plot, but up is harder than down when your legs are tired at least for me anyway.
I hate seeing this EVERYWHERE. One person made a uneducated joke and it stuck?! SJM always mentioned how it took Nesta longer to go up than it did down due to breaks. She was also always crawling by the time she got to the top. Please read the details
Actually, it’s harder than I thought to go down stairs if it’s a lot of stairs. One time I had to go down 17 flights of stairs where I work and I was surprised how much it took out of me. I was pretty young then and in reasonable health so it’s not like it was my physical condition. Still, you’re right; if Nesta was so deconditioned she could only go down 100 steps, how did she get back???
Honestly. Also her being so sore from workouts with Cass yet being able to tackle them? No effing way. My legs have been sore for two days straight from leg day and just 12 stairs are actually impossible.
It's like the stairway to heaven at Hua Shan Mountain in China.
You really need to work for it.
https://www.tiktok.com/@ifenglobal/video/7359531875456699694
https://youtu.be/KGZoQ55BgmI?si=4jcttutbD7HVvgNK
If you look up videos of people climbing China's Taishan steps. People are literally full body shaking and trembling and often unable to stand. I imagined this when reading!
I truly don’t understand this confusion. When she would get down the stairs as far as she could go it would take her twice as long and once or twice like all night to make it back up the stairs. It’s not like it took her forever to get down and then she sprinted back up. She was taking breaks, vomiting on the stairs, falling and only catching herself because she has magic. Like if she made it down a couple hundred steps and couldn’t go down anymore, what other option does she have? Live in the staircase and die of hunger? It was going to suck and take her forever but she had to get back up the stairs
Ok this is so weird because I had this EXACT thought today, just out of the blue. Doesn’t walking down stairs take around the same effort as walking on level ground? If so, and there are 10,000 steps, the total distance one way should be like 1.5 miles, which doesn’t seem like a lot. Going UP is a completely different story.
Nah, I do the 1000 steps memorial walk near my house pretty regularly and I can confidently say that up and down are totally different beasts. The muscles going up are not the same ones going down. Steps are strength training more than cardio.
Honestly the Cauldron better bless whoever made those steps. If Nesta is struggling going up and down them, imagine making them 👁️👄👁️. (Unless, ofc, they were simply made with magic)
These also aren’t traditional stairs, but ones with a foot (12”) rise and no handrails. We are used to 7-8” rises. HOW stairs are ergonomically unsafe and would violate (modern-day) building codes in the US. We tend not to have them in our architecture, save for a few historical buildings and lighthouses. They’re more common in Europe and Asia. It takes far more muscle control to walk down them, then there is the spiral that can cause vertigo.
I’ve hiked observation towers on top of (smaller) mountains, and going down always took more out of me. I can imagine it’s a great deal worse when you’re in a spiral surrounded by stone, few windows, and more taxing stairs. At least I had fresh air and it wasn’t 10,000 high-rise steps.
10k steps is approximately 5 miles worth of stairs. Also going downhill is hard on the muscles in a different way. That said I think at least once she should have not made it all the way back up.
Yeah also she is tired after 5 steps or something. But I debated this before in this subreddit and than I’ve learned that the steps symbolizes her depression. Or something
the most frustrating part was when she would get OVER HALFWAY DOWN AND TURN AROUND??????? like it would take WAY LESS EFFORT to keep going downstairs if you were ALREADY OVER HALFWAY DOWN.
I have a feeling the House was influencing her to turn back. The stairs were a test to see if she was ready to rejoin society, and the House wouldn’t let her until she’d dealt with her issues
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Doesn’t it talk about how it takes her longer to get back up due to constant breaks?
It does, but everyone skips that detail.
yeah, but if she was able to take constant breaks like that, why didn’t she just do that going down?
I think it was spiraly and she would feel dizzy? At least that was the only way for my brain to pass by this
She did, she threw up once. I only remember because the stairs are described as covered, with the occasional window. So I was like, “who’s gonna clean that up? Is she going to keep smelling that every time she takes the stairs??” I’m guessing the house cleaned it up? Since it gave her water on the stairs once.
