Family Crest Quotes

I was just going to say it reminds me of the symbols on a family crest.” Noah stopped mid-stride, and turned very slowly. “We’re not related.” “I know, but—” “Don’t even think it.

Sometimes family hurts you more than they could ever love you.

It was only after her death that I realized who she was: the apparently magical force at the center of our family who'd kept us all invisibly spinning in the powerful orbit around her.

Angry at being angry—there’s a worm that will eat its tail and no mistake. I should have Oroborus on my family crest.

Having a family crest meant a lot to a girl who'd been adopted.

You guys are too horny. I don’t think it’s normal.

I come from a long line of tall-tale talkers. Our family crest is bullets over crossed fingers and underneath it says, ‘Bullshit Über Alles.

He felt like a brother of mine, but not at all like my actual brother. He seemed like someone I'd always know even if I never saw him again.

The motto of the mongoose family, so Mr Kipling tells us, is: 'Go and find out.' If Caroline ever adopts a crest, I should certainly suggest a mongoose rampant. One might omit the first part of the motto. Caroline can do any amount of finding out by sitting placidly at home.

Those two boys have healed you. They took you in. They protected you. They continue to love you because they’re your family and both of them know it. They love you for the same reasons they don’t love anyone else. You’re pure. It might not make sense to you, but you don’t use them. You don’t want anything from them. You don’t want to hurt them. Your love for both of them is pure.

I get to see her at night." "No deal." "That's the only deal. I sleep over." "She's my daughter." "She's the love of my life". My heart was pumping so damn fast I needed to see her. David was searching my eyes. I let him see the truth. I needed her. That was the only way. "Fine, but only you. Logan can't start sleeping over, too." "He'll try." David groaned. "You two, you just storm your way in-" "We're family to her. We took her in when you let her go. We protected her from that woman.

Well, you might not think it to look at me,” Dortmunder told him, “but I got a family crest.” “Have you?” “Yeah. And it’s got a motto on it.” “I am anxious to hear this motto.” “Quid lucrum istic mihi est.” Mr. Hemlow squinted; the red-headed hawk in flight. “I’m afraid my Latin is insufficient for that.” “What’s in it for me,” Dortmunder translated.

The father's job is to teach his children how to be warriors, to give them the confidence to get on the horse and ride into battle when it's necessary to do so. If you don't get that from your father, you have to teach yourself.

There were things you could do with family that you just couldn’t do with friends: You could let them see you wearing the same outfit three days in a row. You could invite them over for lunch and then mostly ignore them as you finally got off hold with the internet provider. You could have an entire conversation while wearing Crest Whitestrips.

Sometimes family hurts you more than they could ever love you. That’s a truth a lot of people don’t want to hear, but sometimes people get the opposite. They get the families that love you more than they could ever hurt you. Those people are the luckiest in the world. You know what pisses me off? Is that they probably don’t even know it. They don’t know how lucky they are, but, Sam, you’re one of them.

If I had a family crest, it would read Please Don’t Make Me Be an Asshole.

It turned out I wasn’t able to keep my family together. I wasn’t my mom. It was only after her death that I realized who she was: the apparently magical force at the center of our family who’d kept us all invisibly spinning in the powerful orbit around her.

When he left for his date, he was late

I never did make that Thanksgiving dinner. By the time Thanksgiving rolled around eight months after my mom died, my family was something I spoke of in the past tense.

You know, I couldn’t have done what I’ve done without support,” I said. “Support. That’s really important. Support. From family and friends.” Did I have to say it again? He

Does it matter? He’s going to leave her and she knows it. Do you know what that does to our family? What it’s like to live in that?

He had calling cards with his family crest on them and respected all the known rules of urbanity as well as some of his own invention, such as eating artichokes with tongs, which provoked general stupefaction.

SILENT, SHE WAITS FOR the sky to fall, standing upon an island of volcanic rock amidst a black sea. The long moonless night yawns before her. The only sounds, a flapping banner of war held in her lover’s hand and the warm waves that kiss her steel boots. Her heart is heavy. Her spirit wild. Peerless knights tower behind her. Salt spray beads on their family crests—emerald centaurs, screaming eagles, gold sphinxes, and the crowned skull of her father’s grim house. Her Golden eyes look to the heavens. Waiting. The water heaves in. Out. The heartbeat of her silence.

You asked what my intentions are, Mrs. Brenner, and I would like to answer your question.” Dibs opened his mouth as if preparing to argue and she glared at him from across the table. Did he really think not to let her state her case in front of his family? He snapped his mouth shut and briskly rubbed a palm across his forehead before tossing that same hand in the air. “My intentions are these.” She gathered her thoughts, folding her hands in her lap. “When David is sad, I intend to make him happy. When he is ill, I intend to make him well. When he is angry or upset, I intend to listen and find the words to make him feel better. When he is depressed, I intend to bring him joy, and when he is hurt, I intend to find the source of his pain and take it away from him.” She bridged the distance to Dibs’s devoted gaze, and radiant love crested the last barricade surrounding her heart. “You see, Mr. and Mrs. Brenner, I’m in love with your son. But I don’t want anything from him. You don’t need to worry because my only intention is to give to him. That’s the way it’s supposed to be when you love someone, isn’t it? To think only of their needs, instead of your own?” She broke off from Dibs and faced his mother. “Those are my intentions, Mrs. Brenner. I hope you find them satisfactory.

The best part about wearing capes is the pin (well… unless someone puts a tracker in the pin). Most of the time, this is where we wear our family crest—but the Foxfire uniform uses the grade level’s mascot. And Team Valiant has special pins to represent the Prime Sources (because we’re fancy like that!).

Sometimes family hurts you more than they could ever love you. That’s a truth a lot of people don’t want to hear, but sometimes people get the opposite. They get the families that love you more than they could ever hurt you. Those people are the luckiest in the world. You know what pisses me off? Is that they probably don’t even know it. They don’t know how lucky they are, but, Sam, you’re one of them.” I sucked in a breath. That ache was a stabbing pain now. She leaned forward. Some of her long hair fell forward, but she ignored it as she grasped my shoulders. Malinda moved so we were eye-level. “Forget the people who’ve hurt you. You don’t have them anymore, but you have two others that’ll do anything for you. Mason and Logan would move mountains for you. I see how you are with them. You love them, but you’re scared to let yourself be happy. Why? Because that’s when they’ll leave? Is that what you think? You’ve got it all wrong. Those two will never leave you.” She tapped my chest. Once. Twice. “You. You’re the one that’s going to hurt them. You have that power, and you don’t know it. You could rip those two apart in a second, and they’re the ones who are scared of you. Not the other way around. You need to recognize the real situation.

