“I'm not going to use the knife," saidDamen, "but if you're willing to put it inmy hand, you underestimate how much Iwant to.""No," said Laurent, "I know exactly whatit is to want to kill a man, and to wait.”

“I thought killing was easy for you," said Laurent. His voice was rather quiet. "I thought you did it without thinking." "I'm a soldier," said Damen, "and I have been for a long time. I've killed on the sawdust. I've killed in battle. Is that what you mean by easy?""You know it isn't," said Laurent, in that same quiet voice.”

“No," said Laurent, almost as if he wasrealising it for the first time. "I don'tthink you would. But I know you don'tlike it. I remember how much itmaddened you in the palace, to be boundand powerless. I felt yesterday howbadly you wanted to hit someone."Damen found he'd moved withoutrealising it, his fingers lifting to touchthe bruised edge of Laurent's jaw.He said, "The man who did this to you.”

“I don't have sleeves to carry handkerchiefs in,' said Damen. 'I wouldn't mind being given a knife.' 'Or a fork?' said Laurent.”

“To get what you want, you have to know exactly how much you are willing to give up.Never had he wanted something this badly, and held it in his hands knowing that tomorrow it would be gone, traded for the high cliffs of Ios, and the uncertain future across the border, the chance to stand before his brother, to ask him for all the answers that no longer seemed important. A kingdom, or this.”

“Stop enjoying yourself," Damen murmured. "We're going to be killed, any minute." "Giant animal," said Laurent. "Stop it.”

“To Laurent, in the same voice, he said, 'Calm down.'Laurent said, 'I wasn't finished.''Finished what?' Reducing every man in the room? Jord isn't any kind of match for you in this mood, and you know it. Calm down.'Laurent gave him the kind of look a swordsman gives as he decides whether or not to slice his unarmed enemy in half.”