These Twisted Bonds Quotes

I don't care if the world hates you, I'll defend you against all of them.

Life’s fucking unfair. It wants to crush you, but you can’t let the bitch win. You’ve got to force her to play by your rules.

None of us asks for the burdens we bear, but that doesn't make the way we handle them any less significant.

Sometimes I feel like my insides are a raging flood of emotions when I look at you, but I don’t mind drowning.

Most of what she knew, she'd learned from the wild. Nature had nurtured, tutored, and protected her when no one else would. If consequences resulted from her behaving differently then they too were functions of life's fundamental core. Tate's devotion eventually convinced her that human love is more than the bizarre mating competitions of the marsh creatures. But life also taught her than ancient genes for survival still persist in undesirable forms among the twists and turns of man's genetic code. For Kya it was enough to be part of this natural sequence as sure as the tides. Kya was bonded to her planet and its life in a way few people are. Rooted solid in this earth. Born of this mother.

Those of us who love the night revel in it because of how clearly it allows us to find even the smallest points of light. Whereas they deny that darkness exists, even while the sun they worship throws shadows in every corner.

You're no princess. You're my queen.

Personal sacrifice is what makes great kings. They're willing to give up what they want for themselves in exchange for what's best for their people.

I don’t have a temper!” I snap. And pause. “I’m simply passionate.

Betrayal is a more subtle, twisted feeling than terror. It burns and eats, but terror stabs right through.

It’s unfair,” I whispered desperately. Remo downed the remaining rum. “Life’s fucking unfair. It wants to crush you, but you can’t let the bitch win. You’ve got to force her to play by your rules.

One should never tell anyone anything or give information or pass on stories or make people remember beings who have never existed or trodden the earth or traversed the world or who, having done so, are now almost safe in uncertain, one-eyed oblivion. Telling is almost always done as a gift, even when the story contains and injects some poison, it is also a bond, a granting of trust, and rare is the trust or confidence that is not sooner or later betrayed, rare is the close bond that does not grow twisted or knotted and, in the end become so tangled that a razor or knife is needed to cut it.

I shouldn't feel this way, but feelings very rarely care about should and shouldn't.

For here was the thing that no fairy tale would ever admit, but that she understood in that moment: love was not inherently good. Certainly, it could inspire goodness. She didn’t argue that. Poets would tell you that love was electricity in your veins that could light a room. That it was a river in your soul to lift you up and carry you away, or a fire inside the heart to keep you warm. Yet electricity could also fry, rivers could drown, and fires could burn; love could be destructive. Punishingly, fatally destructive. And the other thing, the real bloody clincher of it all, was that the good and the bad didn’t get served up equally. If love were a balance of electric lights and electric jolts, two sides of an equally weighted coin, then fair enough. She could deal. That wasn’t how it worked, though. Some love was just the bad, all the time: an endless parade of electrified bones and drowned lungs and hearts that burned to a cinder inside the cage of your chest. And so she looked down at her son and loved him with the kind of twisted, complex feeling that came from having never wanted him in the first place; she loved him with bitterness, and she loved him with resignation. She loved him though she knew no good could ever come from such a bond.

I am just as selfish as the males who loved Queen Gloriana. I don’t want pieces of you. I want all of you, and I won’t share.

Emotions aren't allways that simple,they are not limited by what we should or should not feel.

In a different world, in a different life, we'd be together," I whisper. "No kingdoms to rule, no people to save, just you and me and a simple life loving each other." "But we're in this world. In this life." He presses a kiss to the top of my head, and it feels like goodbye. "So I'll have to save that for my dreams.

It was strange the way that people venerated truth. Everyone seemed to strive for it, as though it were some unalloyed good, a perfect gem of glittering rectitude. Women and men might disagree about its definition, but priests and prostitutes, mothers and monks all mouthed the word with respect, even reverence. No one seemed to realize how stooped the truth could be, how twisted and how ugly.

She’s been so quiet, I almost forgot she was here. I wonder how much she learns simply because others forget she’s present.

Well...What did love do for us, other than ruin our plans?

Don't blame yourself for the cracks of a world that was distroyed far before you were born.

Nothing worth having comes easy or without a fight

Cupcakes are like sex for stress. Just a lot cleaner and slightly less pleasurable.

pull my gun from the boot. His eyebrows go up, his smirk growing, and I put it back. “But neither Chucks nor heels hide a gun,

There is only one thing I can trust, and that is that no one can be trusted.

-I'm ok. -You're not, but you'll be.

This isn’t just a kiss. It’s all the words we haven’t said written with our mouths, with our bodies. It’s unbridled anger and hope and fear and lust—all woven together and electrified.

One day I’m going to kill every single person who made you feel less. They should pray that your kindness stops me long enough.” Deadly words shouldn’t warm my heart, shouldn’t feel like the most romantic declaration of love, but with Nino they did.

I don't know how to decide who to trust in this realm, but you can learn a lot from the way someone treats those weaker than they are, those who have nothing to offer them.

Remo was Las Vegas. Remo was the Camorra. Remo was a born leader.

I don't belive love is about what we deserve.

...I know a good soul when I see one, and good souls are never alone for too long.

Remo downed the remaining rum. “Life’s fucking unfair. It wants to crush you, but you can’t let the bitch win. You’ve got to force her to play by your rules.

