Madeline

“I wanted a love so intense it could send me into a brain fever or cause the man who loved me to gnash his teeth and dash his head against a tree till he bled. To dig up my grave and be so blinded by love that he'd swear that even after seven years in the ground my face was still my face, uncorrupted.”
― Samantha Ellis, How to Be a Heroine: Or, What I've Learned from Reading Too Much

“It is better to arm and strengthen your hero, than to disarm and enfeeble your foe.”
― Anne Brontë

“We applaud patience but prefer it to be a virtue that others possess.”
― N.T. Wright, After You Believe: Why Christian Character Matters

“A time may come soon," said he, "when none will return. Then there will be need of valour without renown, for none shall remember the deeds that are done in the last defence of your homes. Yet the deeds will not be less valiant because they are unpraised."
She answered: "All your words are but to say: you are a woman, and your part is in the house. But when the men have died in battle and honour, you have leave to be burned in the house, for the men will need it no more. But I am of the House of Eorl and not a serving-woman. I can ride and wield blade, and I do not fear either pain or death."
"What do you fear, lady?" he asked.
"A cage," she said. "To stay behind bars, until use and old age accept them, and all chance of doing great deeds is gone beyond recall or desire.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King