The Winter King (The Warlord Chronicles, #1)
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13%
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‘What is it?’ I asked. I confess I was more tempted by the smell of roasting pork that came from Uther’s hall than by whatever momentary trance had so exhausted Nimue.
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Kingdoms need kings, and without them they are nothing but empty land inviting a conqueror’s spears.
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May God and His angels forgive me, but that day I discovered the joy that lies in battle and for a long time afterwards I craved it like a thirsty man seeking water.
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Taxes, as I was to learn, were the best source of wealth for men who did not want to work,
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and though my good fortune was holding the curse at bay, I could feel its malevolence circling me like a hidden dark enemy.
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fat and suspicious man with the foulest breath of anyone I ever met.
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The young will often rush in where the wise go steadily.
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but then I was young enough to enjoy war.
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God give the truth victory,’
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She spoke with the terrible simplicity of truth and I thought how ferocity gave her a beauty that nature had denied her.
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The bards sing of love and men and women yearn for it, but none knows what love is until, like a spear thrown from the dark, it strikes.
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don’t know, Lord,’ I said. I only knew that my Lord was rehearsing arguments in his head, repeating them over and over until he believed them.
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Guinevere dulled the sun with her presence.
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‘Dafydd ap Gruffud will translate the tale any way I want him to, and I like the idea of a sword in the stone.
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The truth is always astonishing.
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times when we understood each other without speaking and others when words tumbled out for hours.
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I do not enjoy writing about Lancelot for the memory of him lies like a stain on my life.
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‘I was born weak, Derfel,’ she said, ‘and life is spent pretending otherwise.’
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‘Merlin would reckon I can look after myself,’ she said, then smiled. ‘And he knows I have you.’
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‘There was a time,’ she said bitterly, ‘when his gifts came from love, not guilt.’
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but as a man can love a fine wild creature, an eagle or a wildcat,