"Petyr 'Littlefinger' Baelish: The realm. Do you know what the realm is? It's the thousand blades of Aegon's enemies, a story we agree to tell each other over and over, until we forget that it's a lie.Lord Varys: But what do we have left, once we abandon the lie? Chaos? A gaping pit waiting to swallow us all.Petyr 'Littlefinger' Baelish: Chaos isn't a pit. Chaos is a ladder. Many who try to climb it fail and never get to try again. The fall breaks them. And some, are given a chance to climb. They refuse, they cling to the realm or the gods or love. Illusions. Only the ladder is real. The climb is all there is."

"Before he had lost his sight, the maester had loved books as much as Samwell Tarly did. He understood the way that you could sometimes fall right into them, as if each page was a hole into another world."

"It was queer how sometimes a child's innocent eyes can see things that grown men are blind to."

"Strike hard and true, crow, or I'll come back and haunt you."

"The light that brings the dawn."

"Was there ever a war where only one side bled?"

"It is said with truth that every building is constructed stone by stone, and the same may be said of knowledge, extracted and compiled by many learned men, each of whom builds upon the works of those who proceeded him."

"Our enemies leave our bodies for the crows and the wolves. Our friends bury us in secret graves."

"Would you rather die with honor intact or live with it besmirched?"

"What sort of gods make rats and plagues and dwarfs?"

"There is sitting and there is sitting. (...) Each one waits for the other to move, but the lion is poised, his tail twitching, while the fawn is frozen by fear, bowels turned to belly. No matter which way he bounds, the lion will have him, and he knows it."

"No, said Bran. "I haven't. And if I have it doesn't matter. Sometimes Old Nan would tell the same story she'd told before, but we never minded, if it was a good story. Old stories are like old friends, she used to say. You have to visit them from time to time."

"Most of my kin are bastards," [Tyrion] said with a wry smile, "but you're the first I've had to friend."

"The day my father came to claim me, my mother did not wish for me to go. 'She is a girl,' she said, 'and I do not think that she is yours. I had a thousand other men.' He tossed his spear at my feet and gave my mother the back of his hand across the face, so she began to weep. 'Girl or boy, we fight our battles,' he said, 'but the gods let us choose our weapons.' He pointed to the spear, then to my mother's tears, and I picked up the spear."

"The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword. If you would take a man's life, you owe it to him to look into his eyes and hear his final words. And if you cannot bear to do that, then perhaps the man does not deserve to die."

"The little man gave the big one a look. One of his eyes was green, one was black, and both were cool."

"It's not," Mormont told him. "Gods save us, boy, you're not blind and you're not stupid. When dead men come hunting in the night, do you think it matters who sits the Iron Throne?"

"All the world knew that a maester forged his silver link when he learned the art of healing-but the world preferred to forget that men who knew how to heal also knew how to kill."

"Men come and go. They lie, or die, or leave you."

"Without honor, a knight is no more than a common killer. It is better to die with honor than to live without it."

"I value my privacy, and if sometimes my actions seem strange or arbitrary or capricious, I do not want them challenged."

"Your brother Jaime keeps losing battles. He gave Sansa an angry look, as if it were her fault. He's been taken by the Starks and we've lost Riverrun and now her stupid brother is calling himself a king.The dwarf smiled crookedly. "All sorts of people are calling themselves kings these days."

"You are your mother's trueborn son of Lannister.""Am I?" the dwarf replied, sardonic. "Do tell my lord father. My mother died birthing me, and he's never been sure.""I don't even know who my mother was," Jon said. "Some woman, no doubt. Most of them are." He favored Jon with a rueful grin. "Remember this, boy. All dwarfs may be bastards, yet not all bastards need be dwarfs."And with that he turned and sauntered back into the feast, whistling a tune. When he opened the door, the light from within threw his shadow clear across the yard, and for just a moment Tyrion Lannister stood tall as a king."

"Most of the stories you hear about dragons are fodder for fools."

"May the Father judge him justly."

"There is a savage beast in every man, and when you hand that man a sword or spear and send him forth to war, the beast stirs."

"You may be as different as the sun and the moon, but the same blood flows through both your hearts. You need her, as she needs you..."

"It is hard to die unmourned."

"You can write the most detailed, vivid description of an ax entering a skull, and nobody will say a word in protest. But if you write a similarly detailed description of a penis entering a vagina, you get letters from people saying they'll never read you again. What the hell? Penises entering vaginas bring a lot more joy into the world than axes entering skulls."

"Your brother was a terrible traitor, I know, but if we start killing men at weddings they'll be even more frightened of marriage than they are presently."

"Innocence and experience make for a perfect marriage."

"Every man should lose a battle in his youth, so he does not lose a war when he is old."

"Fat men take a cushion with them wherever they go."

"Tell Khan Drogo that he has given me the wind."

"In the deep sands a man must hoard his water."

"Secrets are worth more than silver and sapphires."

"When a dog goes bad, the fault lies with his master."

"She loved the sea. She liked the sharp salty smell of the air, and the vastness of the horizons bounded only by a vault of azure sky above. It made her feel small, but free as well."

"A hound will die for you, but never lie to you."

"Power resides where men believe it resides. A very small man can cast a very large shadow."

"My smile is my servant, he should come at my command."

"They can keep their heaven. When I die, I'd sooner go to Middle Earth."

"Worms have crawled up your nose and eaten your wits."

"You are an honest and honorable man, Lord Eddard. Ofttimes I forget that. I have met so few of them in my life. He glanced around the cell. "When I see what honesty and honor have won you, I understand why."

"There's always a bear."

"She liked the sharp salty smell of the air, and the vastness of horizons bounded only by a vault of azure sky above."

"No wounded man shall sound me and live."

"The sword was not the kingdom, he says."

"We're all just songs in the end. If we are lucky."

"A dozen great fires raged under the city walls, where casks of burning pitch had exploded, but the wildfire reduced them to no more than candles in a burning house, their orange and scarlet pennons fluttering insignificantly against the jade holocaust."