[Unlike Margot Robbie, Alecto's eyes are golden. They are golden like hot amber, like molten earth, like a human being. They have always been expressive since she and John first swapped eyes, always filled with too much emotion. Before, all she'd known was sadness and rage. Now she knows disappointment.

She's disappointed, she realises, in John. She's disappointed that John would spend his time gossiping with old ladies and not even once gossip about her. She did so many gossip worthy things, forever ago. Huge things - things which deserve to be spoken aloud. Not for the first time, Alecto feels like a dirty secret and it is not at all tantalising the way the old Earth romance novels made it sound when John read them aloud to her. ]

I must be pretty stupid too, because you all came from me. [She's going into a sulk, now: shrinking back against the pillows, drawing her knees up to her chest. ] I used to like listening to him, too. He's very good at talking. Sometimes I think I should have cut off his tongue instead of stabbing him, but he'd probably just grow it back and keep talking.