Before They Are Hanged (The First Law, #2)

by Joe Abercrombie

Some of the richest, most handsome, most elegant, most useless young men in the whole Union were sprawled in their chairs around the Prince. If the measure of a man was the size of his hat, these were great men indeed.

In my experience, a friend is merely an acquaintance who has yet to betray you.

‘It’s a sad fact, but pain only makes you sorry for yourself.’

‘A man who doesn’t want opinions should keep his own mouth shut.’

‘Fearlessness is a fool’s boast, to my mind. The only men with no fear in them are the dead, or the soon to be dead, maybe. Fear teaches you caution, and respect for your enemy, and to avoid sharp edges used in anger. All good things in their place, believe me. Fear can bring you out alive, and that’s the very best anyone can hope for from any fight. Every man who’s worth a damn feels fear. It’s the use you make of it that counts.’

‘Evil?’ Bayaz snorted his contempt. ‘A word for children. A word the ignorant use for those who disagree with them. I thought we grew out of such notions long centuries ago.’

‘Few indeed are those who get a choice. We do as we are told. We stand or fall beside those who were born near to us, who look as we do, who speak the same words, and all the while we know as little of the reasons why as does the dust we return to.’

Glokta sat on the bed, tonguing at his empty gums and rubbing his throbbing leg. He looked around his quarters. Or Davoust’s quarters. That’s where an old wizard terrified me in the middle of the night. That’s where I watched the city burn. That’s where I was nearly eaten by a fourteen-year-old girl. Ah, the happy memories . . .

‘Do you have to?’ he muttered, looking her right in one yellow eye. ‘Have to what?’ ‘Be a cunt. Do you have to?’

If only the old crew could’ve seen him now. Logen Ninefingers, the most feared man in the North, piss-wet frightened of the dark, clinging tight to the hand of a woman who hated him, like a child clinging to his mother’s tit. He might almost have laughed out loud. But he was scared the Shanka would hear.