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Gideon Nav packed her sword, her shoes, and her dirty magazines,
Priorities
soupy white
Excuse me???
Whenever Gideon had been made to go through those doors as a kid, she’d screamed like she was dying.
Yeah, that's terrifying
“You’re no slave, but you’ll serve the House of the Ninth until the day you die
...so a slave?
she was taken as a very small bondswoman, not of the Ninth but beholden to it: What greater debt could be accrued than that of being brought up?
At that time, the tiny Ninth House boasted two hundred children between infancy and nineteen years of age, and Gideon was numbered two hundred and first. Less than two years later, Gideon Nav would be one of only three children left: herself, a much older boy, and the infant heir of the Ninth House, daughter of its lord and lady.
Gideon’s appeals to better natures, financial rewards, moral obligations, outlined plans, and simple attempts to run away numbered eighty-six by the time she was eighteen. She’d started when she was four.
“First objection: the Cohort won’t enlist an unreleased serf, you know.” “I faked your signature on the release form,” said Gideon. “But a single word from me and you’re brought back in cuffs.” “You’ll say nothing.” Harrowhark ringed two fingers around one wrist and slowly worked the hand up and down. “It’s a cute story, but badly characterised,”
Oh i'm invested already
“I completely fucking hate you, because you are a hideous witch from hell. No offence.” There was a pause. “Oh, Griddle!” said Harrow pityingly, in the silence. “But I don’t even remember about you most of the time.”
raaaahhhhhhh, banter is so hot
They stared at each other. There was a lopsided smile tugging at Gideon’s mouth, unsuppressed, and looking at it made Harrowhark’s expression slide into something even moodier and more petulant.
Kiss
butt-touched nun,”
I'm stealing this
This close, Gideon could see the red starbursts at the corners of her eyes, the pink smears of someone who hadn’t slept all night.
in some far-off way Gideon had always known that this would be how she went: gangbanged to death by skeletons.
Awesomeeeeeee
If she’d been stuck being Harrow’s parents she would have done the same years ago.
Right right
Gideon was grinning so hugely that her split lips recommenced bleeding.
Hot
You couldn’t spell obligation if I shoved the letters up your ass.”
pleaseeee
Gideon had never confronted a broken heart before. She had never gotten far enough to have her heart broken.
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.”
HOT
“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.
“How the world would suffer without your wit,” said Harrowhark blandly.
“And that is why you, Griddle,” said the Lady, “are to act as cavalier primary of the House of the Ninth. You will accompany me to the First House as I study to become a Lyctor. You’ll be my personal guard and companion, dutiful and loyal, and uphold the sacred name of this House and its people.”
“Come on, Nav,” she said, and her voice was alight.
I'd cave
“It won’t be the last time I make you weep.”
gay panic
“How is it settled. I have patently not agreed to this shit.”
“I haven’t agreed to stone cold dick,”
Iconic
She tried to turn Gideon’s face up to hers by force, fingers grasping beneath the chin, but Gideon promptly bit her.
Kiss x 2
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.
“Do you want,” Gideon whispered huskily, “my hanky.” “I want to watch you die.” “Maybe, Nonagesimus,” she said with deep satisfaction, “maybe. But you sure as hell won’t do it here.”
RAAAAHHHHH
“Your dead mummified mother’s got ridiculous hair.”
NOT THE YO DEAD MAMA JOKE
The boy just looked a bit of a dick.
Don't they all?
They might have been a woman and might have been a man and might have been neither.
mouth puckered up like a cat’s asshole.
AWESOME COMPARISON
Fix your face, idiot.
To clarify, anybody is a word that refers to any person alive or dead.
“Your parents must have been so relieved to die.”
Ouch
Gideon was genuinely surprised to find that she was shy, and more still to find she was relieved by Harrow’s diktat against talking. Gideon Nav, absolutely goddamn starved of any contact with people who didn’t have dark missals and advanced osteoporosis, should’ve yearned to talk. But she found that she couldn’t imagine a single thing to say.
Good going, dickhead! thought Gideon, straightening up. It’s a mirror.
Gideon went to the chair and fiddled with the fastening, immediately emasculated by the difficulty of working out a simple chair-latch.
“I know that you’re doing penance and can’t talk, so you don’t have to figure out how to tell me through charades.” Gideon’s eyebrows shot up over her sunglasses’ rims before she could stop them. “Oh, yes,” said the girl, dimpling. “You’re not the first Ninth nun I’ve ever met. I’ve often thought it must be so hard being a brother or sister of the Locked Tomb.
At the juxtaposition of Gideon with obedient many people would have rocked with laughter and gone on chuckling and gurgling for quite some time.
It made Gideon’s cheeks flare, despite her mental reproach to Slow down, Nav, slow down.
Me core
“Indulge me. Lots of people do … but I want you to.”
“I hope we talk again soon.”
he was a little afraid of her.
In the aperture before the tiled room, a cloaked figure stood: skull-painted, a veil pushed down to the neck, a hood obscuring the face. Gideon stood in the centre of the training room, and for a second that emasculated minutes, she and Harrowhark looked at each other.
Harrow had been prevented from coming home for reasons, e.g., that (i) She was dead; (ii) She was too impaired; (iii) She was busy. 2. Harrow had chosen to live elsewhere, leaving Gideon free to put her shoes on Harrow’s bed and indiscriminately rifle through all her things. 3. Harrow had run away.
She yearned to talk, beginning with: How did you do a little flip like that? but the necro brought her up short with: “You’re here about Nonagesimus, aren’t you?”
“She was down there last night too and, if I’m correct, never surfaced. Her blood’s on the floor down there.” Because necromancers lived bad lives, he added: “To clarify. Her intravenous blood. Her intravenous blood.” At this clarification, a very strange thing happened to Gideon Nav. She had already exhausted neurons, cortisol, and adrenaline, and now her body started moving before her head or her heart did; she strode past the boy and yanked so hard on the top of the hatch that it damn near broke her wrists.
He had the eyes of a very beautiful person, trapped in resting bitch face.
“Then get off your ass and help me,” said Gideon Nav.
