Spear Quotes

“Being here is like standing at the edge of the sea under a wide sky: clear, open, clean, and bright. Here is where I am meant to be.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“A name, she thinks, is what makes a person who they are. A name is how they know themself.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Even the dead had names.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“All different yet somehow alike-not family but easy with one another and loud, laughing and singing, bright and clean. The same bright, the same clean she remembered from the scent of the promised lake. The girl’s heart soared: a story came alive from legend, knights hunting dragons!”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“They would write songs of what followed: the horses dancing; the spears flickering like swords, faster than the eye could see; Llanza’s perfect seat; Peretur’s grace, lithe as a cat; the sweat running down their mounts’ flanks. The crack of Llanza’s spear as it split.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Most importantly for me, historical accuracy also meant this could not be a story of only straight, white, nondisabled men. Crips, queers, women and other genders, and people of colour are an integral part of the history of Britain—we are embedded at every level of society, present during every change, and part of every problem and its solution. We are here now; we were there then. So we are in this story.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“when the snow begins to fall once again, she catches a flake on her tongue and feels, lapping against her belly, the lake it was drawn from by summer sun, far away—a lake like a promise she will one day know. Then as the world folds down for winter, so too do the girl and her mother, listening to the crackle of flame and, beyond the leather door curtain, the soft hiss of snow settling over the hills and hollows like white felt.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“The late afternoon sky over the lake this time was grey, but the water laughed and sparkled, reflecting the blue sky and other time and place.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“If a lord was frightening, a noble lady was terrifying.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Her own sea-grey with green to his sea-green with grey.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“We both love her, as we love each other. We will not set her aside.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“They were good travelling companions. Llanza had lived half his life in the saddle and Nimuë had journeyed far and often. Both were easy with each other, and after a while Peretur found her rhythm with them.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“My lord.” Gwenhwyfar’s voice was gentle. “You have given no word here for any to either trust or distrust.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Arturus did not seem to hear him. He caressed the pommel of his sword, head cocked, as though listening to its song.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“All I have ever wanted is to fight for what is good and clean and bright. All I want is to know who I am and where I belong. And I belong here, lord, as a Companion.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Gwenhwyfar looked at her husband and quivered like a leashed hound with the scent.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“The lake sometimes has a mind of its own; there’s no telling how it might treat you.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Peretur laughed. Risk. Her whole life was risk. And now, today, with Nimuë at her side-and keeping food down-Peretur feelt she could slay a dragon.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“She knew that scent, and her need rose like the tide.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“In the flickering ochre-and-gold light, Peretur saw the heat rise in Nimuë’s cheeks, and her lips redder, and her own belly warmed, and she filled with another hunger.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Her hand felt good in Peretur’s, warm, more than warm.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Light is a comfort, a human thing, and it pleases me. It reminds me I’m mortal.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“The world was different in the dark. Colours faded. Living things glowed reddish gold-there was a mouse in the pantry. Dead things once living-the table, the wool hanging-gleamed like darkened bronze. Stone glimmered silver, and iron dull zinc.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“She wrapped her hands around the wooden bowel. This was real. This was stuff of life.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“The world felt rude and fragile and new as though she had lately risen from her sickbed.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Peretur wanted to reach out and touch her hand, but Nimuë looked brittle enough to fall apart. So she just waited.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“To hear you talk is like hearing him talk when he first become king.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“Most of those who would become bandits were good, decent folk; they would form if they could. He is right to try. Right to hope for it, right to fight for it. That’s what I would fight for.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“You fight not to take or break but to make.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear

“She heard the secret, perhaps a secret no one wholly mortal should hear.”
― Nicola Griffith, Spear