Cristabel Oct - Tumblr Posts

i wanna talk about mercymorn the first. let's talk about mercymorn the first.

mercymorn, the ex cryogenicist turned master anatomist, the know-it-all flesh magician who memorized the entire human body by rote, the scientist, the skeptic, the heretic. mercymorn, who founded...the eighth house???

the eighth house. the eighth house? the spotless-white-and-delicate-chain-mail spirit magicians? the religious fanatics who carry around giant portraits of the emperor undying when they travel? the guys who explicitly model themselves after the knights templar? little miss "thou shalt not take cristabel's name in vain" founded the soul siphoner house?? the one that produced glorified human battery colum asht??

i'm not the only one who sees something strange in this, right? none of the others are this mismatched. augustine's fingerprints are still all over the fifth. we know very little about cyrus, but from what we do know, i completely buy that he founded the third. g1deon and/or pyrrha make perfect sense as the founders of the second. same goes for casseopeia, anastasia, and ulysses. where the information exists, it adds up. except in the case of mercymorn and the eighth.

but, of course, there's an obvious answer here. who do we know who was resurrected in the first wave, who worked very closely with mercymorn, who had a notable interest in the soul, who was fanatically religious, who probably wouldn't have minded the idea of a cavalier being used for anything, no matter how painful or demeaning? who do we know who could easily have been the first to suggest soul siphoning, who could have thought up eight for salvation no matter the cost in the same sitting as one flesh, one end?

personally, i can't believe it's not just commonly understood that cristabel oct is the true founder of the eighth house.

so. mercymorn's eyes are described as sort of a mainly red hazel colour. y'all ever wonder if cristabel's eyes were red post-res bc she shot herself in the head and john couldn't remember the actual colour after that?

Okay but theory on why Augustine might additionally hate Cristabel so much:

He's the first saint to serve the king undying, and this is based on ascension order.

Cristabel convinced Alfred of the "let's kill ourselves and force lychtorhood solution" and all that, but apparently Alfred ascended first. While it's possible Mercy hesitated longer, or the order of the first two is more random, he specifies he was the first several times and seems to hold a cold anger behind the fact.

I wonder if Cristabel convinced Alfred of the plan, but then proceeded to wait and see if it would actually work or waited around to explain what they were doing while Alfred died. Since like, it seems unlikely in the chaos someone would be having a stop watch to see who finished first or if it was the same time either of them would specify "I'm the first" "I'm the second" so many times. So a lot of Augustine's additional anger toward Cristabel is about the fact she not only got his brother in on the plan, but also she potentially waited long enough to do it too that there's a noticeable first and second saint

THIS BLEW MY MIND WIDE OPEN.

The Last Bout

Over the past week, Loveday Heptane had taken to wearing her bladed gauntlets wherever she went. 

She understood that this was off-putting.

 She did not particularly care. 

After Anastasia had repaired her thirteenth phalangeal fracture in a fortnight, she realized she cared more for her gear than she did for herself. The presence of those knuckle knives was just enough to give her pause before she let loose and punched the wall. 

In those moments, she thought of Annabel with an envy that was greener than roses in the bud. She longed to rend flesh and scream. It was difficult to stay soft while wearing gauntlets. 

Her new habit meant that she was already armed when John strolled into their bed chamber with sickening nonchalance, clearing Cytherea’s saturated chest with a single, citrus-scented gesture. Prior to that moment, she had been frightened, boiling water and relying on base instincts. She was terrified that Cyth would drown in a dry ocean of whisper-soft sheets while she stood there like an incompetent idiot. And, because she’d grown up devout, she’d prayed. 

Why was she furious that God had answered? 

She hadn’t meant to punch him the first time, but the second time gauntlet met bone, it was on purpose. She’d launched herself bodily atop him, straddling his hips like a lover, tearing into his skin over and over to no avail. If Cyth hadn’t come to, she might have kept going for eternity like a starved, mad ouroboros. 

Instead, she bore down on his chest and pushed off, tearing down the hall, her anger like a torrid cloud of steam with nowhere to go. She peeled off the gauntlets, ashamed. They made an awful sound as they skidded against the stone, falling limp and bloody in a corner.

Violence didn’t feel good unless there was feedback—it had to be tangible, it had to take. And so, she found herself facing off against her old friend, the corridor wall. 

“Anastasia isn’t here,” came a calm voice from behind her, catching her off-guard before she could strike. 

“I know,” Loveday responded with a shuddering breath, still facing the wall, head bowed, vision spotty with rapidly dispersing rage. 

“Alright, then. If the wall’s offended you, by all means.” 

