The kingdoms' people were at the mercy of the natures of those who rose to be their rulers. It was a gamble, and the current generation did not make for a winning hand.

In the end, Leck should have stuck to his lies. For it was the truth he almost told that killed him.

...when truths disappear, they leave behind blank spaces, and that is also dangerous.

Through an arrow loop in the wall she saw a familiar horse and rider tearing across the camp toward the healing rooms. Brigan pulled up at Nash's feet and dropped from the saddle. The two brothers threw their arms around each other and embraced hard. Shortly thereafter he stepped into the healing rooms and leaned in the doorway, looking across at her quietly. Brocker's son with the gentle gray eyes. She abandoned all pretense of decorum and ran at him.

His last thought was that it hadn't been stupidity that had allowed his son to enchant him so easily with words. It had been love.

Ivan had contrived somehow in the dark of night to replace every watermelon in the watermelon patch with a gravestone, and every gravestone in the engraver's lot with a watermelon

A consciousness was like a face you saw once and forever recognized.