Deadhouse Gates (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #2)

by Steven Erikson

Nastiness grows like a cancer in any and every organization—human or otherwise, as you well know. And nastiness gets nastier. Whatever evil you let ride becomes commonplace, eventually. Problem is, it’s easier to get used to it than carve it out.”

The lesson of history is that no one learns.

Some times you just have to grin and spit in Hood’s face.

Why do the survivors remain anonymous—as if cursed—while the dead are revered? Why do we cling to what we lose while we ignore what we still hold? Name none of the fallen, for they stood in our place, and stand there still in each moment of our lives. Let my death hold no glory, and let me die forgotten and unknown. Let it not be said that I was one among the dead to accuse the living.

the tracks we have walked in for so long become our lives, in themselves a prison—