In the story, Till We Have Faces what is the significance of Orual hearing three chains in the well at night no matter where she went? | Till We Have Faces Questions & Answers

The fate of Orual's true self is bound up with the memory of Psyche. 'One part of me ... said, “Orual dies if she ceases to love Psyche.” But the other said, “Let Orual die. She would never have made a queen.”' 'What was that?' she asks one night when drunk. 'No, not a girl crying in the garden. It was the chains swinging at the well. It would be folly to get up and call again; Psyche, Psyche, my only love... I am the Queen; I'll kill Orual too.' When the sound of the chains continues to remind her disturbingly of Psyche, she walls them up with stone; for a while she dreams she has walled up 'not a well but Psyche (or Orual) herself. But that also passed. I heard Psyche weeping no more. The year after that I defeated Essur.' Forgetting Psyche and becoming submerged in her queenship are the twin aspects of her 'veil'.

1 Answers