Kushiel's Dart Quotes

All knowledge is worth having.

That which yields is not always weak.

There is no fulfillment that is not made sweeter for the prolonging of desire

When Love cast me out, it was Cruelty who took pity upon me

It's funny, how one can look back on a sorrow one thought one might well die of at the time, and know that one had not yet reckoned the tenth part of true grief.

Oh love and hate are two sides of the same blade

Stand at the crossroads if you will, but if you'll not choose, I'll move on without you

If you will not die for us, you cannot ask us to die for you.

Yes my lord, but questions are dangerous, for they have answers

Surely if we knew what bitterness fate held in store, we would shrink back in fear and let the cup of life pass us by untasted.

To have a traitor for an ally is to have an enemy in waiting

It is my observations, though, that happiness limits the amount of suffering one is willing to inflict upon others

If I had to fall from Cassiel's grace, at least I know it took a courtesan worthy of Kings to do it.

A little truth seasons a lie like salt.

Nothing spoils idle pleasure like too much awareness

It's funny how despair can soon become an old companion

This is the secret that none dares tell who fights for a cause. Dying, we are all alike.

Truly, it is in loss that we learn a thing's true value.

Wars come and go; politics endure.

Garner knowledge, by any means possible

For this too I learned, that a storyteller's tale may end, but history goes on always. These events, so distant in legend, play a part in shaping the very events we witness about us, each and every day.

Pain obliterates everything else. In pain, there is only the eternal present.

I had begun to think my ripening body would wither untasted on the vine.

There are those who are awkward in the face of sorrow, fearing to say the wrong thing; to them, I say, there is no wrong in comfort, ever. A kind word, a consoling arm ... these things are ever welcome.

Some chains are forged for us - those are the hardest to bear.

For every victory there is a price.

Whip us 'till we're on the floor, we'll turn around and ask for more, we're Phèdre's Boys! We like to hurt, we like to bleed, daily floggings do we need, we're Phèdre's Boys! Man or woman, we don't care, give us twins we'll take the pair! We're Phèdre's Boys! ...But just because we let you beat us, doesn't mean you can defeat us, we're Phèdre's Boys!

Pain redeems all. It is the awareness of life, a reminder of death.

If I'm to be damned for what I've done, I'll be damned in full and not by halves.

Only insofar as you enjoy being sorry, my dear, which, while it is a considerable amount, occurs only after the fact, thus making it a singularly ineffective deterrent, yes?

And Kushiel sends no punishment that we are not fit to bear.

Beauty is at its most poignant when the cold hand of Death holds poised to wither it imminently.

There are those who do not hold that there is any innate goodness to mankind. To them I say, had you lived my life, you would not believe it. I have known the depths to which mortals are capable of descending, and I have seen the heights. I have seen how kindness and compassion may grow in the unlikeliest of places, as the mountain flower forces its way through the stern rock.

There is as much deception in noise as there is in silence

It is a human failing, to attribute the best of motives to those we know the least, and the worst to those we love best.

Like a falling star, he descended on the Tarbh Cró, a Cassiline berserker, his sword biting and slashing like a silver snake.

...not stories, but histories. For this too I learned, that a storyteller's tale may end, but history goes on always.

To fail and persevere is a harder test than any you will meet on the practice-field.

How do you want to die, Admiral? We are D'Angeline. At the hand of numbers, or dreams?

Alas for we who are mortal, and are denied the luxury of dramatic license. We mus live, and go onward.

for the keeping of secrets from adults is oft the only power a child may hope to possess.

You have given us a part in a story the bards will sing to our children's children.

I don't think, before that moment, that he truly grasped the nature of what I was. He knew, of course; had always known, and had been the one person who'd never cared for what, but only who I was. I saw him comprehend it now, and feared. It could change everything between us.

It is human nature, to give in hope of getting.

For every victory," Necthana whispered, her great dark eyes shining with a mother's tears, "there is a price.

The night court taught me to serve, and Delauney taught me to think; but from Melisande Shahrizai, I learned how to hate.

No two sacrifices are the same, and yet all are, in the end. It is the commitment to belong, wholly, to that which claims one.

Non sempre chi accondiscende è debole.

Quando l'Amore mi ha scacciata, è stata la Crudeltà ad avere pietà di me.

Ma al di sopra di tutto c'è l'amore. E se desideriamo essere più che umani, è quella la stella che dobbiamo seguire.

Questions are dangerous because they have answers

It must sound, I know, as if I had no pity for him; it wasn't true. I was angry because I was terrified. But there are times when a curse is more bracing than an endearment.

