THE BLACK PRISM - BRENT WEEKS

The Black Prism - Pg 593

   Odd, running through an empty city. Almost everyone was simply gone, and there wasn't yet that air of abandonment and layer of dust that settled over cities soon after their inhabitants had left. Garriston was the kind of empty that happened when people left food burning on the fire and simply ran. The burnt smell hadn't even dissipated yet. In fact, they were lucky no one had burned the city down. Empty alleys. Empty homes. Little Potts flowers abandoned in windowsills and not yet withered. 

   Death will come for you too, little flower. 

The Black Prism - Pg 586

There were hundreds of soldiers here. He could see dim flashes of the winking armor of the Mirrormen of the other side of the square. Then he was subsumed, folded into the loving arms of battle. There was no morning mist. No counting of his foes. No deciphering the shouts of his enemies into plain language, orders that might help him know what was coming. There was only the roar coming from Kip's own throat, the hammering of his own heart, the pulsing life that was his magic. There was only the burning in his muscles, the resistance his arm felt as a bladed arm cut into a man's torso, and the freedom as he pulled it all the way through. 

The Black Prism - Pg 560

   "What do you say?" Kip asked.
   What was he talking about? "Thank you?" Karris asked.
   "I say we go kill us a king," Kip said, grinning recklessly. When they were in the grip of their color, greens didn't tend to be real big on common sense.
   Karris looked and saw that Rask Garadul was just getting to the gap they'd blown in the wall. Half of his men were already through. It was the perfect time to attack--well, other than the fact that Karris and Kip were on the side of the wall with King Garadul's entire army.
   Drafting some red of the pools of gore around them, Karris felt the comforting wash of red rage. She felt strong. "Let's go kill us a king," she said.

The Black Prism - Pg 548

   "You were supposed to be a monster, Dazen."
   "Glib, still. The snot-nosed younger brother with a quick tongue. I mean it." She looked at him long and hard. Looked at the Freeing knife that he hadn't drawn. "How well do you know yourself?"
   He thought about the years, the goals he'd achieved, and the ultimate goal it was serving. "The Philosopher said that a man alone is either a god or a monster," Gavin said. "I'm no god."
   She stared at him for one moment more, those intense blue eyes unreadable. She smiled. "Well then. Maybe the times call for a monster." She knelt at his feet, and he blessed her.

The Black Prism - Pg 454

   "We had us a pact," Usem the Wild said, answering Gavin's obvious confusion. "Some of us who fought together. Said once the first of us had to go, we'd all go together. Wanted another year or two, myself, but better to go out on top, isn't it?"
   "Better to go out sane," the Purple Bear growled.
   "Better to go together," Samila Sayeh said.

The Black Prism - Pg 439

 When she'd turned her face away from his kisses, he'd mistaken it for shyness and kissed elsewhere. When he'd pulled off her slip and she'd covered herself with her hands, he'd mistaken it for modesty. Modest? When she'd been with Dazen, she'd gloried in his eyes on her. She'd been bold, shameless. She'd felt like a woman--though now she knew she'd only been playing at being a woman in so many ways. With Dazen, she'd felt beautiful. With Gavin, she was filled with such unutterable despair it choked her cries in her own throat.

The Black Prism - Pg 439

   Until that moment, Karris had been able to stave off her rising panic. At least I won't have to sleep with him until we're married, she'd thought. I'll be able to fall in love with him in the coming months. I'll forget Dazen. I'll forget my shivers when he kissed the back of my neck. I'll forget that swelling in my chest I felt every time he gave that reckless grin.

The Black Prism - Pg 413

Though she had just seen him praying, she knew her father wasn't very religious. That part of him had died with her mother. His prayer had likely been something along the lines of: "Well done, sir. This is a beautiful sunset."

