Toll the Hounds (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #8)

by Steven Erikson

changed my mind, Spin. These poor runts did that.’ He hesitated. ‘You did that, making me do what we just done.’ He then laughed harshly. ‘Fancy this, I’m feeling … redeemed. Now ain’t that ironic, Spin.’ Spindle slowly settled back against the trench wall, and then sank down until he was sitting in the mud. ‘Shit. How about that. And I walked all this way, looking for just what you done and found here. I was needing something, I thought they was answers … but I didn’t even know the right questions.’ He grimaced and spat. ‘I still don’t.’ Monkrat shrugged. ‘Me neither.’ ‘But you been redeemed.’ And that statement was almost bitter-sounding. Monkrat struggled with his thoughts. ‘When that hits you – me, when it hit me, well, what it’s feeling like right now, Spin, it’s like redemption finds a new meaning. It’s when you don’t need answers no more, because you know that anybody promising answers is fulla crap. Priest, priestess, god, goddess. Fulla crap, you understanding me?’ ‘That don’t sound right,’ Spindle objected. ‘To be redeemed, someone’s got to do the redeeming.’ ‘But maybe it don’t have to be someone else. Maybe it’s just doing something, being something, someone, and feeling that change inside – it’s like you went and redeemed yourself. And nobody else’s opinion matters. And you know that you still got all them questions, right ones, wrong ones, and maybe you’ll be able to find an answer or two, maybe not. But it don’t matter. The only thing that matters is you now...