Not lover, not husband, but more than that. A bond so deep, so permanent that it was honored over all others. Rare, cherished. Not Tamlin’s mate. Rhysand’s. I was jealous, and pissed off … You’re mine. The words slipped out of me, low and twisted, “Does he know?” The Suriel clenched the robes of its new cloak in its bone-fingers. “Yes.” “For a long while?” “Yes. Since—” “No. He can tell me—I want to hear it from his lips.

Savio nodded, then yawned. “I’m still not over it and I’ve been staring at doll-face and little Remo for hours.” “Doll-face?” I said with a smile. “Did you take a look at that face? If you put that kid up on a shelf, nobody would realize she wasn’t a puppet.

Belief is relative. Religion is optional. Here is the thing, Noelle—no one can make you believe anything your heart isn’t fully into. No one can dictate to you your feelings or dreams. And that means no one can offer you any more or less than your heart declares, as long as your heart is strong.

He’s a bit like those creepy little killer dolls from horror movies the way he stalks me and grins his little maniac Remo grin. ~Savio

Attraction is such a strange thing! It's like we don't even have a word to say about this. Just...boom!

I told him I don't care, but we both know that's not true. I care more than I want to.

...never let yourself fooled by the thought that love is enough.

Our love, my child, its what makes us worthy to rule, but, at the same time, it also makes us evil.

Don't loose your darkness out of sight! Let it serve the light!

But there is another part of you. Your shadow self. And it has power.

Considering that our marriage was only meant to bring temporary peace. This is incredible.

...Kiara had surprised us all. She found her place in our family in her own quiet, thoughtful way, accepted us despite our many faults, and tried to better us in subtle ways.

there was a difference between platonic love and the deep bonds that bound a person to their parents and significant other.

They all wore different masks, Nino his lack of emotions. Remo his anger, and Savio his arrogance. I wasn’t quite sure about Adamo’s mask yet, but he was wearing one too, I was sure of it.

I had Josh and my friends, but there was a difference between platonic love and the deep bonds that bound a person to their parents and significant other. At least there was supposed to be.

It's the only thing that blocks out this other feeling- this anguish and frustration that belongs to the one I love. The male I'm bonded to forever. The one who lied to me, who betrayed me.

The glass shattered but the bullet hadn’t passed through and at the same time Bond was diving to one side, his left hand scrabbling for the gun. He grabbed it and now, protected by the lower half of the door, he twisted round and dived down.

Bonded, each avian mate instinctively gave the other what was needed without ego or expectation getting in the way. A simple moment of acceptance and care with no jostling for control. Why did humans always complicate things by thinking about them too hard?" -A Twisted Case of Murder

The known world was not so circumscribed then, nor knowledge equated with facts. Story was a kind of human bonding. I can’t explain it any better than that. There was telling everywhere. Because there were fewer sources of where to find out anything, there was more listening. A few did still speak of the rain, stood at gates in a drizzle, looked into the sky, made predictions inexact and individual, as if they were still versed in bird, berry or water language, and for the most part people indulged them, listened as if to a story, nodded, said “Is that so?” went away believing not a word, but to pass the story like a human currency to someone else. The key thing to understand about Ganga was that he loved a story. He believed that human beings were inside a story that had no ending because its teller had started it without conceiving of one, and that after ten thousand tales was no nearer to finding the resolution of the last page. Story was the stuff of life, and to realise you were inside one allowed you to sometimes surrender to the plot, to bear a little easier the griefs and sufferings and to enjoy more fully the twists that came along the way.

Soon she’ll start yelling, I thought, soon she’ll hit her, trying to break that bond. Instead, the bond will become more twisted, will strengthen in remorse, in the humiliation of having shown herself in public to be an unaffectionate mother, not the mother of church or the Sunday supplements.

His conjured shield above their heads their only protection. Every mote of magic he could draw to him, he added to the shield, and knew it would not be enough. His mind sped along the lines of his construct, strengthening bonds, twisting complicated knots which could resist the falling blocks, and knew he would fail.

There had been no crises of incident, or marked movements of experience such as in Felipe's imaginations of love were essential to the fulness of its growth. This is a common mistake on the part of those who have never felt love's true bonds. Once in those chains, one perceives that they are not of the sort full forged in a day. They are made as the great iron cables are made, on which bridges are swung across the widest water-channels,--not of single huge rods, or bars, which would be stronger, perhaps, to look at; but myriads of the finest wires, each one by itself so fine, so frail, it would barely hold a child's kite in the wind: by hundreds, hundreds of thousands of such, twisted, re-twisted together, are made the mighty cables, which do not any more swerve from their place in the air, under the weight and jar of the ceaseless traffic and tread of two cities, than the solid earth swerves under the same ceaseless weight and jar. Such cables do not break.

Looking up at him from across the room, Bond had to admit that there was something larger than life in the looming, imperious figure, in the hypnotically direct stare of the eyes, in the tall white brow, in the cruel downward twist of the thin lips. The square-cut, heavily draped kimono, designed to give the illusion of bulk to a race of smallish men, made something huge out of the towering figure, and the golden dragon embroidery, so easily to be derided as a childish fantasy, crawled menacingly across the black silk and seemed to spit real fire from over the left breast. Blofeld had paused in his harangue. Waiting for him to continue, Bond took the measure of his enemy. He knew what would be coming – justification. It was always so. When they thought they had got you where they wanted you, when they knew they were decisively on top, before the knock-out, even to an audience on the threshold of extinction, it was pleasant, reassuring to the executioner, to deliver his apologia – purge the sin he was about to commit.

