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iviarellereads · 2 years ago

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Nona the Ninth, Day Four, Chapter 17

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For detail on The Locked Tomb coverage and the index, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

(Plant shoot icon)(1) In which the children and the adults make a plan.

WHERE IS PYRRHA?—THE GANG SWEARS AN OATH—THE ANGEL MAKES A CALL— HOT SAUCE DRAWS HER GUN—FORTY-EIGHT HOURS UNTIL THE TOMB OPENS.(2)

Nona wakes, confused about how she fell asleep in all her clothes.

The evening was awful, but Cam didn't ask any other questions once she learned Nona had waited at the school and been driven home by a teacher. She only asks if Nona heard about the broadcast. Nona is ready to tell her about the girl from her dream, but Cam doesn't press the issue, just went to ask Pal something. The last she remembers from the night was admitting she didn't contradict Crown about dating Cam to Pal, and then Pal trying to figure out where Pyrrha went, and realizing she probably went to steal the shuttle, just before Nona passed out.

In the morning, Cam has Nona recite her dream into the recorder alone, while Cam does the washing up that Pyrrha usually does. Nona feels adrift, wondering if the girl in the broadcast really was the girl from the dream or not. By the time she realizes she should start recording, she forgets which button to push, and hits them at random until something happens, and she starts hearing Cam's and Pal's messages to each other.

On the recordings they discuss why the BOE would want a Lyctor on tap, then commiserate about their shared loneliness without each other. Pal can't bear eating Cam's life like this, but Cam says she'd carry his memory anyway, she'd rather have any part of him for real.

Just as the recording moves on to a recorded session with Nona and her dreams, Nona in the present notices Cam standing in the doorway. Nona apologizes and says she didn't hear anything, but Cam just tells her to wash up before breakfast. Nona worries about Pyrrha, and who she'll tell ass jokes to.(2)

In this saintly, uplifted, and really quite terrified state of mind, Nona looked at herself and found that she was very grimy. In a welter of fearful bravery she sponged herself at the cold-water tap until she was free of smuts(3) and old blood and dust, and the water was so cold it made her skin purple and blotchy. She called out, “Camilla, can I borrow a shirt?” and was pleased to hear, “Sure,” so she picked out one that was only a little too big but smelled comfortingly of Camilla. She looked in the cracked mirror and decided her hair was probably all right. The braids were a bit fuzzy but still doable. Thus armed, she went into the kitchen to see about breakfast.

Nona eats more of her breakfast than usual without resisting, so much that Cam doesn't even encourage her to eat more. Nona asks if they're going to wait for Pyrrha, but Cam says, no, Pyrrha's been gone for almost a full day, and Cam's been stuck at home that whole time. She needs to see the broadcast and look for Pyrrha, whose guns are still here, indicating she didn't intend to be gone far or for long.

Cam says she and Nona will go to the spaceport. Nona is excited, but asks to stop in at the school first, to make sure her friends and teacher are safe. Cam agrees, as Pal had wanted to thank the teacher anyway, but… this may be the last time Nona can see her friends. Nona understands, has been expecting it any time now, and says she's loved her friends. Cam says "we" (she, Pal, probably Pyrrha) know it.(4)

Cam goes to get dressed and cleaned up, and Nona does something she never would have normally: she peels up the sniper blazing(5) and looks up at the blue sphere in the sky.

She so rarely got to look at it from here. It hung on the morning horizon, and as she watched the sphere made a low, voiceless moan—a wanting sound—but quiet, on the edge of hearing. A whispered vocalisation and nothing more. “Can you help me?” Nona whispered. “Can you do anything? Do you know where Pyrrha is?” But it only lowed sadly, like a cow.(6) “That’s all right,” whispered Nona. “Sorry for asking.” Then: “Don’t do anything weird, okay? I’m having enough trouble right now.”

Nona gets the blazing pressed back down just in time for Cam to come out. She dresses for outside, and they leave. They can hear voices and sounds like people moving boxes behind doors, and Cam takes the elevator to conserve energy for what's to come.(7) Nobody pays them any attention, but there's an electric tension in the air of the city, as though waiting for a big event.

