“We wrap up our violent and mysterious world in a pretense of understanding. We paper over the voids of our comprehension with science and religion, and make believe that order has been imposed. And, for the most of it, the fiction works. We skim across the surfaces, heedless of the depths below. Dragonflies flitting over a lake, miles deep, pursuing erratic paths to pointless ends. Until that moment when something from the cold unknown reaches up to take us.The biggest lies we save for ourselves. We play a game in which we are gods, in which we make choices, and the current follows in our wake. We pretend a separation from the wild. Pretend that a man’s control runs deep, that civilization is more than a veneer, that reason will be our companion in dark places.”
“A sensible man may fear certain possibilities, but don’t let fear turn possibility into certainty.”
“You would think it best to save your breath for running, but I often find screaming helps.”
“It’s always better to sit on your dignity in private than to stand on it in public.”
“Keep still and your troubles find you. I might not have known much about the unborn, but I sure as hell knew about running!”
“I can help you, Jorge. I can give you back your self. I can give you your will.' He held out his hand, palm open. 'Free will has to be taken,' I said.”
“Sometimes the only option is to raise the stakes, to throw yourself the other way, to force your opponent further down the path they've chosen, further than they might want to go.”
“Those were great big angry men with sharp swords actually wanting to cut pieces off me. It’s not until you’ve seen a red gaping wound and all the complex little bits inside a man all broken up and sliced open, and known that they weren’t ever getting back together again, and vomited your last two meals over the rocks . . . it’s not until then that you understand the business of swords properly and, if you’re a sensible man you vow to have nothing to do with it ever again.”
“We die a little every day and by degrees we’re reborn into different men, older men in the same clothes, with the same scars.”
“Nothing can be cut away. Even the worst of our memories is part of the foundation that keeps us in the world.”
“It was a defeat, resorting to crude threats in a game of subtlety, but sometimes one must sacrifice a battle to win the war.”
“You can win the victories you seek, Jorg. But only if you find better reasons to want them.”