Book Of A Thousand Days Quotes
"Isn't it something, all the trouble they're going to for us? I feel like a jewel in a treasure box."
"Thank the Ancestors that my lady's fit stopped me from speaking out of turn."
"When you can't move, there isn't much to do but think, and I don't much want to think right now."
"Goda heard my prayer last night and did let us sleep until morning."
"The mouth grumbles more than the stomach, my mama used to say."
"You have to know someone a thousand days before you can glimpse her soul."
"Mama used to say, 'Hitting is the language of cowards and drunkards.'"
"I feel like a mucker from the ends of my hair to the mud of my bones."
"It's not good being alone like that. Not good."
"The mightiest of the healing songs was a good laugh."
"The body wants to be whole, and when you sing the right sounds, you're reminding it how to heal itself."
"We couldn't start a war over a tower, not when my lady and I were alive and the cellar more full of food than of rats."
"The air is so clear, it shivers. All the stars are out, every one, even the babies. It's so bright with stars, the blacks of the sky look a dark, dark blue."
"Things worn closest to the skin, to the heart, carry the scent of a person, and of course, scent is the breath of the soul."
"Times there are when I wake thinking that it's morning, only to peer out the flap and see darkness thick as stew. Time makes no sense in a dark prison. But My Lord the cat knows the time."
"She made me believe she could choose whomever she wanted, and the poor man would have no choice but to fall in love with her, too."
"Every day, my lady says she will take a turn whacking rats, but really she's down there eating. Rats squeal and skitter around her, and I hear her lips smack, smack, smack."
"My father died before I was old enough to call him Papa. It should've been all right for us because Mama had three sons before me. The oldest was fourteen, of an age to hunt for food and protect us, as sons are supposed to do."
"Times I thought, good riddance to my brothers. They don't know what they missed."
"But when she smiled, I remembered — she is as beautiful as light on water."
"It's my honor to serve. It's my honor, I know it is, and yet... Ancestors, don't read this, but I begin to wonder, is it right?"
"I can hear the rats squeaking madly down there. When I'm half asleep, it sounds as though they're holding a party just to laugh at me."
"Just now, rat meat sounds as tasty as winter antelope."
"I actually like those rats. It makes me smile to think of how brilliant they are at surviving."
"I wish I had a cat curled up in my lap, his sleep purr singing that everything is all right."
"The wall still holds. How odd it is that, just now, that's a blessing."
"My body felt stripped naked, washed hard in cold water, dried, and dressed again."
"I was under the stars, like a fish is under water."
"The world is far too beautiful to waste a moment on such nonsense."
"The sky is a yawning blue, big and delicious, as though it wants me to be happy."
"I felt as though someone cut me loose from heavy chains."
"The smell of fish cooking is rich enough to wake up the trees, but still my lady sleeps."
"I'm a stubborn mare sometimes and must dangle my own carrot."
"Thinking of our talks, of the laughing parts, of My Lord the cat and the pine bough, it was hard not to shout hello."
"Only just now did I realize what I should've done—tell him at once that Lady Saren is here."
"Why didn't he come for us? For her? He said he'd return, but he left us in that tower."
"Tonight we scrubbed more pots than I thought existed in all the realms."
"I must return to work. Tomorrow her khan is holding a feast for visiting gentry from Beloved of Ris, the realm to our northwest."
"I wonder, does he ever think of us? Does he remember?"
"The songs nudge things to be what they really are — a healthy body, a heart as calm as a baby's in the womb."
"I'm writing this from a clean room with its own hearth, a horsehair blanket, and a wood table and chair."
"Privacy's a strange notion to a mucker, where five in a tent is a roomy place."
"He looked as tired as dawn, and he leaned against my door and just stared at me for a time, eyes half closed."
"I think it's lovely to think of your mother holding her first baby, and looking at your fingers and toes, your eyes, your lips, and saying, 'Perfect. He's perfect. My Tegus.'"
"But just saying those words to Khan Tegus was like being swatted in the face with the sadness all over again."
"But I must say it somehow. He's alive! He's here, he's strong and pretty as ever he was, and purring like to shake the house down."
"I'm afraid to put down my brush and ink. I'm afraid I'll be chilled by the quiet that comes after my brush ceases stroking parchment."
"I write because I want these ink strokes to give me courage, as I seem to be lacking it."
"I've got to do something and I don't know if I can."
"I've tried laughing at myself, but it hasn't helped yet."
"I'm relieved because I have enough thoughts and fear quakings to make me happy to be alone."
"The letters were a game. I was young, I felt as though I were playing at being in love."
"It was fun, anticipating a new letter, hiding it from my father and hers."
"I felt responsible, but I was dreading the meeting, too."
"It was strange, as I think back on it now, that I'm the one scheduled to die but I was comforting him."
"Living didn't matter to me if it meant I'd be alone."
"You're better than seven years of food. You're better than windows. You're even better than the sky."
"I feel like a dragonfly clinging to a grass blade in a windstorm, but I can't just let go."
"The light is small and unsteady, but unless it's snuffed out, it'll keep burning for as long as the wick runs."
"It makes me almost believe that everything works out somehow."
"Endings aren't so bad. After the night I endured, any ending sounds like peace."
"To tell you the truth, I didn't want to move ever again."
"I can't. I stare at the candle, how the flame shivers and bends when the wick is too long."
"I'm tired of deception and lies. I want Tegus to know all."
"How can a body be too sad or frightened or lonely when she's filled up her soul with the highest sky blue?"
"I've kept my wages in the far left corner of the sugar closet beneath the pile of empty sacks."
"Every word made me hate myself more, and I decided that they'd be right to hang me."
"Do we honor Lady Vachir's claim of blood against any who threaten her betrothal? Or do we protect Dashti as a member of my own family?"
"I'm not a mucker marrying a khan. I'm Dashti marrying Tegus."
"Can a person actually float away from happiness?"