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Famous T. Kingfisher Quotes

“Ah.' The godmother smiled then, and cracks ran across her skin from the motion, like a plaster wall falling apart. As Marra watched in horror, a chip of skin fell from her cheekbone. There was no blood under it, nothing but cool, brown bone. 'Yes, Agnes, will you pass me my teacup? It seems that I am about to die, and I would like a little more tea.' ... She tried to press it in to the godmother's hands, but they were only bone, folded politely in to a pile of dust. ... 'Thank you,' said the godmother against the rim of the teacup, and then she fell apart. Marra took a step back but there was something oddly peaceful about it, about bones sinking down in to the robes and the dust pattering down around them. There had been very little flesh left to the godmother, only skin and skeleton and iron will. Her robes stayed in the perfect triangle, stiff with gold brocade.”

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Book:Nettle & Bone
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“She could track the progression of starvation backwards through the layers. They had eaten deer and they had eaten cattle. When the cattle ran out and the deer were gone, they ate the horses, and when the horses were gone, they ate the dogs. When the dogs were gone, they ate each other. It was the dogs she wanted. Perhaps she might have built a man out of bones, but she had no great love of men any longer. Dogs, though... dogs were always true.”

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“Health's not so little a thing, ' said the dust-wife. 'Compared to the alternative, anyway.' Marra's lip curled. 'She might have wished us safe,' she growled. 'Or at least that we wouldn't marry someone who'd murder us.' 'She might have,' said the dust-wife. 'But parents object to people making pronouncements like that at christenings, for some odd reason.”

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“At sunset, just as the light from the fire became brighter than the light from the doorway, she finished. The skeleton lay across her lap, complete, claws wired to paws vertebrae strung like beads. 'Wake,' she whispered, while the light faded outside the door. 'Wake. Please.' The bones lay motionless in her lap. She bowed her head. Please. Please, Bonedog. I'm never going to see my sister again, or my mother. I'm not going to see the Sister Apothecary or the abbess. I need one more friend. Please. It was too much like the first time. The second impossible task was also the third. She had always known that she had gotten off too lightly, being handed the moon in a jar. Fenris took her free hand, careful of her sore fingertips, and held it between his palms, waiting with her. 'Please,' she said again, and a single tear ran hotly down her cheek and splashed on to the white expanse of skull. Bonedog yawned and stretched and woke. Marra let out a sob of relief and buried her head in Fenris's neck. He held her in the crook of his arm while Bonedog stood up and bounced and cavorted around the hut.”

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“Maybe you and I could... not go home together?' The words hung in the air between them, as fine as spun glass and just as fragile. Marra waited for him to say something, to catch the words or shatter them, whichever he chose. 'I think I'd like that,' said Fenris. Marra sagged with relief. She had been so focused on what he might say that she hadn't quite expected what he might do. So it came as a surprise when he wrapped both arms around her and put his lips against her hair. 'I think I would like that very much,' he murmured. 'Oh good,' said Marra, against his neck. And then she would have kissed him or he would have kissed her, but Bonedog decided that they were wrestling and jumped up and barked soundlessly at them both.”

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“Marra thumped the pillow and then gave up. 'Fenris?' 'Yes?' 'I don't know how to ask this without giving you completely the wrong idea.' 'All right?' 'Do you remember on the road, when we slept back-to-back?' He did not answer, but she heard the bed creak, and then the indignant snuffle of Bonedog being nudged out of the way. Her own bed sagged as Fenris sat on the edge of it. Marra scooted up against the wall to give him room. His back was as solid and warm as she remembered. She sighed and felt something unclench, although whether it was in her jaw or her gut or her soul, she couldn't say. 'You're a saint,' she mumbled, tugging the blanket up around her shoulder. 'You have no idea,' muttered Fenris.”

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“Very unlikely people, you know, will share confidences with each other if they think the other person understands. A prisoner who won't tell a guard anything will thaw immediately if he's put in a cell with another man in for the same crime. And doctors who would bite off their own tongues before showing indecision to a patient will tell another doctor about how little they know and how frightened they are. I've seen it happen many times. It's how spies work.”

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“It was fourteen hours later that Marra and the dust-wife flung themselves at the stone lid, scrabbling with all their strength. For a horrible moment, she thought that it would not be enough, that they would have to come back with levers, but it began, inch by agonising inch, to slide. They got it perhaps six inches and had to stop, panting. Fingers slid out of the gap and caught the edge. Marra nearly wept with relief. Fenris shoved the lid aside and sat up, gasping for air. 'You're really here,' he said, bending over so that his forehead touched his drawn-up knees. 'I kept imagining voices, but you're really here this time.' 'We're here,' said Marra, the words this time jabbing her like pins. He took a half dozen sobbing breaths. 'It is very close in there,' he said, 'even with holes.' His face was slick with sweat or tears, Marra did not know. 'Close and cold.' 'I'm sorry,' said Marra. 'I'm sorry. It was the only way I could think of.' She pulled him out of the coffin, or he climbed out and she helped, and he wrapped his arms around her and they stood together, shaking.”

