Top 200 Kristin Cashore Quotes (2026 Update)
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151. “In the saddle again, Fire mulled over the commander’s trust, prodding it around, like a candy in her mouth, trying to decide whether she believed it.”

— Kristin Cashore

152. “How acutely sometimes the presence or absence of people mattered.”

— Kristin Cashore

153. “She felt his eyes on her at times. Bold, he was, and entirely unlike the rest of the guests, who carefully pretended she wasn’t there, as they always did. It occurred to her that it wasn’t just the strangeness of his eyes that disconcerted her. It was that he wasn’t afraid to hold hers. She glanced at him once when he wasn’t looking. He raised his eyes to meet her gaze. Davit had asked the same question twice before Katsa heard him and turned from the Lienid’s uneven stare to answer.”

— Kristin Cashore

154. “If he touches you, I’ll come in and choke him to death.”

— Kristin Cashore

155. “I don’t understand your book. Isn’t every book a book of words?”

— Kristin Cashore

156. “Maybe it was for the best that she’d been so foolish, for if she’d known how hard this would be, perhaps she wouldn’t have done it.”

— Kristin Cashore

157. “I forgive myself... today I forgive myself.”

— Kristin Cashore

158. “And,” he continued, his strange smile gleaming, “as I see it, our hearts are not so different in size. I murdered my father. You murdered yours. Is that something you did with a large heart?”

— Kristin Cashore

159. “They seemed no closer to the tops of the peaks that rose before them. It was only by looking back, to the forest far below, that she knew they’d climbed.”

— Kristin Cashore

160. “His last thought was that it hadn’t been stupidity that had allowed his son to enchant him so easily with words. It had been love.”

— Kristin Cashore

161. “Get some sleep in here, will you? Both of you, girl and horse. And I hope you’ll tell me someday, Fire, why you did it.” With a swirl of skirts and a click of the latch, Roen was gone. Fire closed her eyes and considered the question. She’d done it because she’d had to. An apology for the life of her father, who’d created a world of lawlessness where towns like Gray Haven fell under the attack of looters. And she’d done it to show Roen’s son that she was on his side. And also to keep him alive.”

— Kristin Cashore

162. “It was starting to seem to her that being “forward-thinking” too often involved avoiding any kind of thought at all – especially about things that might benefit from a great deal of thinking.”

— Kristin Cashore

163. “Sneaking was a kind of deceit. So was disguise. Just past midnight, wearing dark trousers and Fox’s hood, the queen snuck out of her own rooms and stepped into a world of stories and lies.”

— Kristin Cashore

164. “It made Fire so angry, the thought of such a medicine, a violence done to herself to stop her from creating anything like herself. And what was the purpose of these eyes, this impossible face, the softness and the curves of this body, the strength of this mind; what was the point, if none of the men who desired her were to give her any babies, and all it ever brought her was grief? What was the purpose of a woman monster?”

— Kristin Cashore

165. “Our own story is even more important for us to know than history.”

— Kristin Cashore

166. “Ivan had contrived somehow in the dark of night to replace every watermelon in the watermelon patch with a gravestone, and every gravestone in the engraver’s lot with a watermelon.”

— Kristin Cashore

167. “Do you ever feel,” she says to Jane, “like you’re trapped in the wrong version of your life?”

— Kristin Cashore

168. “She would thump them both, and she would apologize to neither.”

— Kristin Cashore

169. “And of course she understood now why her body wanted to run whenever he appeared. It was a correct instinct, for there was nothing to be got from this but sadness.”

— Kristin Cashore

170. “He thinks we’re made of money.”

— Kristin Cashore

171. “I’m bored to death. Perhaps I should pillage one of my neighbors for my own amusement. It seems to work for Drowden.”

— Kristin Cashore

172. “Then she’ll know I’ll want to knock her senseless if she so much as looks at me.”

— Kristin Cashore

173. “If we knew a person was going to die, we’d hold harder to the memories.”

— Kristin Cashore

174. “How will you answer Giddon when he asks you to marry him?” Po asked. “Will you accept?” Katsa sat up, and stared at him. “That’s an absurd question.” “Absurd – why?” His face was clear of its usual smiles. She didn’t think he was teasing her. “Why in the Middluns would Giddon ask me to marry him?” His eyes narrowed. “Katsa. You’re not serious.” She looked at him blankly, and now he did begin to smile.”

— Kristin Cashore

175. “Hanna’s announced her intentions to marry Archer.”

— Kristin Cashore

176. “A consciousness was like a face you saw once and forever recognized.”

— Kristin Cashore

177. “What man can hate or love well when he is drugged?”

— Kristin Cashore

178. “What a horrifying notion,” he said. “A creature with the power to take over one’s mind.”

