Miranda

“Richard straightened with a sigh. "People are often more willing to believe lies than truth. Lies can be made to sound pleasant. The truth, by it's very nature, isn't always so attractive."
"That leaves peaceful people no choice but to fight for their lives or fall to the blades of madmen. In such a situation, there is no middle ground. There is no such thing as compromise between civilization and savagery. Civilization must always defend itself against savagery or else fall to it."
"I guess that's our part in this?"
Richard nodded. "I've never wanted to fight, to be in a war, to see good people die, to have to kill. I just wanted to live my life in peace. Others wouldn't allow me that life of peace. The battles I fight have always been to survive and live in peace, not to conquer.”
― Terry Goodkind, The Third Kingdom

“Runach took the book in hand and went to look for that Bruadarian lass, who was likely having a conversation with the flora and fauna of his grandfather's garden...
He just hadn't expected her to be singing.
It wasn't loud singing, though he could hear it once he'd wandered the garden long enough to catch sight of her, standing beneath a flowering linden tree, holding a blossom in her hand. Runach came to a skidding halt and gaped at her.
Very well, so he had ceased to think of her as plain directly after Gobhann, and he had been struggling to come up with a worthy adjective ever since. He supposed he might spend the rest of his life trying, and never manage it.
It was difficult to describe a dream.
He had to sit down on the first bench he found, because he couldn't stand any longer. He wondered if the day would come where she ceased to surprise him with the things she did.
Her song was nothing he had ever heard before, but for some reason it seemed familiar in a way he couldn't divine. It was enough for the moment to simply sit there and watch as she and the tree--and several of the flowers, it had to be said--engaged in an ethereal bit of music making. It was truthfully the most beautiful thing he had ever heard, and that was saying something, because the musicians who graced his grandfather's hall were unequalled in any Elvish hall he'd ever visited.
And then Runach realized why what she was doing sounded so familiar.
She was singing in Fadaire.
He grasped for the rapidly disappearing shreds of anything resembling coherent thought, but it was useless. All he could do was sit on that very cold bench and listen to a woman who had hardly set foot past her place of incarceration, sing a song in his mother's native tongue, that would have brought any elf in the vicinity to tears if they had heard it. He knew because it was nigh onto bringing him to that place in spite of his sorry, jaded self.”
― Lynn Kurland, River of Dreams

“Sahara dug her fingers into his arms. “You do not do this,” she said, and it was an order. “You do not let that monster destroy the life we are going to have together. You are mine, not his. You have always been mine.”

The claiming was so absolute, it dared him to fight. Kaleb had no intention of doing so. Shuddering, he crushed her to him. “Yes,” he said, battling the rage because if he gave in to it, he would lose Sahara. “I’m yours. I will always be yours.”
― Nalini Singh, Heart of Obsidian

“Are you really going to turn down gifted help? That's your plan? Do without what could make all the difference?"
"My plan is to move swiftly, strike fast, and get out. You would slow me down."
She arched an admonishing eyebrow. "And if you break a leg in a badger hole while moving swiftly, who is going to help you? I'm going with you, Lord Rahl, and that is all there is to it."
Richard pressed his lips tight as he appraised the determination in her dark eyes.
"You are one stubborn little girl."
"Not a girl," she said with conviction. "Samantha, sorceress serving the Lord Rahl."

******

Richard sighed as he rose up from beside Kahlan. "I know. But there's no choice. It's something I have to do. This threat could kill people in numbers beyond your ability to imagine. I'm the Lord Rahl. I have to do what is necessary to protect all the people of the New World."
Ester dipped her head. "I can't argue with the word of the Lord Rahl..." Ester gestured at Samantha. "But why is she going?"
"Because she is stubborn," Richard said.”
― Terry Goodkind, The Third Kingdom