Nona felt sorry for the city: it wasn’t its fault. It was as tall and tumbledown and snaggletoothed as always.

Nona buzzes into the schoolhouse, and Honesty opens the door. Nona's so glad to see him again. Beautiful Ruby almost gives away that Nona snuck off to the broadcast, with Cam unknowing right behind Nona, but this gives way to asking where Hot Sauce is and Nona explaining. Beautiful Ruby thought Nona would "get a massive hiding"(8), and says Nona's "pimp" scares him. Nona says Pyrrha hasn't come home since yesterday, and they can't tell anyone.

Beautiful Ruby said instantly and kindly, “Won’t tell. Don’t worry, Nona, pimping is long hours and you have to go all over,” and she turned on him and something in her eyes and face made him stop immediately and say, “It was a joke! It was a joke. Oh my God, don’t be crazy at me, stop it.”(9)

Instead of talking more about Pyrrha, Nona asks where Born in the Morning is, but silence answers her. Honesty says breezily that all his dads probably joined up. They're all silent until the door buzzes again, but it's only the Angel and Noodle and Hot Sauce.(10) Cam thanks the Angel, but she waves it off, and suggests they talk once the kids are settled. The other teacher won't be coming.

The Angel brings them all upstairs, and they all sit spread out across the room as usual. Cam takes a seat near the back, strangely meek. The Angel asks if everyone and their families are alright. Beautiful Ruby, calling his mother by her first name, says she said they should give in to the Houses. Hot Sauce says she's weak. The Angel says it can be hard to be strong for more people than yourself, and you should judge people by what they do, not what they say. Hot Sauce says, so if someone says they're a necromancer, you should wait until they do something before you shoot them? Nona risks a glance at Cam, who is listening so intently Nona doubts she's Cam anymore.

The Angel says if Hot Sauce sees a necromancer, she should run in the opposite direction. There's no point fighting them, is there? Honesty asks if the Angel is scared of Necromancers, and she replies that of course she is, she was born on Lemuria. Cam asks what happened there. The explanation seems to make it clear that it was a turned world, and inhabited right up until the moment the final switch occurred between thalergy and thanergy. The Houses won the confrontations in the upheaval of the flip, and twenty years later, here's the Angel.

Beautiful Ruby still thinks his mum is embarrassing him by wanting to give in. The Angel says it's not wrong to not want to fight, and if you think all in black and white, your mind can't be agile. She suggests Ruby try to understand his mum's point of view.

Nona asks if they'll have normal school. The Angel says she can't or doesn't want to teach most of the regular subjects, but she thought she could teach them how not to get into too much trouble in the coming conflict.

She takes out a huge waxed paper map of the city, and lays it on a table. Nona can't understand the map any more than any other writing,(11) but the group discusses where in the city is safe and not safe to go. At one point, when discussing whether one place is safe or not, the Angel says "What we know is that we don’t know anything." Nona likes that as a motto, and a summary of her life.

The Angel asks Honesty to find Southgate and colour it blue. Honesty says, only for her, and colours it.

The Angel said, “Southgate is a good place to go in an emergency. Why do you think that is?” Nona said mechanically, “Because it’s got access to the road out of town and there’s a water pump and the ground is stable and it’s not a priority target for any kind of orbital strike or bombardment.” Everyone looked at her. Then they looked at Camilla, sitting in the back. Camilla didn’t move. She had found some bit of paper and was writing on it furiously,(12) so Nona didn’t even get a “Well done, Nona,” which she deserved because Cam had taught her all that. “What’s bombardment?” asked Beautiful Ruby suspiciously. “No idea,” said Nona proudly. “An interesting group, your family,” said the Angel slowly, with an eye on Camilla. “I mean, you’re totally right—if you have to run away, run there and keep close to the road.”

She continues that they shouldn't wait for each other there, and they couldn't survive in the open desert, but they should make it a priority to find and fill water bottles. Any problem will be short-term. The Angel suggests Hot Sauce show them the building she picked, and Hot Sauce points to a watchtower she's hidden out in before. It's stable and has supplies. She threatens whoever tries to sell her stuff, but Honesty swears he's her best boy, and the Angel reinforces that action is likely to be short-term.