The Suriel's stained teeth clacked against each other. 'If you wish to speed your mate's healing, in addition to your blood, a pink-flowered weed sprouts by the river. Make him chew it.' I fired my arrow at the snare before I finished hearing its words. The trap sprang free. And the word clicked through me. Mate. 'What did you say?' The Suriel rose to its full height, towering over me even from across the clearing. I had not realised that despite the bone, it was muscled- powerful. 'If you wish to...' The Suriel paused, and grinned, showing nearly all of those brown, thick teeth. 'You did not know, then.' 'Say it,' I gritted out. 'The High Lord of the Night Court is your mate.' I wasn't entirely breathing. 'Interesting,' the Suriel said. Mate. Mate. Mate. Rhysand was my mate. Not lover, not husband, but more than that. A bond so deep, so permanent that it was honoured above all others. Rare, cherished. Not Tamlin's mate. Rhysand's. I was jealous, and pissed off... You're mine. The words slipped out of me, low and twisted, 'Does he know?' The Suriel clenched the robes of its new cloak in its bone-fingers. 'Yes.' 'For a long while?' 'Yes. Since-' 'No. He can tell me- I want to hear it from his lips.' The Suriel cocked its head. 'You are- you are feeling too much, too fast. I cannot read it.' 'How can I possibly be his mate?' Mates were equals- matched, at least in some ways. 'He is the most powerful High Lord to ever walk this earth. You are... new. You are made of all seven High Lords. Unlike anything. Are you two not similar in that? Are you not matched?' Mate. And he knew- he'd known. I glanced toward the river, as if I could see all the way to the cave, to where Rhysand slept. When I looked back at the Suriel, it was gone.

A child will twist his own mind into knots to protect his image of a parent as caring, loving, committed. It never occurs to a child that a parent doesn’t have his best interest in mind. Why won’t a child speak his mind to a neglectful parent? Easy: he fears losing his sacred bond. He knows, on some deep level, that the cost of rebelling is abandonment, and no child will take the risk of that loss.

Wicked, to be sure.” He repeated the word as though tasting it, his gaze now following her finger's progress. “Perhaps you'd better punish me.” Good Lord, what next? “Punish you, indeed.” She advanced her finger just to the base of his erection and stopped. “Suppose I were to walk out of this room and leave you here alone until you remembered your decency. Would that be punishment enough?” He smiled as though he were teaching her chess and she'd just made a clever move. “Maybe.” His eyes came to her face, and wandered in leisurely, thorough fashion down her body and back to her still finger. “Or maybe you ought to touch yourself. Pleasure yourself, and force me to watch.” “Now I know beyond question that you've confused me with someone else.” Aplomb had company: his every shameless utterance was waking strange--or not so strange--sensations that spiraled from her core on out. “And I doubt you would take it as punishment, quite.” "Darling, I would take it as torture.” Again he twisted against his bonds, so much power at her mercy. “Because you'd taunt me with it, wouldn't you? You'd place yourself where I could nearly reach you. And you'd say things to inflame me, but never touch me at all. I'd have to lie here helpless, watching you give yourself what you won't take from me.” He sucked in a breath. “Start now, if you would.

All minds, except such as are delivered from doubt by dulness of sensibility, must be subject to this recurring conflict where the many-twisted conditions of life have forbidden the fulfilment of a bond. For in strictness there is no replacing of relations: the presence of the new does not nullify the failure and breach of the old. Life has lost its perfection: it has been maimed; and until the wounds are quite scarred, conscience continually casts backward, doubting glances.

Honest question: If I am a good Christian, and have faith and stuff, will God protect my children? Honest answer: He might. Or He might not. Honest follow-up question: So what good is He? I think the answer is that He’s still good. But our safety, and the safety of our kids, isn’t part of the deal. This is incredibly hard to accept on the American evangelical church scene, because we love families, and we love loving families, and we nearly associate godliness itself with cherishing family beyond any other earthly thing. That someone would challenge this bond, the primacy of the family bond, is offensive. And yet . . . Jesus did it. And it was even more offensive, then, in a culture that wasn’t nearly so individualistic as ours. Everything was based on family: your reputation, your status—everything. And yet He challenges the idea that our attachment to family is so important, so noble, that it is synonymous with our love for Him. Which leads to some other spare thoughts, like this: we can make idols out of our families. Again, in a “Focus on the Family” subculture, it’s hard to imagine how this could be. Families are good. But idols aren’t made of bad things. They used to be fashioned out of trees or stone, and those aren’t bad, either. Idols aren’t bad things; they’re good things, made Ultimate. We make things Ultimate when we see the true God as a route to these things, or a guarantor of them. It sounds like heresy, but it’s not: the very safety of our family can become an idol. God wants us to want Him for Him, not merely for what He can provide. Here’s another thought: As wonderful as “mother love” is, we have to make sure it doesn’t become twisted. And it can. It can become a be-all, end-all, and the very focus of a woman’s existence. C. S. Lewis writes that it’s especially dangerous because it seems so very, very righteous. Who can possibly challenge a mother’s love? God can, and does, when it becomes an Ultimate. And it’s more likely to become a disordered Ultimate than many other things, simply because it does seem so very righteous. Lewis says this happens with patriotism too.

