Victoria Falls Quotes

I see a world on the edge of a blade. Without balance, it will fall.

It's our nature. We destroy. It's the constant of our kind. No matter the color of blood, man will always fall.

The best discoveries always happened to the people who weren't looking for it. Columbus and America. Pinzon, who stumbled on Brazil while looking for the West Indies. Stanley happening on Victoria Falls. And you. Amy Curry, when I was least expecting her. -Roger Sullivan

I'm red, I'm nothing, and I can still make you fall.

Don’t tell me you’re afraid of heights,” she said, shimmying along the edge. “Not heights,” he murmured. “Just falling.

When his flame falls, my lightning rises, and so on.

The best discoveries always happened to the people who weren't looking for them. Columbus and America. Pinzón who stumbled on Brazil while looking for the West Indies. Stanley happening on Victoria Falls. And you. Amy Curry when I was least expecting her." I smiled back at him while feeling sharply just how much I was going to miss him. It was almost a physical pain. "I'm on that list?" "You're at the top of that list." He leaned over and kissed me and I kissed back.

It frightens me about being alone with Cal, at least in daylight. But when night falls, there’s no one I’d rather see.

You don't know how precarious things are, how close this world is to falling back into ruin.

They've spent so long at the top, protected and isolated, that they've forgotten they can fall. Their strength has become their weakness.

There you go again,” murmured Rhy, leaning his head on Kell’s shoulder. “You never let me fall.

Her wavy hair falls to mid-waist, and I think how she looks better this way. From the back.

I can see why my daughter likes you." "Do you think she's falling for my dashing good looks, my charm, or the fact that I supply her with pastries?

It’s in our nature, Julian would say. We destroy. It’s the constant of our kind. No matter the color of blood, man will always fall. I didn’t understand that lesson a few days ago, but now, with Cal’s hands in mine, guiding me with the lightest touch, I’m beginning to see what he meant. I can feel myself falling.

There is nothing more wonderful than falling in love.

Funny how when we start to tell a secret, we can’t stop. Something falls open in us, and the sheer momentum of letting go pushes us on.

honeyed words, smooth as butter and strong as iron, fall on open ears.

I'm Red, I'm nothing, and I can still make you fall.

To love anyone means to admit extinction. I tell myself this, so I never fall in love, so that the fire lights just me.

I hate the endless admonishments of a nanny state that lives in fear of its lawyers. While colonies of dim-witted traffic wardens swarm about looking for minor parking infringements, nobody seems to notice that our very social fabric is falling apart.

Everything that rises will fall. Empires, societies, governments. None of them lasts forever. Why? Because even though they are the products of change, they become resistant to change. The longer a society survives, the more it clings to its power, and the more it resists progress. The more it resists progress- resists change- the more its ciizens demand it. In response, the society tighten its grip, desperate to maintain control. It's afraid of losing its hold.

Apparently falling slowly is a scientific impossibility. Falling means that you’re not in control, doesn’t it? I should’ve considered that.

Just close your eyes and fall. Fall backwards in your mind and tell me who you see catching you. Is it him... or is it me?

His lips linger on mine, urgent and warm. Lasting. And then he pulls away, breath ragged. His hand falls from my skin, and I understand. He’s not wearing his ring. He didn’t just kiss me. He read me.

History, like beauty, depends largely on the beholder, so when you read that, for example, David Livingstone discovered the Victoria Falls, you might be forgiven for thinking that there was nobody around the Falls until Livingstone arrived on the scene.

When the power falls on me, it buzzes in the warm, dark spaces of my skull. It stings like nettles at the tips of my fingers. The power is a fever I have felt since early childhood, a heat in the blood that leaves me flushed and unsteady, dreaming in daylight.

I mean I should have known. It always happens this way" "What does?" "The best discoveries always happened to the people who weren't looking for them. Columbus and America. Pinzón, who stumbled on Brazil while looking for the West Indies. Stanley happening on Victoria Falls. And you. Amy Curry, when I was least expecting her

Mmm, butt bagels." Elody reaches into the bag and pulls out a bagel, half squashed, then makes a big deal of taking an enormous bite out of it. "Taste like Victoria's Secret." "Taste like thong floss," I say. "Taste like crack," Lindsay says. "Taste like fart," Elody says, and Lindsay spits coffee on the dashboard, and I start laughing and can't stop, and all the way to school we're thinking of flavors for butt bagels, and I'm thinking that this---my life, my friends---might be weird or screwy or imperfect or damaged or whatever, but it's never seemed better to me.