Beautiful Ruby says the necromancers can't do anything anyway, but the Angel points out that now there's a Lyctor involved. They shouldn't be able to do too much, with "the blue madness", but it's good to have a plan.

The lights go out, and the Angel says that will be it for school for now. She tacks the map up so Honesty and Hot Sauce can memorize it, and the rest are to clear out the fridge and take home what's in it so it won't go to waste. Cam is lost in her own world in the back of the classroom, so Nona gathers up the drawings they did yesterday. She can tell which is whose, and organizes them, then hands them to the Angel, who says it might be nice for the children to have a "reminder of normal times" at home. Nona asks if they're never coming back, and the Angel says the broadcast changed everything. Nona knows that much, and says so, sadly.

“I thought you were your own boss here,” said Nona. “I have a lot of bosses,” said the Angel. “How many?” “Millions,” said the Angel, with perfect truth in the set of her shoulders. “Don’t worry about that for now—I’m being unhelpful and unkind—it’s just that, Nona, there comes a time in your life when you have to separate the things you do because they make you feel good from the things that make you—” The Angel stopped so dead midsentence that Nona thought she had had a heart attack, that she had been hurt in a way Nona couldn’t understand. She was staring at the topmost drawing of the sheaf of papers. Nona peeked over, ready to apologise for another one of Honesty’s explicit anatomical sketches. “Oh—that one’s mine,” she said, wanting to break the spell, wanting to help. “It’s mine, don’t worry.” The Angel was speechless for a moment. Then she looked at the paper, then looked at Nona again, and looked at the paper. She said, “Sure,” as though everything were normal and she hadn’t acted like she had been knifed. She laid the drawing aside and said, “Give the rest out, why don’t you?” and smiled at Nona, but it was a weirdly awful smile, as though the Angel had forgotten how smiles worked.(13)

Nona passes the rest out, and the gang all gather in the cloak room. Hot Sauce says they can all come with their families, even Beautiful Ruby's traitor mum, and Hot Sauce can defend them. They pile their hands on like a sports team about to start.

“Doesn’t feel right without Born in the Morning,” muttered Honesty. “It’s for him too,” said Hot Sauce. Then she said— “We swear to protect each other and die for each other. We are loyal to each other forever. Any zombies we kill, we kill for each other, and we’ll say, ‘This is for the others.’ That’s it.”

Honesty, Nona, Beautiful Ruby, and Kevin all swear, and Hot Sauce, as the boss. They go to open the door and Born is there after all, having snuck away. They all swear again, and most of them take off. Nona and Hot Sauce go back upstairs, and Hot Sauce says they won't see Born again until most of his fathers die, they're just baggage holding him back from the gang.(14)

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(1) Another new icon. What could this one mean? There's nothing particularly plant-related here, is there? (2) Whomst among us hasn't had a weird day where our routine is thrown all the way off and had sad weird thoughts only loosely related to it? (3) The nearest common usage of "smut" near this context I can find is a class of fungi that typically infect plants (you may have heard of "corn smut" which is a delicacy known as huitlacoche in Mexico). It may also be used to mean soot. Alternately, since "smut" derives from an old Germanic word for "dirt", it could just mean dirt stains of unknown origin. (4) I feel this implies that Cam wouldn't ask Nona to say her goodbyes if she didn't have to. (5) I think it's been mentioned before, but I don't think I ever went into exactly what was… possibly because I can't quite be sure. Searches for "window blazing" all just return "window glazing", or how to make your Windows computer blazing fast. My assumption is that it's a layer of some sort of vinyl to obscure the positions of those inside and thus foil snipers. The blackout curtains are separate so I assume it's not an opaque black, it may just be like window frosting or it could be more complex. But, the peeling is what makes me think of window frosting, because I used some vinyl window frosting on nearly all my apartment's windows to prevent people seeing into the bathroom, bedrooms, or kitchen when I want curtains open for natural light but don't want to be Observed or Perceived in those spaces. (6) So, Pyrrha definitely wasn't the only one who could communicate with Varun. (7) Ominous. (8) It's interesting how common child abuse seems to be in this community. It's taken as a given. (9) Interesting for Nona to be scary to anyone. (10) Priorities, Nona has them. (11) She can parse drawings, even photos, but nothing meant to convey information? (12) Pal is absolutely taking notes on Nona's behaviour in a group. I'm frankly shocked neither of them thought of doing this sort of sit-in before. (13) What did Nona draw? An animal she's sure makes anatomical sense, from the chapter where she did it. But what could cause the Angel to react so? (14) Hot Sauce is one of the most interesting characters in a book, in a series, so chockablock with interesting characters you can't turn a page without seeing at least one.

