He towered over her, dwarfing her with his height and the bulk of his body which was clothed in the way of a mortal gentleman. He felt and heard that voice tremble inside her, replaced the rational voice she allowed to go unchecked. 'He could break m...
I love you.” I stared stupidly at him. Was he joking again, reciting another line from my story? I didn’t remember writing this. He leaned in and kissed me. I didn’t respond for a few seconds. My mind lagged behind what my body was feeling. “...
It took me a moment to realize but I was having an epiphany. I was standing in the middle of Times Square wearing nothing but purple tennis sneakers with the laces pulled out, clutching an empty bottle of Jack Daniel’s in one hand and a shit-eating...
song of elli (old age) "What is plucked will grow again, What is slain lives on, What is stolen will remain What is gone is gone... What is sea-born dies on land, Soft is trod upon. What is given burns the hand - What is gone is gone... Here is there...
Dwarfs were not a naturally religious species, but in a world where pit props could crack without warning and pockets of fire damp could suddenly explode they'd seen the need for gods as the sort of supernatural equivalent of a hard hat. Besides, whe...
They know a million tricks, those novelists. Take Doctor Goebbels; that's how he started out, writing fiction. Appeals to the base lusts that hide in everyone no matter how respectable on the surface. Yes, the novelist knows humanity, how worthless t...
[To have Faith in Christ] means, of course, trying to do all that He says. There would be no sense in saying you trusted a person if you would not take his advice. Thus if you have really handed yourself over to Him, it must follow that you are tryin...
And then the queen wept with all her heart. Not for the cruel and greedy man who had warred and killed and savaged everywhere he could. But for the boy who had somehow turned into that man, the boy whose gentle hand had comforted her childhood hurts,...
I brought my hand to the back of his neck and leaned into him, sliding my fingers into the curls at his nape. His arms clasped tighter around me. I sighed just a little against his mouth, feeling that it was almost too much, all this newness, this fe...
When I speak of God, I mean that god who prevented man from putting forth his hand and taking also of the fruit of the tree of life that he might live forever; of that god who multiplied the agonies of woman, increased the weary toil of man, and in h...
I wonder if he practices making awkward and nerdy look sort of cool. Like he fills his house with furniture that is the wrong scale for his tall body and buys plaid shirts in bulk and tells his barber to leave crazy, too-long pieces of hair mixed in ...
Besides," said Suriyawong. "This was not a rescue operation." "What was it, target practice? Chinese skeet?" "An offer of transportation to an invited guest of the Hegemon," said Suriyawong. "And the loan of a knife." Achilles held up the bloody thin...
Human freedom brings with it the burden of choice and of its consequences. As humankind is akin to claim for its own special privilege a certain unique destiny not afforded with equal measure to other organisms, so must it further—if paradoxically ...
So that's how we live our lives. No matter how deep and fatal the loss, no matter how important the thing that's stolen from us--that's snatched right out of our hands--even if we are left completely changed, with only the outer layer of skin from be...
Kathel grabbed Mahgen so fast it shocked her, causing her to let out a sharp gasp. With his hands on her shoulders, he shook her lightly as he spoke. "I love you, Mahgen. Do you understand what I'm saying? Because I want there to be no mistaking what...
Right now he was nothing but a physically hurt man who had been through hell and back, clinging to his promise. “We be... together. More than just... few... hours. Wanna die... with you. Not... alone.” Fought to stay awake, needed to spend every ...
Master Palaemon's hand, dry and wrinkled as a mummy's, groped until it found mine. "Among the initiates of religion it is said, 'You are an epopt always.' The reference is not only to knowledge but to their chrism, whose mark, being invisible, is ine...
Although the art world reveres the unconventional, it is rife with conformity. Artists make work that "looks like art" and behave in ways that enhance stereotypes. Curators pander to the expectations of their peers and their museum boards. Collectors...
It’s a secondhand world we’re born into. What is novel to us is only so because we’re newborn, and what we cannot see, that has come before- what our parents have seen and been and done- are the hand-me-downs we begin to wear as swaddling cloth...
A shabby looking old man was walking their way. It must be a relative of one of the men, wandering in the wrong direction as they often did. Where were they going to put this one? He was wearing a pulled-down hat and he had a long beard. He was weavi...
When I reach out, you take my hand. When I smile, you mirror the expression. When I triumph, you glory as if it were your own. When I fail, you point to the light at the end. When I need, you tenderly provide. When I cry, you kiss away my tears. Wh...
