Pax Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Pax. Here they are! All 100 of them:

You do not follow me because I am the strongest. Pax is. You do not follow me because I am the brightest. Mustang is. You follow me because you do not know where you are going. I do.
Pierce Brown (Red Rising (Red Rising Saga, #1))
You traumatized Pax, by the way. He's crying. Good work.
Pierce Brown (Red Rising (Red Rising Saga, #1))
He uncovered the boat, his hands working the knots like he'd been doing it his whole life. Under the tarp was an old steel rowboat with no oars. The boat had been painted dark blue at one point, but the hull was so crusted with tar and salt it looked like one massive nautical bruise. On the bow, the name Pax was still readable, lettered in gold. Painted eyes drooped sadly at the water level, as if the boat were about to fall asleep. On board were two benches, some steel wool, an old cooler, and a mound of frayed rope with one end tied to the mooring. At the bottom of the boat, a plastic bag and two empty Coke cans floated in several inches of scummy water. "Behold," Frank said. "The mighty Roman navy.
Rick Riordan (The Son of Neptune (The Heroes of Olympus, #2))
Matthew held out his hands. “Pax,” he said, wheedlingly. “Let it be peace between us. You can pour the rest of the port on my head.” James’ mouth curved up into a smile. It was impossible to stay angry with Matthew. It was almost impossible to get angry at Matthew.
Cassandra Clare (Chain of Gold (The Last Hours, #1))
Because I am exactly where I should be, doing exactly what I should be doing. That is peace.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
The plain truth can be the hardest thing to see when it's about yourself. If you don't want to know the truth, you'll do anything to disguise it.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
When the church takes affairs of the state more seriously than they do Jesus, Pax Romana becomes its gospel and the president becomes the Son of God.
Shane Claiborne (Jesus for President: Politics for Ordinary Radicals)
Sometimes the apple rolls very far from the tree.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
I’m still having trouble convincing Pax that underwear and pants go together – underwear is not pants!
Angelina Jolie
Pax amor et lepos in iocando. Latin for Peace, love and sense of fun.
Julie Andrews Edwards (The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles)
Pax is worth anything.
Courtney Cole (If You Stay (Beautifully Broken, #1))
I howl for my wife, for my father. For Ragnar and Quinn and Pax and Narol. For all the people I've lost. For all they would take. I howl because I am a Helldiver of Lykos. I am the Reaper of Mars. And I have paid for access to this bunker with my flesh, all so that I might either die with my friends or see our enemies brought to justice.
Pierce Brown (Morning Star (Red Rising Saga, #3))
I disbelieved what he was saying so hard that I probably created an alternate universe where it wasn't true.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
no matter how bad things got, we could always make ourselves new again.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax)
Of course. I don't want you to go through that alone. If something hurt you enough to make you want to forget it, I want to help you get through it. let's chase these dreams away, Pax.
Courtney Cole (If You Stay (Beautifully Broken, #1))
We all own a beast called anger. It can serve us: many good things come of anger at bad things; many unjust things are made just. But first we all have to figure out how to civilize it.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax)
I don't want to start over again," she says slowly. "I like what we had. I don't want to re-do it. I love you, Pax. But I don't know if I can handle it if you leave me like that again. You shut me out and i couldn't help you. That's not what people do when they love someone. You ripped my heart out and stomped on it.
Courtney Cole (If You Stay (Beautifully Broken, #1))
You are not an alcoholic or an addict. You are not incurably diseased. You have merely become dependent on substances or addictive behavior to cope with underlying conditions that you are now going to heal, at which time your dependency will cease completely and forever.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
She's the reason I came to your house, remember? She called me or I wouldn't have known that things were so bad. She loves you, Pax. And if there's anything that you should take away from this is that you need to live for today. Tomorrow is not promised to you.
Courtney Cole (If You Stay (Beautifully Broken, #1))
So which is it? You going back for your home or for your pet? They're the same thing, Peter said, the answer sudden and sure, although a surprise to him.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
...on the job there was nothing but the job. You left the shit outside the door. You could always pick it up on your way back out.
Laurell K. Hamilton (Obsidian Butterfly (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #9))
Bombs and bullets alone cannot destroy India, because Indians will pick their way through the rubble and carry on as they have done throughout history.