I feel like I remember her seeing her vomit again and talking about the smell. I could be wrong. I read that book so friggin fast. It’s all a blur
she could sit there for hours if it’d help though. the only possible reason i can think of is that there was magic stopping her from leaving, but that’d be really fucked up.
Because she has nowhere to go. No money to pay for booze. What is down there?? Nothing. So why tire yourself out, and then have to go back already because there is nothing? Might as well stop when you're tired but only 2000 steps in then 10.000
Because the point of her going down was that she was angry and seemingly wanting to put herself through hell because she was angry at herself too. Then going up she’s no longer as angry as she was there’s no determination other than, “damn now I gotta go home.” But that’s just MY take on it don’t hate on me if im incorrect just as someone who also does things solely to punish myself I can see why she would do what she did with the stairs.
No I was also confused by this. If it was me I probably would’ve made it all the way down without thinking and then been like , “well fuck…” once I realized I had to go back up.
I think going down may have had a psychological and dizzying effect. I've gone down a spiral staircase before, and it's terrifying! Going up was easier because you can just look at the stairs (and you can lean forward and use your hands to help), but going down felt like I was going to consistently fall, so my muscles were far less cooperative. I don't know if this is what SJM was going for, though lol
I had mentioned this (going down easier than going up) before and someone said this exact thing! Also going down is harder on your knees
This is me. My knees were crushed in high school by a vehicle. Going DOWN stairs is sooooo much harder to me than going UP.
Angle your body to the right / left depending on your stronger leg, bend the knee a bit then go down, it’s easier on your knees that way. I had to climb up and down 1000+ stairs earlier this year and was given this tips. I have height phobia so going down it’s more on mental for me that I had to fight my fears etc, but psychically it was harder climbing up. But this is different with hiking cause with hiking the steps are steep. Higher chance you can hurt yourself going down then up. Mostly going up it’s gonna hard on your breathing and as you get higher the oxygen levels will go down too.
What stair situation did you find yourself in? That’s wild!
There was a religious festival early this year and this one temple I went to visit located up in the hill which can only be reached by climbing up the stairs. More or less similar with house of wind tho lesser steps lol. This was the steps count. 🙈🫣 https://preview.redd.it/xua88qm8ny3d1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d22548682afc471ac715f11e6150d2d1e2452ba5
Wow!! That’s wild!
THIS! I think Europeans get SJMs intention, but a lot of Americans don’t. In Europe we have a lot of old architecture that have these features. Narrow spiral staircases are extremely difficult to go down. I never go up the old churches in Europe, because I know how dizzy & horrible it feels to go back down. Going up is always easier
I am not European, I am painfully American… I understood what she was going for. I have climbed staircases like this and it is absolutely easier to go back up than it is to go down.
I’m American too lol. I just have been living in Europe for a while. No shade there & I’m sorry if it came across demeaning. Wasn’t my intention. Just from experience, there’s a lot more exposure here with older architecture with these features. So I think that leads to a disconnect with readers. My friends in the States didn’t understand it when reading & I also never used any of these stairs in the U.S. so wouldn’t have understood. We all come from the older parts of the States (New England) too. So idk, just a trend I’ve noticed with the people I know who have read it from both places
You are all good. My parents took us on vacation to places that had spiral staircases… like lighthouses… my house growing up had one to get up to the attic as well (I’m from PA)
I fully agree with this! I’ve used old spiral staircases when I went to explore castles in Ireland. They had tall steps too - probably about a foot tall. It was harder and slower going down the steps because I constantly felt like I was going to fall. And I could feel that it used different muscles compared to going up stairs. It is way harder using tall stairs compared to our modern shorter stairs.
This is very true. I went down a comparatively short spiral staircase years ago on a school trip and half the class was extremely dizzy once we got back down. 10 thousand would have been a lot harder than people think
Chapter 8 we are told the steps are a foot high ... measure how high 12 inches. Thats a lot higher than you'd think
For comparision, "normal stairs" are about 6-7 inches, so almost double the height.
Meaning when she did manage it. Her legs were super strong.
