Sagara Quotes & Sayings

Success and failure are two edges of the same blade, two sides of the same coin. To fear one is to forever deny the possibility of the other. — Michelle Sagara West

I'm missing something, aren't I?"
"Brains", he snapped. "And survival instinct. The Hawklord's been waiting for you for three hours."
"Tell him I'm dead. — Michelle Sagara West

They were like gray stone, like the walls of the round room; they gave no impression of life, and they hinted at nothing but surface. His face, pale as ivory, heightened their unusual color; his hair, gray, fell beyond his back. He was not Barrani, but he might as well have been; he was tall, proud and very cold. But his wings crested the rise of drawn hood, and they were white, their pinions folded. Hawklord. — Michelle Sagara

Hope was cruel. It could be an act of torture far more profound than despair. — Michelle Sagara

You never wanted to stand out. You never wanted to attract too much attention, because some of that attention would be bad. — Michelle Sagara

They're humanity writ small, and many of them haven't learned how to hide, how to pretend to know things they don't know, how to doubt the things they want to believe in. — Michelle Sagara

I hate being the only mortal in a gathering full of Immortals who think killing each other cleverly is the height of good manners. — Michelle Sagara West

Is there anyone's life story you don't want to know?"
"Not really." His expression was unexpectedly serious. "Because people make a story of their lives.
Gains, losses, tragedy and triumph - you can tell a lot about someone simply by what they put into each
category. You can learn a lot about what you put into each category by your reaction to them. They
teach you about yourself without ever intending to do it - and they teach you a lot about life. — Michelle Sagara West

She could have written a treatise on the danger of dresses in about thirty seconds, but it wouldn't have been printable. — Michelle Sagara

To try. To live through the horror of failure; to endure the guilt. To try again. To make that choice. — Michelle Sagara

If she fails to wake, I will kill him. I will not kill him quickly. — Michelle Sagara

Everything happens at night.
The world changes, the shadows grow, there's secrecy and privacy in dark places. First kiss at night, by the monkey bars and the old swings that the children and their parents have vacated; second, longer kiss, by the bike stands, swirl of dust around feet in the dry summer air. Awkward words, like secrets just waiting to be broken, the struggle to find the right ones, the heady fear of exposure
what if, what if
the joy when the words are returned. Love, in the parkette, while the moon waxes and the clouds pass.
Promises at night. Not first promises
those are so old they can't be remembered
but new promises, sharp and biting; they almost hurt to say, but it's a good hurt. Dreams at night, before sleep, and dreams during sleep.
Everything, always, happens at night. — Michelle Sagara

Don't miss CAST IN HONOR! — Michelle Sagara

If life were fair, we would never have suffered what we suffered at all; having suffered it and survived, we're still reacting to things that don't exist anymore. — Michelle Sagara

Where are you going?" Kaylin stopped. "I'm following you." "Which is usually done from behind. — Michelle Sagara

She told him she was fine. Except the words she used were No. I'm not. — Michelle Sagara

Is this some sort of test?"
"Everything that doesn't kill you is."
"Mind you," he added, "surviving doesn't always mean you passed. — Michelle Sagara West

I don't like people much - they irritate and annoy me. But I'm fascinated by them anyway. — Michelle Sagara

History is not our guide, it is not our friend. It is a passing stranger, one which shadows legend, sprinkling it with the seeds of truth. — Michelle Sagara West

Hope is often bitter, but it drives us, and we cling. — Michelle Sagara West

At the very least, if I have not - yet- chosen to end your life, I refuse to allow any of my kin to forever deprive me of my prerogative to do so. — Michelle Sagara West

What humans do when they're desperate is just an expression of fear. What they do when they feel safe is a better indication of whether or not you can trust them. — Michelle Sagara

Because not all weakness has to be weakness. Weakness, strength, power, failure - they're just words, and we can define what the words mean if we have the will or the courage. — Michelle Sagara

Sanabalis never seemed to eat, and he deflected most of her questions about Dragon cuisine. Then again, he deflected most of her questions about Dragons, period. Which was annoying because he was one, and could in theory be authorative. — Michelle Sagara West

Truth, like beauty, is in the eyes of the beholder. — Michelle Sagara West

There, in thin blue lines that could be called spidery, was the mark of Lord Nightshade - the — Michelle Sagara

I don't make the laws, I just enforce them."
"Then remind me to introduce a new set of laws, since the ones we have clearly assume a level of common sense that's lacking. — Michelle Sagara West

