Isla

“A voice in my head said, can’t be helped. Why do I listen to those voices? Common sense dictates that any voice you hear inside your head must be just you, thinking; so, if you know it’s just you and you know you’re basically an idiot, what possesses you to do what the stupid voice tells you?”
― K.J. Parker, Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City

“She’s just jealous, people say, as if jealousy is something minor. But it’s not, it’s the worst, it’s the worst feeling there is—incoherent and confused and shameful, and at the same time self-righteous and focused and hard as glass, like the view through a telescope. A feeling of total concentration, but total powerlessness. Which must be why it inspires so much murder: killing is the ultimate control.”
― Margaret Atwood, The Robber Bride

“YOU TRIED TO WARN HIM, he said, removing Binky’s nose-bag.

“Yes, sir. Sorry.”

YOU CANNOT INTERFERE WITH FATE. WHO ARE YOU TO JUDGE WHO SHOULD LIVE AND WHO SHOULD DIE?

Death watched Mort’s expression carefully.

ONLY THE GODS ARE ALLOWED TO DO THAT, he added. TO TINKER WITH THE FATE OF EVEN ONE INDIVIDUAL COULD DESTROY THE WHOLE WORLD. DO YOU UNDERSTAND?

Mort nodded miserably.

“Are you going to send me home?” he said.

Death reached down and swung him up behind the saddle.

BECAUSE YOU SHOWED COMPASSION? NO. I MIGHT HAVE DONE IF YOU HAD SHOWN PLEASURE. BUT YOU MUST LEARN THE COMPASSION PROPER TO YOUR TRADE.

“What’s that?”

A SHARP EDGE.”
― Terry Pratchett, Mort

“Oberyn wanted vengeance for Elia. Now the three of you want vengeance for him. I have four daughters, I remind you. Your sisters. My Elia is fourteen, almost a woman. Obella is twelve, on the brink of maidenhood. They worship you, as Dorea and Loreza worship them. If you should die, must El and Obella seek vengeance for you, then Dorea and Loree for them? Is that how it goes, round and round forever? I ask again, where does it end?" Ellaria Sand laid her hands on the Mountain's head. "I saw your father die. Here is his killer. Can I take a skull to bed with me, to give me comfort in the night? Will it make me laugh, write me songs, care for me when I am old and sick?”
― George R.R. Martin, A Dance with Dragons 1: Dreams and Dust