Royal Assassin: Book 2

Lost a fight? The fight isn't over until you win, Fitz. That's all you have to remember.

Wrong? If you can do it, how can it be wrong?

Trust is not trust until it is complete.

You forbid? You forbid? Forbid the wind to blow past your stone den, then, or the grass to grow in the earth around it. You have as much right. You forbid.

Our own ambitions and tasks that we set for ourselves, the framework we attempt to impose upon the world, is no more than a shadow of a tree cast across the snow. It will change as the sun moves, be swallowed in the night, sway with the wind, and when the smooth snow vanishes, it will lie distorted upon the une en earth. But the tree continues to be. Do you understand that?

The exercise for centering oneself is a simple one. Stop thinking of what you intend to do. Stop thinking of what you have just done. Then, stop thinking that you have stopped thinking of those things. Then you will find the Now, the time that stretches eternal, and is really the only time there is. Then, in that place, you will finally have time to be yourself.

Forces shift. Shadows flutter. Suddenly there is a rippling in the possibilities. A reordering of the futures, as destinies multiply. All paths diverge, and diverge again.