“What of honour? What of courage? What of all the things that bind the legions together?’ He gave a shrug and a nod together, and a faint grin that was all the old Juvens; wild, erratic, carefree. His tilted palm said, ‘What of them? Life is too precious.”

“He is wounded, but he is still the Leopard, still dangerous. His eyes look through you, until they don’t. That’s when he’ll kill you.”

“My lady, it is the lady empress Sextilia Augusta, mother to—’ ‘She knows to whom I am mother. The entire world knows to whom I am mother. The entire world shares my shame.’ The empress’s voice was sharp”

“The dying go so swiftly at the end. Always the speed of their leaving catches me unawares; so much left to say, to promise, to pray for.”

“Quotes ain’t all that useful. Fact is, there’s more concise ways to express what you’re feelin’, like screams and moans.”

“I don’t want the finer things in life, like preserves of jam and thick soft quilts, until I get what I need: the machinery to make that stuff for me.”

“If you ask me what remains to be known in the future, I’ll say, ‘Memorize all the world’s encyclopedias.’ Once you do that, forget all that fancy junk and rake the leaves – else I’m gonna take a stick to you, boy.”