“That’s a well-thought out layout,” Caldenia said. “But why pink marble?” She waved at the ceiling. “Pink marble, white ceiling, golden accents… With the electric lighting it will turn into this ghastly orange.”
“I had one chance to impress the Arbiter and I had to improvise.”
Caldenia arched one eyebrow.
“I saw it in a movie once,” I explained. “It was easy to visualize.”
“Was it a movie for adults?”
“It had a talking candelabra who was friends with a grumpy clock.”
“I see.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“What are you planning?” I asked, as we turned toward the grand ballroom.
“Just a small demonstration for the public good,” he said. “I am so sorry.”
“You’re apologizing in advance.”
“Yes.”
Never a good sign.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Like a primitive savage, who sets out to tame the wilderness armed with nothing but a knife and his indomitable will, I will persevere. I will wrestle victory from the greedy jaws of defeat. I shall rise like a bird of prey upon the current of the wind, my talons raised for the kill, and I shall strike true.”
Oh wow. I hope the inn filmed that.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Football is a wargame of land acquisition.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“This is blasphemy!” Odalon declared in the same way Gerard Butler had once roared “This is Sparta.” Sadly, Odalon had nobody to kick into a bottomless hole for emphasis, so he settled for looking extremely put out.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Caldenia blinked. “Who are the attending parties?”
“The Holy Anocracy represented by House Krahr, the Hope-crushing Horde, and the Merchants of Baha-char. They coming here for Arbitration and they will probably try to murder each other the moment they walk through the door.”
Caldenia’s eyes widened. “Do you really think so? This is absolutely marvelous!”
She would think so, wouldn’t she?”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Attosecond?” Gaston asked.
“I’m guessing it’s a very, very small fraction of a second,” I said.
“One quintillionth of a second,” George said, without raising his head from his reader.
Jack pondered him. “Have you started memorizing random crap again to amuse yourself?”
“No, I’m connected to the wireless,” George said. “I googled it.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“My future chef was an oversized, hysterical hedgehog with a martyr complex.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“What may I do to get back into your good graces?”
“You’ve done nothing to offend me.”
“Then why did you acknowledge Robart before me?”
What?
“You addressed him before you addressed me.”
I cleared my throat. “Just to be clear, you’re upset because I spoke to Robart before I spoke to you? In the ballroom just before we went to check on the car?”
“I understand that the circumstances of the summit prevent frank exchanges,” Arland said. “An appearance of propriety must be maintained and any hint of favoritism is to be avoided at all costs. But when one travels so far, one looks for the small things. A chance glance. A brief kindness, freely offered and gone unnoticed by all except its intended recipient. Some hint, some indication that he has not been forgotten. One might take an acknowledgment of a bitter rival before him, in public, as an indication of certain things.”
It dawned on me. His feelings were actually hurt.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“She is in particular interested in the Ennui predator. She very much likes its demeanor and coloring in the images. She understand she may not get that particular one, but perhaps one that resembles it? A young one?”
The Ennui predator. “Where did she find these images?”
“On your planet’s holonet,” Nuan Ara said helpfully.
We didn’t have holonet. We had internet… Oh. “So, the esteemed grandmother would like a kitten that looks like Grumpy Cat?” I picked up my laptop, typed in the image search for Grumpy Cat, and showed him the picture.
“Yes!”
“I will see what I can do.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“What can I do for you, Arbitrator?” I asked.
“George, please. There is no hot water in my bathroom.”
“Oh really?” You don’t say.
“Yes. In fact, it’s ice-cold.” He raised a half-filled glass. Thin slivers of ice floated on its surface. “I drew this from the tap in my sink.”
“How unfortunate. When did this happen?”
“About two minutes ago.”
“While you were in the shower?”
“Yes.”
“My apologies. I’ll get right on that.”
George squinted at me, his face thoughtful, and waved the call off.
Sophie leaned back and laughed. “You really love those trees.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Some things were constant in the universe. Two and two didn’t always equal four, but every water-based species at some point had heated water and thrown some plants into it.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“We make our own choices in life. Our actions shape our lives and we alone are responsible for them.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Dina, I’m bored,” Caldenia announced.
Too bad. I guaranteed her safety, not entertainment. “What about your game?”
Her Grace gave me a shrug. “I’ve beaten it five times on the Deity setting. I’ve reduced Paris to ashes because Napoleon annoyed me. I’ve eradicated Gandhi. I’ve crushed George Washington. Empress Wu had potential, so I eliminated her before we even cleared Bronze Age. The Egyptians are my pawns. I dominate the planet. Oddly, I find myself mildly fascinated by Genghis Khan. A shrewd and savage warrior, possessing a certain magnetism. I left him with a single city, and I periodically make ridiculous demands that I know he can’t meet so I can watch him squirm.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Robart blinked, momentarily thrown off track, but recovered. “I will have my knight returned to me.”
Knight? What knight? Oh shoot. I had completely forgotten about the vampire who’d almost chopped the police car in a half. I’d left him in the basement holding cell for almost four hours. I concentrated. The knight was alive and well. He was sitting on the floor meditating. I gave the floor a little push and felt it slide up, carrying the knight with it.
“You will find your knight in your quarters.”
