“Once upon a time,' I whispered, "there was a girl who got away.' The light burned a little less brightly through my lids. Maybe. 'Once upon a time there was a girl who changed her fate,' I said, louder. The words ran together like beads on a string. Like a story, or a bridge I could climb-- up, up, up, like a nursery-rhyme spider. 'She grew up like a fugitive, because her life belonged to another place." I held my fingertips out, feeling the ice of them melt the wall's fine, hot fizzing. 'She remembered her real mother, far away on an Earth made of particles and elements and /reason/. Not stories. And she ripped a hole in the world so she could find her way home. And she lived happily ever after in a place far, far from the Hinterland,' I said. I begged. 'And the freeze left her skin. And she found her real mother in the world where she had left her.' Slowly, slowly, I opened my eyes.” FreedomFateStorytellingFairy Tales Book:The Hazel Wood Source: The Hazel Wood
“Not yet?' I said. 'What does that mean, not /yet/?' 'It means the only way out is through. Through the woods, through the story, through the pain. Did you think you'd get what you want for /free/?” FreedomFate Book:The Hazel Wood Source: The Hazel Wood
“Why did you make me?' I asked her, before she could speak. I felt like a convict standing on a gallows with a noose around my neck, asking about the nature of God. 'Why like this? Can I really end my story? Were you ever going to let me go?' 'Let you go?' Her voice was honey on razor blades. 'Go to /what/? This is your purpose-- the start of your story. This is what you were made to do.' 'So you lied. I can't really change anything.' She smiled at me, a tender smile that sent fear jackrabbiting through my blood. 'You wouldn't want to... can't you see that yet? The Stories are perfect. The Stories are /worlds/. I made a whole world just for you, and in it you get to do what no one else gets to: you get to live, and live, and live. And everything will come out the way it's meant to be, no matter what. I made it that way.' 'But how is that living?' I whispered.” StoriesPurposeFreedomFate Book:The Hazel Wood Source: The Hazel Wood
“I have a soft spot for my kind-- and look where it got me. Rules exist for a reason. But. /But/... You can't finish your story, but you can change it. /Technically/ speaking, you can. You can choose another ending, and destabilize it from the inside. If you fail to close the loop, the story might let you go. In theory.” ChangeFreedomFateNew BeginningsRules Author:Melissa Albert