Sarah Blakley-Cartwright > Quotes

“If the innocent are unjust, I'd rather be counted among the guilty."
-Valerie”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“I am going to save your daughter. And then I intend to marry her. I would like your blessing in this, but I can live without it.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“His leaving had been like snipping off the end of a rope - leaving two unraveling strands.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“She didn't want to be considered a woman yet, wasn't ready to be the recipient of jewelry from men.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Valerie stood with the other women, watching the men go. She couldn't help bristling at this division of the sexes. Her fingers itched to hold a weapon, too, to do something, to kill something with her anger.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“The wolf lives right here. In this village". He looked at the villages. "Among you. It is one of you.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“He had held out shakily, like a tree that had been hacked down to its breaking point. But that kiss was the last swing, the final impact, and he gave in finally, felled.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Peter had stolen a knife. We were seven years old, and we'd caught a rabbit in a trap. We looked at each other darkly, a look I'll never forget, one of a shared savage thrill, like young wolves taking down their first kill.

A spill of blood issued from the rabbits neck, a quick red streak across pristine white fur, slow enough to be cruel. I hadn't cut deep enough. Had I wanted to spare its life or prolong its misery? I've never wanted to know the answer.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“How strange to have a sister, Valarie thought. Someone you might have been.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“His memory loved her too much.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Red Riding Hood is not a fairy tale, but rather a universal story about courage and growing up”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“The wedding doesn't feel like mine. It feels like I'm being sold.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Though Valerie and Peter were dancing differently, their bodies moving in different ways, they were both doing the same dance. It was a jealousy dance, old as the human race”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“but she never asked because something so wonderful should never be explained”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“His face was glistening with cold. He was beautiful, the snow in his eyelashes like diamonds, the cool pink of his cheeks, the wet red of his lips. He was staggering toward her.
"I have to leave you." His breath came in uneven bursts. "You won't be safe with me."
Whatever he was, he could not be bad. An amazing and terrible thought entered Valerie's mind, clearing away all others.
"Peter..."
She stepped toward him, arms out. They gave in to each other, finally, their bodies fitting together. Her fingers warmed his cheek, and his arms slipped underneath her crimson cloak as her long blond hair blew around them. Enveloped in a shelter of white, standing out in black and red, were just the two of them. Nothing else anywhere. Valerie knew that she could never be apart from him, that she was what he was and that she would be his always.
She didn't care if he was the Wolf or not. And if he was a Wolf, then she would be one, too.
She made he choice and brought her lips to his.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“If you're the wolf, though, I'll chop off your head and piss down the hole”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“She never worried about falling; such a thing was never possible in this weightless world”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Take it easy, friend," siad Peter, regaining his balance, quickly understanding the condition Henry was in.
"Friend? You left us. In the caves." Henry's muscles tensed.
Peter stepped back cautiously. Henry didn't look like himself.
"Seems someone can't hold his drink," Peter said. He didn't go further, sensing then that Valerie might be thinking of her father.
"And now," Henry continued on his own track, stepping closer to meet him, the smell of alcohol on his breath, "my father, too is dead."
Valerie moved to Henry. "Please, don't do this," she said, stepping in. "It's not worth it."
Henry pushed past her, not realizing his own weight. The force knocked her back. Peter grabbed Henry's arm and twisted it. Overreacting, Henry reared back his fist and landed a punch in the hollow of Peter's eye. The crowd laughed as Peter fell hard to the ground.
Henry scrambled on top him, held him by the collar, forced Peter to face him as he'd never done. He looked into the eyes of the man he wanted to blame for his parents' deaths, because it was a shelter from the terrible thought that everything could be lost to a simple slip of fate. "You filth," he spat out.
This really got the villagers going. But Peter didn't laugh. He pulled a knife from his boot and leapt up, thrusting it viciously in Henry's face.
"Keep your hands off her or I'll cut them off!”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Valerie, I love you so much. I wanted you to have a normal
childhood—so I lived a double life. Hiding in plain
sight. Living modestly.” He began to pace the room, the
words tumbling out of him. “I tried to keep it up, but I’ve
been so disrespected. Even by my own wife. I couldn’t do it
anymore. I’ve settled for far less than I deserved, and I just
couldn’t do it anymore. I decided it was time to leave for
the city....For richer hunting grounds.” Cesaire was snarling
now, a scary, powerful force. Valerie felt herself being
drawn to it....
She took a deep, steadying breath. It was not just fear
that she felt. What she felt was so much more complex
than that, something she couldn’t understand. “Then why
didn’t you just go?”
“Because I loved you girls, and I wanted you to come
with me. To share the wealth.”
“But you had to wait until the blood moon.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood Bonus Chapter

