Swan The Warriors Quotes

That was ridiculous," I told Dorian, once she'd left. "She's not the kind of person to fall for your flirting." "On the contrary," said Dorian. "She's exactly the kind of person to fall for it. I understand these warrior maids, you know. They live such harsh, cold lives, always trying to keep up with the men... when really, they just need someone to make them feel like a woman. And that, of course, is an area in which I excel. Why, if I'd had ten minutes alone with her—

A villain. The enemy. Sandor watched Sophie tug on her eyelashes—her nervous habit, back in full force. “Nothing is going to happen,” he promised, tucking her blond hair behind her ear with a surprisingly gentle touch for a seven-foot-tall goblin warrior. It definitely helped having Sandor back at her side—especially after almost losing him during the battle on Mount Everest. And Sandor wasn’t the only goblin at Foxfire anymore. Each of the six wings in the main campus building had been assigned its own patrol, with two additional squadrons keeping watch over the sprawling grounds. The Council had also added security throughout the Lost Cities. They had to. The ogres were still threatening war. And in the three weeks since Sophie and her friends had returned from hiding with the Black Swan, the Neverseen had scorched the main gate of the Sanctuary and broken into the registry in Atlantis. Sophie could guess what the rebels had hoped to gain from the elves’ secret animal preserve—they obviously didn’t know that she’d convinced the Council to set the precious alicorns free. But the registry attack remained a mystery. The Councillors kept careful records on every elf ever born, and no one would tell her if any files had been altered or stolen. A bubble popped on Sophie’s head, and Sandor caught the box of Prattles that had been hovering inside. “If you’re going to eat these, I should check them first,” he told her. Sandor’s wide, flat nose scented no toxins in the nutty candy, but he insisted on examining the pin before handing them over. Every box of Prattles came with a special collectible inside, and in the past, the Black

NBA players made roughly the same percentage of shots from 23 feet as they did from 24. But because the three-point line ran between them, the values of those two shots were radically different. Shot attempts from 23 feet had an average value of 0.76 points, while 24-footers were worth 1.09. This, the Warriors concluded, was an opportunity. By moving back a few inches before shooting, a basketball player could improve his rate of return by 43 percent.41

A swan-maiden came and filled the young sailor’s cup. She bowed her head and went to leave, but before she could Batward grabbed her arm. “A cup for me, too, if you don’t mind,” said the warrior. “Please.” “Are you sure?” asked the woman. Batward nodded. “For too long have I rested these feet on firm land. The sea; she calls to me. I am ready.” “As you wish, m’lord.” The maiden filled Batward’s cup, and then the man stood and raised it high. “A toast to me, and a parting glass to you all — for this drink shall, in Seolho’s fine hall, be my last.” The guests did not cheer or hoot at Batward’s words, for it was known that he had arrived at the hall long before the rest of them. Instead, they bowed their heads and raised a solemn toast. Batward gave a nod to Seolho, and the prince nodded back. And the next day, as the gulls called at dawn, Batward was gone. For a sailor cannot be kept from the sea for long.

In fact, Odin is not alone in having valkyries in his service. Analysis of the texts and of the attested valkyrie names reveals that these women can be sorted into three major groups: some are indisputably warriors and bear the names of fighters (“Battle,” “Force,” “Paralyzing,” etc.), others have “feminine”-sounding names, and the last group, which is the least numerous, has names associated with fate. 37 The goddess Freya has a right to half of those who die on the battlefield (valr), while the other half are reserved for Odin; furthermore, this goddess is also a swan maiden. I should add that because of the theme of transformation into swans, water is also closely associated with these mythological legends. We are still evolving in the same great complex of representations: elves/water–death–life–Third Function. One final detail we may point out: the valkyries do not shun the love of men (cf. Brynhildr, who disobeys Odin on account of her love for Helgi), and a very ancient belief, which we see crop up more recently in the writings of Paracelsus, is that water sprites are the closest of such elemental spirits to humans and the most apt to form unions with them.

Luke was a wizard and a warrior. Not—ever—a ladies’ man,

She pulled the shell of a cicada from a pine tree’s trunk, turned it over to show the neat slit down the belly where, having grown, it had wriggled out of its old self into something new. And she told him stories. Stories about warriors and princesses, poor brave girls and boys, monsters and magicians. The brother and sister who outwitted the witch and found their way home. The girl who saved her swan-brothers from enchantment. Ancient myths that made sense of the world: why sunflowers nod, why echoes linger, why spiders spin. Stories her mother had told her in childhood, before she stopped speaking of such things: how once there had been nine suns, baking the earth to dust, until a brave archer shot them one by one out of the sky. How the monkey king tricked his way into the heavenly garden to steal the peaches of immortality. How once a year, two lovers, forever separated, crossed a river of stars to meet in midair.

This is a warrior before me and he is the most terrifyingly beautiful thing I have ever seen.

I kept thinking about my grandfather, and his childhood. By his bed he had always kept the most striking photograph of his mother. She is almost warrior-like in that picture, gazing past the camera towards a place unknown. Piercing eyes, a long neck – taut, like a swan’s – an air of the otherworldly in her stance. I both loved and hated that image, that woman. Her ancestral draw was so extreme that it called to me, siren-like, even through the cheap and flimsy paper that could never dare to capture her on its surface. There is a restlessness to her hands, a hunger in the way she holds herself. Despite the black and white of the print, there is no sense of her being in the shadows. After he died I printed a copy of that picture of my grandfather’s mother and put it up in the bathroom of my flat. A desire came over me to be able to see her when I wanted to, to nurture an odd sense of intimacy with the image of her –

The ambassador is more warrior than any member of the general staff. By the power of his words alone are entire nations disassembled.