— Kristin Cashore

179. “There is nothing wrong with impractical loves.”

— Kristin Cashore

180. “It was just that she had the need to tell him something honest, something honest and unhappy, because cheerful lies tonight were too depressing and too sharp, turning in on her like pins.”

— Kristin Cashore

181. “Danzhol. The one with the marriage proposal and the objections to the town charter in central Monsea. “Bacon,” Bitterblue muttered. “Bacon!” she repeated, then carefully made her way up the spiral stairs.”

— Kristin Cashore

182. “A king who’s innocent of the things of which he’s guilty?”

— Kristin Cashore

183. “She would like to restrain from cruelty and receive no admiration for it.”

— Kristin Cashore

184. “And the kings were no better to their own people than they were to each others.”

— Kristin Cashore

185. “I’ve heard you could kill a man with the nail of your smallest finger.” She smiled. “Yes, Lord Prince.” “Does it make it easier?” She squinted at his form hunched in the saddle. “I don’t understand you.” “To have beautiful eyes. Does it lighten the burden of your Grace, to know you have beautiful eyes?” She laughed. “No, Lord Prince. I’d happily do without both.”

— Kristin Cashore

186. “For a moment, it was almost as if they were friends again.”

— Kristin Cashore

187. “Kasta looked from one of them to the other, the two of them shaking hands, understanding each other’s concern. She didn’t see where Giddon came off feeling insulted. She didn’t see how Giddon had any place in it at all. Who were they, to take her fight away from her and turn it into some sort of understanding between themselves? She would knock his nose from his face. She would thump them both, and she would apologise to neither.”

— Kristin Cashore

188. “King Birn of Wester and King Drowden of Nander might form an alliance and pummel Estill’s army on the northern borders, but Wester and Nander could never work together for long. Suddenly one would offend the other, and Wester and Nander would become enemies again, and Estill would join Nander to pound Wester.”

— Kristin Cashore

189. “We are not made of money.”

— Kristin Cashore

190. “And is it the way, in these kingdoms you fell from, for a woman to join forces with an unnatural child who’s murdered her friend? Or is that expectation unique to you, and your infinitesimal heart?”

— Kristin Cashore

191. “The seventh kingdom was Monsea. The mountains set Monsea apart from the others, as the ocean did for Lienid. Leck, King of Monsea, was married to Ashen, the sister of King Ror of Lienid. Leck and Ror shared a dislike for the squabbles of the other kingdoms. But this didn’t forge an alliance, for Monsea and Lienid were too far removed from each other, too independent, too uninterested in the doings of the other kingdoms.”

— Kristin Cashore

192. “How I wish I could hear those words in your voice. My own voice is wearing thin.”

— Kristin Cashore

193. “They’d never liked her before, for no one liked the Graced, but at least they’d tolerated her presence. Now there was no pretense of friendliness. “Watch for the blue-eyed green-eyed one,” they would whisper to guests. “She killed her cousin, with one strike. Because he complimented her eyes.” Even Randa kept out of her way. A murderous dog might be useful to a king, but he didn’t want it sleeping at his feet.”

— Kristin Cashore

194. “It’s not true, of course,” she said in a normal voice. “What isn’t?” Bitterblue looked at the moon, motionless above her, while the ground moved under her feet. “That I’m stronger than the sea.” “Okay,” he said. “But you’re stronger than the way the sea makes you feel.”

— Kristin Cashore

195. “I want you to know why I’m angry,” I said. “I want you to know why I get mean. The anger inside me is too big. If I look at it too close, I feel too much grief to survive.”

— Kristin Cashore

196. “This world kept wanting to be bigger than she was letting it. Why did she keep trapping herself inside small things?”

— Kristin Cashore

197. “I’m so small that my husband won’t be able to find me in the bed. And when he does, he’ll discover that my breasts are uneven and I’m shaped like an eggplant.”

— Kristin Cashore

198. “Oh, it was all such a mess, the things people did to each other, and the decisions that had to be made.”

— Kristin Cashore

199. “We have lived the same life. But when Bitterblue looks in her mirror, she sees herself, and when I look in mine, I’m not sure which of us I see. Sometimes I wish I had stronger barriers against whatever she’s feeling. I’m porous. Her feelings invade mine and I disappear. Does this happen to other people?”

— Kristin Cashore

200. “A long moment of silence stretched out between them. Her conversation to this point had mostly been an attempt to distract him while she gathered her feelings: gathered them and ejected them, so that she could face him with a mind that was blank and smooth, with no thoughts for him to read. She was fairly good at this. Even bleary-headed and shaky with fatigue, she was good at emptying her mind.”

— Kristin Cashore