“The truth is that banks are the last feudal kingdoms, their rulers omnipotent, divine warlords. Their key lieutenants are 'ronin' (wandering mercenary samurai) who roam financial markets ready to ally themselves to any warlord for a share of plunder. This is not the place to apply the latest management theory.”

“You couldn't stand to see what terrifies warlords.”

“Maxim 2: A sergeant in motion outranks a lieutenant who doesn't know what's going on.-The Seventy Maxims of Maximally Effective Mercenaries”

“What is he doing here?" Curran growled."He's Roland's Warlord. He's here for me." He was here for the woman who had broken his master's blade."Tough luck. You're mine.”

“that men, thinking to better their condition, are always ready to change masters, and in this expectation will take up arms against any ruler; wherein they deceive themselves, and find afterwards by experience that they are worse off than before.”

“The element of truth behind all this, which people are so ready to disavow, is that men are not gentle creatures who want to be loved, and who at the most can defend themselves if they are attacked; they are, on the contrary, creatures among whose instinctual endowments is to be reckoned a powerful share of aggressiveness.”