Juliet Marillier Quotes

A tree is never just a tree, it is bigger and deeper and wiser than a girl like you will ever be.

Don't punish me for what you see as your own failings. I want to be with you more than anything in the world. I've dreamed of this since that day you spoke of, the day you called me 'my heart' and surprised me with a kiss. Never mind the handfasting, if you don't want that. But please don't push me away. I know you love me. I love you with all my heart. Please give this time.

Even in that time of utter darkness, somewhere deep inside me the memory of love and goodness had stayed alive.

Dawn will come,' I told him quietly. 'The night can be very dark; but I'll stay by you until the sun rises. These shadows cannot touch you while I am here. Soon we'll see the first hint of grey in the sky, the color of a pigeon's coat, then the smallest touch of the sun's finger, and one bird will be bold enough to wake first and sing of tall trees and open skies and freedom. Then all will brighten and color will wash across the earth and it will be a new day. I will stay with you, until then.

Now he understood what it was to be a man: that it was to be weak as well as strong, to be foolish sometimes and wise sometimes, to know love as well as to kill. And he had learned that there were other paths for him, other gods who called in the deep places of the earth, in the lap of wavelets on the shore, in the breath of the wind. He had learned that there were other kinds of courage. He knew, with deep certainty, that the islands held a new path for him. He need only move forward and find it.

So you do believe in ... true love? she whispered.
I took a deep breath, I think I have to, I said, blinking back tears. Without it, we're all going nowhere.

The rain accompanied Faolan as he travelled inland to the crossroads where he must at last make a choice of ways. He tried to fix his mind on the decision ahead, but thoughts of Deord intruded: Deord strong and serene as guard to a solitary, gifted captive; Deord devoting all he had left, after Breakstone, to keeping that wrongly imprisoned man safe from his own brother and from himself. Deord, at the end, fighting one last, heroic battle and dying so Faolan and Ana and the remarkable Drustan could go free.

But I believe we all have an inner goodness; a little flame that stays alight through the worst of trials.

There's a light shining in him, moving him forward: the light of freedom. That's what draws all of us to follow, to take risks, to keep on fighting when we see our comrades fall beside us. But there's no light without shadow.

Only a fool gives up his one treasure.

Our family has survived a long time. We've weathered battles and transformations, enchantments and floods and fires. We've endured being sent away, and we've coped with evildoers in our midst. If I were telling a story of Sevenwaters – and it would be a grand epic told over all the nights of a long winter – I would surely end it with a triumph. A happy ending, all well, puzzles solved, enemies defeated, the future stretching ahead bright and true. With new challenges and new adventures, certainly, because that's the way things always are. But overall it would be a very satisfying story, one to give the listener heart.

All that he had of her was his memory, where he held every moment, every single moment that she had been his. That was all he had, to keep out the loneliness.

It was quiet; so quiet. Didn't these people know how to grieve for a good man? Didn't they know how to weep, and scream with rage, and curse the powers of darkness in their sorrow? Didn't they know how to hold one another, and dry one another's tears, and tell tales of the things he had done, and of what he had been, to see him safe on his way? Where were the great fires, and the toasts in strong ale, and the scent of burning juniper?

How could you live without human touch? Wasn't that the first thing you knew, when you came into the world and they laid you on your mother's belly? Her hand would come across and stroke your back, and cup your head, and she would smile through tears of exhaustion and wonderment. That touch of love would be the very first thing for you.

cherish what you have, for in an instant it can be gone. And when it's gone, let the memory not be a weight that drags you down, but a bright light leading you forward.

Wake the sleeper must, and confront his fears, or risk being lost in the dark places of the mind forever.

Best face your fears straightaway; putting things off only makes them harder.

A wonder tale can be truer than true, I said. I had learned ( ... ) that the deepest kind of truth can be found in the strangest and wildest of stories. One may not meet a fire-breathing dragon on the way to the well. One may not encounter an army of toothed snakes in the woodshed. That does not make the wisdom in those tales any less real.

Amazing, I thought nobody could tell that man what to do.
-Foalan to Bridei
Talking about Broichan

You will find the way, daughter of the forest. Through grief and pain, through many trials, through betrayal and loss, your feet will walk a straight path.

Nobody expects you to exhibit godlike strength, excepting maybe yourself.

At the end of the parapet, a long black coat lay neatly folded on the wall. At the other end stood my sister and her lover. Tati's arms were wound around Sorrow's neck, her body pressed close to his, as if she would melt into him. His hands were enlaced in my sister's long hair as he strained her slight form against him, white on black. Their eyes were closed; their lips clung; they were lost in each other. It was beautiful and powerful. It was impossible.

