#tlt theories | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ourg0dsal · 6 months

Text

Gideon Nav CANNOT Die. Hold on- I know... but give me one second and I'll explain.

So, as I said before Gideon Nav cannot die, or at least her body can't. Cause clearly (spoiler warning) Gideon Nav died at the end of Gideon the Ninth. There is no avoiding that.

But! If you have read all the books GtN, HtN, and NtN including all of the accompanying short stories (tho I will admit I have not read The Mysterious Study of Dr. Sex yet) then there is a better understanding of the timeline of the whole story outside of just what the three main books give you. Specifically and especially with Gideon's body. But also there are many times In Gideons life were she has faced near death events or events that she should not have survived from and still was breathing on the other side.

To go in chronological order of these events, when she was first born she was found in a container held by the air depraved suit of her mother. And while ofc In the book it does state that her mother had redirected her air supply to Gideon, but it is simply being stated to cover all my bases.

Then the 200 sons and daughters massacre when Gideon was 1 (or 2 im not sure) when she inhaled poisonous air without dying. Which led ofc to the Reverend Mother and Father fearing the ground she walked. And this is a big one because, it literally creates waves in the plot. It's a defining point of Harrow and Gideons relationship. That Gideon did not die when she was supposed to.

Later in the story Gideon talks with Pal when she believes Harrow to be a murderer and openly admits to him that "she nearly killed me a half dozen times growing up" which obviously in context was to emphasize on the brutal relationship between her and Harrow. But this could also be other times where miraculously Gideon survived death when she shouldn't have. Because as we know from the first confrontation between Harrow and Gideon. Harrow doesnt hold back for her.

Finally of all the events where Gideon escapes death, this one actually happens within the main story of Gideon the Ninth. When Harrow siphons from Gideon to retrieve one of the challenge keys. And at the end when Gideon passes out, it is narrated ""ha-ha," said Gideon, "first time you didn't call me Griddle," AND DIED." Now, this could obviously just be the snarkiness of Gideon narrating. Or something incredibly clever left behind by Tamsyn Muir for a book series that is so clearly meant to be reread. But ofc to do my rounds the next line after does state "well, passed out. But it felt a hell of a lot like dying." But then immediately after "wake up had an air of ressurection." Which honestly feels like Tamysn Muir teasing the readers at this point. The question then becomes rather, which one was the tease and which one was foreshadowing/ evidence.

Now the point of listing all of these events is that in all of these cases the chances of death are so incredibly high that for most its a miracle she's alive. Ofc most notably for the siphoning trial and the poision gas, but none the less there is proof within the written story and and out that Gideon has looked death in face and moved on with maybe a headache. And it wasn't just in her child hood this is something she can just do. Some recreated in the written story! Because as Pal said. Even with the siphoning challenge done perfectly the chances of leaving Cam with severe brain damage was far to high. And Gideon didn't even suffer that.

Sadly, despite all these Gideon gets to the final battle and fights Cytherea and does die. At the hands of a particularly pointy fence. Or was it truly the fence that did her in? Rather than the lyctorship ritual that was started seconds afterwards.

My full theory, isnt just that Gideon Nav can't die. It's that Gideon Nav wouldn't have been able to die... If Harrow hadn't sucked her soul out. There are at the very least 8 seperate events that Gideon should have died, two of which were nearly gauranteed, but she was ended by a piece of metal. Yes, a very well placed piece a metal, but the point still up to that point she had faced worse a came out unscathed.

If Harrow had not completed the lyctor ritual, Gideon would not have died. Wether or not through resurrection or simply walking it off. Gideon's body has some sort of necromantic attributes to it that keep her alive. We see this in the Untitled Entry short story with Judith Deuteros that describes Gideons body, as it does not rot, cannot be injured, cannot be fed to animals forced or otherwise. And that is all before Jod ever gets a look at the body, because otherwise he would have known Gideon was his daughter before the later events of Harrow the Ninth.

And ofc during the first challenge when Harrow uses Gideon as her eyes to be able to see the construct in the other room and Gideon is able to see the thanergetic signatures that Harrow remarks should be impossible. (I assume because the process is Harrow extracting information (Gideons eyesight) from Gideon and so Gideon should not also be receiving information (the ability to see the signatures)) unless Gideon had some form of necromantic abilities, which she was tested for as a kid and apparently did not have. Alongside not having the correct attitude to be a nun of the ninth. And so we can round it out to be her body being naturally necromantic leaving Gideon without the ability to use it. (Which Is a jump from the actual point we are attempting to use, but for now this stops us from assuming Gideon as any sort of necromantic ability which is a theory all on its own. One that I personally have no evidence for or against)

Now, that I have hopefully made both my Ap Lit and Lang teachers proud with my 3 am essay, I must give you the real tragedy of Gideon the Ninth. Had Gideon not died, had Harrow been unable to complete the lyctor ritual for emotional reasons or otherwise, had Harrow not become a lyctor and killed cytherea. Gideon would have had to watch Harrow and Cam be killed, possibly even Corona, Judith and Ianthe. And then to be used for Cythereas own motives. Tamysn Muir beautifully set up the story so that the best possible outcome could have happened. Had Gideon not died. Everyone else would have. And "Camilla the sixth was no idiot" cam knew and accepted this whereas Harrow never would have. And so the unkillable Gideon had to die, and forcing Harrows hand was the only way to do it.

1K notes · View notes

badcatcait · 10 months

Text

Pyrrha says Gideon the First’s ORIGINAL name, here, change my mind:

Compare the G dash to the standard em dash above it…it’s longer and thicker, just like the placeholders in John’s speech. AND it’s followed by a comma, which isn’t standard if it’s just indicating interruption.

That’s G’s real name, and somehow not even Alecto can hear it…so what did John DO?

Audiobook folks, does this stand out in the audio version as much as it does visually??

#tlt theories #tlt spoilers #pyrrha dve #gideon the first #the locked tomb #the locked tomb spoilers #nona the ninth spoilers #ejg #fuck john gaius

2K notes · View notes

figonas · 11 months

Text

I’m sorry but you all aren’t listening, lyctorhood itself is not the “indelible sin” and you can pry this theory from my cold dead hands, honestly, maybe not even then. TazMuir herself could not dissuade me until she explicitly tells me otherwise. My proof for this you ask? Pyrrha’s conversation with Varun in NtN chapter 9.

But let’s backtrack for a second. John has stated that the resurrection beasts are after him and the lyctors for committing the indelible sin of lyctorhood, and as such the lyctors can never return to the Dominican System for fear of drawing the RBs back to the Nine Houses. I’ve never believed this was true given the fact that John is always the greatest common denominator when it comes to the presence of an RB and there’s no mention of an RB going after a lone lyctor. Sure, lyctors have been killed fighting resurrection beasts but there’s a huge difference between being caught in the crossfire and starting a firefight. For me, Nona the Ninth only reinforced that what we’ve been told is the “indelible sin” is either John misunderstanding the RBs (doubtful) or lying for his own purposes (more likely).

In chapter 9 of NtN, Nona recounts the story of her disastrous beach trip and towards the end of this recitation Nona says that Pyrrha;

“…crossed to the taped-up window, bottle and glass in hand. To Nona’s awe, she twitched the blackout curtains aside—stood bathed in the hyper-blue light from the sky as Nona held her breath—and she said to the window, “Here’s to Camilla Hect, yet another of devotion’s casualties,” and knocked back the glass. Then she said to the light, quite gently, “No, I don’t blame you, man … He was always looking for things to throw himself on.”