Shashi Tharoor (Pax Indica: India and the World of the Twenty-first Century)
Oh, let me tell you, feelings are all dangerous. Love, hope... Ha! Hope! You talk about dangerous, eh? No, you can't avoid any of them. We all own a beast called anger. It can serve us: many good things come out of anger at bad things; many unjust things are made just. But first we all have to figure out how to civilize it.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
You going back for your home or for your pet?” “They’re the same thing,
Sara Pennypacker (Pax)
She didn't drink wine, and even if she did, I didn't know if red or white was appropriate for telling a woman that you want to kill her former lover. Do they have greeting cards for that sort of thing?
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
You do not follow me because I am the strongest. Pax is. You do not follow me because I am the brightest. Mustang is. You follow me because you do not know where you are going. I do.
Pierce Brown (Red Rising (Red Rising Saga, #1))
Do you think anyone in the history of this world ever set out to fight for the wrong side?
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
Popular young adult novels notwithstanding, vampires only sparkle when they burn.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
Education stems from the desire to learn. With that, you don't need schools. Without it, all the schools in the UNIVERSE are useless.
Gene Brewer (K-Pax (K-Pax, #1))
Son, you were your mother's peace. You brought her so much peace and joy from the very first time she held you, that she knew she had to name you Pax. Your mother loved you more than anything in the world. She would have gladly given her life a hundred times over to keep you safe. Whatever you do, just live a good life for her. She had so many hopes for you. But when it boils down to it, all she would want is for you to be happy.
Courtney Cole (If You Stay (Beautifully Broken, #1))
I began asking myself just what my high was about. What did I do when I was high that I didn't do when I was sober? What was wrong that heroin fixed?
Pax Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
Fact: I don't know of a single girl who doesn't wish the show-it-all boxer-shorts phenomenon would go away as well. Guys, we just don't want to see your underwear. Truthfully, we believe that there is a direct correlation between how much underwear you show and how much you've got upstairs, if you know what I mean.
Lisa Samson (Hollywood Nobody (Hollywood Nobody, #1))
The woman set Sig's chocolate orgy out in front of her and deposited my steak on the table. "Y'all must work out," the waitress observed a little sourly. She apparently did not. "I'm going to throw this up later," Sig said expressionlessly. "I have a tapeworm," I said cheerfully.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
There's nothing like love or incumbent death to make you realize how many things you still want to do.
Monica La Porta (Pax in the Land of Women (The Ginecean Chronicles, #2))
War,” Pax said, “either dulls the mind to despair or sharpens it toward intuitive truths.
Dean Koontz (Ashley Bell)
No, I’m not.” “Yes, you are.” “No, I’m not.” “Yes, you are.” “I said Pax Non.” “You said Pax.” “No, I didn’t.” “Yes, you did.” “No, I didn’t.” “Yes, you did.
T.H. White (The Once and Future King (The Once and Future King, #1-4))
This war that is coming—are you sure it will harm all in its path? Even the youth? Everything. It will destroy everything. Pax
Sara Pennypacker (Pax)
The debate over the inherent benefits of Pax Americana should have been settled long ago. But history only settles great debates for as long as people can remember the history.
Bret Stephens (America in Retreat: The New Isolationism and the Coming Global Disorder)
I'm counting on that," Mila murmurs as she steps away. "I just need some time Pax; time for you to show that you are serious about this, about putting the work in. That's all I need.
Courtney Cole (If You Stay (Beautifully Broken, #1))
We’ve been stuck in one species since our Cro-Magnon ancestors helped to wipe out the smarter Neanderthals,” she said. “Now it’s our chance to diversify rapidly, and institutions like the Hegemony, the Pax, and the Core are stopping it.
Dan Simmons (The Rise of Endymion (Hyperion Cantos, #4))
And it is awful here, there is no other way to say it. But I believe that Detroit is America’s city. It was the vanguard of our way up, just as it is the vanguard of our way down. And one hopes the vanguard of our way up again. Detroit is Pax Americana...America’s way of life was built here.
Charlie LeDuff (Detroit: An American Autopsy)
Oneness is always growing in the world, boy. Two but not two. It's always there, connecting its roots, humming. I can't be part of it--that's the price I pay for taking myself away. But you can be. You can vibrate with its heartbeat. You may be on your own. But you won't be alone.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
A false hope gives only false comfort.
