Protector Of The Small
Captain Flyndan: You don't think history gets rewritten, sometimes?
Lord Raoul: When people say a knight's job is all glory, I laugh and laugh and laugh. Often, I can stop laughing before they edge away and start talking about soothing drinks.
Dom: You're alive. Most people who go five rounds with my lord can only babble about funeral plans.
Lord Raoul: Are you all right? Was he being unchivalrous?
Kel: No. He was just being Garvey.
Royal Courier: His Majesty said with all deliberate speed!
Lord Raoul: That's how we're doing it. Deliberately.
Kel: Well, is social scheduling what YOU thought you'd do as a knight?
Merric: I didn't think. I just did what my parents told me, for once.
Lord Raoul: I thought only Alanna was lucky enough to be the tool of the gods.
Kel: Don't the gods say if they choose you? I've never heard from them.
Lord Raoul: Don't let them poison you. Your coming was a fine thing, for the realm, for all those girls who come to watch you tilt, even for an old bachelor like me.
Kel: Sir, I've learned so much from you. You're the kind of knight I want to be.
Lord Wyldon: I am not. But that you believe it is the greatest compliment I will ever receive.
Kel: It's the only bad thing about animals. Most of them don't live as long as we do.
Cleon: I know, sweet. But think how bleak life would be without them.
Kel: I'm not a Yamani anymore. I'm allowed to be rude. Foreigners don't know any better.
Kel: The Yamanis don’t have them {competitions}. They just beat each other half to death in training.
Raoul: They sound like sensible people.
Cleon: The queen sent him {Raoul} to his room.
The herald: I don’t know why I came over here. By now you know the rules as well as I. Lord Raoul asked me to tell you that if you get yourself killed, he will never speak to you again.
Kel: So helpful.
Dom: Mithros, I HATE it when the enemy learns new things!
Raoul: The glory of knighthood is lovely, isn’t it? The brilliance and fury of battle, the sound of trumpets in the air, the flowers, and all the pretty girls – or pretty boys, in your case – climbing all over us.
The Chamber Of The Ordeal: You again.
Kel: Yes, of course, it’s me. I’m proving to myself that I’m not afraid of you.
COO: But you are.
Kel: I like lying to myself. It’s fun.
Kel: I’ve been thinking.
Yuki: Uh-oh.
Raoul: Practice is the difference between winning and being worm food.
Buri: I haven’t seen Raoul about. I suppose he defied their majesties and is hiding in his rooms.
Kel: No, he’s here. Not in this room, though, or we’d have seen a big lump behind the hangings.
(After Kel drops water bowl upon seeing Alanna with Raoul)
Raoul: I’m sorry. Should I have warned you?
Alanna: Don’t tease. Yes, you should have warned her.
Kel: You get used to anything –
(Looks at Daine’s head on an eagle body)
Kel: Well, maybe you don’t.
Kel to Joren: You’ll make a wonderful father someday. You’re good at bedtime tales.
Kel: Why didn’t they mention hammering and digging and sawing, when they talk about war. They never talk about mud in your teeth.
Dom: If they did, who would be crazy enough to fight? Pretty girls look oddly at a fellow if he talks about the mud in his teeth, instead of the enemies he killed so THEY might sleep safe.
Numair (had said): When in doubt, shoot the wizard.
Raoul (to the king) - I'm to attend balls and banquets without my squire? I can't handle things like requesting water to shave with, or getting my clothes pressed. I need Kel.
Kel (to Neal): I'm off to the practice courts. You want to come?
Neal: I'm about to commence four years obeying the call of a bruiser on a horse. I refuse to put down what may be the last book I see for months.
Raoul: Servants and our standard-bearer won't be enough when I have to deal with every jumped-up, self-important toady in the country.
Neal (about Alanna): She and Father are friends, so she probably won't kill me.
Sergeant Osbern: Let's have an inspection. Mithros witness, if I find one strap undone, heads will roll.
Giles of Veldine: But, Sergeant Osbern, sir, I like my head.
Dom (to Kel): Your page-sponsor was a certain mad cousin of mine.
Kel: You're related to Neal.
Dom: Sadly, yes. I call him Meathead.
Raoul: We do try to eat. I go all faint if I don't get fed regularly. Only think of the disgrace to the King's Own if I fell from the saddle. Someone: But there was that time in Fanwood.
Sergeant Osbern: That wedding in Tameran.
Someone else: Don't forget when what's-his-name, with the army, retired.
Raoul: Silence, insubordinate curs! Do not sully my new squire's ears with your profane tales!
Dom: Even if they're true?
Bernin: Isn't Keladry a girl's name?
Kel (to Raoul): Begging my lord's pardon, but you are a bad man.
Neal (about Alanna): She doesn't need a sword-that temper sharpens her tongue just fine.
Kel (to Neal): You know, Neal, I think your branch was cheated when they handed out brains, because Dom (Neal throws roll at her)
Yuki (about Kel's friends): They stare so. (Bows and everyone tries to stand up and bow back)
Kel: Now you've done it. They won't be able to talk sense for weeks.
Yuki: Easterners normally make sense?
Kel (about Raoul, to Neal): You'd particularly like the tilting practice we have every day when we aren't in the field.
Neal: Tilt with Lord Raoul? Why don't I just lie down in front of an elephant and let him step on me? I bet it feels the same.
Jon: Change the law? Squire, what do you think her majesty and I have done ever since we took the thrones? No, don't answer-I dread what you might have the courage to say.
