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Dread Emperors/Empresses
“Maybe I won’t go to Heaven but you’ve never owned a pit full of man-eating tapirs so who’s the real loser here?”
—Dread Empress Atrocious, best known for comprehensive tax reform and having been eaten by man-eating tapirs. They were later executed by her successor for treason after a lengthy trial.
“Morality is a force, not a law. Deviating from it has costs and benefits both – a ruler should weigh those when making a decision, and ignore the delusion of any position being inherently superior.”
—
“There’s no surer sign you’re being played than being certain you’ve grasped your opponent’s intent.”
—
“Please, do keep digging your own grave. I look forward to your splendidly inevitable demise.”
—Dread Emperor Benevolent the First
"Funny, isn’t it? No matter what language they speak, everyone sounds the same when you pull out their fingernails.”
—Dread Emperor Foul III, “the Linguist”
“I imagine the High Lords would be inclined to protest the mind control, if I hadn’t seized control of their minds, which just goes to show this was the right decision all along.”
—Dread Emperor Imperious
“See, this is exactly the kind of trouble I’d be avoiding by mind controlling the entire world. You fools are making my point for me, can’t you see?”
—Dread Emperor Imperious, shortly before being torn apart by an Ater mob
“Hahahahaha. Ha. You can’t beat me now, this is the first part of my plan!”
—
“I can’t beat your band of heroes, true, but what if there were another eight bands also out for my blood? Ha! What are you going to do, form a line?”
—
“Ah, but being defeated was always part of my plan! Yet another glorious victory for the Empire.”
—
“Oh, I get it. The real treasure was the people I had executed along the way!”
—
“Ah, but every palace you destroy has to be rebuilt! You’ve single-handedly pulled the Empire out of a slump, hahaha. Once again sweet victory is mine.”
—
“Oh, woe is me, you’ve destroyed my army… Hahaha, you fell for it again! I haven’t paid them in a year, they were about to depose me. Once more, Irritant triumphs against all odds!”
—Dread Emperor Irritant I, the Oddly Successful
“No, see, you’ll profit as well. All you need is to convince five others of contributing coin and when they do you’ll get a part of their own contribution. It’ll all work out, I promise.”
—Dread Emperor Irritant, the Oddly Successful, convincing High Lords to invest in the construction of ritual pyramid outside Ater
“Obviously you can’t kill me now: your enmity is with the Dread Emperor of Praes, and I’ve already abdicated. I am now but a humble shoemaker, and what kind of hero slays a shoemaker?”
—Dread Emperor Irritant, the Oddly Successful. Later noted to have made surprisingly nice shoes during his three abdications.
“Tyrants do not lose. We face temporary setbacks.”
—Dread Empress Maledicta II
“I see I’ll have to take drastic measures to ensure intelligent conversation around here.”
—Dread Empress Maledicta II, before having the tongues of the entire Imperial court ripped out
“Nothing is half as dangerous to a villain as victory. We raise our own gallows.”
—
“Maybe I’ll lose one day. But not today, and not to the likes of you.”
—Dread Empress Maleficent the First
“Any plan with more than four steps is not a plan, it is wishful thinking.”
—
“I never keep grudges. Not for long, anyway.”
—
"The closest equivalent I’ve found to the Imperial court is the act of shoving your hand in a bag that could be full of jewels but is, most of the time, full of razor blades.”
—
“The worst sin a villain can commit is to hesitate.”
—
“Sometimes you can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs, executing the hens who laid them on trumped up charges and setting the most rebellious henhouse on fire as an example to the others.”
—
“To bargain with devils is to paint with your own blood: the greater the work, the harsher the price.”
—Dread Empress Maleficent II
“The most important part of any summary execution is to remember to have fun and be yourself.”
—
“You’d be surprised at the breadth of things that can be powered by the souls of the innocent. Fortresses, swords, my favourite chandelier.”
—
“You have to enjoy life’s little pleasures, like lazy mornings and strawberries and invading Callow with an invisible army.”
—Dread Empress Malevolent II
“The best revenge isn’t living well, it’s living to crucify all your enemies.”
—
“Where have all the good men gone? Graveyards, mostly.”
—Dread Emperor Malevolent III, the Pithy
“Only heroes get to have the torch handed to them. Villains must take it from their predecessor’s corpse.”
—
“I trust people to act according to their nature. Anything more is sentimentality.”
—
“Power is mostly a matter of making the right corpses at the right time.”
—Dread Empress Malicia the First, First of her Name
“It is impossible for the Empire to make an appreciable gain so long as this gain is a loss to every other nation on Calernia. To remedy this, we must discard the traditional lines of allying only to Evil polities and make it so that it is in the interest of other powers for us to rise.”
—Extract from ‘The Death of the Age of Wonders’, a treatise by Dread Empress Malicia
"Note: only offer the hero the chance to replace my right-hand man when my right-hand man is no longer in the room. Additional note: find out estimated rebuilding cost for the summer palace.”
—
“Note: those meddling heroes keep surviving getting thrown off cliffs. Must build taller ones in anticipation of the next encounter.”
—
“Note: orc buoyancy is limited. Avoid fighting the damnable rebels near shoddily-built dams in the future.”
—
“Home is wherever you can order someone drowned and not get any odd looks.”
—
“Look, if he didn’t want to be fed to my acid-spewing crocodiles he shouldn’t have brought me bad news.”
—
"Note: bottling up the power of friendship cannot be achieved by bottling up friends. Must pursue further trials, perhaps prior liquefaction diluted the substance.”
—
—Dread Emperor Malignant II, the Particularly Petty
“You can never have too many tiger pits, Chancellor. That’s the same lack of vision that has people say “that’s too large a field of energy to absorb” or “calling yourself a living god is blasphemy”.”
—Dread Emperor Malignant III, before his death and second reign as Dread Emperor Revenant
“Of course I don’t step on people’s throats using my own heels. Have you seen how gorgeous these boots are? I’m not getting blood on these beauties: it takes at least two princes to get the right amount of skin, and duke leather just isn’t the same.”
—Dread Emperor Nihilis I, the Tanner
“If I had an aurelius for every assassination attempt, I wouldn’t have to keep raising taxes.”
—Dread Emperor Pernicious, the Imperiled
“That’s the thing with invincibility. You have it until you don’t.”
—Dread Empress Prudence the First, the ‘Frequently Vanquished’
“There’s a natural hierarchy to the world, Chancellor: there’s me, then my boot, then all of Creation under the boot.”
—
“A villain should make plans with the understanding that everything you can conceive of going wrong will, and then a few other things too.”
—Dread Empress Regalia
“Gaining power’s a lot like scaling a tower, Chancellor. The longer you do, the more likely you are to fall.”
—Dread Empress Regalia the First, before ordering her Chancellor thrown out the window
“Your mistake, Queen of Blades, is in thinking that virtue is the province of Good. Every Tyrant who has ever claimed the Tower, every fool and every madman, had the seed of greatness in them. Courage, cleverness, ambition, will. We may lose our way, we may lose ourselves, but every time we get… a little closer. You think I am afraid of death? I am a droplet in the tide that will drown Creation. I take pride in this, even in my hour of failure. Empresses rise, Empresses fall. But the Tower?
