The Hod King (The Books of Babel, #3)

by Josiah Bancroft

“If I ever get to the point where I can stand idly by while a child falls to his death, I don’t think I can claim to have priorities of any kind anymore.”

there is nothing so dangerous as a coward!”

“You know there was a point, and not so long ago, when I wanted to see the world. At least a few of the nice bits. The mountains. A forest, maybe. But now I just want to be back home and … Well, it doesn’t matter what I want. That’s the thing about life, isn’t it? You don’t get to say when you’ve had enough.”

‘Asking nicely once is polite. Asking nicely twice is just begging.’

A man may rot like an egg: His shell does not show it, but all that is within him has gone foul.

A man who is not suspicious of a philosophy that appeals to his nature is like the bull comforted by the rutted path that leads to the slaughterhouse.

He had at times in the past wondered whether, given the opportunity, he would prove to be a hero or a coward. Naturally, he had flattered his ego by imagining that if he ever was called to action, he would find himself suddenly possessed by such a spirit of valor and poise that his foes would quake before him. At the very least, he had imagined he wouldn’t run away and hide in a closet at the first sign of trouble. The instinct to flee had proved unconquerable. But as he cowered with his back wedged in a corner, a new fear began to grow inside him. It grew so large, in fact, it eclipsed even his mortal terror. Because there was one thing worse than dying, and that was living to see a bleak future.

To be stomped to death by a nanny was an insult to his very humanity!

Edith had always felt that there was a certain point at which the cleanliness and order of a room veered from tidiness into tyranny.

The duke lunged at an end table, flung the drawer open, and drew out a pistol. As he spun around with it, Reddleman picked him up at the hip and shoulder, hoisted him up like a dumbbell, and flung him through a bay window. The sound of shattering glass, cracking wood, and tearing curtains almost drowned out the duke’s undignified yelp. Almost. Dusting his hands, Reddleman turned to see the startled expressions of the two women in the room. “Should I have used the door?”

Memory is not like a box of stationery—easy to browse, reorder, and read. No, memories accumulate like leaves upon the forest floor. They are irregular and fragile. They crumble and break upon inspection. They turn to soil the deeper you go.

While the captain and pilot parlayed with Algezian royalty and Byron watched the proceedings from the bridge, Ann sat upon the foot of Voleta’s bed reading a book of droning verse to an unresponsive audience. Midstanza, Iren interrupted her to ask, “Did you ever want to have children?” “Me?” Ann said, closing the book with her finger still in it. “I had children. I had many. Xenia was the last, and I think she finished off my appetite for any more.” Her cheeks puffed with an exasperated sigh. “Although that Olivet is the dearest little infant I’ve ever seen! I have to confess, that will always be my favorite age.” “But those are just the children you looked after. They weren’t really your own, were they?” “Why? Just because I didn’t have them? Just because they didn’t carry my physical traits or my family name? I’ve never put much stock in all that, really. Those children were as much mine as they were their mothers’, who rarely spoke to them, rarely fed them, and never nursed them when they were ill. I knew their dreams and their fears. I could recognize a change in mood from across the room. I could tell what they were thinking just from a smirk.”