Megan Whalen Turner

Quotes

1. "Treachery," said the Mede.

   "Diplomacy," said Attolia, "in my own name," as the rest of her guard rose up from the grass behind their captain.

2. 

   "We invoke the Great Goddess in our hour of need for her wisdom and her mercy," Teleus said in the demotic.

   "Ere translates as love, a rather ruthless love, not mercy, Teleus. The Great Goddess of Eddis not known for her mercy."

3. 

   "...Everything about you reveals your low birth. You'd never be comfortable at the court."

   "I'd be famous."

   "Oh, you're already that, Gen," he said pityingly.

4. 

   "If it is an affliction, it is as you said: The gods know me so well they can predict my behavior. They don't control it. They could know I would love her, but they don't make me. I've watched her for years, you know. All those times when you didn't know where I went, mostly it was to Attolia."

5. 

   "He looks--" Attolia hunted for the word. "Defenseless" came to mind, but it wasn't the one she wanted, nor was "young," though he looked even younger when he was asleep.

   "Quite guileless," she said at last.

   "Oh, yes," said Eddis. "I'm always willing to forgive him anything - until he wakes up."

6. 

   "...She's like a prisoner inside stone walls, and every day the walls get a little thicker, the doorways a little narrower."

   "And?" Eddis prompted.

   "Well," said Eugenides, "it's a challenge."

7. 

   "He lies to you?" Attolia asked.

   "Constantly," said Eddis. "He lies to himself. If Eugenides talked in his sleep, he'd lie then, too."

   Attolia looked stunned. "And you can't tell?"

   Eddis thought for a moment. "I sometimes believe his lies are truth, but I have never mistaken his truth for a lie. If he needs me to believe him, he has his own way of showing his veracity."

8. 

   "You can always give me some of Ambiades's food."

   The magus gave me an ugly look. "You'll get your share and nothing else. No one's going hungry so that you can eat."

   "I don't see why not," I said as I lay down on the grass for a nap. It had dried in the sumer sun to crakling stalks that poked me in the arms and neck. "I'm a lot more important than anyone else here," I told the blue sky above me.

9. 

   "I can steal anything."

   "So you claimed. It was a wager to that effect that landed you in prison." He picked a pen nib off the desk behind him and turned it in his hands for a moment. "It is too bad for you that intelligence does not always attend gifts such as yours, and fortunate for me that it is not your intelligence I am interested in, but your skill. If you are as good as you say you are."

   I repeated myself. "I can steal anything."

   "Except yourself out of the king's prison?" the magus asked, lifting one eyebrow this time.

   I shrugged. I could do that, too, but it would take time.

10. 

    Neither the king's reward nor Pol could stop me, but I wanted to be a kingmaker myself. I wanted to be the first one to steal Hamiathes's Gift in hundreds and hundreds of years. I wanted to be famous. Only I couldn't steal the damned thing if I didn't know where if was, and only the magus could find it for me. I would stay with him until he led me to the stone, but I promised myself that someday I would stick a sharp knife into his arrogance and give it a good twist.

11. 

    "He couldn't have found the whereabouts of the stone from the papers in my study," the magus went on. "I was careful to destroy any records. But he could have followed us and stolen the Gift once it was located."

12. 

    The moon disappeared behind a cloud. Eugenides was only a dark form against the darker water behind him. "Before you make a decision," he said, "I want you to know that I love you."