The Guns of Avalon

Nobody steals books but your friends.

In the mirrors of the many judgments, my hands are the color of blood. I sometimes fancy myself an evil which exists to oppose other evils; and on that great Day of which the prophets speak but in which they do not truly believe, on the day the world is utterly cleansed of evil, then I too will go down into darkness, swallowing curses. Until then, I will not wash my hands nor let them hang useless.

Strygalldwir is my name. Conjure with it and I will eat your heart and liver." "Conjure with it? I can't even pronounce it, and my cirrhosis would give you indigestion.

Of course it does not apply to me. I am the soul of honor, kindness, mercy and goodness. Trust me in all things.

Thus did I bear Sir Lancelot de Lac to the Keep of Ganleon, whom I trusted like a brother. That is to say, not at all.

We fought.' 'A duel?' 'Nothing that formal. A simultaneous decision to murder one another is more like it.

Tonight I will suck the marrow from your bones!” it said. “I will dry them and work them most cunningly into instruments of music! Whenever I play upon them, your spirit will writhe in bodiless agony!” “You burn prettily,” I said.

While I had often said that I wanted to die in bed, what I really meant was that in my old age I wanted to be stepped on by an elephant while making love.

Time, too, is a function of Shadow, and even Dworkin did not know all of its ins and outs. Or perhaps he did. Maybe that is what drove him mad.

The most difficult thing about Time, I have learned, is doing it.

I was not always that way, but perhaps the shadow Earth, where I spent so many years, mellowed me a bit, and maybe my hitch in the dungeons of Amber reminded me somewhat of the quality of human suffering. I do not know. I only know that I could not pass by the hurt I saw on the form of someone much like someone who had once been a friend.

Amber casts an infinity of shadows, and my Avalon had cast many of its own, because of my presence there. I might be known on many earths that I had never trod, for shadows of myself had walked them, mimicking imperfectly my deeds and my thoughts.

Pijesak, kamenje, vjetar, još narančastije nebo, gomila plosnatih oblaka prema kojima je padalo sunce... Potom duge sjene, umiranje vjetra, mir... Samo zvuk kopita na kamenju i zvuci našeg disanja... Prigušeno svjetlo kad se sunce sudarilo s oblacima... Zidovi dana potresani grmljavinom... Neprirodno jasni obrisi udaljenih predmeta... Hladan, električno plavi osjećaj u zraku... Opet grmljavina... Sad - uzbiban, staklasti zastor kiše koja mi se približava zdesna... Plave pukotine u oblacima... Temperatura pada, naš korak i dalje stalan, svijet sad posve jednobojan...

Hell, we make our own ifs. I had better things to think about than what could have happend

Beyond the River of the Blessed, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Avalon. Our swords were shattered in our hands and we hung our shields on the oak tree. The silver towers were fallen, into a sea of blood. How many miles to Avalon? None, I say, and all. The silver towers are fallen.

Hell, we make our own ifs. I had better things to think about than what could have happened

The thing had been quite unpremeditated on my part. I had not even thought of her as a woman until she came into my arms and revised my thinking on the subject.

child of Amber may walk among them, and such was my heritage. You may call them parallel worlds if you wish, alternate universes if you would, the products of a deranged mind if you care to. I call them shadows, as do all who possess the power to walk among them. We select a possibility and we walk until we reach it. So, in a sense, we create it.

Thus did I bear Sir Lancelot du Lac to the Keep of Ganelon, whom I trusted like a brother. That is to say, not at all.

Their voices lack the thrust and dip of men chewing over their words and tasting them. They