“We are the stories we tell about ourselves. But when those stories are lies, we are the most surprised of all.”
“This world has only two kinds of people: villains and smiling villains.”
“This is why there are few prophets. We end up dead a lot. The truth is offensive to men who love darkness.”
“Don’t judge a man by what he says his ideals are, judge him by what he does. Look at what the Color Prince has done. They’re wrong, Teia. They’re liars and murderers. It doesn’t mean everything we do is right. It doesn’t mean our house doesn’t need a thorough cleaning. I just don’t think we need to burn it to the ground to do it.”
“This is how tyrants fall. By destroying their people, they destroy themselves.”
“You got potential, Kip.
And you know what potential means? he replied.
“Ain’t done nothing yet.”
“I am of you," said Kip."I am Guile as much as you are. True, I have a scrap of decency, but only a scrap. How do you think you can treat a Guile with such disregard and get away with it? Because I am you. I'm as cold as you, I'm as smart as you, and when you push me, I'm as evil and cruel as you. I have a thin film of goodness floating on the top of my Guile, grandfather, but I don't know how senile you must be to miss just how thin it is.”
“When you have lived either a very short time or a very long time—if you’ve lived well—you will be able to love easily, too. Broken hearts have fresh places to bond with new faces.”
“Knowing I would die for you, how would you live if you were worthy of that sacrifice? Live that way.”
“Orholam,” Gavin said, “do I have your full attention?” “Always.” “Good.” He cracked his neck right and left. “Because fuck you.” He dove into the water.”
“You’re the best there is. No one can replace you.” Unexpectedly, the White chuckled. “Words every megalomaniac longs to hear. But true only of the truly bad and the monumentally great. I am neither,”
“I die and go to a library? Sure, it could be worse, but I’ve spent a lot of time in libraries this year. Quite enough time, really. Do I have to stay forever? Where do I go pee?”
“He kissed her. And she kissed him. And it was infatuation, and it was hunger, and it was longing to be loved, and it was an all-consuming fire so hot it devoured worry and loneliness and fear and time and being and thought itself. They kissed, embracing, flying, and for a hundred heartbeats, there was no war, no death, no pain, nothing hard, nothing terrible, nothing but warmth and acceptance.”
“She looked at the door, and wondered if they meant it. Could she leave now? “We’ve no cowards among us,” the man said. “Good.” Teia wanted to shout, Wait! I think I might be a coward! Can I think on it a bit longer?”
“The man who is content to live alone is either a beast or a god.”
“Perhaps great men are content with marrying a woman who is not their equal, but we great women … Our equals are rare enough in the first place, and then most of those we do find have married twits.”
“And on a difference of three minutes, all of history changes.”
“When you surrender what isn’t under your control, you’re not giving up a crown, you’re giving up a yoke.”
“Attack dolphins. What the hell was that? Dolphins were supposed to be nice.”
“To hold fealty to your own and to call it a high virtue is ludicrous. Even animals protect their own. It is a good, but it is a common good, an easy one. It’s a miser who says he grows rich not for himself, but for his children. His vice is not thus magically made virtue.”
“Knowledge is a musket. You can use it only as a club, but will you? When your life is on the line?”
“The choice to give up bitterness is not easy, but it is simple: peace or poison. And don't wait until you feel like making it. You never will.”
“It was like a child addressing a tidal wave, saying, I will not be moved—and before the words are out of his mouth, all is ocean, leaving no sign; not only no sign of the child, but no sign of his defiance, no sign that anything opposed the crushing sea in the least, no eddy, no swirl, no detritus, only simple, plain, indisputable nothingness.”
“This is what it is to grow up. It is to live beyond the blind rush of passion, or hate, or green luxin, or battle juice. It is to see what must be done, and to do it, without feeling a great desire or a great hatred or a great love. It is to confront fear, naked. No armor of bombast or machismo. Just duty, and love for one’s fellows. Not love felt, not the love that compelled action without thought, but love chosen deliberately. I am the best person to do this thing, it said, though I may die doing it.”
“..More choices in a limited time didn't mean didn't mean you could do everything-it meant that you could do anything, so you probably did nothing, frozen with indecision.”
“...Many shadows hide behind light, and the best lies are those seasoned liberally with truth: salt covering the flavor of rotten meat.”
“He is terribly bright; he is handsome; he is charming; and you have spoiled him horribly. In other words, he has all the makings of a true monster.”
“Neither day nor night is our master. And do you know what happens when a woman walks without fear?”
Teia shook her head, but there was a sudden longing deep in her that swelled so strong it paralyzed her tongue. Tell me. Tell me.
“She becomes.”
Becomes what? Teia didn’t say the words aloud, but he knew what she was thinking, for he answered:
“She becomes whatever she wills. Minus only one thing.” In the dark, he held up a finger, almost like he was scolding her.
Teia was silent now. The question was obvious, and now she didn’t want to ask it.
Sharp said, “She has one thing she can never be, never again. You know what it is, don’t you?”
The words came unbidden to her lips, from a place so dark no light had ever touched it: “A slave.”
“There’s a hope that empowers, and a hope that enfeebles. Don’t confuse them.”
“You were so scared, Kacie, just like you are about life. I wanted you to see that sometimes, even when something terrifies you, if you just give it a chance it’s actually pretty incredible.”
“My words, my writing, my actions—these have never been for myself alone, either directly or indirectly. There is no such thing as an artist who creates art only for himself. That is masturbation.”
“Just a minute of perfect darkness before he pulls me out of a place I really had no business going.”
“Bread – like real love – took time, cultivation, strong loving hands and patience. It lived, rising and growing to fruition only under the most perfect circumstances.”
“Who did you pass on the road?" the King went on, holding out his hand to the Messenger for some more hay.
"Nobody," said the Messenger.
"Quite right," said the King; "this young lady saw him too. So of course Nobody walks slower than you."
"I do my best," the Messenger said in a sullen tone. "I'm sure nobody walks much faster than I do!"
"He can't do that," said the King, "or else he'd have been here first.”
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