You could betray me a hundred times over, and I fear I’d still fall at your feet.

The vision I see in the mirror is me, who I am, supposedly, but that vision does not express the way my mind works or the way I feel inside. A realization creeps over me, the words tumbling into my head quietly like falling leaves. I. Am. Crazy. This is my new shameful truth. Something changed yesterday. A door has been opened that I can never close again. I touch my reflection, the glass smooth and cold, not really believing that the girl I see is me.

The air was warm and heavy as sprinkles began to fall from the clouds high above. The Triton glided through the waters and the whoosh of the ship combined with the steady beat of the rain to make a concerto, like a pianist fluttering his fingers on the keys at one end and running his fingers up and down the scales at the other. Expectancy hung in the air as the tune moved to a crescendo.

Look, cat, you and I are never going to be friends. She’s going to call you Max, but I’m going to call you Shit Head. And if you think for one second—” The cat lies down in a tight little ball of nastiness and falls asleep. “Oh, please. Make yourself at home by sleeping on my scrotum.” I peek out into the sitting room area that connects to the four bedrooms, and then glance back at the kitten. Releasing a sigh of discontent, I pet Shit Head with one finger. He purrs extra hard, and I find myself wondering if I could train him to do things. Every hero needs a sidekick, and I’m nothing if not a Grade-A Hero. - Dante Walker

And then she was looking up into the deep-set, dark eyes of the Marquess of Rockley.

One of the cardinal rules of lying is to never, if it can be prevented, involve someone else in your story, because you can’t control them. Which is why I want to punch myself when the lie that falls from my lips is, “To hang out with Wesley.

New Rule: You don't need a paper shredder. I've seen your mail--it's not that interesting. What are you worried about, that the magazine from the auto club might fall into the wrong hands? I hate to break it to you 007, but the Victoria's Secret catalog isn't actually a secret.

Instead of trying to hold on, to push myself into this force, I let go. And I fall into what I can't explain, into a sensation that is everything and nothing, light and dark, hot and cold, alive and dead. Soon the power is the only thing in my head, blotting out all my ghosts and memories.

There is a mirror across from me, and I check my reflection in it before heading home. Despite the bone-deep fatigue and the growing fear and frustration, I look…fine. Da always said he’d teach me to play cards. Said I’d take the bank, the way things never reach my eyes. There should be something—a tell, a crease between my eyes, or a tightness in my jaw. I’m too good at this. Behind my reflection I see the painting of the sea, slanting as if the waves crashing on the rocks have hit with enough force to tip the picture. I turn and straighten it. The frame makes a faint rattling sound when I do. Everything in this place seems to be falling apart.

The most reliable topic for small talk is the goings-on of stars whether they’re rising or falling, and whether nor not a particular story is truth or fiction. This is way out of balance. It invades the privacy of men and women who didn’t give up being human when they became famous, and it negates the meaning inherent in our own lives. (300)

Together we alternate back and forth, protecting our own retreat. When his flame falls, my lightning rises, and so on. Together, we have a chance. He

Fitzroy gave him a burning, gloriously amused look, the sort that had made everyone fall in love with him. But Cliopher was the one he had chosen back.

Passage Every leaf that falls never stops falling. I once thought that leaves were leaves. Now I think they are feeling, in search of a place— someone's hair, a park bench, a finger. Isn't that like us, going from place to place, looking to be alive?

OhI dreamt of his arms long before I felt them. He would stand near me, just feet away, and my body would arch towards his. If I had taken a knife I could have cut the air between us, fed it to the birds and watched them fall to the earth with the weight of it.

No!” Kell shouted, reaching toward his brother, uselessly, desperately, but as his hand brushed the nearest person, the darkness leaped like fire from his fingers to the man’s chest. He shuddered, and then collapsed, crumbling to ash as his body struck the street stones. Before he hit the ground, the people on either side of him began to fall as well, death rippling in a wave through the crowd, silently consuming everyone. Beyond them, the buildings began to crumble too, and the bridges, and the palace, until Kell was standing alone in an empty world. And then in the silence, he heard a sound: not a sob, or a scream, but a laugh. And it took him a moment to recognize the voice. It was his.

Meilin … eilin … lin.” But now it didn’t sound like her father. It sounded like Zerif. It sounded like Shane. It sounded like Olvan. It sounded like Conor. It sounded like Abeke. It sounded like Rollan. It sounded like people she knew, and people she’d lost, and even people she hadn’t met.