I never forgot, never, that it had been he who, with two words, turned my deadliest flaw to a treasure beyond price.

In the general course of things, when beauty passes, the flower bows its head upon the stem and fails. Sometimes, though, when the petals droop, a framework of tempered steel is revealed within.

If the greatest danger one faces as a slave is displeasing one's masters, this is the second: pleasing them.

All knowledge is worth having

You sang the seas calm, and you drove the Dalriada to war, whatever it took. They know that. That's why they adore you. But everyone needs to laugh in the face of death. They're following an anguissette into battle. Give them credit for seeing the absurdity of it. You've been dwelling on it long enough.

Genius requires an audience. For all his cleverness, Delaunay was an artist and as vulnerable as any of his kind to the desire to vaunt his brilliance. And there were few, very few, people capable of appreciating his art. I did not know, then, how deep-laid a game they played with each other, nor what part in it I was to play. All I knew was that she was the audience he chose.

The keeping of secrets from adults is oft the only power a child may hope to possess.

Non c'è appagamento che non sia reso più dolce dal protrarsi del desiderio.

It is my fate, it seems, to fall privy to rare and splendid vistas in a state of exhaustion too profound to care.

You're as bad as your master," he muttered, scarce audible amid the sea-sounds. "Worse. At least he didn't ply his words from a courtesan's lips.

You're better off," d'Aiglemort said dryly. "Steel and faith are an unnatural mix.

I cannot blame them, in truth, for desiring... But they were like children, who have only just begun to grasp the idea of a thing. And like children, they had no notion of laboring to create, but only of having... and no thought given to the cost, to others, of taking it.

That which yields, is not always weak. Choose your victories wisely.

„To, co se podvolí, není vždycky slabé.

Non c'è nulla che non valga la pena sapere.

La genialità ha bisogno di un pubblico.

That which yields, is not always weak.

A pretty sight; it would have surprised me, if my capacity for surprise wasn't flattened.

It was small consolation, but it would have to do. I squeezed his hand once more, in lieu of things unsaid. "Come on.

He nodded at Josceline and me. "Keep these two with you, will you? They seem to be damnably hard to kill.

a storyteller’s tale may end, but history goes on always.

All this I knew, and yet it was a different thing, to learn it from Delaunay: not stories, but histories. For this too I learned, that a storyteller's tale may end, but history goes on always. These events, so distant in legend, play a part in shaping the very events we witness about us, each and every day. When I understood this, Delaunay said, I might begin to understand.

There are those who are awkward in the face of sorrow, fearing to say the wrong thing; to them, I say, there is no wrong in comfort, ever. A kind word, a consoling arm ... these things are ever welcome.

Ci sono persone che si sentono in imbarazzo di fronte al dolore altrui e temono di dire la cosa sbagliata; a costoro dico che non si sbaglia nell'offrire conforto, mai. Una parola gentile, un abbraccio consolatorio... queste cose sono sempre bene accette.

Betimes I have heard people bewail the fact that our destinies are shrouded in mystery; I think, though, that it is a blessing of sorts. Surely if we knew what bitterness fate held in store, we would shrink back in fear and let the cup of life pass us by untasted.

You belong in Orchis House because you love to laugh in bed. Sex and love are both sources of great joy to you, and you're not too picky about it, as long as you can enjoy yourself, and enjoy your lover. You know how to bestow joy in sex, because that's what you want from your lover, too.

Young men," Melisande murmured after they had left, smiling faintly. "Such a sense of honor. Is he a little bit in love with you, do you think?" "Joscelin quite despises me," I said. "My lady." "Oh, love and hate are two sides of the same blade," she said cheerily enough, motioning for a servant to take my cloak, "and an edge finer honed than yon Cassiline's dagger divides them.

I went to him unhesitatingly. He drew me against him, his lean body clad in black velvet doublet and breeches, with the de Morhban crest on his shoulder. I felt the dark tide of desire loose in my marrow, as one hand clasped hard on my buttocks, pressing me to him, and the other grasped the nape of my neck, entangled in the mesh caul, drawing my head back. He kissed me, then, hard and ruthlessly. I had chosen this. For what had happened before, for Melisande, for Skaldi; I had repented, I had been scourged. With a relief so profound it was like pain, I surrendered to it, to this Kusheline lord, with his strong, cruel hands.

