The very dull truth is that writing love scenes is the same as writing other scenes - your job is to be fully engaged in the character's experience. What does this mean to them? How are they changed by it, or not? I remember being a little nervous, as I am when writing any high-stakes, intense scene (death, sex, grief, joy).

He is a weapon, a killer. Do not forget it. You can use a spear as a walking stick, but that will not change its nature.

Chiron had said once that nations were the most foolish of mortal inventions. "No man is worth more than another, wherever he is from.

I stopped watching for ridicule, the scorpion's tail hidden in his words. He said what he meant; he was puzzled if you did not. Some people might have mistaken this for simplicity. But is it not a sort of genius to cut always to the heart?

No man is worth more than another, wherever he is from.

and her skin shone luminous and impossibly pale, as if it drank light from the moon.

It was almost like fear, in the way it filled me, rising in my chest. It was almost like tears, in how swiftly it came. But it was neither of those, buoyant where they were heavy, bright were they dull.