More on Melanthe

Have I mentioned how much I love Melanthe's heartlessness? Here are some quotes I adore, showcasing her detachment when men try to court her (it's revealed very early in the story that she'll be assassinated if she accepts marriage or attention from any man, for reasons that are complicated to explain here):

She began to encourage him, though he needed no encouragement from her to lead himself to his own humiliation. She was angry at him, but smiled. She regretted him, but she smiled still, ruthless, laughing at his wit, complimenting his banquet.

I love her. She's flawed and complex. And she's paranoid that everyone talks about her. Here's a quote from the beginning of the story, when she's sitting at a banquet with the gyrfalcon she brings with her everywhere, sure that everyone is gossiping about her behind her back:

There-- that woman in the blue houpelande, leaning back to speak to the next table-- she was no doubt complaining to her neighbor that such a gyrfalcon as Princess Melanthe carried was too great for a woman to fly. Nothing in the duke's mews could match it; not even the Black Prince himself owned such a bird. The insolence, that she would display it so at the duke's own feast! Immodesty! Wicked vanity and arrogance!

Melanthe gave the woman a long dispassionate stare and had the pleasure of watching her victim turn white with dismay at the attention.

It's that last line that really cinches it for me. Melanthe is so sure of her own imagined scenario of what the woman in the blue houpeland is saying, that she cuts her with a cold glance, but moreover, she enjoys watching the woman squirm! I love Melanthe. She's everything awesome and real and wonderful to me.

One of my favorite lines of hers is simply this:

Since she felt the urge to smile, she followed the primary rule of her existence and did not do it.