Tanith Lee

He said quietly, “I see a jackal running. His name is I remember.”

Destiny or gods or fortune—whatever one is pleased or innocent enough to call them—they seal men to their decree.

A tomb contains the dead, who are properly immobile and unspeaking. Though Masrians leave lamps for the ghosts, nobody expects they will be lighted.

“Some god must be laughing somewhere.”

“Some god is always laughing. That is, if you believe in them, which is surely enough to make them laugh.”

Nothing breaks more quickly than corroded steel.

Far too soon a man is in his grave, and how small are the hurricanes and mountains of his life—vengeance, love, might, and conquest—compared to that tiny heap of bone dust at its end.

Such is the civilizing effect of city life upon men. It kills the instincts and replaces them with extended noses.

I had a rare wine in my blood. Expiation was over, guilt washed out, terror canceled.

The grape of truth is often bitter, but not to taste it in its season would be to waste the vine.

I had made vows and to spare, but the present cannot be ruled forever by the past.

There is no swifter way to make an enemy of a woman. You may tell her she is a clod or a bitch; as long as you lust for her, it will be forgiven. But say she is the wonder of the world and show her cold loins, and she will hate you till the sun goes out.

Westward and inland there was a form of government, some prince or other sitting on his backside ordering this or that.