Anna Lloyd

“True allegiance is only given willingly.”
― Lloyd Alexander, Taran Wanderer

“When I was a child I dreamed of adventure, glory, of honor in feats of arms. I think now that these things are shadows.'

'If you see them as shadows then you see them for what they are,' Annlaw agreed. 'Many have pursued honor, and in the pursuit lost more of it than ever they could gain.”
― Lloyd Alexander, Taran Wanderer

“What lacks?’ he cried to Annlaw. ‘I could forge a sword well enough and weave a cloak well enough. But now, what I truly long to grasp is beyond my reach. Must the one skill I sought above all be denied me?’ he burst out in an anguished voice. ‘Is the gift forbidden me?’ He bowed his head, and his heart froze even as he spoke the words, for he knew, within himself, he had touched the truth.

Annlaw did not gainsay him, but only looked at him for a long while with deep sadness.

‘Why?’ Taran whispered. ‘Why is this so?’

‘It is a heavy question,’ Annlaw replied at last. He put a hand on Taran’s shoulder. ‘Indeed, no man can answer it. There are those who have labored all their lives to gain the gift, striving until the end only to find themselves mistaken; and those who had it born in them yet never knew; those who lost heart too soon; and those who should never have begun at all.

‘Count yourself lucky,’ the potter went on, ‘that you have understood this now and not spent your years in vain hope. This much have you learned, and no learning is wasted.”
― Lloyd Alexander, Taran Wanderer

“There is more honor in a field well plowed than in a field steeped in blood.”
― Lloyd Alexander, The Black Cauldron