Leontines were a tad on the possessive side, they didn't share space well, and they responded to an order as if it were a suicide wish and they were magic wands. — Michelle Sagara

Complaining about life's little miseries was one of the few conversational luxuries people were allowed, and at the moment, Kaylin couldn't put herself behind complaint. — Michelle Sagara

Teela turned to Severn. "I'm having trouble remembering why I haven't
strangled her yet."
Severn shrugged. "I have that problem myself some days. At the moment,
though, the only betting pool in the office seems to be on the Sergeant."
"Ha-ha." Kaylin said with a distinct lack of cheer. And then, because she
was a fiefling, "What odds?" He cuffed the top of her head. — Michelle Sagara West

Angry Leontine Sergeant, angry Aerian Commander in Chief, slightly bored Dragon, and panicked human - you could practically call it a racial congress, with humans in their usual position. — Michelle Sagara

Chase stretched. "I'll give you the week." And he held up his pinky.
Eric grimaced. He HATED this part.
"Shake on it, pinky shake, or we don't have a deal."
"You're an asshole," Eric told him.
"Pretty much." He waited until Eric did, in fact, lock pinkies with him. — Michelle Sagara West

Climbing was one of her strengths, but she didn't do it with grace - which, come to think, was an apt description of the way she lived the rest of her life, as well. — Michelle Sagara

Never anger the idealistic. They feel right is on their side - and right excuses much. — Michelle Sagara

Geography bends to the dictate of will. — Michelle Sagara

Kaylin. The shape of a girl on the edge of the long climb into adulthood. — Michelle Sagara

The end of the world is easy. We'll survive it, or we won't. But if we do survive, the rest of life is waiting. — Michelle Sagara West

It was true: hope could be unkind. You opened yourself up to the worst of wounds because you wanted to believe that something good could finally happen. But if you didn't? You missed this. This intense and prefect moment in which, while the world was almost literally going to hells all around you, hope and reality blended in a single, perfect note. — Michelle Sagara

Her hair was a flyaway mess, and her cheeks, she knew, would be a little too red for dignity - but she often had to choose between dignity and living another hour. — Michelle Sagara

She outpaced Severn. Whole years of her life had been narrowly defined by the fact that she couldn't even keep up. — Michelle Sagara

Kaylin hated politics. Hated them. She hated the stupid decisions, the game playing, the grandstanding. She hated political decisions made by people who never had to do any of the law's actual work. She hated the pervasive sense of superiority and smugness that underlay all of the rules. — Michelle Sagara

Not all of our heartless plans work as we intend; nor do all of our good intentions. We are where we are, and we can rarely predict where we will go, no matter how firm our beliefs. — Michelle Sagara West

Stop judging your life only by the failures," he whispered.
"What should I do?" she whispered. "I'm always going to fail."
"We all do," he said softly, his voice closer now. "We all fail. But none of us fail all the time. — Michelle Sagara West

Kyuthe," he said. "Kaylin. An'Teela. You carry my heart in your arms. — Michelle Sagara

You are, if I understand correctly, Chosen. It is your responsibility to use the words given you to ... finish things. To resolve stories that have been left hanging; to offer closure to the things abandoned long ago. — Michelle Sagara

If hearts really could sink, Kaylin's was busily rearranging her internal organs. — Michelle Sagara West

No ... if the world demanded their deaths in return for safety, she would have watched it burn. — Michelle Sagara West

He wasn't as tall as Tanner, and he wasn't as broad; he had the catlike grace of a young Leontine, and his hair was a burnished copper, something that reddened in caught light. But his eyes were the blue she remembered, cold blue, and if he had new scars - and he did - they hadn't changed his face enough to remove it from her memory. — Michelle Sagara

Kill me now."
"Nonsense. Dead, you will provide no relief from the interminable boredom."
Everyone needed a purpose in life. Kaylin, however, wished fervently for a better one at this moment. — Michelle Sagara West

In youth,' he said, speaking as if from a great distance, 'we believe, and the death of belief forces us to disavow all belief. But that disavowal, time softens, and if we do not believe, we hope. Belief is easier to kill, somehow, and its death easier to bear. — Michelle Sagara West

No, time has silverted the dark sheen of her hair, and thickened her body, and lined the corners of her eyes and her lips.
He saw in them the hints of the smile he loved, and knew, to be fair, that time had been no kinder to him. Or perhaps, it had been just as kind; for she did not look the part of a young girl, and she was not: she was stronger, wiser, and more just than the fear of youth allowed; she gave him the shelter that he needed, on the rare occasions that that need drove him. She trusted him, always; she looked up to him, still; he strove, in every way, to continue to live up to her expectation. She was the one person in his life he did not wish to disappoint. — Michelle Sagara West

