More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
DRAMATIS PERSONAE In Order of House Appearance The Ninth House Keepers of the Locked Tomb, House of the Sewn Tongue, the Black Vestals Harrowhark Nonagesimus HEIR TO THE HOUSE OF THE NINTH, REVEREND DAUGHTER OF DREARBURH Pelleamena Novenarius HER MOTHER, REVEREND MOTHER OF DREARBURH Priamhark Noniusvianus HER FATHER, REVEREND FATHER OF DREARBURH Ortus Nigenad CAVALIER PRIMARY TO THE HEIR Crux MARSHAL OF THE HOUSE OF THE NINTH Aiglamene CAPTAIN OF THE GUARD OF THE NINTH Sister Lachrimorta NUN OF THE LOCKED TOMB Sister Aisamorta NUN OF THE LOCKED TOMB Sister Glaurica NUN OF THE LOCKED TOMB Some
...more
AND THE PRIESTHOOD OF CANAAN HOUSE The Second House The Emperor’s Strength, House of the Crimson Shield, the Centurion’s House Judith Deuteros HEIR TO THE HOUSE OF THE SECOND, RANKED CAPTAIN OF THE COHORT Marta Dyas CAVALIER PRIMARY TO THE HEIR, RANKED FIRST LIEUTENANT OF THE COHORT The Third House Mouth of the Emperor, the Procession, House of the Shining Dead Coronabeth Tridentarius HEIR TO THE HOUSE OF THE THIRD, CROWN PRINCESS OF IDA Ianthe Tridentarius HEIR TO THE HOUSE OF THE THIRD, PRINCESS OF IDA Naberius Tern CAVALIER PRIMARY TO THE HEIRS, PRINCE OF IDA The Fourth House Hope of the
...more
The Sixth House The Emperor’s Reason, the Master Wardens Palamedes Sextus HEIR TO THE HOUSE OF THE SIXTH, MASTER WARDEN OF THE LIBRARY Camilla Hect CAVALIER PRIMARY TO THE HEIR, WARDEN’S HAND OF THE LIBRARY The Seventh House Joy of the Emperor, the Rose Unblown Dulcinea Septimus HEIR TO THE HOUSE OF THE SEVENTH, DUCHESS OF RHODES Protesilaus Ebdoma CAVALIER PRIMARY TO THE HEIR, KNIGHT OF RHODES The Eighth House Keepers of the Tome, the Forgiving House Silas Octakiseron HEIR TO THE HOUSE OF THE EIGHTH, MASTER TEMPLAR OF THE WHITE GLASS Colum
Asht CAVALIER PRIMARY TO THE HEIR, TEMPLAR OF THE WHITE GLASS
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 writig is so sick
She charged. It was too late. Next to the drifts of dirt and stone that she had carefully kicked apart, skeletons burst out of the hard earth where they had been hastily interred. Hands erupted from little pockets in the ground, perfect, four-fingered and thumbed; Gideon, stupid with assumption, kicked them off and careened sideways. She ran. It didn’t matter: every five feet—every five goddamned feet—bones burst from the ground, grasping her boots, her ankles, her trousers. She staggered away, desperate to find the limits of the field: there were none. The floor of the drillshaft was erupting
...more
Literally sounds so cool
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
“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.”
between disgust and desolation. “What are you doing with your other hand?” Gideon compensated. “No! Oh, Lord. Put that down until I formally show you how.” “The sword and the powder,” said Harrowhark eagerly. “The sword and the knuckle, my lady,” said Aiglamene. “I’m dropping my expectations substantially.” Gideon said, “I still have absolutely not agreed to any of this.” The
Im dead haha
There was something urgent in her voice: something worried, something new. “Things
are changing. I used to think we were waiting for something … and now I think we’re just waiting to die.” Gideon’s heart sagged. “You really want me to say yes.” “Go on and say no,” said her captain. “It’s your choice … If she doesn’t take you, I’ll go with her and gladly. But she knows … and I know … and I think you damn well know … that if you don’t get out now, you won’t even get out in a box.” “So what happens if I agree?” 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
...more
“That,” said the Reverend Daughter, “is the implication.” “For crying out loud! Then let me dress how I want and give me back my longsword.” “Ten thousand years of tradition, Griddle.” “I don’t have ten thousand years of tradition, bitch,” said Gideon, “I have ten years of two-hander training and a minor allergy to face paint. I’m worth so much less to you with pizza face and a toothpick.” The Reverend Daughter’s fingers locked together, thumbs rotating in languid circles. She did not disagree. “Ten thousand years of tradition,” she said slowly, “dictates that the Ninth House should have been
...more
This highlight has been truncated due to consecutive passage length restrictions.