His motto, emblazoned on the family’s crest, was Ditat virtus: “Virtue enriches.

As he fell to the ground with a panicked scream,

Sometimes family hurts you more than they could ever love you.” ― Tijan, Fallen Crest Public

had beloved friends whom I sometimes referred to as family, but our commitments to each other were informal and intermittent, more familial in word than in deed. Blood is thicker than water, my mother had always said when I was growing up, a sentiment I’d often disputed. But it turned out that it didn’t matter whether she was right or wrong. They both flowed out of my cupped palms.

But it was the second guy who caught my eye. Like the girl, he, too, paused by the door, seeming even more wary than she looked. The sunlight streaming in through the windows highlighted the rich honey in his dark chocolate brown hair, even as it cast his face in shadow. The tan skin of his arms resembled marble—hard, but smooth and supple at the same time. He must have passed through the mist spewed up by the fountain outside, because his black T-shirt was wet in places and the damp patches clung to his skin. The wetness allowed me to see just how muscled his chest was. Oh, yeah, I totally ogled that part of him, right up until I spotted the silver cuff on his right wrist. Given the angle, I couldn’t tell what crest was stamped into the metal, but I glanced at the others, who also wore cuffs. I sighed. So they belonged to some Family then. Wonderful. This day just kept getting better.

The Ilhalmiut do not fill canvases with their paintings, or inscribe figures on rocks, or carve figurines in clay or in stone, because in the lives of the People there is no room for the creation of objects of no practical value. What purpose is there in creating beautiful things if these must be abandoned when the family treks out over the Barrens? But the artistic sense is present and strongly developed. It is strongly alive in their stories and songs, and in the string-figures, but they also use it on the construction of things which assist in their living and in these cases it is no less an art. The pleasure of abstract creation is largely denied to them by the nature of the land, but still they know how to make beauty. They know how to make beauty, and they also know how to enjoy it-- for it is no uncommon thing to see an Ilhalmio man squatting silently on a hill crest and watching, for hours at a time, the swift interplay of colors that sweep the sky at sunset and dawn. It is not unusual to see an Ilhalmio pause for long minutes to watch the sleek beauty of a weasel or to stare into the brilliant heart of some minuscule flower. And these things are done quite unconsciously, too. There is no word for 'beauty'--as such--in their language; it needs no words in their hearts.

Nights with bright pivots, departure, matter, uniquely voice, uniquely naked each day. Upon your breasts of still current, upon your legs ofharshness and water, upon the permanence and pride of your naked hair, I want to lie, my love, the tears now cast into the raucous basket where they gather, I want to lie, my love, alone with a syllable of destroyed silver, alone with a tip of your snowy breast.   It is not now possible, at times, to win except by falling, it is not now possible, between two people, to tremble, to touch the river’s flower: man fibers come like needles, transactions, fragments, families of repulsive coral, tempests and hard passages through carpets of winter.   Between lips and lips there are cities of great ash and moist crest, drops of when and how, indefinite traffic: between lips and lips, as if along a coast of sand and glass, the wind passes.   That is why you are endless, gather me up as if you were all solemnity, all nocturnal like a zone, until you merge with the lines of time.   Advance in sweetness, come to my side until the digital leaves of the violins have become silent, until the moss takes root in the thunder, until from the throbbing of hand and hand the roots come down.

Books were cities I'd never visited, filled with pillars of great thoughts and streets of phrases, mazes of abstruse sentence structures and alleys of complicated syllables. They were stores that displayed a wide range of things, punctuation twinkling like the crest of a venerable family, sentences breathing peacefully, words whispering.

It only took Alexis a day to read a five-hundred page book. Fiction stories took her to another world where she could lose herself for a while in someone else’s life. Its funny how things like loans to pay back, a broken home and family, and a future to worry about meant nothing to characters who only had to worry about things like boys, beaches and fun.

The world would end as it began, as beatific arbour, and if any family crests or luminary busts or graven names of institutions were yet visible between the droning hives and honeysuckle, they would be by then wiped clean of any meaning. Meaning was a candlelight in everything that lurched and shifted in the circumstantial breezes of each instant, never twice the same. Significance was a phenomenon of Now that could not be contained inside an urn or monolith. It was a hurricane entirely of the present, an unending swirl of boiling change, and as he stood there gazing out towards the city's rim, across the granite fields of time towards the calendar's far tattered edges, Snowy Vernall was a storm-rod, crackling and exultant, at the cyclone's dangerous and brilliant eye.

Having nothing more than those two pennies was both horrible and just the slightest bit funny, the way being flat broke at times seemed to me. As I stood there gazing at Elk Lake, it occurred to me for the first time that growing up poor had come in handy. I probably wouldn’t have been fearless enough to go on such a trip with so little money if I hadn’t grown up without it. I’d always thought of my family’s economic standing in terms of what I didn’t get: camp and lessons and travel and college tuition and the inexplicable ease that comes when you’ve got access to a credit card that someone else is paying off. But now I could see the line between this and that—between a childhood in which I saw my mother and stepfather forging ahead over and over again with two pennies in their pocket and my own general sense that I could do it too.

As I stood there gazing at Elk Lake, it occurred to me for the first time that growing up poor had come in handy. I probably wouldn’t have been fearless enough to go on such a trip with so little money if I hadn’t grown up without it. I’d always thought of my family’s economic standing in terms of what I didn’t get: camp and lessons and travel and college tuition and the inexplicable ease that comes when you’ve got access to a credit card that someone else is paying off.

Pandora looked dully at the red wax seal on the envelope, stamped with an elaborate family crest. If Gabriel had written something nice to her, she didn’t want to read it. If he’d written something not nice, she didn’t want to read that either. “By the holy poker,” Ida exclaimed, “just open it!” Reluctantly Pandora complied. As she pulled a small folded note from the envelope, a tiny, fuzzy object fell out. Reflexively she yelped, thinking it was an insect. But at second glance, she realized it was a bit of fabric. Picking it up gingerly, she saw that it was one of the decorative felt leaves from her missing Berlin wool slipper. It had been carefully snipped off. My lady, Your slipper is being held for ransom. If you ever want to see it again, come alone to the formal drawing room. For every hour you delay, an additional embellishment will be removed. —St. Vincent Now Pandora was exasperated. Why was he doing this? Was he trying to draw her into another argument? “What does it say?” Ida asked. “I have to go downstairs for a hostage negotiation,” Pandora said shortly. “Would you help put me to rights?” “Yes, milady.

