Best 56 quotes in «crooked kingdom quotes» category

But they were his first friends, his only friends, and Wylan knew that even if he'd had his pick of a thousand companions, these would have been the people he chose.

And that was what destroyed you in the end: the longing for something you could never have.

Alys Van Eck waddled along beside him. Her blindfold had been removed, and through his long glass, Matthias could see her lips moving. Sweet Djel, is she still singing? Judging from the sour expression on Kaz's face, it was a distinct possibility.

At some point, Jesper realized Kaz was gone. "Not one for goodbyes, is he?" he muttered. "He doesn't say goodbye," Inej said. She kept her eyes on the lights of the canal. Somewhere in the garden, a night bird began to sing. "He just lets go.

Before you finish that sentence, I want you to think about what a promise from me costs and what you're willing to pay for it.

Farvell,” she said in Fjerdan. “May Djel watch over you until I can once more.

Crows remember human faces. They remember the people who feed them, who are kind to them. And the people who wrong them too. They don’t forget. They tell each other who to look after and who to watch out for.

Everything is a negotiation with you, Brekker. You probably bartered your way out of the womb.

Everything in him recoiled. The water was cold against his legs. His body had gone numb and yet he could still feel the wet give of his brother's rotting flesh beneath his hands. It's shame that eats men whole. He was drowning in it. Drowning in the Ketterdam harbor. His eyes blurred. "It isn't easy for me either." Her voice, low and steady, the voice that had once led him back from hell.

He might as well go to meet his death is style.

Has anyone noticed this whole city is looking for us, mad at us, or wants to kill us?" "So?" said Kaz. "Well, usually it's just half the city.

Good," said Kaz, but the answer didn't come as quickly as Matthias might have expected. He fears for her, Matthias thought, and he does not like it. For once, he could sympathize with the demjin.

Have any of you wondered what I did with all the cash Pekka Rollins gave us?" "Guns?" asked Jesper. "Ships?" queried Inej. "Bombs?" suggested Wylan. "Political bribes?" offered Nina. They all looked at Matthias. "This is where you tell us how awful we are," she whispered.

He didn't mean to say it. He meant to let her go. "I can help you.

He might as well go to meet his death in style.

He nodded to her right forearm, not trusting himself to speak. His gloves lay on the other side of the basin, black against the gold-veined marble. They looked like dead animals. He focused on the shears, cold metal in his hands, nothing like skin. He could not do this if his hands were shaking. I can best this, he told himself.

Her heart felt too full, a dry creek bed ill-prepared for such rain.

How many rules have you broken since you met me? How many laws? They won't be the last. Nothing about us will ever be proper," she said. She tilted her face up to his. So close now it was as if they were already touching. "Not the way we met. Not the life we lead. And not the way we kiss.

Inej frowned. “I thought you and Nina chose four outbreak sites on the Staves.” Kaz straightened his cuffs. “I also had her stop at the Menagerie.” She smiled then, her eyes red, her cheeks scattered with some kind of dust. It was a smile he thought he might die to earn again.

I didn’t come looking for an apology, Jesper. You have a weak spot. We all have weak spots.” “What’s yours?” “The company I keep,” she said with a slight smile.

I don't like this." "To be fair, Matthias, you don't like much.

If you don't care about money, Nina dear, call it by its other names." "Kruge? Scrub? Kaz's one true love?" "Freedom, security, retribution.

I would have come for you. And if I could't walk, I'd crawl to you, and no matter how broken we were, we'd fight our way out together - knives drawn, pistols blazing. Because that's what we do. We never stop fighting.

Inej's mother had told her that gifted wire walkers were descended from the People of the Air, that they'd once had wings, and that in the right light, those wings could still be glimpsed on the humans to whom they showed favor.

I've been nothing but kind to you. I'm not some sort of monster." "No, you're the man who sits idly by, congratulating yourself on your decency, while the monster eats his fill. At least a monster has teeth and a spine.

There are no good men in Ketterdam, Kaz said. And then he'd simply let go.