Loveday leaned forward, pressing her blood-hot forehead into the cool stone. She shut her eyes tight.

“Come here.”

“I’m fine here,” Loveday hissed.

“Then I’ll come to you.” 

Despite her pristine, all-white training ensemble, Cristabel sat on the ground, leaning up against the stone. She was the only person at Canaan House who’d never seemed to fear her. Everyone else was smart enough to back away when faced with a feral creature, but Cris took her chances—she was convinced she could tame anything. 

In their current configuration, they could have been two little girls playing hide and seek. Cris sat quietly as Loveday worked through her moment, sniffing and huffing like a distressed animal. 

When it was reasonably quiet, Cristabel reached up one hand and caught Loveday’s in her own, massaging the knuckles in a practiced gesture. Loveday had spotted her doing the same to her necromancer beneath the supper table when the dinnertime conversation became particularly contentious. 

“Pretty nails,” Cris remarked. Loveday merely produced a noncommittal hum. Cytherea had never been allowed to paint her nails. Her army of caretakers worried they’d miss out on the signs of cyanosis. The necromancer loved those tiny colorful bottles of varnish, however, and had been subjecting Loveday to weekly manicures from the age of nine. 

It took longer these days. Cyth’s hands were rarely steady, though neither of them commented on it. If Loveday’s nails went bare for too long, she began to feel naked. 

She wondered if she’d get used to it one day. 

She hated herself for wondering. 

“I punched Teacher,” she blurted out after a few moments of oppressive silence. In a rare turn of events, she found that she preferred existing in the present to dwelling in the abyss of endless anger—and anything was better than launching herself into the future. 

“How’d that go?”

“He liked it.”

Cristabel burst out into a whole-body laugh that echoed through the halls, floating and bouncing like chamber music, like bubbles. 

“It isn’t funny.” “It is, a bit. ‘He liked it,’ she said,” the eighth cavalier wheezed, eyes crinkling at the corners. “Why do you think he liked it?” 

“I don’t know. He took it. He leaned into it. When someone’s throwing a duel, you can tell.”

“I meant, what do you think would make him like it?”

The only thing to pop into Loveday’s mind in response was the image of Annabel. 

“That’s none of my business,” she replied drolly. She’d grown up with Cytherea, after all, and in fairer weather, they shared the same inoffensive brand of Rhodian wit. Cris grinned in return. 

“We all like things that aren’t good for us. I’ve fallen in love with plenty of things that scare me.” “I’m not interested in talking about Mercymorn.” Again, Cris laughed. “Other things,” she amended, “Will you sit?” Loveday acquiesced, plopping down on the ground beside the older cavalier, one knee propped up. She hugged it to her chest. 

“What do you need?” Cris asked, finding it easier to speak earnestly when she could look into her face. “If you need to hit something, we can spar. If you need to talk, I have nowhere else to be.” 

“Cytherea might need—” “John’s got her. What do you need?” 

“If she’s feeling better, she won’t want to be in bed.” 

“And she’s an adult and capable of expressing as much. Let him handle it. He can use the exercise.” 

“It’s my job,” Loveday shot back, a bit more aggressively than she’d intended. “You asked what I need? I need to do my job.” 

“What’s your job?” Cris asked. Loveday looked back at her like she’d produced a series of high-pitched squeaking noises rather than words. 

“We have the same job,” Loveday replied slowly, in case the incessant trepanning had finally taken its toll. 

“I don’t disagree,” Cris replied, her tone flip, “I only wonder why honoring God and His resurrection means obsessing over her, punching Him, and thoroughly ignoring yourself.” 

Loveday huffed incredulously, rising to her feet, her jaw set. She began stalking away, unsure that she wanted to go back to the bedroom. Teacher might still be there. He’d either mention her murder attempt casually or never bring it up again, and she wasn’t sure which would be worse.  

“Are you angry because I’m right?” Cristabel called after her, her voice filling the hall. 

On another day, Loveday might have kept right on walking—not pausing, not flinching. Today she turned around. 

“No,” she spat decisively. “I know what I need. And I’ve already asked for it.”

“Good,” Cristabel said. Loveday snorted as if to say, ‘not good.’ 

“Have you ever asked a question, not because you weren’t sure of the answer, but because you needed to hear what you already knew spoken aloud?”

“I’m sure I have.”

“I asked him, and he gave the wrong answer.”  Loveday's voice was too sharp and shrill in those desolate halls, desperate in a way that the kilted mountain of a woman rarely allowed. “I’ve asked for one thing. One thing, for her, not for me, and he said no.” 

Cristabel did not balk, and her voice remained true, even as the blue-eyed goliath fell apart before her. “You know he loves you. Both of you.” 