I wanted to have a family again, to be folded into something I believed was safe from destruction. Right alongside my longing for them, I felt something as hot as hate for each of them now. I imagined a big machine like the one that had mawed up this forest mawing up our forty acres in the Minnesota woods. I wished with all my heart that it really would. I would be free then, it seemed. Because we had not been safe from destruction after my mom died, total destruction would come now as a relief. The loss of my family and home were my own private clear-cut. What remained was only ugly evidence of a thing that was no more.

had found the only hippie-opera-singer-dream-cabin-in-the-woods in Westchester! It was perfection, and I knew exactly what to do to bring it to life. I took it on like I was an interior designer on one of those makeover shows. I picked out and paid for every piece of brand-new furniture, all the knickknacks and accouterments. I chose every detail, from light fixtures to paint colors, all in “Pat’s palette.” I hung wooden flower boxes outside and filled them with romantic wildflowers. I got photo prints made of her Irish family members and Irish crests, had them mounted and framed, and hung them ascending the wall along the staircase.

Nights with bright pivots, departure, matter, uniquely voice, uniquely naked each day. Upon your breasts of still current, upon your legs ofharshness and water, upon the permanence and pride of your naked hair, I want to lie, my love, the tears now cast into the raucous basket where they gather, I want to lie, my love, alone with a syllable of destroyed silver, alone with a tip of your snowy breast.   It is not now possible, at times, to win except by falling, it is not now possible, between two people, to tremble, to touch the river’s flower: man fibers come like needles, transactions, fragments, families of repulsive coral, tempests and hard passages through carpets of winter.   Between lips and lips there are cities of great ash and moist crest, drops of when and how, indefinite traffic: between lips and lips, as if along a coast of sand and glass, the wind passes.   That is why you are endless, gather me up as if you were all solemnity, all nocturnal like a zone, until you merge with the lines of time.   Advance in sweetness, come to my side until the digital leaves of the violins have become silent, until the moss takes root in the thunder, until from the throbbing of hand and hand the roots come down.   VALS Yo toco el odio como pecho diurno, yo sin cesar, de ropa en ropa, vengo durmiendo lejos.

My love, she sleeps! Oh, may her sleep,         As it is lasting, so be deep;         Soft may the worms about her creep!         Far in the forest, dim and old,         For her may some tall vault unfold—         Some vault that oft hath flung its black         And wingèd panels fluttering back,         Triumphant, o’er the crested palls,         Of her grand family funerals—         Some sepulchre, remote, alone,         Against whose portal she hath thrown,         In childhood many an idle stone—         Some tomb from out whose sounding door         She ne’er shall force an echo more,         Thrilling to think, poor child of sin!         It was the dead who groaned within.

Come inside." Shelby tilted her head just enough to rest it briefly on his shoulder as they walked to the door. "I'm relying on your word that I'll walk out again in one piece at the end of the weekend." He only grinned. "I told you my stand on playing the mediator." "Thanks a lot." She glanced up at the door, noting the heavy brass crest that served as a door knocker. The MacGregor lion stared coolly at her with its Gaelic motto over its crowned head. "Your father isn't one to hide his light under a bushel,is he?" "Let's just say he has a strong sense of family pride." Alan lifted the knocker, then let it fall heavily against the thick door. Shelby imagined the sound would vibrate into every nook and cranny in the house. "The Clan MacGregor," Alan began in a low rolling burr, "is one of the few permitted to use the crown in their crest.Good blood. Strong stock.

Our life together was filled with contrasts. One week we were croc hunting with Dateline in Cape York. Only a short time after that, Steve and I found ourselves out of our element entirely, at the CableACE Award banquet in Los Angeles. Steve was up for an award as host of the documentary Ten Deadliest Snakes in the World. He lost out to the legendary Walter Cronkite. Any time you lose to Walter Cronkite, you can’t complain too much. After the awards ceremony, we got roped into an after-party that was not our cup of tea. Everyone wore tuxedos. Steve wore khaki. Everyone drank, smoked, and made small talk, none of which Steve did at all. We got separated, and I saw him across the room looking quite claustrophobic. I sidled over. “Why don’t we just go back up to our room?” I whispered into his ear. This proved to be a terrific idea. It fit in nicely with our plans for starting a family, and it was quite possibly the best seven minutes of my life! After our stay in Los Angeles, Steve flew directly back to the zoo, while I went home by way of one my favorite places in the world, Fiji. We were very interested in working there with crested iguanas, a species under threat. I did some filming for the local TV station and checked out a population of the brilliantly patterned lizards on the Fijian island of Yadua Taba. When I got back to Queensland, I discovered that I was, in fact, expecting. Steve and I were over the moon. I couldn’t believe how thrilled he was. Then, mid-celebration, he suddenly pulled up short. He eyed me sideways. “Wait a minute,” he said. “You were just in Fiji for two weeks.” “Remember the CableACE Awards? Where you got bored in that room full of tuxedos?” He gave me a sly grin. “Ah, yes,” he said, satisfied with his paternity (as if there was ever any doubt!). We had ourselves an L.A. baby.

Oh, ’ello, ’Arry,” said Mundungus Fletcher, with a most unconvincing stab at airiness. “Well, don’t let me keep ya.” And he began scrabbling on the ground to retrieve the contents of his suitcase with every appearance of a man eager to be gone. “Are you selling this stuff?” asked Harry, watching Mundungus grab an assortment of grubby-looking objects from the ground. “Oh, well, gotta scrape a living,” said Mundungus. “Gimme that!” Ron had stooped down and picked up something silver. “Hang on,” Ron said slowly. “This looks familiar —” “Thank you!” said Mundungus, snatching the goblet out of Ron’s hand and stuffing it back into the case. “Well, I’ll see you all — OUCH!” Harry had pinned Mundungus against the wall of the pub by the throat. Holding him fast with one hand, he pulled out his wand. “Harry!” squealed Hermione. “You took that from Sirius’s house,” said Harry, who was almost nose to nose with Mundungus and was breathing in an unpleasant smell of old tobacco and spirits. “That had the Black family crest on it.” “I — no — what — ?” spluttered Mundungus, who was slowly turning purple. “What did you do, go back the night he died and strip the place?” snarled Harry. “I — no —” “Give it to me!” “Harry, you mustn’t!” shrieked Hermione, as Mundungus started to turn blue. There was a bang, and Harry felt his hands fly off Mundungus’s throat. Gasping and spluttering, Mundungus seized his fallen case, then — CRACK — he Disapparated. Harry swore at the top of his voice, spinning on the spot to see where Mundungus had gone. “COME BACK, YOU THIEVING — !” “There’s no point, Harry.” Tonks had appeared out of nowhere, her mousy hair wet with sleet. “Mundungus will probably be in London by now. There’s no point yelling.” “He’s nicked Sirius’s stuff! Nicked it!” “Yes, but still,” said Tonks, who seemed perfectly untroubled by this piece of information. “You should get out of the cold.” She watched them go through the door of the Three Broomsticks. The moment he was inside, Harry burst out, “He was nicking Sirius’s stuff!” “I know, Harry, but please don’t shout, people are staring,” whispered Hermione.