Oh, the Tower endures.”
—Last words of Dread Empress Regalia the First
“They call Ater the City of Gates and then forget to mention how often those are shut on people’s fingers.”
—
“Oh, on most days we lose. But once in a while, just once, it works. And those moments of perfect clarity where all the world is in the palm of your hand, a hundred thousand middling minds made into flawless assembly by your will? Those are worth all the rest.”
—
“The only thing more dangerous than being hated by a villain is to be loved by them.”
—
"Here is the truth of our dreadful crown: to claim it a declaration of war on banality, on mediocrity. The banner of the enemy is apathy, the slow grind of the inevitable. Victor or ruin, every Tyrant that ever lived bet their madness against the bridle of the Heavens.”
—
“No man in Creation is so dangerous as a well-meaning fool.”
—Dread Empress Regalia II
“Mark my words, the Imperial banner will be flying above Summerholm by midsummer.”
—Dread Empress Regalia II, shortly before initiating the Sixty Years War
"Who should really be afraid, between the dragon and the peasant with a sword?"
—Dread Emperor Reprobate the First
“My dear Chancellor, I didn’t murder my entire family and use their blood to turn myself into an undead abomination to be told I couldn’t do things.”
—Dread Emperor Revenant
“The source of wonder and horror is the same, and the boundary between them thinner than you would think.”
—
“It probably doesn’t count as cannibalism if you’re already dead.”
—Dread Empress Sanguinia I, the Gourmet
“This eye for an eye business is horridly proportional. I assure you, if I’m losing an eye then so is everyone else.”
—
“Ah, mortal wounds. My only weakness.”
—
“I’ll be honest, Chancellor – revenge is the motivation for over half the decrees I’ve made.”
—Dread Empress Sanguinia II, best known for outlawing cats and being taller than her
“Invading? Good Gods, of course not. We’re merely manoeuvring.”
—Dread Empress Sinistra II “the Coy”, after being hailed by the garrison of Summerholm
“Of course not, did you see the height of that drop? That is the last we’ve seen of the Shining Prince, I assure you.”
—Dread Empress Sinistra IV, the Erroneous
“Now kneel, fools, and witness my ascension to GODHOOD!”
—Last words of Dread Empress Sinistra IV, the Erroneous
“There’s only a thousand of them, I don’t care if they’re on a hill. This will be over by midday, Black Knight, mark my words.”
—Dread Empress Sulphurous, the Technically Correct
“The classic Callowan blunder. Sending an army into the Wasteland you can’t handle if it comes marching back as undead.”
—
“Three can keep a secret, if two are dead. Unless you’re a necromancer, anyway, then the world is your blasphemous undead oyster.”
—
“The essence of sorcery is blasphemy. Through will and power, every mage usurps dominion over the laws of Creation from the gods Above and Below.”
—
“I was once told that character is what you are in the dark. I found, my dear Chancellor, that I was the dark.”
—Dread Emperor Sorcerous
“Taxes. Taxes and triplicate forms.”
—Dread Emperor Terribilis I, upon being asked what powerful sorceries he would use to humble the High Lords
“The best defence is to have killed all your enemies.”
—Dread Emperor Terribilis I, the Thorough
“It is a shallow soul who fights to the cry of ‘might makes right’. The truth is more concise: might makes.”
—
“Doubt is the mother of failure.”
—Dread Emperor Terribilis I, the Lawgiver
“Only if it’s ‘being executed’.”
—Dread Emperor Terribilis I, upon being asked for a last request by a hero
“Do not make laws you do not intend to enforce. Allowing one law to be broken with impunity undermines them all.”
—
“Did you really think I wouldn’t cheat just because I was already winning?”
—
“Trust is the victory of sentiment over reason.”
—
“Always mistrust these three: a battle that seems won, a chancellor who smiles and a ruler calling you friend.”
—
“Threats are useless unless you have previously committed the level of violence your are threatening to use. Make examples of the enemies you cannot control so those that you can will be cowed. This is the foundation of ruling.”
—
“Mercy might be the mark of a great man, but then so’s a tombstone.”
—
“Never wound a man you do not intend to kill.”
—Dread Emperor Terribilis II
“Ha! And I bet you didn’t even see it coming!”
—
“Treason is more art than act.”
—
“I’ve been told one can only be betrayed by a friend, which is why I constantly surround myself with enemies.”
—
"I’ve yet to encounter a situation that couldn’t be improved by a copious amount of lies and body doubles.”
—
“There’s nothing better in life than the look on your enemy’s face when they realize you’ve played them every step of the way. Why do you think I keep starting secret cabals trying to overthrow me?”
—
“I’m not saying all your closest friends are shapeshifting devils I sent to spy on you after having the originals murdered, but I’m certainly implying it very heavily."
—Dread Emperor Traitorous
“Gentlemen, there is no need to worry: our plan is flawless. The Emperor will never see it coming.”
—Grandmaster Ouroboros of the Order of Unholy Obsidian, later revealed to have been Dread Emperor Traitorous all along
“My dear friends, I have a confession to make. Some creative reframing of the truth may have taken place during the planning of this coup.”
—Dread Emperor Traitorous, addressing the Order of the Unholy Obsidian upon successfully usurping the throne from himself
"If Creation is not mine, what need is there to be a Creation at all?”
—
“All lessons worth learning are drenched in blood.”
—Dread Empress Triumphantnote , First and Only of Her Name
“Don’t think of it so much as a fall, but rather as an opportunity to learn how to fly.”
—Dread Emperor Venal, in the act of succeeding his predecessor
“Those who live by the sword kill those who don’t.”
—Dread Emperor Vile the First
“Before embarking on a journey of revenge, dig two graves. One for the fool and one for all those pesky relatives.”
—
“And on your grave we shall have inscribed: he was witty all the way into the tiger pit.”
—Dread Emperor Vindictive the First
“I’ve found that the best way to win at shatranj is usually to turn into a giant snake and tear my opponent’s throat out.”
—Dread Empress Vindictive III
Kings/Queens of Callow
“I do not fear wicked men, who know only cruelty and pain. The fear they inflict leashes them as well. But a decent man? Oh, there is no limit to the devilry a decent man will fall to, if he believes it necessary.”
—
"Kingdoms don’t die on battlefields. They die in dark, quiet rooms where deals are made between those who should know better.”
—King Edward Alban III of Callow, best known for annexing the Kingdom of Liesse
“We have grown to mock Tyrants for they are mad but that is a very dangerous thing. A madman thinks the world other than what it is, and in a mortal that is a harmless thing. Not so in one who moulds Creation to their will, as all Named do.”
—King Edmund of Callow, the Inkhand
“We should never forget that for a great evil to be defeated, a lesser evil must first become great.”
—
“Those who clap others in irons always end up choking on them.”
—Eleanor Fairfax, founder of the Fairfax dynasty
“There’s a very important difference between a nice man and a good one.”
