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A Skinful of Shadows QUOTES

A Skinful of Shadows QUOTES

1 " She imagined it, a great Bear lost in darkness, friendless and trapped as it had been for so long. It could not understand where it was, or why its body was so strange and weak. All it knew was that it was under attack, just as it had always been... "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

2 " She inhaled a deep breath of fresh air, and blinked up at the high, heavy sunlit walls.
I am lucky, she told herself. Better in here than out there. Grizehayes was strange and frightening, but it was a fortress. It could keep the darkness out. Even as she tried to convince herself, however, she was wondering why her mother had fled the house, and remembering her words.
You have no idea what I saved you from! If I had stayed in Grizehayes... "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

3 " Everybody betrayed her, so why expect otherwise? But it turned out that distrust could fool you and endanger you, just as trust could. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

4 " Before her escort could react, she sprinted out from their little pool of lantern-light into the darkness, her feet pounding the soft, treacherous clods of the field. The guards called after her for a while, but did not pursue, In a lost city, how could they chase down every lost soul who became a little more lost? "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

5 " No, not like me. He's no better than the other Fellmottes. Another rich man bent on what he thinks the world owes him, and willing to pay any price, as long as it's in the blood of others. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

6 " If someone throws aside their pride and begs with all their heart, and if they do so in vain, then they are never quite the same person afterwards. Something in them dies, and something else comes to life. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

7 " Habits, places and faces grew into you over time, like tree roots burrowing into stone work. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

8 " I trust you, she had often told him. But was that true?

No, she realized, with a feeling like grief. All these years, even while she plotted with James, in her heart of hearts she had been waiting for him to betray her. When at last she had looked into his eyes and seen a host of dead enemies staring back, her mind had filled with a storm. But there had been an eye to that storm, a quiet core where a calm, relieved voice was saying: Ah, there it is at last. No more waiting for the sword to fall. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

9 " Even when she slept, her anxieties did not. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

10 " They understood something together at that moment, Makepeace and Bear. Sometimes you had to be patient through pain, or people gave you more pain. Sometimes you had to weather everything and take your bruises. If you were lucky, and if everyone thought you were tamed and trained... there might come a time when you could strike. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

11 " Humans are strange, adaptable animals, and eventually get used to anything, even the impossible or unbearable. ... Terror is tiring, and difficult to keep up indefinitely, so sooner or later it must be replaced with something more practical. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

12 " Trust was like mould. It accumulated over time in unattended places... Over the years, Makepeace had become encrusted with other people's inattentive trust. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

13 " But then again, the dead are often easier to praise than the living. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

14 " Like medicine, truth could be used as a poison by someone cunning enough. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

15 " Mother was like this sometimes. Conversations became riddles with traps in them, and your answers had consequences. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

16 " If someone throws aside their pride and begs with all their heart, and if they do so in vain, then they are never quite the same person afterwards. Something in them dies, and something else comes to life. Afterwards, it was as if some understanding of the world had sunk into Makepeace's soul like winter dew. She knew that she would never feel safe or loved as she had before. And she knew that she would never, ever beg that way again. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

17 " What strange beasts people are, she thought. We adjust to everything so quickly. Perhaps we would even get used to Hell. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

18 " The world was turning cartwheels, Makepeace realized, and nobody was sure which was was up any more. Rules were breaking, but nobody was certain which ones. If you had enough confidence, you could walk in and at as if you knew what the new rules were, and other people would believe you. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

19 " I do not know," said Dr Quick, "It is a blow to my vanity to consider the possibility that I am nothing but a bundle of thoughts, feelings and memories, given life by somebody else's mind. But then again, so is a book. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows

20 " Lord Fellmotte was not a man. He was an ancient committee. A parliament of deathly rooks in a dying tree. "

― Frances Hardinge , A Skinful of Shadows