#the locked tomb #tlt #nona the ninth #ntn #nona the ninth spoilers #ntn spoilers #nona #camilla hect #palamedes sextus #the angel (ntn)#hot sauce (ntn)#honesty (ntn)#born in the morning #beautiful ruby #kevin (ntn)

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no-man-no-woman · 1 year ago

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Okay, I'm going to be very direct and I'm sorry if I come off as mean, but I just have to say it: I hate people who consider NtN a bad book and Nona a bad and/or childish narrator.

First of all: Nona is six months old and dying, it makes sense that she's a "childish" narrator, of course her point of view is strange and slightly useless at some points; she's treated like a child! She thinks a bit like a child!

Nobody says anything to her. I think that's also something to keep in mind: Gideon and Harrow were told things, even if they were half-lies [or just lies] at times, Nona is purposely kept in the dark (even if it's with good intentions for the most part).

And yes, the setting is different, but also (in my opinion) quite more grim than GtN and HtN because it's basically set in a big refugee camp, New Rho is an active war zone (the bombed out buildings where Nona and the gang spend their afternoons, the way the kids at school talk about violence...) but both Nona and her environment are highly desensitized to it. The BoE people are pretty much the dictionary description of guerrilla fighters. Hot Sauce is a radicalised child. Kevin, from the way he is described, seems to have suffered a severe catatonic shock. And Nona doesn't know that.

New Rho is all she's ever known, but the horror, for homely it feels at times, is the basis of it all. Children so used to mass ejecutions that they thalk about them while eating, gas mask that have to be kept on whenever you are outside, a teacher so used to child prostitution that was her first thought upon meting Nona's family, Hot Sauce not thinking twice before shoting her friend's brains out, Honesty being a drug dealer…

Also: I think the underlying body horror of this book is a fucking gift. Phyrra living in her dead best friend corpse, Phyrra drinking bleach because she was bored, Palamedes and Camilla fusing along the way (even before Paul), Nona not remebering how to move correctly at times, Judith sharing a body with a planet's soul, Nona's tantrums destroying her body over and over again, Aim not being allowed to be just herself and having to be the Mensager.

#tlt #the locked tomb #nona the ninth #pyrrha dve #tlt spoilers #hot sauce tlt #nona the 9th #Someday I will write an extensive study of this book #Maybe when Alecto is out #So I can get all the info #paul tlt #palamedes sextus #camilla hect #I could go on and on about Nona for hours

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freemonker · 1 month ago

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I read this quote thinking of Nona the Ninth, and was very confused for a moment

can’t believe people call kevin heartless when this literally happened

#the locked tomb #nona the ninth #ntn #kevin #nona #harrowhark nonagesimus

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bb-enablefreebuild · 1 year ago

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NTN opinions

so I haven't read NTN very recently (or the other locked tomb books) but its the most recent installment about Nona I think about a lot.

Muir said that she was splitting Alecto the Ninth into two parts, NTN and then ATN. She explained that Nona already had a complete story arc and could be its own separate book. Obviously there's nothing wrong with that.

But to be quite honest, I feel like most of NTN could have been cut. The most important parts of Nona are these:

More detail about the Blood of Eden

Nona's relationship with Varun the Eater

Her dreams of John Gaius

Now don't get me wrong, I loved seeing Nona going to school as a teachers aide and making friends! The problem is, the relationships she develops with the kids like Hot Sauce aren't...very important. I think it would have been better if Nona developed relationships with characters that she already knew, like Crown (Coronabeth) for example.

