“My father was the son of ancient priests, my mother the daughter of petty kings long gone,” he told Suukmel. “A thousand times, their people might have died out. A thousand times, they nearly killed themselves off with political bickering and moral certainty and a lethal distaste for compromise. A thousand times they might have become nothing but a memory in the mind of God.” “And yet they live?” she asked. “Last time I looked,” he said. “I can’t swear to more than that.” “And so might we,” Suukmel replied, with frail conviction.
