Chapter 35: The Competition and the Cursed Bow

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary

On the morning of the competition, Astrid prepares breakfast for Katrina before Shizuka drives her to the Golden Friendship Pavilion. Backstage, coaches are banned, leaving Katrina alone among rivals. Tremon Philippe and judge Daniel Kar-Ching Tso visit the green room; Tso sexually assaults Katrina and slips her a suite key. The announcer introduces Katrina mockingly as a “transgender activist,” but she claps back, likening the stage to sex work. Instead of the expected gaming medley, she launches into Bartók’s Sonata for Solo Violin with the cursed dogwood bow. Playing the four movements—Ciaccona, Fuga, Melodia, Presto—she channels rage, sorrow, and a fierce self-love, recognizing that her soul is now forfeit. Through dissonant quarter tones and fugue-like interweaving, she reclaims her voice, offering her truth even as she damns herself. By the final note, she understands the night was a lie, yet her music and identity endure.

Key Events

Astrid serves Katrina a quiet final breakfast; Shizuka appears fragile but regal.
Shizuka and Katrina drive to the Pavilion; Katrina trembles, hoping her teacher detects the cursed bow.
Backstage policy forces Shizuka to leave Katrina, who faces isolation.
Tremon and Mr. Tso tour the green room; Tso gropes Katrina’s genitals and gives her a hotel room card.
The announcer introduces Katrina by her transgender identity and mocks her dress, provoking her sex-work retort.
Katrina discards the announced program and begins Bartók’s Sonata for Solo Violin, using the dogwood bow.
In the Ciaccona, she embraces the contradictory voices and realizes the stage is hers.
In the Fuga, she weaponizes the fugue as flight and persecution, feeling other unheard voices join hers.
In the Melodia, she mourns wasted chances, family memories, and her own cruelties.
In the Presto, she plays the in-between quarter tones, affirming that nothing is wrong with her love.
Katrina concludes understanding her soul is damned, yet her music and self-worth hold—even if the night was built on a lie.

Character Development

Katrina Nguyen

Katrina moves from terrified hope to radical self-possession. She briefly wishes Shizuka would stop her, but when alone and assaulted, she steels herself. By choosing Bartók—music that speaks in “contradictory voices” and “in-between” notes—she transforms the cursed bow’s compulsion into a weapon of honesty. She accepts damnation but insists on offering her love and truth anyway, morphing from a victim into an artist who defines her own worth.

Shizuka Satomi

Shizuka is rendered helpless. The separation from her student, Tremon’s machinations, and the sight of the dogwood bow leave her shocked and mute. Her internal monologue reveals despair, while her earlier playfulness (boba, tea eggs) underscores the depth of attachment she feels for Katrina—and what she is about to lose.

Tremon Philippe and Daniel Tso

Tremon orchestrates the backstage isolation and the degrading introduction to break Katrina’s spirit. Mr. Tso embodies the predatory, dehumanizing gaze, treating her body as a commodity. Their actions drive Katrina to her defiant performance and cement the corrupt nature of the competition.

Themes, Symbols, and Motifs

Music as Identity and Defiance

Bartók’s sonata becomes a vehicle for Katrina to articulate queerness, trauma, and survival. The music is not merely played; it is lived, forcing the audience to confront a reality they might otherwise mock or ignore.

Exploitation and the Male Gaze

From Tso’s assault to the announcer’s transphobic commentary, the chapter exposes how institutions and predators consume marginalized bodies. Katrina’s retort and subsequent performance reclaim the act of being watched, turning surveillance into a platform for self-expression.

The Cursed Bow and Forced Beauty

The dogwood bow can compel beauty, but Katrina subverts it—she shoves “every part of myself into that beauty.” The bow represents both the curse that could damn her and the tool that forces the audience to truly see her.

Fugue, Flight, and the Quarter Tone

The fugue (from fugere, to flee, and fugare, to chase) mirrors Katrina’s life of escape and pursuit. The quarter tones—notes between the piano keys—symbolize the in-between spaces of trans identity, dismissed as “wrong” by conventional harmony yet where Katrina locates her truth.

Why This Chapter Matters

Chapter 35 is the emotional and thematic climax of Katrina’s storyline. It marks the moment she fully wields the cursed bow not for gain but for self-assertion, simultaneously sealing her soul and liberating her voice. The performance is a microcosm of the novel’s central concerns: the intersection of art, identity, and damnation. Katrina’s choice to play Bartók redefines the terms of her sacrifice—she will not be erased, even in Hell. This chapter also sets the stage for the final resolution of Shizuka’s curse and the fate of the bow.

Study Questions and Answers

Why does Katrina choose Bartók’s Sonata for Solo Violin instead of the announced gaming medley?
The medley would have played into the judges’ expectations of a “transgender activist” performing novelty content. Bartók’s sonata, with its dissonance, quarter tones, and emotional range, allows Katrina to tell her own story—of trauma, defiance, and love—on her own terms, even as the cursed bow forces the audience to listen.
How does the dogwood bow affect Katrina’s performance and the audience’s reception?
The bow compels the listeners to experience the beauty Katrina creates, but instead of using it to charm them, she channels her anger and vulnerability through it. The audience is held captive, unable to dismiss her as a “half-woman freak,” and some even seem to join her in musical dialogue, though Katrina later suspects that response was artificial due to the curse.
What does Katrina realize about her own damnation by the end of the chapter?
She understands that her soul is forfeit—the mistaken applause after the first movement confirms it. Yet she also realizes that her music and self-love remain real and potent. Even as she says farewell, she feels “held” by the music; the night was a lie, but her identity and the truth of her art are not diminished by the curse.