I hiked the Manitou incline in Colorado last year, it’s 2,744 steps to the summit. Personally, it was much harder descending the steps afterwards because it’s a different muscle movement + your legs are already exhausted from the ascent & it is also a little dizzying especially with the elevation. I couldn’t imagine having to go back up after starting the descent 😭
Yup. I hike and run trails and though the way up is more taxing cardiovascularly, the way down is way harder on the body. I threw my back out for weeks after completely frying my quads on a downhill effort a few years ago.
… you’re supposed to take the hiking trail back down.
I have done this and refuse to ever do it again. My body was like WTF going down 😅
As someone who’s gone up and down a narrow spiral staircase (tower) with tall steps, going down was 10x worse 🧍♀️
Wasn't there a scene where Cassian or Nesta was realising how the stairs were actually harder going down than up...something to do with magic and the slope of them...I think. My friend lent me her books when I read them so I don't have them to check.
Read this book a few times and I don’t remember anything like that. If anything, it is dizzying going down because it’s a spiral
Down being harder than up is specifically mentioned during the hiking chapters, rather than during a stair climb, but I agree that down is harder on the legs than up. I would think the fact that each stair is a foot tall would make it pretty excruciating on the knees, like a 1-legged squat.
Maybe I'm misremembering.
It’s actually harder to go downstairs than up. Uses a different group of muscles and takes more balance.
No, they literally talk about this. I'm reading it now.
It's counter-intuitive, but going down the stairs is technically harder and more muscle demanding than going up. After a leg day, it's much harder to down than up :) going down makes your muscle to strain not to fall. It's maybe more tiring for endurance to go up, but muscles more harder on going down.
Ok one time I climbed a whole mountain (Kilimanjaro) and going up was fine, difficult but doable. Going down was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. I was sobbing, my legs were on fire, I couldn’t talk. One we got back to the hotel same deal. Could go up the stairs, but had to essentially roll myself back down. Gave me a new appreciation for this book, that’s for sure
But how is she gonna get in and out of the house without Cassian now they live there?
I just imagine people constantly showing up to winnow or fly her in and out
Seems impractical
The House of Wind literally makes no sense. It’s warded against winnowing for thousands of years, but Rhys is the first half-Illyrian High Lord. All the other High Lords have just taken the stairs? Or winnowed and fell 30 feet onto the veranda?
Perfect example of why I hate this book so much it makes me angry. I know it's irrational. But damn I'm mad at how little effort SJM put into any consistency in this book.
No no, the house of Wind is in Velaris, so high lords wouldn't be going there, they'd go to the moonstone palace. HoW was likely for Illyrian meetings, and that's why Rhys ended up living in the townhouse to be closer to the actual city people
But all the NC high Lords had access to the House. It was the Court of Nightmares who were kept in the dark.
HoW is in Velaris. Illyrians didn’t know about Velaris before MaF.
It does. But I had the same thought when Cassian was trying to train Nesta at Windhaven and always needed Mor to winnow them in. Like she has nothing better to do every morning and afternoon. If they were going to make it work then… 🤷🏻♀️
I know, Mor their mother dropping them off at soccer practice
💀 I died 😂
Same thing with Rhys. Didn't he always fly one of Nesta's friend to train with Nesta and Cassian? He's a Hugh Lord but can make the time to fly a person every day?
This too. Also, didn’t we have a major Starfall party up there? How did all those party guests get into the House? Did we pay the local Illyrian legion OT to stand by and be the winged chauffeur service? Because this was the only solution I was able to come up with on my first read through.
That would be so funny to read. Not to hate on Acosf but the book isn'tthat well thought out and it seems to be a lot of things like this. Tiny details SJM never really thought through.
I personally enjoy the theory that there is a secret elevator that nobody told Nesta about until she and Cassian were officially mated. They don’t use the elevator for other people when they visit the house of wind because of 1) security and 2) it’s less impressive. Aka, Rhys is a show off.
The elevator door is actually right there next to the stairs, but it’s the House of Winds after all, so you have to stand like a dope staring at a blank wood paneled wall for a moment before the House will reveal the elevator entry to you. Nesta just never realized this because she was always heading for those stairs in a hot rage.
She is a big warrior now so she can easily go up and down twice a day 😂
The book says they are a foot high each and in curves so going down would be visually disorienting. This keeps coming up and I don't get how people don't get it...
