Bring Me Their Hearts (Bring Me Their Hearts, #1)

by Sara Wolf

For those who have lost their own hearts, and who struggle with their own hunger.

“That would be pointless, Mother, and I tend to avoid doing pointless things.”

Unlike the rest of these restrained nobles, his emotions burn hot just beneath the surface. He hasn’t learned how to hide them completely, not yet.

“A lady isn’t merely a decoration,” he says, words rumbling like thunder. “She is the mother of our future, the teacher of our progeny. A lady must have a brain between her ears, as must we all. For what is beauty without purpose? Nothing more than a vase of flowers, to wither and be thrown away.”

all too often do we equate nobleness of blood for soundness of mind and goodness of judgment.”

“If a simple sword drives the prince away,” I fire back, “I can’t imagine what my personality might do.”

“Simply that our pain breeds hate, and our hate makes us all do terrible things.”

“You are a lady, and a lady always hides her true feelings behind an impenetrable mask of politeness.”

“Sometimes, Sir Whisper, the choices are made for you, and there’s nothing you can do except make up for them.”

“Trying so hard to be good in a world that’s bad.”

“Have you considered that maybe I deserve it, milord?” I ask. Deserve every painful grain of it,

I’ve been incomplete for a long time.

Right here, right now, even if it hurts—I can pretend to be perfect, human, free. Whole.

I sit up and watch the sunrise again, this one more glorious than yesterday’s. I’ll never get tired of these. How many do I have left, I wonder?

“Is it weird that when people say I’m lovely, or pretty, I get itchy?” “We all get a little uncomfortable when our value is reduced to our physical appearance,” he says patiently.

When one loses much, one tries desperately to understand why.”

I’m not ready. None of that matters now. Time has a way of disappearing on me, and then reappearing with horrifying punctuality. The time is now. I have to be ready. At the very least, I have to fake it,

Fate has never once shied away from the opportunity to take a massive shit on my life, and this time is no exception.

“That to be young and lonely is a terrible thing.”

“He was a tool. You break the wielder, not the tool itself.”

killing only makes more killing. Killing only makes more hate, and the world’s got enough of that right now.”

“Ignorance doesn’t excuse cruelty.”

They will try to tell you that you aren’t good enough.

This is a lie.

You have always been go...

Modesty kills as a drought does—slowly and from within.”

“I might be a lot of things, Your Highness—a joker, a lightweight, a fool—but I’m not a coward.”

“What’s worse, Reginall—to be a monster, or to make monsters?”

I could tell in your eyes; you weren’t afraid. Of me. Of anyone. And that’s the exact moment I knew you’d be a thorn in my side.

“Allow me to impart a bit of wisdom from my teacher; a blade is a blade—no matter who wields it, it can still cut.”

There are two things men will always believe about a woman: that she’s stupid, and that she’s weak. Today, as every day, I am neither of these things.

“I’m so glad you’re alive.”

It’s just—no one has ever said that to me before.”

There’s nothing but a girl made of mistakes and lies beneath my hand.

ShE caN’t abAnDon whaT sHe doeSn’t lOve,

“I’m afraid,” I say. “Afraid of failing her. Failing myself.”

“But I’m more afraid of doing the wrong thing.”

“Fight with everything you have, everything you are. Everything that is left of you—battle with it. Fight by the moonlight, the starlight, whatever faded hope you can find at any moment—cling to it. Embrace the smallest of lights, and never stop fighting.”

No matter how we feel about them, we will always look like them, act like them. We were raised by them, after all.”

“It’s not a question of whether or not the apple falls far from the tree, because of course it doesn’t.” Her eyes fix in the distance. “It’s whether or not the apple can grow taller than the tree.”

“But the Old God loves to test us,” she presses on. “He loves to send us people who change our lives in great and terrible ways.”

“In the words of the very intelligent witch philosopher Erildan,” I grunt as I open the window and perch myself on it, the night wind blowing my hair every which way. “What is safe can never be satisfying.”

“In the deathbed words of the maybe not-so-intelligent witch philosopher Erildan,” I pant. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

“Not to be the bearer of bad news or anything.” I cough. “But there’s this pesky little thing called time, and it keeps moving forward whether or not we’re moving with it.”

You are in the silence, Reginall’s voice. You are of the silence.

It’s sick, and it’s wrong, but for one moment in this strange pipe, in this strange city, embracing this not-so-strange boy, this monster feels happiness.

“Memories are dangerous things,” I murmur. “They keep you prisoner sometimes,” he agrees. “But just having them, being able to remember them, revisit them, live in them when life gets too rough—I think it’s worth it.”

Why can’t I just be the monster? BeCausE it hUrts,

‘Fear the past, not the future.’

If you feared the past, you were incapable of moving toward a future.”