Gene Brewer (K-PAX The Trilogy (K-PAX, #1-3))
Treatment for dependency at substance abuse treatment centers must change if alcoholism and addiction are to be overcome in our society.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
Because I am exactly where I should be, doing exactly what I should be doing. That is peace. Eat.” Peter
Sara Pennypacker (Pax)
but distrust is no match for kindness administered consistently and unmeasured, especially in creatures new to the world.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
If you can stop using substance or stop your addictive behavior for extended periods of time without craving, you are not dependent. You are dependent only if you can't stop without physical or psychological distress (you have unpleasant physical and/or psychological withdrawal symptoms) or if you stop and then relapse.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
Heroin was a coping mechanism that I had used to deal with my underlying fears. They were the real problems; heroin wasn't the culprit, my fears were.
Pax Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
Eso es política, y la política es estúpida. Ante un problema, una conducta racional sería tratar de solucionarlo, pero la solución política siempre será negar su existencia.
Yeyo Balbás (Pax romana)
Tailgate: Ooh! Ooh! What about Orion Pax? What happened to him? Chromedome: Orion Pax? Tailgate: He was GREAT! I really liked him. "I trust him, Roller. End of conversation." I'M gonna start saying stuff like that.
James Roberts (The Transformers: More Than Meets the Eye, Volume 3)
She smiled sinisterly. Light mist started to slowly swirl around us. All I could see was her, the tall rocks and the white wall. She beckoned to me. I took a step and another. I was now ankle deep into the water. The mysterious girl smiled like a predator.
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
I was slightly thankful when Mom finally came out and unlocked the car. It was warm and toasty inside and it smelt like home. There was not the slightest smell of something that didn’t belong home.
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
Why do human beings have the peculiar impression that belief is the same as truth?" "Because sometimes the truth hurts. Sometimes we need to believe in a better truth." "What better truth can there be than truth?
Gene Brewer (K-PAX The Trilogy (K-PAX, #1-3))
It's a Buddhist concept. Nonduality. It's about oneness, about how things that seem to be separate are really connected to one another. There are no separations...This is not just a piece of wood. This is also the clouds that brought the rain that watered the tree, and the birds that nested in it and the squirrels that fed on its nuts. It is also the food my grandparents fed me that made me strong enough to cut the tree, and it's the steel in the axe I used. And it's how you know your fox, which allowed you to carve him yesterday. And it's the story you will tell your children when you give this to them. All these things are separate but also one, inseparable. Do you see?
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
Next time when I dive into the territory that I had lived next to, where my sister grew up, I know what to expect. I would be ready. I would be prepared.
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
Sig idly stuck her index finger in her cup of steaming-hot coffee and stirred it. I couldn't decide it it was mildly erotic or mildly disgusting.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
I knew that it was impossible for us to be kept apart for too long.
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
Peter shifted his backpack and crutches. He took a step toward the bus. Then he turned back. "I'm family?" "That's as true a thing as I've ever known. Now get on that bus.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
What good does it do you to love?
Trisha Leigh (Summer Ruins (The Last Year, #4))
There is no cell culture for depression. You can't see it on a bone scan or an x-ray. Not everyone with depression will show the same behavioral symptoms.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
I live like a Nazi war criminal or a serial killer... like I have something to be ashamed of.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
I wanted to live, and the knowledge filled me with a fierce and exultant joy until I felt like flame in a world made of paper. I wanted to live.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
If you don’t want to know the truth, you’ll do anything to disguise it.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax)
I am the biggest and most powerful creature on Pax, and the most dangerous, and I have made mistakes I cannot rectify. But I meant well. I meant greater happiness for all. I meant to create a new and different and better life. I thought I would not repeat the past. I failed.
Sue Burke (Semiosis (Semiosis Duology, #1))
It always seemed like a snake to him, his anxiety. Waiting just out of sight, ready to slither up his spine, hissing its familiar taunt: “You aren’t where you should be. Something bad is going to happen because you aren’t where you should be.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
Everyone, Pax believed, was more than she or he appeared to be, and one of the saddest things about the human condition was that most people never realized what talents, capacities, and depth they possessed. That Pogo had taken a full measure of himself must be one reason that Bibi so loved him.
Dean Koontz (Ashley Bell)
I spent the rest of that day and most of the night thinking about all the hundreds of people I had met in rehabs and sober living houses and on the streets. We were all medicating our fears and our pain!
Pax Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
Sig is like that. She tends to have an “it takes a village” attitude toward monster hunting. I have mostly hunted supernatural predators alone, partly because I had no choice and partly because I’m an idiot.
