I am a master of foolhardy plans, I thought. I have so much practice I consider them professional risks.

As soon as the guards where gone, I lay down on my stone bench and dumped the king and his threats out of my head without ceremony. They were too unpleasant to worry over anyway.

One cannot toss ambassadors back like bad fish," said Eugenides. "You treat them with care, or you'll find you've committed an act of war.

I grieved, but a part of me felt a lightening of a burden that I had carried all my life: that I could never be worthy of them, that I would always disappoint or fail them. As an unknown slave in the fields of the baron, I knew the worst was over. I had failed them. At least I could not do so again

Would you have your hand back, Eugenides? And lose Attolia? And see Attolia lost to the Mede?' Eugenides's eyes were open. In front of his face the floor was littered with tiny bits of glass that glittered in the candlelight. 'You have your answer, Little Thief.

You learn something new everyday." "What are you learning?" Sophos asked. "To keep my mouth shut, I hope.

Ah," said the magus, understanding at once. "I see that he means to be prepared if he meets him again." "Surely that's unlikely," said Sounis. "I don't think unlikely means to him what it does to the rest of us," said the magus.