89
" Why may you not kiss me?” she had demanded. “Am I a corpse?”“Of course not.”“Do you find me less attractive now that weather and wind have scoured the bloom from my cheeks?”“Skaytha, it’s nothing like that. If anything you are more beautiful now than when we lived on Skyrl. Often enough I have no breath when I look at you. You rob me of any other thoughts.”“So you’re afraid my kisses will take what little brain you have left?”“I’m afraid the angels will do something I don’t want them to do if I fly in the face of their commands, commands I can only assume are divine as well as angelic.”“Did you ever think to ask them the reasons behind their demands?”“When it is an angel I just want to get out of the conversation alive or at least without being struck dumb. So I don’t prolong the chat.”“You might have wanted my kisses more than that. If you had any romance in you you’d have told them you were ready to fight ten legions of angels for my love.”Hawk had reached out to hold her. “If I’d told them that they might have taken me up on it. Angels are not just useful for gallant flourishes the moment you declare your intention to battle all comers for the woman you love. Angels burn like fire and blaze like a hundred suns – they strike fear in my heart.”She had pulled away from his embrace and jumped to her feet. “Oh, no, you don’t. If I’m not good enough to kiss I’m not good enough to take in your arms either. It’s angels or me. Make up your mind whom you fear more. Or love more.”“I don’t love the angels.”“Clearly you don’t love me either.”They had been in a tipi. She’d gone to the opening, lifted the flap, bent, and stalked away, passing by warriors of the tribe with her head as high as a goddess and her back as straight as the shaft of the spear. The chief had poked his head in.“All is well, Hawk?’ he had asked.Hawk had learned their tongue.“It couldn’t be better,” Hawk had responded. “Only being slain in battle would be greater than this.”The chief had thought this over and laughed. " That would bring you great honor." " I am in short supply of honor right now and such short supply never pleases a woman like her. Better to die at the end of a spear and have it for a few moments and win her back." The chief had nodded. " Sound wisdom. Would you like to join a raiding party against our enemy tonight?" " I couldn't be happier." (from The Name of the Hawk, Book 2) "
91
" December 27, 11:00 p.m.
My Dear America,
I’ve never written a love letter, so forgive me if I fail now. . . .
The simple thing would be to say that I love you. But, in truth, it’s so much more than that. I want you, America. I need you.
I’ve held back so much from you out of fear. I’m afraid that if I show you everything at once, it will overwhelm you, and you’ll run away. I’m afraid that somewhere in the back of your heart is a love for someone else that will never die. I’m afraid that I will make a mistake again, something so huge that you retreat into that silent world of yours. No scolding from a tutor, no lashing from my father, no isolation in my youth has ever hurt me so much as you separating yourself from me.
I keep thinking that it’s there, waiting to come back and strike me. So I’ve held on to all my options, fearing that the moment I wipe them away, you will be standing there with your arms closed, happy to be my friend but unable to be my equal, my queen, my wife.
And for you to be my wife is all I want in the world. I love you. I was afraid to admit it for a long time, but I know it now.
I would never rejoice in the loss of your father, the sadness you’ve felt since he passed, or the emptiness I’ve experienced since you left. But I’m so grateful that you had to go. I’m not sure how long it would have taken for me to figure this out if I hadn’t had to start trying to imagine a life without you. I know now, with absolute certainty, that is nothing I want.
I wish I was as true an artist as you so that I could find a way to tell you what you’ve become to me. America, my love, you are sunlight falling through trees. You are laughter that breaks through sadness. You are the breeze on a too-warm day. You are clarity in the midst of confusion.
You are not the world, but you are everything that makes the world good. Without you, my life would still exist, but that’s all it would manage to do.
You said that to get things right one of us would have to take a leap of faith. I think I’ve discovered the canyon that must be leaped, and I hope to find you waiting for me on the other side.
I love you, America.
Yours forever,
Maxon "
― Kiera Cass , The One (The Selection, #3)
92
" Plan all you want, it is a very different thing to actually kill a person than to fantasize about it. In your fantasy, you have superhuman strength. Or your action takes no strength at all. You just do it, your arms gliding effortlessly through the weightlessness of your dream world. In reality, you have to plunge a knife or pull a trigger. You have to look into the eyes of an actual person. You see their humanity. You have to push past the respect for life that has been drilled into you since before you could talk. I’m not saying it’s impossible. It happens every day. But for normal people who have lived their whole lives as law-abiding citizens, trying to be polite and well-mannered, respectful of their elders and kind to animals, good listeners and good employees; for people who use their turn signals, and hurry to get to work on. time, leave tips for their letter carrier, and put dollars in the Salvation Army’s red bucket, hoping to make the world a little better— killing another human being is not an easy thing. "
94
" She led them to their pallets, again encircled by other pallets. She sat down, sighing at her aching muscles, and caught his gaze. “You may, er, wrap your arms around me if that will make you feel I am safer.”
He chuckled--a hoarse chuckle, rusty, but a chuckle nonetheless. She’d take it.
“May I indeed?” He lay beside her and pulled her back against him, settling her head on his arm, bunching the other hide up to use as a pillow. “If I must.” His warm sigh tickled across her neck. “After all, I must ensure that pinkie does not wander.”
Would Robert never let her forget that? "
― Angela Quarles , Must Love Chainmail (Must Love, #2)
95
" Without warning, David was visited by an exact vision of death: a long hole in the ground, no wider than your body, down which you are drawn while the white faces above recede. You try to reach them but your arms are pinned. Shovels put dirt into your face. There you will be forever, in an upright position, blind and silent, and in time no one will remember you, and you will never be called by any angel. As strata of rock shift, your fingers elongate, and your teeth are distended sideways in a great underground grimace indistinguishable from a strip of chalk. And the earth tumbles on, and the sun expires, and unaltering darkness reigns where once there were stars. "
― John Updike , Olinger Stories
96
" Finn said, “You feel the wind is a bully, beating you. But that is your seeing. That is your story, not the wind’s. To a bird who rides it, that wind is only a kind hand. Because the bird rides the wind’s power. Do you understand?” Clare, bitter, cold, and wind-battered, frowned stubbornly. “But a bird can fly. I can’t fly.” He turned to look at her, and his face was troubled. “If you cling to the safety of the rock, indeed you can’t. To fly, you open your arms and fall, heart first, trusting the wind to bear you up. That’s what the birds do. "
― Katherine Catmull , The Radiant Road
