That one,-he nodded toward the closed door- will rule more than just Attolia before he is done. He is an Annux, a king of kings.
Please, he whispered. His voice was low but clear. Don't hurt me anymore.Attolia recoiled. Once, as a child, she'd thrown her slipper in a rage and had knocked an amphora of oil from its pedestal. The...
I woke with a terrible headache and wobbled around 'till I fell out the window.You what?Fell out the window. That one over there. She [Edwina] gestured to the curtain behind her. I broke my back. My s...
I was listening, the king said, aggrieved. I closed my eyes to listen better.What did you hear?I'm not sure, he said. That's why I was listening so closely. I may have to ask the baron to repeat some...
I was captivated. My own hair was easily as long as Olga's, but it frizzed and knotted at every opportunity. When it was combed, it didn't float in perfect fans down to my shoulders.
I can't leave her there all alone, surrounded by stone walls... She's too precious to give up.
He loves me, and I reward his love by forcing on him something he hates. In the evening, after we dance, he rarely returns to the throne; he dances with others or moves from place to place through the...
Eddis looked at her minister, curious. Your head? she asked.Attolia explained. He had to be forcibly dissuaded from strangling his son.So have we all from time to time, Eddis said seriously.
After one moment of gripped immobility, the queen bent to kiss the king lightly on one closed eyelid, then on the other. She said, 'I love your eyes.' She kissed him on either cheek, near the small lo...
I asked Ochto what in the name of all that was sacred he thought he was doing.Helping you, said Dirnes.Why?They put the soldier down, and Ochto straightened to look me in the eye. Because I know nothi...
Your Majesty, please get down. My friend Aris is really a very good man, and if you fall off that wall he's going to hang for it, and so will his squad, most of whom are also nice men, and though I ca...
You'll have to pardon me, the magus said. But with your country at war I can't see how any of it really matters.Standing up, Eugenides pulled the papers from the magus's hands. It matters, because I c...
Who knows but that you will get up to find that the world has inverted itself yet again?
The room was full of people. Ninety-eight days, said the queen, folding her hands in her lap. You said it would take six months. Eugenides picked at a nub in the coverlet. I like to give myself a marg...
The king lifted a hand to her cheek and kissed her. It was not a kiss between strangers, not even a kiss between a bride and groom. It was a kiss between a man and his wife, and when it was over, the...
The gate was made out of blocks of stone bigger across than I am tall. Something else supposedly built by the old gods, it was topped by a solid stone lintel with two carved lions that were supposed t...
The Attolian waited, far and away the best non-speaker I think I have ever known.
The Attolian king obviously had a deep well of spite and I would've appreciated his low cunning more if I hadn't thought the Attolian was about to wring my neck.
I am an ambassador, Akretenesh warned me, anger bringing his confidence back. You cannot shoot.I don't mean to, I reassured him, still smiling. I adopted his soothing tones. Indeed, you are the only m...
He would go east and fight the emperor’s wars, carrying out the bloody business of larger countries eating up the littler ones. It wasn’t a matter of theory in a tiny office in the emperor’s palace. I...