My theory is that the King of all the lands, the King who Kvothe kills, the Poet King who Ademre guarded for 5 years, the Wizard who created the fae, and the mysterious, educated alchemist who tried to kill the mayor are all the same person:

He is Dena's father, or Dena's Fathers most trusted advisor. He is also Haliax.

Here's my reasoning:

I've been binging the first two books again and a couple things popped up to me that I'm sure you guys probably already figured out, but this my first time here after like a 10 year hiatus from the books. I think a lot of us can agree that one of the main themes of this book is how fate connects all of us together. And how after telling a story 100 times, all the meat is stripped from the story until only fragments of the bones remain. I think the story that the woman mercenary tells about the boy who stole the moon highlights this on purpose.

After finishing the two books and thinking back on them, I found it off putting that Dena, her mysterious powerful patron who values privacy of all else, and the chandrian were all on top of each other but somehow all missed each other.

I also found it weird how in the second book Denna seems to get defensive when Kvothe asked of the Chandrian. It reminded me of how anxious and defensive I get whenever anyone brings up my estranged cult family that I quite literally ran from.

Then I binged read the book the Wizards First Rule (which I love because the rule is that all people are stupid. Even the smartest, diabolical people in the world are stupid because after a while they grow comfortable not being challenged and assume that the fool before them couldn't possibly be a better actor than himself.)

So I wonder if it could really be so obvious that Dena isn't any runaway nobility (as suggested in the second book when when Dena seemed know exactly what the runaway nobility girl had in store for her life if she didn't go back to her castle), but is more than that.

Then I realized that there was only one figure in the entire series that his privacy is sacred as Dennas patron who beat her just to keep his privacy. The same man who killed Kvothes entire family. Haliax.

If I've learned anything after escaping a cult is that the best place to hide is a complete plain sight while everyone forgets just how diabolical and stealthy people can be if they leave their egos and identities out of the equation, having no qualms playing multiple identities to keep their cult running.

Some days it just feels like Patrick Rothfuss is just waiting for the majority of the population to forget about the plot lines of every classic Disney movie (Aladdin) so he can use and people will still be surprised.

He was just about to release the book when they announced the live action remake of Aladdin and he had to start all over! :P