Heather Heffner > Quotes

“It is not often one chooses a demon over an angel.”

So they told me. But this demon was the only one who made me feel safe.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Wolf

“I found it easier to stare out into the infinite blackness, away from the fire burning itself out in his eyes.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Wolf

“I was falling for the man who had turned me. He could never know.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Wolf

“It felt as if I’d been teleported to the dark side of the moon, forced to gaze out at the stars and wonder which one I’d come from.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Wolf

“I clung tightly to Kwan’s mane as he propelled his great serpent body through the cloud banks. The cockatrice’s big green head dipped under the clouds, and I spotted an emerald island below, with dramatic peaks jutting up from the jungle. I asked the great cockatrice for the name of the isle, but he only laughed at me, saying that names changed faster than a century’s wind. That didn’t seem very fast to me, but I took his word for it.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Tiger

“–We are all dying– she told me. –Even something of the immortal will die–
“What?”
–Meaning–”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Tiger

“Father never went into depth about what happened if I woke up, unable to remember how I’d died, but most definitely in the hands of those not selected to have s’mores and sleepovers for all of eternity.”
― Heather Heffner, The Tribe of Ishmael

“There is a rule in Hell: Don’t trust anyone who takes time out of their day to help you.”
― Heather Heffner, The Tribe of Ishmael

“My body slid from human to wolf in a crack! of black smoke. Wolf was panting and I watched frost dissipate on my hot tongue, sending tiny rivulets of steam into the air. The world was sharp and clear, and I never realized how many different colors of shadow there were. It made me savor the dark beauty of night even more.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Wolf

“…the door banged wide open, and the most striking man I had ever seen stood in the frame, the black winds whipping around him like a chariot of storm clouds.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Wolf

“I told you we were returning with the Dragon King,” I called, adopting a fighting stance. Silver scales armored my forearms up to my shoulders. “But it was never him you should have been afraid of. I am the Queen of Air and Darkness. These are my people. And you are trespassing in my home.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Rat

“I stood alone in the alley, unruffled by the winds whispering with broken Yeouiju curses and lost souls. My single eye gleamed gold as I scented my prey’s fear.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Rat

“I blew a strand of black hair from my face. “A demon treating another with kindness is something I have yet to see.”

“Careful,” the demon whispered. “You may have already seen the rough shape and form it takes in this world, and yet you do not recognize it.”
― Heather Heffner, The Tribe of Ishmael

“When you face the vampyres, you fight with passion, because you can see a new sunrise beyond their darkness. A life beyond their misery. And you’re going to make sure everyone else wakes up with you to see it.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Tiger

“In every story I’d read about dragons, they dwelled in caves far away from civilization. They didn’t live in the upper heights of ritzy Gangnam with a view of the Han River shimmering in the moonlight. And they certainly didn’t live in a villa that looked like a geometric cube with windows that changed color based on the time.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Dragon

“I’d like to sit there,” I said softly to the girl sitting in front of the other mirror. She scampered.

I took over her abandoned make-up and painted my face. Red cheeks, to attract hungry vampyre glances. Black liquid eyeliner and mascara, to draw attention away from my bitter eyes. My silky-thin, raven hair, undone in waves over my bare shoulders. The magenta shade of apple gloss on my lips, to make them plump and inviting. Finally, a strapless golden dress that hugged my hips and not much lower. I stood up, feeling the cold air slide down the bare skin of my back like fingers, and panicked. I couldn’t wear something like this! Not without a cardigan! A light dress jacket, at least!

I took a gulp of Amrit’s wine and detached myself from the fretting child in my head. Then I strode from the sleeping chambers.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Tiger

“You have seen the suffering that creates the greatest and most beautiful of things. It also creates the greatest of evils.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Dragon

“We are the gods now, I realized, gazing upon their weary faces one by one. Heaven help us.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Rat

“I stared at him. He loomed before me in the junk-cluttered alley with the grace of a prince but the mystery of a mythological being. He was neither quite here nor there. A creature who flashed his full glory for an instant in dreaming, but upon waking, left me questioning what I had seen. I had come here believing that at last I would know if the oldest vampyre in Maya’s line was friend or foe.

I still didn’t know, but I did know it was a risk I wanted to take.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Rat

“The Bloodsucker Queen has lived for what, a millennium? She can wait on her decaying ass a little while longer.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Tiger

“I asked the ink to part, and it did. I understood now that it was water of a different kind; spilled blood could be painted into words. Pain barely touched me, not from where I stood in the belly of deepest fury, every cloud from here to the East Sea answering my summons.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Rat

“I loved the way his eyes glowed when they looked at me. My piece of Earth.

I kissed it one more time, gently, and let it go.”
― Heather Heffner, The Tribe of Ishmael

“I knew my strange, oversized family of fur and claws would go to the ends of South Korea and beyond for me. They would spend days in the clandestine laboratories of Yong Enterprises where the future was made and nights gallivanting around a terrifying and wondrous spirit world where the past was alive and well.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Rat

“The Frost King’s vampyres thought they had won this city. They didn’t know the first thing about surviving in it.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Rat

“We landed heavily on the sand. I threw off Khyber’s embrace. “I can walk by myself.”

“Good. You’re heavier than usual. How does a girl manage to put on weight on a deserted island?”

“I’m just trying to keep you in shape,” I replied sweetly. “Your tiny, pale-ass arms aren’t impressing anyone.”

“Sensitive, are we?”

But when a tree-sized stalagmite barred our way, Khyber swiftly strode forward to snap it in two. I laughed and brushed past him.

“I’m not the only one.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Dragon

“Clinging to the rags I had left, I gazed out upon the full breadth of the Furnace and shook at what I saw.

The world had been wiped clean of all trace of humanity. Sharp sandstone peaks protruded into the gray sky like a humped backbone, spilling into vast seas of sand on either side. Boulders and driftwood, the castaways of some bygone mountain, cast the only disruption upon the land. And I realized—no sun crossed the sky; there was only constant, lingering grayness.”
― Heather Heffner, The Tribe of Ishmael

“The lanterns filled the sky, pulsing with the harmonious light of fireflies, and a great host of ghosts departed from the earth to join them. The higher they rose into the zenith of the heavens, the further night was chased back, until a great and radiant being resumed its throne in the sky.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Tiger

“Since the Red Night fell, there have been three things I haven’t felt in months: a full belly, laughter, and the sun.

Today someone laughed.”
― Heather Heffner, Year of the Rat

“In a world of fog and gray, the youth is a shining being dressed in dark violet, his golden-flecked hair smoothed back from his bronzed temples. He resembles a human, but no man I have ever seen holds himself like a king, like a gleaming statue chiseled from topaz.

I swallow. I am standing before a demon, the most beautiful being I have ever seen, and I can’t run. I can only stand in the hushed glade and stare, snowflakes falling in the space between us.”
― Heather Heffner, The Tribe of Ishmael

“I want to be humbled. I want to meet people more messed up than I am. I want to get lost and come out the other end having no idea who I am.”
― Heather Heffner, The Tribe of Ishmael