brittle point

Politicians and other leaders here worry that tensions are reaching a brittle point, and that passions may dictate the outcome of elections for provincial offices on Nov. 20.

But it was the Sun diminished, Sol with no discernible disk, Sol dwindled to the bright, brittle point of Venus on a frosty Earth night.

The stars were brittle points that sent fiery beams of energy into his brain, the rising and falling hum of the cicada weirdly in control of his pulse.

He built the Granite City, sheer and windowless, a dark place of inner courtyards and secrets, and in its midst, rising in brittle points, stood the Towers of Granite.