From Ashes

[Ascendancy]

Nik nodded, but he did not respond to Allan’s comments about guilt. The young man at his side was blissfully unaware of the movements in the world wrought by Nikolai’s hand. The things he orchestrated were written in biographies a plenty, but the acts undertaken in the night, those were the things to take to the grave. None would ever know. None would ever prove. None would ever realize. It wasn’t the hand of a god that reshaped the planet, the masses did that themselves. His was nothing but a nudge toward the inevitable.

“Sometimes it is good to check on progress,” he said by way of explanation about the tunnel. With that, he clapped Allan on the shoulder and said he looked forward to seeing him that night.