The Curse of Chalion

Ignorance is not stupidity, but it might as well be. And I do not like feeling stupid.

Events may be horrible or inescapable. Men have always a choice - if not whether, then how, they may endure.

The gods' most savage curses come upon us as answers to our own prayers. Prayer is a dangerous business.

Any man can be kind when he is comfortable. I'd always thought kindness a trivial virtue, therefore. But when we were hungry, thirsty, sick, frightened, with our deaths shouting at us, in the heart of horror, you were still as unfailingly courteous as a gentleman at ease before his own hearth.

I need words that mean more than they mean, words not just with height and width, but depth and weight and, and other dimensions that I cannot even name.

This wasn't prayer anyway, it was just argument with the gods. Prayer, he suspected as he hoisted himself up and turned for the door, was putting one foot in front of the other. Moving all the same.

Well, what is a blessing but a curse from another point of view?

I'd storm heaven for you, if I knew where it was.

The world demands I make good choices on no information, and then blames my maidenhood for my mistakes, as if my maidenhood were responsible for my ignorance. Ignorance is not stupidity, but it might as well be. And I do not like feeling stupid.

When the souls rise up in glory, yours shall not be shunned nor sunderered, but shall be the prize of the gods' gardens. Even your darkness shall be treasured then, and all your pain made holy.

I don’t duel, boy. I kill as a soldier kills, which is as a butcher kills, as quickly, efficiently, and with as least risk to myself as I can arrange.

Any man can be kind when he is comfortable. I'd always thought kindness a trivial virtue therefore. But when we were hungry, thirsty, sick, frightened, with our deaths shouting at us, in the heart of horror, you were still as unfailingly courteous as a gentleman at his ease before his own hearth.' 'Events may be horrible or inescapable. Men have always a choice - if not whether, then how they may endure.' -Bergon and Cazaril talking over the past

His outflung hands traced over the threads of his rug, passed loop by loop through some patient woman's hands. Or maybe she hadn't been patient. Maybe she'd been tired, or irritated, or distracted, or hungry, or angry. Maybe she had been dying. But her hands had kept moving, all the same.

So you’re saying that I could die at any moment!” “Yes. And this is different from your life yesterday in what way?

Well, it is a particular sin to permit grief for what is gone to poison the praise for what blessings remain to us.

In mysticism, knowledge cannot be separated from a certain way of life which becomes its living manifestation. To acquire mystical knowledge means to undergo a transformation; one could even say that the knowledge is the transformation. Scientific knowledge, on the other hand, can often stay abstract and theoretical. Thus most of today’s physicists do not seem to realize the philosophical, cultural and spiritual implications of their theories.

It wasn't a case of storming heaven. It was a case of letting heaven storm you.

Take heart, sir," Cazaril consoled him. "It is not your destiny today to win a royacy for your son. It is to win an empire for your grandson.

Not all prisons are made of iron bars, some are made of feather beds.

Men have always a choice - if not whether, then how, they may endure.

Your Reverence, I do not hate any man in this world enough to inflict the results of my prayers upon him.

You cannot outguess the gods. Hold to virtue—if you can identify it—and trust that the duty set before you is the duty desired of you. And that the talents given to you are the talents you should place in the gods’ service. Believe that the gods ask for nothing back that they have not first lent to you. Not even your life.

We have what we can hold, dear boy, and never let them see you flinch or falter.

Your divine should not have used water. It just doesn't hold the attention properly. Wine. Or blood, in a pinch. Some liquid that matters.

To a man of certain age... all young ladies start to look delightful. It's the first symptom of senility.

The gods do not grant miracles for our purposes, but for theirs. If you are become their tool, it is for a greater reason, an urgent reason. But you are the tool. You are not the work.

A saint is not a virtuous soul, but an empty one. He—or she—freely gives the gift of their will to their god. And in renouncing action, makes action possible.

I have had another thought on such fates that denies neither gods nor man. Perhaps, instead of controlling every step, the gods have started a hundred or a thousand Cazarils and Umegats down this road, and only those arrive who choose to.

the key was to take the initiative from the first moment, and keep it thereafter. He could be as hollow as a drum, so long as he was as loud.