To Ride Hell’s Chasm

by Janny Wurts

‘It’s tragic how the lack of imagination so often shapes our defeat,’

Here is the paradox. I am the weapon a king has taken to hand, yet I am not his to possess. My power to act in his name is not his. I know this. He may not. Or he might forget, at his peril. Therefore, the gift of my oath to serve enacts the potential for dangerous consequence. If I misuse his Majesty’s trust, the earned debt is entirely mine. If he misdirects me, there could be a dreadful cost. The balance becomes mine to guard, do you see? I choose when to strike or when to stand upon mercy’

‘Death has no repeal. It is a brute ending that leaves us the legacy of an inscrutable silence. Therefore, I understand the voice of mercy very well.’