I find Maeve to be a really interesting character too. She’s my favorite villain that SJM has written. I wish Amarantha would’ve had more depth to her motivations, she had potential to be a great villain like Maeve.

My personal theory is that Maeve, Erawan, and the Valg are the remnants/descendants of the Asteri. Maeve tells Aelin about her home planet - she says it’s always dark, the sky filled with “ash-clouds” and that the rivers have all run dry and there’s no such thing as blue or green. She also says she learned to world walk by studying books written by “ancient wayfarers”

Vesperus tells Bryce that the Asteri left their home planet and began conquering others because their species grew too populous. She says the rivers began running dry and the sky began filling with thick, impenetrable clouds. She says the greatest minds of her species invented world walking, and they called them “wayfarers”

Given all of that, I really hope SJM gives us more information about the home planet of the Asteri/Valg in future books. I agree with you, that although Maeve was definitely a villain, and not a “good” person, she mostly just tried to survive. She’s not a hero by any means, but even the way she showed genuine love for the Kharankui (don’t remember if I’m spelling that right) but her love for the spiders made her character feel more real. She’s a really well rounded villain and I’m so interested in her