1
Oh, he did look like a deity — the perfect balance of danger and charm, he was at the same time fascinating and inaccessible, distant because of his demonstrated flawlessness, and possessing such strength of character that he was dismaying and at the same time utterly attractive in an enticing and forbidden way.Simona Panova
2
You know what, your imagination works faster than your mind.Simona Panova
3
Everybody is equally weak on the inside, just that some present their ruins as new castles and become kings —Simona Panova
4
Strength and victory... What he would never praise himself for, but whose loss was his most obsessive fear.Simona Panova
5
I always am in a role, lovely — for you, for them — even for myself. Yeah... Even when I’m alone, I am still in a role — and I myself am the most exacting audience I have ever had.Simona Panova
6
Have a look around, my pretty, we are surrounded by Death in all forms — just the two of us are still alive —Simona Panova
7
Even I don’t know myself... In fact, I don’t know if I really have a self at all, as I’m constantly playing different roles and pretending — not so much on stage as in real life...Simona Panova
8
Emotions don’t interfere in my acting, nor in my life.Simona Panova
9
So, apart from casting runes, what other hobbies do you have? Forbidden rituals, human sacrifices, torturing? —Simona Panova
10
I was never able to accept anyone else’s support but my own —Simona Panova
11
A good enemy can be better than the best of friend.Simona Panova
12
You can speak to me like you haven’t spoken even to yourself.Simona Panova
13
Desires are what can most easily ruin us, lovely.Simona Panova
14
I’d love to try to tame you... And I would simply adore it if you turn out untamable —Simona Panova
15
And what if you try to kill me? Or worse: to kiss me?Simona Panova
16
You kissed me once and now you feel as if you’ve got some special kind of licence to do it whenever you want?Simona Panova
17
Don’t you have dragons to fight so that you started saving girls who don’t need it?Simona Panova
18
Insane love. Loving insanity. Insanity and love...Simona Panova
19
My ghost is the only soul who ever comes to cry on my grave... Only the skies cried sincerely on my funeral.Simona Panova
20
Paranoia. The more you think of an imaginary problem, the more you feel as though it’s real —Simona Panova
21
The unknown grayish mystifying forest was benumbed into frost-covered cold, and the tremendous pines towering above the dark marshy soil resembled a gathering of severe mute brothers from a forbidden ancient order worshiping forgotten gods no one had ever heard of outside of the world of secret occult visions.Simona Panova
22
And I wasn’t playing a role — I was trying to be myself. But the harder I was striving, the more I was realizing that I had probably lost that ‘myself’ somewhere between two perfectly performed roles...Simona Panova
23
Gray.The overcast skies had the colour of deadened stones, and seemed closer than usually, as though they were phlegmatically observing my every movement with their apathetic emptily blue-less eyes; each tiny drop of hazy rain drifting around resembled transparent molten steel, the pavement looked like it was about to burst into disconsolate tears, even the air itself was gray, so ultimate and ubiquitous that colour was everywhere around me. Gray..Simona Panova
24
I was recently living more comfortably surrounded by secrets... Like dozens of luxurious satiny pillows, they were embracing me from all directions into safe lulling warmth, thus isolating me from the sharp dead-cold edges of the truth hiding behind their endearingly smooth textures and tender soothing colours. Secrets could be so irresistibly beautiful...Simona Panova
25
The utter unbroken silence was more appalling than any ominous noise, than the loudest yells of anguish, than the most piercing screaming... Dead silence. Literally dead.Simona Panova
26
I was beginning to agree with the thesis that some truths were better off dead. And buried.Simona Panova
27
His character would be blamed, loathed, discussed, and adored — but somewhere there, behind his mask of a hero, Cardew would remain faceless. Anonymous.Simona Panova
28
The desperate piercing scream of horror echoed far above the sharpened tops of the trees wrapped in thin obsidian-transparent mist, and I startled jerkily, tripping again, and almost collapsed onto the cold moist ground.Simona Panova
29
I lie more convincingly than I tell the truth.Simona Panova
30
I can be anything — and nothing, and everything at the same time. It all depends on the role I am in.Simona Panova