Pyrrha stands in front of Nona, bathed in the light of Varun the Eater, and proceeds to have a conversation with it. We only get one side but based on the context of the last line, “No, I don’t blame you, man … He was always looking for things to throw himself on.” Varun seemingly apologizes to Pyrrha for killing G1deon. It’s proven later on in the book that Varun can speak to Nona, and while it could be argued that since G1deon is dead and his soul is gone the “indelible sin” has been undone this still begs the question; why would the punisher apologize to the sinner?

If Varun and the other RBs are hunting the lyctors to dole out justice for their sins why would they apologize for doing the very thing they sought to do unless that wasn’t their true intent. The “indelible sin” is not the consumption of another soul, it is the consumption of a specific soul. It is John taking Alecto into himself, not being able to house all of her and instead making an exchange. Housing a piece of her in him, and a piece of him in her. Splintering the soul of a great and terrible force into manageable parts. Which explains Varun’s ominous presence hanging over the planet in the first place.

If RBs are hunting Lyctors there are no lyctors on this planet. Palamedes has not consumed Camilla’s soul, G1deon is gone, Harrow is in the River, Gideon is thumbtacked to her dead body, the only soul of any significance to Varun is Nona. Later on in chapter 13 Varun, by way of Judith, says to Nona;

“…what they did to you and what they wrung from you and what shape they made you fill—we see you still—we seek you still—we murdered—we who murder—you inadvertent tool—you misused green thing—come back to us—take vengeance for us—we saw you—we see you—I see you.”

And in chapter 27,

“….what did he do to you, to make you this way.”

What did HE do to you!!! what did HE do to YOU!! To give John credit he doesn’t deserve he may not realize it himself but the RBs have been looking for Alecto this whole time. They don’t want the lyctors, they want what John stole, they want the piece of Alecto inside of him. Want to make her whole again, their misused green thing. She’s almost there. She has her piece back from harrow’s body, united with the piece of her hidden in the locked tomb. She only has 1 piece left to collect. And god knows what will happen when the green and breathing thing is whole once again.

#the locked tomb #Nona the ninth #john gaius #alecto the first #tlt #tlt theories #this has been rattling around in my brain since Gideon the Ninth #John’s explanation of the RBs just doesn’t add up #and you know he has to be lying about it because he straight up lies to Harrow about the number of RBs in HtN

3K notes · View notes

llovelyclouds · 6 months

Text

"NEVER LEFT THE PLANET, DIED IN THIS SELFSAME TOWER"... ok. ok. so. okay so. if we're operating under the assumption that canaan house is john & company's labs, and that the other skeleton servants also died at canaan house and never left the planet, then one can assume that the bone servants in gideon the ninth are all of the cultists & ex-cultists in nona the ninth.

wow. so. after the cultists killed johns friends... he didn't fully resurrect them but instead kept them all to work for him and his pals and make food for them and rot until they couldn't even remember how to write anymore. okay. the implications.

haha. anyway

#im connecting the dots #the locked tomb #tlt #tlt meta #junos silly little locked tomb thoughts #gideon the ninth #nona the ninth #gtn #ntn #tlt theories #tlt spoilers #john gaius #palamedes sextus #cassiopeia the first

941 notes · View notes

transbutchbluess · 7 months

Text

hi locked tomb fandom !!

i made an analysis document that compile important informations about the series, comments on every single chapter of every book, theories, biblical and classical parallels, name meanings (not limited to those in the prononciation guides, and linked to character theories), and other things. i spent a very long time on it and it’s still in progress, but i think it’s long enough to be shared now, since it’s over 100 pages.

please tell me if you have ideas of things to add, any theory you’d like to share, anything you think might be relevant. and please share this, writing it really helped me understanding and connecting things better, so i think it could be useful for others

814 notes · View notes

ossifer-bones · 8 months

Text

Liminal Physics 101 - What's wrong with the River?

I want to preface this theory/analysis by giving credit to the excellent, thought-provoking response left on my theory on the mechanism behind lyctoral thanergy generation by @greyhairedgeekgirl, because it inspired me to finally finish typing up this post.

There is a lot of conjecture contained within this theory but I've attempted to firmly root it in the terminology used by the characters in relation to the River, as well as how the River itself is described. My avenue of thought is closely related to that of @greyhairedgeekgirl, but I think my conclusion likely differs due to how I have chosen to interpret the definition of the River as a liminal space.

Anyway, onto the question I'm seeking to answer here: I feel that the answer to it lies in Harrow the Ninth, during the explanation we get in response to a question asked by John Gaius himself, and the veritably horrific implications of it.

“Harrowhark, what happens when somebody dies?”

“Thalergetic decay causes cellular death,” you said carefully, pressing the nail in harder, “which emits thanergy. The massive cell death that follows apopneumatism causes a thanergetic cascade, though the first bloom fades and the thanergy stabilises within thirty to sixty seconds.” “What happens to the soul?” “In the case of gradual death—senescence, illness … certain other forms—transition is automatic and straightforward. The soul is pulled into the River by liminal osmosis. In cases of apopneumatic shock, where death is sudden and violent, the energy burst can be sufficient to countermand osmotic pressure and leave the soul temporarily isolated. Whence we gain the ghost, and the revenant.”

Note how this explanation is structured in a sequential way that is likely deliberate:

We establish that thanergy is emitted by thalergetic decay: thalergy is characterised as life energy, produced by cell growth and reproduction. Thanergy is also said to be produced by cell death in the glossary of GtN, which to me indicates that the thalergy produced by a cell is in some way tied to it, beginning to decay into thanergy when the cell dies.

Massive cell death follows apopneumatism: the soul leaving the body results in mass cell death, resulting in the body's thalergy 'flipping' and rapidly decaying into thanergy.

Gradual death results in the soul being pulled into the River by liminal osmosis. Sudden and violent death results in a thanergetic energy burst sufficient to countermand (lit. revoke or cancel an order) osmotic pressure, leaving the soul temporarily isolated outside the River.

The soul leaves the body, the cellular thalergy begins to decay into thanergy in the absence of the soul, and the amount of thanergy produced results in the soul either being pulled into the River or being temporarily stranded.

River Terminology

liminal - occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold; relating to a transitional or initial stage of a process. This word is used in reference to the River a lot.

apopneumatism - apo meaning 'from, away from' and pneumatism referring to the pneuma, or soul; this is the process of the soul coming away from the body. put simply, this is death.

liminal osmosis - osmosis is 'the spontaneous net movement or diffusion of solvent molecules through a selectively-permeable membrane from a region of high water potential (region of lower solute concentration) to a region of low water potential (region of higher solute concentration)'; a solution is a solute dissolved in a solvent, meaning that osmosis is the process whereby a solution resolves the discrepancy in solute : solvent ratio between itself and another solution that are divided by a selectively-permeable membrane. imagine you have two bodies of water, of unequal volume, one with more solute in it than the other: osmosis will result in the body with more solute gaining water from the body with less solute until the ratio of water : solute is equivalent in each body. it equalises their concentration of solute.

osmotic pressure - 'the minimum pressure which needs to be applied to a solution to prevent the inward flow of its pure solvent across a semipermeable membrane', but it is also defined as 'the measure of the tendency of a solution to take in its pure solvent by osmosis'. this is to say that osmotic pressure can serve as the current that pulls a soul into the river, if you assume that the river is a solution and the soul is a solvent. Alternatively, one could also consider the River as the selectively-permeable membrane dividing two solutions.

What does this mean?

Assume the following:

The world is a solution, solute dissolved in a solvent, and the soul is the solvent in that solution.

The River is a selectively-permeable membrane.

The River beyond that Abigail Pent speaks of is another solution.

