2022-11-10 1:55:20 ¶ ●

Thinking about Abigail Pent who imagined Magnus’s son and how she’d raise him, and when she couldn’t conceive she accepted that it “wasn’t in the cards” and chose instead to protect two children of the fourth because she knew how hard it could be to represent the hopes and dreams of your entire house, and even in the river kept them far away from the fear and confusion of the Sleeper.

Then I start thinking about Palleamana Novenarius who also couldn’t conceive so she killed her whole house for the chance to raise a daughter, and shared her secrets to a little girl treading and choking on saltwater, raised that girl to hate another kid who had done nothing but be born, raised her in pain and shame and loneliness, and when she realized her baby had done the unthinkable tied a tiny noose for her.

Then I think about M— and the “maternity problem” or dozens of dead eggs Wake struggled to keep, “gravid birth” as a novelty on the sixth. and I think I’m going to be devastated when we finally find out the extent of the pain endured by the mothers of the nine houses for 10,000 years.