Ashes of Man (Sun Eater, #5)

by Christopher Ruocchio

The ugliness of the world does not fade, nor are fear and grief made less by time, nor is any suffering forgotten. We are only made stronger by its blows.

“The gods bend evil to good ends.

We have need of heroes, however broken, however terrible, however insufficient they may be. And we have need of more than one hero, for heroes do break, you know.

One cannot step in the same river twice, and home is not home when you return, for you are not yourself. The man you were yesterday died yesterday, and is only a piece of the man of today, as you will be tomorrow.

But there is little right in all the universe, and none which we do not fight for and make for ourselves.

The universe is infinite, or so the scholiasts say, and I have seen that it is so. But it is infinite only in certain ways: in space and in potential. It is bounded in time, for time had a beginning—all magi agree—and so it must have an end. As will we. Something in this asymmetry between infinite space and finite time, I think, explains all coincidences, conserving fact as readily as other laws conserve matter and energy. Or perhaps . . . it is only that we are human, and that our human lives are woven together, and are more tightly bound by the action of the loom of human drama.

“Angels are only demons that kept their oaths . . . and still serve good and truth.”

He turned again, and a green fire was in his eyes, keener and more deadly than any I had before seen there. “We will kill it. You and I.”

Fuckin' *chef's kiss*

“Hell is empty, and all the devils are here.”

We believe war is waged by heroes and brave men, and it is so. But war is waged as much—and more—by those not brave at all.

“Beautiful.” I repeated the word like a curse, not certain if it was agreement or bitterness that edged my voice. Beauty is Truth, the poet once observed, and I have said it is not so, for there are hideous truths. But Truth is good, I thought then—and think now—even when it is hideous, and the atomic light and fire of the devastation playing out on the screen before Bassander and me was good, for it destroyed much that was evil.

The Empire is a belief! A commandment! What is Caesar if not a man who can command that he is Caesar? Who can prove it by the sword?

I laid my hands flat on the table, unconsciously mirroring Lin’s posture from my seat. Unheard by the others, I muttered, “Lorian isn’t going to like this.”

“I DON’T LIKE THIS,” Lorian said. “What happened to Lin needs you, Aristedes. You’re wasted on ground engagements? I ask you!”

LMFAO

“Oft hope is born when all is forlorn.”

But to know a thing and to see it, to experience it, are as different as the moon and the finger pointing to it. Knowledge is not truth, only the apprehension of it. Experience is something else entirely.

Time does not stop. Not ever. Not even once. The future comes, whatever it may hold. Alone of all the things and forces in the universe, Time will never end, and will remain—ticking on—after even Death has died and the universe lies dark and cold.

The cosmos is not cold or indifferent because we are not indifferent, and we are a part of that cosmos, of that grand order which has dropped from the hand of He who created it. Every decision creates its ripples, every moment burns its mark on time, every action leads us ever nearer to that last day, that final last battle and the answer to that last question: Darkness? Or light?

Only the past is written. Time runs down, and what once was never comes again.

I said once that a man is the sum of memories, and it is so. Thus, to discard those memories—however terrible—is to discard a part of ourselves.

Evil occurs because we are insufficient to challenge it. Too weak to stop it at the gates, too blind to see it bubbling within. Were we all angels in our virtue and heroes in our capacity, we might hold all chaos at bay, might stop even the unkindling of the stars. Yet we are but men.

It is hard to live. Easier perhaps to die. Easier at least to be dead, though the gate is harder won when one raises the portcullis himself than those who have not tried it believe.

If what I have suffered, if what I have done disturbs you, Reader, I do not blame you. If you would read no further, I understand. You have the luxury of foresight. You know where this ends. I shall go on alone.