Don’t touch me. Don’t tell me how beautiful my eyes are, how soft my hair is, how you love to hear my voice. Don’t. Don’t pretend you are falling in love with me. I know you are lying, and every word you say hurts even more. Let us just be friends, if we can start there. Can’t we? Can’t we at least be friends? Get to know each other a little? Before the wedding, and the bedding, when I will have to take you as my lord and husband?

Being forgotten, she thinks, is a bit like going mad. You begin to wonder what is real, if you are real. After all, how can a thing be real if it cannot be remembered? It’s like that Zen koan, the one about the tree falling in the woods. If no one heard it, did it happen? If a person cannot leave a mark, do they exist?

I don’t know you anymore. I remember the girl that I fell in love with, and if I’m being honest with you, I still love her.” Her chin began to quiver, but my smile grew. “I want to fall in love with the woman now. I want to know who Ash Victoria Mabie really is.” … “I’m not the same guy you remember. The years have changed me too— in some ways for the better, and some for the worse. Hell, you might hate me in two weeks, but at least give me the chance. I want to make you fall in love with me, not the memories.

Moonlight falls on the floor, bright enough for us to see by. In the silvery light, the red blush in my skin is barely visible—I look the same as a Silver.

The circle of life isn’t a circle at all. It’s a straight line with hunters on one end, and prey on the other. With my father’s rifle in my hands, there’s no question where i fall.

Her consolation was the sunlight, fall breeze, and the field full of wheat, ripened on the stalks and ready to be harvested.

I—I don’t know.' The words came out as a broken whisper, and she squeezed her middle, hoping to hold every broken piece inside so that it wouldn’t fall shattered to the floor.

You cannot fall for the alien!

Falling in love feels like jumping out of a plane without a parachute and somehow landing safely and then wanting to do it again the next day.

She cares about fall’s magnificence in the rain The dipping raindrops' dance assigning thence Indicated rhyme that eases her refrain Before they met - her paces commence.

The Veil rises and falls around me, carrying smoke and jazz, and the whispers I’ve come to recognize as Jackson Square.

There’s nothing you can do. They were her five least favorite words. When Zhong had fallen, she’d heard them. When her father had died, she’d heard them.

Learn to be content right where you are. When you are content knowing that God is in control and you stay in peace, all the pieces of your life will fall into place.

If all goes well we should be in Lusaka by tonight, then Victoria Falls, and from what I hear our troubles are over after that. Zimbabwe and South Africa are comfortable, efficient, Westernized. Akuna Matata. No Problem. Wild, uncomfortable, incomprehensible Africa will give way to tamed and tidied Africa – hot baths and iced beers, air-conditioning and daily newspapers, French wines and credit cards. Lying here, listening to the aching wind in a hut by a lake in a forest, I feel a pain of sadness at the prospect of leaving behind all I have been through these past months and returning to a world where experience is sanitized – rationed out second-hand by television and newspapers and magazines and marketing companies.

When you can talk without losing a lung, I’ll let you go chase after hotties in your backless hospital gown. I’m sure the entire third floor would love to see yours and Victoria’s secrets.

Come. Sit with me now. We’ll gaze at the falling sun as it grazes this horizon for I want to talk about simple nothings and silent stirrings, and wild things with someone who means everything.

how can a thing be real if it cannot be remembered? It’s like that Zen koan, the one about the tree falling in the woods. If no one heard it, did it happen? If a person cannot leave a mark, do they exist?

He stepped closer. Reaching out a hand now, bridging the gap through the hole in the walls of her heart, the stone she had let fall, allowing him to see through the barricade and giving him a glimpse of the fragile garden behind it.

I can feel myself falling deeper and deeper with every cell of my being, and it is to my great regret that it is not just a wave of lust. My heart is thumping so loudly that I’m afraid he can hear it. DON’T FALL IN LOVE. Just don’t.

Her head had taken to constantly pounding, and despite the massive amount of work to be done, all she felt like doing was curling up on her little mat by the fire and falling asleep for enough hours to bring her back to her normal, cheerful, rested self. But every time her head hit the pillow, no sleep came for the worrying. No matter how hard she tried, she always tossed and turned, nervous, anxious, and overwhelmed at the possibilities of the dangers that presented themselves at every corner.

Oh I dreamt of his arms long before I felt them. He would stand near me, just feet away, and my body would arch towards his. If I had taken a knife, i could have cut the air between us, fed it to the birds and watched them fall to the earth with the weight of it.

