Ana

“Val smiled evilly at the child and reached into his pocket.
“Do you,” he asked, “like kittens?”
And he held out a black, fluffy kitten with a white chest.
Annalise blinked at the kitten’s green eyes.
The kitten blinked back.
“Oh, yes!” said Annalise.
Val deposited the kitten into the plump little arms and strolled to the kitchens, where Hecate and her kittens were in residence, swinging his gold walking stick.
There were seven more kittens remaining and a garden full of his enemies’ children…”
― Elizabeth Hoyt, Duke of Sin

“The most beautiful thing is not when you learn to live
without something; it’s the moment you realize you never
needed it in the first place.”
― Lang Leav, Love Looks Pretty on You

“The eyes caress more sweetly than the lips.”
― Auguste Angellier

“Bluntly put, a chaplain is the minister of the Prince of Peace serving in the host of the God of War—Mars. As such, he is as incongruous as a musket would be on the altar at Christmas. Why, then, is he there? Because he indirectly subserves the purpose attested by the cannon; because too he lends the sanction of the religion of the meek to that which practically is the abrogation of everything but brute Force. 25”
― Herman Melville, Billy Budd, Bartleby, and Other Stories