“There's really nothing quite like someone's wanting you dead to make you want to go on living.”
“Love is a negative form of hatred.”
“I've always been impulsive. My thinking is usually pretty good, but I always seem to do it after I do my talking — by which time I've generally destroyed all basis for further conversation.”
“The death of an illusion tends to disconcert.”
“P.S. I still dunno if it's art. Go to Hell yourself. ”
“Your woman is gone and your heart is heavy. Words will not lighten the weight, and what is written is written. But let it also be put down that I grieve with you. ~Hasan~”
“He spent the last second of his life screaming, as the force of Bortan's leap pulped him against the ground, before his head was snatched from his shoulders.
My hellhound had arrived.”
“Nothing is cheaper than past glories.”
“Far below, the ocean was a bluegray rug being pulled out from beneath us.”
“I’ve always been impulsive. My thinking is usually pretty good, but I always seem to do it after I do my talking—by which time I’ve generally destroyed all basis for further conversation.”
“I’m all right now,” I said, “but leave me alone. I’m going down to the river to bathe.” I took seven steps, and then someone must have pulled out the plug, because I gurgled, everything swirled, and the world ran away down the drain.”
“I’ve always been impulsive. My thinking is usually pretty good, but I always seem to do it after I do my talking—by”
“we avoided their swarms by putting one foot in front of another without pause and making noises of our own. We didn’t step on anybody who squashed.”
“Dress Blacks mag-bind down the sides, leaving a smooth front whereon is displayed a green-blue-gray-white Earth insignia, about three inches in diameter, high up on the left breast; below, the symbol for one’s department is worn, followed by the rank-sigil; on the right side goes every blessed bit of chicken manure that can be dreamt up to fake dignity—this, by the highly imaginative Office of Awards, Furbishments, Insig-niae, Symbols and Heraldry (OAFISH, for short—its first Director appreciated his position).”
“As for the rest of him, his function is rather like that of an anti-computer: you feed him all kinds of carefully garnered facts, figures, and statistics and he translates them into garbage.”
“So feathers or lead?” I asked him. “Pardon?” “It is the riddle of the kallikanzaros. Pick one.” “Feathers?” “You’re wrong.” “If I had said lead’ . . .?” “Uh-uh. You only have one chance. The correct answer is whatever the kallikanzaros wants it to be. You lose.” “That sounds a bit arbitrary.” “Kallikanzaroi are that way. It’s Greek, rather than Oriental subtlety. Less inscrutable, too. Because your life often depends on the answer, and the kallikanzaros generally wants you to lose.”
“And then the night wind, cool through arches of the years, came hounding after me.”
“he's the yin to my yang" -Emma Wise”
“Nothing endures for so long as fear. Everywhere in nature one sees evidence of innate releasing mechanisms literally millions of years old, which have lain dormant through thousands of generations but retained their power undiminished. The field rat’s inherited image of the hawk’s silhouette is the classic example - even a paper silhouette drawn across a cage sends it rushing frantically for cover. And how else can you explain the universal but completely groundless loathing of the spider, only one species of which has ever been known to sting? Or hatred of snakes and reptiles? Simply because we all carry within us a submerged memory of the time when the giant spiders were lethal, and when the reptiles were the planet’s dominant life form.”
“Most of us concentrate on what we can get in life, but we need to concentrate on what we can give.”
“glass?” she asked, sitting down on the edge of one of the chairs beside the small round table. “Thank you.” Ander sat”
“I leveled a scowl at him. “Is there
anything in our agreement that says I can’t
call you names?”
He crouched and added a few touches
to the diagram. A very faint smile curved
his mouth. “No.”
My own mouth twitched. “So,
hypothetically, if I were to call you an
asshole, there’d be no reprisals?” I asked
with an innocent look. “Hypothetically, of
course.”
Idris glanced up sharply, then hissed
and drew back his hand as the sigil he was
working on stung him.
“Nothing of that sort is covered by the
agreement,” was Mzatal’s mild reply.
I chuckled under my breath. “I think
I’ll just call you Boss.”
He glanced over at me with a raised
eyebrow. I smiled sweetly in response.
Mzatal straightened, turned fully to me,
hands behind back and head lowered
slightly, and still with the faint hint of a
smile. “There could be consequences.”
I shrugged, still smiling. “What fun
would it be if there weren’t?”
Mzatal lifted his head. “None
whatsoever,” he said, his face betraying a
hint of amusement as he moved to the
center of the diagram.”
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