The Black Prism - Pg 412

   "These, these..."
   "Those are what make grenadoes kill. That's what we're doing, Aliviana. We're killing people. Right here, right now. We're using Orholam's gift to kill Orholam's children. Most of whom are fools who could be our friends at any other time. It's a hard world. You want me to lie about it? You want to be protected after all?"
   Liv felt the blood drain out of her. Her father's words were a sponge, sucking up her illusions, blotting up the thin joy she'd gotten from being in his presence again, in trusting someone to make her decisions for her. Something snapped.
   "Father, I can't do this," she said...
   For a moment, she saw keen sorrow in her father's eyes. He looked--for the first time she'd ever seen in her whole life--old, haggard. "Liv." He paused. "At some point, you have to decide not merely what you're going to believe, but how you're going to believe. Are you going to believe in people, or in ideas, or in Orholam? With your heart, or with your head? Will you believe what's in front of you, or in what you think you know? There are some things you think you know that are lies. I can't tell you what those are, and I'm sorry for that."
   It seemed to Liv that this was his long way of explaining Fealty to One.

The Black Prism - Pg 410

   Corvan's lips moved faintly, mouthing words. Oh, he was praying, she realized. Finished, he made the triangle, splaying three fingers: touching his thumb to his right eye; his middle finger to his left eye; and his forefinger to his forehead, the spiritual eye. He completed the gesture by touching mouth, heart, and hands. The three and the four, the perfect seven, sealed to Orholam. What you behold, what you believe, how you behave.

The Black Prism - Pg 408

   "A little slow at the starting line, but watch out when he picks up speed. Reminds me of someone." His smirk told Kip the someone was himself. He put his hand on Kip's shoulder.
   Kip felt a thousand things he couldn't identify at that touch. That touch claimed him: That's my boy.

The Black Prism - Pg 397

   "You're a general again?"
   "Not as enviable a position as you might think. A softer bed doesn't make for easier sleep when ten thousand lives rest in your shaking hands."

The Black Prism - Pg 394

   "People see me now." She smiled ruefully, sadly. "I guess you know all about having everything change in a blink. The think is, I like my new life. I have new clothes, jewelry, an allowance. A room slave. I guess what I'm seeing is that maybe I didn't hate the hierarchy, maybe I just hated being at the bottom of it. So every time I enjoy something, it feels like confirmation that I'm a hypocrite."

The Black Prism - Pg 379

But he'd not remarried again, not even with the overwhelming number of women for every man in Rekton and the constant carping of the would-be matchmakers. He couldn't love as he had loved before. Losing another woman he loved as much as he'd loved Qora would kill him, and it wasn't fair to ask another woman to act as mother to his daughter if he wasn't willing to love her with his whole heart. Corvan no longer had a whole heart to give.

The Black Prism - Pg 369

   "Ironfist?" Gavin said.
   Ironfist raised an eyebrow--oh, now you want me to go with you?
   "Best chance you'll have to see a pompous Ruthgari governor get kicked out of his rooms. More if you're lucky. Might even be someone you know."
   The corner of Ironfist's mouth twitched. "It's the simple pleasures that make life beautiful, isn't it?"

The Black Prism - Pg 66

   He felt her shaking, and realized she was laughing with delight, though he could barely hear it. The wind blew away the smell of her hair too, but for a moment he imagined he could smell it again. It made him ache.

The Black Prism - Pg 65

   Gavin was sweating, but it was a good, clean feeling. The wind blew in his face, carrying away any words either he or Karris might have said, and without words, there was simply her presence, the sight of her dark hair whipping in the sea wind, the strong lines of her face, skin glowing in the morning light, chin lifted, neck extended, enjoying the freedom as much as he was.

The Black Prism - Pg 10

   Kip couldn't see the soldiers or the red drafter approaching Gaspar, but he did see a fireball the size of his head streak toward the color wight, hit his chest, and burst apart, throwing flames everywhere.
   Gaspar rammed through it, flaming red luxin sticking to his green armor. He was magnificent, terrible, powerful. He ran toward the soldiers, screaming defiance, and disappeared from Kip's view.
   Kip fled, the vermilion sun setting fire to the mists.