Damn
you look just right then perhaps they won’t ask you any tricky questions. They may not discover that the cavalier of the House of the Ninth is an illiterate peon. Hold your mouth closed.”
“Oh, this is boring,” Gideon had said in disappointment. “I wanted one with a skull puking another, smaller skull, and other skulls flying all around. But tasteful, you know?”
“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.”
Of all things to say im dead hahah
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.
“Hood up,” breathed Harrowhark, “hide that ridiculous hair.” “Your dead mummified mother’s got ridiculous hair.” “Griddle, we’re within the planet’s halo now, and I will delight in violence.” A final, thuddering clunk. Complete stillness. The seals on the outside were unlatched by some outside force, and as light blazed around the edges of the hatch, Gideon winked at her increasingly agitated companion. She said, sotto voce: “But then you couldn’t have admired … these,” and whipped on the glasses she’d unearthed back home. They were ancient smoked-glass sunglasses, with thin black frames and
...more
I fucking love gideon i swear to god
Protesilaus did not deign to reply, his gaze fixed on Gideon. In the awkward silence that resulted, the girl added: “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.”
a word about what Gideon had done. “A blood flaw runs through the ruling House of the Seventh,” was all he said, “sparing most who carry the gene … but fatal to a few.” Harrowhark asked, “Teacher, was the Lady Septimus so diagnosed?” “Dulcinea Septimus was not meant to live to twenty-five,” said the little priest. “Come along, come along
Aww no
They might have been a woman and might have been a man and might have been neither.
Love that line!!!!
“I will not tell you what you already know,” said the little priest. “I seek only to add context. The Lyctors were not born immortal. They were given eternal life, which is not at all the same thing. Sixteen of them came here a myriad ago, eight adepts and the eight who would later be known as the first cavaliers, and it was here that they ascended. Those eight necromancers were first after the Lord of Resurrection; they have spread his assumption across the blackness of space, to those places where others could never reach. Each of them alone is more powerful than nine Cohorts acting as one.
...more
If you ascend to Lyctor, or if you try and fail—the Kindly Lord knows what is being asked of you is titanic. You are the honoured heirs and guardians of the eight Houses. Great duties await you. 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. “Or the all of you,” added the little priest brightly, nodding at the twins and their sullen-ass cavalier with a flash of amusement, “as the case may be. Cavaliers, if your adept is found wanting, you have failed! If you are found wanting, your
...more
Teacher said: “This is not a pilgrimage where your safety is assured. You will undergo trials, possibly dangerous ones. You will work hard, you will suffer. I must speak candidly—you may even die … But I see no reason not to hope that I may behold eight new Lyctors by the end of this, joined together with their cavaliers, heir to a joy and power that has sung through ten thousand years.”
Don’t talk to anybody. “Guess I won’t talk to … any body,” said Gideon, but then read on: I have taken the ring. “Harrow,” Gideon bellowed, impotently, and slapped her hands down into her pockets. The ring was gone. There was no mistake greater or stupider than to let Harrowhark Nonagesimus at you when you were in any way vulnerable; she should have booby-trapped the threshold.
Gideon said aloud, “Your parents must have been so relieved to die.”
IM SCREAMING
A weird relief was carved above the lintel, set within a moulded panel. Gideon’s boots echoed down the shiny stone tiles as she came closer to see. The relief was five little circles joined with lines, in no pattern that Gideon recognised. Below this sat a solid stone beam with carved leaves swagged horizontally from one end to the other.
The curl was let go with a visual sproing. “Ianthe, don’t make me cross.” “Please don’t be cross,” said her sister. “You know your brain can only deal with one emotion at a time.”
