Coming from light into the dark, he was looking ahead of him, not down at me. My lunge, as I came to my feet, took him in the chest as I drove the sword upward with the strength of my legs. Even rusted, the sword slid through him, and I found, for the first time, how easy it is to kill a man.

I can't leave her there all alone, surrounded by stone walls... She's too precious to give up.

She's like a prisoner inside stone walls, and every day the walls get a little thicker, the doorways a little narrower.

[I had a]...Second bowl of oatmeal. It was a little bit gloppy.

Your Majesty, you just-" Costis stopped. "Just what?" the king prompted wickedly. Nothing would induce Costis to say out loud that the king had almost fallen from the palace wall and that Costis had seen him manifestly saved by the God of Thieves. The king smiled. "Cat got your tongue?" "Your Majesty, you are drunk," Costis pleaded. "I am. What's your excuse?

Are you badly hurt?" "Hideously," said the king, without sounding injured at all. "I am disemboweled. My insides may in an instant become my outsides as I stand here before you.

A little danger adds spice to life.