—
“Never back the Praesi in a corner, son. That’s when the devil-summoning starts, and it’s all downhill from there.”
—
“Prayer and a sword gets better results than prayer alone.”
—King Jehan the Wise
“Oh, give me a bloodthirsty, fire-and-brimstone conquering villain any day. It’s the schemers you have to watch out for.”
—
“Peace is a fine thing, but war is the crucible of crowns.”
—
“Do not ever speak of victory before the last foe is dead.”
—Queen Elizabeth Alban of Callow
Other Rulers
“I don’t trust wizards. Every time I levy taxes on them, they try to get my political opponents to pull swords from stones.”
—Attributed to Louis Merovins, seventh First Prince of Procer
"The victor in a war is usually decided before the first battle’s been fought.”
—Prince Louis of Brabant, later eighth First Prince of Procer
"An alliance of victors is like a hearth in summer.”
—Julienne Merovins, tenth First Princess of Procer
“Tonight we must speak of Callow, that stubborn graveyard of empires. Princes and princesses of Procer, we must now admit this truth: we have lost an entire kingdom to peasants and bandits.”
—Beginning of First Princess Éloïse of Aequitan’s speech to the Highest Assembly, on the subject of withdrawal from occupied Callow
“Diplomacy is the art of selling a deal you don’t want to people you don’t trust for reasons you won’t admit to.”
—
“We make the shepherds kings at the end of our stories because they already know how to lead recalcitrant, bleating creatures of limited intellect.”
—
“The Praesi take on negotiations is to slam a severed head on the table and smile at your interlocutor until they reconsider their position.”
—Prokopia Lakene, first Hierarch of the League of Free Cities
“The Heavens have a way of favouring the general with the better army.”
—
“Swiftness is the lifeblood of war. No army can win a battle if it isn’t standing on the battlefield.”
—
“Grand designs in war are a thing of vanity. Victory goes to the general that blunders the least.”
—Theodosius the Unconquered, Tyrant of Helike
“The most dangerous opponent for a master is a novice. Therefore, seek to be a novice in all things.”
—
“One learns more from defeat than victory. Therefore, fear the general that has never won a battle.”
—
“The heart of warfare is deception. Therefore, the general who can deceive even themself is invincible.”
—Isabella the Mad, only general to ever defeat Theodosius the Unconquered on the field
“Look at how edible you are. You’re basically asking for it.”
—Warlord Grog the King-Eater, addressing the king of Okoro during the sack of the same
Extracts
"In the beginning, there were only the Gods.
Aeons untold passed as they drifted aimlessly through the Void, until they grew bored with this state of affairs. In their infinite wisdom they brought into existence Creation, but with Creation came discord. The Gods disagreed on the nature of things: some believed their children should be guided to greater things, while others believed that they must rule over the creatures they had made.
So, we are told, were born Good and Evil.
Ages passed in fruitless argument between them until finally a wager was agreed on: it would be the mortals that settled the matter, for strife between the gods would only result in the destruction of all. We know this wager as Fate, and thus Creation came to know war. Through the passing of the years grooves appeared in the workings of Fate, patterns repeated until they came into existence easier than not, and those grooves came to be called Roles. The Gods gifted these Roles with Names, and with those came power. We are all born free, ->but for every man and woman comes a time where a Choice must be made.
It is, we are told, the only choice that ever really matters.”
—First page of the Book of All Things
“you call me villain
cast the word as you
would a stone;
seek to bury under
scorn of herded
multitude, and yet
forget my Name:
I am empress
most dread,
savage ruler of
yet fiercer race;
did you expect
meekness of me?
you call me villain
speak it a curse
as if Hells were
grasping instead
of grasped;
as if I had knelt.
you dare?
I am tyrant,
bringer of calamity;
crowned and
crowning glory
of mine empire
be fearful now
tremble; for
my reach is long
my wrath is great
patient but
unrivalled
above or below
and I will be
Triumphant”
—Extract from the play “I, Triumphant”, author unknown, banned by decree of the Tower under Terribilis II
“Then let us be wicked,
Let us be reddest ruin
Rent, broken, crooked
Black hearted and cruel
Then let us be doom,
To both friend and foe
Fly banner of gloom
We lowest of the low
Rise, rise all ye villains
You rogues and madmen
Proudly claim the stage,
Of this wondrous age
We are not kind or just
Deserving of any victory
We are a thing of dust
Promised only misery
So smile, Tyrants,
And let us be wicked”
—– Final monologue of “The Many Deaths of Traitorous”, a play on the reign of the Dread Emperor Traitorous
“What say you, Empress of Praes?
Here you lie upon the blood-soaked ruins of your dominion, surrounded by the corpses of the legions that once swarmed over the world. Hundreds of thousands dead for the sake of your wretched ambition, your mad design to bring to heel the kingdoms of man. In all the history of Creation no one woman has been so wicked as you, and I will have my answer.
Why, o Empress of Ruins?”
She shrugged.
“Why not?”
—Last lines of the “The Fall of Empress Triumphant, First and Only of Her Name”
“Though goblins are the most secretive of all peoples, audiences with Matrons granted me some insight into their people. The Tribes have no true concept of war because there is no such thing as peace, to a goblin – only the temporary witholding of violence.”
—
“The question of who the most vindictive people of Calernia are has long been debated. Some say it is the Arlesites, who will duel to the death over the use of the wrong adjective in a verse. Others say it is those of the Free Cities, where the moving of a border by half a mile will spawn a war lasting three generations. Others yet say it is the Praesi, who indulge in political assassination the way other nations enjoy a cup of good wine. I would humbly put forward, however, that the answer is the people of Callow. Steal an apple from a farmer of the Kingdom and fifty years later his grandson will find yours on the other side of the continent, sock him in the eye and take three apples back.”
—
“The Kharsum word for war is derived from the one used for a full cookpot. That tells you everything you need to know about how the Clans think of Creation.”
—
On the third month of the year I found myself on the outskirts of the city of Okoro, and stumbled upon one of the famous Praesi field rituals. The throats of ten and three men were slit on dusty ground, and from the lifeblood spilled the earth turned from yellow to black. Granted audience with the lord presiding, I asked him the meaning of the ceremony. ‘Everywhere men bleed,’ he told me. ‘In Praes we get the full worth of it.’”
—Extract from “Horrors and Wonders”, famed travelogue of Anabas the Ashuran
“And so Maleficent said: ‘Though you be god I am Empress, crowned of dread, and by my hand comes your doom. Rage in vain, for from your bones will rise a great tower whose shadow will be cast upon all the world.’”
—Extract from the Scroll of Chains, first of the Secret Histories of Praes
“And so Subira of the Sahelians slew Maleficent and said: ‘Emperor am I now, Sinister of name and deed. Let this be the truth of our empire, that iron ever sharpens iron ‘til the last cut is made.’”
—Extract from the Scroll of Thrones, second of the Secret Histories of Praes
“It is said that the founding First Prince spoke of Procer as a great tower, every principality a stone raising it to ever greater heights. I have found the sentiment more poetic than accurate. Procer is no single tower but twenty-three of them, and their owners constantly steal each other’s stones to rise at the expense of the others.”
