Chapter the Eleventh: In Which the Plot, Behaving in Much the Manner Of a Soup to which Corn Starch Has been Added, Begins, at Last, to Thicken.
Saving someone’s life is a wonderful feeling. Try it. You feel like, if you don’t mind a TV reference, a big damn hero.
The door opened, and Ren emerged, and my heart did a thing.
She grinned and nodded and another frozen thing inside of me melted.
If you’re trying to scare me,” I said, “it’s working.” “I can do a great deal more than scare you.” Where do they get this stuff? “Um, if I thought all you could do was scare me, you couldn’t scare me, if you see what I mean.” “We’ll see how funny you are in a little while.” I was mildly curious about that myself.
It isn’t always easy to act on what’s in your head instead of what’s in your heart. And it isn’t always right to. The whole trick to knowing what to do is deciding when to make yourself listen to your head, and when it’s okay to just follow your feelings.
Chaler, who had finished his ale, left the cup where it was, making no effort to procure more, indicating that he was capable of what the natural philosopher calls “learning behaviour,” which turn of phrase pleases us so much that we cannot resist making use of it.
I’m a decent cook. I’m an outstanding eater.
Short version: it doesn’t matter how many bad decisions you just made, your job is to make the next one correct.
As I passed a market, I thought I saw Devera, Aliera’s daughter, looking at me. I almost stopped, but when I looked again she was gone, so I decided I was either imagining it, or she didn’t want to talk to me. She is a very unusual child, but I guess now isn’t the best time for that conversation. I put it out of my head and kept walking until I reached the Imperial Palace.
Any point in a process looks like the process was leading up to it if that’s as far as you’ve gotten.
I once had someone explain to me that we don’t have real interactions with people, we have interactions with the image of those people we carry in our heads. I don’t know. Maybe. But I figure if I stick a Great Weapon into a guy’s eye, it’s close enough to a real interaction for most purposes.
When you have understood the piece of the world you want to change, and aligned your will with the world as it actually is, then and only then can you begin to change it;.
A cheery receptionist met Donovan as he entered and said something with an upside-down question mark at the beginning.
There’s nothing to tell.” I gave her a brief discussion of fertilizer. She seemed unimpressed with my agricultural expertise. “Believe what you like,” she said. It was good to have permission, but I resisted telling her so.
Ever heard someone tell you that hard physical labor can be soothing? Can take your mind off your problems? Can leave you feeling better? I’d heard that. In my opinion, hard physical labor gives you blisters, and the only real distraction I got was trying to remember the spells I’d once known for curing them. He was much better than me, by the way; turns out there is even skill involved in digging holes. Who knew?
And all of the late, late-night talks, when you’re not stoned, but you’re so tired you might as well be, when you just sit there glowing with warmth, and all of those things that you really hope for come out, and you connect with each other on such deep levels that, when you think about it the next day, you wonder if it was real – if the others felt it too.
Some things you just can’t fight, and sneezing is like falling in love. There’s little you can do about it, and it makes you look ridiculous and sometimes makes your eyes water.
Are we going after it, Boss?” “After it? Are you nuts? What if we caught it?” “I love it when you break out in common sense.
You’re not desperate until you’ve opened all the doors. T-A-L-T-O-S.
I’d fought personal demons and impersonal gods and wandered through buildings that couldn’t exist to do impossible things.