The Emperor's Blades Quotes

“Resist faith. Resist trust. Believe only in what you touch with your hands. The rest is error and air.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Assume nothing,’” he said. The first chapter of the Tactics. “If we figure everyone might be a murderer, we’re less likely to be disappointed.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Any fool can see what's there. You need to see what is not there.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“You squint hard enough, and everything starts to look suspicious.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“There’s no blade as keen as surprise.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Men tend to die when you slide steel beneath their skin and wiggle it around. Even priests.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“The man still fighting last week’s battle will always lose to the man already fighting tomorrow’s,”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“we use the time we have. There is no other.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Leadership isn't just about giving orders. A fool can give orders. A leader listens. He changes his mind. He acknowledges mistakes.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Easier to recall a loosed falcon than a spoken word.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Henderson Jakes, the founder of the Eyrie, had envisioned a cadre of elite soldiers dedicated to celibacy, the empire, and the art of war. He had to settle for two out of three. Young men and women willing to leap off massive birds into burning buildings at a mere nod from a commanding officer grew violently rebellious when required to abstain from sex.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“I’m doubly sorry for your loss,” the old monk began after a time. “First, because every son should have a chance to know his father, not as a child knows his protector, but as a man knows another man.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“The fighters who frighten you are not the fighters to fear. The man you barely notice will be the one to bury a blade in your back.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Believe what you see with your eyes; trust what you hear with your ears; know what you feel with your flesh. The rest is dream and delusion.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“The mind was a clay pot set out in the rain. A monk could empty it daily and still the old hopes and worries, the body’s meager strengths and perennial pains pattered against the bottom, trickled down the sides, filling it once more.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Obedience is a knife that cuts the cord of bondage.
Silence is a hammer that shatters the walls of speech.
Stillness is strength; pain a soft bed.
Put down your basin; emptiness is the only vessel.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“When you know nothing about a creature," the monk ground out, his voice as hard as a rock slide, "expect it has come to kill you.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“The present is the present. Tomorrow will still be ‘now.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“If you hope to play a part in this empire, Sanlitun had told her time and time again, you must learn to divorce your feelings from your face. The world sees what you allow it to see, judges you according to what you reveal.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“What I observe is that the world is ruled by men—good men and bad, desperate men and those with principles.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Triste lay in a heap, her dress hitched up around her thighs, whimpering and shuddering until Gwenna shifted to kick her ungently in the head.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“The process is the goal,” Kaden responded innocently, trying not to feel smug. It was about time one of those Shin maxims worked in his favor.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Those who wait for certitude before they act almost always wait too long.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“a packed mind resisted new impressions; it tended to force itself onto the surrounding world, rather than filling itself with that world.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“The idea ... seemed about as likely as a shark strolling out of the sea on its fins to ask for a bowl of soup.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“The ablest swordsman, Hendran wrote, the consummate tactician, the peerless general: All seem invulnerable until luck turns against them. Make no mistake—place a man in death’s way enough times, and his luck will turn.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Fear is blindness, he muttered, repeating the old Shin aphorism. Calmness, sight.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“Is that so bad? Might make whoever's trying to kill you think twice."
"I don't wan't them to think twice," Valyn said, rolling his eyes. "I want them to think once and, if at all possible, drunkenly.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“every son should have a chance to know his father, not as a child knows his protector, but as a man knows another man.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades

“I’d leave you here longer, but it’s no longer safe.”
― Brian Staveley, The Emperor's Blades