Birgit Mampe and colleagues analysed the crying patterns of 30 French and 30 German newborns. They studied the ups and downs of their natural cries and it turns out that French babies produce more rising pitches, whereas German babies cry more with falling contours.

Tenavo,” she said. “What’s that?” he asked. “That was the word for bad luck in my village. Not just any bad luck, but the kind you ask for.” “Superstitious girl,” grumbled Rollan, fetching up the fallen apple. He took a big bite. “You’ll see,” she warned. Ten minutes later, the storm rolled in.

Piper decided to jump off the roof. It wasn't a rash decision on her part. This was her plan: Climb to the top of the roof, pick up speed by running from one end all the way to the other. Jump off. Finally, and most importantly, don't fall. She didn't make plans in the event she did fall, because if you jump off the roof of your house and land on your head, you really don't need any plans from that point on. Even Piper knew that. So that's what she did. She jumped clean off her roof. But before we get to what happens next, you'll probably need to know a thing or two about a thing or two...

I don’t know what they want from me,” he says. “I don’t know who they want me to be. They tell you to be yourself, but they don’t mean it, and I’m just tired . . .” His voice breaks. “I’m tired of falling short. Tired of being . . . it’s not that I’m alone. I don’t mind alone. But this—” His fingers knot in his shirtfront. “It hurts.

the day of resumption, we could only afford the bare necessities, for lack of adequate funds. To any observer, we would have appeared as two misguided, foolhardy dreamers. However, we were surprisingly upbeat. Falling back on our upbringing, we prayed for God’s help and headed out knowing full well that it was a make or break situation.

I immersed myself in my relationship with my husband, in little ways at first. Dutch would come home from his morning workout and I’d bring him coffee as he stepped out of the shower. He’d slip into a crisp white shirt and dark slacks and run a little goop through his hair, and I’d eye him in the mirror with desire and a sultry smile that he couldn’t miss. He’d head to work and I’d put a love note in his bag—just a line about how proud I was of him. How beautiful he was. How happy I was as his wife. He’d come home and cook dinner and instead of camping out in front of the TV while he fussed in the kitchen, I’d keep him company at the kitchen table and we’d talk about our days, about our future, about whatever came to mind. After dinner, he’d clear the table and I’d do the dishes, making sure to compliment him on the meal. On those weekends when he’d head outside to mow the lawn, I’d bring him an ice-cold beer. And, in those times when Dutch was in the mood and maybe I wasn’t, well, I got in the mood and we had fun. As the weeks passed and I kept discovering little ways to open myself up to him, the most amazing thing happened. I found myself falling madly, deeply, passionately, head-over-heels in love with my husband. I’d loved him as much as I thought I could love anybody before I’d married him, but in treating him like my own personal Superman, I discovered how much of a superhero he actually was. How giving he was. How generous. How kind, caring, and considerate. How passionate. How loving. How genuinely good. And whatever wounds had never fully healed from my childhood finally, at long last, formed scar tissue. It was like being able to take a full breath of air for the first time in my life. It was transformative. And it likely would save our marriage, because, at some point, all that withholding would’ve turned a loving man bitter. On some level I think I’d known that and yet I’d needed my sister to point it out to me and help me change. Sometimes it’s good to have people in your life that know you better than you know yourself.

You look beautiful.” Lindsay giggles, checks Elody out in the rearview. “There are some bagels under your butt, beautiful.” “Mmm, butt bagels.” Elody reaches into the bag and pulls out a bagel, half squashed, then makes a big deal of taking an enormous bite out of it. “Tastes like Victoria’s Secret.” “Tastes like thong floss,” I say. “Tastes like crack,” Lindsay says. “Tastes like fart,” Elody says, and Lindsay spits coffee on the dashboard, and I start laughing and can’t stop, and all the way to school we’re thinking of flavors for butt bagels, and I’m thinking that this—my life, my friends—might be weird or screwy or imperfect or damaged or whatever, but it’s never seemed better to me.

Even love comes with strings attached. We fall in love with people because of how they make us feel. We don’t just fall in love with any random kind person we encounter. It’s more than admiration. It’s sizzling need. Your need, not theirs. Your crush, your wants, your desire for them. Everyone is a monster, as far as I can tell. I’m not alone in this.

