Christopher Buehlman > Quotes

“One of the hardest and truest things a grown-up learns is that sometimes it's not okay.”
― Christopher Buehlman

“But it will be harder for you if you remember. Love is always harder. Love means weathering blows for another’s sake and not counting them. Love is loss of self, loss of other, and faith in the death of loss.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Between Two Fires

“One scene stayed with de Chauliac forever, obsessing him, even though, mercifully, the rest would blur; he saw a devil with wide black wings gripped by two angels, who drove it down and seemed to speak in its ears as they fell; they hit the bend of the Rhone, sending up a great, illuminated plume of water visible from Orange.

Two angels and a devil had tumbled into the water.

Three angels came up.

Forgiveness, then, was possible even for the worst.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Between Two Fires

“But when I make a good [taxidermy] mount I feel like I beat God in a small way. As though the Almighty said, Let such critter be dead, and I said, 'Fuck You, he can still play the banjo.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Those Across the River

“Only the strong, the rich, and the dying think truth is a necessity; the rest of us know it for a luxury.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“Man is born into sin. All because of Adam.”
Guillaume said, “Mostly Eve, my priest told us.”
Delphine looked up from the water now.
“That’s not fair.”
“How’s that?” said Guillaume.
“She was tempted by something stronger than her. Adam was tempted by a weaker creature. Or so we are told. If Eve was his inferior, his sin was greater. You can’t have it both ways.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Between Two Fires

“Shall we journey East together?"
She considered me. "What will you do for me?"
"It's what we'll do for each other."
"So tell me."
"I'll watch while you sleep. Sleep while you watch. I'll lie to you when it doesn't matter, but I'll also lie for you when it does. If you let me do the talking, I'll make sure you miss the penny-cock with the pizzle-itch and get the best wine in the merchant's barrel. You'll never again meet a door you can't get through nor a wall you can't get eyes over. I need your arms, yes, but you need my nose. If you do the worst of the fighting, I'll make sure you know where your foes are coming from and cull the weak ones. I won't be your dog, but if you are half the wolf I think you are, you've found a fox to run with.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“A mundane lie hiding an exotic truth is deception; an exotic lie hiding a mundane truth is storytelling. Deception may be necessary to preserve life, but storytelling makes life worth living.”
― Christopher Buehlman

“Well, I do what I say. Which is why I don’t say much.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Between Two Fires

“What a fabulous kingdom the mind is, and you the emperor of all of it. You can bed the duke's wife and have the duke strangled in your mind. A crippled man can think himself a dancer, and an idiot can fool himself wise. The day a magicker peeks into the thoughts of commoners for some thin-skinned duke or king will be a bad day. Those with callused hands will rise on that day, for a man will only toil in a mine so long as he can dream of sunny fields, and he'll only kneel for a tyrant if he can secretly cut that tyrant's throat in the close theater of his bowed head.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“My five Upstart sons are all bloody and brave
I’ve got one on the gallows, and two in the grave
One is your prisoner, and none is your slave

“Pish,” said Gormalin. “That’s a war song!”

I’ve got one in the hills that you never have met
And though he is young, he will murder you yet
For the hour is coming you’ll answer your debt

“That song’s illegal!” he protested, and right he was. It’s the very song that got Kellan na Falth hanged. “You can’t sing about men killing men since the Goblin Wars! Especially not a song against a proper king of Holt, even an old, bad king!”
Now, of course, I joined in.

My five Upstart sons have declared against you
Their tongues are as black as their promise is true
And they’ll call you to answer whatever you do!

No Coldfoot guard was going to be left out of an illegal Galtish rebel song, so Malk picked up the next verse with us, his strong, confident baritone suddenly making the whole insurrection seem credible.

The crown you so love sits but light on your head
The castle you stole has a cold, stony bed
And though I am old, I will yet see you dead
You’ve hundreds of men with long swords and long knives
But you’ve lain with near half of their fair Galtish wives
And none of them love you to lay down their lives
Abandon your tower and open your gate
No silver-bought army can alter your fate
If all my five perish, my neighbor has eight
Our ten thousand sons have declared against you
Their tongues are as black as their promise is true
And they’re coming, they’re coming, whatever you do”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“I was so scared, I half wanted to piss myself, but the difference between the strong and the weak isn't that the strong don't piss themselves. It's that they hitch their pissy pants up after and go through with it.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“May laughter keep us young and malice keep us rich.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“if she had to summon a smile to put out a fire, half the town would burn.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“When listening for danger, one must never mistake silence for safety.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“She had seen him once, smiling a little through another friar’s sermon about Hell, saying after the other left that fear of Hell is one of many paths to it. Forget Hell and love one another. That is all He wants of you.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Between Two Fires

“I'm a man who will always choose to know.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“How easily the paint of civilization peels off with a little bad weather.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Those Across the River

“Monarchy is a bad system because, no matter how smart you are, you can still squirt a moron out of your plumbing. Maybe you get lucky and your son or daughter is at least half as smart as you--what about your grandchild? Probably a knob, and when they inherit the throne, everything you built falls to shyte.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“Shyte! What the sixteen ways to fuck a fuck is that?”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“Spear had picked up her lost hand and run into the forest like she knew a sewer-on of hands whose shop closed soon.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“I won’t be your dog, but if you’re half the wolf I think you are, you’ve found a fox to run with.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“How did Heaven come into all of this? Heaven was life, not death. Heaven was a woman holding your head in the crook of her arm and looking down at you. Heaven was a warm hand on your cheek and the smell of soup with garlic on the fire.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Between Two Fires

“It's sad, but the world's made of sadness. if you hadn't noticed, great gray bricks of it and mortared all together with pain and obligation.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“the rich hold grudges the poor can’t afford,”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“Some righteous men and women yet held faith, but they were scattered so far that none could see the other’s light, and it seemed the darkness had no end.”
― Christopher Buehlman, Between Two Fires

“Thomas looked at her standing with her delicate arms and legs and thought how odd it was that children were small, and that they found this normal. He could not remember being small. What must he look like to her, standing so far above her, holding that murderous hammer? What did it feel like to know you lived or died at the whim of the giants around you?”
― Christopher Buehlman, Between Two Fires

“Weapons!” Malk cried, but he had none. I drew my dagger, feeling I’d do just as well to wave my manhood at it, had that not already shrunk itself as far in my body as it could go.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief

“Happiness is the province of those who ask few questions.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Lesser Dead

“When it croaked out of my mouth, I meant it as statement of fact, but looking back, it sounded perfectly weird, ambiguous, and off-putting, so it was just the right thing.”
― Christopher Buehlman, The Blacktongue Thief