Mother Mary of Anabolic Grace, we got Teras incoming?” He levels angry blue eyes on me. “You’re a hex, lady, dark luck, powerful bad juju, ken?” “Only to people who try to kidnap me,” I tell him sweetly, and March snorts, so I feel obliged to add, “Or rescue me…” And then Dina makes a pfft sound. “Or who travel with me…” My gaze sweeps around the darkened interior, trying to find an ally, but nobody will hold my eyes more than two seconds, it seems. “Fine, frag you all, I’m dark juju, bad luck, and you’re all doomed.

People try to make sense of things, and if they don’t know the answers, they make them up,because for some, a wrong answer is better than none.

But wishes were empty thoughts, cast down a dark hole. They didn't come true unless you worked for them. I'd learned that about the world, if nothing more.

Have you ever watched a child learning to walk? Before this week, I never had, but there's a certain grace to it. Well, if not grace, then tenacity. Fall down nine times--get up ten. And the tenth time you get where you're going, you don't stop, not for obstacles, not for other people telling you to stop. You don't listen to anything but that inner voice until you arrive where you want to be.

It's only a sure defeat when you stop trying.

My skill didn't lie in planning battles, only in fighting them.

This is not a love story. It is my life, and as such, there is love, loss, war, death, and sacrifice. It's about things that needed to be done and choices made. I regret nothing.