HAHAHAH FUCK THAT WAS GOOD
“This is not a clever path to start down,” she said softly. “I would not attract attention from the necromancer of the Third House.”
The fuck does that mean ???
Gideon had spent too long in the depths of Drearburh not to know when to, put scientifically, get outie. It was not the first time she had received that look. Sister Lachrimorta had looked at her that way almost exclusively, and Sister Lachrimorta was blind. The only difference in the way that Crux had looked at her was that Crux had managed also to encapsulate a complete lack of surprise, as though she already had managed to disappoint his lowest expectations.
Gideon had a million questions. Like: Your kind? And: Why do you have such a baby uncle, one the colour of mayonnaise? And: Is “your kind” people who aren’t nephews and who have middle fingers? But
Im dead
But you got a lot of information by being silent and watching. The Second House acted like soldiers on unwilling leave. The Third revolved around Corona like two chunks of ice about a golden star. The Fourth clustered by the Fifth’s skirts like ducklings—the Fifth necromancer turned out to be a fresh-faced woman in her mid-thirties with thick glasses and a mild smile, who looked about as much the part as a farmer’s wife. The Sixth and Seventh were perennially absent, ghosts. The Eighth’s creepy uncle–creepy nephew duo she saw seldom, but even seldom was more than enough: the Eighth necromancer
...more
Not for Gideon a security detail on one of the holding planets, either on a lonely outpost on an empty world or in some foreign city babysitting some Third governor. Gideon wanted a drop ship—first on the ground—a fat shiny medal saying INVASION FORCE ON WHATEVER, securing the initial bloom of thanergy without which the finest necromancer of the Nine Houses could not fight worth a damn. The front line of the Cohort facilitated glory. In her comic books, necromancers kissed the gloved palms of their front-liner comrades in blessed thanks for all that they did. In the comic books none of these
...more
Wait what does gideon have heart disease or am i just dumb??
After two silent, ironed-out days of exploring and squats, Gideon did not exactly get bored. It took a hell of a lot more to bore a denizen of the House of the Ninth. It was a lack of change at the microscopic level that made her suspicious: one morning she realised that the rumples on Harrow’s bed and the top layer of black clothes in the laundry hamper had not changed for over twenty-four hours. Two nights had passed without Harrow sleeping in the Ninth quarters, or changing out of dirty clothes, or refreshing her paint. Gideon cogitated:
What is harrow doing??
if it was murder, what if the murderer was, like, weird, which would make their subsequent marriage to Gideon pretty awkward? Maybe they could just swap friendship bracelets.
Gideon shook her head so emphatically no that she was surprised her hood didn’t fall off. The cavalier’s face was turned toward him, expressionless, waiting. The young man strummed his fingers together before coming to some unknown decision. “Well, you’re cutting it fine,” he said abruptly. He pulled his thick, nerdy spectacles off his long nose and shook them as though wicking them free of something. “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.
...more
This cocoon-looking thing was about the size of a person, if that person wasn’t particularly tall. Before Palamedes and Camilla could stop her, Gideon strode up to it and gave it an enormous kick. Osseous matter showered one side of the cubicle, tinkling away as the spell broke into the oily grey ash of cremains. Curled up inside—hands bloodied, paint smeared, the skin beneath it the same oily grey as the cremains—was Harrowhark Nonagesimus.
Holy shit wtf
“You’re not very good at I’m Asking the Questions Now, Bitch, are you,” said Gideon. “This is going somewhere. Answer me.” Gideon resented the answer me, but she begrudgingly cast her mind back through a montage of rotting furniture, assholes, and astringent tea. “Teacher?” she said. “Uh—the door thing. We weren’t to go through any locked door.” “More specifically, we weren’t to go through a locked door without permission. The old man’s a pain in the neck, but he was giving us a clue—take a look at this.”
“I’ve divided Canaan House into its three most significant levels, but that’s not quite accurate. The central floor is more of a mezzanine providing access to the top and bottom floors. The terraces are sections in and of themselves, but they’re not important for what I’m identifying here. Each X denotes a door. Current count is seven hundred and seventy-five, and Griddle—only six are locked. The first two hundred doors I identified—” “You spent this whole time counting doors?” “This calls for rigor, Nav.” “Maybe rigor … mortis,” said Gideon, who assumed that puns were funny automatically.
