Forge of Darkness (The Kharkanas Trilogy #1)

by Steven Erikson

Conviction is a fist of stone at the heart of all things. Its form is shaped by sure hands, the detritus quickly swept from view. It is built to withstand, built to defy challenge, and when cornered it fights without honour. There is nothing more terrible than conviction.

Draconus was feared for reasons Arathan could not comprehend.

The insipid and the incompetent had no place in which to hide their failings. ‘This is natural justice, Arathan, and thus by every measure it is superior to the justice of, say, the Forulkan, or the Jaghut.’

It was said that those with Hust blood knew iron as if they’d suckled its molten stream from their mother’s tit, and Ivis had no doubt in this matter – the smith was a skilled man and a fine maker of weapons, but Ivis possessed Hust blood on his father’s side, and though he counted himself a soldier through and through, he could hear a flawed edge even as a blade was being drawn from its scabbard.

He had sounded foolish, naïve, disappointing the man who had sired him. Perhaps these were things all sons felt before their fathers.

And yet, each time his thoughts skated towards that imminent blessing of knowledge, he thought of ice, and fear took him then, as he waited for the cracking sounds.

‘So she took a lover,’ Galak said in a growl, not needing to add so what? ‘The sorcery surrounding her is said to be impenetrable now,’ Rint mused. ‘Proof against all light. It surrounds her wherever she goes. We have a queen no one can see any more, except for Draconus, I suppose.’

So much of history was nothing but gaping holes that needed filling with whatever was expedient, for now, and more significantly for the future, where the fruition of carefully planted inventions and half-truths would, if he had his way, yield a wealth of rewards.

Station and wealth were flimsy props thrown up in front of people as flawed and as mortal as anyone else, and if it was their need to strut and prance behind them, it was proof of internal weakness and nothing else, and what could be more pathetic than that?

Each and every day was too short, the light too whimsical, his vision too sharp not to see the failings in his work – and no amount of praise from onlookers could change any of that.

Portraits were the weapons of tradition, and tradition was the invisible army laying siege to the present.

‘But are not laws little more than formalized opinions, Lord?’

‘Laws decide which forms of oppression are allowed, Lord. And because of that, those laws are servants to those in power, for whom oppression is given as a right over those who have little or no power.

When stripped down to its bones, criticism is a form of oppression. Its intent is to manipulate both artist and audience, by imposing rules on aesthetic appreciation.

all of it would be past, a thing of his history day by day losing its force, its power over him and his life.

The Tiste language struggled with notions of filial duty – or so Kadaspala’s friend, the court poet Gallan, was fond of saying

These three brothers had a way of standing apart, even when they stood together.

Anomander’s sun-burnished face, the colour of pale gold, now smiled at her.

‘I am minded,’ Andarist said after a moment, ‘of our father’s gift to us. Mother Dark has rewarded his loyalty through the elevation of his sons, and you, Anomander, have been lifted the highest among us.’

As he turned away, Anomander called out to him, ‘A moment, please. You are known by title alone. I will have your name.’ The huge man half swung round, studied Anomander for a long moment, and then said, ‘I am named Caladan Brood.’

The world was not infinite, and yet a population could aspire to become so; it could (and would) expand well beyond its own limits of sustainability, and would continue to do so until it collapsed. There was, he said, nothing so deadly as success.

Wisdom did not belong to mortals, and those whom others called wise were only those who, through grim experience, had touched the very edges of unwelcome truths.

There were wars far away, where hate locked weapons and blood sprayed like rain. And there were wars in a single house, or a single room, where love died the death of heroes, and weeping filled the sky.

Peace did not serve order; order served peace, and when order became godlike, sacrosanct and inviolate, then the peace thus won became a prison, and those who sought their freedom became enemies to order, and in the elimination of such enemies, peace was lost.

Upon the blessing of Nimander, for his service to Mother Dark, all land holdings had been relinquished to Mother Dark, and all those Tiste born to the bloodline, and their attendant staff, warriors, mendicants and scholars, now served her, taking the name of Andii, Children of Night.

It seemed that they valued ignorance, finding it a virtue when it was their own.

The sun opened its eye and so slashed in two all existence, dividing the worldly realm into Light and Dark – and they too warred with one another, reflecting the struggle of life itself.

After all, Mother Dark had, before embracing Darkness, been a mortal Tiste woman – little different from Finarra herself. Yet now they call her goddess. Now, we are to kneel before her, and know her face as Dark’s own, her presence as the elemental force itself. What has become of us that we should so descend into superstition?

In a world of blood, everyone drowns.

Ilgast remembered when Mother Dark was known by her birth name; when she was simply a woman: beautiful, vivacious, possessor of unimaginable strengths and unexpected frailties – a woman like any other, then. Until the day she found the Gate. Darkness was many things; most of all, it was selfish.

stand in our own shadow and none other’s. If you are called a bastard then the failing is your father’s, not yours.’

‘Wealth,’ they said, ‘is a false measure. Honour cannot be hoarded. Integrity cannot adorn a room. There is no courage in gold. Only fools build a fortress of wealth. Only fools would live in it and imagine themselves safe.’

And I have a brother, who thinks he knows me, but all he knows is a sister he has invented – go to her again, Rint. She’s easy to find. Bound to the chains inside your head.’

The Lord of Hust Forge was motionless, the lines of his face seeming to deepen the longer he stared down at Kellaras. Then he spoke, in flat tones. ‘It is said that the sceptre I made for Mother Dark now possesses something of the soul of Kurald Galain. She has imbued it with sorcery. She has taken pure but plain iron and made it … unnatural.’ ‘Lord, I know little of that.’ ‘It now embodies Darkness, in some manner few of us understand. Indeed, I wonder if even Mother Dark is fully aware of what she has done.’

Can it be that those who hold the most power also know the greatest fear?’

The man laughed. ‘I am Captain Scara Bandaris, Cryl.

‘Forgive me, commander,’ Ilgast said, with a gruff laugh. ‘Healing wearies me. There is a Shake word to describe that sense, as of the myriad things in nature giving sudden and most fixed attention upon a person, and the uncanny shiver that comes of it.’ Calat nodded, eyes still on the fire. ‘Denul.’

Civilizations in decline are notable when certain of their members escape justice, and do so with impunity.’

Loss was universal. It was life’s own language, after all.

‘Many speak of peace, yet their hearts are torrid and vile. Their one love is violence, the slaying of enemies, and in the absence of true enemies, they will invent them.

‘Wealth? Is it rarity that warrants value? If so, of greater value than these trinkets are trust, truth and integrity. Of greater value still, forgiveness. Of greatest value among them all, an outstretched hand. Wealth? We live in paucity. And this here is a most treacherous path – and we must walk it with unerring step, child.’

Potential felt like a burden, possibility like wolves on her trail.

Need was its own answer. One needs to eat, be it flesh or plant, and death was the currency.

K’rul has begotten a child and the earth itself holds the memory of its birth-cry. Will you drink of K’rul’s blood?’

We must awaken her to the threat these new Warrens pose – to us all.

‘I yield the meaningless secrets, Setch, to better hold hidden the important ones. Think of prod and pull, if you like. Explore the concepts in your mind, and muse on the pleasures of misdirection.’

Thoughts unspoken left no scars upon others.

‘It is said that we are ever students, no matter our age.’ Resh grunted. ‘Lessons oft repeated, never quite learned.

‘You give me reason to drink.’ ‘Then your reason is weak.’ ‘And lo, I am the only philosopher brave enough to admit it.’ ‘Only because you’re sober, and I always question the courage of sobriety.’

To know too much is to lose the wonder of mystery. In answering every question we forget the value of not knowing.’