When the Fair Folk gave you an instruction, you followed it, whether it suited you or not. That was just the way it was.

A tale can start in many ways. Thus, it is many tales, and at the same time each of these is but one way of telling the same story.

As for me, I had found love, and that was a gift worth suffering for.

There are technical tricks that may help you create more effective characters. My approach to characterization is not at all technical. I can't really analyze how I do it, but I am sure of one thing. To write convincing characters, you must possess the ability to think yourself into someone else's skin.

For indeed you have a choice. You can flee and hide, and wait to be found. You can live out your days in terror, without meaning. Or you can take the harder choice, and you can save them.

And as I watched him, I knew that in every dark night there was, somewhere, a small light burning that could never be quenched.

What I do . . . the path I tread . . . it brings some choices that test me hard.

I was learning the nature of magic; it seemed to work according to a strict set of rules. And yet, somehow, it never worked in quite the way you expected.

Three children lay on the rocks at the water's edge.
A dark-haired girl, two boys, slightly older.
This image is caught forever in my memory, like some fragile creature preserved in amber.

You bound him to you with your courage and your tales. You hold him to you now. You captured a wild creature when you had no place you could keep him.

Seven years of this and I'll have lost whatever edge I once had," I said. "I'll have turned into one of those well-fed countrywomen who pride themselves on making better preserves then their neighbors, and give all their chickens names.

Nothing comes without a price.

I like your anger,' the Hag said mildly. 'I like your resistance. It makes you less than courteous, but altogether more interesting.

We cannot know the future. All we can do is face it bravely. We should take heed of those we love and respect. But in the end, we make every decision alone.

Every man or woman who makes a stand helps keep the flame of freedom burning.

The man journeyed far, and he heard and saw many strange things on his travels. He learned that - that the friend and the enemy are but two faces of the same self. That the path one believes chosen long since, constant and unchangeable, straight and wide, can alter in an instant. Can branch, and twist and lead the traveler to places far beyond his wildest imaginings. That there are mysteries beyond the mind of mortal man, and that to deny their existence is to spend a life of half-consciousness.

But in a song or a tale, anything is possible

If a man has to say trust me it's a sure sign you cannot. Trust him, that is. Trust is a thing you do without words.

This is a long goodbye, yet not time enough. I have no aptitude for this. I cannot learn this. I would hold on, and hold on, until my hands clutch at emptiness.

It is frightening, how one lie is just the first strand in an ever increasing fabric of untruth. And once this fabric is woven, it is very hard to unravel.

Death, of course, should not be feared, but awaited with certain wonder. To die was to step across a threshold into a new world, unknown, unimaginable.

Some broken things you can't mend. Some you have to put together very slowly piece by fragile piece, waiting until the last bit of work is strong enough before you try the next. It takes a lot of patience.

It seemed to me it would be better to die standing up to a tyrant than to survive as a tool of his will.

Mistress Blackthorn?"
Fool. Who else would it be?

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Death is final. The felling of trees is final. What we ask of you is simply the recognition of change, Jena. Yours is a world of constant change. You must learn to change, too. You spend a great deal of time worrying about others: trying to put their lives right, trying to shape your world as you believe it should be. You must learn to trust your instincts, or you are doomed to spend your life blinded by duty while beside you a wondrous tree sprouts and springs up and buds and blooms, and your heart takes no comfort from it, for you cannot raise your eyes to see it.

I'm here, Sorcha.
I would not believe it at first; it had been so long since he had touched my mind in this way.
I'm here. Try to let go, dear one. I know how it hurts. Lean on me; let me take your burden for a while.
I could scarcely see him; he was on the far side of the fire, behind the others and half turned away, with his head still in his hands. It seemed as if he had scarcely moved at all.
How can you? How can you know?
I know. Let me help you.
I felt the strength of his mind flow into mine, and somehow he managed to close off the terrible, the dark and secret things that he had dreaded sharing with me, and fill my head with pictures of all that was good and brave.

I've loved fairytales, folklore and mythology since I was a small child, and I think it was inevitable that they would influence my style and my development of stories.

I cannot expiate my sin, yet I am compelled to try. My mind will not let me rest. There must be something I could have done, some way I could have acted, something I could have changed to snatch victory from bitter defeat.

I know it's hard for you to trust me. If I ever find the man who did this to you, who made you so frightened, I'll kill him with my bare hands. But you can trust me.

In time, your spirit will be with them again, perhaps in a great, spreading tree that shades the place where your grandchildren play. Maybe in a wide-winged eagle soaring aloft, watching as your dear one spreads her linen on the hawthorns to dry and looks suddenly to the sky, shading her eyes against the sunlight. You will be there, and they will know.