….unable to find a title for her last published novel, she wrote six lines which included her eventual title The Birds Fall Down. These lines were attributed to Conway Power (the name she generally appended to her poetry, even in her private notebooks), from a non-existent poem called ‘Guide to a Disturbed Planet.’ When the novel was published she had fun deflecting the enquiries of readers who wanted to know how to find the works of Conway Power. One was told a long story: Conway Power was a landowner in a remote area who had written thousands of poems and destroyed most of them. He had left some of them with her, given his property to a nephew, and gone abroad. ‘If I can trace the book (if there is a book) I’ll let you know.

In the Rig-Veda, the most ancient of Indian religious texts, a duck lays golden eggs on a nest built on the head of a thief, and the Finnish epic Kalevala describes a duck building a nest on the body of Ilmator (daughter of air) as she lies in the sea. The duck lays eggs that fall and crack open, the yolk forming earth and the rest the heavens, sun, moon, stars, and the clouds.

Loving someone again doesn’t mean one has to be better or stronger. If you’re smart, you’ll fall in love as many times as the world will allow—sometimes, it’s with the same person and all the new versions of each other that grow over the years. And for others, who experience loss or goodbyes, it’s when someone new shows up, shakes you up, and all of a sudden, things feel a whole lotta right.

THERE’S A SAYING AT MY MONASTERY,” SAID TAKODA AS they made their way down the path on the right. “It goes, ‘There are no easy roads in life. There are no hard ones either. There are only the paths we choose to take, and the places they lead us.’ ” “Oh, yeah?” countered Meilin. “What about when you choose one path, but it’s full of white-eyed monsters and so you have to double back and take the other road? Is there a saying about that?

The little girl he loved was gone and in her place stood a stranger with Mattie's eyes and a woman's body, her long auburn hair pulled up from her neck, her small shoulders squared against the world...She didn't see the blush rise up in his face when he spoke his name. She didn't hear his young voice crack when he stammered an answer to her questions. And she didn't know that, for the first time in his life, John Henry Holliday was falling in love.

I see anger in you, Princess,” Kesar said softly, hesitant. Tentative as a traveler walking across broken ice. Ridha sighed, her chest rising and falling beneath her furs. “There is gratitude in me too,” she murmured. “So much it is almost overwhelming. To you, to Dyrian, even to the cold Lady of Kovalinn. For ignoring my mother. For refusing to leave the Ward to it’s dark fate. For all of your who refuse to surrender.” The air froze on her teeth. “I will not surrender either.

Victoria sighed deeply as the clock tower bell chimed midnight. Light snowflakes, almost weightless, began drifting down from the sky. Tiny, white butterflies danced in the wind among the bare trees. The two young people turned their eyes up towards the dark sky. "The fairies are weeping," she whispered. "What?" asked Ted, looking back at her. Victoria turned her grey eyes back at him and smiled. "In the lands of the north they say that when snowflakes fall at midnight, they are the tears of fairies falling on the ground. The fairies are weeping.

This is the first completely Silver legion going into the trenches,” he says evenly. “They’re going to fight with the Reds, dressed as Reds, serving with Reds. The Lakelanders won’t know who they are when they get to the Choke. And when the bombs fall, when the enemy tries to break the line, they’re going to get more than they bargained for. The Shadow Legion will take them all.” Suddenly I feel hot and cold at the same time. “Original.” But Cal doesn’t gloat. Instead, he looks sad. “You gave me the idea.” “What?” “When you fell into Queenstrial, no one knew what to do. I’m sure the Lakelanders will feel the same.

I saw you the second I walked into the bar that night. I saw you and felt you were different.” His lips had moved so close to hers that if she edged forward a bit, his mouth would be on hers. “I’m actually not different,” she said, hating that her voice sounded all breathy and nervous. “I’m similar to lots of people. I can even list off a bunch of people who look like me. And these boots aren’t really kick-ass boots. I bought them because they were on the clearance rack.” A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth before his lips touched hers, and all her carefully constructed reasons as to why she’d never get involved with a man like Matt burned to ashes.

When light shines on a leaf, or a daub of paint, or a lump of butter, it actually causes it to rearrange its electrons, in a process called "transition." There the electrons are, floating quietly in clouds within their atoms, and suddenly a ray of light shines on them. Imagine a soprano singing a high C and shattering a wineglass, because she catches its natural vibration. Something similar happens with the electrons, if a portion of the light happens to catch their natural vibration. It shoots them to another energy level and that relevant bit of light, that glass-shattering "note," is used up and absorbed. The rest is reflected out, and our brains read it as "color.".... The best way I've found of understanding this is to think not so much of something "being" a color but of it "doing" a color. The atoms in a ripe tomato are busy shivering - or dancing or singing, the metaphors can be as joyful as the colors they describe - in such a way that when white light falls on them they absorb most of the blue and yellow light and they reject the red - meaning paradoxically that the "red" tomato is actually one that contains every wavelength except red. A week before, those atoms would have been doing a slightly different dance - absorbing the red light and rejecting the rest, to give the appearance of a green tomato instead.