The soul (solvent) is pulled through the River (selectively-permeable membrane) by osmotic pressure into the solution with less solvent in (the River beyond), except it can't, because that semi-permeable membrane has been rendered impermeable: why?

Solute concentration.

What is the solute?

You collected bits of dried wood—dried wood?—and empty-coloured stones—stones?—from the banks of the River beyond death, and you collected armfuls of the sharply unkind osiers and tall, feathery plants, the ones with long fibrous stems as tall as you were and thin, tangled leaves. Filthy salt wind whipped your faces as you formed wards from the flotsam that grew, apparently, on the bank.

She stood before the coffin of the Sleeper, and gathered those white, soft, solid rips in her hands, and she popped the bubble, and the River came rushing in. It came down around her in shreds, as light and insubstantial as drifts of spiderweb. The water sprayed through white holes, rushing in with a pounding roar: that brackish, bloodied water that only existed within the River. She was buoyed up by a spray of ice water and filth.

The River is described as brackish, it is associated with salt wind. Brackish means water with higher than average salinity, saltwater concentration, so let's assume our solute is salt.

What did John do when he became God? He introduced a copious amount of thanergy into the system, because murders generate more thanergy, enough to make souls unable to pass into the river, and used it to fuel himself.

He murdered Alecto. The salt-water creature: the first thalergetic planet he flipped. The water is the solvent, the solvent is the soul, salt is our solute, salt-water is our solution.

I was so close to cracking this third thing, the soul. I’d realised there was the energy you produced from being alive and the energy you produced when you died, but the fact that energy was produced when you died meant there was another phase. I could get a corpse’s heart beating and get all the neurons firing in the brain, but it wasn’t producing the alive stuff anymore. It wasn’t an on-off switch.

“The body needs thalergy and a soul to keep the lights on. Anastasia’s tripod principle. Body plus thalergy, but no soul, is basically a very weird vegetable … after a while it gives up and shuts down.”

Nona the Ninth shows exactly what the soul is: the third thing, the on-off switch, the leg of the tripod. A body full of thalergy without a soul shuts down after a while because the thalergy isn't stable in the absence of a soul, and decays in its absence. Thalergy decay emits thanergy.

Thalergy is salt, water is the solvent, water is the soul, salt-water is the solution of a living creature: thalergy stabilised by a soul.

How does salt affect water?

A river is freshwater: it doesn't have high salinity. It is not salt-water.

What does salt do to water? It adds to its mass, makes it more buoyant. Buoyancy, or upthrust, is an upward force exerted by a fluid that opposes the weight of a partially or fully immersed object.

The Riverbed is studded with mouths that open at proximity of Resurrection Beasts, and no ghosts venture deeper than the bathyrhoic layer. Anyone who has entered a stoma has never returned. It is a portal to the place I cannot touch—somewhere I don’t fully comprehend, where my power and my authority are utterly meaningless. You’ll find very few ghosts sink as far as the barathron.

Ghosts don't venture near the Riverbed. The Riverbed is studded with stoma. The stoma are mouths that open when Resurrection Beasts near them, and the Resurrection Beasts are the souls of murdered planets, the only souls that can sink that low; the stoma lead to a place John can't touch.

[...]“And that was a titanic effort on the part of Cassiopeia the First, who was brilliant and sensible and careful—she thought she could bait physical portions of the Resurrection Beast into the current. She was right. It followed her.”

They were writhing together, wild and excited—the current swirled in an agitated pandemonium—there was a massive sickening jolt, and the Mithraeum started to slide again, forward … tilting … sliding. “We’re in the current now,” said Pyrrha calmly. “We’ll be pulled in, if the mouth doesn’t close.”

The current of the River leads to the stoma. The River is a semi-permeable membrane that leads to the River beyond, and the stoma are mouths in the Riverbed that lead to a place beyond the power of John. Osmosis pulls solvent, souls, through the membrane into the neighbouring solution.

Conclusion

You went en masse into the River, leaving your bodies behind to slump into C-curves—or at least, yours did, the rest of them stood—and crunched the silvery sand of the bank beneath your feet as the three saints led you both to assemble wards. No blood or flesh or bone here: the first two might be scavenged, the last swept away by the capricious tide. You collected bits of dried wood—dried wood?—and empty-coloured stones—stones?—from the banks of the River beyond death, and you collected armfuls of the sharply unkind osiers and tall, feathery plants, the ones with long fibrous stems as tall as you were and thin, tangled leaves.

The River holds no blood, flesh, or bone. But its waters are made brackish by a kind of salt: the thanergy of murdered billions. How can one make a ward from something unthanergetic, from dried wood and stones? It's impossible, unless they are suffused with thanergy, made pliable to a lyctoral touch.

When John murdered the planets and humanity in one fell stroke, he flooded with the River with enough thanergy that its buoyancy countermanded the osmotic process that draws souls into the River beyond. The River is full of ghosts gone mad: souls that should have moved beyond, but can't, because the current cannot carry them through the stoma, the thanergy working against its pull.

“A powerful necromancer at the peak of their game could last ten seconds in the River,” said God, pushing himself up to stand. “Soul magic is the great leveller. In the first few seconds their thanergy would all be stripped away … then their thalergy, and then their soul.”

The River strips away thanergy and thalergy, but it can only do so much: when its waters are already so permeated with thanergy, souls float, fail to sink to the depths and pass through it, carried by its current. They cannot reach the stoma because their souls are too light compared to that of the Resurrection Beasts, the thanergetic buoyancy pushing them back up.

What lies beyond the stoma isn't Hell, or rather, it is Hell: it is a place where John Gaius can't touch. It is where souls are meant to go. It is the River Beyond.

#the locked tomb #harrow the ninth spoilers #nona the ninth spoilers #tlt theories #tlt meta #hi it's me again i've gone even more insane :)

598 notes · View notes

waterlilyvioletfog · 1 year

Text

No, like. The line immediately after “crown him with many crowns” is “as saints before him fall”. Like yeah haha puns bc Corona means Crown and Corona’s new name is Crown. But specifically that line. Immediately followed! By the promise of saints kneeling before the crowned. but also ‘fall’ has connotations of a) love and b) death. Cainabeth and Abella…….

#the locked tomb spoilers #ntn spoilers #nona the ninth spoilers #nona the ninth #tlt spoilers #tlt series #tlt #coronabeth tridentarius #crown him with many crowns #the locked tomb #gideon the ninth #the locked tomb series #hnnnnggggg #and that’s not even getting into the inherent divided loyalties of her name.#bc it’s literally a line about God. but the name is Edenite in its style.#and like I don’t know if corona knows the full verse but like tamsyn definitely does so.#tlt theories #also obvious gender shit surrounding corona.#chooses name referring to male pronouns.#and while my edition calls her crown princess I distinctly noticed the audiobook saying she was crown prince.#and also she’s like 6’ 3 and buff as hell and the whole gendering of cavaliers thing tam is doing.#like there isn’t NOT a gender thing here.

1K notes · View notes

lady-harrowhark · 1 year

Text

I promise I’m going somewhere with this but I am currently fixating on how seeing Naberius’s trident knife in the beginning of HtN gives Harrow the Gideon Memory Migraine™, despite no clear connection to Gideon:

Ianthe considered this. She nudged the confection basket hilt of the rapier at her hip aside, and took out a long knife that, again, ran a hot rill of pain down your temporal bone. It was—though you had never bothered to learn—Tern’s main-gauche, his trident knife, a long blade from which two other blades would spring at the press of some hidden mechanism; she flicked that mechanism now, and with a snickt they burst out like a firework, two hard points of gleaming steel. She flicked it again, and the blades went snickt back into their housing.