So it began. It ended as it always does, with such things; he had a full pleasure-chamber and flagellary, the Duc de Morhban, and he took me there, in the cool depths of the earth beneath his castle at the outermost edge of Terre d’Ange, setting the torches ablaze until it might as well have been Kushiel’s domain, wringing me limp with blood and sweat, his face distorted behind the lash, and the sound of my own voice, begging, pleading, as he rode me at the end, bestriding me like a colossus. He used flechettes, too. I hadn’t counted on that. A thousand deaths, of agony and pleasure, I died there in Quincel de Morhban’s chamber. He was good, better almost than any patron I had known, when at last he laid civility aside for violent pleasure, the mask of lust obscuring his features. He was a Kusheline, it was in his blood. He wanted—oh, Elua, he wanted!—to hear me give the signale. If he gave up his questions, it was for that, waiting. And if I had given it, I would have answered. But I had given the signale to one patron only, who had sundered me from myself. Quincel de Morhban could command me, shuddering, to give up my very flesh, quivering in abject climax. He could, and he did, snarling with victory. Not my signale. And in the end, his exhaustion defeated us both.

Lifting his head, Quincel de Morhban looked at me with something like awe. “It’s true,” he whispered. “What they say … Kushiel’s Dart. It’s all true.” “Yes, my lord,” I murmured; if he’d told me the moon was locked in his stables, I’d have said the same, at that moment. De Morhban released me, turning away to pluck a great silvery rose, mindful of its thorns. “You see this?” he asked, placing it in my hand and folding my fingers about the stem. “It exists nowhere else. My Namarrese-gardener bred it. Naamah’s Star, he calls it.” His hand was still around mine; he closed it, tightening my clutch on the stem. Thorns pierced my skin and I gasped, my bones turning to water. The silvery rose blossomed between us, fragrant in the torchlit night air, while blood ran, drop by slow drop, from my fist. De Morhban’s gaze held me pinioned, his body close, rigid phallus pressed against my belly. He released my hand and I sank to my knees, divining his desire, unfastening his breeches, the rose falling forgotten as I took him in my hand, his hard-veined and throbbing phallus, slick with my own warm blood, and then into my mouth. All around us his unlikely garden opened onto the night as I performed the languisement until he drew away at the end, spending himself on me, in the garden, drops of milky fluid lying on my skin, on the dark leaves and silken petals, pearlescent and salty. He groaned with pleasure, then gazed down at me, freeing my hair from the caul with a harsh twist, so that it cascaded about my shoulders and down my back. “Dinner,” he said, catching his breath. “And then I will show you my pleasure-chamber, little anguissette.

raised on

I will be your friend, then, for the ancient Hellenes said a good friend may stand between a man and his moira. Do you know what that means?' 'Fate.' I answered unthinking...

Custodire i segreti è l'unico potere che un bambino può sperare di esercitare nei confronti degli adulti.

Non c'è nulla che non valga la pena sapere

The edge between love and hate is honed finer than the keenest fletchett. She told me something like that, once, but I dared not think on such things, with her name so close to my tongue. She told me too that it was not my acquiescence that interested her, but my rebellion. That was the thing that set her apart from the others, who failed to see where it lay. That was the thing that terrified me. -Chapter 67

There is something innately pitiful about a man in vambraces spewing up his breakfast.

there is no saying how events in one place may affect what happens elsewhere, for the tapestry of history is woven of many threads.

It is my observation, though, that happiness limits the amount of suffering one is willing to inflict upon others. I like to think it might have been so.

How he did it, I do not know, for by then the cold and exhaustion were so deep in my bones that I could barely think. It wasn’t until he returned, hollow-eyed, that I realized he was worse off than I. It is a strange thing, human endurance.

It is a funny thing, how one’s perspective changes.

That which yields is not always weak

They would be heirs to the D‘Angeline throne instead, half-Pictish scions of Elua, raised to House Courcel. I will admit, for one born and bred to Terre d’Ange, it was a discomfiting thought.

frowsty

I cannot help it that Kushiel’s Dart drives me to violent desires; I am an anguissette, and destined to find my greatest pleasure mingled with pain.

This I will tell you, Star of the Evening,” he said in a cold voice, bowing formally to her, the distant tone of the dromonde in his telling. “That which yields, is not always weak. Choose your victories wisely.

Pain redeems all. It is the awareness of life, a reminder of death.

There are those who are awkward in the face of sorrow, fearing to say the wrong thing; to them, I say, there is no wrong in comfort, ever. A kind word, a consoling arm … these things are ever welcome. Grainne

Nothing, perhaps. But there is no saying how events in one place may affect what happens elsewhere, for the tapestry of history is woven of many threads. We needs must study the whole warp and weft of it to predict the pattern on the loom.