But there are two sides to every fight. It starts from something small, a chance remark, a gesture made lightly. It grows from there. Both sides can be unjust. Both can be cruel.

This is a - a proposal of marriage?" he asked me, and there was the very smallest trace of a smile at the corner of his mouth, something I had never seen before.
"I suppose so," I said, blushing again. "And, as you see, I'm doing it properly, on my knees."
"This would, however, be a partnership of equals you're offering, I imagine?"
"Undoubtedly." (448-49)

Why should I be polished and improved like goods for sale? I might not even want to marry! And besides, I have many skills. I can read and write and play the flute and harp. Why should I change to please some man? If he doesn't like me the way I am, then he can get some other girl for his wife.

We draw our strength from the great oaks of the forest. As they take their nourishment from the soil, and from the rains that feed the soil, so we find our courage in the pattern of living things around us. They stand through storm and tempest. They grow and renew themselves. Like a grove of young oaks, we remain strong.

...if you give respect, yet get respect back. If you offend, you get...retribution.

Saved my life," Grim said.
"You saved mine."
"Good team, then.

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We're all trapped in a net of consequences, condemned to paths outside our control. It's the way of things.

There is no good or evil, save in the way you see the world. There is no dark or light save in your own.

There is the darkness of a moonless night out of doors, and there is the darkness of a house with its shutters closed and the lamps quenched. There is the darkness of sleep, relieved by the bright images of dreams. But no darkness is as complete, as blanketing, as terrifying as the utter darkness of underground.

Stronger than iron crueler than death sweeter than springtime it lives beyond breath

I do not view suicide as wicked, just terribly sad. There is only one death, but it is like a stone cast into a pond - the ripples stretch far. Such an act must leave a burden of sorrow, guilt, shame and confusion on an entire family. A natural death, such as my father suffered, is hard enough to deal with. A decision to end one's life must be still more devastating for those left behind. I cannot imagine the degree of hopelessness someone must feel to contemplate such an act.

I should have realized, when Cathal kissed me in the hallway, that my response was the first raindrop heralding a storm.

He and I ... we share a bond. Not love, exactly. It goes beyond that. He is mine as surely as sun follows moon across the sky. Mine before ever I knew he existed. Mine until death and beyond.

I did not want to cry any more. Instead I felt hollow, empty, as if all the meaning had been sucked out of me and I was drifting, light as a skeleton leaf, at the mercy of the four winds. I was drained of tears.

My heart. Your heart.

Meanwhile, the great ash would rest where she lay, and mosses would creep over her trunk, and tiny creatures make their homes her dim hollows. Even in death she was a link in the great chain of the forest's being.

There is no place here for softness. Let folk in too close and you offer them up as weapons for your own destruction.

And they say, if ever a traveler plucks the wild parsley, and takes the bark of the hazel tree, and the secret toadstools, and mixes them with crocus from the patch of forest where the hero's last bones lie, a powerful spell will come to life. The hero will be reborn, not as he was before his destruction, but many times stronger in body and spirit; for he will be filled with the strength of earth, sea, and air. I think of the seven of us as the parts of one body. We may be torn asunder, and it may seem as if there is no tomorrow for us. We may each travel our own path, and we may fall and be broken and mend again. But in the end, as surely as the sun and moon make their way across the arch of the heavens, the strength of one is the strength of seven.

The greatest tales, well told, awaken the fears and longings of the listeners. Each man hears a different story. Each is touched by it according to his inner self. The words go to the ear, but the true message travels straight to the spirit.

This was a familiar feeling, for there were many places in the great forest where you could drink in its energy, become one with its ancient heart. When you were in trouble, you could find your way in these places.

In the old tales, when people undertake quests, they find themselves fighting dragons or serpents or giant dogs. Or maybe a dark warrior of some kind, folk who are enemies from the start. But it's far more frightening when someone seems friendly and good, and turns out to be different altogether. The odd and uncanny are not terrifying in themselves. The most disturbing thing is the ordinary turned strange. Things familiar and safe becoming not right.

Can a split quill write fair script?
Can a blunt axe cut wood for the fire?
Can a cripple please a lady?

I am a child of Alban's earth Her ancient bones brought me to birth Her crags and islands built me strong My heart beats to her deep wild song. I am the wife with bairn on knee I am the fisherman at sea I am the piper on the strand I am the warrior, sword in hand. White Lady shield me with your fire Lord of the North my heart inspire Hag of the Isles my secrets keep Master of Shadows guard my sleep. I am the mountain, I am the sky I am the song that will not die I am the heather, I am the sea My spirit is forever free.

You are ... you're like a beating heart. A glowing lamp. I've never met anyone like you before.

I wanted so much to keep you safe. I did my best. I'm sorry things didn't come out different for the two of us. I wish I could have been good enough for you.