If Nona being friends with a group of kiddos is important, then maybe she should do it specifically with kids from the Blood of Eden. Out of all of Nona's friends, her relationship with Noodle the dog is the most important, and maybe Hot Sauce. She could be another niece of Wake, the same as Pash. It would explain why Hot Sauce is so suspicious of necromancers and why she shot up Nona in that one scene.

Also, If Nona is the secret weapon, why isn't she more involved with B.O.E? It's implied that the Blood of Eden is on the struggle bus. Wouldn't the inception have more depth if Nona was among their ranks right before their eyes, it'd be a major example of why they've failed for so long to stop Mr. Jod.

Cam and Palamedes could have gathered a few trust worthy relationships used to protect Nona too. Heck, the Blood of Eden could have a "school" of their own where they teach the kids of their soldiers propaganda, look at how Pash was raised!

I genuinely believe that all of the stuff that happened could have been condensed to a feasible first part. As an author, cutting things we're proud of writing is like shooting yourself in the head then doing it again. But I think if I was in Muir's shoes, I would've done it. I love Hot Sauce, Kevin and the other kiddos so much but they're just...not important enough for the over all plot :(

Lastly, and this is where I'm getting super nit picky, but I wish there was more world building. I 100% appreciate Muir's trust in the readers intelligence and for us to put the pieces together. I understood that Steles were used to travel far distances and "flip" planets to be colonized for necromancers. I VASTLY prefer this instead of five hundred pages of exposition (Fourth Wing) slammed into the beginning of the book.

That being said, a little bit of exposition is fine. Gideon The Ninth does this perfectly with explaining thanergy and other necromancer related info. We learn more in HTN as well. I think Muir was thinking that "Nona wouldn't know these things, so it can't be expressed in the book" which I totally get, but Nona has a canon excuse for just Having knowledge! Her uncanny reading of body language and understanding of different languages? Her ability to draw animals from Earth that were lost to public knowledge? Nona just casually absorbing information and thinking about it in her internal monologue is completely reasonable. I say this to point out that Muir was too vague with the world building in NTN. Yes, I could fill in the gaps but I would have loved more information about the colony planets outside of the House system! She's doing too much showing, which I think is precisely why NTN got much too long.

Anyway, PLEASE take all of this with a grain of salt. I love Nona the Ninth and I think the way it was written is digestible and good! It's just not how I would have done it. Please Tamsyn I'm begging you for lore I am BEGGING YOU FOR LORE.

#my opinions do not matter btw. I am just shitting out of my mouth.#nona the ninth #ntn #the locked tomb #tlt series #tamsyn muir #gideon the ninth #harrow the ninth #alecto the ninth #john gaius #camilla hect #palamedes sextus #uuuhhhhhhh #pyrrha dve #*

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theriverbeyond · 2 years ago

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hello!! I love your tlt posts and metas and everything 😍 these books are just so packed with detail that I feel like I’m always learning more and more it’s so exciting.

I just finished NTN and have a question I haven’t been able to find answers to on the internet! I picked up on the fact that Nona is mishearing the names of the kids in the gang, both because when she says “honesty” and pyrrha or cam (I forget who) asks is that really his name she’s like that’s what I heard anyways or something like that, and then also when she says “born in the morning” to someone else they’re like you mean born in the morning and she’s like that’s what I said, implying she’s not saying it right but is still hearing it the same way even when someone corrects her. I was guessing that “honesty” is “augustine” and “born in the morning” is “mercymorn” but couldn’t figure out kevin or beautiful ruby or anything else, and could totally be getting that wrong anyways (I know there are so many references and details I’m not catching). But wondering if you’ve come across any explanations about who the kids are in reference to or any kind of significance about their names or anything like that!

thank u thank u 💌

Hi!! thanks so much!!! SO, general consensus is that you're right, Nona is not hearing the name but the meaning, i.e. would theoretically hear "John" as "God is gracious". to my knowledge there is no connection between the new Rho kids and Lyctoral characters.