Then he pressed his lips to mine, and the world disappeared around me. He traced his fingers up my arm, and before I knew what was happening, he’d pinned me against the wall of the cliff, his fingers entangled deep into my hair. My hand found its way to his, our palms connecting. A wave of energy passed through my body as the bond between us twisted together, reminding me of what I’d felt earlier while healing him. We shouldn’t be doing this—but I didn’t care. All that mattered was Blake kissing me, and how I never wanted him to stop.

I twisted, studying his face. There was nothing warm in his eyes, nothing of the friend I'd made. I opened my shield enough to let him in. What? His voice floated into my mind. I reached down the bond between us, caressing the wall of ebony adamant. A small sliver cracked- just for me. And I said into it, You are good, Rhys. You are kind. This mask does not scare me. I see you beneath it. His hands tightened on me, and his eyes held mine as he leaned forward to brush his mouth against my cheek. It was answer enough- and... an unleashing.

Imagine for a moment what the brain must do to ignore (and eventually prune) the neurological processes that identify a dangerous mother? It must compartmentalize fear somewhere outside your consciousness so that bonding can happen. Over time, the brain shrinks danger signals, like a mother’s shrill voice or furrowed brow, so you can tolerate her proximity. Pruning alters perception and protects you when you are small and dependent, but over time, your innate ability to detect or discern risky situations is twisted. In this way, neuroception is altered, which is why exposure to early betrayal puts you at a greater risk of further victimization. Maternal abuse is a devastating betrayal because not only do you miss out on essential nurturance, protection, and guidance, but your neuroception and protective instincts are also damaged.

Evidently she had been trying to calm the child for hours, without success, and was exhausted. Leaving the house, she had tried to clothe her daughter’s rage in a pretty dress, pretty shoes. She herself had put on a nice dress of a wine color that became her, she had pinned up her hair, wore earrings that grazed her pronounced jaw and swung against her long neck. She wanted to resist ugliness, cheer herself up. She had tried to see herself in the mirror as she had been before bringing that organism into the world, before condemning herself forever to adding it on to hers. But to what purpose. Soon she’ll start yelling, I thought, soon she’ll hit her, trying to break that bond. Instead, the bond will become more twisted, will strengthen in remorse, in the humiliation of having shown herself in public to be an unaffectionate mother, not the mother of church or the Sunday supplements.

Kya never had her troop of close friends, nor the connections Jodie described, for she never had her own family. She knew the years of isolation had altered her behavior until she was different from others, but it wasn't her fault she'd been alone. Most of what she knew, she'd learned from the wild. Nature had nurtured, tutored, and protected her when no one else would. If consequences resulted from her behaving differently then they too were functions of life's fundamental core. Tate's devotion eventually convinced her that human love is more than the bizarre mating competitions of the marsh creatures. But life also taught her that ancient genes for survival still persist in undesirable forms among the twists and turns of man's genetic code. For Kya it was enough to be part of this natural sequence as sure as the tides. Kya was bonded to her planet and its life in a way few people are. Rooted solid in this earth. Born of this mother.

Next week is Beltane,” she reminded him. “Do you suppose we will make it through the wedding this time?” “Not if Gideon says you cannot get out of this bed,” he countered sternly. “Absolutely not!” she burst out, making him wince and cover the ear she’d been too close to. She immediately regretted her thoughtlessness, making a sad sound before reaching to kiss the ear she had offended with quiet gentleness. Jacob extricated himself from her hold enough to allow himself to turn and face her. “Okay, explain what you meant,” he said gently. “I refuse to wait another six months. We are getting married on Beltane, come hell or . . . necromancers . . . or . . . the creature from the Black Lagoon. There is no way Corrine is going to be allowed to get married without me getting married, too. I refuse to listen to her calling me the family hussy for the rest of the year.” “What does it matter what she says?” Jacob sighed as he reached to touch the soft contours of her face. “You and I are bonded in a way that transcends marriage already. Is that not what is important?” “No. What’s important is the fact that I am going to murder the sister I love if she doesn’t quit. And she will not quit until I shut her up either with a marriage or a murder weapon. Understand?” Clearly, by his expression, Jacob did not understand. “Thank Destiny all I have is a brother,” he said dryly. “I have been inundated with people tied into knots over one sister or another for the past weeks.” “You mean Legna. Listen, it’s not her fault if everyone has their shorts in a twist because of who her Imprinted mate is! Frankly, I think she and Gideon make a fabulous couple. Granted, a little too gorgeously ‘King and Queen of the Prom’ perfect for human eyes to bear looking at for long, but fabulous just the same.” Jacob blinked in confusion as he tried to decipher his fiancée’s statement. Even after all these months, she still came out with unique phraseologies that totally escaped his more classic comprehension of the English language. But he had gotten used to just shrugging his confusion off, blaming it on the fact that English wasn’t his first, second, or third language, so it was to be expected. “Anyway,” she went on, “Noah and Hannah need to chill. You saw Legna when she came to visit yesterday. If a woman could glow, she was as good as radioactive.” She smiled sweetly at him. “That means,” she explained, “that she looks as brilliantly happy as you make me feel.” “I see,” he chuckled. “Thank you for the translation.” He reached his arms around her, drawing her body up to his as close as he could considering the small matter of a fetal obstacle. He kissed her inviting mouth until she was breathless and glowing herself. “I thought I would be kind to you,” she explained with a laugh against his mouth. “You, my love, are all heart.” “And you are all pervert. Jacob!” She laughed as she swatted one of his hands away from intimate places, only to be shanghaied by another. “What would Gideon say?” “He better not say anything, because if he did that would mean he was in here while you are naked. And that, little flower, would probably cost him his vocal chords in any event.” “Oh. Well . . . when you put it that way . . .

