“In life, it's best not to take anything for free - unless it's from someone who wishes you well.”

“I tried to hold on to this compassion, sensing its preciousness, but even as I reached to grasp it, it dissipated into wisps. No revelation can endure unless it is bolstered by a calm pure mind- and I'm afraid I didn't possess that.”

“Can't you ever be serious?' I said, mortified.'It's difficult,' he said. 'There's so little in life that's worth it.”

“She who sows vengeance must reap its bloody fruit.”

“Everyone breathes in air, but it's a wise person who knows when to use that air to speak and when to exhale in silence.”

“The heart itself is beyond control. That is its power, and its weakness.”

“Above us our palace waits, the only one I've ever needed. Its walls are space, its floor is sky, its center everywhere. We rise; the shapes cluster around us in welcome, dissolving and forming again like fireflies in a summer evening.”