“I swear by my life and my love of it that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine.”

“Swear it on your life. (Zephyra)That I can never do. (Stryker)Why can’t you? (Zephyra)Because you are my life, and I can’t live another day without you. (Stryker)”

“I'm just a common man with common thoughts, and I feel I've lived a pretty common life; there will never be any monuments dedicated to me, and undoubtedly my name will be forgotten; but I've loved another with all my heart and soul, and to me, this has always been enough.”

“And my happiness needs no higher aim to vindicate it. My happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end. It is its own goal. It is its own purpose...I am a man. this miracle of me is mine to own and keep, and mine to guard, and mine to use, and mine to kneel before!I do not surrender my treasures, nor do I share them. The fortune of my spirit is not to be blown into coins of brass and flung to the winds as alms for the poor of the spirit. I guard my treasures: my thought, my will, my freedom. And the greatest of these is freedom.I owe nothing to my brothers, nor do I gather debts from them. I ask none to live for me, nor do I live for any others. I covet no man's soul, nor is my soul theirs to covet.I am neither foe nor friend to my brothers, but such as each of them shall deserve of me. And to earn my love, my brothers must do more than to have been born. I do not grand my love without reason, nor to any chance passer-by who may wish to claim it. I honor men with my love. But honor is a thing to be earned.I shall choose my friends among men, but neither slaves nor masters. And I shall choose only such as please me, and them I shall love and respect, but neither command nor obey. And we shall join our hands when we wish, or walk alone when we so desire. For in the temple of his spirit, each man is alone. Let each man keep his temple untouched and undefiled. Then let him join hands with others if he wishes, but only beyond his holy threshold.”

“But when it comes to life or love, I choose life. I’m here right now, ready to live and love another day. I could never regret that. I’m glad you didn’t love me. You gave me my life by doing so.”

“For the rest of my existence, if I lived to see the end of this world, there would never be another Ezekiel Crosse. There would never be another soul as bright as his. And that both terrified me and made me savagely - and maybe selfishly - determined to keep him. Zeke was mine now. Forever.”