My Shifter Bonded looks at me and nods, pulling his shirt over his head. “I’ll shift and get to them faster. They’ll need backup.” His bones and skin morph and twist into a giant feline predator. I shake my head at him. “Think bigger.” My Bonded looks at me with a raised eyebrow. “He’s a leopard, the biggest Shifter I've ever seen. What could be bigger than that?” I reach into his chest, bond to his bond, smaller and quieter than I am, but still there and alive and more than anyone elses. As I lean down and look into the perfect, honey-colored eyes of the leopard, I say, “Think. Bigger.” His eyes shift to white, and my other Bonded both falter to a stop to watch as his body writhes and grows, bigger and bigger and bigger, the fur slowly slipping away to reveal shiny black scales. An extra set of limbs burst from his back, shifting and morphing until, slowly, he has a set of wings protruding from his shoulder blades. Bigger, bigger, bigger, until suddenly, we're staring at a monstrously large creature. One who has never walked the earth before now. “What the actual fuck?” my Bonded sputters, and my Damage Bonded nods slowly. “A fucking dragon.

Unchopping a Tree. Start with the leaves, the small twigs, and the nests that have been shaken, ripped, or broken off by the fall; these must be gathered and attached once again to their respective places. It is not arduous work, unless major limbs have been smashed or mutilated. If the fall was carefully and correctly planned, the chances of anything of the kind happening will have been reduced. Again, much depends upon the size, age, shape, and species of the tree. Still, you will be lucky if you can get through this stages without having to use machinery. Even in the best of circumstances it is a labor that will make you wish often that you had won the favor of the universe of ants, the empire of mice, or at least a local tribe of squirrels, and could enlist their labors and their talents. But no, they leave you to it. They have learned, with time. This is men's work. It goes without saying that if the tree was hollow in whole or in part, and contained old nests of bird or mammal or insect, or hoards of nuts or such structures as wasps or bees build for their survival, the contents will have to repaired where necessary, and reassembled, insofar as possible, in their original order, including the shells of nuts already opened. With spider's webs you must simply do the best you can. We do not have the spider's weaving equipment, nor any substitute for the leaf's living bond with its point of attachment and nourishment. It is even harder to simulate the latter when the leaves have once become dry — as they are bound to do, for this is not the labor of a moment. Also it hardly needs saying that this the time fro repairing any neighboring trees or bushes or other growth that might have been damaged by the fall. The same rules apply. Where neighboring trees were of the same species it is difficult not to waste time conveying a detached leaf back to the wrong tree. Practice, practice. Put your hope in that. Now the tackle must be put into place, or the scaffolding, depending on the surroundings and the dimension of the tree. It is ticklish work. Almost always it involves, in itself, further damage to the area, which will have to be corrected later. But, as you've heard, it can't be helped. And care now is likely to save you considerable trouble later. Be careful to grind nothing into the ground. At last the time comes for the erecting of the trunk. By now it will scarcely be necessary to remind you of the delicacy of this huge skeleton. Every motion of the tackle, every slightly upward heave of the trunk, the branches, their elaborately reassembled panoply of leaves (now dead) will draw from you an involuntary gasp. You will watch for a lead or a twig to be snapped off yet again. You will listen for the nuts to shift in the hollow limb and you will hear whether they are indeed falling into place or are spilling in disorder — in which case, or in the event of anything else of the kind — operations will have to cease, of course, while you correct the matter. The raising itself is no small enterprise, from the moment when the chains tighten around the old bandages until the boles hands vertical above the stump, splinter above splinter. How the final straightening of the splinters themselves can take place (the preliminary work is best done while the wood is still green and soft, but at times when the splinters are not badly twisted most of the straightening is left until now, when the torn ends are face to face with each other). When the splinters are perfectly complementary the appropriate fixative is applied. Again we have no duplicate of the original substance. Ours is extremely strong, but it is rigid. It is limited to surfaces, and there is no play in it. However the core is not the part of the trunk that conducted life from the roots up to the branches and back again. It was relatively inert. The fixative for this part is not the same as the one for the outer layers and the bark, and if either of these is involved