“Peter," she began. He looked up at her, and she could see the pain in his eyes. "I love you," she said freely. With Peter, she was laid bare; he extracted her from herself.
Peter didn't know what to say. HIs eyes glimmered, bright and burning. He only let her see them a moment before he turned away. He took a ragged breath.
"What were you doing with Rose anyway" she demanded, asking a lot of him.
Peter darkened again. He turned his back to her, took a step farther into the alley, and said in a dead voice, "I don't have to like her
to get what I want."
"I don't believe you," Valerie said, reaching for his face, again. Peter pulled away from her. "You're lying.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“The leaves of the tree were yellow, as though they have absorbed all the spring sunshine and were saving it for winter.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“This is your idea of a bribe?" Solomon's brow was still lifted.
The Captain laughed roundly. They let her stand there, feeling hopelessly foolish.
"Don;t you want me?" she murmured, almost convincingly.
"Turn around, girl," Solomon spat out.
Now it was she who felt dirty. Roxanne managed to cover herself before the Captain laid his hands on her to drag her out.
Wait!" she cried.
The worst thing Roxanne had ever had to do was beat the body of a filthy, drunken man off her mother with Claude standing nearby, wringing his hands as he witnessed the scene. This was so much worse. This...this would haunt her forever. But she had no choice.
"Wait, please. I do have one more thing." She spoke quickly enough that she could not turn back.
"If you spare my brother," she began, "I'll give you the name of a witch."
This got Solomon's attention. "Now that is worth something.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“ Dong.
Dong.
Dong.
The third toll of the church bells hovered in the air, and everything became still. Someone in the village had died. Valerie froze.
Dong.
A forth toll shattered the silence. The world split open, exposing a raw inside.
Valerie and Peter looked at each other first in confusion, then in awful understanding.
The fourth bell meant only one thing: Wolf attack.
She had never heard the fourth bell except for the time she and Peter had rung it themselves.
With those bells, Valerie knew.
Life would never be the same,”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Maybe Father Auguste is right," Henry started thoughtfully, rising from a bench. "Maybe we should wait."
From the back of the tavern, Peter stifled a burst of laughter. Henry gripped the edge of the table.
Adrian turned to Henry with a withering glare.
"Maybe, my son," Adrian said quietly, "you should find your courage."
Henry took a labored breath.
"You want to hunt the Wolf?" He narrowed his eyes, spurned. "All right, then. Let's hunt it.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“For Lucie," Peter said quietly, the flame of a gilded saint's candle fluttering in his hand."
"Leave."
Peter had anticipated this reaction and was prepared. He cleared his throat. "I'm paying my respects," he said, still trying to be polite. The woman was grieving for her daughter.
"I can guess the reason you're here. I've just lost one daughter," she said, her hand on the door. "I won't lose another."
"Wait,"
"She's all I have left," she said. "And you have nothing to offer her."
Peter knew that she was right, that Valerie deserved better. But he could not give her up.
"I have a trade. The same one as your husband."
"I know what a woodcutter earns."
Peter began to protest, but Suzette stopped him. "Henry Lazar is her only hope for a better life."
Peter looked into Suzette's anguished eyes, her words hitting him somewhere deep. It sank in: He could not give Valerie a good life.
"If you love her," Suzette said, her voice cracking, "you'll leave her alone.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“With Peter, she was laid bare; he extracted her from herself.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Father. No..." Valerie sputtered in what she knew was a vain protest. She had no say. She'd never had a say.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood Bonus Chapter

“Good girls don't talk to werewolves”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, David Leslie Johnson

“You've been betrothed."
Her hand dropped from the unruly seam at her shoulder. She stared straight ahead at his sun-touched skin.
"To...Henry Lazar." It wasn't easy for him to say the name.
Valerie felt something fall to the floor of her stomach like a wet rag.
"No," she said, not wanting to believe him. "No, no," she told his chest.
Peter stood mute, wishing he could tell her what she wanted to hear.
"It's not possible," she said.
"It is. I'm telling you, it's done.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood

“Peter?”
He couldn’t look at her. Instead, he stared down at his
poisoned arm.
“I could do terrible things to you,” he cautioned her
sadly. “I have to leave you. You won’t be safe with me until
I learn to control myself.”
“I’ll wait for you.”
Finally, when he felt the strength of his conviction, of
her conviction, he turned to her, allowing her in for just a
moment.
“I thought you’d say that.”
― Sarah Blakley-Cartwright, Red Riding Hood Bonus Chapter