Sara A. Mueller > Quotes

“Men did not respect anger in a woman. They labeled it weakness.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“You’ll find that what you can bear increases a great deal when you are not offered any other choice.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“To change any of this, we need to live.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“The world isn’t all towers of white marble, and it isn’t all gardens of perfectly trimmed grass,” said Pain softly. “Whether we want to look or not, we cannot escape from the world. We can retreat for awhile, but always it is there.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“They made you! They made you to control me! A childish woman who lives to be good. To be proper. To be appropriate! To do what she’s told! And every time I came to the surface you split that ‘me’ off! It isn’t the mindlock that kept you from throwing me out, it’s that I’m Charmaine and you were never part of me. And I won’t feel guilty anymore for what was done to us! I won’t feel guilty about surviving! I won’t be ashamed of what was done to me! I won’t be ashamed of remaking myself. And I won’t turn my back on myself.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“The Lady’s head ached. She didn’t want to think about it, didn’t want to know anymore or fight anymore. She was so tired already. How did people live like this, with all the ugliness?”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“I tore myself apart so they wouldn’t destroy me, but I can stand it now.” Tears traced down her cheeks. She bared her teeth and wouldn’t stop. She wouldn’t spare herself. Better wild grief than this meekness with no passion. “Pain…she was how I stood it then, but I can remember it all, now. I can stand by myself because I won’t let you win. I won’t let what someone else made me into be what I am. I love this me I’ve made myself into. I’m proud of me. And I damn well won’t give this me up to you.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“You began as an emptiness, and all your experiences are only yours. I don’t need an empty place now. It scares me to be without it,” she admitted, “but I’m not going to let another person carry my hurt. You’re a separate person now; so much so that you have your own name, and a rather lean, slightly sticky gentleman who loves you.” She paused and tipped her head at the rosy blush that crept up Mercy’s face.
Mercy clamped a hand over her mouth for a moment, giggling. Her scarlet eyes shone with tears.
Charm went on. “I wouldn’t feel right taking your life away from you. So…welcome to the world.” Charm smiled in spite of the pinch in her throat. Something that was hers, and not Pain’s.
The fragility in the air seemed to fall away with Mercy’s shaky smile. “Thank you.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“I’m tired of being only a ghost,” she said with something like desperation.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“He did not want to hear or believe what she said, and so she said nothing.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“I’ve noticed a curious trend in your boneghosts, Mistress Charm. Desire cannot hold on to anything, Pain is pale, and Pride is blind. It cannot be a coincidence, surely?”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“Sorry, Mistress, but I’m not much interested in ghosts. I have enough of my own.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“They’re all falling away from me. I don’t want to be the Lady. I’m just learning how to be me. I don’t want to go back to the Lady, to being an empty nothing. I’m afraid.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“How did you escape?”
It took Pain a moment to decide. She wasn’t sure she liked the answer she found. “Well, first of all you threw me away. And now I am becoming too much my own self.” She paused. “I am afraid, too. We are the same in that, at least. I don’t want to go back to sleep. I don’t want to be only an empty place. I do not think I can do it.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“We were made pale, crippled, blind, and lame so that we would be clumsy and ridiculous, but the Lady has underestimated us.” The last words rang in the dank of the laboratory as if in marbled halls. “I love you, Pain, as a sister; but I will not suffer you to take my place. Do I make myself clear?”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“He doesn’t deserve anything from you. Not. One. Tear. Cry for yourself. Not for him.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“I have been outside the walls of Orchard House, Lady. The things that are bad within this house, and even the things that are wrong in the city, are not bad and wrong everywhere; any more than Inshill’s perfection existed outside the walls of its palace,” Pain told her. “When you see a larger world, there is room for good things as well as bad.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“You exorcised the others. You threw away shame and pain and pride…even justice. Everything that interfered with being their obedient little dolly. You kept me locked in whatever they asked, and you never had to pay the price for any of it because you had parts of me to do that for you.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“She took the bird to her worktable and put a rubber tube into its beak. With the end of the tube in her mouth, she massaged its ribs with her finger as she puffed, very gently, into the tube. The little swallow kicked, and she held it gently between her hands.
“Just like resuscitating a person,” murmured Bern.
“Exactly like that,” agreed the Lady. “Most animals want to live. They struggle toward life regardless of their surroundings.” She deposited the bird in the cage, a sad smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “Human beings are more difficult. At some point of trauma, most people just give up and die.”
Bern’s face changed, something like guilt shadowing his eyes. “Only if they’re let to, Mistress.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“Responsibility for a country’s actions must ultimately rest with their government.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“The night breeze off the sea riffled through the bone orchard, playing softly in the ghastly white fruits, making the solid ones clatter while the long bones chimed and fluted. The trees were as foreign to Borenguard as their owner, Charm. She sat in the solarium with the windows open to the mellow night, going over her books. A soothing rhythm of touch, tally, and check to the uneven music of her bones.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“She couldn’t find anyone who was responsible except herself.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“We need to treat your hands,” said the Lady, coming out of her trance. She took Pride by the wrists and drew her to a stool. The Lady ignored Pride’s loathing look and began to collect linen, tweezers, a jar, and bandages as if nothing at all were wrong. She began to gently peel the tattered remnants of loose skin from Pride’s bloody, blistered hands. “Tell me if I’m hurting you.”
Pain put a hand over her mouth to hide a smile as Pride’s lip curled in utter scorn. “I’ll take it, Pride,” she said softly.
Pride turned toward Pain, her chin coming up in spite of the tear that slid down one cheek. “No. I earned it. It’s mine.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“You want me to feel as hurt as you do? Well, I don’t, and I’m not going to. I won’t mourn my surviving. No one has the right to ask me for that. Certainly not you so that you can feel nobly blameless.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“She asked for our help. We agreed. We had to survive.” Desire searched his face for any reaction.