Is it simply that it’s something from the Canaan House era in general? Or is there more going on? Stick with me here.

One of my pet theories I’ve been harboring since Kiriona’s wounds were revealed is that Harrow herself wounded Gideon after she threw herself on the fence, paralleling Jesus’s side wound from being speared after his crucifixion. They needed to ensure Jesus was truly dead, and presumably Harrow also needed to be well and truly sure that Gideon was dead before proceeding. Ianthe says she put a sword through Naberius’s heart to pin his soul in place for her ascension, and we see his body run through with the sword. Harrow needing to do the same to Gideon would certainly be some very juicy angst fuel.

The other crucial component here is one of my other favorite pet theories: that Harrow knew Gideon’s sword was haunted, likely before even coming to Canaan House. I’ve seen a few people do some more detailed explanations about that, but I’ll do a brief rundown here.

Harrow says as far back as GtN about the sword “I never liked that cursed thing anyway; I always felt like it was judging me.” After the events of HtN with the River and Canaan House 2.0, we know she has an innate and potentially subconscious talent with spirit magic; it seems likely she was able to sense what was in the sword whether she knew exactly what was going on or not.

In HtN, Guideline #3 in her her pre-lobotomy letters to her post-lobotomy self has several stipulations (wipe it down with arterial blood nightly, coat it in regenerating ash, don’t cut flesh or bone with it) that sound a lot like precautions one would take to keep a soul from hopping out of it.

When discussing the sword with Abigail in Canaan House 2.0, we get some very specific qualifiers around how much information Harrow is able to provide about the sword. Directly before remembering that the sword was Gideon’s we have: “Harrow’s brain, though still a jumble, was no longer a mess in a darkened room. Memory had gifted her a small torch she could light the disarray with.”

After that, she struggles to recall further details, her own brain providing obstacles: “The light was not proving helpful enough: she was, in desperation, kicking over piles of the rubble in her own brain.” In the end, she’s able to tell Abigail: “I hated that damned sword for years. I don’t know why; it just felt strange - rancorous. I cannot deny that I often assumed its edge would be the last thing I saw. I don’t know.”

Circling back to the final battle of GtN, we get my favorite little nugget of support for this: Harrow is described as looking “affrighted” when Gideon tells her to go get her two-hander. I’d initially taken that to mean she was startled (and maybe a bit annoyed) to find out that Gideon had brought it at all, or freaked out at the situation in general. But I’ve begun to wonder if she specifically didn’t want Gideon to bring that sword with her to Canaan House because she knew, or at least suspected, what it contained.

Which brings us to the trident knife. If Harrow needed to fix Gideon’s soul in place by impaling her herself, and she knew there was a malevolent soul in the two-hander that could conceivably hitch a ride in another body that it came into contact with, she would have needed a different tool for the job… Which may very well have been the trident knife. Seeing the weapon she used to mutilate her cavalier’s body with seems like exactly the sort of thing that would bring on one of Harrow’s Gideon-induced headaches, no? It’s also notable that when Harrow sees this knife, it’s directly before Ianthe stabs her through the hand, again analogous to crucifixion wounds. I gotta say, if this holds water, there’s a certain poetry to both Harrow and Gideon receiving versions of the Holy Wounds on the blade of the same knife.

(Edit to add: further theorizing prompted by @camilla-rekt‘s fab addition can be found on this reblog)

#this is really just a jenga tower of theories but i'm still sitting here rubbing my hands together like a cartoon villain #i am just ripping biting tearing to know what happened between those two chapters #(and incidentally there may have been actual ripping biting tearing involved but i digress)#i wonder if this could have anything to do with the favor harrow owes ianthe… hmm #Nona the Ninth spoilers #harrowhark nonagesimus #Gideon nav #kiriona gaia #ianthe tridentarius #Nona the Ninth #ntn #the locked tomb #tlt #tlt meta #tlt theories

2K notes · View notes

liesmyth · 5 months

Note

okay, what do we think the average niner thought after all of the kids died & p&p's pregnancy announcement? personally i'd be so horrified by the thought of my political leaders a) hearing that a bunch of children had died and deciding to rawdog it, or b) hearing that my leaders didn't hear about the mass death b/c they were so busy rawdogging it that i'd expire on the spot

Ok LISTEN. I think actually the average Ninth dweller might have taken it as a sign of... things going back to normal? I don't think there was a big announcement, and even if someone did the maths, for all they knew Harrow could've been conceived in vitro (she might have been! All we know is that the ovulum was irradiated with death juice) and I just think that births give people hope. Gideon POV sort of implies that, with the “only birth amidst a sea of tiny tombs” line.

However. I also think there was widespread suspicion about the timing of ALL those death, and imo if we're going to not question canon's implications that there have been NO births on the Ninth since Harrow, then the obvious conclusion is that it was a consequence of the mass death event. So like... I can imagine initial positive feelings after all that grief, followed by rising disquiet and fear once things did not even BEGIN to go back to normal.

Anyway tldr I don't think the average Ninth holy order think TOO much about the Reverend Parents having sex in details Only me and my homies do that. It's our roman empire so probably the rawdogging took a backseat to everything else

#ask #anonymous #pelleamena novenarius #priamhark noniusvianus #ninth house #tlt theories #elle tlt posting #tlt

222 notes · View notes

badcatcait · 10 months

Text

Just bought the paperback of Harrow, and uh…new conspiracy just dropped.

Five pages earlier:

Valency’s description from her portrait:

QED red hair and martial prowess runs in the family 🤷‍♀️

#the locked tomb #harrow the ninth spoilers #nona the ninth spoilers #tlt theories #valancy trinit #commander wake #awake remembrance of these valiant dead

1K notes · View notes

ourg0dsal · 6 months

Text

Harrow The Ninth, pg 17

"Beloved dead, hear your handmaiden. I loved you with my whole rotten, contemptible heart- I loved you to the exclusion of aught else- let me live long enough to die at your feat."

Like look, I know at this point in time Harrow does not remember Gideon. And this is mostly likely about The Body (Alecto). But jeez man- why the use of LOVED in PAST TENSE. Like if it was the body it should have been in present tense ya know? it almost feels like she is doing it instinctively. That Harrow is talking to Gideon and she doesn't even know it.

Then ofc Gideon In narration is like " you extemporised wildly" because she obviously thinks it's to the body as well. And even if Harrow did remember her, she would still have thought that.

#tlt #the locked tomb #the locked tomb series #gideon nav #gideon the ninth #harrow the ninth #harrowhark nonagesimus #harrowhark the first #harrowhark #griddlehark #htn spoilers #htn #gtn #ntn #the locked tomb brainrot #tlt brainrot #tlt theories #the locked tomb theories #theory

192 notes · View notes

tereziii · 2 years

Text

An interesting theory from lesbian_mothman on twitter suggesting that Alecto has always been in Harrow. Awesome thread, give it a read.

This also gives a lot of significance to the line in the last act of harrow the ninth where gideon says "Living inside you—if I start I’ll never stop, so we have to move on—was like living in a well, and every time I bobbed to the surface I kind of got clotheslined back down to the bottom. I’m not complaining, I just want you to know."

Was alecto there with gideon, pushing her back down to the bottom?

#tlt #gideon nav #harrow nonagesimus #htn #ianthe tridentarius #gtn #brain crying #harrow the ninth #harrowhark nonagesimus #kiriona gaia #alecto #alecto the ninth #anastasia the first #anastasia the ninth #nona the ninth spoilers #tlt theories

2K notes · View notes

shouldhavebeenpersephone · 9 months

Text

So I was re-reading Nona. And. Have we talked about this yet? Have we gone through the implications of this section?

NtN John 5:4. Analysis under the cut.

I always assumed the tower was a part of the Ninth because right after this chapter Nona sees the tower in the River and after that drives the truck everyone is in to the Ninth. But nowhere does it say that the tower is the Ninth.

I mean, looking at the description it certainly sounds like it - all grey and death, which is why I assumed it was. The Ninth is tall even if embedded inside of a planet, one could argue shafts are towers. But why would a tower of the Ninth be in the River?

First things first; the tower in Tarot stands for sudden change, confusion and awakening - I don't feel this needs further explanation on why it's relevant (I might, however, someday do a Tarot Locked Tomb analysis because there is A LOT there). It also refers to the Tower of Babel, which was destroyed by God along with the uniform language of Earth so that people would not come so close to Him again, so that they stayed vincible. Sound familiar?

John did make a uniform language technically, but he also separated the population to different planets, rendering them unable to unite and overcome him not only due to instilled nationalism but also due to the faults in the Houses. We know that the Sixth is struggling to keep up their lineages and population number - we know the Fourth die too young to really leave anything behind - we know the Second is too busy fighting wars.

This leads me to believe that whatever the tower represents will be the end of the world as they know it - maybe through a new God and an end to the Houses, maybe the end of Godhood and Lyctorhood in general. Either way, something is piercing through the River - something that has the power to change it all.

NtN Chapter 30. Nona's mind knew what it was "above" and "below". Does this refer to Harrow and Alecto?

Now let's go back to that first passage from John 5:4. The parts that stand out to me are 'speared-through and mute', 'a tower that soared, impossible and deadly grey', and 'lurching out of the River as though gasping for air.' All of this sounds like Gideon.

GtN Chapter 37. Very much speared-through and mute.

NtN Chapter 16. Ramrod posture? Soaring, impossible and deadly grey.

NtN Chapter 25. And Gideon knows what's in the River. Chances are that the tower is a construct created by John for whatever purposes. Gideon is also a construct created by John - at least Kiriona is.

I obviously don't know how accurate this connection my brain jumped on is, but it honestly makes a lot of sense to me. There is something below the River, just like how 'reality' is above the river. Especially when considering Nona referred to a thought above and below that knew what the tower was, it appears to me like the below is a plane much like reality and the River where things exist and can continue to exist. I have not yet sat with or developed an opinion on what exactly might be there, but there is something there. I think it might be the cavaliers.

So what if Gideon ended up there? What if, when she ended up in the River at the end of HtN, Gideon ended up in the below once Alecto was forced into Harrow's body? What if John knew all along how to reach there and he finally decided this was the time to bring something - no - someone back?

But you can't really reach the other plane without the River, can you? We have seen it with the Resurrection Beasts - they travel through the River and exist in it while simultaneously being above it. And, if we look at Palamedes, one who has passed and is part of the River needs a container of sorts to be above. Perhaps, then, one can sink while tethered higher in the three layers, but one cannot soar from below without a container to carry them up. An integrated cavalier is forced down, not reaching up - they are buried in the below.

So let's say John brought Gideon back. Her corpse would obviously be the container for her above. The tower, then, could be her container for the River. Ianthe could be using Gideon's aberration in the River as a means to anchor herself as well. That could be why they are the Tower Princes.

Alecto would know the tower was a gateway of sorts. She would understand, like presumably any other Resurrection Beast would understand. But Harrow. Harrow.

GtN Chapter 36. I cannot let go of this passage in relation to the tower. "Instead, she was Drearburh." "She took the whole putrid, quiet, filth-strewn madness of the place, and she opened her doors to it."

Cavaliers' tethers are shown through the eyes, through altering the look of that which binds them to above - so, maybe through being Gideon the tower became Drearburh. Maybe Harrow saw it, and felt it, and she saw Gideon, and she saw home. So she walked, and she walked, and she knew that it would lead back to her.

The tower - Gideon, then, will be the changer of things in the end. Maybe Gideon and Harrow, but definitely Gideon.

#this ended up being so much longer than I was planning for #also the tower having a bell!!!!! muster call to get your girl #Ash does TLT Meta #the locked tomb #tlt #the locked tomb spoilers #tlt spoilers #gideon the ninth spoilers #harrow the ninth spoilers #nona the ninth spoilers #tlt meta #tlt speculation #tlt theories

294 notes · View notes

ossifer-bones · 8 months

Text

On the Mechanics of Lyctorhood

I want to preface this by saying this is a long, long post that is going to delve deep into lyctorhood, skim the surface of physics and biology, and fully embrace conjecture! If I'm right about all this then I'm very happy, but I also cannot wait to be disproven in Alecto the Ninth.

Thanergy

Thanergy is the product of the decay of thalergy: this is the principle that underpins all of necromancy. All necromantic adepts are capable of manipulating both thalergy and thanergy, but necromancy is shown to be reliant on thanergy specifically, and is most geared toward utilising thanergy as a result.

As shown by @pokkop15 in this post the term thanergy is almost certainly derived from Thanatos, the Greek God of Death, but thalergy's origins are more murky: likely candidates are thaleros (a greek word that means lively), Thalia (the muse of Festivity whose name also means blooming), or Thalassa (divine personification of the sea in greek mythology, which would fit considering how life is very associated with saltwater in TLT).

The Eightfold Word: What is Lyctorhood?

According to the resident tall glass of skank and questionably reliable narrator, Ianthe Tridentarius, the Eightfold Word is composed of the following steps:

Preserve the soul, with memory and intellect intact.

Analyse it—understand its structure, its shape.

Remove and absorb it: take it into yourself without consuming it in the process.

Fix it in place so it can’t deteriorate.

Incorporate it: find a way to make the soul part of yourself without being overwhelmed.

Consume the flesh [NOTE: Ianthe says 'a drop of blood is enough to ground you', which to me indicates that this step serves as a way to ground the incorporated soul into the lyctor's body, by having material from the soul's original body. This is very significant.]

Reconstruction—making spirit and flesh work together the way they used to, in the new body.

Hook up the cables and get the power flowing.

Lyctorhood seemingly works by providing the necromancer with, among other things, a near limitless reserve of thanergy that is presumably derived from the incorporated soul once the power is flowing: as we see with Cytherea healing herself, lyctors are either unable to generate thalergy—or their ability to do so is lessened in comparison to their ability to generate thanergy—and must instead siphon it from external sources when their own thalergy is depleted.

In Nona the Ninth we are introduced to Palamedes' conception of Lyctorhood in terms of Lysis: the Lyctorhood we are most familiar with is Petty Lysis, where only one of the components dies, while Grand Lysis is a mutual death—a gravitational singularity creating something new, as is the case with Paul. Lysis is a term used in biology that refers to 'the breaking down of the membrane of a cell', which as I've explored before

In the series, Lyctorhood is spoken of in terms of fire: there are repeated references to Gideon's soul being made the furnace of [Harrow's] Lyctorhood and serving as a furnace of power, Mercymorn refers to her cavalier's mortal soul burning in her chest, John says that the risk posed by fully incorporating Alecto into himself completely would be that he'd probably burn to death, and Paul's birth results in Camilla's body being consumed by flames. This leads us on to how lyctorhood is also characterised as consumption: eating the cavalier, absorbing their soul, burning it for fuel.

What is the mechanism behind the thanergetic generation of lyctorhood?

Lyctorhood is barbaric, it is cannibalism, it is taking another and burning them in yourself for power. But that raises the question of where that power comes from. By the way that thalergy/thanergy are spoken of with terms reminiscent of radiation, coupled with how lyctorhood is rendered through metaphors and imagery related to fire and/or consumption, it would seem that the logical conclusion behind this is that the soul is being subject to continual thanergetic fission.

