What This Theme Explores
The theme of Fate and Reincarnation is the engine driving the narrative of Fallen. It explores the idea that love can be a force so powerful it transcends lifetimes, eternally binding souls. For Lucinda "Luce" Price and Daniel Grigori, this isn't a romantic ideal, but a tragic curse. They are destined to find each other in every life, fall in love, and then face a catastrophic end. Reincarnation is the mechanism of this curse, forcing Luce into a cycle of rebirth without memory, while Daniel is condemned to remember every moment and every loss. The theme explores the tension between a predetermined destiny and the hope of breaking a tragic cycle.
How It Develops
The theme of Fate and Reincarnation unfolds gradually, starting as a subtle mystery and building to a supernatural revelation. Luce's journey is one of awakening to a past she instinctively feels but cannot consciously recall.
Initially, the theme is introduced through mystery and déjà vu. The prologue depicts a past life in 1854, where Daniel is acutely aware of a repeating tragedy, while the woman he loves is oblivious. When Luce arrives at Sword & Cross, she feels an immediate, inexplicable connection to Daniel, establishing their fated bond before she understands it.
As the story progresses, concrete clues about their shared past begin to surface. Luce's recurring dreams and Daniel's cryptic remarks hint at a shared history. The discovery of a 19th-century photograph in The Watchers, depicting people who look exactly like them, provides the first tangible evidence that their connection spans lifetimes.
The theme culminates in Daniel's revelation of their curse: they meet every seventeen years, fall in love, and Luce dies the moment she learns his true identity and recalls their past. This lifetime is different because Luce was not baptized, creating a loophole in their fate. The focus shifts from what is happening to how they can change their destiny.
Key Examples
Specific moments throughout the book build upon the theme, moving from subtle hints to explicit confirmation.
- The Prologue (Helston, 1854): The novel opens with a direct depiction of a past life, establishing the predetermined, tragic nature of their fate. Daniel's knowledge of the repeating cycle is clear, as is his desperation to change the outcome.
He had let things go too far, hoping this time would be different... A cold chill spread through him as he realized that her discovery—the exposure of his feelings—would destroy her. He should have been more careful. It always began like this.
- Luce's First Impression of Daniel: Upon arriving at Sword & Cross, Luce's reaction to Daniel is not one of simple attraction but of deep, unsettling familiarity, the first sign of her soul's memory.
When Daniel’s eyes held hers, her breath caught in her throat. She recognized him from somewhere. But she would have remembered meeting someone like him. She would have remembered feeling as absolutely shaken up as she did right now.
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Daniel's Slips of the Tongue: Burdened by his eternal memory, Daniel occasionally lets his knowledge of their past slip through, creating moments of confusion for Luce and clues for the reader.
- During detention in the cemetery, Luce cracks her knuckles, and Daniel instinctively reacts: "I hate it when you do that." His comment implies a long history of witnessing this habit, something impossible if they had just met.
- At the lake, he begins to say, "But you were always..." before catching himself and creating a clumsy excuse. This reveals his constant struggle to conceal the truth of their many lives together.
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The Final Revelation: The theme culminates in Daniel's heart-wrenching explanation of their shared curse, listing their past lives together across history.
"You knew it when I hid in your cellar during the tsar’s purge of St. Petersburg. When I scaled the turret of your castle in Scotland during the Reformation, and danced you around and around at the king’s coronation ball at Versailles... You turn up everywhere, always, and sooner or later you sense all the things I’ve just told you."
Character Connections
The theme of Fate and Reincarnation is central to the identity and motivations of several key characters.
Lucinda "Luce" Price is the unwitting participant in the cycle. Her journey is defined by her subconscious struggle to remember her past, manifesting as an unexplainable pull toward Daniel and persistent feelings of déjà vu. These feelings drive her to uncover the truth behind their connection.
Daniel Grigori is the tragic anchor of this theme. Cursed with immortality and perfect memory, he is fated to watch the love of his life die again and again. His initial hostility toward Luce is a desperate attempt to fight their destiny and protect her from the fatal consequences of their love.
Miss Sophia Bliss serves as a crucial, albeit deceptive, source of information about the mechanics of their fate. She reveals that Luce's lack of baptism in this life has altered the rules of reincarnation, creating the possibility of breaking the cycle. Her knowledge underscores the fact that their fate is part of a larger, ancient conflict.
Cameron "Cam" Briel is also aware of the recurring romance between Luce and Daniel. His efforts to woo Luce are a direct attempt to interfere with their fated bond, suggesting that their destiny is a known quantity in the supernatural world and a point of contention in the war between angels and demons.
Symbolism
Lauren Kate uses several powerful symbols to represent the cyclical and predetermined nature of Luce and Daniel's story.
The cemetery, the setting for many pivotal moments, symbolizes death, memory, and the past. It physically represents the countless lives Luce has lost and the history that haunts her and Daniel. It is a place where their past is buried, yet also where the truth of their reincarnation begins to emerge.
During their picnic, Cam shows Luce a snake molting, a direct visual metaphor for reincarnation. The shedding of an old form to continue life anew foreshadows the revelation of Luce's own cycle of death and rebirth.
The dark, menacing Announcers that have haunted Luce her whole life symbolize the supernatural forces tied to her tragic fate. Their increased presence at Sword & Cross signifies that this lifetime is a critical juncture and that her destiny is coming to a head.
Contemporary Relevance
The theme of Fate and Reincarnation resonates deeply with modern audiences. The idea of a destined love—a soulmate you are meant to find across time and space—is a popular fantasy in contemporary romance and media. Fallen takes this concept and gives it a dark, tragic twist, exploring the potential pain and suffering of a love that is fated but also doomed. On a metaphorical level, the struggle to break free from a repeating, destructive pattern is a universally relatable experience, whether escaping toxic relationships, bad habits, or generational trauma. The ancient philosophical debate over how much of our lives is predetermined versus how much is within our control remains a compelling topic, examined through a supernatural lens, asking whether destiny is an unbreakable law or a path that can be altered.