Now there is this song on the saxophone. And I am ashamed. A glorious little suffering has just been born, an exemplary suffering. Four notes on the saxophone. They come and go, they seem to say: You must be like us, suffer in rhythm. All right! Naturally, I’d like to suffer that way, in rhythm, without complacence, without self-pity, with an arid purity. But is it my fault if the beer at the bottom of my glass is warm, if there are brown stains on the mirror, if I am not wanted, if the sincerest of my sufferings drags and weighs, with too much flesh and the skin too wide at the same time, like a sea-elephant, with bulging eyes, damp and touching and yet so ugly? No, they certainly can’t tell me it’s compassionate—this little jewelled pain which spins around above the record and dazzles me. Not even ironic: it spins gaily, completely self-absorbed; like a scythe it has cut through the drab intimacy of the world and now it spins and all of us, Madeleine, the thick-set man, the patronne, myself, the tables, benches, the stained mirror, the glasses, all of us abandon ourselves to existence, because we were among ourselves, only among ourselves, it has taken us unawares, in the disorder, the day to day drift: I am ashamed for myself and for what exists in front of it. It does not exist. It is even an annoyance; if I were to get up and rip this record from the table which holds it, if I were to break it in two, I wouldn’t reach it. It is beyond—always beyond something, a voice, a violin note. Through layers and layers of existence, it veils itself, thin and firm, and when you want to seize it, you find only existants, you butt against existants devoid of sense. It is behind them: I don’t even hear it, I hear sounds, vibrations in the air which unveil it. It does not exist because it has nothing superfluous: it is all the rest which in relation to it is superfluous. It is. And I, too, wanted to be. That is all I wanted; this is the last word. At the bottom of all these attempts which seemed without bonds, I find the same desire again: to drive existence out of me, to rid the passing moments of their fat, to twist them, dry them, purify myself, harden myself, to give back at last the sharp, precise sound of a saxophone note. That could even make an apologue: there was a poor man who got in the wrong world. He existed, like other people, in a world of public parks, bistros, commercial cities and he wanted to persuade himself that he was living somewhere else, behind the canvas of paintings, with the doges of Tintoretto, with Gozzoli’s Florentines, behind the pages of books, with Fabrizio del Dongo and Julien Sorel, behind the phonograph records, with the long dry laments of jazz. And then, after making a complete fool of himself, he understood, he opened his eyes, he saw that it was a misdeal: he was in a bistro, just in front of a glass of warm beer. He stayed overwhelmed on the bench; he thought: I am a fool. And at that very moment, on the other side of existence, in this other world which you can see in the distance, but without ever approaching it, a little melody began to sing and dance: “You must be like me; you must suffer in rhythm.

Tyrrik!” A blaze of blue-and-black fire danced around us. The flame touched our bodies, dancing and twisting, tying us together. I lifted my gaze and saw the brilliant light shone across the bloodied valley. I stared in awe at the capering fire. I’d never been able to see the tendrils between us like this. As a Phaetyn, I could see my power working inside him during healing, but I’d never seen our Drae energy outside us with my eyes open. “Isn’t it beautiful?” he whispered. Overwhelming emotion choked me, stealing my voice. My head and my heart felt light. Words were not enough to describe the sight or the feeling of the deep hues of blue-and-black flames encasing us in their midst. Are the flames real? “No one can see them but us,” he said. They’re ours alone. I knew what this was. It’s our mate bond.

Domination, I have argued, is a twisting of the bonds of love. Domination does not repress the desire for recognition; rather, it enlists and transforms it. Beginning in the breakdown of the tension between self and other, domination proceeds through the alternate paths of identifying with or submitting to powerful others who personify the fantasy of omnipotence. For the person who takes this route to establishing his own power, there is an absence where the other should be. This void is filled with fantasy material in which the other appears so dangerous or so weak - or both - that he threatens the self and must be controlled. A vicious cycle begins: the more the other is subjugated, the less he is experienced as a human subject and the more distance or violence the self must deploy against him.

Even her damage was fucking beautiful.

Sometimes people just snapped, and once they broke, you can never put them back together again.

Yeah, but they don’t know you have bigger balls than half my guys put together. Sucks to be them if they try to hurt you, because you’d burn them alive while laughing manically and roasting fucking marshmallows over their burning corpse.

In every decision, large or small, I envisioned her by my side, a steadfast companion through the twists and turns of life's journey. I yearned for her love to illuminate each pathway, casting away the shadows of uncertainty. Not bound by the constraints of time, I yearned to find her in every chapter of my life's story.

When archeologists find our Skeletons. They won’t have to question if it was love or not, My bones entwined with yours. Of all the beliefs in the world They’ll find at least two That coincided enough to be found Miles & miles in the dirt. Bonded to each other Branched & twisted with joy Not knowing that moment would be the last. Aware that nothing lasts Forever

Besides bonding, sex is also designed by God as the way we procreate and have children. Again, this is a very good part of God’s design; without it our species would cease to exist. However, kids are healthiest, happiest, safest, and most secure when they are raised by both a mother and a father within a committed, stable, God-honoring marriage. Children raised in any type of family other than with their married parents—in other words, single parents, divorced parents, stepparents, or cohabitating couples—are more likely to be poor, more likely to have behavioral or psychological problems, more likely to be abused, and less likely to graduate from high school.11 Children are a natural outcome of sex, at least part of the time. That’s true even if you try to prevent it using birth control, since no form of contraception is 100 percent effective.12 If you have sex outside of marriage, you are running the risk of having a child outside of marriage, which can be hard for you and for the innocent child. It’s important to note that all of these statistically negative outcomes for children are still far preferable to their death, which is why abortion is not the answer to pregnancy outside of marriage (or inside marriage). But many people decide that abortion is the answer when faced with those circumstances, and the tragedy of having tens of millions of children killed before birth is directly related to the modern prevalence of sex outside of marriage. It’s sick that we’ve twisted something as beautiful and wonderful as pregnancy, where new life is created, and turned it into a negative consequence to be avoided (or “terminated” if we can’t avoid it). But that’s what happens when we go against God’s design. There are consequences, for ourselves and for the people we love. “No strings attached”? There are always strings. So many strings. But let me clearly say this: I’ve been very honest about my own poor choices, and I can say from my own experience that God loves you no matter what choices you’ve made. He is not mad at you. He desires a relationship with you. You do not need to be overwhelmed with shame. You need to receive his grace and forgiveness.

