Then did his luck indeed lie in his sword? And had these mercies of fortune marked pivotal moments – moments that would come back to haunt those who'd spared him? For his own well-being, he hoped not.

His was no longer the Empire's road. He'd walked that path of blood and treachery for too long. Never again. What lay before him, then, was the singular effort to save the lives of Whiskeyjack and the squad. If he managed that, he would not begrudge his own death as a consequence.

Some things went beyond a single man's life, and maybe justice existed outside the minds of humanity, beyond even the hungry eyes of gods and goddesses, a thing shining and pure and final. Some philosophers he'd read during his schooling in the Malazan capital, Unta, had asserted what seemed to him then an absurd position. Morality was not relative, they claimed, nor even existing solely in the realm of the human condition. No, they proclaimed morality as an imperative of all life, a natural law that was neither the brutal acts of beasts nor the lofty ambitions of humanity, but something other, something unassailable.

Just another hunt for certainty. Paran scowled and stiffened in his saddle, his eyes fixed on the trader track winding before him through low, rounded hills. He recalled discussing this with Adjunct Lorn, at a time when neither had been compelled by the outside world. Just another hunt for certainty, she'd said, in a voice brittle and cynical, putting an end to the discussion as clearly as if she'd driven a knife into the wine-stained table between them.

For such words to have come from a woman no older than him, Paran suspected then, as he did now, that her particular view had been no more than an easy, lazy mimicry of Empress Laseen's. But Laseen had a right to it and Lorn did not. At least, in Paran's mind. If anyone had a right to world-weary cynicism, it was the Empress of the Malazan Empire.

Truly had the Adjunct made herself Laseen's extension. But at what cost? He'd seen the young woman behind the mask just once – as they'd looked out over a road carpeted with dead soldiers then proceeded to pick their way through them. The pale, frightened girl that was Lorn had shown herself in a single frail moment. He couldn't remember what had triggered the return of the mask – likely it had been something he'd said, something he'd tossed off in his own guise as a hardened soldier.

Paran sighed deeply. Too many regrets. Lost chances – and with each one passing the less human we all became, and the deeper into the nightmare of power we all sank.

Was his life irretrievable? He wished he had an answer to that question.