my fake laugh is even better than my real one, and nine-tenths of being popular is the ability to jolly the menials along.

The world is changing, moving beneath our feet. We are in a war, children of the Red March, though you may not see it yet, may not feel it. We are in a war against everything you can imagine and armed only with our desire to oppose it

I will have tasks for you all soon: quests for some, questions for others, new lessons for others still. Be sure to commit yourselves to these labours as to nothing before. In this you will serve me, you will serve yourselves, and most importantly—you will serve the empire

Go. Scurry back to your empty luxuries and enjoy them while you can. Or—if my blood runs hot in you—consider these words and act on them. These are the end days. All our lives draw in towards a single point and time, not too many miles or years from this room. A point in history when the emperor will either save us or damn us. All we can do is buy him the time he needs—and the price must be paid in blood.

“Walk with me.” I set a hand to his shoulder and steered him towards the Battle Gate. It’s good to steer a man in the direction he intended to go. It blurs the line between what he wants and what you want.

If there’s one good thing to be said about opera, it’s that it makes a man appreciate all other forms of entertainment so much more.

There’s something almost orgasmic about getting out from under a heap of trouble, winning free and thumbing your nose at it

Revenge is a business of calculation, best served cold. Rescue holds more of sacrifice, suicidal danger, and all manner of other madness that should have me running in the opposite direction

had never had much time for calling on gods. He might raise a flagon to Odin on feast day, or swear by Hel when they stitched his wounds, but in general he saw them as an ideal, a code to live by, not an ear to moan and complain into

Even his arms grew heavy, muscles almost unable to bear the weight of the bones they wrapped. A

Mountains are pretty at a distance, but my advice is to never let them get to be more than scenery. If you have to crane your neck to look at something, you’re too close

Then out spake brave Horatius,
the Captain of the Gate:
“To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late.”

And how can man die better
than by facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,
And the temples of his gods.”

I try to be a fair man, to live with honour, but come against me armed and looking to take my life, and you will not walk away again.

Men who’ve made choices always feel they own their destiny. Few ever think to ask who shaped and offered up those choices. Who dangles the carrot they think they’ve chosen to follow.”

I guess it’s hard for even the wisest not to show off that they are wise.

Scared of being a coward, is that what bravery is? Am I brave because I don’t fear being afraid? You’re of the light; the light reveals. Shine a bright enough light on any kind of bravery and isn’t it just a more complex form of cowardice?”

Humanity can be divided into madmen and cowards. My personal tragedy is in being born into a world where sanity is held to be a character flaw

Each hour became a process of taking a dull future and squeezing it into a dull past through the narrow slot of the moment—a moment, like each other, crowded with pain and exhaustion, and with a cold that crept around you like a lover carrying murder in her heart.