Emperor John Gaius - Tumblr Posts

Thanks! I think the biggest thing currently bugging me about HtN is why every surviving lyctor, with 1 single exception, was plotting to kill Jod? My understanding is that it was only when they saw cav!Gideon's eyes on the Mithraeum that they realized Jod lied about the existence of perfect lyctorhood. So why had they spent decades plotting with BoE to open the tomb and murder God? Only explanation I've read is "because he made them kill their cavs," which seems weak.

The short answer is: They at least suspected that he lied about it even before meeting Gideon. She was just the final nail in the coffin, so to speak. Plus, he did make them kill their cavs! Their siblings, their lovers, their closest friends! They dealt with that truth for far more than a lifetime, but they just so happens that they had a lot of time to dwell on it. It’s not really a surprise that it eventually got ugly.

Long answer under the cut, because I love my followers and don’t want them to suffer.

First off: it isn't just the surviving lyctors who betrayed God. Mercymorn, Augustine, Cytherea, yes; but even G1deon was willing to share a bed with the enemy. Either he or Pyrrha told Wake about the RB's and what they do to necromancers, thereby handing her an effective weapon against lyctors. 

And then there's Anastasia, who's implied to have gone against John's orders by even founding the Ninth House. Cassie, who contacted BoE *6 000 years ago*. So who really knows what Cyrus and Ulysses were up to, or would have been if they'd survived for long enough. 

As for why? We get two pieces of explanation in the text. 

YOU LIED TO US

Could this refer to the proof in Gideon's eyes? Sure.  But I'm not convinced that it wasn't the message Cyth always wanted to send. 

Checking in with the other duplicitous sluts:

“You’ve offered us explanations for everything over the years. But—some of them didn’t hold up on examination … It was the power I could never get my head around, you know? I follow power back to its source, John. It’s the skill you asked me to perfect. And the longer I looked at yours, the less things added up.”  “This has been troubling you for a very long time, then,” God said finally. [...] “You don’t get your power from Dominicus,” said Augustine. “It gets its power from you. There’s no exchange involved, no symbiosis. You draw nothing from the system. It relies on you entirely, as we all know. You’re God, John. But—as the Edenites are fond of pointing out—you were once a man. So whither that transition? Where does your power come from? Even if the Resurrection had been the greatest thanergy bloom ever triggered, it would drain away over time. And then Mercy said to me—in a moment of true Mercy vileness—she said, What is God afraid of? [...] I never wanted to believe it when she said, What if he didn’t really put down A.L.? And then—What if he couldn’t put down A.L.?” (HtN, ch. 51)

So: they knew that John didn’t have a tangible power source; and lyctorhood was the only kind of internal furnace they know about. Ergo: yes, they suspected that John had lied about perfect Lyctorhood. He made them kill their cavs. 10 000 years of guilt, literally chasing them across the universe, and for what? For whom?

What kind of God demands such a sacrifice? I think that's one of the central questions of these books. What kind of God demands it? (compare the Binding of Isaac - John) But also: What kind of God punishes it? (compare the Mark of Cain - the Resurrection Beasts) 

But - 

“Why would one of the Emperor’s Lyctors hate him?” “Hate him?” The voice of the girl whom Gideon had known as Dulcinea rose, high and intent. “Hate him? I have loved that man for ten thousand years. We all loved him, every one of us. We worshipped him like a king. Like a god! Like a brother.” (GtN, ch. 35)

They are Believers losing their Faith. They’re questioning the entire foundation of his divinity. Augustine and Mercy are still asking, still hoping that they're wrong - “All that effort to break open the Locked Tomb,” said Augustine, “only to have the answer we wanted wander up in the form of one dead teenager flaunting your genes." - but crucially, they are also lovers going through a messy divorce. You know, when people who once loved each other and were presumably capable of communication are suddenly throwing plates at each other? “Come, swear your loyalty, my son—my brother—beloved—Lyctor—saint.” 

Possibly what Tazmuir is saying is, they're the same picture. But that might be conjecture. 

(edited to add in links to other theory posts. call it the director's cut)

i am thinking about lyctors names again. that one post where someone theorised that mercymorn was joy not bcs cristabel was joyful as a person, but bcs she brought john joy. pyrrha made him dutiful. alfred made him patient.

loveday didn't love john. loveday looked at everyone like she wanted them beaten. why do i have a feeling that cytherea was a saint of rage/disdain or something synonymous?

we know nothing about john's feelings on nigella, titania, valancy, so we don't know how the cassiopeia, ulysses amd cyrus were called.

moreover if we look at the current situation with lyctors, ianthe is saint of awe bcs she is the one bringing john awe. not naberius.

so in any au where entire canaan house ascended, john wouldn't know or particularly care about cavaliers. he wouldn't know how they looked. he name the fresh lyctors by what they bring him, remind him of.

harrow is forgiveness.

judith would be emptiness.

isaac would be sadness (?).

abigail would be doubt.

palamedes would be distrust.

dulcinea would be remembrance.

silas would be pity.

reread the epilogue of gideon. god. the desolation. harrow throwing herself down to her god's mercy. harrow asking — harrow, the nun! — how dare you ask me to live with it?

how

dare

you

and he doesn't kill her even though she wishes he did. note the emphasis: you, the god i worshipped along with my beloved, how dare you. you, the emperor who is supposed to be almighty? you, the king, who is supposed to be kind? you, the scourge of death?

the entirety of harrow the ninth is set in stone the second john says "i can't".

I understand some of you are 19 but that is not an old man, he's 32.