sun eater
Not once in nearly twenty standard years—not once—had either of my parents shown me an ounce, an instant of physical affection. That one embrace made up for nearly all of that. I didn’t move for the longest time, and it was only with a sort of shellshocked slowness that I moved to embrace her in return. But I did not cry; I did not make a sound
Christopher Ruocchio • Empire of Silence
Fear is a strange thing, irrational, but incredible in the way it achieves truth faster than reason.
Christopher Ruocchio • Empire of Silence
His Imperial Radiance, the Emperor William XXIII of the House Avent, Firstborn Son of the Earth; Guardian of the Solar System; King of Avalon; Lord Sovereign of the Kingdom of Windsor-in-Exile; Prince Imperator of the Arms of Orion, of Sagittarius, of Perseus, and Centaurus; Primarch of Orion; Conqueror of Norma; Grand Strategos of
Christopher Ruocchio • Howling Dark
Cowards and faint-hearted runaways look for orations when the foe is near, I thought, quoting that first Marlowe, that ancient poet whose name and devil sign my ancestors had taken for their own. Cowards negotiate when the fighting is thickest. They retreat into terror and call it principle.
Christopher Ruocchio • Howling Dark
Men are slower to act from principle than self-interest, and far slower to act on principle than jealousy or revenge.
It is a mistake to believe we must know a thing to be influenced by it. It is a mistake to believe the thing must even be real.
Focus blurs, Gibson used to say. Focus blinds. You must take in all of a thing by seeing the totality of it, not by focusing on minutiae. This is as important for a ruler as it is for a painter.
Augustine once said that if there are such things as the past and the future, they do not exist as such but are only the present in their own times. The past, he says, exists only in memory and the future only in expectation. Neither is real
fear is death to reason, reason death to fear