—Extract from ‘The Labyrinth Empire, or, A Short History of Procer’, by Princess Eliza of Salamans
“When approaching a siege, a general must draw distinction between tactical and strategic importance. The costs of a victory on the tactical theatre of a campaign may yield defeat on the strategic one.”
—“Considerations on Warfare”, by Marshal Grem One-Eye
“Thirty-one: use a sword fit for your height and built, not the largest chunk of metal you can find. It will both improve your life expectancy and save you a great many jokes about overcompensation.”
—
“Forty-nine: if any wizard over the age of fifty suddenly becomes evasive when asked about your parents, you may safely assume yourself to be either royalty or related to your archenemy in some way.”
—
“Sixty-seven: putting an arrow in a villain during their monologue is a perfectly acceptable method of victory. Heroes believing otherwise do not get to retire.”
—
“Seventy-three: always send the comic relief in front if you suspect there’s a trap. The Gods won’t allow you to be rid of them so easily.”
—r
“One hundred and twelve: always be kind to any monster held in a cage by your nemesis. When it inevitably gets loose, it will remember the kindness and attempt to destroy the villain instead.”
—
“One hundred and forty-three: do not try to avert prophecy, fulfill prophecy or in any way tinker with prophecy. Swallowing poison will lead to a quicker death and less ironic horror inflicted upon Creation.”
—
“One hundred and eighty-seven: should one of your trusted companions be taken hostage at knife-point, check for the following features – cliff, moat, or any kind of sharp drop. Should one be nearby, you may assume the situation will solve itself momentarily.”
—“Two Hundred Heroic Axioms”, author unknown
“Who reigns up high?
A dead man’s sigh
What sleeps below?
A crown of woe
That is the Tower:
Learn and cower.”
—Extract from ‘And So I Dreamt I Was Awake’, Sherehazad the Seer
“We fought,
across field and river,
carrying the Tower’s writ
to the foot of the Wall.
We fought
and did not grow old.”
—Spoken Kharsum verse attributed to Sharok the Blinded, chieftain of the Iron Bears (banned by Imperial decree)
“What Foundling does isn’t thinking outside the box so much as stealing the box and hitting her opponents with it until they stop moving.”
—
“When historians try to pin down Foundling’s methods they point to the Battle of the Camps or the Princes’ Graveyard, but those came later. After she’d learned her trade. If you want to understand how she operated, look to the Battle of Four Armies and One – from the beginning to the end, she was playing an entirely different game from every other commander on the field.”
—Extract from “A Commentary on the Uncivil Wars”, by Juniper of the Red Shields
“In its infancy, the Fifteenth was in the awkward position of being within spitting distance of the heart of the Empire without being part of it. Legate Juniper, ever brutally sardonic, pointed out that give how tall their manors stood, they had a better chance of landing the spit on us than us on them. History wasted no time in proving her correct.”
—
“In most histories of the Uncivil Wars, the Battle of Three Hills is but a footnote – especially given its proximity to the much more contentious Battle of Marchford. But for us, back then? Marchford might have been the crucible that forged us, but Three Hills lit the furnace.”
—
“There’s a degree of argument among scholars as to whether the Liesse Rebellion was the underlying cause of the Uncivil Wars or the first of them. I was there, though, and I can tell you this: the seeds that were sown in Liesse are what we reaped in the years that followed.”
—
“It admittedly took me a few years to make my peace with the fact that Lady Foundling’s take on diplomacy is essentially to bring a bottle of cheap wine and a sword to the table, then remind the interlocutor that while the wine might be awful it is still arguably better than being stabbed.”
—Extract from the personal memoirs of Lady Aisha Bishara
"There’s a lot of people in the Fifteenth who remember Marchford as the day we proved we could spit in the eye of Hell and get away with it. For me, though? It was the first time I ever put on legionary armour with pride. In the end, I think that might have meant more.”
—
“It’s hard for people to understand what it means to have been part of the Fifteenth. We were farmboys and thieves, not people that were ever supposed to matter. Fodder for noose and ledger. But then she came along, and told us we were to be the doom of gods. Heavens forgive me, but I believed her then and believe her still.”
—Extract from the “Forlorn Memoirs”, author unknown
"…such wanton deviousness had been unseen since the days of Dread Emperor Traitorous, who famously passed for his own Chancellor through cunning use of a wig and a pair of cantaloupes…”
—Extract from “The Most Illustrious Histories of the Inimitable Dread Empire of Praes”, volume IV
“I stared into the abyss and found what stared back… wanting.”
—
“Most live out their days on an isle of vapid ignorance, shying away from the dark and hungry waters that surround it. To seek power is to brave the tides, but one who does should not expect to see those shores again.”
—Translation of the Kabbalis Book of Darkness, widely attributed to the young Dead King
“That slip of a girl from Rhenia is playing ruler, coming south with her pretty little army. I’ll have driven her out of Brus by winter, then we can turn our attentions to real threats like the Princess of Aisne.”
—Extract from the correspondence of Prince Dagobert of Lange, dated four months before the fall of Lange
“War is a breed of conflict decided by the allocation of resources. Through better apportionment a lesser nation can defeat a greater, but never if decision-making is of equal standing on both sides.”
—Extract from “The Modern Legion”, a treatise by Marshal Ranker
“It is ever the temptation of chroniclers to ascribe great failures to a single turning point, a flaw revealed or enemy virtue displayed. This simplification of history ignores the starker truth of all great enterprises, that in the end though all leaders are captains of a ship they rule neither wind nor tide. Failure and victory are the collection of choices small and great, shaped by perspectives of the myriad making them.”
—
“Heed my warning princes and princesses of Procer: for every empire laid low by Evil, a hundred were wrecked by mere greed and stupidity.”
—Extract from ‘The Ruin of Empire, or, a Call to Reform of the Highest Assembly’, by Princess Eliza of Salamans
Sayings & Proverbs
“Still waters are the hungriest.”
—
“Truth and silence lie better than the silvermost tongue.”
—
“Truth is a lie grown old and beloved.”
—Soninke saying
“Sooner or later, the Tower always gets its due.”
—
“A single strike parts a champion from a corpse.”
—
“Better behind a Tyrant than before them.”
—Praesi proverb
“Victory, most fickle of friends.”
—
“The covenant of the hungry lasts as long as the meal.”
—
“The viper that bites a Matron dies poisoned.”
“What cannot bend is fated to break.”
—Taghreb saying
“There is nowhere angels fear to tread.”
—
“Trust the Heavens but tie your horse.”
—
“No matter how good the horse, it can only bear one saddle.”
—Callowan proverb
“Men makes the sword. Heavens the sheath.”
—Callowan saying
“How many Praesi does it take to change a lantern’s wick? A legion to conquer all the candlemakers, a High Lord to sell the wicks down south and then we’re taxed for being in the dark.”
—Overheard in a Laure tavern
“We do not forget.”
