Myke Cole > Quotes

“That love is worth it. It is worth any hardship, it is worth illness. It is worth injury. It is worth isolation. It is even worth death. For life without love is only a shadow of life.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“Fear isn’t the mind killer. It is fathoms deep and miles wide, more intri­cate than the pat­tern on a fine Per­sian rug. I will not “master my fear.” I am a thinking man who knows it’s not a thing that could ever be mas­tered. I will instead seek to under­stand it, to embrace it, to know how it lifts me up and how it holds me back.”
― Myke Cole

“When you cannot have a thing, sometimes you hunger for it anyway. The closeness of it, the taste of it, the feel of its heat. It is a pale reflection of the truth, but a reflection is better than darkness.”
― Myke Cole, Gemini Cell

“...while your thoughts are your own, the words you let pass your lips belong to the world, and the world will not always take the meaning you intended.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“This was the thing about religious types she hated so much. They never missed a chance to proselytize. No tragedy was sacred, no setback off-limits. They would solemnly enter your private space, regal and pompous as crows, full is righteous self-importance. Then, when she was at her weakest, they would tell her why the unacceptable was acceptable, why it was okay that she'd lost the love of her life
because an invisible man in the sly (and it was always a man, wasn't it?) had willed it.”
― Myke Cole, Gemini Cell

“Freedom is...it's like a mountain. Impossibly high, impossibly steep.”
― Myke Cole, The Queen of Crows

“There are those who wish to possess love utterly, to own it not just for themselves, but for all. Do you know how they possess it, Heloise? They own it by defining it. They say 'love is this' and 'love is that' and when others say it is something else, they imprison them, or flog them. Sometimes they kill them. My love was a thing outside the circle they had drawn.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“Hell is a word men use in place of fear.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“Never be sorry for loving, Heloise. No matter who it is, no matter how it is done, no matter how the person you love receives it. Love is the greatest thing a person can do. Most go their entire lives knowing only ritual and obligation, mistaking it for love. But you have loved truly, as few can ever hope to do, and so young.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“Not all can be so brave, and if you expect them to be, they will fail you again and again.”
― Myke Cole, The Queen of Crows

“You have the heart of a Palantine,” Samson said. “And the bladder of an old man.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“Fear is a deadly thing, Heloise. It can drain a person of all their strength, make them weak before their enemies.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“It is easy to mistake fleeing for traveling. There are many among us who would prefer to run no longer.”
― Myke Cole, The Queen of Crows

“Did we have to do it? She asked.
“No,” he answered, his voice breaking, tears falling into his beard to turn the flakes of ash to gray slush. “No, child. We didnt.”...
He took a deep break then spoke again. “And making us complicit means we will never call them to account for the crime.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“I will hesitate to kill you if I feel you are too far off the reservation. Is that clear?” Dadou”
― Myke Cole, Javelin Rain

“Jesus,” Oliver straightened, stared at the sheer enormity of the firepower all around her. “This whole thing could go pear-shaped if somebody sneezes.” Pervez stood, lifting the anti-materiel gun by its carry handle. “Guess we better not sneeze.”
― Myke Cole, Sixteenth Watch

“No. It is a person you love. Not a name. Not a she or a he. A person in all their shining glory. There is a thing in us, Heloise. A seed. It makes us who we are. It is our core. That is the thing we love. It alone exists. It alone is holy. It has no home, no name. It is neither Male nor female. It is greater than that.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint

“They’ve just stood off all the devils from hell, so I don’t imagine they’ll be cowed by men in red dresses.”
― Myke Cole, The Killing Light

“I'm just a woman who has been hard done, who has lost those who she loved. I am angry, and I am tired, and I am through making deals.”
― Myke Cole, The Queen of Crows

“Wanting to live without fear isn’t a crime.”
― Myke Cole, Javelin Rain

“Do not grieve. Let the branches do as the root commands. You are a warrior.”
― Myke Cole, Gemini Cell

“It can’t be long now,” he said, “if we don’t get out of this road, we’ll be ridden down.” “Then we make our stand,” Barnard said, “and die on our feet.” “How many standing dead men have you seen?” Sigir asked.”
― Myke Cole, The Queen of Crows

“The flame cleans even as it lights the way. It warms as it scours. It feeds us as it drives our enemies into the dark.”
― Myke Cole, The Queen of Crows

“And a lot of soldiering wasn't found in any manual. No chapter laid out how to be valorous, or honorable. No text ever told him that on the battlefield, saving lives was every bit as important as taking them.

But he'd learned it just the same.”
― Myke Cole, Fortress Frontier

“Jesus, Jim. I’m a doctor, not a cartographer.” Schweitzer stared at him, stone-faced.”
― Myke Cole, Javelin Rain

“Take as long as you need, so long as that isn’t more than three days.”
― Myke Cole, Sixteenth Watch

“And suddenly she was dancing, red flowers blooming across her chest, spraying across the wall.”
― Myke Cole, Gemini Cell

“It's not the girl you need to fear, It's the war-machine she's driving in.”
― Myke Cole, The Queen of Crows

“Ma’am, with respect–” “Nothing after the words ‘with respect’ is ever entirely respectful, Wen.”
― Myke Cole, Sixteenth Watch

“No matter what happened, try and take joy in the day, girl. We have precious few of them.”
― Myke Cole, The Armored Saint