The terminology Tamsyn uses is something that lends credence to this: nuclear fission 'occurs when a neutron slams into a larger atom, forcing it to excite and split into two smaller atoms—also known as fission products'. Sudden, sharp decay/conversion of thalergy into thanergy could be the mechanism behind thanergetic fission, as we see with Harrow's description of apopneumatic shock and how the burst of thanergetic energy (a neutron slamming into a larger atom, forcing it to excite) is sufficient to prevent liminal osmosis from taking place: "In cases of apopneumatic shock, where death is sudden and violent, the energy burst can be sufficient to countermand osmotic pressure and leave the soul temporarily isolated."

But from what we know of the nature of the thanergy, thalergy, and the soul, this explanation makes no sense. Thanergy is emitted by thalergy decay, but souls in of themselves are not a source of thalergy nor thanergy, as shown by Anastasia's tripod principle: “The body needs thalergy and a soul to keep the lights on. Anastasia’s tripod principle. Body plus thalergy, but no soul, is basically a very weird vegetable … after a while it gives up and shuts down.” [Nona the Ninth]

Going back to the nuclear terminology, I'm going to cut straight to the core of this theory: the mechanism behind the thanergetic generation of lyctorhood is thanergetic fusion.

What is thanergetic fusion?

The term I use here is a misnomer, because a more accurate term would be pneumatic fusion, considering how Tamsyn Muir is fond of using the Greek pneuma to refer to the soul: nuclear fusion 'is a reaction in which two or more atomic nuclei combine to form one or more different atomic nuclei and subatomic particles'.

A nucleus in physics is 'the positively charged central core of an atom, consisting of protons and neutrons and containing nearly all its mass', while in biology the term refers to 'a dense organelle present in most eukaryotic cells, typically a single rounded structure bounded by a double membrane, containing the genetic material'. Palamedes uses the term lysis for Lyctorhood, which as you'll recall refers to the disintegration of the cell membrane, thus exposing it's innards: such as the nucleus. The soul is the nucleus.

Nuclear fusion involves combining two or more atomic nuclei to form one or more different atomic nuclei and subatomic particles: the difference in mass between the reactants and products is manifested as either the release or absorption of energy; as a rule of thumb the fusion of lighter nuclei releases energy, making it an exothermic process, while the fusion of heavier nuclei results in energy being retained by the product nucleons, and thus the resulting reaction is endothermic. An exothermic reactions releases heat, causing the temperature of the immediate surroundings to rise, while an endothermic one absorbs heat and cools the surroundings.

In the context of this nuclear fusion explanation of Lyctorhood, an exothermic (exothanergetic) reaction releases thanergy while an endothermic (endothanergetic) reaction absorbs thanergy: the fusion of lighter souls release thanergy, the fusion of heavier souls absorbs it.

What are the implications behind these mechanics?

The question that comes to mind is what is a heavier soul? The answer, once again, lies in physics: "The heaviest atomic nuclei are created in nuclear reactions that combine two other nuclei of unequal size into one; roughly, the more unequal the two nuclei in terms of mass, the greater the possibility that the two react." [Wikipedia]

How does John explain the soul of a planet to Harrow?

John: “And what has a soul?” Harrow: “Anything with a thalergetic complexity significant enough to … have a soul. So, humanity.” [...] Harrow: “A planet’s a ball of dust. Its thalergy comes from the accumulation of microbial life. You can’t consider it one coherent system.” John: “Call it a communal soul. What’s a human being, other than a sack of microbial life?

Planets' souls are communal, formed from the thalergetic complexity of an entire world coalescing into a nuclei that lies at its heart, heavy in a way a human soul is not: a human soul is light, a planet's soul is heavy. In other words, Alecto is a heavy nuclei and John is a light nuclei, with the resultant nuclei of their combination forming something heavier than either: an endothanergetic reaction.

Moving back to thanergetic fission and the apopneumatic shock of a violent death, we can now examine what happens when John becomes God:

He becomes aware of Alecto when Cristabel kills herself in front of him.

Now aware of Alecto, he creates a massive flood of thanergy by inciting the violent deaths of millions, possibly billions, through the detonation of nuclear devices.

Empowered by the mass thanergetic fission caused by an untold number of apopneumatic shocks, 'I became a demigod', he finishes off the rest.

He kills Alecto, takes her soul in his hands, and attempts to become one with her.

He almost fails, and during this flawed process is forced to split her soul between his body and another, hiding himself in her and herself in him.

Fusion still occurs, this reaction is endothanergetic and allows him to near absorb a massive amount of thanergy in one sitting: "And when we were together … once the shaman had claimed the sun … I became God."

He violently kills the rest of the planets in the system, flipping them and creating a surplus of thanergy, a process of large-scale energy creation and transferall: to quote Ianthe once again, "You see, my field has always been energy transferral … large-scale energy transferral. Resurrection theory."

What this all means is that the secret behind the Resurrection is that John's Lyctorhood works fundamentally differently to that of his Saints, because his is endothanergetic where theirs is exothanergetic, a reaction between a heavy and a lighter nuclei.

Not only is it endothanergetic instead of exothanergetic, it generates a different form of energy. Emperor John Gaius produces thalergy.

Resurrection Theory

As we know from Anastasia's tripod principle, thalergy alone cannot make life, a soul is also needed—meaning that the inverse is true, in that a soul alone cannot make life, thalergy is needed; In order for John to have performed the Resurrection, he would have needed to imbue bodies with both their soul and thalergy to recreate the life he took in the first place. Logically, this means that John would have to be able to create thalergy. John is the only being in the universe who is able to generate thalergy, namely via the continual fusion reaction between a heavy soul and a light soul, also known as Alecto and himself, to produce it.

Let us return to what Augustine says of the nature of his power: “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.”

John is the source of fresh thanergy in the system: he produces thalergy, which he can decay into thanergy. The thanergy in the system is finite, it would drain away after enough time, but his heavy and light soul reaction producing thalergy that can then be decayed into thanergy allows for new thanergy to be introduced into the system; John's necromancy's unique in that it relies on the rapid creation of thanergy via accelerated thalergetic decay, resulting in thanergetic fission.

Why do I say thanergetic fission? Becase it could explain why his necromancy is shown to manifest as large amounts of light, because what does thanergetic fission result in? We see when Palamedes utilises the rapid thanergetic fission of his thanergy reserves to blow up in Cytherea's face:

The sickroom exploded into white fire, and the bonds pinning Gideon snapped. She fell hard against the wall and spun, drunkenly, lurching back down the corridor as Palamedes Sextus made everything burn. There was no heat, but Gideon sprinted away from that cold white death without bothering to spare a glance behind as though flames were licking at her heels.

White light that gives off no heat. What happens when John reassembles himself?

White light. It bleached the insides of your nose and the back of your throat. It hurt coming out your ears. It bled out your eyeballs. It wasn’t a flash of light, more … a suddenness; when it was gone—as though it hadn’t even existed, but had been a luminous hallucination—time stopped.

Speaking of that scene, it is likely the most definitive proof we see that John produces thalergy, because there is no way for his body to function without thalergy, and thanergy cannot be converted to thalergy (as far as we know). That thalergy has to come from somewhere. John, the Resurrector, is able to create thalergy.

