After a while, footsteps sounded on the flagstones outside and there was a gentle tap at the door. Of course, one of them would come. So close were we, the seven of us, that no childhood injury went unnoticed, no slight, real or imagined, went unaddressed, no hurt was endured without comfort.

Juliet Marillier

Categorized in : Doors Hurt Real

With courage and hope, we can conquer our fears and do what we once believed impossible.

Juliet Marillier

conquer impossible

The future was in our own hands. If we wanted a world where such things were possible, it was for us to make it.

Juliet Marillier

wanted hands world

And as I watched him, I knew that in every dark night there was, somewhere, a small light burning that could never be quenched.

Juliet Marillier

light dark night

In all experience, there is something to be learned. In deepest sorrow, wisdom is found. In the well of despair, hope rises.

Juliet Marillier

despair sorrow found

My feet will tread soft as a deer in the forest. My mind will be clear as water from the sacred well. My heart will be strong as a great oak. My spirit will spread an eagle's wings, and fly forth.

Juliet Marillier

eagles strong heart

I had grown up. I had learned that being a woman was knowing when to stand firm and when to compromise. I had learned to laugh and weep; I had learned that I was weak as well as strong. I had learned to love. I was no longer a rigid, upright tree that would not flex and bow, even though the gale threatened to snap it in two; I was the willow that bends and shivers and sways, and yet remains strong.

Juliet Marillier

strong knowing two

Don't you long for something different to happen, something so exciting and new it carries you along with it like a great tide, something that lets your life blaze and burn so the whole world can see it?

Juliet Marillier

life long world

He would have told her - he would have said, it matters not if you are here or there, for I see you before me every moment. I see you in the light of the water, in the swaying of the young trees in the spring wind. I see you in the shadows of the great oaks, I hear your voice in the cry of the owl at night. You are the blood in my veins, and the beating of my heart. You are my first waking thought, and my last sigh before sleeping. You are - you are bone of my bone, and breath of my breath.

Juliet Marillier

sleep heart spring

She seemed fragile like a moonflower – destined to bloom for a single lovely night, and then to fade and fall.

Juliet Marillier

lovely night fall

Trust is a thing you know without words.

Juliet Marillier

knows

He was sitting not far away, watching me, and I surprised a smile on his face, the first real smile I had ever seen him give, a smile that curved and softened the tight mouth, and warmed the ice-cool eyes; a smile that brought the blood to my face and made my heart turn over.

Juliet Marillier

eye real heart

Your actions are your own. Your choices are your own. Each of us carries a burden of guilt for decisions made or not made. You can let that rule your whole life or you can put it behind you and move on. Only a madman lets jealousy determine the course of his existence. Only a weak man blames others for his own errors.

Juliet Marillier

weak-man men moving

Come, dear heart. Lean on me and let us walk this path together.

Juliet Marillier

path together heart

She had sacrificed her childhood to save her brothers; she loved her family above all else, and her spirits yearned to return home once more, to the wild forest and the land of mystic tales and ancient spirits whence he had taken her. That was the place of her heart, and if he loved her, he must let her go.

Juliet Marillier

taken brother home

I have listened to many tales in my life, and told a few of my own. If this has taught me anything, it is that there are some occurrences that change the course of things, that make an alteration far beyond their own apparent magnitude. It is like the throwing of a tiny pebble into a pool, how it makes an ever-expanding circle of ripples, spreading right across the water's surface.

Juliet Marillier

tiny circles water

You will find the way, daughter of the forest. Through grief and pain, through many trials, through betrayal and loss, your feet will walk a straight path.

Juliet Marillier

betrayal daughter pain

You are... you're like a beating heart. A glowing lamp. I've never met anyone like you before.

Juliet Marillier

glowing lamps heart

You know not, yet, the sort of love that strikes like a lightning bolt; that clutches hold of you by the heart, as irrevocably as death; that becomes the lodestar by which you steer the rest of your life. I would not wish such a love on anyone, man or woman, for it can make your life a paradise, or it can destroy you utterly.

Juliet Marillier

wish heart men

As for religious faith, a lack of it shouldn't stop us from doing good deeds for their own sake.

Juliet Marillier

deeds sake religious

There are technical tricks that may help you create more effective characters. My approach to characterization is not at all technical. I can't really analyze how I do it, but I am sure of one thing. To write convincing characters, you must possess the ability to think yourself into someone else's skin.

Juliet Marillier

writing character thinking