Quotes from Megan Whalen Turner

Darker thoughts crowded in during the deepest hours of the night when he woke listening to the secret mystifying sounds of the sleeping palace. Many nights, the king was there. Pleasant, irrelevant, and distracting, he eased Relius past nightmares and self-recrimination. Some nights he said nothing at all, just comforted with his presence. Other nights he related the events of his day, spewing out his insights and analyses of the Attolian court in a devastatingly funny critique.

If there is anything else you desire, Your—" "I desire"—the king interrupted in a level voice—"never again to see your living face.

Don't match your weakness against your opponent's strength

I woke with a terrible headache and wobbled around 'till I fell out the window. You what? Fell out the window. That one over there. She [Edwina] gestured to the curtain behind her. I broke my back. My spine is all wobbly now, but it doesn't hurt.

Staring at the wall opposite him he presented the queen with a view of his ear and awaited her orders.

We might someday attain a relationship of mutual respect," he said softly. First, I thought, I will see gods walking the earth. He went on. "For now I will have your obedience." His ability to convey a world of threat in so few words was remarkable.

I sometimes believe his lies are the truth, but I have never mistaken his truth for a lie. If he needs me to believe him, he has his own way of showing his veracity.

I think they have to show their worst selves sometimes in order to be sure that even at their worst they are loved. Irene knows how frightened he is. The King didn't sound frightened. Any minute, said Eddis, he will realise-- As if her words were magic, silence fell in the tent and Eddis finished in a whisper. How frightened she is.

Ridiculous to think what indignities I would suffer in silence, if I knew that I was to be rewarded with an oversize bucket of hot water, the magus said as he settled into the bath the servants had filled for him.

I'll stop shouting. I won't sit down. I might need to throw more inkpots.

I did not say that I am afraid. He is, though, I think. Afraid of his own desire for power.

I never understood why she didn't marry you. The king settled further into the seat with a snort. Maybe the prospect of being driven out of her mind put her off.

My gift is that I always know when I've made an ass of myself.

Ask yourself, Eugenides: why that orange tree? Why that tamarisk bush? She had promised you your heart's desire while a child of hers was alone in the world and unhappy. See, Eugenides," Moira said, holding out a finger from each of her hands and interlinking them. "Only two threads brought together, two threads that touched," she reassured him. "Nothing more than that. And everything else left up to you.

But if I hadn't lost the hand, I'd be another person entirely by now. Wishing for the hand back would be like wishing the man I already am, to be replaced by some stranger. It would be wishing my own self out of existence.

You don't know what I mean. She is so strong, and you assume that strength has no end, no breaking point. You and Teleus are among the few she still trusts enough to love, and you say yes, she should have you tortured and killed. What were you thinking?

Everybody is always willing to throw someone else's country to the dogs.

He felt a chill on the back of his neck. It was self-doubt, the black beetle that had pursued him all his life, pinching at him, poisoning his every success, whispering in his ear about his flaws and his failures and his unworthiness. He hadn't felt it in months, but the pinprick of its claws was instantly familiar. They informed him with their tiny tattoo that he had almost certainly done something immensely, irrevocably, and unforgivably stupid.

That was inappropriate, said Attolia. Inappropriate? shouted the king. You in your state on your way to war is inappropriate! I did not become inappropriate all by myself! she shouted back. Do you imagine I don't know that?

my opponent's self-confidence is usually my best asset.

His forehead was covered by wrinkles brought on by a lot of sun and too much frowning.

He looked at their shabby clothes in puzzlement. "We were traveling anonymously for safety—" explained the magus. "But surely—" "—and then we were robbed on the road." "Ah," said the king, "the danger in being anonymous.

Kings don't move mountains as a favor to a friend

Surely it is counterproductive to expect sense from someone you are beating senseless.