Danse Macabre Quotes

“All angels are men, all men are crows, and all crows are liars.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“Blue always preferred numbers to words. Words have power. Words hold painful truths and delicious lies. Just one word can stir up a hundred memories and a thousand feelings so that you can be hurt by a word or killed by a sentence.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“All angels are men, she had said. All men are crows, and all crows are liars. The old woman also used to say that angels were no better than demons, and that if the Maker truly existed then he was surely the cruellest creature in the entire world. The reverend had stopped letting the old woman sleep on the church floor when he found out she’d been saying such things. She froze to death the following Christmas. The”
― Laura M Hughes, Danse Macabre

“His cavernous laugh fills her head, fills the graveyard, fills her soul with utter despair. Blue hugs her battered knees, rocking backward and forwards on the cold damp earth while the fiendish voice echoes around the dell, that wretched crimson-drenched necropolis that has somehow become her entire world. She bows her head under the weight of that despair, and feels as though she will never ever move again. She will be trapped here for eternity – this is her punishment, her own private corner of Hell, bathed in blood and tormented by the mad merriment of a monster.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“Blue knelt beside the waterlogged corpse, praying.
She prayed for him. She prayed also for the one-eared man who had murdered her twin, prayed for every member of the market crowd that had chanted and sneered as her beloved sister bled to death.

She prayed that they would all burn in Hell.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“His spider-egg eyes are the beginning and end of every journey she makes, and his whisper is the earthquake that heralds the end of the world.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“An old woman had told Blue the same thing, long ago. All angels are men, she had said. All men are crows, and all crows are liars. The old woman also used to say that angels were no better than demons, and that if the Maker truly existed then he was surely the cruellest creature in the entire world. The reverend had stopped letting the old woman sleep on the church floor when he found out she’d been saying such things. She froze to death the following Christmas.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“Sparrow always loved insects. Mamma sometimes said that Sparrow was only interested in living things as long as they had six legs or more. Mamma never sounded entirely happy about that.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“Blue never liked words much. She had met many people who had used words to trick, to hurt. To lie. But this one was different. This one didn’t just give her words. He gave her numbers too. And though Blue had never been skilled with either words or numbers, numbers had always seemed more honest to her. Numbers couldn’t lie.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“There are many ways in and out of large buildings. Any child knows this. A roof hatch, a window, or even an air vent is as good as a front door to anyone with a mind to use it as such.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“The coffin lay open and ready, dark and polished and cushioned with fine pink silk lining. Blue was tempted to climb in herself to find out whether it was as comfortable as it looked; she probably would have done, if not for the corpse.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“If he was aware of her outrage he ignored it. And she had found it fading, evaporating like smoke on the wind even as she tried to hold on to it. Her heart had screamed, then whimpered, then stopped protesting altogether. His voice belonged to the Serpent, and mamma had always told her to beware those who used too many words. Words are liars. But his words had curled their way into her consciousness and wrapped tightly around her unresisting mind.”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre

“You’re right: most of it is shite. But mamma always says that we should try an’ abide by the Ten Commandments, and I reckon she’s right. What’s so shite about a world where no one ever lies, or steals, or kills each other?”
― Laura M. Hughes, Danse Macabre