How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
"Yet they did not. That is what I cannot figure," he said, his left hand warm on her ankle.
"Healed me, cared for me, and I their enemy and they mine. But why? Why?" (1.90-91)
Cam tries to come to terms with the fact that the Uplanders didn't have him as a prisoner and just let him leave, even though he was fighting for the other side. He doesn't say it directly, but we can tell he feels guilty about the whole thing.
Quote #2
"What are you hiding?" Bailey Nelsan's da had asked. It wasn't only he who had looked dirty at Cam, and then muttered to his pot-mate. And Cam… Cam had caught Ban staring and Ban had gone red. At the sudden heat in his face he'd turned away. (3.21)
Why does everything think Cam is hiding anything at all? Perhaps it's because they need someone—anyone—to blame for losing their loved ones.
Quote #3
"Dead, dead, dead. Each and all of them. Spear or arrow or sword or disease. What is there to tell?"
There had been a long pause then, while Ban found the nerve to speak. "They do have a right to know."
"If I had never come back— and I nearly did not— who then would they ask?" (4.26-28)
Do you agree with Cam or Ban? Does it matter how people's loved ones died? We can see both of their points, and the book asks you to be the judge.
Quote #4
While Cam swam, Ban fidgeted about on the bank and told Cam about the guilty feeling he had been holding, the length of summer. (4.51)
Ban's family doesn't like him hanging out with Cam because they think he's a bad influence. No one's really sure what Cam's been up to, and Ban feels badly for spending time with the guy given his family's feelings.
Quote #5
Cam had a hunger in him. He didn't know what it was, and he didn't know how to assuage it. It was an always-hunger, but worse now, in this after-the-war stillness. (5.1)
Cam is hungry for life, for adventure and thrills. This is what led him to war, and what leaves him to venture out again once it's over—even though both of these decisions leave him with some guilt.
Quote #6
Why me? he asked himself, looking down from the wall onto the wide sward where he had fought, now green and growing with the bodies of Kayforliers, Isycherns, Dunnemen lying under it. (5.58)
All Cam can do when he thinks about war is question why over and over again. This is a classic sign of his survivor's guilt for being the only Downlander to come out of the war. Sometimes there are no reasons why—it's just luck, fate, or a mixture of the two.
Quote #7
"What's this, then? My little Pin-sister being a stranger to me?"
"Do you blame her when you're never about?" Da had said.
"I'm about now."
Pin had put her tongue out at him. "You do only come home to fight with Da." (6.92)
Their dad has a point—how can Pin be close to her bro when he's never around? Yet we can't help but feel for the guy, because it's not as though he's been out with his buddies—he was fighting a war, which seem like it's earned him a little slack.
Quote #8
She closed her eyes tight, but she was not thinking of merrows now; she was thinking of Cam. Cam on that last night. Just as they had sat to supper without him, he had come laughing through the door, and it was not just shy she had been with Cam— she had been cross, and he had known it and now he was gone. (6.85)
There's more than enough guilt to go around with this family. Pin feels badly about her brother leaving, even though it wasn't her fault. We'd like to point out that this guilt is probably just a form of anger about everything the war has stolen from their family.
Quote #9
"Miss Graceful… it was war. He did not kill me and he could have. Should have. You do see?" He stared at her with eyes darker than the Uplander Lord's, his hair darker, his skin. More Uplander than any Uplander. (13.267)
When Graceful blames Gyaar for taking Cam's arm, he reminds her of this—all of them do stuff or have stuff done to them that they later regret or can't understand. So if no one is innocent in the war, are they all guilty?
Quote #10
How can she smile, when you will not see her fully? (15.223)
Cam is plenty happy to blame Gyaar for his problems with Graceful, but she's partly to blame as well. Cam just can't stand to see his former flame happy without him, and Gyaar doesn't get why Graceful is so stubborn and selfish during wartime.