“Yeah, he’d yield. He was a bad cut of steak left on the open grill too long, though—the general’s teeth wouldn’t be enough to do the job.”

“The woman trembled, eyes wide as she stared at the bluff. Her teeth pressed against her lower lip hard enough he wouldn’t have been surprised to see blood. Devyn recognized the building hysteria. His chest tightened; he’d seen like expressions all too often and it opened a raw, bleeding hurt in his chest.”

“Do I wish you would’ve left him a long time ago? Hell yeah. But there’s something to be said for someone brave enough to take on that kind of darkness alone.”

“If you do the job badly enough, sometimes you don't get asked to do it again.”

“Boys play with death as though it were a game, cutting their teeth on daggers.”

“It was like trying to think about what he’d be thinking if he never existed. He wouldn’t be thinking about what he was thinking. He just wouldn’t exist. It wouldn’t hurt.”