“The first two hundred doors I identified,” Harrow repeated, through gritted teeth, “included the access hatch to the lower area of Canaan House. My method was to start at the bottom and go up as far as I could from a static starting point. There are two lock-points here, at X-22 and X-155. X-155 is the hatch, X-22 is another door. I went to Teacher and asked permission to enter both. He agreed to let me through the hatch if I could provide a safe place for the key, but said that X-22 didn’t belong to him and that he couldn’t in good conscience give permission. All the while he was winking at
...more
“A head start,” said her necromancer, “is the only advantage one can claim by choice. My other advantage is in workforce. In this case I’m fairly sure that Sextus started a mere two hours after me, and that Eighth House zealot not long after.”
Damn
“It’s very old,” Harrow said, quietly, more to herself than to Gideon. “Considerably older than the rest of Canaan House. It’s pre-Resurrection—or made to look pre-Resurrection, which is just as curious. I know Sextus is obsessed with dating the structure, but as usual, he’s getting caught up in the details. What’s important is the function.” “So what was it for?” Harrow said, “If I knew that, I’d be a Lyctor already.” “Do you know who used it?” “That’s a much better question, Nav.” “And why,” said Gideon, “were you down there with your ass kicked to hell, hiding in a bone?”
The Reverend Daughter sighed heavily, then had a fit of coughing, which served her right. “Whoever left the facility also left the majority of their work behind and intact. No theorems or tomes, unless they’ve been removed—and I doubt Teacher removed them—but, as I’ve discovered, it’s possible to trigger … tests. Theorem models that they would have used. Most of the chambers down there were used to prepare for something, and they were left in a state where anyone who comes across it can re-enact the setup. Someone left—challenges—down there for any necromancer talented enough to understand
...more
Gideon flipped another page. There was a pencil sketch of an animal’s skull with long horns. The horns curved inward into points that almost touched but not quite, and the sockets were deep holes of black pencil lead. An electric thrill of recognition ran through her. “I’ve seen this before,” she said. Harrow bestirred herself. Her eyes narrowed. “Where?” “Hang on. Let me look at the map again.” Gideon flipped back and found the atrium; she traced with her finger the twisty route from there to the corridor and stairs that led to the cavalier’s dais. She found the staircase, and jabbed with her
...more
“Down there resides the sum of all necromantic transgression,” she said, in the singsong way of a child repeating a poem. “The unperceivable howl of ten thousand million unfed ghosts who will hear each echoed footstep as defilement. They would not even be satisfied if they tore you apart. The space beyond that door is profoundly haunted in ways I cannot say, and by means you won’t understand; and you may die by violence, or you may simply lose your soul.” Gideon rolled her eyes so hard that she felt in danger of twisting the optic nerve. “Knock it off. We’re not in chapel now.” But Harrow
...more
eating breakfast and stealing lunch.
Hahaha fuck
“What happens now?” Harrow said, “Look through the window.” Through the smeary little window Gideon could see that Response had opened up. Harrow continued, joylessly: “The door shuts in response to—as far as I can tell—weight and motion. I didn’t test precisely how much weight, but it’s around thirty moving kilograms. I have, at this point, sent around ninety kilos’ worth of bone matter into that room.” The things Harrow could pull off with the tip of someone’s toe bone were astonishing. Three kilos of osseo for Harrow could have been anything. A thousand skeletons, crammed and interlocked
...more
It was a bone construct, she could tell that much. Grey tendons strapped a dozen weirdly malformed humeri to horribly abbreviated forearms. The rib cage was banded straps of thick, knobbly bone, spurred all around with sharp points, the skull—was it a skull?—a huge knobble of brainpan. Two great green lights foamed within the darkness there, like eyes. It had way too many legs and a spine like a load-bearing pillar, and it had to crouch forward on two of its heavyset arms, fledged all over with tibial spines. The exterior arms were thrust back high, and she could see now that they did not have
...more
“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.”
Dead
noise of
“Nonagesimus,” she hollered again between attacks, “this shit is regenerating!” There was nothing from the speakers. Gideon wondered if Harrow could hear her. She
