The thing about egg-hunting snakes is that if Harrow finds one she is going to twist its head three hundred and sixty degrees and nail it up as an example to the others. The thing is, increasingly she realizes she needs to worry about cracking the egg herself, from holding it too tight or getting distracted and being careless.

The thing is, Harrow's most hateful enemy has always been Harrowhark Nonagesimus. And in Gideon she has, perhaps, an ally against that tyrant at last.

"I don't know what I think about the stitches," she says, with an light in her eyes that gives the lie to every word she says. "It makes me imagine a world where flesh wizards used facepaint instead of us."