Every time he glances at me I feel it just as surely as if he has reached out and run his finger along my soul. It is all I can do not to smile at the sheer wonder of it.

And just as love has two sides, so too does Death. While Ismae will serve as His mercy, I will not, for that is not how He fashioned me. Every death I have witnessed, every horror I have endured, has forged me to be who I am -- Death's justice.

This is what I want to be. An instrument of mercy, not vengeance.

You would throw away all that we have given you for a man’s love?” “Not a man’s love,” I say softly. “But Duval’s. And I would find a way to serve both my god and my heart. Surely He does not give us hearts so we may spend our lives ignoring them.

We are all of us, gods and mortals, made up of many pieces, some of them broken, some of them scarred, but none of them the total sum of who we are.

If he is smart, he will run. He is not.

If you are not careful, soon you will have men locking themselves in dungeons so that you can rescue them.