Loveday said nothing.  

“What did you ask?” Cristabel prompted tentatively. 

For a long moment, Loveday didn’t speak. She swallowed, working her throat.

“If we don’t finish the work before…” she paused, “...before Cytherea succumbs—” she struggled, hating each word as she said it, “I asked if he’d bring her back. I don’t see why he couldn’t. He resurrected humanity, all of humanity, and she’s so small. I’m not a necromancer, but shouldn’t that be easy? One soul? I don’t understand. He’s supposed to be God.” 

“Loveday, he resurrected humanity so that each of us could die on our own terms.” 

“These aren’t her terms.” 

“It’s a gift to die again.” “Do not say that to me.” 

“And to die for Him and His empire—” 

“She isn’t dying for him! She’s done enough for him! She’s just dying!” the cavalier roared, pacing as if caged, “She’s dying from a cancer that he resurrected, that our house believes was ordained. I could accept that the cancer was a mistake, but I cannot accept letting the mistake win.” 

“Do you think death and loss are the same?” 

“They are.” Loveday knew what it meant to lose, in every sense of the word. She was the Seventh’s show pony—a gifted swordswoman unaffiliated with a cavalier line, unlikely to ascend to any rank or title. Rather than wasting her, they sent her off to compete, so she could win trophies on behalf of Castle Rhodes. After some years, she’d grown bored of dueling and had begun training in new weapons, showing off her superlative skills in demonstration categories. She might’ve gone on like that forever, collecting big swords and measuring her life in wins and losses, if Cytherea hadn’t risen in the house’s esteem so rapidly. They’d promised Cyth a cavalier so she could focus on her work in the limited time she had—a nursemaid more than a sword hand. She’d asked for Loveday. 

From that day on, she’d measured her life in grins, in giggles, in long afternoons basking in the colorful stained-glass light of the orangery. 

At Canaan House, the rules were different. She didn’t want to play anymore. This time, win or lose, the outcome would be for good. 

“Have you considered—”

“I don’t want your advice. It means nothing. You’ve lost no one.” 

“Loveday.” 

“I assure you, whatever you were going to ask, I’ve considered it. I considered it when I lost my father. I considered it when I lost the woman who raised me. I consider it each time I think about my mother, who I’ve never met, and the child my house desperately wants to create using my genes and hers. I cannot close my eyes at night without considering it all over again.” “Then you’d look your necromancer in the eye, on her deathbed, and call her a loser?” 

“Did I say that? Would I ever say that? No.” 

“Then, forgive me, but who’s the loser in this scenario?”

Loveday took a deep breath in through her nose. She opened her rough-palmed hands. She closed them. She ran one over her hair and exhaled. “No one,” she said as she turned on her heel and walked down the hall. This time, when Cristabel called out, she did not turn around.

Instead, she walked straight past the bloody pile of abandoned gauntlets in the corner and straight into her necromancer’s rooms. 

She wrapped Cyth in blankets, grabbed her hat, and wheeled her into the conservatory. 

She adjusted the chair. She found the perfect patch of sunlight and the perfect strip of shade. She sat back and listened to the woman who was her world prattle on about nothing while touching up the chipped, sea-green varnish on her fingernails. She rested her unbroken fingers atop her knees as they dried. Somewhere, a bird sang. In cells, in bones, in hearts, the war raged on. 

Loveday Heptane knew what her duty was, and she’d win this bout if it killed her.

It's been said before but I'll say it again — ever be so deeply, permanently emotionally destroyed by killing your best friend in the name of the newfound necromancer/cavalier relationship that you build a house that treats cavaliers as innately disposable, breeds them for a single purpose, genetically matches them to babies before they are born, names them for sacrificial animals, specifically so none of the necromancers who follow behind you will experience the heartbreak of losing the person they love most in the world, so horribly that they can't stand to hear their name spoken aloud for the next ten thousand years, only for the scion of that house, ten thousand years later, to be so revolted by the concept of killing his cavalier for Lyctorhood, so disgusted by your crime, that he claims G-d's directly expressed will is heretical and fundamentally morally opposed to the principles of the religion you helped to found?

And then, when that person does do what you explicitly built his house to be able to do and uses his cavalier as a tool rather than a person — even if he does it because he believes his cavalier capable of surviving anything, the polar opposite of what you tried to teach his house to believe — he experiences his cavalier's death as such an abrupt and horrifying loss that after he himself is killed he wanders the afterlife in grief, impotently taking revenge on a woman who should have been burned up for Lyctorhood by the person who loved and needed her most, but was spared, saying may all the blood of your blood suffer even a fraction of what I have suffered? The suffering you tried so incredibly hard to insulate him from? He of the church you built to bury the memory of a nun?