Do you know where else we see what is explicitly called a form of resurrection? The endothanergetic reaction that created Harrowhark Nonagesimus: "My parents gassed fifty-four infants, eighty-one children, and sixty-five teenagers, and harnessed that thanergy bloom to conceive me. My mother used the resultant power to modify her ovum on a chromosomal level, so thanergy ignition wouldn’t compromise the embryo. She did this so I would be a necromancer." [Harrow the Ninth]

A large amount of thanergy is generated within an instant by closely-timed apopneumatic shocks caused by sudden death via what Harrow specifically names as nerve gas [Gideon the Ninth]. This brings to mind thanergetic fission as opposed to fusion, due to the fact it relies on thanergy, but the key detail here lies in two factors: the unequal size of the nuclei (souls) involved here, and the fact these souls are shown to have been manipulated.

The souls—emphasis on souls, as opposed to thanergy—of a large amount of children, of varying ages, are forcibly prevented from passing to the River via liminal osmosis due to the sheer amount of thanergy involved, and they are tied to Harrow's soul, as shown by Abigail commenting on her unique spiritual signature: "I’ve counted up to one hundred and fifty signatures contributing to you, and there’s more—they’re stamps rather than complete revenants, of course, which means their spirits were manipulated to leave marks on you in some way, which is fascinating if it means…"

What is a planet's soul? A communal one, the thalergy complexity of a world. What is Harrow's soul? A communal one, exactly two hundred sons and daughters of her House, manipulated to be stamped on her original one. I cannot speak of what this means, but it means that Harrow's soul is naturally heavier than John's: a nuclei formed from two hundred others.

Conclusions

Lyctorhood is nuclear fusion, with souls as the nuclei: the combination of souls produces thanergy as a byproduct of the process of forming a new nuclei; Souls are not a perpetual energy source, and are unable to generate thanergy or thalergy on their own, it is the combination of them that creates thanergy or thalergy.

Petty Lysis, the Lyctorhood of the Saints, is an exothanergetic reaction which produces thanergy as the two souls involved are melded over untold years: it is not a one-way consumption, it is a fusion, but the power transferral does only go one way, due to the fact it is not a mutual death. Grand Lysis is a more complete, and thus powerful, version of this reaction wherein the two nuclei are fully combined within an instant, as opposed to gradually combined.

John's joining with Alecto works on the same fusion principle of Lyctorhood, but the difference lies in the nature of the reaction at the heart of it: he is endothanergetic and produces thalergy as opposed to thanergy, which he can subsequently decay into thanergy to fuel his necromancy. The Resurrection was made possible by him generating thanergy.

Final Note:

I want to point out something before anyone else can, and that is the fact Lyctors could be interpreted as working on pneumatic fission as opposed to fusion: meaning that the constituent souls are split to produce power, and that the exothanergetic and endothanergetic reactions would be reversed—John exothanergetic instead of endothanergetic, and vice versa with Petty Lyctors, which explains why they appear to be thanergy voids: they absorb all thanergy in their surroundings.

I considered this while writing this theory, but ultimately I found that fusion seemed more likel. Alternatively, both Paul and John are examples of pneumatic fusion due to their more complete Lyctorhood while the Petty Lyctors are working on pneumatic fission. I prefer the idea that all Lyctorhood is pneumatic fusion, which is why I ultimately leaned into that interpretation in this post.

Thank you for reading.

#the locked tomb #nona the ninth spoilers #nona the ninth #tlt theory #tlt theories #tlt meta

742 notes · View notes

mindfogs · 4 months

Text

might be the alectopause talking but here's a bonkers thought

kiriona is obviously jesus so i though who is harrow in this scenario? and here are my two options:

JUDAS: he is the cause of jesus crucifixion and because of this he indirectly led to human salvation and because of this he's a controversial figure. now, if there was a kiriona Bible i immagine harrow would also be a controversial figure like judas being the cause of her death but because of it she indirectly caused the rebirth of Prince Kiriona that leads armies against the devil (savior of mankind). yes this will mean a kiss between the two in Alecto BUT the kiss would be horrible

PETER: i have no concrete proof for harrow being strongly associated with peter other that him being extremely faithful to jesus, being one of the first apostles and being crucified with an upside down cross because he didn't think he was worth of dying in the same way as jesus. seems very harrow to me. THEORY TIME and istg this is something i have no proof of i just KNOW it will happen somehow tamsyn told me in a dream. Kiriona will ask Harrow if she loves her three time through the book like jesus did to peter. idk guys mark my words IT WILL HAPPEN. if we want to get crazier with it, peter was also the first pope, make it it what you will.

#foggy thoughts #the locked tomb #gideon the ninth #griddlehark #gideon nav #kiriona gaia #harrow nonagesimus #tlt #tlt theories #alecto the ninth #alecto the ninth theories #bible

113 notes · View notes

multifunctionalnitroglycerin · 2 months

Text

Poe’s Annabel Lee in TLT #1

“Annabel Lee” is the last poem E. A. Poe composed, and arguably one of his most famous ones. It is in many ways, typical of one would consider a Poe poem, featuring thematics such as the death of a beautiful young woman, love, and grief. Thematics and subjects that are ever-present in the tlt book series, and I will do my best to dissect in this post.

With a superficial read of the books, most would garner the rather obvious parallel between John Gaius and Alecto on the one hand, and the hero of the poem and Annabel Lee, on the other. John himself is not particularly mindful or discreet of the analogy he himself creates. And he has no need to, seeing as he is the only one that remembers the world from before. And I think it is terribly beautiful and utterly devastating, in a poetic irony sort of way, that a comparison so obvious as this, a hallmark of American poetry would go completely unnoticed in the new world that John has built in his image, for he is the only one who truly knows, the only one who remembers.

Another more subtle parallel, I feel could be drawn between Gideon and Harrow, and the poem’s heroes. Though, I must admit it is perhaps a bit of a stretch. I might make another post abt that. But for now, let’s dive in the magical world of Annabel Lee, and dissect the poem, bit by bit.

For all our literature geeks out there, I will just point out that the poem is a narrative poem, and it uses a few different rhyme schemes, and meters, with both anapests and iambs being present (Shout out to all the lovely people who are familiar with iambic fifteen-syllable lines and have been haunted by them).

I will now start with a general feeling of the poem before jumping into the details. From the start, Annabel Lee feels like a fairytale, with a hopeful start that alludes to the fairytale opening of Once upon a time… However, as the poem progresses this hopeful emotion slowly devolves to something eerie, ominous, and desperate. Something dark, cynical, and terrifying. And this is where we will draw our first parallel.

The Earth is dying. That much we can garner. There is however a man, that loves her more than anything else. That desperately, with his clumsy, human, imperfect, selfish way wants to save her. And thus, she bestows him with a gift, hoping that he would indeed help. It does make for a nice fairytale start of the story does it not? Unfortunately, however, this is not how it evolves, for John inevitably fails to do what he has been tasked with, despite all his love for her. And he kills her. She is now trapped in a human-like body of John’s design, a body that in its design is proof he could not escape the industrialism he so loathed, and she feels like a monstrosity. And the story only gets worse from then on, with her inevitable banishment in the Tomb for what seems to be an eternal sleep at the behest of John’s Lyctors.

Both takes I feel follow the same pattern of emotional development, regarding both their content of the text and the emotional rollercoaster they inspire in the reader.

It was many and many a year ago

In a kingdom by the sea

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

by the name of Annabel Lee

10.000 years ago, to be precise, in a water-filled planet called Earth. See that fairytale tone? Also, I would like to point out once more, that saltwater references. Salt water, the sea, Θάλασσα as a source of life and energy is a strong thematic that repeats itself multiple times in Muir’s books, and this is no exception. And the fact that Earth is a planet with a lot of saltwater, and in this instance serve both the kingdom and the personification of the maiden is an apt usage of the theme. Moreover, in these introductory lines, we are immediately presented with what will be the central figure of the poem, Annabel Lee, an alleged maiden. A noun that alludes to a young, beautiful woman. (Alecto is arguably in the form that John gives her, also a beautiful woman, despite the Lyctors finding her monstrous. I am of the opinion that what unsettled them was that Alecto was both too bizarre, too other, too immense to be fully understood and contained within so plain a physical vessel, and way too human to be clearly marked as different and other. One look at John’s creation and they would immediately see that alien strange cavalier, and their closest friends in her quirks and mannerisms, all at once.)

