I always wanted to be a spear or a cudgel—a flaming steel battle-brand was too high an aspiration for a piece of lowly wood—to slaughter the wicked and laugh as their blood drained away. But here I am, with an innocent man stretched and nailed to me like an oxhide for tanning, and I dare not quiver for He commanded me to hold. He screams, a long terrible cry that rends the heavens in two and shudders through the underworld, but I cannot move—cannot do anything but hold, feeling the blood and water trickle down my side from his limp and cooling body.

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I don't even know how/why I wrote that...