she has not remembered her end

Isa | 28 | ⚢✡︎ | 🔞 pfp @alexsiple | follows from @dykegerard

[sexcromancy]

ive been turning this passage over in my mind and thinking about the varied ways we are presented with the origins of alecto: John's version, the lyctors' version, this version from her. there's the fractal nature of her narration at this point when nona is slipping over into alectohood, and there is the thing i love most about taz's writing, the little tricks of phrase she works in to communicate multiple hidden meanings. as alecto thinks, she lists increasingly complicated and divergent truths. from this little passage we get different versions of the origin story, with agency placed on different actors. what is the split between the world (earth? the universe? a specific active force?) and alecto? did alecto exist before john made her? was john born with the ability that he has, or was it granted to him "for he so loved her"? curiously, john does not spend much time (in his narrative to harrow) on the question of why he got these gifts. two things majorly come up for me with all these questions: horrors of love, of course, and the difficult unending push-pull of giving yourself over to something/someone, what you can expect in return. that is the defining theme of tlt to me and i really appreciate that it is so loudly present in this germinating moment of the series. second, this passage is referencing John 3:16, one of the most famous bible passages: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son [...]" but in the bible, the World is not an actor. the books are in conversation with christianity, within canon and metatextually; crucially taz is not reproducing straightforward biblical narratives. that transformation is really important, it asks critical engagement of us as readers. how is this connected to christianity, and how is it different? all the overlapping versions of this story (and the things happening off the page in the books) indicate there are many more forces at play than just john and alecto. what is the World? what is it doing? what does it mean for the world to love john?

[mintish0]

BOOK COVER REDRAW of one of the most insane and gutwretching books ever written. (Art without text and full process on my insta!)

It was my first time designing a book cover and I have to say the process was painful. I started with a strong idea in mind: I wanted to portray Harrow at the exact moment she got her memories back. It had to be spectacular, dramatic, atrocious. There had to be skeletons, lots of skeletons, the castle of her House, and of course, Gideon's sword. Then came the hard part, colors. I changed the colors I think 4 times, just couldn't get them right, but in the end can say I'm quite happy with the result. During the whole process I kept looking at the original cover from @studiotommy.co (insta) trying to grasp even a small fragment of his tenique (ps. Posting this 2 days before a big tit announcement wasn't in my plans👀)

I hope I've done this book justice, because at the end, that's what it's all about.

Ty @noblenico for sharing the We Do Bones font, it really made the difference!

[blackarachnya]

[daydreamhoneybee]

Wait... I just remembered that the French word cavalier, in addition to its literal meaning of horserider, also refers to one's ballroom dancing partner; in particular the one you came to the ball with... And the one you traditionally save the last dance for... Which Harrowhark is... For her cavalier—

I'm gonna be sick

[sthaid]

“Of such banality was grief made.”

[fandaniel]

[planetarytransformation]

"AMAB" i mean so what. i was jaundiced at birth too but nobody seems to want to assign social significance to that. they should though. they should assert that i will always have a jaundiced soul no matter how much urine i process. and mock me for my weak faggot kidneys #myweakfaggotkidneys

[xalatath]

Everybody in the club Yield to my will

[gideonisms]

the hill I die on re: griddlehark characterization is that gideon is canonically tidy and harrow is not. Because gideon needs some small sense of agency over her own life. similar to how she's always working out because she needs control of something about her own body. Harrow isn't as careful with things that belong to her

[gideonisms]

don't get me wrong harrow is living by a set of strict rules that keep her functional but those rules are not legible to anyone else and they don't involve taking care of her body or doing her laundry

[caesarsaladinn]

if you're ever wondering what popular media is getting wrong about basically any premodern society, the answer is that there are never enough lawsuits

[caesarsaladinn]

there's a common idea that in the olden days all disputes were resolved through violence, but even in settings where that was true, people would still sue each other about it.

[systlin]

Like 80% of Icelandic sagas involve lawsuits. Sometimes against ghosts.

This worked to get rid of the ghosts, incidentally.

[trambrosia]

If people go to the 9th house for penitence, what are they guilty about anyway?

[katakaluptastrophy]

It's hard to say, because we know so little about what the Houses mean when they talk about sin, and what their religious frameworks for responding to sin even are.

We do get repeated discussions about what does or doesn't qualify as a sin, or a "necromantic sin" specifically, but no firm conclusions about what those sins might actually be (making a beguiling corpse? Siphoning? Making eyes at your cav outside of the niche jurisdiction of Fifth House canon law? Engineering a necromancer out of 200 infants?).

Silas seems to suggest that there's some kind of practice of confession. But given that the Eighth regard the Ninth as heretical, I can't imagine they're sending people off to do penance on the Ninth when 10 King Undyings and a donation to the Cohort Orphans and Widows Fund just won't cut it. And what is penance understood to do, spiritually, in House religion anyway?

The other question is whether they're in penance for their own specific sins, or whether there's a more general sense that the orders of the Ninth House are doing penance simply to keep the Tomb shut.

On trying to imagine it, what comes to mind is the phenomenon of people doing penance, or joining religious orders, as a response to their experience of fighting in the Crusades. With half a myriad of ongoing war, there would probably be no shortage of people for whom the Ninth might seem to offer some kind of solace.

[nobrashfestivity]

Edvard Munch a) Buried Skull b) Girl Kissing a Skull Indian ink and crayon 1896

[skarchomp]

the fantasy lesbian adventurer is immune to the seductive evil sorceress's feminine wiles because she's butch4butch

[maxknightley]

this is exactly why any evil sorceress worth her salt keeps a towering knightgirl in gleaming black armor "on retainer"

[maxknightley]

well it's one of two reasons anyway

[haxanhexes]

Tfw u give urself a lobotomy and the love of ur life killed herself in front of u and keeps hijacking ur brain to tell u ur holding ur sword wrong and it’s called a “pommel”

[silasoctakiseron]

Sorry for reblogging that hot take post and then not answering any of the asks I got LMFAO I'll get to them in a bit here

[alends-lacr]

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.

[werewolfbutches]