Quotes from Tanith Lee

Go nowhere on a horse that fades.

Azhrarn the Beautiful, said Chuz lovingly, it is your beautiful madness I have come to see.

Don't ever, he said, be afraid of me. But I was. He'd driven a silver nail through my heart.

Azhrarn, Lord of Terrors, terrified.

Louisa beheld the grounds and house with the calm pleasure of one who has seen nothing, been nowhere, expects everything, and has little imagination.

I loved him, just for a minute. I loved him and I grieved for him and my pity was part of the beauty, before the shame began.

Free of me, I was whole.

I will pay you in trouble and terror.

He sang. The robot sang. He sang into my veins where my blood had been and where instead the notes and throbbing of the guitar now flowed. I could feel his song vibrating in my throat, as if I sang it too. I couldn't see him. If the crowd parted and I saw him, I would die.

You, too, are a fool, earthborn, to trust in demon-kind and to ride on a mare of smoke and night. What demons love they slay in the end, and the gifts of demons are snares. Go nowhere on a horse that fades, for your dreams will betray you.

And I will love you; for such as I am, I do not give my love lightly, but once given it is sure. Only remember this, if ever you make an enemy of me, your life shall be as dust or sand in the wind. For what a demon loves and loses he will destroy, and my power is the mightiest you are ever likely to know.

The humble were the elect of God. Did not the priests teach so, in their gemmed, kingly robes, from their towering pulpits?

The child might fear to be born and the mother to give birth, yet neither can choose otherwise when the time is come. Neither have I a choice. This is my only path.

She braced herself for the pain of the perfect horn breaking her heart.

The kind of teacher who never learned anything herself. Or taught anything, except sarcasm or fear.

In the greater part of humankind there resides an instinct for survival. It is this which can clutch at straws and effect a rescue from them. It is this which can, now and then, outwit fate.

Men could not have too much. Ecstasy and vulnerability belonged in the same dish. The fear the cup would be snatched away was what gave the wine its savor and as Zhirem's cup was sure, so was his joylessness… to die is a fear, but to live is a fear, also.

He may harp in the Dark One's Hall and take no harm, who is a true harper.

The sky was becoming iron, and the trees seemed to rustle uneasily at an unfelt wind, murmuring to one another, Weather is coming.

She has a lot of opinions, which is restful, as that way I don't have to have many of my own.

This sight was terrible, more terrible than words can convey, for words are cowards as men are, and hide things as men do.

Then he was gone, and all the colors and the light of the day crumbled and went out.

I do not want the lying kindness and the gifts of men, nor of other than men. I am armed now.

Everything now had been taken from him, his striving after goodness, his hopes, his pride, even that human revenge upon fate--to destroy his own life-- for he was invulnerable. A terrible predicament he was in, to be utterly suicidal, and unable to perish.