collecting a list of ways that mercymorn and harrowhark parallel each other. the way that they’re bitter and unlikeable, both VERY good at what they do (arguably the best), probably because the guilt they have from the cost of their creation is too enormous for them to be anything but the best. how mercymorn hates harrow from the start, I’ve seen lots of people arguing that it’s because she reminds her of herself, and I kind of agree. their names are the only ones in the series that follow the conventions that they do (mercy-morn, harrow-hark. no one else’s names are like that.) both of them are trapped for essentially their whole lives in a place with people who despise them, but who they are bound to by necessity and resentment and a lifetime spent despising each other. mercy and augustine HATE each other, but who else do they have? no one has seen what they’ve seen or been through what they’ve been through, and no one will ever feel as strongly about them as they do about each other. I think until canaan house, the exact same thing applied to harrow and gideon.
and the thing I just thought of yesterday that I can’t BELIEVE it took me so long to realize- both of them are so consumed by grief that NEITHER allow themselves to hear the name of their cavalier. mercy treats names as sacred and HATES when people use cristabel’s name. harrow rewires her own brain so that she can’t hear gideon’s.
I think mercy functions as a version of harrow, one much older and like, much more trapped in her grief? I think she would have lobotomized herself in an instant if she’d thought of it, or if she’d had anyone to help her, or who knows if she even could do that sort of necromancy so soon after she ascended. instead all she has is this bitter, myriad long revenge plot.
this post is getting away from me and I’m just kind of waxing on about mercymorn now. I think they’re versions of each other but they’re living in different narratives.