—Official motto of the House of Iarsmai
“May you become the weakest link in the Chain of Hunger.”
—Ancient Lycaonese curse
“From small slights, long prices.”
—Deoraithe proverb
“No matter how hallowed the crown, it fits only one head.”
—Proceran saying
Misc.
"Nauk’s legionaries had splattered the entire width of the road with the blood of their enemies: the only place their formation broke was when the shield wall had to split around the corpse of some enormous tangled abomination of horse and man flesh. Someone had apparently climbed on top and skewered it to death with its own lance. Weeping Heavens, my legion was full of crazies. What was Ratface feeding these people?"
—Catherine in the middle of Battle of Marchford
“Our doctrine is one of cost-efficiency. Any officer who believes extermination of the enemy is a valid path to victory should immediately be demoted back to the ranks.”
—Marshal Ranker
“If you can’t play to your strengths, play to your enemy’s weaknesses.”
—Marshal Grem One-Eye
“In war, begin as you would end.”
—Marshal Nim
“I’ve been informed that the position of the King Under the Mountains is that ‘since only dwarves own property, only dwarves can be stolen from’. I’m afraid that if you insist on getting your family jewels back, my lord, we will have to buy them.”
—Official state missive from Cygnus of Liesse, ambassador to the Kingdom Under
“Always walk into traps. Evil is clever and patient and never as vulnerable as when it thinks it holds all the cards.”
—
“My mother used to tell me it gets worse before it gets better, but I’ve found it’s usually the other way around.”
—
“The truth of monsters is that, in the end, they die. If they didn’t we would have to call them gods.”
—Eudokia the Oft-Abducted, Basilea of Nicae
“Refuge is not a city so much as it is a cluster of vagabonds, held together by awe of the Lady of the Lake. There are no laws here, save for her whims, and those she inflicts only rarely. The Kingdom Under seems to consider Refuge a protectorate, though they have no real presence on the premises, and I should not need to remind you of Lady Ranger’s infamous ties to the Calamities. The Consortium must tread lightly. This is the woman who once hunted the Wild Hunt for sport, and she has not grown meeker with the passing of years.”
—Varrus Ipsimos, agent for the Consortium
“Procerans have always been the villains in our plays, scheming Alamans and grasping Arlesites. Given our history this is understandable, my lord Exarch, but you and I know the truth of of it. The Principate is the final line of defence between Calernia and Evil. Two millennia they have kept the Dead King on his shore of the northern lakes and even longer have they turned back the ratling plague, without aid or succor from the rest of the continent. When Procer fails, the light of civilization dims and the monsters all get a little closer to our homes.”
—
“You can’t drop a pin in Procer without hitting royalty.”
—Eleusia Vokor, Nicaean ambassador to the Principate
“Does not show traditional heroic talent for forging strong friendships but considered a leader by her peers. Responds aggressively to threats. Displays continued recklessness and an aptitude for thinking on her feet. This agent recommends disposal before she can turn into a legitimate threat to the peace of the realm.”
—Report ‘for the eyes of Lord Black only’, concerning the Imperial ward Catherine Foundling
“Even the kindest hero stands over a spreading graveyard.”
—
“The heart of succession is always murder. The new cannot grow where the old remains.”
— Theodore Langman, Wizard of the West
Speeches
“We have fought this war before. Forty years ago, we fought it from the Steppes to the Hungering Sands. Twenty years before that it was fought as well, and again and again all the way back to the days of the Declaration. A thousand battles spanning a thousand years.”
The Black Knight’s power filled the air like a haze, and even where I stood I could feel it whispering to me.
“Legionaries. Look atop those walls and know you face a millennium of blood and arrogance staring down at you. You know that banner. Your fathers and mothers fought under it, against it. Under that standard Callow was bled a hundred times. Under that standard, Praes tore itself apart at the whims of the mad and the vicious. Are you not tired? I am.”
He laughed, a thing of dark and bitter anger.
“I have fought this war since I was a boy. And so have you, in every shop and field and pit there is to be found in this empire. There is no peace with this foe, only struggle from dawn to dusk.”
His voice rose.
“Legionaries. You of Praes and Callow, of Steppes and Eyries, you have fought this war before and won it. Forty years ago, we broke the spine of the High Lords. Yet here they stand before us, fangs bared. Will you let this challenge go unanswered?”
It was the orcs that begun. Feet stamped the ground, swords were hammered against shields. It came and went like a summer storm, deafening in sudden fury and sudden absence.
“I will not tell you our cause is just, for justice does not win war," he said. "I will not tell you victory is deserved or assured, for Creation owes nothing. If the world refuses you your due, then declare war upon all the world.”
His sword cleared the scabbard, the sound of sharpness and steel a call to war.
“On this field, on this day, two truths rule,”
“There is only one sin.”
“DEFEAT,” sixty thousand voices screamed back.
“There is only one grace.”
“VICTORY.”
Shields rose, swords unsheathed, horns sounded and with that last word filling the air the Second Battle of Liesse began.
—The Black Knight, the Second Battle of Liesse
"The Third Army marched across the span of Iserre, pursued by fourfold its number and ambushed by Helike’s finest. Yet when I found Sarcella, your banner flew. They rode you down, they burned you out, they stormed every single wall you raised – and the Third Army did not break."
"I could praise you. But what could I possibly speak that would ring louder than your record? Instead, I will say there are faces here that I recognize."
"From the two thousand that charged Summer, at Five Armies and One. From the first into the breach, at Dormer. From those who took the hellgate at the Doom of Liesse. From the Battle of the Camps, holding against three to one and hero’s wroth."
I laughed.
"Have you ever fought a battle where you were not meant to lose?"
Laughter answered, harsh and grim and heartbreakingly proud.
"In the crucible of the Conquest, names were granted to honour the greatest deeds of Legions. Cognomen, they are called. You have gone through crucible harsher still, and so this honour is long overdue."
My voice rose.
"You are the Third Army of the Kingdom of Callow," I proclaimed. "You have been the vanguard of our every victory, never once flinching nor breaking – and for that, I name you Dauntless."
For a moment there was only silence, and my stomach dropped, but then roar drowned out everything. Thousands of throats screaming out into the night, a chorus of stomping feet and blades striking shields. Dauntless, I thought, letting the sea of noise wash over me.
“We’ll all put friends to the flame tonight,” I said. “And there will be others, on other fields. So weep for the lost, but know that I can promise you this: in the end, they will remember us.”
—Catherine Foundling, during the funeral after the Battle of Sarcella.
“My name,” she said, “is Akua Sahelian. I am a villain.”
“The pale imitation of an ancient enemy,” the fae mocked.
“Oh yes,” Diabolist agreed softly. “That is exactly what I am. The Enemy, they call us in the West. I am the last of a line unbroken since time immemorial. My kind has usurped the mantle of gods, stolen secrets from beyond Creation and turned kingdoms into sea. I am Praesi of the old blood, fae. You should kneel in awe.”
“You are the dying ember of a fire long gone,” the Count sneered. “Soon to be put out by the might of Summer.”
