“ Part of her exulted that he’d asked her, out of everyone in the coach, this question; he must think her intelligent. The rest of her, though, wanted to slap herself for disproving his thought. Here wa… Colleen Chen
“ Then you shouldn’t be worried about him being with me. You can have him back when I’m done with him. Colleen Chen
“ Somehow, it bothered her watching Garth’s charm directed so effectively at another. Could he convince her so easily of an untruth? Colleen Chen
“ She would have found it peaceful and relaxing here, but in every town they traveled through, people radiated anxiety under uneasy masks of optimism. Their dependency on magic had made them nearly help… Colleen Chen
“ Vesper felt herself turning red with humiliation. Then she looked at Allegra—really looked at her. Maybe she’d had such a problem with people not seeing her because she wasn’t seeing them. Did Allegra… Colleen Chen
“ The nobles had made reading unpopular, as it showed that one couldn’t afford to buy spells or magical devices, since one had to get knowledge to do things the ordinary way; even if this view held litt… Colleen Chen
“ Souls aren’t discrete units — or even units at all. They’re more like reflections of consciousness in a fractured mirror. Colleen Chen
“ Have you heard of the Children of Mae?”“The cult?” She knew of a religious group whose members went door to door, preaching the benefits of self-discipline—abstinence, celibacy or monogamy, vegetarian… Colleen Chen
“ He hasn’t really seen you, not as you want to be seen, but he’s starting to, a little. Colleen Chen
“ Oh,” she breathed. “How silly I’ve been.”“How silly we’ve all been,” said another of the wives. “We shouldn’t be fighting each other. Our problems don’t lie in any of the relationships we have with ea… Colleen Chen
“ Some of the pain released, and love filled the cleared space, uniting, magnetizing more self-love to it. Colleen Chen
“ It is nearly impossible to feel anything negative in here. Because you’re really connected, to everything, here… but it’s only meant to be a temporary sanctuary, a place to remember yourself. In time… Colleen Chen
“ She’d never spoken to anyone before of this business of being seen, loved for who she was; to have it voiced by this man she’d just met sent chills down her spine. Colleen Chen
“ Souls are simply aspects of ego splintered off from Mae and Jin, the two original gods. They began with no ego at all, you know. But as they gained awareness of themselves, each affirmation of somethi… Colleen Chen
“ Happily-ever-after monogamy has been reinforced so steadily in literature that we tend to feel like failures when we don’t achieve that in reality. Colleen Chen
“ For everything about him fitting her fantasy image of what she wanted, she still didn’t feel seen by him…and that made her all the more aware that maybe her fantasy wasn’t what she wanted at all. Colleen Chen
“ Nim looked aghast. “Of course not. Do you think my future wife would be a servant? No—it’s Number Seven of the wives. Her name is Begonia.”“Oh, no, Nim,” Vesper said. “You can’t fall for one of the wi… Colleen Chen
“ To him, she was one of the few girls who was nice to him, the stodgy son of a poor alcoholic shoemaker with such little status that he seemed unlikely to even get one wife, let alone the three or more… Colleen Chen