Cleon: You shimmer like a mirage of delight. Your teeth call to mind wolfhounds romping in the snow.
Kel: Wolfhounds are furry. I hope my teeth aren't. And teeth aren't cold enough to be snow. How is it you get sillier every time I talk to you?
Cleon: The joy of our nearness cooks my lovestruck heart.
Neal: Did Cleon kiss you for Midwinter luck?
Kel: Did Princess Kalasin ask for a dance at the ball tomorrow night?
Raoul: As for issues of the body-sex, pregnancy, and so on-perhaps you should discuss those with a woman. (clears throat) If you WANT to discuss them with me, it is my responsibility-
Kel: No, no! I'll ask Mama, truly I will!
Raoul: Oh, good. I'd probably make a botch of it. I've talked with young men, of course, but even that's been rare. Ususally by the time I get them they know where babies come from.
Faleron: Gods curse it, Kel, you heard what he said! [referring to what Garvey said which was you're friends with her now because you can have her when you want]
Kel: I heard a fart You know where those come from. Let it go.
Raoul (about giants): Those big fellows are all alike. Smash 'em on the toe and they turn into kittens.
Lord Wyldon: Very well done. Very well indeed. You listened to my advice bout your shield-but then, I xpected no less. I only wish -
Kel: I know my lord. You wish I were a boy. But being a girl is more fun. More fun-er? Is that right?
Thayet: Wear it in Health and Victory, Now, show the nice people.
Alanna: Nobody ever says that, even with Healers your body adds up your breaks and bruises, then gives you the bill in your mid-thirties
Kel: Lady Alanna, would you like to come to supper with us? Someone has to keep Neal from making speeches.
Kel (to an idiot): "Next time remember I'm bigger than you!"
Kel - It's the dress silly, Lalasa can make anyone look pretty (They kiss)
Cleon- It's you silly
Neal glared at the chubby second-year with all the royal disdain of a vexed lion. He was limping from a staff blow to the knee. "You are a bloody-minded savage," he informed Owen sternly. "I hope you are kidnapped by centaurs."
Neal ( to Kel): It's your own fault for encouraging him [Owen] when he was a first year, you know. Now he thinks he's a human being.
Neal: now, if you'll excuse me, I need to shave
Kel: you don't need to
Neal: I live in hope, as the priest said to the princess...
Neal (to Lord W): How can I be silent and yet apologize?
Owen: Sir, you talk like Kel couldn't handle the fighting. She's the one who saved our bacon.
Neal (dryly): I suppose he [Joren] could have changed. I myself, have noticed my growing resemblance to a daffodil.
Kel (eyeing Neal): You do look yellow around the edges. I hadn't wanted to bring it up.
Neal (slinging an arm around her shoulder): We daffodils like to have things
brought up. It reminds us of spring.
Cleon (irritably): Does Dung remind you of spring to Princess Flower? You needn't manhandle our Kel like that.
Kel (moving Neal's arm): Thanks but no thanks. I don't want to crush your petals.
Cleon (placing arm on Kel's shoulder): Crush mine all you like fair lady.
Owen (moving between Kel and Neal and putting an arm around Kel's waist): Me too.
Owen: Mithros spear Kel. When did you turn into a girl.
Iden or Warric: You said she was a girl already
Kel (thought): The God's have run mad. They've put me in a spot where I'm begging to go down that dreadful stair.
Neal: You are an education, Keladry of Mindelan.
Kel: I'm not sure that's a compliment.
Neal: Neither am I.
Kel: You will pay for that, on the practice courts.
Owen: (to Neal) It was good knowing you.
Wyldon: We need the realms sons. Girls are fragile, more emotional, easier to frighten. They are not as strong in their shoulders and arms as men. They tire easily. This girl would get any warriors who served with her killed on some dark night.
Neal (on sponsoring Kel): I suppose I'm being rash and peculiar, again, but if it means helping my friend Joren improve his studies, well, I'll just have to sacrifice myself. There's nothing I won't do to further the cause of book learning among my peers.
Jon: That is an order, Lady Knight. If you cannot accept that, say as much now and I will find you work elsewhere.
Alanna: Don't tax yourself. I'll find knights work myself. As far from Corus as possible.
Neal: What possessed you? Why in the name of all the Gods in all of the Eastern and Southern Lands would you start a fight with them?
Kel: I didn't like the shape of Joren's nose.
Neal: There! You see what I have to deal with!
Duke Baird: You may have noticed my son has an endless capacity for drama.
Lord Raoul: This is what I've come to - following little birdies.
Neal: Ouch! Well, label me very impressed and ship me to Carthak!
Seaver: Its not right.
Neal: What's not right?
Seaver: When Clean talks to us he doesn't do that. You don't call us 'rose' and 'pearl'. If you don't talk to us like that, you shouldn't do it to her.
Owen: She's as good as us. You don't have to treat her like a girl.
Clean: But she is a girl...
Kel: I think I could flirt about as well as my gelding dances.
Owen (to his first-year cousins): That's Lalasa, Kel's maid. She sews and knows all sorts of ways to hurt you. (to Lalasa) I wasn't trying to be rude.
Neal: You can be rude without trying.
Kel: I'll find my way on my own.
Wyldon: When I require your opinion...
Neal: It's no trouble. None at all, Demoiselle Keladry. (to Wyldon) My Lord, I apologize for my wicked tongue and dreadful manners. I shall do my best not to encourage her to follow my example.