It’s not for the weak or faint of heart. It will take a toll on you. Your body will hurt. Your soul will ache. Your family life will suffer. No one will understand what you do or why you do it, but you do it. You will work nights. You will work weekends. Holidays. You will bathe the elderly, the weak. You will clean their body, their bodily fluids. You will have to know every medication, what it does, when to stop it, when to give it, and how to get it into people. You will have to know how to interpret blood tests, when the doctor must know. You will have thirty seconds to start an IV, how to hook up an EKG machine. You will need to know how to interpret tracing or when you should give or take away oxygen. You will experience joy, grief, and sorrow in a day, sometimes within the same hour. You are the glue between the patient, the family, the doctor. It’s you who will keep everyone happy, as comfortable as possible. Code blue. Trauma evaluation. Labor. Delivery. Surgery. Babies. Postpartum. Psychology. These and more will all need to be learned. And when you think you know everything, you don’t. You’re just starting. I was asked to write this essay on why

I know I’m supposed to stand up here and say a bunch of nice things.” Mason’s voice grew serious; there was no forced lightness now. The room grew quiet. “But I can’t do that. I can say a bunch of things about what I hope for their future. I hope they continue to be happy. I hope they’ll remain faithful to each other. I hope Analise won’t start drinking because even though that’s not what her problem was, I know it might’ve helped. I hope she won’t do anything to tear this family apart. I hope one day Logan and I will enjoy coming to the house again, the place we grew up. I hope our father will one day apologize to our mother for the endless stream of mistresses. I hope Logan will have a relationship with his father, because he didn’t growing up. I hope Samantha won’t fear her mother one day. I hope you both will be welcomed at my wedding one day.” He looked at me then. “I hope you’ll both be doting grandparents to my future children, and I hope I’ll let you see them, and maybe even have unsupervised sleepovers. I hope for a lot of things.” [...] “I know this wasn’t the nicest speech, but I’m not one to be fake. My dad knows that, so he must’ve been expecting something like this. I can say a few good things. I can say that I used to hate my dad, and I don’t any longer.” He tore his eyes away to look at his father. “I don’t have as much anger at you as I did, so maybe you wanted to hear that?” Then he looked at my mother. “And Analise…” I heard a woman suck in her breath at the nearest table. “I can thank you for giving Sam space, but I want you to let her go.

FALL, SIERRA NEVADA This morning the hermit thrush was absent at breakfast, His place was taken by a family of chickadees; At noon a flock of humming birds passed south, Whirling in the wind up over the saddle between Ritter and Banner, following the migration lane Of the Sierra crest southward to Guatemala. All day cloud shadows have moved over the face of the mountain, The shadow of a golden eagle weaving between them Over the face of the glacier. At sunset the half-moon rides on the bent back of the Scorpion, The Great Bear kneels on the mountain. Ten degrees below the moon Venus sets in the haze arising from the Great Valley. Jupiter, in opposition to the sun, rises in the alpenglow Between the burnt peaks. The ventriloquial belling Of an owl mingles with the bells of the waterfall. Now there is distant thunder on the east wind. The east face of the mountain above me Is lit with far off lightnings and the sky Above the pass blazes momentarily like an aurora. It is storming in the White Mountains, On the arid fourteen-thousand-foot peaks; Rain is falling on the narrow gray ranges And dark sedge meadows and white salt flats of Nevada. Just before moonset a small dense cumulus cloud, Gleaming like a grape cluster of metal, Moves over the Sierra crest and grows down the westward slope. Frost, the color and quality of the cloud, Lies over all the marsh below my campsite. The wiry clumps of dwarfed whitebark pines Are smoky and indistinct in the moonlight, Only their shadows are really visible. The lake is immobile and holds the stars And the peaks deep in itself without a quiver. In the shallows the geometrical tendrils of ice Spread their wonderful mathematics in silence. All night the eyes of deer shine for an instant As they cross the radius of my firelight. In the morning the trail will look like a sheep driveway, All the tracks will point down to the lower canyon. “Thus,” says Tyndall, “the concerns of this little place Are changed and fashioned by the obliquity of the earth’s axis, The chain of dependence which runs through creation, And links the roll of a planet alike with the interests Of marmots and of men.

No offense to you, lady, but he’s my dad and there’s a whole family factor here that you’re helping to break up.” I turned my hand around and gave her a thumbs up. “But good for you. I’m sure my dad will pay you with lots of dinners and diamonds. If you don’t get the private jet ride while you’re sleeping with him, you’re doing something wrong.

My father said to me, I know the sap that courses through the trees as I know the blood that flows in my veins. We are part of the earth and it is part of us. The perfumed flowers are our sisters. The bear, the deer, the great eagle, these are our brothers. The rocky crests, the meadows, the ponies--all belong to the same family.

Home. Mason was home. He was family. He was the future.He was my soulmate.

Admiral Nelson won the great Battle of Trafalgar against the French during the Napoleonic Wars. The Viscount of Camperdown, who also won many battles during that period, was one of the admirals under Nelson. The Viscount of Canperdown's family crest had a ship with full sails on it and with two little Latin words: Disce pai—"Lean to suffer." That is precisely what Peter and Paul and Job and Moses and Jesus would say to you and me as believers in the fallen world. "Learn to suffer.

This is my new stepsister. Help me and Mase welcome her to the family.” He gave me a smirk when I twisted around. “By getting her drunk!

