Gideon the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #1)

by Tamsyn Muir

Two is for discipline, heedless of trial; Three for the gleam of a jewel or a smile; Four for fidelity, facing ahead; Five for tradition and debts to the dead; Six for the truth over solace in lies; Seven for beauty that blossoms and dies; Eight for salvation no matter the cost; Nine for the Tomb, and for all that was lost.

When Aiglamene slapped her, it had none of the trembling affrontedness Crux might have slapped her with. She simply backhanded Gideon the way you might hit a barking animal. Gideon’s head was starry with pain. “You forget yourself, Gideon Nav,” her teacher said shortly. “You’re no slave, but you’ll serve the House of the Ninth until the day you die and then thereafter, and you’ll commit no sin of perfidy in my air. The bell was real. Will you come to muster of your own accord, or will you disgrace me?”

The Lady of the Ninth House stood before the drillshaft, wearing black and sneering. Reverend Daughter Harrowhark Nonagesimus had pretty much cornered the market on wearing black and sneering. It comprised 100 percent of her personality. Gideon marvelled that someone could live in the universe only seventeen years and yet wear black and sneer with such ancient self-assurance.

The enthroned Lord and Lady should have taken charge of the sacred ritual, but they couldn’t, because they were mega-dead. Harrowhark had handily gotten around this by giving them a vow of silence. Every year she added to their penitents’ vows—of fasting, of daily contemplation, of seclusion—so blandly and barefacedly that it seemed inevitable that someone would eventually say hang on a minute, this sounds like … A LOAD OF HOT GARBAGE, and she’d be found out. But she never was. Crux covered for her, and so did Aiglamene, and the Lord’s cavalier had helpfully decided to die the day that Priam died. And so Gideon covered too, hating every moment, saving up this last secret in the hopes that with it she could extort her freedom.

On Gideon

Gideon said, with difficulty: “What—about—the shuttle?” “Oh, Ortus and his mother stole it,” said Harrowhark. “They must be gone already. She still has family back on the Eighth, and she thinks they’ll take them in.” At her expression, Harrow laughed: “You make it so easy, Griddle. You always do.”

I wanted to wait … for the very moment when you thought you’d gotten away … to take it from you.” Gideon could only manage, “Why?” The girl’s expression was the same as it was on the day that Gideon had found her parents, dangling from the roof of their cell. It was blank and white and still. “Because I completely fucking hate you,” said Harrowhark, “no offence.”

By way of hello she said, “Fuck you,” and switched to push-ups. “Stop sulking, Griddle.” “Go choke on a dick.” “I have work for you,” said Harrowhark.

“Nonagesimus,” she said slowly, “the only job I’d do for you would be if you wanted someone to hold the sword as you fell on it. The only job I’d do for you would be if you wanted your ass kicked so hard, the Locked Tomb opened and a parade came out to sing, ‘Lo! A destructed ass.’ The only job I’d do would be if you wanted me to spot you while you backflipped off the top tier into Drearburh.” “That’s three jobs,” said Harrowhark. “Die in a fire, Nonagesimus.”

While we were developing common sense, she studied the blade. Am I right, Griddle?”

Breaking the spell, Aiglamene roughly shouldered the leather case into Gideon’s arms, slapping it there before stalking back the way that Harrow had left them. “Then you hurry up. If I’m to turn you into the Ninth’s cavalier, I needed to start six years ago.”

Gideon held her mouth closed and, once Harrow was done, said: “I object to illiterate.” “Pinup rags aren’t literature, Nav.” “I read them for the articles.”

Gideon turned away, not meaning to make any kind of goodbye; but she saw Aiglamene, hand crooked into a stiff salute, and realised for the first time that she might never see the woman again. God help her, she might never come back. For a moment everything seemed dizzyingly unsure.

Visible even up here were the floating chains of squares and rectangles and oblongs, smudging the blue with grey and green, brown and black: the tumbled-down cities and temples of a House both long dead and unkillable. A sleeping throne. Far away its king and emperor sat on his seat of office and waited, a sentinel protecting his home but never able to return to it. The Lord of the House of the First was the Lord Undying, and he had not come back in over nine thousand years.

