The Lantern Bearers Quotes

“It may be that the night will close over us in the end, but I believe that morning will come again. Morning always grows out of the darkness, though maybe not for the people who saw the sun go down. We are the Lantern Bearers, my friend; for us to keep something burning, to carry what light we can forward into the darkness and the wind.”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“Why should a deserter take the trouble to light Rutupiae Beacon?” Aquila demanded, and his voice sounded rough in is own ears.

“Maybe in farewell, maybe in defiance. Maybe to hold back the dark for one more night.”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“I sometimes think that we stand at sunset,' Eugenus said after a pause. 'It may be that the night will come close over us in the end, but I believe that morning will come again. Morning always grows again out of the darkness, though maybe not for the people who saw the sun go down. We are the Lantern Bearers, my friend; for us to keep something burning, to carry what light we can forward into the darkness and the wind.”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“So Aquila took his father’s service upon him. It wasn’t as good as love; it wasn’t as good as hate; but it was something to put into the emptiness within him; better than nothing at all.”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“The wind blustered in from the sea, setting the horses’ manes streaming sideways, and the gulls wheeled mewing against the blue-and-grey tumble of the sky; and Aquila, riding a little aside from the rest as usual, caught for a moment from the wind and the gulls and the wet sand and the living, leaping power of the young red mare under him, something of the joy of simply being alive that he had taken for granted in the old days.”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“For a moment they stood looking at each other in the firelight, while the old harper still fingered the shining strings and the other man looked on with a gleam of amusement lurking in his watery blue eyes. But Aquila was not looking at him. He was looking only at the dark young man, seeing that he was darker even than he had thought at first, and slightly built in a way that went with the darkness, as though maybe the old blood, the blood of the People of the Hills, ran strong in him. But his eyes, under brows as straight as a raven's flight-pinions, were not the eyes of the little Dark People, which were black and unstable and full of dreams, but a pale clear grey, lit with gold, that gave the effect of flame behind them.”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“But tonight, because Rome had fallen and Felix was dead, because of Valerius’s shame, the empty hut seemed horribly lonely, and there was a small aching need in him for somebody to notice, even if they were not glad, that he had come home.”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“Quietness rose within Aquila, easing his wild unrest as the salve was cooling the smart of his gashed side. But that was always the way with Brother Ninnias-- the quietness, the sense of sanctuary, were things that he carried with him.”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“As no man is beyond God's mercy, so none can be beyond mine[.]”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers

“He had a sudden longing, which wasn't a bit like him now, though it was like the person he had been before the Saxons burned his home, to give Ness things, to bring them and heap them into her lap. New songs and the three stars of Orion's belt, and honey-in-the-comb, and branches of white flowering thorn at mid-winter . . .”
― Rosemary Sutcliff, The Lantern Bearers