Tanith Lee: Trending quotes (page 5)

“I should have felt pity, but I felt only contempt. I knew had it been a girl she would have mourned less, and it angered me.”

Tanith Lee book The Birthgrave

Book Two, Part II “The Water”, Chapter 1 (p. 173)
The Birthgrave (1975)

Girl , Anger

“He showed no fear. It seemed that, at the commencement, his race had known gods and no other. Gods had bound and ill treated and slaughtered and played with them. Gods were a fact, as were the sun and the shaking of the earth. Just another terrible reality.”

Tanith Lee book Vazkor, Son of Vazkor

Book Two, Part III “The Island”, Chapter 3 (p. 219)
Vazkor, Son of Vazkor (1978)

God , Fear , Reality , Sun

“Now I saw braves hang themselves with amulets, leave tidbits for spirits, and still take an arrow in the neck. I, worshiping nothing and bribing nothing with prayers, rode among an enemy unscathed, scything them like summer wheat.”

Tanith Lee book Vazkor, Son of Vazkor

Book One, Part I “The Krarl”, Chapter 4 (p. 31)
Vazkor, Son of Vazkor (1978)

Summer

“Precognition or self-deception?”

Tanith Lee book Vazkor, Son of Vazkor

Book Two, Part III “The Island”, Chapter 3 (p. 219)
Vazkor, Son of Vazkor (1978)

“Lir chiseled at the stone. It would take a month to make a perceptible impression on it. He had a few hours. Work harder, then.”

Tanith Lee book The Castle of Dark

Source: The Castle of Dark (1978), Chapter 14 “Lir: The Night-Beast” (p. 119)

“Night, the dark widow, came walking on the hills.”

Tanith Lee book Volkhavaar

Source: Volkhavaar (1977), Chapter 7 (p. 69)

Night

““Is it the regency you want, or me?”
“The regency. You, sweetheart, are the worthless dross that comes with it.””

Tanith Lee book The Storm Lord

Book 1, “The Amber Witch” Chapter 3 (p. 47)
The Storm Lord (1976)

“The irony of her story is merely that her love became, in the end, her motive rather than her goal, the doorway rather than the house.”

Tanith Lee book Volkhavaar

Source: Volkhavaar (1977), Chapter 22 (p. 192)

Love , Motivation , Housing

“In the desert, initially, everywhere is like everywhere else—sky, sand, mountains. So far, this was the extent of what I’d seen in my involuntary roost. Then the day began to ebb, the world turned to topaz and gold, and the color of the sky seemed to sink away into the disc of the sun. I found I really could touch the beauty of it then, as I had touched its beauty so long ago when I was free to travel where I wished, and the city still owned me. Now, tinged with my sorrow, the loveliness was bittersweet, but strong as wine.”

Tanith Lee book Drinking Sapphire Wine

Part 2, Chapter 3 (pp. 69-70)
Drinking Sapphire Wine (1977)

World , Beauty , Color , Travel

“The sea was a phenomenon I had never clapped eyes on for myself, yet it seemed, from the tales, a destination ultimate and uncompromising. The ocean’s edge, the brink of the land; the lip of Chaos.”

Tanith Lee book Vazkor, Son of Vazkor

Book Two, Part II “The Wolf Hunt”, Chapter 2 (p. 173)
Vazkor, Son of Vazkor (1978)

Sea

“It was as easy to be alone with six kin as it is to be alone by yourself, and maybe easier.”

Tanith Lee book Volkhavaar

Source: Volkhavaar (1977), Chapter 8 (pp. 73-74)

“All in all he had not done badly out of the war, but the smells of it, the sights of it, and the cries of pain that attended it like the vultures, had sickened and soured him. Yes, he could fight well enough. And kill efficiently. He feared death, like other men, but could put that from his mind in battle, and he was no fool with a sword or knife. But several smoking ruins ago there had come a curious shift inside himself. He had lost his sense of purpose in the war; he supposed because it was not truly his own purpose but that of the King.”

Tanith Lee

Source: Short fiction, Companions on the Road (1975), Chapter 1, “Avillis” (p. 4)

Death , Men , Pain , War

“Anackire asks nothing because she needs nothing, being everything,” Raldnor said tightly, using a quotation of the temple.
The Ommos laughed gently and shook his head.
“Such undemanding gods.”

Tanith Lee book The Storm Lord

Book 2, “Ruins and Bright Towers” Chapter 5 (p. 79)
The Storm Lord (1976)

God

“Brother, sister, only words; but this, a reality, a destroyer at the gate. What could it have mattered, after all, to celebrate her hungry youth, and his, before the sword fell on her? All the plots and schemes, the moralities and codes of men, seemed dust in the face of death.”

Tanith Lee book Vazkor, Son of Vazkor

Book Two, Part III “The Island”, Chapter 2 (p. 215)
Vazkor, Son of Vazkor (1978)

Death , Men , Youth , Reality

“Wealth, or large amounts of possessions seemed to him limiting. They brought their own prison with them. He preferred, since he had once known a kind of prison, to travel free.”

Tanith Lee

Source: Short fiction, Companions on the Road (1975), Chapter 2, “The Chalice” (p. 16)

Travel , Wealth

“The countryside meant grain and herds, and a river meant fish. And if the sky meant anything, it meant a cruel God who took no notice of their pains and chastised them if they sinned.”

Tanith Lee book The Castle of Dark

Source: The Castle of Dark (1978), Chapter 12 “Lir: The Walled Town” (p. 102)

God , Pain , Fish

“Sorry,” I said sweetly, “I’m the new one with the quick temper and the uncontrollable homicidal tendencies.”

Tanith Lee book Don't Bite the Sun

Part 3, Chapter 8 (p. 96)
Don't Bite the Sun (1976)

“Like most loners,” said Moddik, “you carry the seeds of violent authority. Loners need to be bossy. They quickly learn it’s the only method they have of shoving people off their backs.”

Tanith Lee book Drinking Sapphire Wine

Part 3, Chapter 8 (p. 137)
Drinking Sapphire Wine (1977)

People , Learning

““I think Kathaos fears no divine forces.”
“Then he’s a brave man.”
“Oh, men make their own gods,” Yannul remarked. “I have a god with a fat belly, and a house full of expensive women to attend his every need, and I call him Yannul the Lan in Five Years from This.””

Tanith Lee book The Storm Lord

Book 3, “The Meteoric Hero” Chapter 9 (p. 117)
The Storm Lord (1976)

Women , Men , God , Fear

“Well now,” he said, “was I as good as you were when you were me?”

Tanith Lee book Drinking Sapphire Wine

Part 3, Chapter 11 (p. 152)
Drinking Sapphire Wine (1977)