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“Did an echo just tell us to run?' asked Agnes, adjusting Finder, and looking rather calmer than Marra felt. 'Do ghostly echoes have our best interest at heart?' asked Fenris, also remarkably calm. 'Rarely,' said the dust-wife. Marra thought, I'm surrounded by lunatics, but and I love them all, but maybe we should be running, anyway.”

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“You need to train him to sleep elsewhere,' said the dust-wife, disapprovingly. 'Otherwise you'll have a rooster who thinks he should dive headfirst in to your cleavage when he wants to roost.' 'It's been a while since any man wanted to dive in to my cleavage,' said Agnes. 'It might be a nice change.' 'Not when the spurs grow in.' 'Oh, well, probably not.”

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“They emerged, stumbling in to the starlight. The man at Marra's side gasped in air as if he had never breathed before. 'Free,' he said. 'Am I free of that place?' 'Almost,' said the dust-wife. 'Not quite yet. We've got one foot in the other world, and it isn't safe to linger.' ... 'Now,' said the dust-wife, leaning on her staff. 'Now we're all the way back. Now you're free.”

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“The majority of the crowd had looked human from a distance, but once she was among them, she had her doubts. Some were human shaped but had green or blue skin. A number had horns rising from their foreheads, short and pointed as antelopes'. One woman walked by with a rack of antlers that would do any stag proud, and small black birds seated on each tine, wearing silver collars around their necks. Others were not even human shaped. A trio of boards in starched collars, walking on their hind legs, went grunting past. Six white rats, each nearly three feet tall, carried a palanquin on their shoulders. And who could guess what lay beneath the pale braids that covered that figure from head to toe?”

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“... something in the back of her mind whispered that there was no help coming and if she ran out of money, she had no real way to earn more. Her only skills were embroidery and weeding gardens. I suppose I could sell my body, but I'm not sure how one does that, either. It seemed like it would be a lot more complicated than getting a seat on a coach. Dis you approach people, or did they approach you, and how did you start a conversation that ended in money for sex? Was there an etiquette? This was not the sort of thing one was taught at convents. It was easier just to sleep in the coaches.”

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“He isn't my prince,' said Marra acidly. 'If you plan to kill him, he is. Your victim. Your prince. All the same. You sink a knife in to someone's guts, you're bound to them in that moment. Watch a murderer go through the world and you'll see all his victims trailing behind him on black cords, shades of ghosts waiting for their chance.”

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“The king gathered himself. It felt as if the tomb was breathing in. The painted warriors lifted their swords and the archers let fly their arrows, aimed at the dust-wife. They were trapped in the wall and it should not have been possible for them to reach her, and yet for a moment, it seemed as if she would be drawn in to the wall, as if the arrows must reach her... Moonlight flashed as she held up her staff and the painted arrows fell apart in to scattered pigment across the floor. I will not bend! hissed the dead king, rising from his throne. 'Then you will break,' said the dust-wife, and slammed her staff across the painted wall.”

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“She broke in to a run, not caring if the thief-wheel heard her now, half sobbing. 'Fenris! Agnes! Dust-wife!' 'Marra?' She broke in to the room and before she could even focus, Fenris had thrown his arms around her and had his face pressed against her hair. 'You're alive,' he said. 'I thought I'd lost you. You're alive.' 'You're alive, too!' she said. She wanted to stop and think about what I thought I'd lost you might mean, but it didn't quite seem like the time. And he was very warm and she was very cold and it was very pleasant to be held in such a fashion. 'You're alive. 'Yes, yes,' said the dust-wife testily. 'We're all alive. Please don't cry on me about it, though.' Fenris finally released her, although not without reluctance. Bonedog immediately leapt up at her, washing her face with his tongue.”

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“Somebody gives a lonely child a toy and they pour all their hopes and fears and problems into it. Do it long enough and intensely enough, and then it just needs a stray bit of bad luck and the toy wakes up. Of course, it knows that the only reason it is alive is because of the child. A tiny personal god with one worshipper. It latches on and... well.' She clicked her tongue. 'Normally, you get them pried off and burned long before adolescence. Impressive that it lasted this long.”

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