Laughter went on and on, like sunlight and stone, even if the human beings who laughed did not.

He grunted; she recognized it as relief that she wasn't going to nag him further about Tor the Just, who probably wasn't that boring if he could hold off the Notherners for nine days and melt a hole in the hills.

Yes, I am letting my own experience color my answer, which is what experience is for.

The insides of our own minds are the scariest things there are.

...like a grain of sand that gets into an oyster's shell. What if the grain doesn't want to become a pearl? Is it ever asked to climb out quietly and take up its old position as a bit of ocean floor?

But it was equally clear to her that this was her fate, that she had called its name and it had come to her, and she could do nothing now but own it.

The story is always better than your ability to write it.