If I die, I die friendless and abandoned. What choice did that leave him, but to live?

More details, more devils.

Mother, I want to see him fly!

Gods and wonders always appear, to attend the birth of kings.

When you have known the kiss of a flaying knife, a laugh loses all its power to hurt you.

Free folk don't follow names, or little cloth animals sewn on a tunic," the King-Beyond-the-Wall had told him. "They won't dance for coins, they don't care how your style yourself or what that chain of office means or who your grandsire was. They follow strength. They follow the man.

Always keep your foes confused. If they are never certain who you are or what you want, they cannot know what you are like to do next.