One interesting thing is she is only hearing SOME people's names as meanings. This could be for many reasons, possibly just to make it less confusing to the reader, but for example she knows Camilla as Camilla, and not "helper to the priest" (which, btw, is such an on point name for her character), and the teacher Jolie as Jolie and not like, "one who was agreeable". And we know from the scene in the tomb that she hears John's name as John, and *not* actually as "God is gracious". So that is still kinda up in the air.

There are a couple of good posts out there discussing this! I really like this post by @onefleshonepod, linked here, that has a nice breakdown of possibilities! There are also some discussions on reddit, here and here. None of these have been canon confirmed (though perhaps we will get more info in the incoming NtN paperback glossary!), but good thoughts to be had all around.

For Hot Sauce, I think she is just named after the food! So it doesn't have any deeper meaning, besides the fact that it is a thing she loves and wants to be named after.

#if you search on the reddit there are a few more discussion posts as well!#ask #moonmanateee #new rho #new rho kids gang

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just-sg · 8 months ago

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The earlier parts of NtN were harder for me to get through than the other books, and throughout it there are just small parts (only a few) where the "childish" aspects feel a little "too much" for me personally, or where I wish Nona was just a little less oblivious, etc. And yet.

Despite nearly every nitpick I had being directly tied to Nona's PoV, at NO point did any frustrations outweigh how overwhelmingly GOOD she is, how radiant her pure love for everyone and everything is. How absolutely real it feels when Nona laments not the horrors around her nor the suffering of others, at least not directly, but how hard it is to be in the position of just being happy when everyone around her isn't. Of course she wants things to be better for everyone, but she's happy now, appreciates all the wondrous little miracles around her here and now, regardless of the bad things happening, so why will no one else?

It feels like... whispers, echoes of anger and pain and grief that she 'should' be feeling, or that the old her felt. Like Nona can be a little petty or indignant or stubborn, but she redirects all those feelings to support the raw love she feels rather than working against it. She is HAPPY and she WANTS to be happy and she wants YOU to be happy and frankly, it feels a little mean and unfair to make it sound so hard when it should be the easiest thing in the world. Can't you see how beautiful, how wonderful, how inspiring all creation is?

;w; And for all that a few of the extra-"childish" moments irked me a little, it also adds so much to the beauty. Hot Sauce never wanting to be mad at Nona, being scared and having been taught all her life-- but adults and by traumatic experience-- that she should hate People Like Nona. But she doesn't. She loves Nona. And all it takes is a little extra show that Nona still loves her, and a performative "...and you're on Kevin bathroom duty forever for being a zombie. >:c" Just. That easy. That simple. Unconditional and uncomplicated love.

The fucking review quote on the front cover (with its very amusing last name) just...

YEAH... Yeah. I do love you Nona, I love that you love us Nona, I want you to be able to love everyone and everything again and to love loving and being loved, Nona.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: my absolutely favorite thing about Nona the Ninth, and the reason it's one of my favorite books of all time, is the love.

Nona is six months old. She's been 'born' into a cruel world; a city crammed with refugees, under seige from a hostile empire. She lives in the body of another girl, a girl her caretakers knew and cared about. She is a weapon, a symbol of destruction, the promise of the revolutions salvation or its obliteration.

And yet. At no point in the book is Nona ever hated. Her friends love her; they make space for her, they are patient when she doesn't understand something and make an effort to include her at every opportunity. The teacher and the Angel love her, as much as they love all their students; they treat Nona as an equal, and even when they're worried about her they show her courtesy and dignity. Camilla, Palamedies, and Pyrra love her; they braid her hair, make sure she eats, buy her stupid fish'n'chip shop shirts and share ass jokes with her. Even Corona and We Suffer are kind and patient when they don't have to be. The only time Nona ever experiences cruelty is when Hot Sauce shoots her for being a zombie, and even then Hot Sauce forgives her only a few chapters later.

Nona the Ninth is ultimately about love- loving and being loved. It's in every second, every word of Nona's being. It says: "Even when we are terrible, even when we are scared and hateful, we cannot help but love."

#nona the ninth

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