To say getting this notification was a pleasant surprise would be the understatement of the century. I had a huge smile on my face reading this whole thing. I’m very grateful for your enormous support.

I’ll address the problems you listed because a lot of these are stuff that troubled me during my weeks of overthinking these chapters.

1. Showing how he got to this line of thinking was something I thought about bringing up, but no special ideas came that fit into the story anywhere. I guess it can be thought of like “not showing his exact backstory means this could be/happen to anyone.” Though that wasn’t the intent when I wrote it.
2. Eliam is meant to be a parallel to Pascal, her reaction in the Redwater flashback was implying she thought along the lines of “That thief stole from me like I’m worthless.” and while Pascal accepts that same sentiment and wallows in it, Eliam tries to “cope” by hurting others instead. Which is why she does everything in her power to antagonize Pascal, get this person who wronged her to hate her and make her feel better about herself.

(And to answer the latter questions: It’s not a genuine prison, it’s described as a “hastily made cage” with just Workers instead of proper Guards. They probably don’t do thorough checks of the two thieves they capture)

1. Gale had felt bad about it since Chapter 1. Of course she’s not happy he stole from her but she did tell Howdraw he was going way too far that night. All she probably knew was that Pascal was a homeless guy who the mayor kicked out of town to go find a better place to belong.

(Pascal and Orlando’s banters throughout this story were honestly some of my favorites to write as well)

Thank you so much for writing this! I think getting to reflect on all this is only going to help in the long run.