Is it Magic, or Just My Sleep Number Bed?

We got a Sleep Number bed installed yesterday. It's the kind with the flexible base, so it bends like the beds in those Sealy Posturepedic commercials of my childhood. We're trying it out at 35, with a teensy bit of head and foot elevation because we both have sore backs from our old mattress.

I slept like an absolute dream. I had several nice dreams, too. I think Benedict Cumberbatch was in one, with the Sherlock hair that I think is so adorable. I know there was a rabbit, too. Easter Bunny, was that you?

Anyway. I woke up and found myself musing sleepily on my Sleep Number baffle-down pillow (haha, yes, my pillow is always baffled) on the titles of the three books in my Seals of the Duelists series. I love Rebel Elements and Traitor Savant, but Master Steelwielder always felt like something was missing. I tried to pin down that je ne sais quoi with the muzzy-headed logic of the newly awake, and in true creative fashion (I get a good half of my story ideas and plot twists during waking or falling asleep), I actually figured it out.

It seems obvious now, but you know what they say about hindsight. "Rebel" and "traitor" share a certain separatist element, but "master" does not. What could I come up with to fit that pattern in the title of the first two books, something that would reflect not only the hero's journey, but the villain's? And then it hit me.

A rebel is against the establishment from the start. A traitor begins on the side of the establishment, then changes his mind. What could I manage to describe that would fit with being for and/or against the establishment, possibly at the same time, or possibly at different times, without giving too much away because that's never fun either, and which could apply to my hero and to my villain simultaneously or alternately in turn during the execution of the plot? (Feel free to tell me that this is too spoilery. According to research, though, we like spoilers.)

The word "prodigal" jumped into my brain. So hard and so fast that I actually swore in amazement, right into my brand new expensive pillow and probably woke up my husband. (Sorry, honey.) Rebel Elements. Traitor Savant. Prodigal Steelwielder. Huzzah! I have a new working title for book three in the Seals of the Duelists series.

Unless I can't find you, or if I forget (thanks, Shrek).