Redirecting this Alfred + Cristabel ask to you ... what do you think their actual relationship was?

at the end of the day we won't really know unless/until Tamsyn tells us, because frankly what we're given in crumbs by Mercy and Augustine is a very half-painted picture. we know that Cristabel "wasn't the best influence on Alfred" and that "they brought out the worst in each other" which we can conclude from that they were probably, like, insufferable besties—and Augustine does present Cristabel as someone with either enough rizz or enough of a bond with his brother to get him to fall on his own rapier:

"She was a fanatic and an idiot—yes, she was, Mercy—and he... was a man who regretted that he wasn't. It took surprisingly little to lead my brother astray."

i do find it interesting comparing how Augustine talks about Alfred with Cristabel's "corrupting influence" versus how John talks about Cytherea and BOE, considering both of them are insisting that they weren't really like that, no, but were led astray in a way that could have been negated if John/Augustine were simply able to talk to them. there's not a whole lot of regard for personal agency here, which is something i attribute to Augustine's eternal older brother-isms (fellow eldest siblings iykyk) and John's inability to accept that anyone would betray him of their own volition.

which, in this vein, i think the thesis of how Augustine treats Cristabel's memory (as well as Mercy) has to do with the fact that he cannot fathom that his little brother, who might as well be an extension of himself (his "other half") would have it in him to enact that level of personal betrayal. because at the end of the day, Alfred and Cristabel probably really did think they were doing the right thing!! but they did absolutely force their adepts' hands and leave them with immeasurable trauma, though i think for Cristabel this was an easy decision to make given her predisposition to self-martyrdom and religious zealotry.

and this brings me back to the central question of how Alfred slots into the Mercy-Augustine-Cristabel-Alfred web of madness—we know A-'s little brother was working with the nun during John's cryo project, and given the very close relationship Mercy and Augustine have, it would be pretty tidy for their plus ones, and later cavaliers, to fall into step with each other. i think it's the easiest to assume that they were really close friends (much to the ire of their adepts) since Mercy seems to harbor a similar disdain for Alfred, which might reek of jealousy to inquiring minds (read: me). at the end of the day, Cristabel was a fanatic, and no matter what the relationship between her and the fifth house cavalier was, he clearly believed in her of his own volition and ran himself through by her side.

to which i am asking: tamsyn muir where is the canaan house novel. when is the canaan house novel. people are asking for the canaan house prequel. please

i thought about canaan house crowd ascending with cytherea as catalist and made myself sad.

need to establish my vocabulary first though:

to pull a cristabel — kill yourself as a sacrifice with no apparent danger outside of your necro stagnating in her studies and aging.

to pull a gideon — kill yourself because there's an immediate danger to life and your necro's survival is more important than yours.

so. judith does not ascend unless really backed into it. marta would 1) cave in and pull a gideon 2) prefer fighter's death. judith anyway bears guilt for millenias.

ianthe is ianthe. though corona would absolutely pull a cristabel and/or gideon if only she knew.

poor isaac is against this shit much like abigail but both jeannemary and magnus can (and in case of jm will) pull a gideon on them. grief.

with palamedes and cam i see many paths. 1) they make paul from the beginning even though they didn't have enough time to discuss and research. paul is wobbly and cyth is livid at them for doing something she couldn't so she decapitates them. 2) pal pulls a reverse gideon and explodes as per canon, then they make paul. 3) camilla pulls a gideon on pal. i am not interested in thinking about paul paths because anything i come up with pales in comparison with tamsyn's imagination. so in case of traditional lyctorhood pal is grieving and has cool knives. and maybe develops some muscle.

dulcie will pull a reverse gideon just so protesilaus doesn't do it on her. she's so sick of this shit already, she's not spending myriad like cyth. pro wouldn't pull a cristabel and would prefer a fighter's death to pulling a gideon anyway.

silas would like his nephew NOT TO DIE. colum would not pull a cristabel, he has seen enough of the river for a lifetime. colum could 1) choose to pull a gideon because as much as he doesn't want to die he absolutely should like a good cav, shouldn't he? 2) choose to not pull a gideon because silas is against it/stopped him midway screeching tome proverbs at him entire time.

gideon is gideon. harrow does lobotomy.

Me, in the dead of night, delicately whispering my desperate pleas into the universe,

PLEASE DONT LET ALL THE OG LYCTORS BE WHITE, PLEASE DONT LET ALL THE OG LYCTORS BE WHITE, PLEA