THIRTY-THREE MUNICH, GERMANY 1:00 PM WILKERSON HAD SLEPT WELL, SATISFIED BOTH WITH HOW HE’D handled himself at the lodge and with Dorothea afterward. Having access to money, few responsibilities, and a beautiful woman weren’t bad substitutes for not being an admiral. Provided, of course, that he could stay alive. In preparation for this assignment, he’d back-checked the Oberhauser family thoroughly. Assets in the billions, and not old money—ancient money that had lasted through centuries of political upheavals. Opportunists? Surely. Their family crest seemed to explain it all. A dog clutching a rat in its mouth, encased inside a crested cauldron. What myriad contradictions. Much like the family itself. But how else could they have survived? Time, though, had taken a toll. Dorothea and her sister were all the Oberhausers left. Both beautiful, high-strung creatures. Nearing fifty. Identical in appearance, though each tried hard to distinguish herself. Dorothea had pursued business degrees and actively worked with her mother in the family concerns. She’d married in her early twenties and birthed a son, but he was killed five years ago, a week after his twentieth birthday, in a car accident. All reports indicated that she changed after that. Hardened. Became enslaved to deep anxieties and unpredictable moods. To shoot a man with a shotgun, as she’d done last night, then make love afterward with such an unfettered intensity, proved that dichotomy. Business had never interested Christl, nor had marriage or children. He’d met her only once, at a social function Dorothea and

to fucking family

A god of war is also the god of those who are caught in the wheel of eternal struggle, who fight on despite knowledge of certain defeat, who stand with their companions against spear and catapult and gleaming metal, armed with only their pride, who strive and assay and press and toil, all the while knowing that they cannot win.’ ‘You are not only the god of the strong, but also the god of the weak. Courage is better displayed when it seems all is lost, when despair appears the only rational course.’ ‘True courage is to insist on seeing when all around you is darkness.’ And Fithowéo stood up and ululated. As his voice filled the cave walls and bounced back to his ears, he seemed to see the stalactites hanging overhead like bejeweled curtains, the stalagmites growing out of the ground like bamboo shoots, the bats careening through the air like battle kites, the night-blooming orchids and cave roses blooming like living treasure—the cave was filled with light. The god of war laughed and bowed down to the orchid and kissed her. ‘Thank you for showing me how to see.’ ‘I am but the lowest of the Hundred Flowers,’ said the orchid. ‘But the tapestry of Dara is woven not only from the proud chrysanthemum or the arrogant winter plum, the bamboo who holds up great houses or the coconut who provides sweet nectar and pleasing music. Chicory, dandelion, butter-and-eggs, ten thousand species of orchids, and countless other flowers—we have no claim to the crests of the great noble families, and we are not cultivated in gardens and not gently caressed by the fingers of great ladies and eager courtiers. But we also fight our war against hail and storm, against drought and deprivation, against the sharp blade of the weeding hoe and the poisonous emanations of the herbicide-sprayer. We also have a claim on time, and we deserve a god who understands that every day in the life of the common flower is a day of battle.’ And Fithowéo continued to ululate, letting his throat and ears be his eyes, until he strode out of the cave, emerged into the sunlight, and picked up two pieces of darkest obsidian and placed them in his eye sockets so that he had eyes again. Though they were blind to light, they sowed fear into all who gazed into them.

You talked of plans,” he went on, “have you got any yourself? “Yes,” said Snufkin, “I have a plan. But it’s a lonely one, you know.” Moomintroll looked at him for a long time, and then he said: “You’re thinking of going away, aren’t you?” Snufkin nodded, and they sat for a while swinging their legs over the water, without speaking, while the river flowed on and on beneath them to all the strange places that Snufkin longed for and would go to quite alone. “When are you going?” Moomintroll asked. “Now - immediately!” said Snufkin, throwing all the reed-boats in the water at once, and he jumped down from the bridge and sniffed the morning air. It was a good day to start a journey; the crest of the hill beckoned to him in the sunshine, with the road winding up and disappearing on the other side to find a new valley, and then a new hill… Moomintroll stood looking on while Snufkin packed up his tent. “Are you staying away long?” He asked. “No,” said Snufkin, “on the first day of spring I shall be here again whistling under your window - a year goes by so quickly! “Yes,” said Moomintroll. “Cheerio then!” “So long!” Said Snufkin. Moomintroll was left alone on the bridge. He watched Snufkin grow smaller and smaller, and at last disappear among the silver poplars and the plum trees. But after a while he heard the mouth organ playing “All small beasts should have bows in their tails”, and then he knew his friend was happy. (less)

There was a name written on a wee square, right at the top of her arse. Levi Strauss. Was this some sort of family crest?

Baltsaros ran across the ice. His tears froze on his cheeks. He was furious. They would pay. All of them. His skinny legs were a blur. He was fast! Fast like the lion on his family crest. His breath heaved in his bony chest. They would pay. Pay for being so… being so mean! Baltsaros tripped over a chunk of ice and went sprawling. He let out a cry and pulled himself up, wrapping his thin arms around his knee and rocking as he sobbed. There was blood on the ice. He had torn open his knee. He had ripped his pants. Mother would be furious about the pants. He sat and wept like a baby. It wasn’t fair! Then he saw the men on the ice. Strangers. Red hands. Red feet.

For God’s sake, you are as bad as Louisa.” Joseph took his gaze from Harrison’s fancy town coach—and what was a mere portraitist doing with such a rig?—and surveyed Moreland’s features. “I beg your pardon?” “Your affianced wife, Louisa. She’s incorrigible. The girl has loving family on every hand, every hand, and yet she must make her own way. Has always had to forge her own path and I suspect she’s met her match in you, so to speak.” The duke was trying to communicate something, while Joseph was trying to make out the crest on Harrison’s coach. “Your presence here is still not well advised, Your Grace. Hanging felonies will likely be committed.” Moreland thwacked a riding crop against gleaming field boots. “Listen to me, young man: You have no father, no brothers, no uncles, not even a damned third cousin to see you through this. If a prospective papa-by-marriage is all you’ve got, then by God, that’s what you’ll take.” There was something heartening and familiar in the way Moreland delivered a scold. Warmth, unexpected and welcome, bloomed in Joseph’s chest. “Your Grace, may I say first, thank you, and second, you are as bad as Louisa yourself.” “Where do you think she came by it? One wonders what you’ll have to say to Arthur if he ever bestirs his bones to leave his carriage.” The

But the girls are exiled.

Using the satellite phone connection, I finally reached Croc One. The captain, Kris, was in tears. I finally tracked down John Stainton, and he assured me that he hadn’t left Steve’s side. “I’ve got a charter plane coming,” John said. “I’ll get him home, Terri.” I asked about Steve’s personal effects. Steve had had on his khakis and wet-suit boots while he was diving, but because he had no jewelry or anything of value, the medical examiner had destroyed all his clothing. I was devastated. It’s completely unpredictable what one will hold dear in a time of grief, particularly in the case of an accident. I remember thinking, I’ve got to sit down with the powers that be and change these regulations. The family should decide what should be destroyed and what should be kept. I needed to focus on something other than losing Steve. That fact was just too hard to get my head around. As John arranged to bring Steve home, the media pressure steadily increased. I told Wes I wanted to go meet the plane, but that I wouldn’t take the kids. This was my time to be with my soul mate, and I needed to do it on my own. I headed out with a police escort. The Queensland police were considerate and professional, and an officer named Annie was personally assigned to make sure the overwhelming media attention did not interfere with my private moment to say good-bye to Steve. Wes accompanied me. It was night. As the seaplane came in, I recognized it as the same one that had taken Steve on many South Pacific adventures, in search of sea snakes, crested iguanas, or sharks. The ranks of police stood at attention. Many of them had met Steve previously. Once again, I was overwhelmed to see the looks of grief on their faces. The plane landed, and I had a moment to sit with Steve on my own. It was a bit of an effort to clamber up into the back of the plane. A simple wooden casket rested inside, still secured. I knew that who Steve was, his spirit and his soul, were no longer there, but it was strange how I couldn’t cry. I sat down and leaned my head against the wooden box that held his body and felt such strange peace. In some way, we were together again.

