I was not so comfortable with my new authority that I could say 'We eat the chicken now!' but the magus had seen that I was considering it.

As a ten-year-old boy, the Thief of Eddis could stop a grown man in his tracks with a single look. Where had that look gone?

I didn't think about being king,” he said, his voice hoarse. Eddis stared. “Your capacity to land yourself in a mess because you didn't think first, Eugenides, will never cease to amaze me. What do you mean you didn't think about being king? Is Attolia going to marry you and move into my library?

I sometimes believe his lies are the truth, but I have never mistaken his truth for a lie.

So Sophos thinks you're going to marry me." "While I think you'll marry Sophos." "I might. We'll see what he's like when he grows up.

He should have said something, why hadn't he? Costis wondered. In fact, the king had. He had complained at every step all the way across the palace, and they'd ignored it. If he'd been stoic and denied the pain, the entire palace would have been in a panic already, Eddisian soldiers on the move. He'd meant to deceive them, and he'd succeeded. It made Costis wonder for the first time just how much the stoic man really wants to hide when he unsuccessfully pretends not to be in pain.

I am very good at groveling.