Robart nodded. His gaze narrowed. “Perhaps if you were less heavy-handed in your treatment of the guests you claim to honor and protect, your inn would have a higher rating.”
He did not. Oh yes, yes he did. “Perhaps if you trained the knights under your command to follow simple orders, your House would’ve reached greater prominence within your empire.”
Robart locked his jaw.
If my smile were any sweeter, you could pour it on pancakes and call it syrup.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Quillonians were a reclusive race, proud, prone to drama, and violent when cornered. A couple of them had stayed at my parents’ inn, and as long as everything went their way, they were perfectly cordial, but the moment any small problem appeared, they would start putting exclamation marks at the end of all their sentences. My mother didn’t like dealing with them. She was very practical. If you brought a problem to her, she’d take it apart and figure out how best to resolve it. From what I remembered, Quillonians didn’t always want their problems resolved. They wanted a chance to shake their clawed fists at the sky, invoke their gods, and act as if the world was ending.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Greedy can be bought, timid can be frightened, smart can be persuaded, but the zealots are immune to money, fear, or reason”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“It was the kind of sky that called space pirates to their ships.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Are you also a professional soldier?
He grinned. “I’m more of a gentleman of adventure.”
George laughed under his breath.
“I save these two from themselves,” Gaston continued. “Occasionally I do a bit of skullduggery.”
What? “Skullduggery?”
“Scale a ten-foot wall, jump out of the shadows, break a diplomat’s neck, plant false documents on his body, and prevent an international incident type of thing to keep the war from breaking out,” Gaston said helpfully. “Dreadful stuff, but quite necessary.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“No, I never expect people to be idiots,” George said. “I do expect them to lack some of the necessary information, because experience has demonstrated to me that assuming someone in a key position knows everything you do leads to disaster.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“(I) went to see the noble knights of Holy Anocracy.
By the time they assembled, the inn finished assimilating the new gaming consoles. I waved my hand and three huge flat screen opened in the stone walls of the vampire quarters. Wall spat out sets of controllers.
“Greetings,” I said. “House Krah, House Sabla and House Vorga, may I present Call of Duty.”
The three screens ignited simultaneously, playing the opening of the Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare. Soldiers in high tech armor shot at target, flew across the screen from bomb impacts, and walked dramatically in slow motion. Vehicles roared, Marines roared louder, and Kevin Spacey informed us that politicians didn’t know how to solve problems but he did.
The vampires stared at the screens.
“This is a game of cooperative action,” I said, “Where a small elite force can triumph against overwhelming odds.”
At the word elite, they perked up like wild dogs who heard a rabbit cry.
“The game will teach you how to play it. May the best House triumph over their opponents.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“The universe was full of wonders. Some of them would drive you insane if you thought about them too long.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“The Khanum?” Arland coughed. The last sip of tea must’ve gone wrong.
“Are you unwell?” Dagorkun inquired.
“Healthy as a krahr,” Arland said.
“That’s such a relief. I would hate for some illness to interfere and spoil the grand celebration I planned when I send you to your afterlife.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“You are not meant to be at peace. We, the human beings, are meant to live life to its fullest. We are meant to experience it all—sadness, disappointment, rage, kindness, joy, love. We are meant to test ourselves. It is painful and frightening, but this is what it means to be alive.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“What is this?” he whispered.
“Mangoes.” My father always said mangoes with a Quillonian were a sure bet. I hadn’t realized how much of a sure bet.
Orro licked the fruit again, looked at it, and suddenly bit into it, shredding the yellow pulp.
He’d wolfed down half a mango before he realized I was still there and froze, pieces of mango on his whiskers. “Don’t see me.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“He’s come to learn that life is a bitter bitch. She is inherently unfair.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“I would have to stop at a local shelter and possibly PetSmart. They had silent, stealthy, vicious predators available for adoption.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“There comes a point where you have to stop trying to repair yourself and accept the fact that you’re broken.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“Are you going to let me go?” Jack asked quietly.
“I’m thinking about it.”
“So Gaston gets let go but I don’t?”
“I like him more than I like you.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
“We make our own choices in life. Our actions shape our lives, and we alone are responsible for them.”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Sweep in Peace
Ilona Andrews
Born place: in Russian Federation
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― Kresley Cole, quote from Dark Needs at Night's Edge
“Blood hell, what happened to you?" - Dante
The dark wisard and I had a mild disagreement." -Viper
What sort of disagreement?" -Dante
I thought he should be dead and he disagreed." -Viper”
― Alexandra Ivy, quote from When Darkness Comes
“ ‘I promise you calm seas,’ ” Sir Godfrey called, and raised his hands in benediction, “ ‘auspicious gales, and sail so expeditious that shall catch your royal fleet far off.’ ”
― Connie Willis, quote from All Clear
“Sometimes you just have to do things, Quentin,” Julia said, as he climbed on board after her. “You spend too much of your time waiting.”
― Lev Grossman, quote from The Magician King
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The love spell...
A man with a sense of loyalty.
A man with a sense of family.
A man who is a good lover.
A man who can be my friend.
A man who can challenge me.
A man I can confess my secrets to.
A man I can trust.
A man with confidence.
A man with an open heart.
A man who will fight for me.
A man who can love me exactly as I am.”
― Jennifer Probst, quote from The Marriage Trap
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