Louis suspected each of them, in his or her own way, was an exile – from bourgeois values, family crests, unhappy love affairs, childhoods too long spent in church pews. He wondered if they had started as social outcasts who found the artist’s life an acceptable way to be in the world; or if their passions for painting or sculpting or writing had shaped them into outsiders. He had never been quite sure how the chicken-versus-egg question played out in his own life.

Can you come as soon as you’re done with work? At the house. Your mom threw a bowl at my mom. “I

The Bears waited nervously while the judges studied, measured, and weighed, and then studied, measured, and weighed some more. Finally, they made their announcement: “THE FIRST-PRIZE WINNER--AND STILL CHAMPION…” Of course, that meant Farmer Ben had won. It was close--it turned out that Ben’s Monster was just a little bigger, rounder, and oranger than Papa’s Giant. But that wasn’t the worst of it. The Giant didn’t even come in second. A beautiful pumpkin grown by Miz McGrizz won second prize. The Giant came in third. Papa and the cubs were crushed…crushed and very quiet as they pushed their third-prize winner home. It wasn’t until they reached the crest of a hill that overlooked Bear Country that Mama decided to have her say. “I know you’re disappointed. But third prize is nothing to be ashamed of. Besides, Thanksgiving isn’t about contests and prizes. It’s about giving thanks. And it seems to me that we have a lot of be thankful for.” Perhaps it was Mama’s lecture, or maybe it was how beautiful Bear Country looked in the sunset’s rosy glow. But whatever the reason, Papa and the cubs began to understand what Mama was talking about. Even more so on Thanksgiving Day. After the Bears gave thanks for the wonderful meal they were about to enjoy, Sister Bear gave her own special thanks. “I’m thankful,” she said, “that we didn’twin first prize: if we had, The Giant would be on display in front of City Hall instead of being part of the yummy pies we’re going to have for dessert!” As the laughter faded and the Bears thought about the blessings of family, home, friends, and neighbors, they knew deep down in their hearts that there was no question about it--indeed they did have a great deal to be thankful for.

There they came, forty Comanches, all whooping and hollering, lances raised, a frightening spectacle indeed. Forgetting for the moment that she must guard what she said, she cried, “They aren’t attacking. He promised.” “Then what the hell are they doin’? Get outa my way!” Henry shoved her aside and resighted his rifle. “He promised? She’s touched, Rachel! They messed her up in the head, keepin’ her all this time.” Loretta ran for the door. “He isn’t attacking! I know he isn’t. Please, don’t shoot!” The bar stuck as she tried to lift it. Her heart began to slam as she wrestled with it. A vision of Hunter lying dead in the yard flashed through her head. This was exactly what she had dreaded might happen, what she’d tried to explain to him last night. “Please, Uncle Henry--he promised me. And he wouldn’t make a lie of it, he wouldn’t, I know he wouldn’t!” The bar finally came free. “Don’t shoot him, don’t!” Throwing the door wide, Loretta ran out onto the porch. The Comanches were circling the house. She ran to the end of the porch and saw a lance embedded in the dirt fifteen feet away. Hi, hites, hello, my friend. Her knees went weak with relief. “Uncle Henry,” she cried over her shoulder, “they’re marking the property. Protecting us! Don’t shoot or you’ll cause a bloodbath for sure!” She ran to the window and peered in the crack at her uncle. “Did you hear me? If they were wanting to murder somebody, I’d be dead.” She turned back to watch as the Comanches widened their circle to mark the outer perimeters of Henry’s land. Tears stung her eyes. Hunter was leaving a message to every Indian in the whole territory: those at this farm were not to be attacked. Within minutes the braves had driven all forty willow lances into the dirt and ridden to the crest of the hill. Loretta shaded her brow, trying to find Hunter in the swarm. Recognizing him from the rest at this distance was impossible. Then they disappeared over the rise. Loretta stared at the empty knoll, her chest aching, her knees still shaking. “Good-bye, my friend,” she whispered. As if he had heard her, Hunter reappeared alone on the rise. Bringing his stallion to a halt, he straightened and lifted his head, forming a dark silhouette, his quiver and arrows jutting up above his shoulder, his shield braced on his thigh, his long hair drifting in the wind. Forgetting all about her family watching her, Loretta stumbled down the steps and out into the yard to be sure Hunter could see her. Then she waved. In answer, he raised his right arm high in a salute. He remained there for several seconds, and she stood rooted, memorizing how he looked. When he wheeled his horse and disappeared, she stared after him for a long while. I will know the song your heart sings, eh? And you will know mine.

The family crest of none other than Professor James Moriarty.” The very name filled me with fear, and my trousers with something that was certainly not fear.

How in fifteen years I’d bring my family to this same white bench and the four of us would eat ice-cream cones while I told them the story of the time I’d been here once before, when I’d finished walking a long way on something called the Pacific Crest Trail. And how it would be only then that the meaning of my hike would unfold inside of me, the secret I’d always told myself finally revealed.O

The Involuntary Princeling by Stewart Stafford The candle's blaze grows distant fast, Quenched to an ember spark, unseen, Carriage taken in larceny's grasp, Darkness made far bank unclean. Daubing a sovereign slogan, In violet shadows unmasked, A delinquent reunion reprieved, A doggerel name outcast. Trade winds howl to storming, As fireballs 'neath seas seek to atone, The red-crowned crest now stakes its claim, On writhed Rosetta's key stone. © Stewart Stafford, 2024. All rights reserved.

I wanted to talk to Karen or Leif or Eddie. I wanted to have a family again, to be folded into something I believed was safe from destruction. Right alongside my longing for them, I felt something as hot as hate for each of them now. I imagined a big machine like the one that had mawed up this forest mawing up our forty acres in the Minnesota woods. I wished with all my heart that it really would. I would be free then, it seemed. Because we had not been safe from destruction after my mom died, total destruction would come now as a relief. The loss of my family and home were my own private clear-cut. What remained was only ugly evidence of a thing that was no more.

