" The old woman cocked her head on one side. 'You wouldn't let me starve.'

'Wouldn't I?'

'I could put a hex on you that you'd never undo,' the old woman raged. I could bring a cooked fish alive in your throat even as you swallow it to choke you to death. You still don't know the half of what I know, girl, and you never will. You don't have the skill or patience to master it. Haven't had to learn it to survive, not like me, and that's your trouble. "

― Karen Maitland , The Gallows Curse