“You think you know might?” Akua laughed. “I will turn your blood to smoke. I will feed the horrors that crush your bones with the sound of your screams. The hearts of your children will raise my fortresses to the sky and make my ships sail on solid ground. You may have been godlings in your wretched home, but you’ve stepped down from that pedestal – and down here, we bleed the likes of you over altars. Your poor, misbegotten creature. You actually believe you have a chance.”
Her Name pulsed beneath her skin even as her eyes turned cold. “But you’re in Creation now, Count. Here be monsters.”
The Count smirked. “Do you seek to frighten me, child? Summer does not know fear.”
Akua slowly unsheathed her knife, resting the wickedly sharp edge on the side of the fae’s throat. He looked into her eyes, undaunted. Diabolist smiled.
“No, not yet,” she murmured. “But I will teach you.”
—The Diabolist
“We are,” she said quietly, “the last of the Praesi.”
They would hear her, her words carried by sorcery worn and ancient. They would hear her and know they might be wicked but they were not wrong.
“The Tower,” Akua said, “is in the hands of a woman who would rule us forever. Before us stand her legions of dupes, led by her most loyal hound. Your heard them speak of dues, and so know they deny the oldest truth of our empire: there are no equals.”
It was like drinking spring water, to speak words she truly meant instead of whatever must be said to gain. Relief, that after years of scuttling in the dark she could raise her true banner.
“There are the rulers and the ruled,” she said. “The greater and the lesser. To deny this is to deny the Gods themselves, for that is how they made us. And now our Empress bows and scrapes to a conquered people, ignoring the reality that saw them conquered.”
She let silence ring loudly.
“Power,” she hissed.
There were others in foreign lands that would call this ugly truth, but she spoke to Praesi: the people of altars and pacts, of naked ruthless ambition. What she offered them now was the song of their ancestors, sung anew with fresh promise.
“Twenty years ago, we were more powerful than the people of Callow,” she continued. “Twenty years ago we were better than them, for beyond all the lies and stories that is the bare truth of Creation: the powerful own the world.”
A laugh escaped her lips, sharply mocking.
“They call themselves a different breed, these hypocrites, but what is arrayed before you? Mere force of arms.”
And her people knew steel, that old friend of ambition. How many of their ancestors had claimed the Tower wielding it?
“In the end, all they are is another movement in the Great Game. The enemy might be powerful, but that should bring you no fear.”
She leaned forward, hard-eyed.
“Iron sharpens iron, and when we emerge victorious we will be so sharp a blade as to make the world tremble.”
Akua smiled, a display that should have been beneath her but at this last pivot of her life was not.
“Glory in this day, sons and daughters of Praes,” she said. “The Age of Wonders is upon you, and though it is great and terrible to behold, let Creation remember this – so are we.”
—The Diabolist, the Second Battle of Liesse.
Memorable Dialogues
“You’re a monster, aren’t you?” I spoke softly into the night, looking at him from the corner of my eye.
He smiled. “The very worst kind,” he replied.
—The Black Knight and Catherine Foundling's first encounter - Book 1, Chapter 1: Knife.
How can you justify working for these tyrants? the Lone Swordsman had asked. I finally had my answer. Justifications only matter to the just.
—Catherine Foundling - Book 1, Chapter 14: Villain
“War games are, ultimately, still games,” he murmured over the rim of his cup. “You’re still trying to win according to the rules, when you should be trying to win despite them.'
—The Black Knight to Catherine Foundling - Book 1, Chapter 22: Just According To
Hakram met my eyes and then slowly, with all the inevitability of a great tree falling, knelt. The breeze ruffled the tall grass in the fields below us, shiver and caress both. His silhouette looked unearthly in the moonlight, more faerie than orc.
“Warlord,” he rasped.
A promise. An oath. I clasped his arm and hoisted him up.
“Adjutant,” I replied, and in that same moment it became the truth.
And so it ended. And so it began.
—The Squire and The Adjutant - Book 2, Chapter 16: Trust
He laughed. “Oh, if the heroes deserved their victories against us, I would make my peace with it. But they don’t, do they? Your sullen little nemesis gets to swing an angel’s feather, while you make do with steel and wiles. That’s always the way of it. At the last moment they’re taught a secret spell by a dead man, or your mortal weakness is revealed to them or they somehow manage to master a power in a day that would take a villain twenty years to own. Gods, I’ve even heard of Choirs stepping in to settle a losing fight. The sheer fucking arrogance of it.”
The second time I’d ever heard him swear, and it surprised me as much as the last. Teeth bared, he leaned forward.
“None of it is earned. It is handed to them, and this offends me.”
—The Black Knight to Catherine Foundling,- Book 2, Chapter 36: Madman
“You were turned,” he said. “Made into their creature.”
The queen made that strange human sound of derision, all nose and doubt. “I’m really more of an advisor,” she said. “We came to an arrangement, that’s all. Trust was extended, and part of that is letting me speak for them when it comes to you fine folk.”
"You no longer hold power," the Herald of the Deeps said.
"I wield it instead," the human said. "That's quite enough, as far as I'm concerned."
—Catherine negotiating with Dwarven Army after sacrificing her apotheosis to Sve Noc - Book 4, Interlude: Triptych
"“You must hate himnote like poison,” I eventually said. “Are you remaining civil as a courtesy to me?”"
“Hate,” Akua repeated, tone pensive. “I can see why you would believe so.”
“Are you claiming you don’t?” I asked.
“I suppose I might kill him, given reason,” the shade said. “Though that would differ from duty only by the tinge of satisfaction that it would bring, like an old mistake finally blotted out.”
“I was there, Akua,” I said. “I know what it did to you, when-”
She turned to me with burning eyes, and my tongue halted.
“My father’s death was the writ of many hands,” she said. “His, it is true, but others as well. The goblins who fired the crossbows. Your own, for serving as distraction while he was taken. But most of all, the fault is mine.”
She looked way.
“I waged war on villains, and did not sufficiently safeguard that which was precious to me,” Akua said. “I am the mother of that murder in every way that matters.”
“There’s sense to that,” I replied. “Logic, even... And not a trace of the grief I saw then,” I finished.
She turned to meet my gaze, and for once there was anger not mastered or leashed in the cast of her face.
“What is it you want from me, Catherine?” the shade asked bitingly. “Tears? Lamentations? Or is it pain that you demand?”
“Yes,” I said. “I want you to be in pain.”
She flinched back at that like I’d slapped her. Before a heartbeat had even passed, she was smiling and amused and her body beginning to angle so it would display her curves more prominently. I admired how well she’d been trained almost half as much as I utterly despised it.
“While I’ve certainly heard you prefer the rougher forms, I-”
“If you’re in pain,” I continued, “if you can feel pain, I means you value things. People. That you begin to understand things other than yourself have value.”
“I have always known that,” Akua said. “Your take on Praesi values, my heart, remains simplistic for all that we have spoken of the subject.”
