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This musing starts with a quote, from Mockra, the voice of the warrens:
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“As K’rul understood, the blood flows out, and then it returns. Weak, then enlivened. Round and round. Who then, ask yourself, who then is the enemy?”
I can answer that one right now – whoever stops the blood from flowing round and round. Whoever works to break that cycle works to end all existence.
There are many short term reasons to slow the flow, as with the Imass Bonecaster in the Refugium. As per Menandore and Udinaas:
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“That foolish Imass Bonecaster who thought she could seal [SD’s gate] with her own soul.” Menandore sneered. “K’rul’s heart! Did she not know how that weakened him? Weakened everything?”
But she did save her people from the monsters coming through that gate, didn’t she (see MT for details)? Now Udinaas describing the effects of the Imass’s actions on the residents of SD:
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“Like blue flies on the sill of a window,” Udinaas had said. “Wrong side, trying to get out. But the window stayed closed. To them, maybe to everyone, every thing. Or… maybe not every thing.”
Dragons feed on magic/are beings of magic; with the clot in the circulation, the blood didn't flow, and they died. The Imass’s sacrifice saved her people in the short term, but it threatened/weakened all existence. Her life and sacrifice serve as allegory for all the mortals SE describes– people sacrifice for each other so that life can continue.
The cost of those sacrifices is the harm to the grander order of things even as they help shape the minutiae – I think I start to see why SE writes about sacrifices to Gods so often, and why the Gods often seem indifferent to or outright hate the practice. Sacrifices might help in the short term or narrow view, but at their core is a world-destroying practice.
There’s a second facet here too – sacrifices serve to bind things in place. The binding protects the status quo, and so preserves life while that status quo itself destroys the natural order. Draconus:
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'Hear me, please. Before the Houses, there were Holds. Before Holds, there was wandering. Your own words, yes? But you were both right and wrong. Not wandering, but migration. A seasonal round—predictable, cyclical. What seemed aimless, random, was in truth fixed, bound to its own laws. A truth—a power—I failed to recognize.'
'So the shattering of Dragnipur will release the Gate once more—to its migration.'
'To what gave it its own strength to resist Chaos, yes. Dragnipur has bound the Gate of Darkness to flight, for eternity—but should the souls chained to it diminish—'
'The flight slows down—'
'Fatally.'
'So, either Rake begins killing—taking souls—or Dragnipur must be destroyed.'
'The former is necessary—to buy us time—until the latter occurs. The sword must be shattered. The purpose of its very existence was misguided. Besides which, there is another truth I have but stumbled on—far too late for it to make any difference. At least to me.'
'And that is?'
'Just as Chaos possesses the capacity to act in its own defence, to indeed alter its own nature to its own advantage in its eternal war, so too can Order. It is not solely bound to Darkness. It understands, if you will, the value of balance.'
Paran felt an intuitive flash. 'The Houses of the Azath. The Deck of Dragons.'
The hooded head shifted slightly and Paran felt cold, unhuman eyes fixing upon him. 'Aye, Ganoes Paran.'
'The Houses take souls…'
'And bind them in place. Beyond the grasp of Chaos.'
'So the shattering of Dragnipur will release the Gate once more—to its migration.'
'To what gave it its own strength to resist Chaos, yes. Dragnipur has bound the Gate of Darkness to flight, for eternity—but should the souls chained to it diminish—'
'The flight slows down—'
'Fatally.'
'So, either Rake begins killing—taking souls—or Dragnipur must be destroyed.'
'The former is necessary—to buy us time—until the latter occurs. The sword must be shattered. The purpose of its very existence was misguided. Besides which, there is another truth I have but stumbled on—far too late for it to make any difference. At least to me.'
'And that is?'
'Just as Chaos possesses the capacity to act in its own defence, to indeed alter its own nature to its own advantage in its eternal war, so too can Order. It is not solely bound to Darkness. It understands, if you will, the value of balance.'
Paran felt an intuitive flash. 'The Houses of the Azath. The Deck of Dragons.'
The hooded head shifted slightly and Paran felt cold, unhuman eyes fixing upon him. 'Aye, Ganoes Paran.'
'The Houses take souls…'
'And bind them in place. Beyond the grasp of Chaos.'
I think this places the Azath squarely in the “universe destroying” camp, btw. Sure, they preserve the status quo and order, and in so doing protect life, but by binding things down beyond their migrations they are effectively clotting the blood, so they’re also destroying the dynamism of the forces of existence. Dragnipur, the Imass’s sacrifice – bad things, ultimately. I mean, take Kilava’s observation:
Kilava:
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“Onrack, soon these gates will be sealed, each and all drawn into the House, into a squat, clumsy tower. And this realm – with an Azath House here, this realm no longer wanders, no longer fades. It is rooted, and so it will remain.”
Sealing gates = bad news, as we’ve just read. And now the Azath is sealing those gates ☹
One side in the war to come (mentioned in the TtH prologue) are the mortals who want to (or have to?) make sacrifices, seal little bits of that blood to carve out lives. Of course, most mortals are so short-lived and therefore short-sighted that they do not realize they’re destroying/weakening the foundations of existence. Or maybe they don’t care, or necessity drives them on, or other. Then again:
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'Whiskeyjack, we're the Malazans, remember? Nothing we do is ever supposed to reveal a hint of our long-term plans—mortal empires aren't supposed to think that far ahead.
I think this is all leading up to a thesis statement: the two sides in MBotF aren’t Good vs Bad, but Short-Term goals conflicting with Long-Term goals. Extrapolating, the war to come in TtH will shape up with those sides.