It was good. It was like something inordinately beautiful and out of this world. Like I’d found an actual planet that I didn’t know had been there all along. Planet Heroin. The place where there was no pain, where it was unfortunate but essentially okay that my mother was dead and my biological father was not in my life and my family had collapsed and I couldn’t manage to stay married to a man I loved.

He’s quite taken with you. Mirryn hadn’t been talking about the masked man from the gallows parading as a prince, the rogue who had flirted with Kiva in the infirmary. She’d been talking about her brother—her real brother—who had been wearing a dirty tunic and standing in the crowd. The same brother who had kept Kiva from falling to her death and then infused fire magic into his family’s crest, making Mirryn, his sister, deliver it.

There was something about the slightly flattened tone of voice in which Sirius uttered Dumbledore’s name that told Harry that Sirius was not very happy with the headmaster either. Harry felt a sudden upsurge of affection for his godfather. “At least you’ve known what’s been going on,” he said bracingly. “Oh yeah,” said Sirius sarcastically. “Listening to Snape’s reports, having to take all his snide hints that he’s out there risking his life while I’m sat on my backside here having a nice comfortable time . . . asking me how the cleaning’s going —” “What cleaning?” asked Harry. “Trying to make this place fit for human habitation,” said Sirius, waving a hand around the dismal kitchen. “No one’s lived here for ten years, not since my dear mother died, unless you count her old house-elf, and he’s gone round the twist, hasn’t cleaned anything in ages —” “Sirius?” said Mundungus, who did not appear to have paid any attention to this conversation, but had been minutely examining an empty goblet. “This solid silver, mate?” “Yes,” said Sirius, surveying it with distaste. “Finest fifteenth-century goblin-wrought silver, embossed with the Black family crest.” “That’d come off, though,” muttered Mundungus, polishing it with his cuff. “Fred — George — NO, JUST CARRY THEM!” Mrs. Weasley shrieked. Harry, Sirius, and Mundungus looked around and, a split second later, dived away from the table. Fred and George had bewitched

At the crest of one of Araraquara’s many hills there was a sorvete shop run by a Japanese-Brazilian family. The family had been in business there for centuries, as their sign proclaimed, and Bean was both amused and moved by this, in light of what Carlotta had said. For this family, making flavored frozen desserts to eat from a cone or cup was the great cause that gave them continuity through the ages. What could be more trivial than that? And yet Bean came here, again and again, because their recipes were, in fact, delicious, and when he thought about how many other people for these past two or three hundred years must have paused and taken a moment’s pleasure in the sweet and delicate flavors, in the feel of the smooth sorvete in their mouths, he could not disdain that cause. They offered something that was genuinely good, and people’s lives were better because they offered it. It was not a noble cause that would get written up in the histories. But it was not nothing, either. A person could do worse than spend some large percentage of his life in a cause like that.

Even with shaggy-dog hair, Mac’s red locks are ten times nicer than mine. My shade of red is more in the Ronald McDonald family. And when I don’t style it in my signature smooth, wavy curls, I look like those Chinese crested dogs that are always getting meme’d on the internet with something cruel. Poor dears.

dealing with ambiguous loss is as practical as it is profound. Some families, especially those of us from secular Western cultures, value mastery of fate over predestination. This causes us to suffer more when facing problems that we can’t solve. But giving in to helplessness isn’t healthy either. To live within this paradox, we must walk a tightrope between our desire to feel in control and our need to endure that which we cannot master. To cope within a chaotic and mysterious world, to truly “solve” the unsolvable case, we may, on occasion

A fleur-de-lis. A family crest, maybe, and words in Latin. Ego Solus.

Maddoc is the lead, he holds the key, but never steps ahead. Royce is the warrior, he bears the crest but never tries to rule. I am the anchor, I hold the brass knuckles, the loops signifying the fusion of our family—full circles, never one stronger than the other, a reminder we are equals. Always.

If you go anywhere near Mason, I will have him arrested for statutory rape. I believe there are enough people who can testify that you’ve had intercourse with him.

Afterward, as they lay entangled and depleted, Fen drifted off into a dream about a small wooden bridge she could not cross because a man had hold of her hand and would not let go. She frowned in her sleep until she recognized the ring on his finger bore her family crest of the Bernard bear, and then she relaxed. For some reason, she could not raise her eyes to his face, but she was content to let him lead her away from the bridge, toward an oak tree that stood on a hill.

family crest above his head. “Fight until breath and blood have fled and fight again.” He didn’t feel like fighting anymore.

In 1646, the king recognized John Aylett’s heroism by adding distinguished symbols to his coat-of-arms—including a canton, the Rose of England and a crest depicting an arm holding a sword.

It took one party, only one party, and she was walking around with his shirt on the next morning.

Ho capito che non avrei voluto essere da nessuna parte se non al suo fianco, indipendentemente da dove tutto questo ci avrebbe portati. Ho intrecciato le dita alle sue e gliele ho strette. Con forza.

Perché voleva che tu fossi circondata da persone che ti ferissero, così saresti rimasta con lei. Non avresti mai saputo che al mondo ci sono anche persone buone. Neanche io sono un santo, certo, ma quando amo lo faccio con tutto il cuore.

Desidero il meglio per te. Non ho intenzione di imprigionarti. Voglio che tu ti realizzi pienamente, che trovi amici che ti siano affezionati e un lavoro che ti piaccia. Voglio che tu venga nella mia scuola e ottenga una borsa di studio per l'atletica. Voglio che tu faccia tutto questo nonostante tua madre. Se lei l'avesse vinta non arriveresti da nessuna parte.

Se io stessi con Logan e lui fosse qui, non faresti storie. So che Mason non ti piace, ma io lo amo, e in questo momento si sta comportando bene. Se pensi che gli permetterei di distrarmi mentre sto lavorando, allora dovrò dimostrarti che non sono il tipo. [...]" "Penso di essermi innamorata di te. Ora capisco perché quei due ti stanno appiccicati." Nei suoi occhi è balenato un luccichio impertinente.

of we are to believe Helen Cody Wetmore, one of William Cody's sisters, her family was descended from Spanish and Irish royalty, and were accordingly entitled to a crest. In her book Buffalo Bill, Last of the Great Scouts: The Life Story of Colonel William F. Cody, published in 1899, she wrote that her brother was "a lineal descendant of Milesius, king of Spain, that famous monarch whose three sons, Heber, Heremon, and Ir, founded the first dynasty in Ireland about the beginning of the

There is a fine breed for you, Irish-Indian. My family crest would be a Shillalah with a Tomahawk on one end.

