I can bear pain myself, he said softly, but I couldna bear yours. That would take more strength than I have.

Boldness in battle is nothing out of the way... but to face down fear in cold blood is rare in any man.

I stood still, vision blurring, and in that moment, I heard my heart break. It was a small, clean sound, like the snapping of a flower's stem.

What a mystery blood was -- how did a tiny gesture, a tome of voice, endure through generations like the harder verities of flesh? He had seen it again and again, watching his nieces and nephews grow, and accepted without thought the ehoes of parent and grandparent that appeared for brief moments. the shadow of a face looking back through the years -- that vanished again into the face that was now.

And if your life is a suitable exchange for my honor, why is my honor not a suitable exchange for your life?

Highlanders make the truest friends-if only because they make the worst enemies.

Character, I think, is the single most important thing in fiction. You might read a book once for its interesting plot—but not twice.