The Kiss Of Deception Quotes
"Today was the day a thousand dreams would die and a single dream would be born."
"For the Kingdoms rose out of the ashes of men and are built on the bones of the lost."
"The honor and privilege of a First Daughter in a royal bloodline is a gift in itself."
"There are some things you can never pay back."
"The wonder! The sounds! The smells! Even the clap of our donkeys’ hooves on the red-tiled streets sounded like music."
"It was a place I knew with one glance could be my home too, a place where the weight of who I was supposed to be didn’t exist."
"I urged Otto on, as if such a thing could be done with an animal that only knew one speed."
"From this day forward, there is no more Your Highness. That part of my life is gone forever."
"It felt like a baptism. A deeper kind of cleansing."
"What if I never saw my brothers again? What if I was a failure at this life too?"
"I was controlling my destiny now—not a piece of paper that matched me with a royal wrinkle."
"My dreams were of the dull and boring variety if I remembered them at all and certainly were never of arms holding me."
"Some things were easier seen from a distance than when they were right under your nose."
"The truth was I found them both to be attractive in their own ways. I wasn’t a corpse."
"We all have our different skills. You’re patient to a fault, which sometimes doesn’t work to your advantage. I, on the other hand, have the patience of a wet cat."
"Tradition. It was one tradition I looked forward to."
"Sometimes there were skirmishes, but rarely did they even encounter a trespasser."
"Could anyone really travel so far that they might not find their way home again?"
"My dear sweet sister, your brothers all love you as much as we ever did."
"I know the arranged marriage planted seeds of doubt for you, but someone will come along, someone worthy of you. And you’ll know it the minute you meet him."
"He boasts about his conquests and the broken hearts he’s left behind as if they’re medals pinned on his chest. I’m certain."
"She’s free of him now and here with you. He’s nothing but trouble. Make sure she stays away from him."
"I’m afraid I received some disheartening news today from my brother."
"I couldn’t be happier. And once Pauline is feeling better, I’ll be delirious."
"Every time he comes into a bit of coin, he disappears."
"Grief has a way of its own, Lia. A way I can't control."
"Today, I felt something. A flutter inside. Here."
"Through all the pain, I saw the hope of joy in her eyes."
"A reverent hum ruffled through the crowd, holiness incarnate, as if the gods stood among us."
"The same procession, sometimes immense, sometimes attended only by a handful of the faithful, was taking place in towns, hamlets, and villages all over Morrighan."
"The Ancients thought themselves only a step lower than the gods, proud in their power over heaven and earth."
"The gods saw their conceit and the emptiness of their hearts, so they sent the angel Aster to pluck a star from the sky and plunge it to earth."
"It was a journey neither of us could have imagined."
"Every time I want to touch you, I want to feel your skin, your hair, run every dark strand through my fingers."
"Because ever since that first day I met you, I've gone to sleep every single night thinking about you, and every morning when I wake, my first thoughts are of you."
"I want to pull you close and never let you go."
"The story was told in every hovel, every cramped cottage, every grand manor, the older passing it on to the younger."
"A burden shared wasn't so heavy to bear anymore."
"When we first met, you called me an ill-mannered boor."
"I've heard some news... Venda has sent an assassin to find you."
"Our differences will be settled once and for all. Walk carefully, because next time it will be I who will surprise you."
"My words were reckless and impulsive, driven by loathing, and fanned by the safety of hundreds of people around us. But reckless or not, it felt as right and fitting as a snug boot delivered to his backside."
"Surprisingly, his rage curled to a smile. 'Till we meet again, then.'"
"Some things needed to be said. I smiled at my own boldness and went to try my luck with a blindfold and tamer obstacles."
"The bell of the Sacrista rang once, noting the half hour."
"Even the priests seemed to be outside partaking in the festivities."
"Trust your gifts, Arabella, whatever they might be. Sometimes a gift requires great sacrifice, but we can no more turn our backs on it than will our hearts not to beat."
"My knife sliced through the air so fast and clean it was hardly seen. It hit red, dead center."
"I would practice as I’d promised Walther. There would be no more throws left to luck."
"The prayer was sung as I’d never heard it sung before."
"Tonight was one of those things that would last—what I was witnessing right now at this very moment—and I saw a time past, a time even before that, the Ancients dancing in this very street, breathless, feeling the same joy I was experiencing now."
"I held him, rocked him, huddled with him in the squalor and mud."
"I’m a soldier, Lia! I’m not a husband anymore! I’m not a father! I’m a soldier!"
"I understand about duty, Lia. Duty is important."
"You’re quiet. Really? Forgive me. What shall we talk about? The weather?"
"I couldn’t escape—there was nowhere to go in this vast empty basin."
"The sun disappeared behind us. My backside ached. My neck pinched. My clothes chafed. My cheeks burned."
"Distance was deceptive in this shimmering hot flatland."
"How could he have so completely and utterly duped me?"
"Snow. Maybe that was the smile and sadness I saw in my mother’s eyes, wanting to feel it just one more time."
"I’m not living even one life. You’re an assassin. You feed on other people’s misery and steal lives that don’t belong to you."
"It wasn’t the blood dripping down their fingers or the half-cooked snake that killed my appetite—it was their coarse vulgar noises."
"I’d have to learn to play their game, only play it better."
"It’s a patrol from Dalbreck! They won’t know who you are! They’d kill us first and ask questions later."
"You look less like a she-wolf now and more like a true member of the Tribe of Gaudrel."
"The walled in, they starve it just as the Ancients did."
"The gift, as you would call it, is a way like the way of Eben."
"The truths of the world wish to be known, but they won't force themselves upon you the way lies will."
"It's listening without ears, seeing without eyes, perceiving without knowledge."
"The universe knows. The universe has a long memory."
"What is magic but what we don't yet understand?"
"We may all have our own story and destiny, and sometimes our seemingly bad fortune, but we’re all part of a greater story too. One that transcends the soil, the wind, time ... even our own tears."
"Get used to it. I would never get used to it."
"There are always choices. Some choices are just not easy to make."
"May your horse kick stones in your enemy's teeth."
"We can't always wait for the perfect timing."
"It wasn’t just a seeing, or a hearing, or any of the ways I had heard the gift described. It was a knowing."
"I will find you. In the farthest corner, I will find you."
"I’ll remember him exactly this way. I’ll remember them all. I will never forget."