Elliott James (Fearless (Pax Arcana #3))
I'm a mean mother-hmmnhmmnh man of God," she informed me. "Except that I'm a woman, of course." "You just quoted something, didn't you?" I asked. "Yes, I did," Molly agreed. She seemed calm but her heart was beating fat. "From Dusk Till Dawn. Its a vampire movie with George Clooney." "Is it too late to get a different priest?" Choo wondered. "Like maybe one who quotes The Bible?
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
Pinky: I've been in this kind of situation before. Fourth finger: I've felt these feelings before. Middle finger: I've survived them every time. Index finger: Everybody dies eventually. Thumb: That includes my enemies.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
Molly reached over and patted my shoulder. “It’s OK, sweetie. I’m a lesbian.” “That’s it. I definitely want myself a new priest,” Choo said. “Episcopalians will let anybody in,” Molly agreed. “It’s all the drinking that goes on at our conferences. Half the time when our bishops are raising their hands to vote, they think they’re ordering another scotch.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
It's the causes, not the dependent person, that must be corrected. That's why I see the United States' War on Drugs as being fought in an unrealistic manner. This war is focused on fighting drug dealers and the use of drugs here and abroad, when the effort should be primarily aimed at treating and curing that causes that compel people to reach for drugs.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
Mr. Herriton, don’t – please, Mr. Herriton – a dentist. His father’s a dentist.” Philip gave a cry of personal disgust and pain. He shuddered all over, and edged away from his companion. A dentist! A dentist at Monteriano. A dentist in fairyland! False teeth and laughing gas and the tilting chair at a place which knew the Etruscan League, and the Pax Romana, and Alaric himself, and the Countess Matilda, and the Middle Ages, all fighting and holiness, and the Renaissance, all fighting and beauty! He thought of Lilia no longer. He was anxious for himself: he feared that Romance might die.
E.M. Forster (Where Angels Fear to Tread)
You can take a flyin’ leap off a space dock.
M. Pax (The Backworlds (The Backworlds, #1))
Have you lost your mind? What have I told you Charlie about whales? You can’t MANHANDLE THEM!
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
I could have drowned today. If they hadn’t been screaming my name so loudly and if I hadn’t woken up, I would have drowned.
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
Although nobody could ever know about our friendship, that wasn’t going to stop us from being together.
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
She snorted in amusement at my remark. “When are the guards going to start to notice?” Keith peered into the distance. “Starting now,
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
La gente tiene miedo, teme por su seguridad y la de los suyos. Y está dispuesta a renunciar a cualquier cosa, incluso a su propia libertad, con tal de que alguien se la garantice.
Yeyo Balbás (Pax romana)
It takes a strong person to stand up to his or her fate and overcome the obstacles that stand in the way of freedom and success, but I believe in you.
Pax Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
Vola: So which is it? You going back for your home or for your pet? Peter: They're the same thing.
Sara Pennypacker (Pax (Pax #1))
We all own a beast called anger. It
Sara Pennypacker (Pax)
The other one was filled with loud and obnoxious tourists. Always boasting on winning a sand castle competition and seeing who could get tanned first. What a whacky bunch of people.
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
Alcohol and drugs are not the problems; they are what people are using to help themselves cope with the problems. Those problems always have both physical and psychological components- anything from anemia, hypoglycemia, or a sluggish thyroid to attention deficient disorder, brain-wave pattern imbalances, or deep emotional pain.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
People who are dependent are merely using alcohol as a crutch to get through the day. Yet doctors and scientists are still treating "alcoholism" as if it is the problem, when it has nothing to do with the problem. They might as well be studying "scratchism" for people who have a chronic itch.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
He sent it flying at full speed. It jumped six times as well, sending ripples across the sea. The small splashes of foam turned into miniature rainbows as they caught the light of the evening sun setting behind the clouds.
Erica Sehyun Song (The Pax Valley)
The motto was ‘Pax’, but the word was set in a circle of thorns. Pax: peace, but what a strange peace, made of unremitting toil and effort, seldom with a seen result; subject to constant interruptions, unexpected demands, short sleep at nights, little comfort, sometimes scant food; beset with disappointments and usually misunderstood, yet peace all the same, undeviating, filled with joy and gratitude and love. “It is My own peace I give unto you.” Not, notice, the world’s peace.
Rumer Godden
The Prayer of the Middle-Aged Man Amid the doctors in the Temple at twelve, between mother & host at Cana implored too soon, in the middle of disciples, the midst of the mob, between High-Priest and Procurator, among the occupiers, between the malefactors, and 'stetit in medio, et dixit, pax vobis' and 'ascensit ad mediam Personarum et caelorum,' dear my Lord,mercy a sinner nailed dead-centre too, pray not to late,- for also Ezra stood between the seven & the six, restoring the new Law.
