The Daughters' War (Blacktongue, #0)

by Christopher Buehlman

It is tiring to deal with someone who has made an enemy of you when you do not think of them at all. But, of course, this is often why they hate you.

To love someone well is to know their small noises, and to hear home in them.

Many battles are lost before they are fought because soldiers are starving, or they have not slept, or they are so mad for water they cannot be kept in formation near a stream.

This has been a hard skill to learn, the forgiving of self, and it is not always easy to know when it is good and when it is indulgent. But there is not so much time in life that we should spend it being sorry.

Moderation, too, is good in moderation.

I have never been one to make speeches that stir the blood. I am a bringer of fact and truth, even when these are ugly. But by facing ugly truths, we limit their power to harm us.

No one is so furious as a small man caught in a misdeed.

Cruel kings always fear revolt,

do not need to be loved as deeply as I love, and I do not need to speak of it.