In the space of a breath, Kaz had shoved Wylan against the tomb wall with his forearm, the crow head of his cane wedged beneath Wylan's jaw. "Tell me my business again." Wylan swallowed, parted his lips. "Do it," said Kaz. "And I'll cut the tongue from your head and feed it to the first stray cat I can find.

It’s a law of systems,” Wylan murmured. “You build in safeguards for failures, but something in the safeguards ends up causing an unforeseen failure.

I've taken knives, bullets, and too many punches to count, all for a little piece of this town," said Kaz. "This is the city I bled for. And if Ketterdam has taught me anything, it's that you can always bleed a little more.

She realized he'd stopped to change his coat and it clung to him in perfectly tailored lines. He stood leaning on his cane, hair neatly pushed back from his pale brow, a black glass boy of deadly edges. The look of surprise on Haskell's face was nearly comical. Then he started to laugh. "Well, I'll be a son of a bitch, Brekker. You have to be the craziest bastard I ever met.

I will have you without armor. Those were the words she'd said to Kaz aboard the Ferolind, desperate for some sign that he might open himself to her, that they could be more than two wary creatures united by their distrust of the world.

Matthias joined them at the table. "The Shu woman we faced was stronger than me, Jesper, and Wylan put together." "You hear right," said Jesper. "Stronger than Wylan.

Nina glanced from Inej to Kaz and saw they both wore the same expression. Nina knew that look. It came after the shipwreck, when the tide moved against you and the sky had gone dark. It was the first sight of land, the hope of shelter and even salvation that might await you on a distant shore.

She was going to leave a trail of blood over the skyline.

Matthias joined them at the table. "The Shu woman we faced was stronger than me, Jesper, and Wylan put together." "You heard right," said Jesper. "Stronger than Wylan.

Nina screamed, a howl that tore from the black space where her heart had beat only moments before. She searched for his pulse, for the light and force that had been Matthias.

Ravka is grateful for your service," Sturmhond said as they turned to go. "And so is the crown." He waved once. In the late afternoon light, with the sun behind him, he looked less like a privateer and more like... but that was just silly.

She would have her ship and he would have his city.

That boy had betrayed his weakness in a single glance, had ceded the war for the sake of a single battle, and put Inej--all of them--in danger.

Sugar," said Kaz. Jesper nudged the sugar bowl down the table to him. Kaz rolled his eyes. "Not for my coffee, you podge.

Suffering is like anything else. Live with it long enough, you learn to like the taste.

That's where you're wrong," said Kaz. "I don't hold a grudge. I cradle it. I coddle it. I feed it fine cuts of meat and send it to the best schools. I nurture my grudges, Rollins.

Then tailor him," Kaz said coldly. The challenge in Kaz's eyes was clear. So he knew she'd been struggling. Of course he did. Dirtyhands never missed a trick.

They don't know who we are. Not really. They don't know what we've done, what we've managed together. So let's go show them they picked the wrong damn fight.

The really bad monsters never look like monsters

There is no safe," Kaz snarled. "Not in the Barrel. Not anywhere." He threw his strength into rowing. No seal. No ship. Their money spent. "What do we do now?" Wylan said quietly, his voice barely audible above the sound of the water and the other boats on the canal. "Pick up a pair of oars and make yourself useful," said Kaz. "Or I'll put your pampered ass in the drink and let your father fish you out.

The silence between them was dark water. He could not cross it. He couldn't walk the line between the decency she deserved and the violence this path demanded. If he tried, it might get them both killed. He could only be who he truly was--a boy who had no comfort to offer. So he would give her what he could.

Thoughts of moonlight and silken hair evaporated in a black bolt of fury. Kaz saw Inej tug on the sleeve of her left forearm, where the Menagerie tattoo had once been. He had the barest inkling of what she'd endured there, but he knew what it was to feel helpless, and Van Eck had managed to make her feel that way again. Kaz was going to have to find a new language of suffering to teach that smug merch son of a bitch.

Things are always more interesting in the dark

We learn to hold our heads as if we wear crowns.