The Devils

Happy endings are just stories that aren't finished yet.

You need to stop clinging to the notion that there is only one right path. You’ll waste half your time panicking you’re not on it, and the rest backtracking to find it.

Lying was a sin, apparently, unless you did it outrageously and persistently enough, in which case it qualified as scripture.

Show me a man who regrets nothing and I’ll show you a man who’s achieved nothing.

But he’s from England.’ Jakob of Thorn ushered him over the threshold. ‘They’re all devils there.

The Church is not that keen on God, in my experience,” said Baron Rikard. “They think of him much as a lawyer thinks of the law. Something to be got around.” “You’re a vampire,” snapped Brother Diaz. “Of course you hate the Church.” “On the contrary, I am a great admirer of the tenets of your religion. I merely find it a shame that the Saved are, as a rule, so little like their Saviour.

Courage is catching. If one mans shows it, it spreads. Fear is the same.

He had never had much patience for religion. What was it, really, but superstition with money?

Everyone’s scared all the time. That’s the thing you’ve got to tell yourself. They might be scared of different things from you. Things that don’t scare you a bit. Like heights, or failure, or wanting to piss then not being able to go. But everyone’s scared of something. And even if they’re not, it helps to think they are. The brave ones are just good at pretending, and pretending’s just lying by another name,

This is how it goes. Start the evening looking for fun, end the morning begging forgiveness.

Never fuck with a librarian

Men born to peace and privilege often crave the approval of the violent.

but all anyone wants to talk about is the one time you fucked a werewolf.

But a kiss is the start of something. A doorway to something else. The fun is all the promise of what’s on the other side. A kiss, when you know it’s leading nowhere … what’s it worth? It’s just a reminder of what you don’t have. The first sentence of a story that’ll never be told.

We all see the world through the lens of our own obsessions,” murmured Jakob.

You spend years illuminating manuscripts,” said Baptiste, working off one boot, “and singing hymns, and tending the monastery gardens, but all anyone wants to talk about is the one time you fucked a werewolf.

The Saviour had said one could not buy one’s way into heaven, but most agreed that was just a negotiating tactic on her part.

Jakob had never been much for giving praise. In his youth, because he wanted all the praise for himself, like a dragon hoarding gold. In his old age, because he feared his liking a thing might lead to its destruction. But sometimes the right word can nudge a life towards the light, and a life changed is the world changed. By tiny degrees, perhaps. But for the better.

When I was young,” said Jakob, “I thought I was working towards something. Building to last. Some perfect state of things. Of the world. Of myself.” He gently shifted one leg under her, then the other. “You get to my age, you realise nothing lasts for ever. No love, no hate, no war, no peace. If a thing hasn’t ended … you haven’t waited long enough.

On the contrary, I am a great admirer of the tenets of your religion. I merely find it a shame that the Saved are, as a rule, so little like their Saviour.

No one wants to see doubts. You make your choice and live with it. Or die with it.

The Saviour had definitely tended against killing, and she heard priests talk about murder like it was really the worst, but when she finally read the scriptures herself, she found God couldn’t go a page without smiting the shit out of someone.

When someone tells you they’re a liar you’d better believe them.

You should be like water. Take the shape of wherever you are and make the best of what floats past.

The paces don’t have to be quick, or long, or pretty. They just have to keep going.

A wound to the body pales beside a wound to the soul.

He flopped sideways, mute testament to the greatest fighting technique of all: a friend behind your enemy.

One of those things you’ve heard of, sounded vaguely interesting, but you’d never, ever want to actually visit. Like England.

Regrets are a wonderful thing after a fight, Olaf always used to say, ’cause they mean you lived through it.

A sad indictment of the world we live in that we run out of jokes before we run out of enemies.