freedom

There is a power that exists without bargaining, a power that comes from within, that doesn't need to be bestowed or bought from anyone else. And this power is freedom -- freedom is the ability to govern your own life, without payment.

Ursula le Guin Afterword in Tehanu pg 274

“Maybe the change coming into Earthsea has something to do with no longer identifying freedom with power, with separating free from being in control. There is a kind of refusal to serve power that isn’t a revolt or rebellion, but a revolution in the sense of reversing meanings, of changing how things are un

Tehanu by Ursula le Guin pg 232

“‘Arha was taught that to be powerful she must sacrifice. Sacrifice herself and others. A bargain: give, and so get. And I cannot say that that’s untrue. But my soul can’t live in that narrow place — this for that, tooth for tooth, death for life … There is a freedom beyond all that. Beyond payment, retribution, redem