Doubleblind

I'll always want him. Until every sun goes dark in every sky, until I am nothing more than long-forgotten cosmic dust, I will want him. And even then I suspect my particles will long for his.

There are quiet ways to die where the body just doesn’t notice that the heart is gone.

People stay together and stay true only as long as they both want to. And all the promises in the world don’t change the length of time. Nothing comes with a guarantee.

Possessiveness isn’t love. I’m not even sure it qualifies as an emotion.

My heart should be breaking, too, but there comes a point when you’re so inured to loss that you no longer feel the lash.

I’m as forgiving as the wall you hit at two hundred kilometers an hour.

He's earned a lifetime of peace and happiness, but some people never get what they deserve. That's why there are saints in gutters and sadists in palaces.

Don't worry he tells me tenderly. It doesn't matter who you've been, who you are, or who you become. I'm with you every step of the way.

I think people can be trusted to know what makes them unhappy. Maybe we don't always know what we want exactly, but we can usually say what we don't with a fair amount of specificity.

This is the way we win over our enemies, not with bigger weapons, or faster ships, but with human courage, ingenuity, and sacrifice. Don’t lose hope. We’ve faced the darkness before—it has nothing new to teach us. As we go about our lives, let us remember the example Dr. Navarro set for us. At the right time, anyone can be a hero.

Mother Mary," he breathes. "How you shine." I shake my head. "The light is yours. Right now you can't see it because you sit in shadow, but all I do is reflect you.

The ship shudders as we make the leap, passing into grimspace. Pleasure spikes through me, as if I'm taking a hit of my favorite chem. It sings through my veins, echoing the mad whorl of colors outside the view screen. If I had to describe it, I'd say it's like entering the heart of a dying star.

These are not my people.” The neutrality of the vocalizer makes his words more poignant for their lack of vehemence. “This is my race, but these are not my people.” I don’t know what to say to that, but he goes on, so I don’t need to deal with my inadequacy. “I left here because I did not fit. I traveled, but never did I . . .” He pauses, as the translator seeks a word—or perhaps he is thinking. “Belong. In more turns than you can imagine, the closest I have ever come to a home is with you, Sirantha.

Realistically, it's a risk, I suppose, but in this day and age, you almost have to choose between freedom, which can devolve into chaos, and security, which can become a pair of shackles.

The dark breaks wide in fragile rays. Dawn on Ithiss-Tor is more subtle than other sunrises. I have lost count of the worlds where I have stood and watched the light rise, peeling away the sky, sometimes in quiet colors, and sometimes in raw, violent slashes, as if the goddess I don't believe in has cut her veins. And sometimes, as on Gehenna, the sky changes not at all, just endless night, or endless brilliance--and after a time, the constant uniformity makes you feel as if you are the thing that must give way.

You can love somebody without loving what they do. I wish that hadn’t been necessary, and I wish you weren’t so fucked up over it, but seeing what happened on Lachion didn’t change anything for me. Not really.

She has eyes that shine like a night-hunting cat, and she’s so lethal she can kill somebody with just her pinky. I’m not kidding about that.

I’ll always want him. Until every sun goes dark in every sky, until I am nothing more than long-forgotten cosmic dust, I will want him. And even then I suspect my particles will long for his.

I don't want them to focus on my outlaw tendencies. If they knew what a long, messy history I have of doing the opposite of what I'm told, things could get ugly.

These are the results of public security cams at work, recording routinely those who come and go. Apparently, it functions as a wondrous preventative because nothing deters crime so much here as the fear of getting caught. Incompetence is the bogey that haunts all Bug dreams.

Headlong is my natural state, not prudent patience.

That's when I realize - he's afraid of me every bit as much as he is of Vel. We're like the wicked witch and her demon familiar or something.

March is such a maddening bundle of contradictions, brutal strength wrapped around a vulnerable core. The way he used to need me scared me to death - and now I'm afraid he'll never need me again. I'm just never satisfied, am I?

I'd call for an escort, but I think it's ill-advised to reveal that my lover may have a psychotic episode if he's not medicated.