i'm so used to there just being random unidentified bones laying around everywhere in these damn books that it finally occurred to me, just now, to wonder where the bones on new rho came from. y'know, the bones palamedes always tried to teach nona necromancy on.
they're his.
palamedes, who always loved teaching, living on borrowed time in a body that's not his own. palamedes, mentoring, teaching- parenting, by sixth standards, mind you. and that boy is sixth, through and through.
and the entire point of teaching nona necromancy in the first place was to try and determine if nona is, well, nonagesimus, right? so it has to be bones, it can't not be bones. bones are, like, her whole thing.
but they're not in the nine houses, anymore. things are different, on new rho.
they burn bones here. dig up the cemeteries. a society terrified of zombies will evolve to dispose of its dead differently.
the only bones he has access to now are his own. (camilla wouldn't let anyone take them- skull or hand, doesn't matter. they're still him, and she doesn't let go, remember? it's her one thing.)
palamedes woke up every morning wearing someone else's body to then gently place the shrapnel of his own in the cupped palms of a girl who's the closest thing he'll ever have to a daughter and try to teach her- how did the angel put it, again? normal school, as much as possible, for as long as possible.
(but hey, in a roundabout way, at least it's a chance for him to touch camilla again, right? nevermind that she's not there to feel any of it because he's in the driver's seat, that he can only stay for fifteen minutes at a time. it's atoms that belong to camilla touching atoms that used to belong to him, and that's close enough. he'll take what he can get, these days- if she can be their flesh, he can be the end. so what if holding his own bones is a mindfuck? so what if looking at them makes him nauseous? surely he can suck it up and deal with it for fifteen minutes. it's the least he can do— his poor camilla was the one who had to scrape the bloody pulp of them off the floors of canaan house.)
(speaking of, here's a fun fact: we actually only see nona practicing with the bones one time, on-page. camilla's final line in that scene, before palamedes takes over, is none other than: 'keep going. there are some bones left.' ow!)
remember, too, that the only part of dulcinea, the real dulcinea, that palamedes ever physically touched, was her tooth- the one that ianthe gave him, pulled from the ashes cytherea burnt her down to. he only ever touched dulcie once, and it wasn't until after she was already gone, but that doesn't matter- it still happened, and you can't take loved away.
in this same roundabout, bittersweet, by-proxy sort of way, palamedes has been physically touched by nona, too: the atoms she currently occupies, touching atoms that he used to occupy, and never will again.
the main interaction we've seen between palamedes and his mother took place back on the sixth, with her acting as mentor and him as pupil: the two of them studying a set of hand bones, juno encouraging him every step of the way.
we know that harrowhark's "most vivid memory of her mother was of her hands guiding harrow's over an inexpertly rendered portion of skull, her fingers encircling the fat baby bracelets of harrow's wrists, tightening this cuff to indicate correct technique."
they're still small for a nineteen year old, but the wrists are bigger, in this new set of memories nona's making. and it's not an inexpertly rendered portion of skull anymore- it's a hand, now, albeit one crafted from [a piece of skull reassembled (painstakingly—passionately—laboriously reassembled) from fragments, manually, and not by a bone magician, from the skull of someone who, soon after death or symptomatically during, had exploded.] and the identity and origin of these bones is no mystery at all. they belong to palamedes, and he's consented to their use for this purpose, and that matters.
but the details are just set dressing, really. the foundation of the memory is the same.
palamedes and his mother, juno and her son.
harrow and her mother; pelleamena and her daughter.
nona and her father-mother-teacher; palamedes and his daughter.
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Solomon: sometimes i looked at mc and thinks, "are they even human to begin with?"
Simeon: why would you think that?
Solomon: well *points at mc punishing the brothers*
Mc: *dragging Levi and mammon while pinching their ears* the both of you seriously needs to behave today I am not in the mood, you understood?
Levi and mammon: yes ma'am!!
Mc: good *letting go of the hold* now go to your classes!
Levi and mammon: *walking fast to their class*
Solomon: see?
Simeon: I mean you're right but those are nothing compared to when mc pinch lucifer in his thigh while sitting because he's been shooting glare at the other person
Solomon: what?
Simeon: nothing *smiles* let's go hurry to our class
Solomon: okay..
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Pros of knitting a round yoke colorwork sweater from the top down:
Can try it on as you go and make sure it fits
No seams to sew
Small number of stitches to cast on initially
Cons:
Fucking none, it's a perfect sweater format
Pros of knitting a round yoke colorwork sweater from the bottom up:
Can use a sleeve as a swatch to double check your gauge and color harmonies, assuming there is colorwork on the sleeve cuffs
The yoke is often the most exciting part and leaving it for last is satisfying
Cons:
Had to use like 5 different needles to get the sleeve stitches off of waste yarn and join them to the body, playing a game of absolute musical chairs with interchangeable needle tips
Can't easily try it on as you go so you've just gotta hope you didn't screw up too bad and that it'll fit when you're done
Danger of running out of one or more colors of yarn at the yoke, which is arguably the most important part of the design
Gotta sew up the little underarm holes when you're done
I know I already pointed out that you can't try it on as you go but I will bring it up again as I believe it is the most salient point here
What if you bind off too tight and can't get the collar over your head? What then???
In conclusion why do my friends keep letting me knit sweaters from the bottom up
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No hate like christian love is right.
One of the most upsetting sermons I've ever been to was when I was around 10 or 12. We had a guest pastor and he was preaching about love, and how much we should love god. In fact, we should love sky daddy so much, that we should literally HATE our family/friends/loved ones in comparison.
I can't even really tell you why it was so upsetting to me. Most people I tell don't think it's that serious and I just end up looking stupid for being upset. I don't think they realize how serious that guy was. But I was a child thinking about having to hate my family, my friends, the people I cared about in order to be a good xtian... and I knew I couldn't do it.
I think it was supposed to be framed as "we xtians have such a higher capacity for love than the evil heathens which means that we can love our neighbors more than them AND love god so much that it seems like we hate them in comparison but we actually don't, because our capacity for love is so much greater because of Jesus" and I was too young to "pick up on that nuance" or something.
But my capacity for love only got stronger when I left.
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