I shouldn't behave this way, but little do feelings care about what we should or should not feel.

Tate's devotion eventually convinced her that human love is more than the bizarre mating competitions of the marsh creatures, but life also taught her that ancient genes for survival still persist in some undesirable forms among the twists and turns of man's genetic code. For Kya, it was enough to be part of this natural sequence as sure as the tides. She was bonded to her planet and its life in a way few people are. Rooted solid in this earth. Born of this mother.

If you haven’t had the pleasure of physically comparing different Wall Street trading floors, you needn’t bother. They are all basically alike. The floor itself is a checkerboard of stained carpet squares covering a maze of twisted wires and electronic equipment. These removable squares serve as the lid of a massive trash can, and hidden below are dozens of half-empty Chinese food containers and mice. (Mice love trading floors, and banking employees are constantly discussing creative ways to trap and kill them.) If you stop by virtually any trading floor on Wall Street, this is what you will inevitably encounter: Hundreds of telephones are ringing. Television monitors are blasting news and flashing scattered bond quotes. One of the checkerboard squares is upended, and several maintenance men are taking a break to yell at each other in front of a pile of circuits and cables. Dozens of traders and salespeople are standing at three-foot intervals face-to-face at several long rectangular desks, which are stacked with a rainbow of colorful computers, flashing monitors, blue Reuters and green Telerate screens, beige Bloomberg data systems, and customized black broker quote boxes.

Imagine for a moment what the brain must do to ignore (and eventually prune) the neurological processes that identify a dangerous mother? It must compartmentalize fear somewhere outside your consciousness so that bonding can happen. Over time, the brain shrinks danger signals, like a mother’s shrill voice or furrowed brow, so you can tolerate her proximity. Pruning alters perception and protects you when you are small and dependent, but over time, your innate ability to detect or discern risky situations is twisted. In this way, neuroception is altered, which is why exposure to early betrayal puts you at a greater risk of further victimization. Maternal abuse is a devastating betrayal because not only do you miss out on essential nurturance, protection, and guidance, but your neuroception and protective instincts are also damaged. Since you are adapted to danger, situations that would frighten a regular person don’t raise a red flag for you. You know how to bond with others who may betray you.

It never takes you long to forgive him, does it?

You thought you were dreaming? What else do we do in your dreams?

As much as these people pretend that I’m part of the team now, the truth is, they still don’t trust me completely. It’s a reminder that while I may have power and a new immortal body, I don’t truly belong. But I can live with that.

None of us asks for the burdens we bear, but that doesn’t make the way we handle them any less significant.

Fight or fuck…

I lay in Nino’s arms,

You’re mine for the night, little puppet.

Beautiful. So wet for me, little puppet. Soaking for your puppet master.

Fuck cherries, I wanted more.

with a shout of, “Why the fuck didn’t you call me, you dumb bitch?” I laugh and extract myself from her arms and, more regrettably, from Drake’s warm, large hands at my waist. My arms for once empty of files, I sink into the

Briger was a big gruff man, who was known for his bold bets on distressed debt—the troubled bonds and loans that everyone else was too afraid to touch, and that gave Briger and his firm arm-twisting leverage over large companies and occasionally small countries. He sometimes called himself a “financial garbage collector” and he looked the part.

Regardless of how people divide people by color, social code, and category, the equality of one human being to the next (civilized or otherwise) is a tethered-rope of human emotions; most are born with them taut, some learn to twist them, and still others fight daily to keep theirs from unravelling.

Lara, are you alright?" Keir asked, still seething. "I'm fine, belov—" "As if you really care!" Antas stood, and walked over to face Keir. "You, who have dallied with another, even as your so-called warprize attempts to claim you." Dallied? Did that mean what I thought it meant? I flushed, and then went cold at the idea that Keir would turn to another while— "Lower your hood, and show all how true you are to the one you would bond with." Antas pointed at Keir. "Do it now, warrior." There was absolute silence in the tent as Keir glared at Antas. But then his expression changed slightly, and his eyes crinkled in silent humor. Keir lifted his hands and lowered his hood to reveal a small purplish bruise on his neck. A love bite. Oh Goddess above. I blushed bright red, heat flooding my face. My love bite. Keir arched an eyebrow as the Elders reacted to the sight. Antas, however, was nearly foaming at the mouth. "You see? You see? He has broken faith with this Xyian even before she—" It took everything I had to say the words aloud before the entire Council of Elders. "I put that there." "Eh?" Antas twisted to face me. I drew a deep breath, and raised my voice. "That is my mark on his neck." As the group reacted to that, my blush deepened, if that was possible. Then I made the mistake of looking at Keir, and had to cover my mouth to prevent myself from laughing. He looked so smug. Simus was under no such handicap. He was howling with mirth. Antas was scowling, as were Essa and Wild Winds. "How so?" Antas snapped. "You have been kept apart from—" "Her bath." Amyu spoke. "It had to be during her bath." I looked over my shoulder to see that she was none too happy either. I turned back to face the Elders. "It was in my bath," I admitted. "Keir snuck in to see me." As one, the Eldest turned to glare at Keir. Keir shrugged. Simus laughed and slapped him on the back. "The skies favor the bold." Antas paused as a ripple of laughter swept the room again. "So you talked to Keir, despite our rules, despite our—" "We didn't waste time talking," I snapped right back, glaring at him. Then I realized what I'd announced to the room, and blushed bright red. "HEYLA!" Simus shouted. "Truly, the attraction between Warlord and Warprize is as the heat of the summer!

