Page 594 - Enders_Game_Full_Book

"Myself as much as her."
Valentine leaned closer, put her arm around him, pulled his head onto her shoulder.
"No," he said. But he didn't pull away. And after a few moments, his arm swung awkwardly around to embrace her. He didn't cry anymore, but he did let her hold him for a minute or two. Maybe it helped. Valentine had no way of knowing.
Then he was done. He pulled away, rolled onto his back. "I'm sorry," he said.
"You're welcome," she said. She believed in answering what people meant, not what they said. "Don't tell Jakt," he whispered.
"Nothing to tell," she said. "We had a good talk."
She got up and left, closing his door behind her. He was a good boy. She liked the fact that he could admit caring what Jakt thought about him. And what did it matter if his tears tonight had self- pity in them? She had shed a few like that herself. Grief, she reminded herself, is almost always for the mourner's loss.
Chapter 5 -- THE LUSITANIA FLEET
<Ender says that when the war fleet from Starways Congress reaches us, they plan to destroy this world.>
<Interesting.>
<You don't fear death?>
<We don't intend to be here when they arrive.>
Qing-jao was no longer the little girl whose hands had bled in secret. Her life had been transformed from the moment she was proved to be godspoken, and in the ten years since that day she had come to accept the voice of the gods in her life and the role this gave her in society. She learned to accept the privileges and honors given to her as gifts actually meant for the gods; as her father taught her, she did not take on airs, but instead grew more humble as the gods and the people laid ever-heavier burdens on her.