“Intellectually you assign value to other people,” I corrected. “For their usefulness, potential, the pleasure or amusement they can bring you. But that’s still thinking of them as assets. As objects. But if their loss pains you, Akua, they were more than an object to you.”
“Should I weep, then?” the shade harshly replied. “Should I wail and beat my chest, swear revenge on all those who can be revenged upon? Should I burn half the world to assuage my grief, make Creation pay the long price?”
“Would you like to?” I asked her softly. “Weep. Wail. Bury him with no honours of mine, but what you can offer from daughter to father.”
“And what would you know of that, Catherine?” Akua said, sounding tired.
My eyes flicked back to the body laid out in front of us.
“I know,” I said, “that sometimes you grieve more what could have happened than what did.”
“He shouldn’t have been born in Praes,” Akua said. “He’d be angry with me for saying that, but anywhere else on the continent they would have let him read in peace and deep down that was all he ever wanted. But in the Wasteland, when the Gift flowers so strongly there are expectations.”
“He was powerful, I’m told,” I said. “Like few others.”
“Like many others,” Akua softly denied. “But he was clever and found angles others did not even consider. But he was not of the old blood, so his fate was death or patronage. He could have been husband to my mother, you know. He had the talent for it and if he’d tried to establish a presence at her court he would at least have been made a formal consort. But it wasn’t in his nature, Catherine, to see magic as a tool for power. To him it wasn’t just the Gift, it was a gift.”
“He’s the one who taught you,” I said.
“I suppose he did,” Diabolist murmured. “Though it was never a lesson in the way my tutors would have made it. He was… sharing something he loved with me. Helping me understand it so we could wonder at it together. It made a difference. I could not help but love it as well, when it was something that was ours.”
“I loved him,” Akua suddenly admitted. “But, in the end, not as much as I loved what my mother taught me to reach for.”
She chuckled barrenly.
“So how could I dare weep, dearest one, when I chose that ambition over him?” she said.
—Book 5, Chapter 28: Acts
“You kill him, Peregrine, and I’ll make whatever ten corpses I need to make the Grand Alliance eat itself alive,” Archer said. “You might think Cat will keep me in line, or the war on Keter, or half a hundred different other practical little worries for practical little minds. But look into my soul, Tariq. When I tell you not a single fucking thing will stay my hand, am I lying?”
—Archer being very clear with the Grey Pilgrim about what would happen should he kill Masego - Book 5, Interlude: Reckoning
“You told me if I still believed you wrong come morning light, we’d put this to judgement,” Laurence said, looking at Tariq. “Dawn’s around the corner, old friend, and now I tell you this: I will not brook this deal you would strike. It is an abomination in every way.”
“Only ten years,” Tariq told her. “It is breathing room so that we can arrange for a more agreeable ending, Laurence.”
“It’s condoning the birth of a court hatched by servants of the Hellgods,” the Saint barked. “There’s no going back from that once we unleash it, Tariq. And odds are we won’t live to see that garden of ruin come to bear fruit – by what right do you pass on that woe to those that come after us?”
“You would rather embrace murder than compromise?” the Rogue Sorcerer said.
“Shut your mouth, boy,” Laurence hissed. “You understand nothing. You shy away from taking a life now, from takin a risk, and you think that makes you virtuous? All it makes you is complicit. Your scruples will cost a hundred generations blood and fear simply because you flinched when time for the hard choices came.”
“How hard a choice is it really for you?” the Sorcerer replied, tone ice cold. “When did you last make another, Saint of Swords?”
“Peace, Roland,” the Pilgrim said.
“Would that she’d hear of it, if only the once,” the younger man scathingly replied.
“No, Tariq, let him speak,” the Saint said. “Let him sing the praises of compromising with the Enemy. You'll survive this, Sorcerer, for you may yet bring some light into this world. But burn this moment into your memory, child. Keep it close. There will come day when it burns like a lash on your back.”
“What is made can be unmade, Laurence,” the Pilgrim told her. “Even if this bargain were a mistake, and I do not believe it to be, it remains impermanent.”
“Does it?” she asked. “You’re letting them in, Tariq. You are setting a precedent for us sitting across the table from the monstrous and the mad, pretending they can be reasoned with. And Gods be good, perhaps this once it might even be true.”
“And yet it cannot be allowed to pass,” Laurence said. “Because once the exception is made, the precedent is set, the ink touched the water – it’s done. It’s over. The poison is in and there’s only sickness and death ahead. How many times will this bargain you’d strike lead those who come after us astray? How long will it take, before Twilight becomes a murderous madness that can reach everywhere across Calernia?”
—The Saint of Swords and Grey Pilgrim - Book 5, Swan Song (Redux)
“For small slights,” I hissed, “long prices.”
The Pilgrim’s blue eyes widened in startlement, and he raised his hands in appeasement.
“Your Majesty-” he began.
“Yes,” I coldly said. “That is who I am, Peregrine. The Black Queen. The Arch-heretic of the East. It seems you have forgot how we came to stand here on this night. Shall I help you remember?”
“There is no need for threats,” the Pilgrim evenly said.
And yet I could see it in his eyes, the rising awareness of who it was he was dealing with. Remember, you arrogant old priest, I thought. Remember that you did not take me for Triumphant come again without reason and then curb your fucking priestly tongue.
“You sing the praises of she who strikes at me and declare her worthy of passing judgement upon my works,” I mocked. “You, Tariq Fleetfoot? By what right?”
I grinned, sharp and vicious.
“You are not victor here on this field,” I said. “You are the defeated, breathing only by the grace of the aspect I ripped out of you with my own hand. Your plots I shattered, your armies I routed and your own Choir stepped aside when faced with the glare of my purpose. And now you strut about like a green boy, arrogating the rights to lecture me when it is only my mercy that spared your throat my boot.”
“This is not the talk of an ally,” the Grey Pilgrim warningly said.
“You do not behave like one,” I snarled. “And if you can only conceive of amity as vassalage, then this truce is at an end.”
“You have sacrificed much to deliver it,” the Peregrine reminded me flatly. “And through such savage actions you would end any chance of the Accords being signed.”
I laughed, full-throated and cold.
“You think I’d give you a choice?” I smiled. “You think I chose peace because I fear the other path? I’ll not fight the Grand Alliance, Pilgrim. I’ll leave and let you die like whimpering dogs, alone in the dark.”
I took a step forward, limping, and he drew back.
“I’ll return only when I have the full might of the East behind me in array of war, and when I come back wherever the veil of night falls all will have a choice,” I snarled. “You can take up a sword and join my war against Keter, or you can do it as a walking corpse. If treaties and alliances fail, I’ll take steel and fire to the Dead King as Dread Empress, Victorious.”
“You will find me waiting at the end of that road,” the Grey Pilgrim said.
“At the end?” I grinned. “You’ll be the first damned thing I step on, Peregrine.”
He looked at me searchingly, looking for lie or weakness, and found none. Harsh as my words had been, Gods but the truth of them simmered in my belly. I had chosen peace, but I was not beholden to it. And if the only way through was crowned in dread, then so be it.
“What do you want, Black Queen?” the old man finally asked.
