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March 7 - June 12, 2014
When I said ferocity I meant a miasma of chaos. But I will grant you that terror thrives equally well in order.”
Without history there’s no growth—”
I am reminded of my own melodramatic gestures when I but toddled about in Aunt Tulla’s yard. Bullying the chickens when they objected to the straw hats I had spent hours weaving. Incapable of appreciating the intricate plaits I devised. I was deeply offended.
And when the body became a corpse, when it rotted and fell away to join all those others ringing a place that had once held an army, he would be forgotten. Another faceless victim. One in a number that beggared comprehension.
I lie with the weight of a god on their world, and these ants don’t like it. We’re so much more alike than most would think.
“I’d always believed all those tales of other realms were nothing but elaborate inventions wizards and priests used to prop up all the fumbling around they did.”
The lesson of history is that no one learns.
“Children are dying.” Lull nodded. “That’s a succinct summary of humankind, I’d say. Who needs tomes and volumes of history? Children are dying. The injustices of the world hide in those three words.
Mortality’s many comforting layers had been stripped away, revealing wracked bones, a sudden comprehension of death that throbbed like an exposed nerve.
It was a statement that promised to grow in resonance in the time to come, and the momentary silence in the tent told Duiker that he was not alone in that recognition.
Some warriors ready themselves to live, some ready themselves to die, and in these hours before the fate unfolds, it’s damned hard to tell one from the other.
Gossamer webs…intricate traps. Yet it was my thoughtless passage that left the night’s work undone. Will the spiders go hungry this day because of it?
For all that scholars tried, Duiker knew there was no explanation possible for the dark currents of human thought that roiled in the wake of bloodshed.
Life forces were powerful, almost beyond comprehension, and the sacrifice of one animal to gift close to five thousand others with appalling strength and force of will was on the face of it worthy and noble.
“Show me a mortal who is not pursued, and I’ll show you a corpse.
What if the patron god of assassins has reclaimed her? What will it mean if the rebellion is suddenly led by Cotillion—and, by extension, Ammanas? The dead Emperor returns to wreak vengeance.”
It was one thing seeking to assassinate Laseen—that was, in the end, a mortal affair. Gods ruling a mortal Empire, on the other hand, would draw other Ascendants, and in such a contest entire civilizations would be destroyed.
A god walking mortal earth trails blood.
Goats, Captain. Goats can turn a paradise into a desert in no time at all.
That is one curse we all share—the will to live
The Wickans know that the gift of power is never free. They know enough not to envy the chosen among them, for power is never a game, nor a glittering standards raised to glory and wealth.
“but they have since learned the greater value of subtlety when interfering in the activities of mortals—the old way was too dangerous in every respect.
“Deadly proliferation! Do I dare accompany them? Do I risk the glory of witnessing with my own eyes the fullest yield of my brilliant efforts? Well disguised, this uncertainty, they know nothing!”
They migrate. Creatures of instinct. A mindless plunge into fatal currents. A beautiful, horrifying dance to Hood, every step mapped out. Every step…
Such are memories in full flood. We are not simple creatures. You dream that with memories will come knowledge, and from knowledge, understanding. But for every answer you find, a thousand new questions arise. All that we were has led us to where we are, but tells us little of where we’re going. Memories are a weight you can never shrug off.”
“Nonsense,” the man gasped. “Affection. The puppy was so pleased to see me it became overexcited.”
We are all gripped in madness. I have never seen the like nor heard of such a thing—gods, what we have become…
“we ain’t none of us what we once were, and there ain’t nothing simple in what we’ve gone through to get here.”
Humans were but one tiny, frail leaf on a tree too massive even to comprehend.
From something delicate to something brutal, a pattern repeated through all of history.
“All those tomes you’ve read, those other thoughts from other men, other women. Other times. How does a mortal make answer to what his or her kind are capable of? Does each of us, soldier or no, reach a point when all that we’ve seen, survived, changes us inside? Irrevocably changes us. What do we become, then? Less human, or more human? Human enough, or too human?”
Iskaral Pust, squatting a few paces away, sputtered. “Muddy the puddle, oh yes! Yank his loyalties this way and that—excellent! Witness the strategy of silence—while the intended victims unravel each other in pointless, divisive discourse. Oh yes, I have learned much from Tremorlor, and so assume a like strategy. Silence, a faint mocking smile suggesting I know more than I do, an air of mystery, yes, and fell knowledge. None could guess my confusion, my host of deluded illusions and elusive delusions! A mantle of marble hiding a crumbling core of sandstone. See how they stare at me,
...more
“Things are coming up behind us. Things! How much clearer can I be?”
Iskaral Pust is anything but insane, as you all well know.
Sha’ik Elder had the gift of prophecy, but such a gift, when given, is no more than a seed. It grows in the freedom of a human soul.
“strategy and tactics are anathema to the Apocalypse.”
Sorcery makes a hunter lazy, tuned only to what they expect will be obvious, given their enhanced senses.
“A sad demise,” she said. “I had grown almost fond of him.” Fiddler nodded. “Our very own pet scorpion, aye.”
Intruders—this place cares nothing for us, nor are there any laws demanding that it accommodate us. Mind you, the same could be said for any world.
Fiddler briefly wondered about those three dragons—where they had gone, what tasks awaited them—then he shrugged. Their appearance, their departure and, in between and most importantly, their indifference to the four mortals below was a sobering reminder that the world was far bigger than that defined by their own lives, their own desires and goals. The seemingly headlong plunge this journey had become was in truth but the smallest succession of steps, of no greater import than the struggles of a termite.
The worlds live on, beyond us, countless unravelling tales.
We are all lone souls. It pays to know humility, lest the delusion of control, of mastery, overwhelms. And indeed, we seem a species prone to that delusion, again and ever again…
The Elders scarred him deep when they destroyed an entire settlement and laid the blame at Icarium’s feet. They imagined that would suffice. A Watcher was needed, desperately. The one who had held that responsibility before had taken his own life. For months Icarium walked the land alone, and the threat was too great.”
We needed Darujhistan’s resources, we needed Caladan Brood and his Rhivi and Barghast, we needed Anomander Rake and his Tiste Andii. And we needed the Crimson Guard off our backs. Now, none of those formidable forces are strangers to pragmatism—one and all they could see the threat represented by the Pannion Seer and his rising empire. But the question of trust remained problematic. I agreed to Dujek’s plan to cut him and his Host loose. As outlaws, they are, in effect, distanced from the Malazan Empire and its desires—our answer, if you will, to the issue of trust.”
“It’s our nature, isn’t it? Again and again, we cling to the foolish belief that simple solutions exist. Aye, I anticipated a dramatic, satisfying confrontation—the flash of sorcery, the spray of blood. I wanted a sworn enemy dead by my hand. Instead—” he rumbled a laugh—“I had an audience with a mortal woman, more or less…”
They began down the trail, Mogora resuming her litany. “Lying, deceitful, thieving, shifty—” “You said that one already!”
Ah, glad to see I’ve not lost my charm…
Crouched at the base, he held the bottle to the sun and squinted through it. Irp grunted. Rudd then held the bottle against one pointed ear and shook it. “Ah! He’s in there all right!” “Good, let’s go—” “Not yet. The body comes with us. Mortals are particular that way—he won’t want another. So, go get it, Irp.”
He lives!!!! Sort of...
“Yes, a good direction. I admit, Mappo, I feel close this time. Very close.”