Sitting under a tree, I studied my options. The fall flowers were in full bloom: verbena, goldenrod, chrysanthemum, and a late-blooming rose. The carefully tended city beds around the park held layers of textured evergreen but little color. I set to work, considering height, density, texture, and layers of scent, removing touch-damaged petals with careful pinches. When I had finished, spiraling white mums emerged from a cushion of snow-colored verbena, and clusters of pale climbing roses circled and dripped over the edge of a tightly wrapped nosegay. I removed every thorn. The bouquet was white as a wedding and spoke of prayers, truth, and an unacquainted heart.

I blame my rapidly beating heart on the melody, the music that brims with so much life. Somehow this night reminds me of Julian’s lessons, his histories of the world before our own. That was a world of empires, of corruption, of war—and more freedom than I’ve ever known. But the people of that time are gone, their dreams in ruin, existing only in smoke and ash. It’s our nature, Julian would say. We destroy. It’s the constant of our kind. No matter the color of blood, man will always fall. I didn’t understand that lesson a few days ago, but now, with Cal’s hands in mine, guiding me with the lightest touch, I’m beginning to see what he meant. I can feel myself falling.

Before Cliopher could speak, Fitzroy suddenly leaned forward again, grabbed his hands in his, and drew Cliopher’s up to his heart. “Cliopher, Kip, you are my right hand, my outrigger, my mirror that shows me my better side. My people do not have a word for this, but yours do.” Now he had too much air in his lungs to speak, as if all the winds of the whole sky were contained inside him. “Yes.” “Ask me,” Fitzroy whispered. “Ask me so I can say yes.” They held there, hands clasped, the air thundering around them, roaring like a bonfire. Then Cliopher spoke, his quiet words falling clear as water drops. “You are my fanoa. My beloved. My own. Will you let me be yours?” “Not let,” said Fitzroy. “You are. You are.

can …’ As I listened, I looked up at the white clouds drifting past. Finally, they had opened – it had started to snow – snowflakes were falling outside. I opened the window and reached out my hand. I caught a snowflake. I watched it disappear, vanish from my fingertip. I smiled. And I went to catch another one. Acknowledgements I’m hugely indebted to my agent, Sam Copeland, for making all this happen. And I’m especially grateful to my editors – Ben Willis in the United Kingdom and Ryan Doherty in the United States – for making the book so much better. I also want to thank Hal Jensen and Ivàn Fernandez Soto for their invaluable comments; Kate White for years of showing me how good therapy works; the young people and staff at Northgate and everything they taught me; Diane Medak for letting me use her house as a writing retreat; Uma Thurman and James Haslam for making me a better writer. And for all their helpful suggestions, and encouragement, Emily Holt, Victoria Holt, Vanessa Holt, Nedie Antoniades, and Joe Adams. Author Biography Alex Michaelides read English at Cambridge University and screenwriting at the American Film Institute. He wrote the film Devil You Know starring Rosamund Pike, and co-wrote The Con is On. His debut novel, The Silent Patient, is also being developed into a major motion picture, and has been sold in thirty-nine territories worldwide. Born in Cyprus to a Greek-Cypriot father and English mother, Michaelides now lives in London, England.

LAST FALL UNIVERSITY OF MERIT The music was loud enough to shake the pictures on the walls. An angel and a wizard made out on the stairs. Two naughty cats tugged a vampire between them, a guy with yellow contacts howled, and someone spilled a Solo cup of cheap beer near Eli’s feet. He snagged the horns from a devil by the front door, and set them on top of his head. He’d seen the girl walk in, flanked by a Barbie and a Catholic schoolgirl flaunting numerous uniform infractions, but she was in jeans and a polo, blond hair loose, falling over her shoulders. He’d lost sight of her for only a moment, and now her friends were there, weaving through the crowd with interlocking fingers held over their heads, but she was gone. She should have stood out, the lack of costume conspicuous at a Halloween party, but she was nowhere to be found.