He bent down, leaning his elbows on his knees. “I admit to a certain amount of selfishness. It is much more convenient for me to be in love with you when you are alive,” teased Luther in his cool voice, a trickle of amused sarcasm relieving the tone of any sting.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“The Lady caught sight of herself in a window, a creature all glittering and unnatural, corset putting the soft curves of her breasts on display and making her waist look smaller than it was. It seemed as if passing the door into the front of the house would make everything real. She had felt daring, letting Pain recolor her hair pink, donning Mistress Charm’s dazzling clothes. It had been easy to be daring in private.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“Her tone held only distant disinterest, but Pain found it odd that Pride would take any interest at all in Pain’s life or plans. Pride seldom spoke.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“I didn’t think you’d admit that there was anything that anyone else might be better at.”
“That’s a funny thing about sitting here at this desk so much. It gives one a great deal of time to think, and to come to fairly precise terms with one’s strengths and weaknesses.” Pride’s voice held dry humor instead of the bitterness that Pain expected.
Embarrassment was a strange emotion, to Pain, coming with a flush of uncomfortable heat.
Pride’s lips quirked slightly. “A little blindness now and then would have been far more comfortable.”
A laugh rose from Pain’s diaphragm to her lips. “It would be at that.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“Would you have bedded him if you’d been whole?” demanded Luther. “If you remembered me?”
Charm breathed. Men did not respect anger in a woman. They labeled it weakness. “You ask a question designed to ferret out or create guilt, because you’re convinced your best dramatic stance is to be hurt because I’ve ‘spurned’ you. Have I got that right? You want me to feel as hurt as you do? Well, I don’t, and I’m not going to. I won’t mourn my surviving. No one has the right to ask me for that. Certainly not you so that you can feel nobly blameless.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard

“Her eyes prickled with tears at the burdens her ghosts had carried. Her soul burned with them. For all these years she’d done her best to keep her selves alive, and even when they hated her they’d still done their best to protect her. She wouldn’t turn her back on herself now. Not any part of herself.”
― Sara A. Mueller, The Bone Orchard