The man who’d put the sword to her neck was uncomfortably buff. He had upsetting biceps. He didn’t look healthy; he looked like a collection of lemons in a sack.

“But now I can thank you for your aid. I’m Lady Dulcinea Septimus, duchess of Castle Rhodes; and this is my cavalier primary, Protesilaus the Seventh. The Seventh House thanks you for your gracious assistance.”

If you do not find yourself a galaxy, it is not so bad to find yourself a star, nor to have the Emperor know that the both of you attempted this great ordeal.

Nooooo, Magnus, don’t mention me,” hissed that dreadful teen.)

Sparring may be the meat of a fighter’s training, but you’ve got to have some—well—vegetables and potatoes?” (“Magnus. Potatoes are a vegetable, Magnus.”)

“This calls for rigor, Nav.” “Maybe rigor … mortis,” said Gideon, who assumed that puns were funny automatically.

“Surprise, my tenebrous overlord!” said Gideon. “Ghosts and you might die is my middle name.”

You’re going out there to be my eyes.” “What?” “My skeletons don’t have photoreceptors, Nav,” the necromancer said calmly. “I know they’re being destroyed with blunt force. I have no idea what by, and I need to keep my hand on the thanergetic lock. You have perfectly functional eye jelly; you have a dubious but capable brain; you’re going to stand out there and look through the window. Got it?”

There was nothing objectionable to this role, which was why Gideon was automatically suspicious of it. But she said, “As you wish, my lamentable queen,”

“The arms kind of looked like swords. I want to fight it.” “You want to fight it.” “Yep.” “Because it looked … a little like swords.” “Yop.”

LADY ABIGAIL PENT AND SIR MAGNUS QUINN

It was two people, so gruesomely entangled in each other’s broken limbs that they looked like they had died embracing. They hadn’t, of course: it was just the way their back-to-front limbs had arranged themselves in untidy death.

She’d known before Harrow had rolled him over that before them lay the sad, crumpled corpse of Magnus Quinn, jumbled up with the sad, crumpled corpse of Abigail Pent.

And right after their party, that's so sad.

It was a surprise when Camilla raised her voice to say: “Teacher. This is an active investigation. We’re safe down here.” “You are absolutely wrong,” said Teacher. “Poor Abigail and Magnus are dead already. I cannot guarantee the safety of any of you who remain down there another minute.”

“Judith!” said Corona, more coaxingly, before an interhousal war kicked off. “This is us. You’ve come to all our birthday parties. Teacher’s right. Who would have killed Magnus and Abigail? Neither of them would have ever hurt a fly.

“You have one black eye already, courtesy of the Seventh House,” said Harrow, “and you seem to yearn for symmetry.”

“I am also in possession of one,” she said, unruffled. “What?” She did not lose composure. “Don’t act the jilted lover, Babs.” “You never said a damned word!” “You didn’t keep your eyes on your key ring.” “Ianthe Tridentarius,” said her cavalier, “you are—you’re—Corona, why didn’t you tell me?” Corona stopped him, one slender hand on his shoulder. She was looking at her twin, who calmly avoided her gaze. “Because I didn’t know,” she said lightly, chair scraping as she rose to stand. “I didn’t know either, Babs. I’m going to bed now—I think—I’m somewhat overwrought.”

“I believe you,” said Jeannemary thickly, not seeming to register the fact that the Ninth had spoken. “Magnus likes you … liked … He wouldn’t have let anything happen to Abigail,” she added all in a rush. “She hated heights. She never would’ve risked falling. And she was a spirit magician. If it was ghosts, why couldn’t she—”

We have a door to open.” “Yes, tomorrow morning after at least eight hours’ sleep,” Gideon suggested without hope. “An admirable attempt at comedy in these trying times,” said Harrowhark. “Let’s go.”

ut we all know the sad + trying realit is that this will remain incomplete t the last. He can’t fix my deficiencies her ease give Gideon my congratulations, howev

Maybe it’s that I find the idea comforting … that thousands of years after you’re gone … is when you really live. That your echo is louder than your voice.”

