Can we talk about how fucking insane Nona the Ninth must've been from Gideon's perspective?
Like, she spent all of the previous book trapped in a walled off portion of Harrow's subconscious and thinking that Harrow hated her bc she refused to properly eat her soul. Then in the last like thirty minutes of the book harrow's soul goes on holiday and Gideon's now in her body fighting fucked up bug things and she still thinks Harrow hates her but also she's going to do her best to keep Harrow's body safe but definitely not because she cares about Harrow, just because she's her cavalier and that's what she's meant to do.
Then offscreen she got resurrected by god—kinda sorta we'll find out I guess, pyrrah seems to know what's up but is not sharing with the class—who she learned five minutes ago is her dad and was going around doing her tower prince thing with ianthe tridentarius who I'm sure she had a very normal and not at all weird relationship with. Idk maybe they bonded over wanting to fuck Harrow (not that Gideon would ever admit that of course).
Then while Gideon's being all corpse-y in her off time, who does she see but Harrowhark fucking Nonagesimus. Who immediately kisses her. Gideon then learns that said body that she definitely has only very platonic feelings about, antagonistic feelings even, is being piloted by an autistic six month old. Whose one really good skill is reading people and who kissed her because the second Nona walked into the room she read her like a fucking book and saw that Gideon really wanted to kiss Harrow('s body).
Gideon proceeds to be very normal about desperately needing to know where Harrow actually is. Not because she's in love with Harrow obviously, that would be crazy, she needs to know so that she can, uh, point and laugh at whatever predicament Harrow's in, yeah that's it. Only to learn that Nona doesn't fucking know.
Then, at the end of the book, Gideon learns that Nona is actually the corpse that Harrow's had a crush on since she was a kid. And also said corpse wakes up and kisses/bites Harrow right in front of her.
It really is WILD lmao—though about when "Harrow" arrives at the ship:
Ianthe had figured out she was on the planet, and they knew she SHOULD be coming. She'd made a demand on Crown's radio for BoE to turn over Harrow within the day. And then where is Kiriona when everyone arrives? Why, she's trapped! Trapped behind a horrible nasty combination of wards—wards that mimics the effect of the Avulsion trial, the first time she let herself die on purpose for Harrow (she got better but still)—which are practically unbreakable! In theory, breakable only by a particularly cunning Lyctor, tailor made for Harrow to flex as she's able to disarm it when no one else could. And inside, there Kiriona lies, still as death, unbreathing—totally definitely not to mimic the sight of another dead girl laid out on a slab, or anything.
She's playing dead yet can't resist taking a peek. And she sees Harrow's face with golden eyes. Golden eyes that, when Cytherea and Mercy and Augustine saw hers, they'd each thought could belong to only one person in all the universe. Her own eyes are still gold, so Harrow's shouldn't be too, should they?
When Nona kisses her, she tastes like toothpaste. She'd just gotten all minty fresh ready for this Sleeping Beauty ass rescue fantasy. And then it's not even Harrow. And she's bound to have a really strong suspicion right away of exactly who it is, long before seeing them return to their own bodies removes any doubt.
So then she's gotta spend all that time putting up with this literal goddamn infant who's not only wearing Harrow's body but barely even knows who Harrow is, and the whole time asking herself, SURELY this can't ACTUALLY be the chilly weirdo from that coffin, right? This CAN'T be the girl Harrow is allegedly in love with, right??? Ianthe are you seeing this shit. Is anyone—How. What. Why.