Victoria Pappas stood half in and half out of the light, the shading across her body exactly that of the photograph on page 8 of Lingerie Parisienne. Desdemona (costume lady, stage manager, and director all in one) had pinned up Victoria’s hair, letting ringlets fall over her forehead and warning her to keep her biggish nose in shadow. Perfumed, depilated, moist with emollients, wearing kohl around her eyes, Victoria let Lefty look upon her. She felt the heat of his gaze, heard his heavy breathing, heard him try to speak twice—small squeaks from a dry throat—and then she heard his feet coming toward her, and she turned, making the face Desdemona had taught her; but she was so distracted by the effort to pout her lips like the French lingerie model that she didn’t realize the footsteps weren’t approaching but retreating; and she turned to see that Lefty Stephanides, the only eligible bachelor in town, had taken off . . .

In the back of my closet, I saw a pink wrap dress that was hopelessly Southern. Pale pink, with little flutter sleeves all in a Swiss-dot fabric that you could see through if you held it up to the light. I would need nude undergarments, which I was sure I had. My mom always told me never to wear wild undies, you never knew who'd see them! What if I got in a car wreck? I pulled my hair up and allowed a few red curls to fall out of a messy bun at the nape of my neck. I slipped the dress on and gave my lips a quick swipe of gloss. I chose small gold hoop earrings that had belonged to Gran at one time and stepped into a pair of gold flip-flops. I looked at myself in the mirror and reminded myself I was going to a farm. Jim walked in. "Ready for the big... Oh, my God, Magnolia!" "What? Too much?" I said, grimacing. "Good God, no! You look absolutely perfect! You look like a mouthwatering pink confection! A true Southern Magnolia!

me!” For Alexandra sitting beside him, unable to help, each cry seemed a sword thrust into the bottom of her heart. Almost worse for the Empress than the actual episodes of bleeding was the terrible Damoclean uncertainty of hemophilia. Other chronic diseases may handicap a child and dismay the mother, but in time both learn to adjust their lives to the medical facts. In hemophilia, however, there is no status quo. One minute Alexis could be playing happily and normally. The next, he might stumble, fall and begin a bleeding episode that would take him to the brink of death. It could strike at any time in any part of the body: the head, nose, mouth, kidneys, joints, or muscles. Like Queen Victoria’s, Alexandra’s natural reaction was to overprotect her child. The royal family of Spain put its hemophilic sons in padded suits and padded the trees in the park when they went out to play. Alexandra’s solution was to assign the two sailors to hover so closely over Alexis that they could reach out and catch him before he fell. Yet, as Gilliard pointed out to the Empress, this kind of protection can stifle the spirit, producing a dependent, warped and crippled mind. Alexandra responded gallantly, withdrawing the two guardians to permit her son to make his own mistakes, take his own steps and—if necessary—fall and bruise. But it was she who accepted the risk and who bore the additional burden of guilt when an accident followed. To

Cal stares at me, eyes full of accusation. And longing. This time he takes me by surprise when he steps closer, and I fall back on my heels. “Did your mother destroy you entirely? Is there anything left of you?” he asks, searching my face. “Anything that isn’t hers?” He won’t tell me what he’s looking for, but I know. Despite the walls my mother built around me, Cal always manages to weasel through. His hunting eyes fill me with sorrow. Even now, he thinks there’s something in me left to save—and to mourn. There is no escaping our fate, not for either of us. He must sentence me to die. And I must accept death. But Cal wants to know if he’s killing his brother along with the monster—or if the brother died long ago. Cut for cut, my mother whispers, louder now, taunting. The words slice like a razor. It would hurt him deeply, wound him forever, if I let him glimpse what little is left of me. That I’m still here, in some forgotten corner, just waiting to be found. I could ruin him with one glance, one echo of the brother he remembers. Or I could free him of me. Make the choice for him. Give my brother one last proof of the love I can no longer feel, even if he never knows it. I weigh the choice in my heart, each side heavy and impossible. For one terrifying moment, I don’t know what to do. Despite all my mother’s fine work, I can’t find it in myself to land that final blow. I drop my gaze, forcing a detached smirk to my lips. “I would do it all again, Cal,” I tell him, lying with such grace. It feels easy, after so many years behind a mask. “If given the choice to go back, I would let her change me. I would watch you kill him. I’d send you to the arena. And I’d get it right. I’d give you what you deserve. I’d kill you now if I could. I’d do it a thousand times.” My brother is simple, easy to manipulate. He sees only what lies in front of him, only what he can understand. The lie does its job well. His eyes harden, that undying ember in him almost extinguished entirely. One hand twitches, wanting to form a fist. But the Silent Stone affects him too, and even if he had the strength to make me burn, he could not. “Good-bye, Maven,” Cal says, his voice broken. He isn’t really speaking to me. The farewell is for another boy, lost years ago, before he became what I am now. Cal lets go of him, the Maven I was. The Maven I still am, somewhere inside, unable or unwilling to step into the light. This will be the last time we speak to each other alone. I can feel that in my marrow. If I see him again, it will be before the throne, or beneath the cold steel of the executioner’s blade. “I look forward to the sentencing,” I drawl in reply, watching him flee the room. The door slams behind him, shaking paintings in their frames. Despite all the difference between us, we have this in common. We use our pain to destroy. “Good-bye, Cal,” I say to no one. Weakness, my mother answers.