...but there was a difference between platonic love and the deep bonds that bound a person to their parents and significant other.

And I, too, wanted to be. That is all I wanted; this is the last word. At the bottom of all these attempts which seemed without bonds, I find the same desire again: to drive existence out of me, to rid the passing moments of their fat, to twist them, dry them, purify myself, harden myself, to give back at last the sharp, precise sound of a saxophone note. That could even make an apologue: there was a poor man who got in the wrong world. He existed, like other people, in a world of public parks, bistros, commercial cities and he wanted to persuade himself that he was living somewhere else, behind the canvas of paintings, with the doges of Tintoretto, with Gozzoli's Florentines, behind the pages of books, with Fabrico del Dongo and Julien Sorel, behind the phonograph records, with the long dry laments of jazz. And then, after making a complete fool of himself, he understood, he opened his eyes, he saw that it was a misdeal: he was in a bistro, just in front of a glass of warm beer. He stayed overwhelmed on the bench; he thought: I am a fool. And at that very moment, on the other side of existence, in this other world which you can see in the distance, but without ever approaching it, a little melody began to sing and dance: "You must be like me; you must suffer in rhythm." The voice sings: "Some of these days You'll miss me, honey".

My palm was flat on his chest right above his heart and as I lay there, I couldn't help but think how I could fix all of our problems with a single blast of magic. But the more I tried to convince myself to do it, the more bile rose in my throat and I shuddered with horror at the idea of a world without Lionel Acrux in it until I was practically choking over it. I was broken. I knew it. This bond he’d placed on me had done something so twisted that my own thoughts and feelings weren’t entirely my own anymore. But I was also a slave to this connection one way or another. And if I wanted to maintain enough of myself to stand a chance of ever escaping him, then I knew I had to accept this side of it for now. I’d lay here in a bed with my enemy and dream of the day that this nightmare would end. But until then, I was going to have to seek solace in his arms again and again and again.

After Billy’s dragon, Spark, had betrayed them and joined the Dragon of Death, giving her the eight pearls she needed to choose her own destiny, the world around them had disappeared. When it had come back, it was completely different. Billy, Ling-Fei, Charlotte and Dylan had woken in a dark and distant future. One where the Dragon of Death ruled with a fearsome and terrible might. One where somehow she had been ruling for years and years already, even though it felt like only moments had passed between their lives in the past, in the Dragon Realm, and this version of the future where there was no Dragon Realm and Human Realm, only Dragon City and the Void beyond. Both the Dragon and the Human Realms had been decimated and devoured by the Dragon of Death and the Noxious and their never-ending quest for power, leaving Dragon City as the only habitable place for dragons and humans. But at least Billy and his friends had been together, and they still had their memories of their lives before. And even though they had been separated from their dragons, they had heard them when they had first arrived in Dragon City and had found themselves in chains in an unfamiliar and terrifying cityscape. Knowing that their dragons were alive had given them hope. Because the dragons were more than just friends. Deep in Dragon Mountain, the four children had each heart-bonded with a dragon, connecting them for ever. Dylan had bonded with Buttons, a healer dragon who cared deeply for humans. Ling-Fei’s dragon was Xing, a dragon with the ability to seek out magic and power, and whose tough exterior hid a kind heart. The fierce warrior dragon Tank was Charlotte’s heart-bonded dragon, and the two of them together could take on almost any opponent. As for Billy… He didn’t like thinking about his dragon, Spark, with her electricity powers and ability to see into the future. He had trusted her more than anyone and she’d let him down. Despite everything, part of him hoped that they were still connected through the heart bond. But when he tried to reach down their bond, there was nothing. It made him feel empty inside, like something was missing. Even though they had been separated from their dragons, they weren’t alone in the terrifying world of Dragon City. The tiny gold flying pig had been sucked into this future alongside them. And even though it couldn’t speak, Billy knew it could understand them, so when they’d needed help escaping their shackles, he’d asked the pig to find the key. It was a big ask for a tiny pig, but the pig had brought him Dylan’s Claddagh ring, after all, and it had led Billy and the others to where Dylan was trapped in a tree by dark magic. Surely it could find a key to open their chains. Hours had gone by during which the four friends had watched in horror as nox-wings swooped down on unsuspecting human workers and tossed them up into the air in some sort of twisted game, laughing as they did.

But he couldn’t control this. He couldn’t twist this fate. The moment we both accepted this bond between us, our destinies would be sealed and we’d be bound together forever. Elysian mates. Unbreakable. True love.