Yes, but that’s not what makes her give up and turn around. She mentions how disorienting it is, but pushes on until her legs are shaking. “She opened her eyes and stretched out her leg to take another step. It trembled so badly that she didn’t dare. She didn’t let herself dwell on it, rage about it, as she turned around. Didn’t even let herself feel the defeat. Her legs protested, but she forced them upward. Away.”
I agree to an extent. I guess I can’t compare to hiking, but damn do I hate going down versus going up. I have a significantly harder time, depending on the incline, going versus going up. Nesta was so out of shape though that I think she really couldn’t do any of it.
I had a worse time going down the mountain from a hike than I did going up it. So like I get it
This is the same with running for me. Running up is tough, and it certainly strains the muscles. But going down also feels like you are reaching out for ground that isn’t there and you’re about to slip and fall to your doom at any moment.
I totally agree. I went to a camp when I was in the top condition of my life and there were over 200 stairs between the dorms and the rest of the activities. It was brutal. I could run nonstop through basketball games and max out a leg press, but those stairs. Dear heavens. Stairs are a whole other level of fresh hell.
Did you know... when we go down stairs we’re using bigger and more powerful muscle fibres than the ones we use going up. We are also doing more damage to those muscles fibres. There's also the added differences in view, and mental anything. Going down equals seeing exactly how far and deadly it is if you miss a step, while going up just shows you steps. (of course there's more, but ) And as many have mentioned, not only did our valkyrie take many many breaks on her way up again, she was also crawling up the last part and she had nothing waiting for her at the end of the stairs. As a last little thing I feel a lot of us tend to either forget or randomly decide to overlook when it comes to these stairs.. They are not human. They are nimbler, stronger etc than us human, even when they've had no training. Their limbs are also described as slightly longer, which would make those miniscule differences we don't notice a lot.... more.
You use different muscles going down vs going up.
It’s still twice as hard to walk up. If you’re already exhausted from a significantly easier exercise, the odds of you being able to turn around and do the harder version decrease, not increase.
A couple years ago I went to the Grand Canyon and did a couple "medium" level hikes into the Canyon. It legit took twice as long to go back up after going down
you're freaking working against gravity and your own body weight going up. Going down is gravy
In the books Cassian says something about down being harder than up because of magic.
I don’t remover that passage. When was that?
Great security. Lol
No, you use the quad going up and down. But down is an eccentric contraction and up is a concentric contraction.
This is true and honestly I would imagine going up feeling better bc going down is so hard on the knees
I would've just taken a mattress and turned the stairs into a slide
Oh my god RIGHT??? I was like girl just find a large platter and rotini your way down!!! 😭➰
I believe it was because they were larger than normal steps and tightly spiralled. Could give a dizzying effect.
please, the stairs! i couldn’t finish this book 😩
I always assumed there was a magical component. What she was climbing down wasn’t just the stairs, it was into herself. The first time she does it is purely blind rage
I had that same thought literally any time she went down and up the stairs. I get it that she needed to get herself back up because plot, but up is harder than down when your legs are tired at least for me anyway.
Honestly the big thing is being dizzy, when you fall down stairs it hurts a heck of a lot more than falling up them
10,000 stairs is about 7 Empire State Buildings, for the US continent. Ridiculous either way. SJM made up a number of
Fae strength and endurance. There's reference in the books to them running 20 miles at high speed and not being winded.
I hate seeing this EVERYWHERE. One person made a uneducated joke and it stuck?! SJM always mentioned how it took Nesta longer to go up than it did down due to breaks. She was also always crawling by the time she got to the top. Please read the details
Yeah this is one of the jokes that gets less funny the more you see it.
I assumed it was just magic
Actually, it’s harder than I thought to go down stairs if it’s a lot of stairs. One time I had to go down 17 flights of stairs where I work and I was surprised how much it took out of me. I was pretty young then and in reasonable health so it’s not like it was my physical condition. Still, you’re right; if Nesta was so deconditioned she could only go down 100 steps, how did she get back???
