Extraits

- Let me see if I understand correctly. You didn't like the way a pirate and slave trader spoke to me, so you sent a frigate to track him down and murder him and his crew at my convenience ?

- You seemed to really dislike him.

Oui. Parfois, lorsque l'on fait la connaissance de quelqu'un de si différent, la véritable personne se dissimule derrière ces différences. On peut devenir davantage fasciné par ce qu'une personne représente que par ce qu'elle est véritablement.

Il est facile de parler, se remémora-t-elle. Voir trop de choses dans les mots était une habitude dangereuse, et une habitude qu'elle ne pouvait pas se permettre d'avoir.

Human, vampire, werewolf, didn't matter. If they were male and severely injured, they all thought they could just "walk it off".

When she was a child, one of the first lessons her father had given her concerned the importance of tradition to vampires. An aggressive and predatory species, vampires fought at the slightest provocation and their interactions had to be strictly regimented. All of the rules and ceremony ensured that nobody would be casually offended. A vampire would have to actively ignore customs to cause offense, and when they did so, it was always deliberate.

Arland smiled.

- You assume she would meet you in a duel. She wouldn't. One day you would travel somewhere, step out of the vehicule, suspecting nothing, and there she would be with her blade. If she didn't cut your head off with the first strike, she'd let you win until you got close enough to her, spit poison gas into your face, then run you through and be gone before anyone was the wiser.

- So, she's an assassin, Ilemina said.

- No. She's a woman who was dumped on Karhari with a three-year-old child and a husband who was a snake. She is a survivor. She doesn't fight for fun or glory. She fights to eliminate the threat. Every time she draws her sword, it's life or death. She gives it everything, because her child's life hangs in the balance.