I barely noticed loneliness anymore; it was my normal condition, by necessity if not by nature.

I was drawn to his aloofness, the way cats gravitate toward people who’d rather avoid them.

Haven't you always been more than yourself? Haven't we all? We are none of us just one thing.

The world is seldom so simple that it hinges on us alone.

Sometimes the truth has difficulty breaching the city walls of our beliefs. A lie, dressed in the correct livery, passes through more easily.

I barely noticed loneliness anymore; it was my normal condition, by necessity if not by nature.

Orma moved a pile of books off a stool for me but seated himself directly on another stack. This habit of his never ceased to amuse me. Dragons no longer hoarded gold; Comonot's reforms had outlawed it. For Orma and his generation, knowledge was treasure. As dragons through the ages had done, he gathered it and then he sat on it.