Aunt Lydia secretly begins writing a memoir inside a hollowed-out book hidden in the Ardua Hall library.

Agnes's beloved adoptive mother Tabitha dies, leaving Agnes devastated and unprotected in the household.

A car bombing kills Neil and Melanie outside their Toronto clothing store, leaving Daisy orphaned.

Armed men arrest Lydia at her courthouse during the Gilead coup and transport her to a stadium prison.

Agnes's father Commander Kyle marries the cold and calculating Paula shortly after Tabitha's funeral.

Daisy learns from a Mayday operative that she is Baby Nicole, smuggled out of Gilead as an infant.

Commander Judd tortures Lydia in the Thank Tank isolation cell, then moves her to a hotel to break her will.

Lydia and the other Founder Aunts formally agree to design Gilead's women's sphere under Commander Judd's authority.

Paula arranges to have thirteen-year-old Agnes engaged to the powerful Commander Judd against Agnes's wishes.

Aunt Lydia visits Agnes three days before her wedding and suggests becoming a Supplicant is still an option.

Agnes tricks her Guardian into driving her to Aunt Estée, who then takes Agnes to safety at Ardua Hall.

Daisy enters Gilead disguised as a Pearl Girl recruit named Jade and attends the Thanks Giving ceremony.

Aunt Lydia cuts into Nicole's tattoo and inserts a microdot containing evidence that could destroy Gilead.

Aunt Lydia reveals to Agnes, Becka, and Nicole together that Nicole is Baby Nicole and Agnes's half-sister.

Agnes and Nicole reach the Canadian shore by rowing desperately and are later reunited with their mother.

The novel follows three narrators whose stories converge to dismantle Gilead from within. Aunt Lydia, once a family court judge, was coerced into building Gilead's women's sphere and has spent years secretly gathering evidence to destroy it. Agnes, the sheltered daughter of a Commander, escapes a forced child marriage and trains as a Supplicant Aunt while unknowingly drawing closer to her real family. Daisy, a teenager in Toronto, discovers she is the famous Baby Nicole after her adoptive parents are killed by Gilead agents, then agrees to infiltrate the regime to retrieve Aunt Lydia's cache of incriminating documents. Together the two half-sisters smuggle the evidence out of Gilead, triggering the regime's eventual collapse. This pool follows all three parallel threads from their origins to the dramatic reunion and the beginning of Gilead's end.

The headline events that drive Gilead's downfall.

Agnes describes growing up sheltered as a privileged Commander's daughter, protected by her loving mother Tabitha.

Daisy attends an anti-Gilead protest march that erupts into a riot, and Ada pulls her to safety.

Shunammite tells Agnes that her real mother was a Handmaid who ran away with Agnes before being caught.

The Handmaid Ofkyle arrives in Commander Kyle's household because Paula wants to produce a child of her own.

Ofkyle dies when a doctor cuts her open to save baby Mark, and Agnes secretly kisses her forehead.

Agnes attends Ofkyle's small funeral and sees the legendary Aunt Lydia in person for the first time.

Ada takes Daisy to a SanctuCare refugee facility and then moves her to a safe house after the bombing.

Agnes is fitted for spring-green clothing, signaling that Paula is formally marking her as ready for marriage.

Becka slashes her wrists with pruning shears during flower arrangement class rather than face her upcoming wedding.

Mayday operatives train Daisy in self-defense and give her a GOD and LOVE tattoo as a cover identity marker.

Pearl Girls Aunt Beatrice and Aunt Dove approach Daisy on the street and offer to take her into Gilead.

Agnes finds her Bloodlines file on her library desk and discovers her mother is alive and Nicole is her sister.

Agnes and Nicole tear up the forbidden Bloodlines file pages together and flush them down the toilet.

Becka drowns in the rooftop water cistern while hiding to buy Agnes and Nicole more time to escape.

A future academic symposium confirms Gilead has fallen and reveals a statue has been erected in Becka's memory.

Behind the main plot lie the formative experiences that define Agnes, Daisy, and their allies. Agnes's childhood is shaped by the love of her adoptive mother Tabitha, followed by shocking revelations after Tabitha's death, including learning her birth mother was a Handmaid who tried to flee Gilead with her. The Handmaid Ofkyle, assigned to her household, becomes another figure of grief and awakening for Agnes, whose death in childbirth exposes the expendability of women in the regime. Daisy's journey in Toronto is marked by danger and deception, from a violent riot at a protest march to the loss of her parents and a hidden refuge in a Mayday safe house. As both young women prepare for their dangerous mission, allies work quietly behind the scenes, training them and moving them toward the border. The pool closes in the distant future, where a memorial statue confirms the sisters survived and never forgot the sacrifices made for them.

The personal losses, discoveries, and rescues that shape each narrator.

A statue of Aunt Lydia is unveiled at a ceremony and citizens leave offerings of eggs and oranges at its base.

Agnes questions Tabitha about her origins, but Tabitha never confirms that Agnes was born from her own body.

Armed men drag Aunt Lydia from her courthouse during the Gilead coup and imprison her in a stadium with other professional women.

Becka becomes hysterical in class when Aunt Vidala teaches that a concubine deserved to be killed by many men.

Dr. Grove molests Agnes during a routine dental appointment, and Agnes realizes she cannot safely report what happened.

Aunt Lydia arranges for Aunt Sally to be drugged and confined after Aunt Sally suspects Daisy may be Baby Nicole.

Commander Judd reveals to Aunt Lydia that his agents have discovered the Mayday microdot camera operation in Canada.

Aunt Lydia is forced to serve as one of the executioners at the stadium, shooting at a row of blindfolded women.

Aunt Lydia's hidden statue cameras reveal that Aunt Vidala herself has been planting false evidence to incriminate Lydia.

Agnes smashes her teacup in front of Paula at the Schlafly Cafe, giving Aunt Lydia a chance to confront Paula privately.

Aunt Elizabeth frames Dr. Grove for sexual assault at Aunt Lydia's instruction, leading to his death at a Particicution.

Agnes reads the Bible for the first time at Ardua Hall and discovers the Aunts had falsified its teachings.

Agnes and Nicole encounter Aunt Vidala while fleeing Ardua Hall, and Nicole strikes her in the chest and fells her.

Agnes prays silently for survival and rows desperately in dark waters as their inflatable boat nearly sweeps out to sea.

Aunt Lydia takes a fatal dose of morphine before the Eyes can arrest her, ending her life on her own terms.

This pool traces the key moments of revelation and moral reckoning that reshape each character's understanding of Gilead. Aunt Lydia's story pivots from her violent arrest and humiliation by the coup's founders to her decision to cooperate while secretly subverting the regime from within. Agnes's faith in Gilead is shattered step by step, from surviving Dr. Grove's assault in childhood to reading the Bible for the first time and discovering how deeply its teachings had been falsified. Aunt Lydia maneuvers constantly against her rivals, silencing Aunt Sally, exposing Aunt Vidala's treachery through hidden cameras, and engineering Dr. Grove's punishment through elaborate deception. The pool reaches its climax as the sisters' escape erupts in violence, their desperate journey across dark waters tests their endurance to the limit, and Aunt Lydia ends her own life rather than allow the regime to take it. These turning points reveal how Gilead's power depended entirely on controlling information, and how the right knowledge in the right hands could bring it all down.