Jacqueline Carey

“But slight mistakes accumulate, and grow to gross errors if unchecked.”

“And for a price, I will pretend absolutely nothing.”

“Stand at the crossroads if you will, but if you'll not choose, I'll move on without you”

“If you thought better of me, you would not be so surprised”

“The pain of the flesh is naught to that of the heart”

“Well, I was living it, but a shared dream half-lived is a hollow thing”

“I can see patterns in events, and behaviors; in mathematics, I follow slower”

“Why is there ever this perverse cruelty in humankind, that makes us hurt most those we love best?”

“A nervous silence loosens tongues”

“Your dreaming self seeks to tell you something your waking ears will not hear”

“It is not everyday that one learns an entire militia has sworn unbeknownest to obey you”

“I wish sometimes that the gods would either choose better, or make their wishes clearer”

“Battle for the sake of honor may be a fine thing for bards to sing of, but it is no way to preserve one's homeland”

“Spontaneity is the province of youth”

“My lord. It is too much, and not enough”

“After you, it's all cheap tequila.”

“Hear, hear.' Sister Martha hoisted her water glass. 'Let the rigid stick of self-righteousness be dislodged from her very uptight ass.'Father Ramon coughed.'A-fucking-men,' Loup supplied helpfully.”

“Wars come and go; politics endure.”

“This is the secret that none dares tell who fights for a cause. Dying, we are all alike.”

“If you will not die for us, you cannot ask us to die for you.”

“It is my observations, though, that happiness limits the amount of suffering one is willing to inflict upon others”

“It is a fine line, in all of us, between civilization and savagery. To any who think they would never cross it, I can only say, if you have never known what it is to be utterly betrayed and abandoned, you cannot know how close it is.”

“It's funny how despair can soon become an old companion”

“Oh love and hate are two sides of the same blade”

“Yes my lord, but questions are dangerous, for they have answers”

“To have a traitor for an ally is to have an enemy in waiting”

“Surely if we knew what bitterness fate held in store, we would shrink back in fear and let the cup of life pass us by untasted.”

“It's funny, how one can look back on a sorrow one thought one might well die of at the time, and know that one had not yet reckoned the tenth part of true grief.”

“Only insofar as you enjoy being sorry, my dear, which, while it is a considerable amount, occurs only after the fact, thus making it a singularly ineffective deterrent, yes?”

“Garner knowledge, by any means possible”

“There is no fulfillment that is not made sweeter for the prolonging of desire”

“Nothing spoils idle pleasure like too much awareness”

“For this too I learned, that a storyteller's tale may end, but history goes on always. These events, so distant in legend, play a part in shaping the very events we witness about us, each and every day.”

“That which yields is not always weak.”

“Like a falling star, he descended on the Tarbh Cró, a Cassiline berserker, his sword biting and slashing like a silver snake.”

“I had begun to think my ripening body would wither untasted on the vine.”

“We speak of stories ending, when in truth it is we who end. The stories go on and on.”

“What's the point of being a grown-up if you can't indulge the kid inside you every now and then?”

“Happiness is the highest form of wisdom.”

“I would that I could have stopped time and preserved that day forever. It was a perfect day. There was the shadow of sorrow, yes. It would always be there. But that was the nature of life. The bright mirror and the dark, reflecting one another. And today there was so much brightness.”

“Even a stunted tree reaches for sunlight.”

“It is not wise to meddle with D'Angelines in matters of love.”

“Love as thou wilt”

“If I had to fall from Cassiel's grace, at least I know it took a courtesan worthy of Kings to do it.”

“All paths are present, always... and we can but choose among them.”