The Burning White (Lightbringer Book 5) by Brent Weeks
Location 193:
To my wife, Kristi, who is far too practical to have suggested I quit my job to write and far too wise to keep repeating for five years, “Let’s not have a backup plan.” Yet she did.
Location 409:
Ferkudi loved lists, all lists. When the palace chatelaine had shown him her immaculately organized ledgers, the look on his face had been a baggage train of astonishment, then disbelief, then rapture, and finally utter infatuation for the bespectacled sexagenarian and her perfect figures.
Updated Nov 03, 2019:
Location 3961:
Big Leo held his gaze until Kip’s grin collapsed, then said, “Andross and Gavin couldn’t have done what you did—because they’re men invested in their own greatness. It makes them small next to you. Breaker, you didn’t get this far by being like anyone else. So. If the Lightbringer’s a man unmirrored, why the hell do you keep trying to be a mirror?”
Updated Nov 10, 2019:
Location 5562:
“Trainer Tzeddig pointed after you, where the physickers were carrying you, and—” Samite’s voice cracked with sudden emotion. She cleared her throat, but her eyes brimmed. “And she said, ‘That girl Karris has all of two muscles to rub together, and she wants to be here with you so bad she’s literally pissing them down her leg. She is working harder than anyone here. That goddam slip of a girl is working herself to death. Aghilas, do you know how good you could be if you worked half that hard? I don’t, and I don’t think you ever will, either. Last week we rigged the race so you couldn’t do better than second—and you gave up and didn’t finish in the top ten. You haven’t stopped complaining since. You know who’s never complained?’” Samite shook her head, tears spilling down her cheeks. “Orholam’s stones, I remember it like it was yesterday. That woman was magnificent when she was chewing our asses.” Karris was barely holding back tears herself. “Tzeddig said, ‘That little girl will run through a brick wall for you. You give her a goal and death itself won’t keep it from her. For years now I’ve trained the best fighters in the world, and I tell you that you haven’t seen a person until you’ve seen how hard they’ll push themselves and what they do after they reach their end and fail. So you tell me, when you go to war—and you will, may Orholam grant that it’s merely a metaphorical one—but when you go to war, who do you want beside you?’ And I tell you what, Karris, you weren’t there, and Aghilas was. And a lot of us were afraid of him, and we knew we’d have to spar him that afternoon, and the next day, and the next, but almost everyone in the cohort chose you anyway.”
Location 5590:
“Anyway, that day changed my life. That was the day I stopped hating you. I realized that if you could get in on sheer grit, I could, too. So that day you kind of became my role model, and uh, you’ve never stopped. So when I lost my hand, I had this little moment where I thought my life was over and I’d have to retire. It’d kill me, you know? This work is everything for me. But then I thought, ‘How can I quit now? I’m not pissing my muscles down my leg yet.’”
Location 5674:
“How many second chances does a man get? I would’ve said one, and that then he deserves everything he gets and worse. But you give Conn Arthur a third chance—and it feels right. You confuse me, and I can’t tell if things work out for you because different rules apply to you, or if you’re just the only person I know brave enough to try them.”
Location 5712:
Kip met her gaze. “I want to lead as well as you all deserve, and I’m afraid I won’t.” Her eyes widened briefly at his honesty, and he could see her tuck that away to share it with others later. They would love him more for it, he knew, but that hadn’t been why he said it. Somewhere, oddly, he’d displaced some essential part of his fear. He wasn’t, perhaps, fully the man they thought he was, but neither was he a fraud.
Location 5719:
He joined the fire of some river sailors and longshoremen and asked a question about some intricate knot a man was using. When he didn’t understand the answer about why a particular fiber was good for a task, he asked again, and then a follow-up; he dared to do so now because he wasn’t afraid of looking stupid. Even if he would never understand the things these men understood easily, it was no essential threat to him. He did other things well. He didn’t have to be good at everything. Strangely, that lack of fear of failure made failures infrequent.
Location 7887:
Patience against Wrath, Abstinence against Gluttony, Liberality against Greed, Diligence against Sloth, Chastity against Lust, Kindness against Envy, and Humility against Pride.
Location 11786:
“You think they cheered only because you carried me?” this phantasm of Tremblefist said. “Do you not remember your own wounds?” No. He hadn’t been harmed, had he? Hanishu had taken all the brunt of the Tiru fans’ rage. And then he remembered the blood. He’d taken blows in the face, a broken nose, a sliced forehead. Two or three broken ribs. He’d forgotten those. By the time he’d crossed the finish line, he and Hanishu had been a gory mess together. “I begged you to quit. I knew my wounds were temporary, but I was afraid you would die. You said, ‘I don’t know quit.’”
Location 15396:
How could he be daunted? He could give no more than everything in him, and that was exactly what he planned to do.
Location 15771:
And now he saw something of that same beauty in himself, an image of the divine. Here was Dazen Guile through the eyes of charity. And as unwilling tears flooded his eyes, he realized that—wonder of wonders!—he was glorious. Beneath all he’d despised, there had been someone worthy of love here all along. His eyes had simply been too clouded to be able to see it.
Location 16654:
Marissia said, “Every one of these thousands you see here: every gunner, soldier, and sailor has told me some variation of the same thing: ‘When I needed help most, Gavin Guile stood for me. How could I not stand for him now?’”