Megan Whalen Turner Quotes

Eddis nodded. "Gen leaves the reins in Attolia's hands. Which is not what either I or Attolia recommended, but wisely he ignored us both."
"Wisely?"
Smiling, Eddis said, "He hasn't the temperament. He gets angry. She only ever gets angry at him."
Sounis, having seen the Thief of Eddis lose his temper, could see her point.

Would I be wrong," Sounis asked one evening as he walked with Eddis, "to think that I talk to you, you talk to Gen, and Gen talks to Attolia, who talks to the magus, who talks to me?"
Eddis laughed. "Not always. Sometimes, as in this case, someone approaches my Eddisian ambassador Ornon, here in Attolia, and he talks to me, I talk to you, you talk to Attolia, Attolia talks to Gen, and he talks to me."
"I see you appear in that progression twice."
"Oh, more than that, because after Gen talks to me, the process reverses. He goes back to Attolia, who talks to you, who go to the magus, who repeats the information to me, who gives it to Ornon, who takes it back to whoever started this particular political ball rolling in the first place.

Then, as you well know, Eugenides looked me in the eye as if I were a complete stranger and said, "The simplest way to end a war is to admit you have lost it."
The silence after that was not polite.

The magus and I had talked for many long hours about this marriage of Eugenides and the queen of Attolia. The magus insisted it was Eugenides's choice and his desire as well, but it was impossible to know whose influence would prevail and if Gen would grow more like his wife, or his wife like her king.

You eat more than Gen did after prison", he said.
"I have more sympathy with him all the time. Are you going to finish that drumstick?" I asked.
"I am. Stop staring at it."
"What earrings?

Everything, it seemed, depended on gold. The magus and I had fallen easily back into our old habits. He lectured constantly, and I asked questions to my heart's delight. Where he had once been my master and I his apprentice, I had become king and he my sole advisor. Where we had once focused on natural history and philosophy, we now concentrated on administration, taxation, and the prosecution of war.
He had begun his lessons by quoting the duke of Melfi: "To make war you need three things: one, money; two, money; and three, money." He went on to tell me the things I should have known already, that I would have known if I had been a more promising heir to the throne and not exclusively interested in poetry.

I'd suggested eating it before we left the market. I'd also suggested eating it on the road. I was not so comfortable with my new authority that I could say, "We eat the chicken now!" but the magus had seen that I was considering it.

He was confident, I think, of the success over both Eddis and Attolia right up until the world heard that the Thief of Eddis had stolen the queen of Attolia and meant to marry her.

I think he was delighted to see you safe," said the magus, "and grieved that the next time you meet, it must be as king and king and not as friends.

Will you serve me and my god?"
"I will, Your Majesty."
"Then come out," said the king, helping him, "knowing that you'll never die of a fall unless the god himself drops you.

Grown more confident of the queen's humor, Relius said, "I had not pictured you for a fishwife."
"Lo, the transforming power of love."

He didn't marry you to become king. He became king because he wanted to marry you.

A story?" Phresine was surprised. "What makes you think I can tell stories?"
"Insight," said the king. "Go on.

The king, the master of the fates of men, before their eyes was reduced to a man, very young himself, and in love.

I wouldn't destroy an entire house to destroy one man. But I would destroy a man to destroy a house.