King Of Attolia Quotes & Sayings

That is ridiculous," she said.
The king agreed. "Like falling in love with a landslide. Only you could fail to notice. — Megan Whalen Turner

I didn't think about being king," he said, his voice hoarse.
Eddis stared. "Your capacity to land yourself in a mess because you didn't think first, Eugenides, will never cease to amaze me. What do you mean you didn't think about being king? Is Attolia going to marry you and move into my library? — Megan Whalen Turner

You will make the boy Thief king?" he [Nahuseresh] said. "When you could have had me?"
Attolia allowed a slight smile.
"A fine revenge for the loss of a hand," said the Mede, close to snarling.
"I will have my sovereignty," said Attolia thinly.
"Oh, yes, a fine one-handed figurehead he will make," spat Nahuseresh. Then he remembered Attolia's flattery earlier that morning. "Or do I insult your lover?" he asked.
"Not a lover," said Attolia. "Merely my choice for king. — Megan Whalen Turner

I was listening," the king said, aggrieved. "I closed my eyes to listen better."
"What did you hear?"
"I'm not sure," he said." That's why I was listening so closely. I may have to ask the baron to repeat some parts of his report on his grain tax."
"I am sure you can arrange an appointment."
"I am sure I can too. — Megan Whalen Turner

That one,"-he nodded toward the closed door-" will rule more than just Attolia before he is done. He is an Annux, a king of kings. — Megan Whalen Turner

Her queen danced like a flame in the wind, and the mercurial king like the weight at the center of the earth ... — Megan Whalen Turner

My beautiful queen. Your entire court is staring at you, and I can't blame them.
They were, too. The queen turned to look. Her glance swept through the crowd like a reaping sickle through grain. Mouths slammed shut on every side. There was a scuffling sound as the people in the back shifted, trying to screen themselves from view. The queen looked back at the king, who was broadly smiling. — Megan Whalen Turner

I know," Attolia soothed him. "I did not say that I am afraid. He is, though, I think. Afraid of his own desire for power. He is not unused to wielding power, but it has always been in secret. I could, of course, command him to be king. He will give me anything I ask."
"That would only confirm your sovereignty, not his," Relius objected.
"So," agreed the queen.
Relius considered he, sitting beside him. She didn't seem unduly concerned. "I am confident, My Queen, that if you have met your match, so has he. — Megan Whalen Turner

The prison keeper choose an inopportune time to look around the doorway into the cell. He and the king locked gazes, and the king's eyes narrowed while the prison keeper's widened. — Megan Whalen Turner

I want you to steal something."
I smiled. "Do you want the king's seal? I can get it for you."
"If I were you," said the magus, "I'd stop bragging about that." His voice grated.
My smile grew. The gold ring with the engraved ruby had been in his safekeeping when I had stolen it away. — Megan Whalen Turner

The window opened in the same direction as the king's, and there, summer-bright and framed by the darkness of the stairwell, was the same view. Costis passed it, and then went back up the stairs to look again. There were only the roofs of the lower part of the palace and the town and the city walls. Beyond those were the hills on the far side of the Tustis Valley and the faded blue sky above them. It wasn't what the king saw that was important, it was what he couldn't see when he sat at the window with his face turned toward Eddis. — Megan Whalen Turner

Then come out," said the king, helping him, "knowing you'll never die of a fall unless the god himself drops you. — Megan Whalen Turner

Sophos, you sleep with a knife under your pillow? I'm hurt."
"I'm sorry," said Sounis, afraid that he had made contact with his wild swing.
"I was joking. Wake up the rest of the way, would you?"
"Gen, it's the middle of the night."
"I know," said the king of Attolia.
Sounis tried to rub the sleep out of his eyes. He was sitting up in his bed. The sky was still entirely dark, and he couldn't have been asleep for long. He suspected that he had just dropped off. The bare knife was still in his hand, he realized, and he rooted under his pillow for the sheath.
"Don't you trust my palace security?"
"Yes, of course," Sounis said, trying to think of some other reason besides mistrust to sleep with a knife. He heard Eugenides laugh.
"My queen and I sleep with a matched set under our pillows, as well as handguns in pockets on the bedposts. Don't be embarrassed. — Megan Whalen Turner

On the bed, Eugenides stirred restlessly. "Upset at the sight of blood?" he said. "Not my wife, Ornon."
"Your blood," the ambassador pointed out.
Eugenides glanced at the hook on his arm and conceded the point. "Yes," he said. He seemed lost in memory. The room was quiet. — Megan Whalen Turner

It isn't an easy thing to give your loyalty to someone you don't know, especially when that person chooses to reveal nothing of himself. — Megan Whalen Turner

She reached out and touched the king's face, cupping his cheek in her hand.
"Just a nightmare," he said, his voice still rough.
The queen's voice was cool. "How embarrassing," she said, looking at his maimed arm.
The king looked up then, and followed her gaze. If it was embarrassing to wake like a child screaming from a nightmare, how much more embarrassing to be the reason your husband woke screaming. A quick smile visited the king's face. "Ouch," he said, referring to more than the pain in his side. "Ouch," he said again as the queen gathered him into her arms. — Megan Whalen Turner

Are you badly hurt?"
"Hideously," said the king, without sounding injured at all. "I am disemboweled. My insides may in an instant become my outsides as I stand here before you. — Megan Whalen Turner

Anyone who can steal the king's seal ring can manage the locks on his record room. — Megan Whalen Turner

No," he said. "Relius was right and I was wrong. You are My Queen. Even though you cut my head from my shoulders, with my last breath as a noose tightens, to the last beat of my heart if I hang from the walls of the palace, you are My Queen. That I have failed you does not change my love for you or my loyalty. — Megan Whalen Turner

He didn't marry you to become king. He became king because he wanted to marry you. — Megan Whalen Turner

The king lifted a hand to her cheek and kissed her. It was not a kiss between strangers, not even a kiss between a bride and groom. It was a kiss between a man and his wife, and when it was over, the king closed his eyes and rested his forehead in the hollow of the queen's shoulder, like a man seeking respite, like a man reaching home at the end of the day. — Megan Whalen Turner

Who am I, that you should love me? — Megan Whalen Turner

The queen was settling on the edge of the bed, ungainly with hesitation and at the same time exquisite in her grace, like a heron landing in a treetop. — Megan Whalen Turner

We would have died without the additional men," he admitted matter-of-factly. "But we would have taken the entire Mede army with us. Poets would have written about us, and songs would have been sung about us-"
"For all the good that would have done your dead bodies," Eugenides cynically interrupted.
"Well, I wasn't looking forward to it," said Sounis caustically. "But over our dead bodies the Medes would never have been accepted by the people of Sounis. Much more likely that they would have allied with Attolia." He looked at Eugenides, who was still eyeing him in surprise. "I didn't expect to die," he said. "I knew you would send help."
"Why?"
It was Sounis's turn to be surprised. He said, "You told me you needed me to be Sounis. I am. I needed my king to send me help. You did. There had to be reinforcements at Oneia, so they were there." To him it was obvious.
Eugenides swallowed. "I see. — Megan Whalen Turner

Why did you come if not to murder my king?"
"I came to steal his magus."
"You can't," said the magus in question.
"I can steal anything," Eugenides corrected him, "even with one hand. — Megan Whalen Turner