“I never thought you’d actually help out,” said Gideon, grudgingly admiring. “Are you dim,” hissed Harrow. “If we didn’t agree, that bleeding heart Sextus would, and he’d have the key.” “Oh, whoops, my bad,” said Gideon. “For a moment I thought you weren’t a huge bitch.”

“Ha-ha,” said Gideon, “first time you didn’t call me Griddle,” and died.

“Nav,” said Harrow, with the slow deliberation of someone close to screaming, “stay quiet. You’re not—you’re not … entirely well. I underestimated how long it would take me. The field was vicious, much more so than Septimus communicated. It had started to strip the moisture from my eyeballs before I refined on the fly.” “By which point it had eaten your underwear,” said Gideon. “Nav.” “I just had a near-death experience,” she said, “let me have my little moment.”

“The Eighth is both determined and dangerous.” “Protesilaus the Seventh is uncomfortably hench, though. She’s not alone.” Camilla spoke up: “The man’s a glorified orderly. His hand’s never on his rapier. First instinct’s to punch, and he moves like a sleepwalker.” “Just bear witness,” said Palamedes. “Just—keep her in mind.”

“Poor dumb kids,” Gideon said, all of four years their elder. “Do you think so?” said Palamedes, surprising her. “I don’t. I often find myself wondering how dangerous they really are.”

Rightly so

In the newfound dimness Gideon took off her glasses and nodded. Her hood fell back, sliding down in heavy folds of black to her shoulders. The exquisite eyes of the necromancer of the Third were upon her, and the doleful expression turned into a radiant smile, violet eyes crinkling up at the corners with the hugeness of the grin. “Why, Gideon the Ninth!” she exclaimed, mourning banished. “You’re a ginger!”

Everyone else—the Second House with their brass buttons; the twins of the Third and their now-bouffant cavalier; the Fourth teenagers, gimlet eyed; and the Fifth asleep forever in the mortuary; the Sixth in grey and the mismatched Eighth; and the Ninth, with Harrow roused and tight lipped in her spare habit—was accounted for.

Harrowhark said, in the exact sepulchral tones of Marshal Crux: “Death first to vultures and scavengers.”

“Oh, could’ve … should’ve,” she said. “You can could have and should have yourself back into last week … back into the womb. I could have kept Pro by my side, or I should have gone with him. I can go back and make things happen perfectly if I just think about what I should have or could have done. But I didn’t … you didn’t … that’s the way it is.” “I can’t bear it,” said Gideon honestly. “It’s just such crap.”

“Life is a tragedy,” said Dulcinea. “Left behind by those who pass away, not able to change anything at all.

“It’s the Third I’m least certain of. I don’t know which twin to watch out for.” “The big one,” said Harrow, without hesitation. Gideon was pretty sure both twins were the same size, and was surprised to discover that even the anatomist’s gaze of Harrowhark Nonagesimus was not immune to the radiance coming off Princess Corona. “They’re both only middling necromancers, but the big one is the dominant. She says I; the sister says we.” “Honestly a good point. Still not sure. Meet me tomorrow night and we’ll start the theorem exchange, Ninth. I’ve got to think.”

I’m sorry, I don’t hate you, I just kind of hate me right now.

With numb fingers, Gideon removed the severed head of Protesilaus the Seventh.

Oh shit

“What would you do if you discovered Camilla was a murderer?” “Help her bury the body,” said Palamedes promptly. “Sextus.” “I mean it. If Camilla wants someone dead,” he said, “then far be it from me to stand in her way. All I can do at that point is watch the bloodshed and look for a mop. One flesh, one end, and all that.”

“Because I killed her parents,” said Gideon.

Excuse me

“I have tried to dismantle you, Gideon Nav! The Ninth House poisoned you, we trod you underfoot—I took you to this killing field as my slave—you refuse to die, and you pity me! Strike me down. You’ve won. I’ve lived my whole wretched life at your mercy, yours alone, and God knows I deserve to die at your hand. You are my only friend. I am undone without you.”