#slavery

After a while Mary said, “Zsadist?” “Yeah?” “What are those markings?” His frowned and flicked his eyes over to her, thinking, as if she didn’t know? But then . . . well, she had been a human. Maybe she didn’t. “They’re slave bands. I was . . . a slave.” “Did it hurt when they were put on you?” “Yes.” “Did the same person who cut your face give them to you?” “No, my owner’s hellren did that. My owner . . . she put the bands on me. He was the one who cut my face.” “How long were you a slave?” “A hundred years.” “How did you get free?” “Phury. Phury got me out. That’s how he lost his leg.” “Were you hurt while you were a slave?” Z swallowed hard. “Yes.” “Do you still think about it?” “Yes.” He looked down at his hands, which suddenly were in pain for some reason. Oh, right. He’d made two fists and was squeezing them so tightly his fingers were about to snap off at the knuckles. “Does slavery still happen?” “No. Wrath outlawed it. As a mating gift to me and Bella.” “What kind of slave were you?” Zsadist shut his eyes. Ah, yes, the question he didn’t want to answer. For a while it was all he could do to force himself to stay in the chair. But then, in a falsely level voice, he said, “I was a blood slave. I was used by a female for blood.” The quiet after he spoke bore down on him, a tangible weight. “Zsadist? Can I put my hand on your back?” His head did something that was evidently a nod, because Mary’s gentle palm came down lightly on his shoulder blade. She moved it in a slow, easy circle. “Those are the right answers,” she said. “All of them.” He had to blink fast as the fire in the furnace’s window became blurry. “You think?” he said hoarsely. “No. I know. ↗

— J.R. Ward

#mary #nalla #therapy #zsadist #slavery

Devote the mind to confusion and we know only too well, if we´re honest, that it will become a dark master of confusion, adept in its addictions, subtle and perversely supple in its slaveries. Devote it in meditation to the task of freeing itself from illusion, and we will find that, with time, patience, discipline, and the right training, our mind will begin to unknot itself and know its essential bliss and clarity. ↗

— Sogyal Rinpoche

#meditation #spirituality #slavery

No nation ever yet found any inconvenience from too close an inspection into the conduct of its officers, but many have been brought to ruin and reduced to slavery by suffering gradual impositions and abuses. ↗

— Edward Livingston

#been #brought #close #conduct #ever

Only the most unapologetic biblical fundamentalists, for instance, take every biblical injunction literally. If we all took all scripture at the same level of authority, then we would be more open to slavery, to the subjugation of women, to wider use of stoning. Jesus himself spoke out frequently against divorce in the strongest of terms. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#authority #divorce #every #frequently #fundamentalists

Thus again the Netherlands, for the first time since the fall of Rome, were united under one crown imperial. They had already been once united, in their slavery to Rome. ↗

— John Lothrop Motley

#already #been #crown #fall #first

I speak on due consideration because Britain, France, and Mexico, have abolished slavery, and all other European states are preparing to abolish it as speedily as they can. ↗

— William H. Seward

#because #britain #consideration #due #european

There's no question that Stalin broke the agreements made at Yalta completely about elections that were supposed to be held immediately in Poland, and Eastern Europe was plunged into slavery as a consequence. ↗

— Mark Shields

#agreements #broke #completely #consequence #eastern

But if you want to continue to be slaves of the banks and pay the cost of your own slavery, then let bankers continue to create money and control credit. ↗

— Josiah Stamp

#banks #continue #control #cost #create

The secrets of slavery are concealed like those of the Inquisition. ↗

— Harriet Ann Jacobs

#inquisition #like #secrets #slavery #those

It appears that the present-day form of African American English is not the inheritance of the period of slavery, but the creation of the second half of the 20th century. ↗

— William Labov

#african #african american #american #appears #century