"A simple house, in a simple wood, distant from humanity," Oliver said. "With Nila to hunt with… Damn you, Gods, if I had been allowed that, I would have not been here to bring about your war. You prodded me towards this – and you invite the chaos that is to come from it."
He knew his words were weak ones, and he scorned himself even more with everyone that fell out of his mouth, but he could not help the bitterness. Fear made twisted the best of men, and Oliver Patrick had never been so afraid, not since losing his family, for he had never in his life had so much to lose, and never had he faced so overwhelming an obstacle.
"…I shouldn't be afraid," he tried to tell himself, but that didn't work. It hadn't worked when he was Beam. It hadn't worked when the first slave shackles had been strapped onto his wrist. It wasn't the absence of fear that had made him who he was.
