Quotes from Dorothy Dunnett

I had no expectations,' Philippa said. The tears stood still on her face. 'This is one lesson I know by heart already.

His elder brother, grey eyes level, held his gaze. "Perfection frightens me," he said. "They're too good, Francis. What do you want this axe-edge for?" "To cut with," said Lymond, his voice mild.

You will have power and wealth, but what are these to a scholar? You will end your life an oasis in a desert of ignorance.

And, surprisingly, it was Lymond's voice which said sharply, 'You cannot debar a human being from love!

Without thinking at all deeply about anything, he was chiefly aware of the need to be back in a company of men, fighting something.

The trouble with Austin was that he believed so deeply in the chivalrous virtues that he found it impossible to refer to them.

Gorgeous I called him and that he is, Maeve: you'd be surprised. And nasty I called him, and that, Maeve, was a shrewd piece of insight, for nasty he certainly is. And a clever bastard, I called him.… Not to his face, dear. We're not all born to be heroes. But what he may not know, Maeve, is that I'm a clever bastard as well.

I want you to slip it under Mademoiselle d'Albon's chamber door. If she opens it and throws an axe at you, come and tell me. If not, you may go back to bed.

She looked,' said Alec Guthrie dryly, 'like a clever woman who was not unaware that five ill-dressed passers-by were displaying an unhealthy interest in her personal life.

Be kind to her when she comes back. Her love is not only for children but for humanity. She will be a good-hearted and magnificent zealot one day. As her mother is now. Goodbye, Kate. And below he had signed as he rarely did, with his Christian name.

I do not ask,' said Dee. 'You note I do not ask—but I would swear, by all I have learned, that you are Scorpio.' 'With the sting in the tail?' Lymond said. 'You are probably right.

If I did not know how to live, I shall know how to die.

It is not advisable to crow. It might be oneself next time.

else, of course, but the boy's

We may lack some polish,' he said. 'But distrust the society which displays overmuch dangerous charm.

Modern war is fought by a number of strong, sweaty horsemen with constipation, who have their eyes on power, on wealth and on glory, and who obey the rules just when it pleases them.

Warfare and trickery. It is your natural element.

Something comes out of every voyage," said the other man sharply. "Out of every bloody fruitless endeavour. All the striving after the unknowable. The unattainable, the search for Athor, the creative force, rolled into a circle. You with your quest; I with my care-ridden Emperor;

Because,' said Crawford, as if he hadn't spoken, 'you ought to remember that Philippa has been trained in Turkey and will expect certain standards if you mean to make an impression, whether as her first client or her bigamous husband. I could provide some instruction.' Austin walked to the door. 'Or a demonstration?' said the other man wistfully.

The trouble with you, M. le comte de Sevigny, is that you're too god-damned autocratic. From now on, you will kindly remember that a good military tactician requires the support of a team. We are your team.

You did not expect human values from a machine. You did not grow angry with a machine, or be disappointed or feel betrayed by it. You treated it with detachment and curiosity, as you would any soul-deprived object, and if it kicked you in the teeth, you side-stepped and kicked it back, harder.

For this, you are right, I need to be either entirely sober or very drunk indeed.

Do you think I envy him? At least I was reared without tenderness and without expectation of it. During all that time, you were breeding a hothouse love based on deception.

That night Lymond, too, broke free from the prison he had made for himself. He drank of intent, until one by one the barriers crumbled and let run loose all those qualities he possessed, like Alkibaides, of a tarnished and insolent profusion, to set alight in his fellow-men that killing flame of excitement, of passion, of pleasure.