Before They Are Hanged

He squeezed the big hand and the hand squeezed back.

‘Not any?’ No reply. ‘Alright then, I know a song or two, if I can remember the words,’ he cleared his throat.

‘Very well!’ cut in Bayaz. ‘If it will save us from a song, I know hundreds of stories. What did you have it in mind to hear about? A romance? A comedy? A tale of bravery against the odds?’

Ferro squatted at the very edge of the shifting light from the campfire, hunched over, shadowy face almost stuck right into her bowl, staring around suspiciously and shoving food in with her fingers like she was worried it might be snatched away any moment.

. ‘Far too slow. We stick to the track. We’ll see anyone coming in good time out here. Plenty of time.’

Luthar didn’t look convinced. ‘If we see them, they’ll see us. What then?’

‘Then?’ Bayaz raised an eyebrow. ‘Then we have the famous Captain Luthar to protect us.’

‘I imagine it makes you sick, to be treated that way. Very sick, and very angry.’ If only you knew. ‘It still seems a strange decision, though, for the tortured to turn torturer.’

‘On the contrary, nothing could be more natural. In my experience, people do as they are done to. You were sold by your father and bought by your husband, and yet you choose to buy and sell.’

So. What did Juvens say? The best lessons one teaches oneself.'

The years pass, the unimaginable becomes everyday, the hideous becomes tedious, the unbearable becomes routine. I push it all into the dark corners of my mind, and it's incredible the room back there. Amazing what one can live with.'

Doing better next time. That's what life is

‘We should forgive our enemies, but not before they are hanged.’
Heinrich Heine

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