It hit her that she was in a secret area that no one knew about, trapped with a strange boy who thought she was the Maravish princess, and she felt hot red panic begin to prickle her skin. She had to run. She tried to turn around, but he grabbed her arm. “I said wait,” he commanded, pulling her back. “Let go of me!” she screamed. She swiped at him with her free hand, but he caught it effortlessly. “Lottie—” “I will call the police,” she continued, trying to pull away from him, but she seemed to only be mildly annoying him. How is he so strong? “Lottie, please, just listen for a—” “LET GO OF ME!” She gave one final tug with all her energy and stamped down on his foot. He tried to pull his leg back but a strange static sensation shook him and the two tumbled quite ungracefully into the mud. “Eek!” Lottie fell flat on her back, immediately thinking of her poor ruined uniform and hair. She had to remind herself that these were the least of her concerns right now and that she needed to deal with the boy on top of her. She was ready to scream when a pendant around his neck fell against her chest; there was a familiar crest on it with an engraved wolf symbol. The Wolfson family crest, the same one Ellie wore.

Miller MOTTO: My hope is in God. CREST: A blue wolf's head. NAME variations include: Millar Millers

Kathleen.” He made no attempt to hide the lust in his gaze. “If you hold still, I’ll help you with your skirt. But if you run from me, you’re going to be caught.” He took an unsteady breath before adding softly, “And I’ll make you come for me again.” Her eyes turned huge. He took a deliberate step forward. She bolted across the nearest threshold and fled to the carriage room. Devon was at her heels instantly, following her past the workshop with its long carpenter’s benches and tool cupboards. The carriage room smelled pleasantly of sawdust, axle grease, lacquer varnish, and leather polish. It was quiet and shadowy, illuminated only by a row of skylights over massive hinge-strapped doors that could be opened onto the estate’s carriage drive. Kathleen darted through rows of vehicles used for different purposes; carts, wagons, a light brougham, a landau with a folding top, a phaeton, a hooded barouche for summer. Devon circled around and intercepted her beside the family coach, a huge, stately carriage that could only be pulled by six horses. It had been designed as a symbol of power and prestige, with the Ravenel family crest--a trio of black ravens on a white and gold shield--painted on the sides. Halting abruptly, Kathleen stared at him through the semidarkness. Taking the overskirt from her, Devon dropped it to the floor, and pinned her against the side of the carriage. “My riding skirt,” she exclaimed in dismay. “You’ll ruin it.” Devon laughed. “You were never going to wear it anyway.” He began to unbutton her riding jacket, while she sputtered helplessly.

Charlestown’s most characteristic pastime had long been the reckless sport of “looping.” The young “looper” played by a rigid set of rules. First, he stole a car in downtown Boston. Then he roared into Charlestown, accelerating as he reached City Square, where the District 15 police station stood in a welter of bars, nightclubs, and pool halls. Often he had to take a turn around the square before the first policeman dashed for his patrol car or motorcycle. Then the chase was on: down Chelsea Street to Hayes Square, up the long slope of Bunker Hill Street to St. Francis de Sales’ Church at the crest, then down again, picking up speed, often to 70 or 80 miles per hour, until a screeching left into Sullivan Square took him onto Main Street, where, dodging the stanchions of the El, he roared into City Square again, completing the “loop.” All that remained was to ditch the car before the police caught up. Looping was an initiation rite, proof that a Townie had come of age. But it was something else as well: a challenge flung at authority, a middle finger raised to the powers that be. Before long, looping became a kind of civic spectacle, pitting the Town’s young heroes against the forces of law and order. Plans for a loop circulated well in advance. At the appointed hour, hundreds of men, women, and children gathered along Bunker Hill Street, awaiting the gladiators. When the stolen car came in sight, racing up the long hill, a cheer would rise from the spectators, followed by jeers for the pursuing policemen. The first recorded “loop” was performed in 1925 by a sixteen-year-old daredevil named Jimmy “Speed King” Murphy, but most renowned of all was “Shiner” Sheehan, the teenage son of a federal alcohol agent, whose exploits so electrified the Town that he drew round him a group of young acolytes. Membership in their “Speeders Club” was limited to those who could produce newspaper clippings showing they had bested the police.

We stood there maybe five minutes. We didn’t say anything, because there was nothing to say. And then I heard one of the most beautiful sounds I have ever heard in my entire life, that whap! whap! whap!—the distinctive chop of a helicopter. Long before we could see this thing we could hear it claw its way up that two-thousand-foot wall, once again this same lone man rising into view. He moved up the valley with greater authority. With the same consummate skill he lay those skids down again. Not waiting, I hot-footed across there and dove into the back of this machine. They slammed the door and one more time the helicopter tail went up and we moved toward the precipice, crevasses gliding by beneath the skids. We crested the edge and then went screaming down that face with the blades whipping around above us, trying to grab hold of cold, heavy, dense air that would provide lift. The machine felt alive beneath us as it pulled us out of the dive, and we knew we were safe. We retrieved Makalu at Base Camp and put him back in. We got the copilot and put him back in. We got all the gear that Madan had stripped off this machine, and we put it back in. That’s when I discovered that when Madan returned to get me, he was flying the Squirrel on just seven minutes of fuel. Madan is to me the most extraordinary person in this story, because he didn’t know me at all. He didn’t know my family, and he has his own family, for whom he is the sole provider. We were separated by language, by culture, by religion, by the entire breadth of this world, but bound together by a bond of common humanity. This man will never have to wonder again whether he has a brave heart.

She slit the envelope with the knife and pulled out the paper. She read it quickly, with trained eyes, and she dropped it into the garbage. The chardonnay was shitty gas station wine called Hodnapp’s Harvest. Though the labels on the backs of trendier and more whimsical wines might say something like PAIRS WELL WITH DELICATE GRILLED FISH AND SPRING RISOTTO—none of the labels ever mentioned complementing string cheese, she noted—this one featured a photo of what was apparently the Hodnapp family crest. She squinted to read the calligraphic inscription below the surname: THIS WINE PAIRS WELL WITH FRIENDSHIP. She poured a third of the bottle into a coffee mug and went by herself onto the balcony to mourn her future.

Watch out. Deigh says that building on the other side of the road has a crate of something marked with Liam’s family crest,” Tairn tells me as I fire off another blast that lands nowhere near the venin. “He says it’s highly…unstable,” he finishes, pausing as he relays the information. “Not worried about the building,” I reply as the circle of death expands under Tairn’s beating wings, and I draw more power from Tairn, poising to strike again.