“Tally smiled. At least she was causing trouble to the end. "I'm Tally Youngblood," she said. "make me pretty.”

“She doesn't want to end up like me. At least I'm giving someone an example not to follow.”

“The way of the ruler is to make certain that, if what a minister says beforehand does not tally with what he says later, or what he says later does not tally with what he has said previously, then although he may have fulfilled his task with distinction, he is condemned to certain punishment. This is what it means to hold your subordinates responsible.”

“Jenny, if you're so con­vinced I'm a loser, why did you bull­doze me into buy­ing you cof­fee?'

She looked me straight in the eye and smiled.

'I like your body,' she said.”

“A sad smile crossed her face, and I knew right then what she was trying to tell me. Her eyes never left mine as she finally said the words that numbed my soul.
I'm dying, Landon.”

“Be immeasurably great, be unfathomably deep; make certain that names and results tally, examine laws and customs, punish those who act willfully, and the state will be without traitors.”

“And over all those sleepy weeks, the dream always ended the same way, with the dragon coming for the princess saying the same words every time….
"Face it, Tally-wa, you're Special.”

“There was a species of middle pretty who smiled at everything: happy smile, disappointed smile, you're-in-trouble smile.”

“You know, you’re pretty when you smile,” she said, patting the side of his cheek.
“Fierce, woman. I am fierce.”
“If you say so.”

“She smiled at me, arsenically.”