‘It was as if they were driven, but not by any lust or greed that could be sated. It was a thing they could do to me, so they did it. I had always believed, perhaps childishly, that if you followed the rules, you would be protected, that things like that would not happen to you. Afterwards, I felt … tricked. Foolish. Gullible, that I had thought ideals could protect me. Honour and courtesy and justice … they are not real, Fitz. We all pretend to them, and hold them to us like shields. But they guard only against folk who carry the same shields. Against those who have discarded them, they are
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