The Trouble with Peace (The Age of Madness, #2)

by Joe Abercrombie

“The market serves the interests of all,” offered the lord chancellor. “Unprecedented,” agreed the high justice. “Prosperity.” “No doubt the child workers would applaud it,” said Orso. “No doubt,” agreed Lord Hoff. “Had they not been burned to death.” “A ladder is of no use if all the rungs are at the top,” said Bayaz.

“No, no,” said Gorodets. “We would not deny him anything.” “We’d simply never give him anything,” said Glokta.

“It is always a bad idea,” said the First of the Magi, “for a king to choose sides.”

But so awfully orderly. So terribly efficient.

“The higher you climb, the further you have to fall, and the greater the spectacle when you hit the ground.

Loved as only politicians free from power—and therefore from disappointment—ever can be.

“You can’t change the fact the world’s full of arseholes. You can only change how you deal with them.”

Rare anger can be inspiring. Frequent anger becomes contemptible.”

“Could you just for once be wrong, Mother?” “I’ve tried it a couple of times. It really didn’t suit me.”

“You have a window.” High Justice Bruckel pointed through the bars at it. A tiny square of light, up near the ceiling. “He has a window!” “I barely get a window,” said Glokta.

Glokta sucked air disgustedly through his empty gums. “We’ve only been here a minute and you’ve gone from innocent to coerced.” “Few moments more,” murmured the high justice, “he’ll be the victim.”

“I must confess I have always had some sympathy with villains. Heroism makes fine entertainment but sooner or later someone has to get things done.”

“Each generation must make its own choices.” Bayaz stopped, smiling down at a perfect white flower, the first in the garden to fully show its face to the spring sun. “If all we do is stick to what we know, how can we make progress?”

A man is measured by his enemies. Worthy ones can be more missed than friends.”

“Magic fades from the world but, in truth, most problems have always been better solved with a few sharp words. Or a little sharp steel.”

he was dragged in so many different directions at once that it took all his energies to stand still.”

Living kings are always objects of derision. But people cannot wait to worship the dead ones. Someone must lead. Someone must make the hard choices. For everyone’s benefit.

Not even a window!

His first thought was what a portrait they’d make together.

To anyone watching, they must have looked truly spectacular.

You sucked goat’s milk from a cloth, in my arms. Your father said I was the least likely nursemaid he ever saw. Said I brought you back from the brink.” He looked at her then, and a tear streaked from his good eye. “But it was you brought me back.”

“My upbringing was less than happy. An ordeal, d’you see? Living through it once was bad enough but had to be done. Remembering it is a thing I aim to avoid.”

“You don’t need to kneel, Clover,” said Stour, waving him closer. “Old friend like you? Don’t be a cunt, Greenway.” Greenway gave an epic sneer which made him, in Clover’s opinion, look more of a cunt than ever. Some men just can’t help themselves.

“The Nail’s one of his sons, no? Dangerous man, that.” The warriors ranged about the walls competed to look more dangerous themselves.

“You scared?” asked Greenway. “Constantly,” said Clover, “but that’s probably just my age.

Black Calder had spent years stitching the ripped-up North together with threats and whispers and debts and favours. Can’t do it just with fear alone.

“Got no pride, eh, Clover?” “Used to have, my king. Used to have a fucking surfeit. Like a field in spring can draw too many bees. But I found when you’re struggling, there’s not a lot you can buy with the stuff. Pride, that is, not bees. So I shed mine. Don’t miss it in the least.”

“If there were rules it would not be magic.”

Jurand, with his caution and good sense. Jurand, with his endless patience and support. Jurand, with the fine shape of his jaw, and his hair falling in that artless mess, and the perfect definition of his lips… Leo shook himself.

Gay gay homosexual

Sometimes, to change the world, we must first burn it down.”

“That’s what a king’s there for,” said Tunny. “High or low, we all need someone to blame.”

The Young Lion had his moods but it seemed they passed quickly, like stormclouds sweeping over the rugged Northern valleys and just as quickly letting the sun shine again. She could work with that. Who doesn’t have moods, after all? Savine had been in one ever since she got back from Valbeck.

Leo prodded at his fish. “Just feels like there are too many brown faces around in Adua these days.”

So glad he's racist too on top of everything else!

Savine did understand it. But if she truly went to a place of honesty, all she really felt was glad she was no longer one of these wretched ghosts. All she really wanted was to get back to her palatial rooms and her conscientious servants as soon as possible.

She wanted nothing more than to kick the girl off into the gutter.

Ain’t nothing prettier than a pretty girl crying, eh?”

Stour strode grinning past ’em, lapping up their scowls and their curses. He was one of those men loves to be despised. That treats loathing like gold, to be clawed for and hoarded up. He hadn’t learned yet that hate’s the one thing never runs out.

Lots of weapons in that hall, lots of sorrow and lots of anger, and Clover made sure he knew where all the doors were.

When a great man dies, those left over always take a moment working out where their loyalties are most fruitfully laid, and there’s a high risk of bloodshed in the meantime. He’d seen one funeral turn into several often enough.

Then the woman turned, and that shaft of light caught her smile, and Stour shuffled to an uncertain halt. So did his men. A dozen warriors always keen to advertise their courage, but they all checked at the sight of her, and Clover hardly blamed ’em.

“What the hell happened to you?” muttered Stour, giving voice to the thoughts of everyone in the hall, most likely. “A sorceress said she could make me more ordinary,” said Rikke. “Or she could make me less. Guess which I chose?”

Isern-i-Phail, no doubt used to being the weirdest in just about any company, was of a sudden looking workaday by comparison.

“You should’ve. The kind of cold that burns all your doubts away. Whole business was…” And Rikke opened her eyes wide, so wide it seemed they might pop out of her pinched-in face. “Eye-opening. I see right through you, now. Right through all of you.” And she laughed, a jagged laugh, like she’d left her senses far behind her, and it didn’t help at all that she was laughing at her father’s funeral.

muttered Greenway, who should’ve been called Whiteway he’d turned so pale.

like the best of us goes in the ground with you.”

“You’re a woman,” said Oxel, with a sneer. “True,” said Rikke. “I realised that the first time I tried to piss standing up. Most disappointing day of my life.”

“And my pretty smile? What about my pretty smile? I’ve a pretty smile, haven’t I, Isern?” “Like the sun peeping from behind a stormcloud.” And Isern picked at that hole in her teeth with a fingernail, rooted some scrap of food out of it, held it thoughtfully to the light, then ate it.

“Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead.”

PRETTY LITTLE LIARS??

“I heard you had all the brains around here but Leo, why didn’t you tell me how very handsome he is?” “Well…” Leo cleared his throat. “I suppose that’s not the sort of thing a man notices…”

Liar lmfao. Gay gay homosexual

Lady Finree coloured as she retreated to her chair. Savine felt for her, she really did, but she was yesterday’s woman. Her son might act like a child on occasion but treating him like one was a blunder. If he had to have his toy soldiers, Savine would find a way to give them to him. While he was busy playing army, she could mould Angland into the thoroughly modern province she needed it to be.