Golden Fool (Tawny Man, #2)

by Robin Hobb

A burden shared not only can lighten it; it can form a bond between those who share it. So that no one is left to bear it alone.”

To recognize you are the source of your own loneliness is not a cure for it. But it is a step toward seeing that it is not inevitable, and that such a choice is not irrevocable.

“But change proves that you are still alive. Change often measures our tolerance for folk different from ourselves. Can we accept their languages, their customs, their garments, and their foods into our own lives? If we can, then we form bonds, bonds that make wars less likely. If we cannot, if we believe that we must do things as we have always done them, then we must either fight to remain as we are, or die.”

The envoy was young, younger than Dutiful and Hap, though he was as tall. Scales rimmed his eyes and framed his mouth. They were not cosmetic. A fringe of shaggy growths depended from his jaw. He drew himself up very straight. I had thought his hood exaggerated his height. Instead I saw now that the bones of his arms and legs were unnaturally long, yet somehow he still managed to convey grace rather than awkwardness. He looked directly at Kettricken, uncowed by her position, and spoke in a boy’s clear tenor. “My name is Selden Vestrit, of the Bingtown Trader Vestrits, fostered by the Khuprus family of the Rain Wild Traders.”

You always chose to be bound by who you are. Now choose to be freed by who you are.

One man armed with the right word may do what an army of swordsmen cannot.

Perhaps having the courage to find a better path is having the courage to risk making new mistakes.