"“It’s a brute-force approach,” Miles said apologetically. “And not, alas, quite as simple as a data match.” “That,” murmured Gibbs, “is why enlisted men were invented.”"

"Real expertise, the kind that means you can’t be intimidated or, or…persuaded to go along with something stupid because you think everyone in the universe knows more than you do."

"Aim high. You may still miss the target but at least you won’t shoot your foot off."

"What an obituary. When I go down into the ground at last, as God is my judge, I pray my best-beloved may have better to say of me than, “He didn’t hit me.”"

"Oh hell. Have you fallen in love with this woman, idiot boy? Um. Yeah. He’d been falling for days, he realized in retrospect. It was just that he’d finally hit the ground."

"Just like swatting flies with a laser cannon. The aim’s a bit tricky, but it sure takes care of the flies."

"Forward momentum only worked as a strategy if one had correctly identified which was was forward."

"To get the right answer, one must first correctly frame the question."

"We have advanced to new and surprising levels of bafflement."

"She probably felt about matrimony the way Miles felt about needle-grenade launchers."

"Knowledge might not be power, but ignorance was definitely weakness, and so was poverty."

"One’s career might depend solely on one’s own efforts, but marriage was a lottery, and you drew your lot in late adolescence or early adulthood at a point of maximum idiocy and confusion. Perhaps it was just as well. If people were too sensible, the human race might well come to an end. Evolution favored the maximum production of children, not of happiness."

"He consoled himself with the reflection that it was seldom he found himself in company who made him feel this stupid. It was probably good for his soul."

"“Have you determined if it is meant to be a weapon at all?” she said. “We’ve got some very dead people to account for,” Miles pointed out. “That, alas, does not necessarily require a weapon.” Professor Vorthys said. “Carelessness, stupidity, haste, and ignorance are quite as powerfully destructive forces as homicidal intent.”"

"People have some very odd illusions about power. Mostly it consists of finding a parade and nipping over to place yourself at the head of the band. Just as eloquence consists of persuading people of things they desperately want to believe. Demagoguery, I suppose, is eloquence sliding to some least moral energy level."

"If you could go back in time and change things… The only moment in time you could change things was the elusive now, which slipped through your fingers as fast as you could think about it."

"The hostage game is a bad game, a sad and ugly game that’s a lot easier to start than end. The worst versions I’ve seen ended up with neither side in control, or getting anything they wanted. And the people who stand to lose the most in it frequently aren’t even playing."

"He's not even a mad scientist. He's merely a very upset engineer."

"“I’m planning my course work for the next session at university. I was too late to start this summer, so I’ll begin in the fall. There’s so much to choose from. I feel so ignorant.” “Educated is what you aim to be coming out, not going in.”"

"The parents of the preceding generation had taken galactic sex-selection technologies much too far in their foolish passion for male heirs, and the very sons they’d so cherished—Miles’s contemporaries—had inherited the resulting mating mess. Go to any formal party in Vorbarr Sultana these days, and you could practically taste the damned testosterone in the air, volatilized by the alcohol no doubt."

"He couldn’t make this go faster by pushing harder."

"Then time ran out—no. Time ran on. There was no end to time. But you come to the end of yourself, and time runs on, and leaves you."

"“Why are you here, Ivan?” He added under his breath, “and why couldn’t three bodyguards keep you out? Do I have to give orders to shoot to kill?” “My strength is great because my cause is just,” Vorpatril informed him. “My mother has sent me with a list of chores for you as long as my arm. With footnotes.”"

"I’ve seen planetary invasion plans less complex than what’s being booted about for this Imperial Wedding."

"I propose a treaty. You can have all the rest of the women in the universe. I just want this one."

"He must not be in one of his voluble moods. Either you can’t turn him on or can’t turn him off. Well, if there was a choice, taciturn was probably safer for the innocent bystanders than spring-wound."

"Mark had a Thing about Miles. Thing was not accepted psychoscientific terminology, she’d been informed by his twinkling therapist, but there was scarcely another term with the scope and flexibility to take in the whole complexity of the…Thing."

"You had to admire their honesty. No wonder they did so well at the sciences."

"“I thought he was a bit creepy.” Kareen stiffened. If you’d been cloned a slave, raised by terrorists to be a murderer, trained by methods tantamount to physical and psychological torture, and had to kill people to escape, you’d likely seem a little creepy too. If you weren’t a twitching puddle."

"Kareen was by no means sure Mark was a potential husband. He was still working his heart out on becoming a potential human being."

"She’d made it clear that Things Would Be Done Properly. The problem came in defining the term Properly."

"Oh yes. This was going to do well. If there was one thing Tsipis appreciated, it was a quick study. Ekaterin was one of those show once people whom Miles, in his mercenary days, had found more precious than unexpected oxygen in the emergency reserve."

"You couldn’t be that good and not know it, somewhere in your secret heart, however much you’d been abused into affecting public humility."

"My brother has this bad little habit of editing his version of reality to fit his audience."

"Miles was plenty expressive too, in his own unreliable way. Half of it was horseshit, but you were never sure which half."

"All Mark knew was that if it came down to a choice between Kareen and oxygen, he’d prefer to give up oxygen, thanks."

"“No money, but she’s beautiful, and her blood lines are impeccable.” “Are you choosing a wife, or buying a horse?”"

"“He told Mark he’s courting her in secret,” Martya put in to the Vorbrettens. “It’s a secret from her. We’re all still trying to figure that one out.” “Is the entire city party to my private conversations?” Miles snarled. “I’m going to strangle Mark.” Martya blinked at him with manufactured innocence. “Kareen had it from Mark. I had it from Ivan. Mama had it from Gregor. And Da had it from Pym. If you’re trying to keep a secret, Miles, why are you going around telling everyone?”"

"If you’re just now finding out that this world is unjust, well, you’re behind the times."

"You have to be careful who you let define your good."

"For her, this was a metaphor, he reminded himself. Though maybe he was a metaphor too, inside his head with the Black Gang. A metaphor gone metastatic. Metaphors could do that, under enough pressure."

"I could be a virgin again. What a dreadful thought."

"It is always easier to get forgiveness than permission."

"When you give each other everything, it becomes an even trade. Each wins all."

"You don’t pay back your parents. You can’t. The debt you owe them gets collected by your children, who hand it down in turn. It’s a sort of entailment. Or if you don’t have children of the body, it’s left as a debt to your common humanity. Or to your God, if you possess or are possessed by one."

"“There’s something to that in both directions,” said Ekaterin mildly. “Nothing is more guaranteed to make one start acting like a child than to be treated like one. It’s so infuriating. It took me the longest time to figure out how to stop falling into that trap.” “Yes, exactly,” said Kareen eagerly. “You understand! So—how did you make them stop?” “You can’t make them—whoever your particular them is—do anything, really,” said Ekaterin slowly. “Adulthood isn’t an award they’ll give you for being a good child. You can waste…years, trying to get someone to give that respect to you, as though it were a sort of promotion or raise in pay. If only you do enough, if only you are good enough. No. You have to just…take it. Give it to yourself, I suppose. Say, I’m sorry you feel like that, and walk away. But that’s hard.”"