I was needed, but I myself did not need. I had followers, but not allies, and only now do I understand the difference. And it is vast.

Soldiers are issued armour for their flesh and bones, but they must fashion their own for their souls. Piece by piece.

It is one thing to lead by example with half a dozen soldiers at your back. It is wholly another with ten thousand.

What matter the colour of the collar around a man's neck, if the chains linked to them were identical?

Destiny is a lie. Destiny is justification for atrocity. It is the means by which murderers armour themselves against reprimand. It is a word intended to stand in place of ethics, denying all moral context.

For we are all bound in stories, and as the years pile up they turn to stone, layer upon layer, building our lives.

Betrayal was the greatest of all crimes, for it took all that was human within a person and made it a thing of pain. In the face of that, murder itself was surcease: it was quick, and it ended the anguish and despair of a life without hope.