“WANDERING BARD,” I screamed out into the night. “INTERCESSOR.”
I waited a beat, to see if she would appear. She did not. No matter, it would be enough to attract her gaze.
“You spoke for that faceless thing, Peregrine,” I said. “And so now you answer for her as well. If you shelter and safeguard her, then you are responsible for her actions: if she schemes against me or mine, if she moves against truce or Accords, then I will take it as betrayal from both of you.”
“That will not be without consequence.”
—Catherine and the Grey Pilgrim - Book 5, Repute
“And what would that change?”
“That she can be taught to understand that people are… people,” I said. “Not just in the abstract but close-up. That’s what it taught her, our campfires and the Army of Callow. That the sum of people existing in the world weren’t Named and those with golden eyes.”
“That’s supposed to make a difference?” Vivienne scorned.
“Imagine you’ve been breaking statuettes of clay all your life,” I said. “Going through them like a spendthrift to get your way. Imagine, one day, waking up to see they were made of flesh and blood.”
Vivienne’s face blanked. It was probably the cruellest thing I’d ever done to anyone, setting Akua on that path. She had begun with a ledger so filled she might drown in the ink.
“Redemption,” I repeated. “That is the word.”
—Catherine and Vivienne dicussing Cat's attempts to redeem Akua - Book 7, Chapter 23: Sung; Singer
“I don’t have anything to offer you, Catherine,” she said. “I am not a High Lady or the Council of Matrons. The gold I have you have paid me, and my allies are your allies. I couldn’t threaten to leave if refused even if I wanted to – where I would I go? The Army of Callow is my home.”
“It doesn’t always have to be hard coin and favours, Pickler,” I quietly told her. “We can talk.”
“Talk doesn’t move the needle with you,” Pickler said, and before I could reply raised her hand. “It’s not scorn I speak. You are a queen, Catherine. You cannot act like other women.”
“And yet,” I said, “I’d like to hear you out anyway.”
“They’re plagues,” Pickler of the High Ride tribe said. “Both of them. The Matrons just want a hidden kingdom in the mountains with Foramen as a trade city and no imperial leash. The shit they’ll get up to in the Eyries, Catherine, would make a devil shiver.”
“The way I hear it, it’s already no handful of roses,” I said.
“You don’t get let in on the real secrets unless you’re a Matron,” Pickler said, “but I… know things. The Tribes hold back on projects out of fear the Empire will notice and intervene. Wipe them out, even. Even now there’s a lot of Matrons who think munitions should never have been revealed. And the Council is made up of monsters, but my mother’s worse.”
“She likes knives and backs,” I conceded.
“She’s a Matron,” Pickler shrugged, as if that settled it. “But she thinks differently, Catherine. She wants to be the queen of our kind or ensure one of her daughters will be. It’s why she wants Foramen: it’s the lifeline of the Tribes. The ways my people are rich, ore and goods, they’re not worth anything if they can’t be sold to someone. So long as she has Foramen, she has them in the palm of her hand. And to get her way she wouldn’t mind starving half our people to death from behind the walls of her city.”
“I deal with terrible people all the time,” I admitted. “I even backed Helike to prominence in the Free Cities because it’d put down Malicia’s allies.”
“They are tyrants, Catherine,” Pickler said. “Leeches who drink the lifeblood of goblinkind to maintain their power and influence. And I know it is not like me to speak of them, of all they do, but I…”
“I owe it,” she said. “To him. Because he was right, when you spoke to us in Marchford. When I balked at your banner rising against the Tower.”
Pickler met my eyes, the pale yellow unblinking.
“They kill us for sport.”
“Robber spoke true when he said they’ve gotten soft,” Pickler said. “Look at them, darkening your doorsteps with deals they would have once sneered at. They’ve spent so many of us they can’t even get their own dirty work done anymore. They ate each other’s tails until there was nothing left but open maws and anger.”
“I can’t topple them, Pickler,” I said. “Not without a war I can’t afford to fight.”
“You don’t need to,” my Sapper-General said. “They did it to themselves. Do you think my people are happy they’re being used like this? The Matrons, my mother, they only own us so long as there’s nowhere else to go. And that’s something you can change.”
I blinked at her in surprise.
“You allowed the Snake Eater tribe into Callow,” Pickler said. “Let more in. Let us build without Matrons to hollow us out, without Preservers to open our throats the moment we reveal of ourselves. And they will come, I promise you that. Already the Legions and the Army are a home to flee to, but if you open Callow? Entire tribes will leave their tyrant behind.”
“If I grant lands to tribes, I’ll have a rebellion on my hand,” I frankly told her.
“Don’t,” Pickler fervently said. “Don’t let us forge another closed kingdom within the kingdom. Let us into your cities, your countryside, your wilderness. Let us be part of something that does not want to eat us.”
I flinched away from the intensity of her gaze.
“They’ll hate you for it, the Matrons,” she said. “For showing them they don’t own what it means to be a goblin, that just buried every other way and called it guidance. And I know it’s not what you want, not what Vivienne wants, that you have to think in kingdoms and favours and hard coin.”
“But we’ve stood behind you, Catherine,” Pickler said. “Not them, us. From the start, we’ve been with you. Sappers and soldiers and scouts, we’ve bled for you. And I won’t say it’s owed, because my people don’t believe in debt, but I need you to understand that I loved Robber – more than I thought, more than I knew – but there are fifty thousand like him the Eyries that never managed to flee. That are stuck and lost and will never see the light of day, know what the sun and the stars look like or even feel the wind on their face. Not unless you offer your hand to them.”
She left her chair, stood before me.
“I don’t have anything to offer you,” she said. “Nothing to bargain with. All I can say is please-”
I pushed back my chair, half-risen even as my leg ached, but I was not quick enough to stop her getting on her knees.
“- help us,” Pickler said. “Save us from ourselves, from each other.”
“I-” I choked out, at a loss for words.
“I think you might just be the only powerful person in the world who cares, Catherine,” she quietly said. “And I know you’re a queen, that you can’t afford to bend, but still I ask.”
She smiled, heartbreakingly.
“Please,” Pickler asked. “If not you, then who?”
—Catherine and Pickler - Book 7, Chapter 24 Bequeathal
Memorable and Signature Lines
Justifications only matter to the just
Woe on us all, but if the Gods demanded my home be ashes then the Gods would burn.
Whether they be gods or kings or all the armies in Creation
—The Squire
Even victories ordained by the Heavens can be broken by the will of men.
But blame doesn’t matter. Never has, never will. Villains must attend to reality or be swallowed by it.
—The Black Knight
I am the Ranger. I hunt those worth hunting. Rejoice, for you qualify.
—The Ranger
Yoink.
—The Thief, shortly before she stole the Sun from Princess Sulia of High Noon
And whatever may come, I will not flinch.
—The Hierophant, after deciding to pursue apotheosis
And a good horse is a sounder investment than white walls by any reasonable measure. The wall’s stuck in the same place, and you can’t ride it.
—Arthur Foundling, the Squire
I do not judge.
—The White Knight