To his surprise, Sorasa moved with him. She looked straight ahead, refusing to meet his eye. Instead, she fussed with the chain mail beneath her jacket, trying to adjust the metal rings. Clearly she despised it, her usually fluid motions slower and more stilted. He opened his mouth to taunt her, to say anything, to grasp one more second at her side. “Thank you for wearing armor,” he growled. It was the only thing left to say. He expected a quick, poisonous retort. Instead, Sorasa looked up at him. Her copper eyes wavered, filled with all the emotion she no longer cared to hide. “Iron and steel won’t save us from dragon fire,” she said, all regret, her mouth barely moving. Again, Dom wanted to stay, lingering one last moment, his eyes locked on her own. “I know you don't believe in ghosts,” Sorasa murmured, holding her ground. She did not move closer, or move at all, letting the crowd of Elders break around her. A Vedera who falls in this realm falls forever, Dom thought, the old belief a sudden curse. Sorasa’s eyes shimmered, swimming with tears she would never allow herself to shed. She looked like she did on the beach after the shipwreck, torn apart by grief. “But I do,” she said. His chest filled with an unfamiliar feeling, an ache he could not name. “Sorasa,” he began, but the crowd surged around them, his Vederan soldiers too many to ignore. Every part of him wanted to stay rooted, though he knew he could not. She would not reach chin, her hands pressed to her sides, her chin raised and jaw set. Whatever tears she carried faded, pushed down into the unfeeling well of an Amhara heart. “Haunt me, Domacridhan.” The tide of the army swelled before he could muster an answer. While Sorasa stood against it, Dom let himself be carried. While his body marched, his heart stayed behind, broken as it was, already burning. Her last words followed him all the way down to the city gates.

The best discoveries always happened to the people who weren’t looking for them. Columbus and America. Pinzón, who stumbled on Brazil while looking for the West Indies. Stanley happening on Victoria Falls. And you. Amy Curry, when I was least expecting her.

When his flame falls, my lightning rises,

The sound of the click, then the sound of Victoria’s scream, then the sound of Victoria falling sideways to the floor.

The most famous room in the palace—for a time the most famous room in Russia—was the Empress’s mauve boudoir. Everything in it was mauve: curtains, carpet, pillows; even the furniture was mauve-and-white Hepplewhite. Masses of fresh white and purple lilacs, vases of roses and orchids and bowls of violets perfumed the air. Tables and shelves were cluttered with books, papers and porcelain and enamel knicknacks. In this room, Alexandra surrounded herself with mementoes of her family and her religion. The walls were covered with icons. Over her chaise-longue hung a picture of the Virgin Mary. A portrait of her mother, Princess Alice, looked down from another wall. On a table in a place of honor stood a large photograph of Queen Victoria. The only portrait in the room other than religious and family pictures was a portrait of Marie Antoinette.

Victoria Schmidt was engaged to be married on her twelfth birthday. She was married in a secret ceremony on her thirteenth.

Together we alternate back and forth, protecting our own retreat. When his flame falls, my lightning rises, and so on. Together, we have a chance.

I’m quick and smooth—like scribbling with a brand-new roller-ball pen. Like Angela’s hands across the piano. Like Victoria in the Gershwin show, making effortless leaps across the stage and falling into a pirouette. There’s a move in modern dance called the downward spiral—Vic is always trying to perfect hers. Maybe this is my downward spiral, careening yet controlled. When art is like this, when the work is so hard and so easy at the same time, I feel like I’m breaking all the rules of the universe. It’s thrilling. It’s terrifying. I may as well be falling through the floor, down to the beach and the gulf, straight down to the water, all the while managing to bring this painting to life.