Secrets of the Silent Witch

Episode 7

When it comes down to it, this episode is an exploration into the mindset of teenage bullies. In their minds, Lady Norn and her cohorts see nothing they did as wrong. They're simply getting even for a slight made against them. After all, Lady Norn didn't even push Monica down the stairs—she pushed someone else who then crashed into Monica and made her fall. The fact that she is then blamed by the Prince's right-hand man is both unfair and embarrassing. It was an accident—and it's not like a bastard daughter should be sided with over the trueborn child of a Count anyway.

So Lady Norn and company set up the tea party as they way of balancing the scales. Either they'd get Monica to retract her stance—and in doing so humiliate Ashley for reprimanding them—or make Monica embarrass herself by either being so rude as not to drink the tea or do a spit take. The telling thing is that it never occurred to any of them that Monica might drink it. Moreover, they never considered that the eyedrops they spiked her drink with were effectively belladonna poison—they just thought of the liquid as something too bitter to drink.

On one level, Lady Norn and her friends are just being immature kids. They are so caught up in petty drama, so sure that they are the victims and the true righteous ones in their situation, that they can't see beyond their hurt feelings. They are unable to think things all the way through, as they've never had to learn this skill thanks to their powerful families and sheltered upbringings. So it's at least understandable how things got to this point. But where they mess up is in doubling down on this stance even after learning Monica would have died if not for Claudia being nearby.

Lady Norn insists that what they did was meant to be a prank and nothing more—using that as an excuse to dodge responsibility. Time and again, she is given every opportunity to apologize and accept the blame for her actions, yet she remains clinging to the childhood delusion that intent matters more than actual results.

Because of this, Lady Norn is forced to take real adult responsibility—not kid-style responsibility solved with an apology and a slap on the wrist. Objectively, Lady Norn attempted to murder the daughter of Count Norton, the military protector of the region, an illegitimate child though Monica may be. The result of such a horrendous act is the breaking off of friendly ties between the Norton and Norn territories—leaving Lady Norn's territory defenseless against the dragons and monsters until a force from the capital can be organized and sent. In other words, Lady Norn's petty jealousy and inability to admit being in the wrong have forced her family's lands into crisis—and one that may end with more than a bit of loss of life in addition to now having an enemy for a neighbor. It's extreme comeuppance and a lesson that Lady Norn only learns when it's far too late.

As for Monica's side of the story. The events of her poisoning and its aftermath give us new insight into the source of her trauma and her fanatical obsession with numbers. To Monica, the numbers that run endlessly through her mind—the formulas and theorems—are all that remains of her father. They are proof not only of his life but of his effect on the world. Even after being beaten and abused by her uncle, she holds fast to those numbers. To her, math is love—her love for her father. It is the one thing she cannot—will not—abandon, no matter the pain she has to go through.

All in all, this is a fantastic episode of Secrets of the Silent Witch. While it does little to further the overall royal assassination plot, it uses its setting and characters to explore the actual mindset behind bullying rather than simply calling the bully evil and being done with it—all while fleshing out our main character at the same time. And as for the proper introduction of Claudia, her motives, and her personality, well, that's just the icing on this cake.

Secrets of the Silent Witch is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

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