John Berryman (Delusions, Etc.)
My army cries in protest. They don’t understand. Golds don’t do this. Golds don’t sacrifice for one another. Leaders take; they do not give. My army cries out again. I ask them, how is this worse than the rape they were all so comfortable with? Is not Nyla now one of us? Is she not part of the body? Like Reds are. Like Obsidians are. Like all the Colors are. Pax tries to go light. But it’s Pax, so when he’s done, my back looks like chewed goatmeat. I stand up. Do everything I can to prevent myself from wobbling. I’m seeing stars. I want to wail. Want to cry. Instead, I tell them that anyone who does anything vile—they know what I mean—will have to whip me like this in front of the entire army. I see how they look at Tactus now, how they look at Pax, how they look at my back. “You do not follow me because I am the strongest. Pax is. You do not follow me because I am the brightest. Mustang is. You follow me because you do not know where you are going. I do.” I motion Tactus to come toward me. He wavers, pale, confused as a newborn lamb. Fear marks his face. Fear of the unknown. Fear of the pain I willingly bore. Fear when he realizes how different he is from me. “Don’t be afraid,” I tell him. I pull him forward into a hug. “We are blood brothers, you little shit. Blood brothers.” I’m learning.
Pierce Brown (Red Rising (Red Rising Saga, #1))
I was sad but it felt like the sadness was pouring out of me instead of poisoning me. I felt like I had been sleeping in the dark, not knowing I was in a coffin until someone pried the lid off. It hurt, but it was good, the way love is supposed to be.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
I reached my hand out and held it palm open next to hers, and after a moments hesitation she took my hand and squeezed it. I felt absurdly happy. We were a couple of badass monster killers all right. Maybe on the way back to Choo's she'd let me buy her an ice cream cone.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
Think about the stigma that is attached to the idea that alcoholism is a disease, an incurable illness, and you have it. That's a terrible thing to inflict on someone. Labeling alcoholism as a disease, a cause unto itself, simply no longer fits with what we know today about its causes.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
The advertise their products in such a fashion as to make it seem wonderful to drink their ethanol products. It does not matter if they give their products fancy name like Cabernet Sauvignon or Pinot Noir, or if they put bubbles in an ethanol product and call it champagne or beer- everyone is selling ethanol.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
Most humans subscribe to the policy of 'an eye for an eye, a life for a life'. Many of your religions are famous for this formula, which is well known throughout the UNIVERSE for its stupidity. Your christ and your buddah had a different vision, but nobody paid any attention to them, not even the christians and buddhists.
Gene Brewer (K-Pax (K-Pax, #1))
TEN THINGS THAT PEOPLE WHO DIDN'T READ THE FIRST BOOK REALLY OUGHT TO KNOW. I. One day, your father and mother were hugging, and they began to have special feelings. Warm feelings that tingled in their private places. It is likely they weren't wearing any clothes. At any rate, they began to rub against each other like two sticks trying to start a fire, and nine months later, you were born. If this is news to you, please put this book down now. There may well be big bad wolves and evil witches and fairies in the pages that follow, but I promise you, this isn't a children's story.
Elliott James (Daring (Pax Arcana, #2))
Have you ever tried to use your eyes to tell someone that you want them, that because of them you're going to do the best you can to survive but that you're willing to die if that's the cost of putting yourself between them and anything that means them harm? That you don't care if they're playing you, or if what you have is really love, or if the two of you have a shot at lasting, that the very fact that they exist has made you come back to life in some way that's terrifying and exhilarating? A few seconds isn't long enough, especially when the person you're looking at is staring back as if she wants to pull you inside her and crush the two of you into one being.
Elliott James (Charming (Pax Arcana, #1))
Nehru, speaking of his country’s dreams, said: ‘Those dreams are for India, but they are also for the world, for all the nations and peoples are too closely knit together today for any one of them to imagine that it can live apart. Peace has been said to be indivisible; so is freedom, so is prosperity now, and so also is disaster in this One World that can no longer be split into isolated fragments.’ It
Shashi Tharoor (Pax Indica: India and the World of the Twenty-first Century)
We recognize that you've used substances to try to regain your lost balance, to try to feel the way you did before the need arose to use addictive drugs or alcohol. We know that you use substances to alter your mood, to cover up your sadness, to ease your heartbreak, to lighten your stress load, to blur your painful memories, to escape your hurtful reality, or to make your unbearable days or nights bearable.
