When Brocker arrived he took her hands and held them to his face and cried into them.

Sneaking was a kind of deceit. So was disguise. Just past midnight, wearing dark trousers and Fox's hood, the queen snuck out of her own rooms and stepped into a world of stories and lies.

I've liked you better when Katsa's around," Giddon said. "She's so rotten to me that you seem positively pleasant in contrast.

I hear you're supposed to be good at manipulating people. Try a little harder to make me like you, all right? I'm the queen. Your life will be nicer if I like you.

Living is too hard right now. Dying is easy. Let me die.

She would thump them both, and she would apologize to neither.

She crossed the room to him, put her arms around him, clung to him, turning her face to the side, learning all at once that it was awkward to show a person all of one's love when one's nose was broken.