What would this have been, if it had more power to give?"
"This may come as a surprise to you," he replied dryly, "But I am not an Ancient. Nor am I, human philosophy aside, a living construct."
"Which means you don't know."
"Which means, as you so succinctly put it, I do not know." - Kaylin & Tiamaris — Michelle Sagara West

Evanton creaked his way toward the sound of the bell at a speed that made snails look fast - if he decided to answer the door at all. If you made the mistake of ringing the bell while he was already on the way, he got angry. Kaylin had learned this early. On the other hand, if he'd actually failed to hear the door when she was expected, and she failed to ring the bell a second time, he also got angry. It was very much lose-lose, with hope wedged in to add anxiety. — Michelle Sagara

When you have all eternity, the word hurry is relative."
"And the guards, being mortal, have less of it, and their version of slugglish doesn't approach your version of fast?"
"Something very like that. — Michelle Sagara West

There were always people who struggled their way to the top of the heap, no matter how much that heap looked like garbage when seen from the outside. — Michelle Sagara West

Can you hold off on the whole war thing until after I'm dead? — Michelle Sagara West

Generally, I like to appear smart. I don't admit being stupid when there's any hope I'm not. — Michelle Sagara West

But she only knew one way of conquering fear, and that was to charge into it, blindly. — Michelle Sagara

Death was silence, loss, guilt. And anger. But life led that way, anyway. From birth, it was a slow, long march to the grave. Who said that? She couldn't remember now. But it was true. They were born dying. If they were very lucky, the dying was called aging. They reached toward if as if they were satellites in unstable orbits. And then when they got there, they were just dead. One moment in time separated the living from the ghosts. — Michelle Sagara West

She'd learned early that if she couldn't be on time to save her life, she'd better cultivate the unseemly art of groveling. — Michelle Sagara

It can't be any worse than whatever it is Annarion's doing."
"You are devoid of an active imagination, which is disappointing considering the experience you have now amassed. — Michelle Sagara

The look he gave her made her turn away for a moment. Sometimes you couldn't look too closely at another person's pain. — Michelle Sagara West

There wasn't a colloquial phrase, or curse, that went something like, "May your day be full of angry dragons" or, "May every dragon you meet today be pissed off." But, there should have been. — Michelle Sagara West

Trying is fine. Failing is inevitable. Don't let it devour you. — Michelle Sagara

The Swords were the city's peacekeepers, something illsuited to Kaylin; the Wolves were its hunters, and often, its killers. And the Hawks? The city's eyes. Ears. The people who actually solved crimes. — Michelle Sagara

I have always thought it unwise to let fear be your personal guide." "Which one would you prefer? Love has its problems as well, if you listen to old stories." "Ah, but I would argue that that is not love - it is fear. It is fear of the loss of love. But we might spend idle hours arguing the definition of the word love, and I have dinner prepared. — Michelle Sagara

The truth was only another mask, even if it was the best fit, the closest to skin and all that lay beneath — Michelle Sagara West

No," she told them all. Looking up at the creature, or across at it, she said softly, "Yes, it's what I want. But I also want wings. I want to be beautiful. I want to be strong. I want to be perfect.
"If every wish I ever had, if every fear, could become real, instantly, I would destroy the world. — Michelle Sagara

What did she say?'
'She made her displeasure with his existence clear.'
'That's it?'
'She made some claims about how she was going to alleviate her displeasure. — Michelle Sagara West

Need was a funny thing; you were never sure if you had it by the tail or the jaw. Being needed forced her to find strength; being needed too much forced her to confront failure. — Michelle Sagara

It's always easier,' he offered at last, 'when you feel these things yourself; seeing them in other people reveals just how ugly they are. — Michelle Sagara West

You are an ... animal? A talking animal?"
Without missing a beat, Teela said, "Of course not. She's much, much harder to train. — Michelle Sagara West

Kaylin's memory was like a kaleidoscope; fractured, but in a way that was arresting, even beautiful, if looked at the right way. As a child, Catti's hair had been bright red, but it had shaded — Michelle Sagara

Manners,[ ... ] are severly underappreciated in my opinion".
"Oh?"
Where practiced well, they remove the probability that someone in my position will be forced to go through the effort of killing someone in yours. Belive that on occasion that much death can become tedious. — Michelle Sagara West

