Quotes from Elizabeth Bear

We have reason to believe," he said, "that the object indicated by that icon is a sublight colony ship from Earth which has been lost and presumed destroyed since the time of the Kleptocracy.

The radiant globes on their high wrought-iron towers were an advantage to the dark-adapted eye, if one could manage not to be dazzled. For the shadows between were cool and velvet, and a man-or something shaped like a man-in muffling black could vanish into them.

Eleanor, Helen, Ygraine. A queenly name. Your mother chase well. I could wish I had seen you before today.

I turned back so he would see me smile through the shadows, and Whiskey bore me into the trees before I so much as shifted my weight.

One of the problems with AIs grown from personality seeds is that sometimes they're just as reactive and weird as any human.

While thou art looking out for the halt and the stupid, Lord, let me put in a word for a crippled bird as well.

I strained against the fuzziness and fog that still infected me.

Anything that Jack and Abby Irene could not manage together might just as likely be too much for Sebastien.

He raised his hands and froze there, still as an oil painting, poised like a man shielding his face from divine light.

Caitlin Conn was a lousy liar. In her father's house, refusing to lie had been rebellion, and under those circumstances the small rebellions kept one sane. You asserted any control you could; you defended any part of your identity you could own. Lying would have been safer, it would have diverted Alasdair's attention.

If I had had a soul it would have quailed.

You paid your money and you picked your poison.

All the words I can find are stupid words, pointless ones.

I let her have the last word. I didn't really need to answer.

A warrior or a wizard bound his hair and fastened his clothing and left no unknotted strings about his person when he went into battle, but the ponytail always gave Matthew a headache.

A timely rescue, gentlemen. Now find me a pair of trousers, and we'll see if we can manage a timelier one.

I had seen her in the shadows. She had been waiting for some time.

Well, Sebastien thought, they might all be furious with him, but at least his court was convivial.

Kit woke curled tight in layers of his cloak, the French seams he'd stitched flat still prickling his skin, a name on his lips, Mehiel.

I don't engage in murdering sentients for commerce," I said. "Case closed." "You're programmed not to," she admitted. "That's not ethics. I want to know the real you." There was a pause while she examined her fingernails. "Unless you're afraid of what you'll learn.

You can just set things down. And they stay where you put them. I'll never get used to that.

Sebastien was here for revenge, though he could pretty it up with Justice's blindfold if he cared to play the hypocrite. The self-absorbed machinations of Duke Richard and Governor Penfold had led to the destruction of a friend. Sebastien…was not always of a forgiving nature.

It might lack of warmth, confort, and sartorial splendor, but Kit was happy simply to be clothed.

Niyara left you information you didn't know you had, and that's one reason we wanted you. But that's not the most important one.