The dark storyteller did not look about. He said: “You have presumed the gods value man so much that they will hurry to his rescue. I think you misju… - Tanith Lee

Now, when the man struck you, if you had only said to him, 'strike me again for good measure, I have no quarrel with you,' perhaps he would have struck you, or perhaps not, but the affair would have been finished with, and you at liberty to go on as you wished."
"Master, I see it is a parable, but nevertheless, some men, being allowed to strike another unchecked, will make a habit of striking there. Is that not also an interruption?"
"Life is a series of blows," said the priest, "birth and death being the greatest of these, but between them, many of lesser sort. And is it possible to return or mend every smack of fate and life? Sit down beneath a storm, for if you shout at it, it will not hear you.

The grape of truth is often bitter, but not to taste it in its season would be to waste the vine.

All in all he had not done badly out of the war, but the smells of it, the sights of it, and the cries of pain that attended it like the vultures, had sickened and soured him. Yes, he could fight well enough. And kill efficiently. He feared death, like other men, but could put that from his mind in battle, and he was no fool with a sword or knife. But several smoking ruins ago there had come a curious shift inside himself. He had lost his sense of purpose in the war; he supposed because it was not truly his own purpose but that of the King.