greg’s Reviews > Empire of Silence > Status Update

“At last I asked, “Do you hate me, Valka?”

“You do enough of that yourself.” And she favored me with a small smile that bled through the pall that lay on me like ink through cloth. “You don’t need my help.”

“Where they passed, the stars fell and planets went up like smoke. And I beheld one greater than the rest. Silver was its crown, and silver the inlay of its black armor, and its eyes were terrible as the worlds burning in its wake. The great ship with her statues overshadowed that Pale host and plunged into the nearest star like a knife descending.”

“For all I know, you urged him to do this. Made some deal to keep me. What was it? Thirty pieces of silver?”

The man’s face went blank. “What?” He didn’t understand me. “You should be honored. You’re to be my son.”

“I’m to be a whore.” I almost choked, took a moment to crush the sob in my throat before it could escape. ”

“With unfeeling fingers, I snapped the chain from round my neck and slipped the ring onto my thumb, holding it up. “I have every right.” I glowered at Gilliam. Briefly I glanced at Valka and saw surprise etched on those delicate, hard-edged features. “I told you, Your Reverence. You don’t know everything.”

“Man is a wolf to man and a dragon to the inhuman.”

I would fail to capture her, in charcoal and in life. The brazen
declaration of her: the pride in that upturned chin, the pointed nose,
and the tidy carelessness that put her above the opinions of lesser
men. There’s little sign of her wit—so close to cruelty—in any of the
drawings I made of her, and this poor prose cannot contain her
beauty, body or soul. Even holographs fail. They are only echoes, as
is this.

“You never did say: Why did you go to see the Cielcin in the first place?”

That puzzled me for a moment. I had no answer ready, so I chewed my lip, reflecting. “I wanted to know if it was a monster, my lord.” “I wanted to see it.”

The other palatine nodded gravely. “And was it? A monster, I mean.”

“I don’t think so, my lord,” I replied. “It was afraid.”

“I’m sorry,” I said at last. Weakly. However I had suffered—and I had suffered—it didn’t give me a monopoly on suffering”

“We like to imagine it is easy to rise, to stand. The be a hero. It is not. This was not my moment. I was not a hero. Am not, or was not then.”