45
" For Ares, lord of strife,
Who doth the swaying scales of battle hold,
War’s money-changer, giving dust for gold,
Sends back, to hearts that held them dear,
Scant ash of warriors, wept with many a tear,
Light to the hand, but heavy to the soul;
Yea, fills the light urn full
With what survived the flame—
Death’s dusty measure of a hero’s frame! "
― Aeschylus , Agamemnon (Oresteia, #1)
48
" Brianna’s looking for Drake,” Edilio said, thinking out loud.
“You sent her out against Drake?” Albert demanded.
“Sent her? Who sends Brianna out to get into a fight? She goes on her own. Anyway, it’s not like you’ve left us with anyone else.”
Albert had the decency not to say anything to that.
“You know, you guys put me in charge. I didn’t ask to be in charge. I didn’t want to be in charge. Sam was in charge and all you guys ever did was give him grief,” Edilio said. “You two, especially.” He pointed at Albert and Astrid. “So, okay, Astrid takes over. And then Astrid finds out it’s not so much fun being in charge. So it’s like, okay, let’s get the dumb wetback to do the job.”
“No one ever—,” Astrid protested.
“And me, like a fool, I’m thinking, okay, that must mean people trust me. They asked me to be in charge, be the mayor. Come to find out, I’m not making decisions; Albert’s making decisions. Albert’s deciding we need to find more water and sending our two best fighters off into the countryside. Now I’m supposed to fix everything? It’s like you go, ‘Fight a war,’ but you sent my army off on a wild goose chase. "
― Michael Grant , Plague (Gone, #4)
56
" One could not see the Greek, the Celt, the Roman, the man of the Renaissance, not even the Victorian on a white face, for Western civilisation had moved too fast to leave any telltale signs of the past on the European skin. She thought: the white face is without history: too familiar, too unremarkable – always modern. But a look at an Indian face sends the mind travelling back a thousand years. The Olmec, the Maya, the Toltec, the Mexica were still there in the coppery skin, the prominent nose, the high cheekbones, the epicanthic fold, the brown eyes staring back from the deep well of time. "
― Panos Karnezis , The Fugitives
