Shorefall (The Founders Trilogy, #2)

by Robert Jackson Bennett

To commune with a scrived item was, in a way, to feel its scrivings and bindings placed upon you. And every time, Sancia worried a little that whenever she broke away, she was a little more altered than she’d been before.

“She knows.” Berenice sighed. “It is difficult to get someone who’s grown up eating nothing but rice and beans to understand how to appreciate wine.” “I eat a lot more than rice and beans these days,” said Sancia, grinning at her.

“Not a flame, I think,” he said. “A spark. We intend to start an inferno.” He looked out the greasy window at the foggy lanes outside. “Yet fires do not care about who they burn.”

would rather risk a life of damnation,” said Gregor, “and save her, than abandon her and stay with those who first damned me.” He turned and ran into the darkness.

one of my all time favorite characters

Is that what he thinks of me? That I damned him? He had it all wrong, she thought. He had no idea. But I didn’t. I saved him.

.

“There is no innovation that will ever spring from the minds of men that will not eventually be used for slaughter and control.

“His command was to curb the behavior of all the human species,” she said. “To render them incapable of oppressing one another, of making war upon one another. To make a world without suffering, without pain, without war, where mankind could be safe, and flourish and live in harmony, forever.”

“True. I have seen this many times. And I have seen it fail far more often than I have ever seen it succeed. An emperor’s hunger for control will always outlast a moralist’s desire for equality and idealism. And even if you succeed, you will have done so using some advantage that will then be used to shape new hierarchies, new elites, new empires.”

“Then…that is your assessment of all humanity?” said Berenice. “That humankind will always invent, but the powers of these inventions will always eventually accrue to the most powerful, and they will use them for conquest and slaughter?”

“On a long enough timeline,” said Valeria, “this is indisputably so. You have solved many problems here in your city—but the Maker is a different problem. He presents the last problem—when humanity gains a new tool, what will it become?”

“Thinking,” she said. “You all…You are thieves, yes?” “No,” said Gregor. “Yes,” said Sancia. “Sometimes,” said Orso.

favorite quote so far

“Yes. Of course you do. And sometimes I find it takes a lot of treachery and death to make a moral world. That is simply the way of things.”

He looked at her. “Because I am tired of it. And because you need to hear it. You think you’ve changed things now with your little revolution, but you don’t know. You have not solved the last problem. You cannot trust people to use their innovations compassionately. You cannot give them the choice of morality. You must force them.”

“If the children of men cannot rid themselves of their predilection for slavery,” said Crasedes, “then the children of men shall be made slaves themselves. If they cannot make the right choice, then it’s better to just remove the choice entirely.” He cocked his head. “A permission, a privilege that I would simply…revoke.

“To turn all of humanity into what I was—a marionette that danced in your hand, this way and that…” she said. “Even I recognized the monstrousness of this.” “Better they dance than slaughter one another,” he said. “At least then they would all have been equal.” “Except for you. Who would wield the powers of God Himself.”

<Whatever happens,> said Berenice, <I don’t want to lose this.> <Because together,> said Sancia, <we are unstoppable?> <No. Because together, we are one.>

.

But Crasedes isn’t some corrupt wizard looking to rule the world. He’s a true believer. He’s a zealot. And zealots aren’t born, they’re made.