You are a devious woman, Blackthorn,' she said.
'I prefer the term strategic thinker.

But then, if you forget what's bad, cruel, unjust, you might not care anymore about setting things to rights. You might stop standing up against the folk who do evil deeds. And someone's got to.

Our strength comes from that magic, from the earth and the sky, from the fire and the water. Fly high, swim deep, give back to the earth what she gives you ...

There were those whose love spilled over into their every gesture, and so was shared by all who knew them. But they were rare folk indeed.

The girl is not yours, or mine, or anyone's. But for now, she travels under my protection, and let him who lays a hand on her answer to me.

I cannot say what it was that made me take that one step forward. Maybe it was the hesitation in his voice. I knew what it cost him to let himself speak thus. Maybe it was the memory of how he had looked as he slept. I just knew, overwhelmingly, that if I did not touch him I would shatter in pieces. Jump, cried the wind. Jump over. I shut my eyes and moved toward him, and my arms went around his waist, and I rested my head against his chest and let my tears flow. There, said the voice deep inside me. See how easy it was? Bran went very still; and then his arms came around me, quite cautiously, as if he had never done this before and was not at all sure how one went about it. We stood there awhile, and the feeling was good, so good, like a homecoming after long troubles. Until I held him, I did not realize how much I had longed for it. Until I held him, I did not realize he was just the right height to put his arms comfortably around my shoulders, for me to rest my brow in the hollow of his neck, where the blood pulsed under the skin - a perfect fit.

He would have told her - he would have said, it matters not if you are here or there, for I see you before me every moment. I see you in the light of the water, in the swaying of the young trees in the spring wind. I see you in the shadows of the great oaks, I hear your voice in the cry of the owl at night. You are the blood in my veins, and the beating of my heart. You are my first waking thought, and my last sigh before sleeping. You are - you are bone of my bone, and breath of my breath.

A dream is the key that unlocks the mysteries of the waking world ...

You risked much, to give your love to such a one.
I stared at him. Love?
Did you not know, until now, when you must say goodbye?

With respect," said Red, and his voice had gone so quiet people hushed each other to hear him, "my tale is yet unfinished; you should hear me out. And it is her answer I have come to hear, not yours.

For the others, it was still just a tale, like all the tales we told, night by night, tales comical and strange, tales heroic and awe-inspiring, the tales that formed the fabric of our spirits.

As for religious faith, a lack of it shouldn't stop us from doing good deeds for their own sake.

You may be your own best helper, if you choose the right path.

The end of the story is of your making, nobody else's. You can do with it as you choose. There are as many paths open to your hero as branches on a great tree. They are wonderful and terrible, and plain and twisted. They touch and part and intermingle, and you can follow them whatever way you will.

In all experience, there is something to be learned. In deepest sorrow, wisdom is found. In the well of despair, hope rises.

I learned that in the end, only I was responsible for my actions.

This had been real: real in its flaws and uncertainties, real in its small triumphs, real in its compromises and understanding.

.... So Cu Chulainn asked and he asked, and at length he learned that the best teacher of the arts of war was a woman, Scathach, a strange creature who lived on a tiny island off the coast of Alba."
"A woman?" someone echoed scornfully. "How could that be?"
"Ah, well, this was no ordinary woman, as our hero soon found out for himself. When he came to the wild shore of Alba and looked across the raging waters to the island where she lived with her warrior women, he saw that there could be a difficulty before he even set foot there. For the only way across was by means of a high, narrow bridge, just wide enough for one man to walk on. And the instant he set his foot upon its span, the bridge began to shake and flex and bounce up and down, all along its considerable length, so that anyone foolish enough to venture farther along it would straightaway be tossed down onto the knife-sharp rocks or into the boiling surf."
"Why didn't he use a boat?" asked Spider with a perplexed frown.
"Didn't you hear what Liadan said?" Gull responded with derision. "Raging waters? Boiling surf? No boat could have crossed that sea, I'd wager.

She said, a child born at midwinter comes into the world on the shortest day of the year. From that point on, the days stretch out. And so a child born at midwinter walks always toward the light, all his life.

Goodbye Curly. I'll see you next summer. Keep out of trouble, now, until I come back.

Faolan launched himself across the bridge, uttering a prayer to any deity that might be prepared to listen. Let me reach her in time, let her keep hold, let this wretched apology for a bridge not crumble under my feet ...

Real life is not quite as it is in stories. In the old tales, bad things happen, and when the tale has unfolded and come to its triumphant conclusion, it is as if the bad things had never been. Life is not as simple as that, not quite.

It came to me that it was possible to be afraid of your own fear, and that such a phenomenon was utterly ridiculous.