Thirrin Quotes

“Oskan, do you really believe that I don’t understand exactly what my soldiers are going through? Do you really think I’m a stranger to burdens?” She almost laughed at the bitter absurdity of it all, but she controlled herself, knowing that if she started, she wouldn’t be able to stop.

“They’re lucky, they only have to worry about a flogging if they break ranks and endanger their own lives again. But if I make a mistake, thousands could die, a country could be lost, and who knows what else could be inflicted on those unlucky enough to survive!” Her voice had slowly risen in strength as she spoke, and suddenly she let everything go in a glorious outpouring of emotion.

“Don’t talk to me about burdens, I drew up the plans for them! How many fourteen-year-olds do you know who rule a kingdom at war, who command an army, who keep together an alliance of more species than she can remember, who’s killed more people than she can count, who waits desperately day in, day out, every living blessed second, for the arrival of allies she’s terrified are going to let her down? Please tell me, Oskan, tell me her name. I’d like to have a cozy chat with her and compare notes! I’d like that, it might make me feel just a little less isolated, and just a little less afraid that at any minute the whole sorry, ludicrous, deadly, hellish mess is going to collapse around me, and everyone will finally find out that I don’t know what I’m doing and that I’m making it up as I go along!”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“He may be King Redrought Strong-in-the-Arm Lindenshield, Bear of the North, Defender of the Realm, Descendent of Thor, but to Thirrin he was just Dad, a man with a fondness for cats, a taste for comfy slippers and a huge laugh that could dent pewter at fifty paces.”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“Thirrin pointedly ingnored the long woollen warmers that Oskan had carefully rolled down over the ears of his mule, Jenny. Even the fact that they were bright yellow with red pom-poms on the very tips didn’t drag any sort of comment out of her.”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“Thirrin’s fighting spirit still roared within her though, and as the creature lowered its jaws towards her throat she punched it hard on the nose. The werewolf shook its head and sneezed, taken completely aback.”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“Thirrin Freer Strong-in-the-Arm Lindenshield carried her names with ease. She was thirteen years old, tall for her age and could ride her horse as well as the best of her father’s soldiers. She was also the heir to the throne of the Icemark. Her tutor might add that she was attentive when she wanted to be, clever when she bothered to try, and had her father’s temper. Few compared her to her mother, who had died when Thirrin was born. But those who remembered the proud young woman of the fierce Hypolitan people said that Thirrin was her double.”
― stuart hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“Put her in any situation that was even vaguely new and personal and she was lost; her pale, almost translucent skin and auburn hair seemed to signal everything she was feeling. She may raise her chin in proud disdain and even curl her lip in an emergency, but nobody was likely to be fooled if she glowed the colour of a midsummer sunset.”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“She knew she could kill him in a variety of gory ways in less time than it took him to adjust the strange spectoculums that rested on the very end of his nose, but even this distraction didn’t seem to help!”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“Thirrin could be charming when she forgot to be a princess. But just recently that happened only rarely, and Totus was beginning to wonder what was on her mind. He thought perhaps he knew, but couldn’t be sure. And how exactly would one ask the heir apparent if she was afraid that she’d have to rule the country before she was ready, and if she was afraid that she’d have to rule the country before she was ready, and if she was frightened that her father would die before she’d had time to experience life properly?”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“She’d invited Oskan to the Yule Feast. Or rather, she’d sent a royal command ordering his presence on the twenty-first day of Icemas.”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“And where did you spring from, Oskan? I’d already had enough shocks without you leaping out of the shadows like a skinny ghost!”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“I know you’ll probably think it superstitious nonsense, Maggie, but I’m going to ask Oskan to perform…” Thirrin shrugged her shoulders as she struggled to find the right word, “something…a ceremony of some sort before we go into the trees. Something that’ll help the people believe they’re protected in some way.”

“On the contrary, Madam, I agree with the idea,” Maggiore answered and smiled. “It’s wise to use everything you can to keep the citizens calm. I’ll be there chanting whatever you want and waving around as much incense as you think necessary.”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“Look at the two of us, barely out of childhood and already we’re too old-fashioned for this changing world. Is it possible to be born old? Because I certainly feel it sometimes. How can we hope to stand against unstoppable progress; how can we possibly win a war against the forces of science?”


Oskan snorted.

“Which question do you want me to answer first? Born old? Yes, right now I feel ninety. And as for the rest, we’re not fighting progress or science, they’re both ideas that belong to people. Ideas that should help us to understand the beauty of our world and improve the lives of everything that lives in it. But the Empire has kidnapped them, and progress of its sort means sweeping aside everything that isn’t new, whether good or bad. And to the Empire science is just a means of creating more efficient ways of killing people.”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark

“I can assure you that frostbite to any part of that animal’s anatomy wouldn’t delay us for a second. If she was unfit to travel I’d personally poleaxe her,” Thirrin said with venom. Then she added as an afterthought, “And I’d enjoy it!”
― Stuart Hill, The Cry of the Icemark