Time is a lot of the things people say that God is. There’s the always preexisting, and having no end. There’s the notion of being all powerful—because nothing can stand against time, can it? Not moun...
Through eons of living in a land so poor there was little to eat but oats, they had as usual converted necessity into a virtue, and insisted that they liked the stuff.
These were people like that. The ones that cared so terribly much - enough to risk everything, enough to change and do things. Most people aren't like that, you know. It isn't that they don't care, bu...
There’s intelligence, Quarry said slowly. And then there are other things. But perhaps you’re too young to have seen hate and despair at close range. There’s been a deal of it in Scotland, these last...
There were still choices to be made, decisions to reach, actions to take. Many of them. But in one...single declaration of intent, we stepped across the threshold of war.
There was nothing frightening about the dead man; there never is. No matter how ugly the manner in which a man dies, it's only the presence of a suffering human soul that is horrifying; once gone, wha...
The overseer wouldna speak to me of Ian, but he told me other things that would curl your hair, if it wasna already curled up like sheep's wool. He glanced at me, and a half-smile lit his face, inspit...
The body is amazingly plastic. The spirit, even more so. But there are some things you don’t come back from.
Sometimes I want to ride you like a wild horse, and bring you to the taming—did you know that? I can do it, you know I can. Drag you over the edge and drain you to a gasping husk. I can drive you to t...
Something wrong with short men, is there? Roger inquired. They tend to turn mean if they don’t get their way, Claire answered. Like small yapping dogs. Cute and fluffy, but cross them and you’re likel...
Some hae meat that canna eat, And some could eat that want it. We hae meat, and we can eat, And so may God be thankit. Amen.
Sleeping under the moon and stars in the arms of a naked lover, the two of you cradled by furs and soft leaves, lulled by the gentle murmur of the chestnut trees and the far-off rumble of a waterfall,...
She smelled of cinnamon and honey and the clean sweat of exertion, with an undertone of baby-scent, that paradoxical smell composed of spit-up milk, soft feces, and the ultimate cleanliness of fresh,...
She and her mother both gave that odd impression of having been outlined somehow, drawn with such vivid strokes and delicate detail that they stood out from their background as though they’d been engr...
Roger was on the whole rather glad that her father was not present, since he would certainly have taken paternal umbrage at the sorts of thoughts Roger was thinking; thoughts
Roger lay in the dust of the road, bruised, filthy, and starving, with a woman trembling and weeping against his chest, now and then giving him a small thump with her fist. He had never felt happier i...
Roger became aware, in a subliminally marital way, that his wife was disgruntled at the thought of being left behind to organize the harvest-a filthy, exhausting job at the best of times-whilst he fro...
Now is the time when we reenter the womb of the world, dreaming the dreams of snow and silence. Waking to the shock of frozen lakes under waning moonlight and the cold sun burning low and blue in the...
No, there were differences. However unknown my future, it would be shared, and the bond between my man and me went much deeper than the flesh. Beyond all this was the one great difference, though—I ha...
No, the fault lies with the artists, Claire went on. The writers, the singers, the tellers of tales. It’s them that take the past and re-create it to their liking. Them that could take a fool and give...