I don't know why Alec and Richard touch me so very deeply, but they do. They are so real to me and I weep buckets just thinking about them. I don't know if you read The Death of the Duke but I read it for the first time yesterday (or rather, I may have read it before, but it didn't make as much sense until after I'd read TPOTS) and I was incoherent for about 20 minutes afterwards.

the beautiful manservant to an aging Duke (never named) says disbelievingly (when told that the Duke's swordsman killed by blow to the heart ) something like "To the heart? No one bares their heart to the sword."

And the dying Duke pulls him close and whispers, "No. Not no-one."

WAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i'm crying again just thinking about it.