Sarsine Quotes

Drink this," she told her friend.
Jess moaned.
"Do it," Kestrel said, "or you'll be sorry."
"What a lovely bedside manner you have," Sarsine said. ~ Marie Rutkoski

Arin took the basket from her. "Coming or going?"
"I've a errand here, and won't be home until late."
"Shall I guess what brings you to town?"
"You can try."
He peeked in the basket. Bread, still warm from the oven. A bottle of liquor. Long, flat, pieces of wood. Rolls of gauze. "A picnic ... with a wounded soldier? Sarsine," he teased, "is it true love? What's the wood for? Wait, don't tell me. I'm not sure I want to know."
She swatted him. "The cartwright's oldest daughter has a broken arm. ~ Marie Rutkoski

I want to speak with her alone," Cheat told Sarsine.
She said, "Arin--"
"--is not the leader of the Herrani. I am."
"We'll see how long that lasts," said Kestrel, then bit her lip. He saw her do it, and they both knew what it meant.
A mistake. ~ Marie Rutkoski

When Sarsine saw Kestrel, her eyes narrowed to mere cracks and Kestrel became very conscious that Sarsine was a tall woman. "For someone with a reputation for being so smart," Sarsine said, "you act like you haven't a thought in your head. Did it never occur to you that I'd worry when you disappeared from the city with no word?"
"I didn't exactly mean to leave."
"Oh, so it just happened."
"Yes."
"The gods made you do it."
Kestrel laughed. "Maybe they did." Then, earnestly, she said, "I'm sorry, Sarsine."
Sarsine folded her arms. "Then make it up to me."
"How?"
Sarsine's expression softened. Now there was an inquisitive gleam in her eye. "Start with the night you left. End with this very moment. And tell me everything."
So Kestrel did. ~ Marie Rutkoski

After that, Kestrel sought him out. She used the excuse of those lessons he had given her. She said that she wanted more. She acquired a number of menial skills, like how to blacken boots.
Arin was easy to find. Although raids on the countryside continued, he increasingly relied on lieutenants to lead the sorties. He spent more time at home.
"I don't know what he thinks he's doing," Sarsine said.
"He's giving officers under his command the chance to prove their worth," Kestrel said. "He's showing his trust in them and letting them build their confidence. It's sound military strategy."
Sarsine gave her a hard look.
"He's delegating," Kestrel said.
"He's shirking. And for what, I'm sure you know."
This struck a bright match of pleasure within Kestrel. ~ Marie Rutkoski

Sarsine grabbed his wrists and tugged the hands from his eyes. He looked at her, but didn't see her. He saw Kestrel's wasted face. He saw himself as a child, the night of the invasion, soldiers in his home, how he had done nothing.
Later, he'd told Sarsine when the messenger had come to see him.
No, I won't, he'd promised Roshar when the prince had listed reasons not to rescue the nameless spy from the tundra's prison.
"I was wrong," Arin said. "I should have - "
"Your should haves are gone. They belong to the god of the lost. What I want to know is what you are going to do now. ~ Marie Rutkoski

It looked like she held a basketful of woven gold.
Arin leap down the stairs. He strode up to his cousin and seized her arm.
"Arin!"
"What did you do?"
Sarsine jerked away. "What she wanted. Pull yourself together."
But Arin only saw Kestrel as she had been last night before the ball. How her hair had been a spill of low light over his palms. He had threaded desire into those braids, had wanted her to sense it even as he dreaded that she would. He had met her eyes in the mirror, and didn't know, couldn't tell her feelings. He only knew the fire of his own.
"It's just hair," Sarsine said. "It will grow back."
"Yes," said Arin, "but no everything does. ~ Marie Rutkoski

Arin, are you all right?"
"How?" He managed. "How did her arm break?"
"She fell of a ladder."
He must have visibly relaxed, because his cousin raised her brows and looked ready to scold.
"I imagined something worse," he tried to explain.
She appeared to understand his relief that pain, if it had to come, came this time without malice. Just and accident. Done by no one. The luck, sometimes of life. A bad slip that ends with bread, and someone to bind you. ~ Marie Rutkoski

Just what do you think you're doing, Arin?"
He looked up at Sarsine, blearily rubbing his eyes. He had fallen asleep in a chair. It was full morning. "I couldn't sleep in my old rooms. At least here, in Etta's suite--"
"I'm not talking about your choice of bedchamber, though I can't help but notice how conveniently close it is to the east wing."
Arin winced. There was usually only one reason why a man kept a conquered woman prisoner after a battle. "This isn't what it seems."
"Oh, no? Too many people heard you call her a spoil of war."
"It's not true."
Sarsine threw her hands up in the air. "Then why did you say it?"
"Because I couldn't think of any other way to save her!"
Sarsine stood still. Then she leaned over him and shook his shoulder as if waking him from a nightmare. "You? Save a Valorian?"
Arin captured her hand. "Please listen to me."
"I will when you say something I can understand."
"I did your lessons for you, when we were children."
"So?"
"I told Anireh to shut up when she made fun of your nose. Do you remember? She pushed me down."
"Your sister was too beautiful for her own good. But all this was long ago. What's your point?"
Arin held both her hands now. "We share something, and probably not for very long. The Valorians will come. There will be a siege." He groped for what to say. "By the gods, just listen."
"Oh, Arin. Haven't you learned? The gods won't hear you." She sighed. "But ~ Marie Rutkoski

Yet when she returned to the house, Sarsine had a smile on her face. "Go into the salon," she said.
Her piano. Its surface gleamed like wet ink. An emotion flooded through Kestrel, but she didn't want to name it. It wasn't right that she should feel it, simply because Arin had given back to her something that he had more or less taken.
Kestrel shouldn't play. She shouldn't sit on that familiar velvet bench or think about how transporting a piano across the city was no mean feat. It meant people. Pulleys. Horses straining to haul a cart. She shouldn't wonder how Arin had found the time and begged his people's goodwill to bring her piano here.
She shouldn't touch the cool keys, or feel that delicious tension between silence and sound.
She remembered that Arin had refused to sing for who knows how long.
Kestrel didn't have that particular kind of strength.
She sat and played. ~ Marie Rutkoski