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

by Steven Erikson

After he’d left, Bellam shut the door and advanced on Snell, who once more cringed against the back wall. ‘You said—’ ‘We do that, don’t we, when it comes to grown-ups.’ ‘Don’t touch me!’ ‘No grown-ups anywhere close, Snell – what do you like to do when they’re not around? Oh, yes, that’s right. You like to torment everyone smaller than you. That sounds a fun game. I think I’ll play, and look, you’re smaller than me. Now, what torment shall we do first?’ In leaving them for the time being, all grim concern regarding anything unduly cruel can be thankfully dispensed with. Bellam Nom, being cleverer than most, knew that true terror belonged not to what did occur, but to what might occur. He was content to encourage Snell’s own imagination into the myriad possibilities, which was a delicate and precise form of torture. Especially useful in that it left no bruises. Bullies learn nothing when bullied in turn; there are no lessons, no about-face in their squalid natures. The principle of righteous justice is a peculiar domain where propriety and vengeance become confused, almost indistinguishable. The bullied bully is shown but the other side of the same fear he or she has lived with all his or her life. The about-face happens there, on the outside, not the inside. Inside, the bully and everything that haunts the bully’s soul remains unchanged. It is an abject truth, but conscience cannot be shoved down the throat. If only it could.