Who wouldn't put an entire world on the line for the off chance of getting their hands on a creature that doesn't sleep and won't leave them alone? — Michelle Sagara West

She had managed to go almost three weeks without being late. Admittedly on two of those days she'd perambulated around the office like someone doing a good imitation of the walking dead - but she'd been timely walking dead, damn it. — Michelle Sagara West

There is not a man born among us who dreams - at first - of service, although in the end, many are bent that way. — Michelle Sagara

Lies were something you told other people to make things easier, somehow - hopefully, for them, but often more selfishly for yourself. — Michelle Sagara West

I'm sworn to uphold his laws. Saying that you killed someone because they annoyed you isn't codified as acceptable, by those laws, anywhere I'm aware of."
"You are clearly not looking carefully enough. — Michelle Sagara West

You'll be with me, won't you?"
"indeed."
"Then what could go wrong?"
Lord Sanabalis visibly grimaced. "You clearly do not believe in angry gods. — Michelle Sagara West

Stay," he said abruptly. "Stay, feed me. Read to me, if you like. Do not talk to me of death. Do not offer me your fear. I have fear of my own to drive me, and if my own fear is not strong enough to keep me from my duty, yours will only grieve me, girl. It will give me guilt and no rest, but it won't preserve my life. — Michelle Sagara West

The gods where like the weather; sometimes good, sometimes bad, and either way, always beyond her. — Michelle Sagara West

How much did a Dragon hide, when he walked the streets of the city? — Michelle Sagara

His hair was a dark, dark black - Barrani black - but his build was all wrong for Barrani. He was a shade taller than Teela, and about twice her width. Three times, maybe. His hands were empty; he carried no obvious weapon. Wore no open medallion. The hand that he lifted in ritual greeting, palm out, was smooth and un-adorned. — Michelle Sagara

They feared you, and love can't exist when there's that much fear. — Michelle Sagara

Kaylin is not known for her punctuality. She is known, in fact, for her lack
even by those outside of the Hawklord's command. — Michelle Sagara

There were days when boredom - or the possibility that things could get boring - was as much of a gift as life was willing to give. — Michelle Sagara

It made no sense, but nothing did at the moment, and at least this was a good crazy. — Michelle Sagara West

When you worshipped someone, you placed a burden on them. You expected them to live up to your ideals, expected them to be worthy of your worship. And who could do that? Not — Michelle Sagara

Trying," he said at last, "is good. It always is. But failing? Everyone fails, one time or another. It's how you deal with failure that counts, in the end. It's the successes that you're known for-but it's the failures make you what you are. — Michelle Sagara West

Hope. Such a simple word, to hold so much. I like it," she added. "I think it's appropriate. — Michelle Sagara

Kaylin swiveled in her chair. — Michelle Sagara

I'm never going to understand the Barrani."
"You needn't sound so morose, Lord Kaylin. They are unlikely to understand you either."
"Yes, but I'm unlikely to try to kill them for fun. — Michelle Sagara West

She wanted to die. She wanted to die. Because then it would be over. All the loss, all the grief, all the pain, the emptiness - over. And she had said nothing then. Nothing. Nor had she crawled into her room and swallowed her mother's pills, or crawled into her bath and opened up her own wrists. As if death were somehow personal. As if death were somehow an enemy that could be faced and stared down, she would not give it the satisfaction of seeing how badly it had hurt her. Again. — Michelle Sagara West

Some days, Kaylin fervently wished that she had already passed Adult 101 and could get on with being the person she wanted to be. — Michelle Sagara

Kaylin glanced at the small dragon, who exhaled the sigh of the long-suffering everywhere. — Michelle Sagara

I don't understand."
The Consort's smile was bitter. "No. No more do I."
"I doubt that."
"Do you imply that I lie, Lord Kaylin?"
"Clumsy of me. I'm not usually that subtle. — Michelle Sagara

In practice, the Hawks are people. People are political. I don't expect any group of people to be perfect, theoretical beings - for one, the pay isn't nearly high enough. Some of the racial decisions made are purely pragmatic; the Barrani are preferentially sent into figurative war zones because we're much more likely to survive them. There is no equality because we are not equal; we are different. I attempt to respect those differences. — Michelle Sagara

If I need something you can't give, I need to walk away, because sooner or later, all I'll see is what you can't give. I won't be able to see what you can. — Michelle Sagara West