The truth was only another mask, even if it was the best fit, the closest to skin and all that lay beneath

There is not a man born among us who dreams—at first—of service, although in the end, many are bent that way.

I don't make the laws, I just enforce them." "Then remind me to introduce a new set of laws, since the ones we have clearly assume a level of common sense that's lacking.

i'm never going to understand the Barrani." "You needn't sound so morose, Lord Kaylin. They are unlikely to understand you either." "Yes, but I'm unlikely to try to kill them for fun.

The look he gave her made her turn away for a moment. Sometimes you couldn’t look too closely at another person’s pain.

It was true: hope could be unkind. You opened yourself up to the worst of wounds because you wanted to believe that something good could finally happen. But if you didn't? You missed this. This intense and prefect moment in which, while the world was almost literally going to hells all around you, hope and reality blended in a single, perfect note.

Manners,[...] are severly underappreciated in my opinion". "Oh?" Where practiced well, they remove the probability that someone in my position will be forced to go through the effort of killing someone in yours. Belive that on occasion that much death can become tedious.