Chris Prentiss (The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery)
We must not be deluded into making concessions, whether on Kashmir or any other issue, in the naive expectation that these would end the hostility of the ISI and its cohorts. We must understand that Pakistan’s fragile sense of self-worth rests on its claim to be superior to India, stronger and more valiant than India, richer and more capable than India. This is why the killers of 26/11 struck the places they did, because their objective was not only to kill and destroy, but also to pull down India’s growth, tarnish its success story and darken its lustre in the world. The more we grow and flourish in the world, the more difficult we make it for the Pakistani military to sustain its myth of superiority or even parity. There are malignant forces in Islamabad who see their future resting upon India’s failure. These are not motives we can easily overcome.
Shashi Tharoor (Pax Indica: India and the World of the Twenty-first Century)
I ask him if he tried to rape Nyla. “Laws are silent in times of war,” Tactus drawls. “Don’t quote Cicero to me,” I say. “You are held to a higher standard than a marauding centurion.” “In that, you’re hitting the mark at least. I am a superior creature descended from proud stock and glorious heritage. Might makes right, Darrow. If I can take, I may take. If I do take, I deserve to have. This is what Peerless believe.” “The measure of a man is what he does when he has power,” I say loudly. “Just come off it, Reaper,” Tactus drawls, confident in himself as all like him are. “She’s a spoil of war. My power took her. And before the strong, bend the weak.” “I’m stronger than you, Tactus,” I say. “So I can do with you as I wish. No?” He’s silent, realizing he’s fallen into a trap. “You are from a superior family to mine, Tactus. My parents are dead. I am the sole member of my family. But I am a superior creature to you.” He smirks at that. “Do you disagree?” I toss a knife at his feet and pull my own out. “I beg you to voice your concerns.” He does not pick his blade up. “So, by right of power, I can do with you as I like.” I announce that rape will never be permitted, and then I ask Nyla the punishment she would give. As she told me before, she says she wants no punishment. I make sure they know this, so there are no recriminations against her. Tactus and his armed supporters stare at her in surprise. They don’t understand why she would not take vengeance, but that doesn’t stop them from smiling wolfishly at one another, thinking their chief has dodged punishment. Then I speak. “But I say you get twenty lashes from a leather switch, Tactus. You tried to take something beyond the bounds of the game. You gave in to your pathetic animal instincts. Here that is less forgivable than murder; I hope you feel shame when you look back at this moment fifty years from now and realize your weakness. I hope you fear your sons and daughters knowing what you did to a fellow Gold. Until then, twenty lashes will serve.” Some of the Diana soldiers step forward in anger, but Pax hefts his axe on his shoulder and they shrink back, glaring at me. They gave me a fortress and I’m going to whip their favorite warrior. I see my army dying as Mustang pulls off Tactus’s shirt. He stares at me like a snake. I know what evil thoughts he’s thinking. I thought them of my floggers too. I whip him twenty brutal times, holding nothing back. Blood runs down his back. Pax nearly has to hack down one of the Diana soldiers to keep them from charging to stop the punishment. Tactus barely manages to stagger to his feet, wrath burning in his eyes. “A mistake,” he whispers to me. “Such a mistake.” Then I surprise him. I shove the switch into his hand and bring him close by cupping my hand around the back of his head. “You deserve to have your balls off, you selfish bastard,” I whisper to him. “This is my army,” I say more loudly. “This is my army. Its evils are mine as much as yours, as much as they are Tactus’s. Every time any of you commit a crime like this, something gratuitous and perverse, you will own it and I will own it with you, because when you do something wicked, it hurts all of us.” Tactus stands there like a fool. He’s confused. I shove him hard in the chest. He stumbles back. I follow him, shoving. “What were you going to do?” I push his hand holding the leather switch back toward his chest. “I don’t know what you mean …” he murmurs as I shove him. “Come on, man! You were going to shove your prick inside someone in my army. Why not whip me while you’re at it? Why not hurt me too? It’ll be easier. Milia won’t even try to stab you. I promise.” I shove him again. He looks around. No one speaks. I strip off my shirt and go to my knees. The air is cold. Knees on stone and snow. My eyes lock with Mustang’s. She winks at me and I feel like I can do anything.
Pierce Brown (Red Rising (Red Rising Saga, #1))