Bastonikov

“There will always be men in the world who want to control and hurt and kill us. Men who drug us and drive us off roads and hit us with their fists. Men who take girls and make them their toys. Men who gain pleasure from our pain. […] They will walk through this world until it comes unraveled. They will keep on doing what they’ve been doing for thousands and thousands of years until the earth has had enough and ends us all. […] But today I refuse to fear them, not a single one. They have strength and cruelty and endless complicity. They walk tall and almost always win. But not here, not on the Bend, where owls that were once girls fly free. Not here, where magic rides up to meet my will. […] Here, we are witches and men are nothing. Here, the river has teeth.”
― Erica Waters, The River Has Teeth

“I used to think it was vital to know things, to feel safe in the learning and recounting of facts. I used to think it was possible to know enough to escape from the panic of not knowing, but I realise now that you can never learn enough to protect yourself, not really.”
― Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea

“That’s all magic is, really: the space between what you have and what you need.”
― Alix E. Harrow, The Once and Future Witches

“I used to think there was such a thing as emptiness, that there were places in the world one could go and be alone. This, I think, is still true, but the error in my reasoning was to assume that alone was somewhere you could go, rather than somewhere you had to be left.”
― Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea