Juliet Marillier Quotes

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

I almost forgot," said Red. His voice sounded very strange, as if from a long, long distance. He reached into his pocket. "I have something for you."
He put it into my hand. A round, shiny, perfect apple, green as new grass with a faint blush of rosy pink. And now his eyes had changed so that I saw what lay there, hidden deep, so deep only the bravest or most foolhardy would seek to find it.
He has always understood me better, without words. So I laid my hand on my heart, held it there for a moment, and then moved it over and touched my palm against his breast. My heart. Your heart. ~ Juliet Marillier

But there is one thing you must remember, if you forget all else. There is no good or evil, save in the way you see the world. There is no dark or light save in your own vision. All changes in the blink of an eyelid; yet all remains the same. ~ Juliet Marillier

Because if I see you defeated, then I think I will see Alban defeated, and if that happens, none of us can go on. To guard you is to guard the heart of this land of ours. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

I wish- I wish I could dry these tears, I wish I could make this better for you. But I don't know how. ~ Juliet Marillier

What sort of man would you choose for yourself, Liadan?, he asked me.
One who is trustworthy, and true to himself, I answered straightaway. One who speaks his mind without fear. One who can be a friend as well as a husband. I would be contented with that. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

.... 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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

His thoughts inhabit a different plane from those of ordinary men; the simplest interpretation of that is to call him crazy. ~ Juliet Marillier

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? ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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

Hope fought hard to stay alive. Even when you thought it was beaten to nothing, burned to ashes, drowned deep, still it flickered away, waiting to be found again. ~ Juliet Marillier

Bran held his voice leve. "In time,you will regret these words. You may hold me captive now, and believe me helpless. But each foulword you speak of her brings your death a little closer."
Bran to Eamonn ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

She went on because there was no going back. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

He was, as I'd expected, sitting on the most precarious slope of the roof, knees drawn up, arms around them, his expression unreadable as he gazed out over the stonewalled pastures, the barns and byres and cottages, to the smoke gray and velvet green and misty blue of the forest. Not so far away the waters of the lake glinted silver. The breeze was quite chill, catching at my skirts as I came up the slates and settled myself down next to him. Finbar was utterly still. I did not need to look at him to read his mood, for I was tuned to this brother's mind like the bow to the string. ~ Juliet Marillier

There was so much of beauty here: the neat, small tracks of a foraging creature, stoat or marten; the inticate tracery of a skeleton leaf, still clinging vainly to its parent tree as, little by little, time stripped it of its substance, leaving only the delicate remembrance of what it had been. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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) ~ Juliet Marillier

strung a small white stone with a hole in it. 'This is more precious ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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 ... ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

She had sacrificed her childhood to save her brothers; she loved her family above all else, and her spirits yearned to return home once more, to the wild forest and the land of mystic tales and ancient spirits whence he had taken her. That was the place of her heart, and if he loved her, he must let her go. ~ Juliet Marillier

How can he do this? If you were mine, I would fight to keep you. I would die, before I let you go. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

The world is simple, I think, in its essence. Life, death, love, hate. Desire, fulfillment. Magic. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

But in a song or a tale, anything is possible ~ Juliet Marillier

A fine man", observed my sister, pouring mead for the two of us. "Well trained. ~ Juliet Marillier

But if you remove a tyrant in anything other than an open and visible way, another tyrant soon stands up to replace him. ~ Juliet Marillier

What came next is very hard to tell. Indeed, I have told it but once before, when I needed to, and I will tell it this time only becaude it forms a strand in the fabric of my story, and it wove itself into what came after. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

Stronger than iron crueler than death sweeter than springtime it lives beyond breath ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

I felt Red's arm close around me like a shield against the rest of the world. His mouth was against my hair, and his heart thumped violently under my cheek. I shut my eyes, and held onto his shirt with both hands, and wept. ~ Juliet Marillier

Don't you long for something different to happen, something so exciting and new it carries you along with it like a great tide, something that lets your life blaze and burn so the whole world can see it? ~ Juliet Marillier

You thought you'd never give up your vocation, a voice whispered inside me. You thought you'd never even consider it. But you've met the one man who could change your mind. He is your perfect complement. He is Cathal to your Clodagh; he is Bran to your Liadan. No wonder you conjured up those images. No wonder they make you weep. ~ Juliet Marillier

The person they'd locked up last summer was gone, and she wasn't coming back. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

We all accepted that this land was a gate to that other world, the realm of spirits and dreams and the Fair Folk, without any question. The place we grew up in was so full of magic that it was almost a part of everyday life - not to say you'd meet one of them every time you went out to pick berries, or draw water from your well, but everyone we knew had a friend of a friend who'd strayed too far into the forest, and disappeared; or ventured inside a ring of mushrooms, and gone away for a while, and come back subtly changed. Strange things could happen in those places. Gone for maybe fifty years you could be, and come back still a young girl; or away for no more than an instant by moral reckoning, and return wrinkled and bent with age. These tales fascinated us, but failed to make us careful. If it was going to happen to you, it would happen, whether you liked it or not. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

If a man has to say trust me, Gogu conveyed, it's a sure sign you cannot. Trust him, that is. Trust is a thing you know without words. ~ Juliet Marillier

Love ... it complicates our games, old friend, it insinuates itself, disrupting the most carefully laid plans and unmanning the most disciplined heart. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

Water and stone
Flesh and bone
Night and morn
Rose and thorn
Tree and wind
Heart and mind ~ Juliet Marillier

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

Brilliant minds make errors, brave souls falter, kind hearts leave scars. We are none of us perfect, but we're all perfectly human. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

That's lovely singing, Saraid," Eile said. "Is Sorry asleep now?"
Saraid shook her head solemnly. "Sorry's sad. Crying." She held the doll against her shoulder, patting its back.
"Oh. Why is she sad?"
"Sorry wants Feeler come back." It was like a punch in the gut. She had thought Saraid had forgotten him; she had assumed new friends and a safe haven would drive the memories of that long journey across country, just the three of them, from her daughter's mind. Foolish. The images of that time were still bright and fresh in her own head; she dreamed of them every night. Why should Saraid be any different just because she was small? ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

Perhaps he could still weave together the broken threads of his life. And yet, I wanted him here now. I needed him here. In the darkness, if I sat very still, I could almost feel his presence by me, quite near, but not too near. Didn't I promise to keep you safe, he would say softly. I have never broken a promise. Don't look so worried, Jenny. And yet, he would be careful. Careful not to move too close. Careful not to frighten me. Waiting still. I am your shelter. Don't be afraid. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

Even when I was young and content and thought life would bring good things for me and mine, I didn't believe in miracles. ~ Juliet Marillier

Johnny was sobbing in shuddering gasps, telling me his small tale of woe, that the world was suddently different, and that he wanted me to make it better, right now please.
Liadan's interpretation of her baby's cries. ~ Juliet Marillier

More like some small, fierce bird of prey, something with a sharp bite. An owl perhaps, that speaks only when the rest of the world sleeps.
Jenny will do well enough. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

His touch was like a bard's on his instrument, and it awakened a deep and mysterious music in my body. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

Nothing comes without a price. ~ Juliet Marillier

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

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier

My heart. Your heart. ~ Juliet Marillier

Hope is such a tenuous quality. To feel it and then to be denied what one most longs for ... Better, surely, not to hope at all, than to open the heart to a hope that is impossible. ~ Juliet Marillier

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. ~ Juliet Marillier