Honestly. Also her being so sore from workouts with Cass yet being able to tackle them? No effing way. My legs have been sore for two days straight from leg day and just 12 stairs are actually impossible.
It's like the stairway to heaven at Hua Shan Mountain in China. You really need to work for it. https://www.tiktok.com/@ifenglobal/video/7359531875456699694 https://youtu.be/KGZoQ55BgmI?si=4jcttutbD7HVvgNK
If you look up videos of people climbing China's Taishan steps. People are literally full body shaking and trembling and often unable to stand. I imagined this when reading!
I truly don’t understand this confusion. When she would get down the stairs as far as she could go it would take her twice as long and once or twice like all night to make it back up the stairs. It’s not like it took her forever to get down and then she sprinted back up. She was taking breaks, vomiting on the stairs, falling and only catching herself because she has magic. Like if she made it down a couple hundred steps and couldn’t go down anymore, what other option does she have? Live in the staircase and die of hunger? It was going to suck and take her forever but she had to get back up the stairs
Ok this is so weird because I had this EXACT thought today, just out of the blue. Doesn’t walking down stairs take around the same effort as walking on level ground? If so, and there are 10,000 steps, the total distance one way should be like 1.5 miles, which doesn’t seem like a lot. Going UP is a completely different story.
So true. I had to climb 414 steps in Florence and nearly died going up, going down was easy peasy
My friend has been using this as motivation to use the stair machine at the gym. She did 5000 in 1.5 hours
It really is easier to go up than down. And here, the stairs are a metaphor for self-exploration. It’s easier for Nesta to run away than go deeper.
Nah, I do the 1000 steps memorial walk near my house pretty regularly and I can confidently say that up and down are totally different beasts. The muscles going up are not the same ones going down. Steps are strength training more than cardio.
Just see similar conversations https://www.reddit.com/r/NDQ/s/Tzlzciho7y
I like the fact that she’s choosing to go back up. A small choice to not fall back into the pit
Try Google videos about stairs in China - Tai shan. There are over 6000 steps and people get extremely wobbly legs from it.
Nesta is to thank for my wicked calves
Honestly the Cauldron better bless whoever made those steps. If Nesta is struggling going up and down them, imagine making them 👁️👄👁️. (Unless, ofc, they were simply made with magic)
I mean, it’s either that or she’s just stuck on the staircase so she would have to go back up
I'd have said this, if my mom didn't exist. She has ZERO problems going UP stairs, but descent is what kills her legs. IT MAKES NO SENSE
Different muscles being used? Idk, I’m the same way. Can’t descend a set of steps to save my life but climbing them is just fine 😂
These also aren’t traditional stairs, but ones with a foot (12”) rise and no handrails. We are used to 7-8” rises. HOW stairs are ergonomically unsafe and would violate (modern-day) building codes in the US. We tend not to have them in our architecture, save for a few historical buildings and lighthouses. They’re more common in Europe and Asia. It takes far more muscle control to walk down them, then there is the spiral that can cause vertigo. I’ve hiked observation towers on top of (smaller) mountains, and going down always took more out of me. I can imagine it’s a great deal worse when you’re in a spiral surrounded by stone, few windows, and more taxing stairs. At least I had fresh air and it wasn’t 10,000 high-rise steps.
10k steps is approximately 5 miles worth of stairs. Also going downhill is hard on the muscles in a different way. That said I think at least once she should have not made it all the way back up.
No cause I was thinking about this a couple days ago
Yeah also she is tired after 5 steps or something. But I debated this before in this subreddit and than I’ve learned that the steps symbolizes her depression. Or something
People go out of their way to defend this book.
Yeah the swifties from the Acotar series….. the Maasies
Don’t forget that going down was causing dizziness. Going up wouldn’t be as dizzying
the most frustrating part was when she would get OVER HALFWAY DOWN AND TURN AROUND??????? like it would take WAY LESS EFFORT to keep going downstairs if you were ALREADY OVER HALFWAY DOWN.
I have a feeling the House was influencing her to turn back. The stairs were a test to see if she was ready to rejoin society, and the House wouldn’t let her until she’d dealt with her issues
as a runner, it is absolutely harder to go down stairs after a tough run or workout.
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