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

than to love and be loved by me

I was a child and she was a child

In this Kingdom by the Sea

I need not point out I feel the thematic of an impossibly powerful love that is introduced in these lines, the desperate love that John harbored for his dying home planet, and the equally desperate love Alecto harbors for the man she thought would save her. Even when he betrays her, one of the things she says to John immediately after he confines her in the human form is I love you. (“What else...” “I love you”, “…You said that too.”) And of course, the notion that they were both “children”, inexperienced with little idea of what they were doing in their despair– most certainly not untrue. A line that heavily points to one of Pyrrha’s most iconic lines in Nona the Ninth “We were children - playing in the reflections of stars in a pool of water... Thinking it was space.” And they were children in comparison to what they are now. Inexperienced and stumbling through their first steps in the chaos that love is.

But we loved with a love that was more than love—

I and my Annabel Lee;

With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven

Coveted her and me.

Now these lines tie a bit more loosely to tlt. The love that these children so to speak harbor is not any less real because of their youth and inexperience. On the contrary the aftereffects of Alecto’s and John’s love are very much real and rather disastrous for the solar system. And such love, apparently inspired jealously. In the poem in the usually benign and protective guardians that angels are, and in the books, in the Lyctors. And I think that it is at this point that the thematics might or might not deviate from the books. Because one might say, that the Lyctors, that I feel are in these lines represented by the angelical figures, could not possibly be jealous of Alecto, and her relationship with John, could they? They find her monstrous and wrong, a hindrance, so what could they be jealous about? A lot of things, I believe. For we do see in the books the extends of the affections that John harbors for Alecto, even though his little man not responsible for the consequences of his actions, behavior. In the beginning John explains everything to Alecto through his eyes, takes her everywhere, and does not part with her. He harbors this love and kinship for his strange cavalier, or the soul of the Earth that chose him to save her, that it seems to overshadow even the depth of emotion he feels for his Lyctors. For he cares for and loves Augustine and Mercy and Gideon and Cassiopeia, Ulesses and Titania, but I feel that the love he has for them is but a speck in the ocean of the emotional turmoil that Alecto inspires in him. So they cover them for a love they themselves cannot feel.

And what would you do, how would you feel, if the man you gave everything up for, the man you uprooted your life for, the man you condemned the planet and the billions of lives on it for, barely had eyes for you? If despite all you had done for him and all you did on a daily basis to keep this impossible empire intact, all he ever did was parade his monstrous, weird, wrong, guard dog around? And no matter what you did you could never get rid of her, for she was everywhere, and she was his, and he never could care for you as his friend, as a companion, an advisor, a pillar of the empire, his hand and gesture and manifestation of his will with nearly as much love and devotion he showed her? What if you felt that she was a distraction keeping him from building the empire he was meant to build?

And this was the reason that, long ago, In this kingdom by the sea, A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling My beautiful Annabel Lee; So that her highborn kinsman came And bore her away from me, To shut her up in a sepulchre In this kingdom by the sea. The angels, not half so happy in heaven, Went envying her and me— Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know, In this kingdom by the sea) That the wind came out of the cloud by night, Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

Given my ramble above I will not expand anymore on how the Lyctors would see Alecto at least as a hindrance to the empire, and at most would loathe her, for despite never having sacrificed as much as they had – in their eyes at least - she had John’s attention, devotion, respect and -frankly obsessive- love. What follows now, is an abrupt change of tone (gone are the fairytale notions) and an allusion to the Tomb, even though we know that John himself put her in there and not the other Lyctors. But we also know that the other Lyctors were on a surface level, the driving force of that decision. He sealed her away to appease them. And at least in John’s little man mentality he could insist that it was for them and their insistence that he sealed her away. And he feels the loss of Alecto, his Annabel Lee. Furthermore, Annabel Lee has been chilled, and while the interpretation in the poem can be a bit vague, we know that Alecto is held in a freezing ice coffin practically. Frozen in time in the subzero temperatures of the Ninth.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love

Of those who were older than we—

Of many far wiser than we—

And neither the angels in heaven above,

Nor the demons down under the sea,

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:

Lyctorhood ala John. Binding your soul to the soul of a planet, to the soul of Earth. It doesn’t get any stronger and up and personal than that. A love and bond that is stronger than all he knows I don’t think there is much of anything anyone can do to sever Alecto’s connection from John. It is presented as one of the big issues in the book. How to kill God when he has bound his life force to a bloody planet, who seems to be rather murderous on the best of days. I quite look forward to seeing how that moves forward. For the hero of our poem, don’t know about John I must admit, seems to be certain nothing can tear their souls apart from each other.

For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side

Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,

In her sepulchre there by the sea,

In her tomb by the sounding sea.

The first two lines are pretty familiar, aren’t they? They should be because they are featured in the books. And they point that our hero meets Annabel Lee in his dreams. Aka the whole premise of Nona the Ninth, where Nona dreams of Alecto’s memories. As for the second set of lines, it seems to be an allusion to both John’s original bright golden eyes and the bottomless black pits of Alecto’s in which the stars never rise. As for the next line, my presumptive butt would like to take it as a bit of a foreshadowing. And a symbol. Yes, it does bring to mind John’s ascension in a sense with the lying on the ground theme, but the imagery here is much more serene, peaceful. So, I would like to believe it alludes to the end, where John will finally find peace and will lie besides Alecto for what could be their final rest. I do not remember if he lay beside her every night before, so correct me if I am wrong. But I would find it awfully poetic for them to do that as they set off Resurrection Vol2 or they reverse what they have done. And the last lines again allude to the Tomb and the sea. So, a random crazy idea is that they would both lie together in the Tomb and reset everything. And that the Tomb, their place of final rest or not, will be surrounded by water, so I have this crazy imagery that perhaps the Tomb containing Alecto’s and John’s lifeforce will be the center, the core, of the new planet that would resemble earth. And thus, an ocean shall rise surrounding the two, and they will eternally lay beside each other in the depths of a planet surrounded by saltwater.

All in all, both stories are stories of love in its all-consuming nature, that can be romantic and all encompassing, or take a darker turn and become obsessive and destructive. Of Love that can transcend the mortal realm and alter the laws of the world as we know it, inspiring dark feelings in what should be benevolent characters. And still that love transcends the obstacles that are set, for better or worse. Is it really as beautiful as it appears? The stories also are stories of grief and loss that defines the one that gets left behind, grief that attaches itself to the person and doesn’t let go, overpowering sense and sensibility. That becomes the past present and future of our hero. That has no outlet and suffocates its bearer. (We have seen John’s darker days, where he is drunk and barely functional.)

Okay it is probably way too late, and I am way too tired, but it makes sense in my head. Next part of this one we will be analyzing possible comparisons between this lovely poem and Gideon and Harrow’s relationship.

Take care of yourselves.

#the locked tomb #tlt #tlt series #tlt spoilers #alecto the first #alecto the ninth #alecto tlt #john gaius #nona the ninth spoilers #harrow the ninth #tlt fandom #tlt theories #Annabel lee #poetry #literary parallels #literary analysis #John is Poe and A.L is Alecto #Can it be more obvious #tlt fan theory

104 notes · View notes