Ninth House Quotes
"By the time Alex managed to get the blood out of her good wool coat, it was too warm to wear it."
"The guidelines for Lethe House candidates were located near the back of the pamphlet and had last been updated in 1962."
"Alex—whose knowledge of Latin was less than working—looked it up: Death conquers all."
"For the first time in weeks, she looked at the girl in the water-speckled mirror, watched as that bruised girl lifted her tank top, the cotton stained yellow with pus."
"The Bridegroom, the city’s most notorious ghost and a favorite of murder nerds and Haunted New England guidebooks; he had reputedly killed his fiancée and himself in the offices of a factory that had once stood barely a mile from here."
"They had managed to survive the stock market crash of 1929 without the help of prognostication, and limped along until the crash of 1987 when they’d been all but wiped out."
"The societies liked to shop town girls and boys for their experiments. It was the whole reason Lethe existed."
"The greatest gift Lethe had given Alex was not the full ride to Yale, the new start that had scrubbed her past clean like a chemical burn."
"If you don’t take this seriously, you could get yourself or someone else hurt."
"It was the knowledge, the certainty, that the things she saw were real and always had been."
"You mistake me, Alexandra. There is no crime in wanting these things. Only people who have never lived without comfort deride it as bourgeois."
"Winter will come on and break the lower sea on the rocks while we drink summer’s wine."
"You will be all right? You are literally of no use to us if you can’t handle a few Grays."
"Money is the rock we cling to when the current would seize us."
"I once swam naked in Oliver Stone’s pool—does that count?"
"We are not a society and we don’t run like one. This isn’t a clubhouse; it’s our headquarters, the heart of Lethe."
"The idea that there could be hot food just waiting for me three times a day was still shocking."
"People didn’t go looking for lies that didn’t have a reason, and why would anyone lie about going for a morning run?"
"Alex gripped its right side and pulled. It swung out from the wall like a door, revealing a two-story circular chamber lined with bookshelves."
"You wrote down the subject you sought in the Albemarle Book, placed it in the bookcase, and the library would kindly retrieve a selection of volumes."
"The library was also a little temperamental. If you weren’t specific enough in your request or if it couldn’t find books on your desired subject, the shelf would just keep shaking."
"Suffocating beneath a pile of books seems an appropriate way to go for a research assistant."
"It was strange to Alex that the smell of books was always the same."
"The air felt slightly balmy and she could smell orange blossoms on the air."
"In the event of violent death associated with the activities of the landed societies, a colloquy will be called."
"Some things can’t be fixed with therapy or a pill, you know? Some kids are below average, and there’s room for them in the classroom too."
"Alex didn’t disagree. Most of the books she read and the TV shows she watched told her different was okay."
"She’d never even called them that in her head. The blue-lipped girl in a bikini by the pool; the naked man standing behind the chain-link fence at the schoolyard."
"She left the shower running and slipped into the kitchen to burrow through their junk drawer."
"The satisfaction of a job well done" was one of those phrases Alex’s mom liked."
"She’d gone on that way until Hellie—golden Hellie, the girl Len had expected her to hate, maybe hoped she would."
"She saw a butterfly lying in a puddle beneath the sink, one wing flapping listlessly as if it were waving to her."
"Alex hadn’t been sure how to act, so she stood with her hands in her pockets until Mosh’s boyfriend offered her the bong they were passing around."
"It wasn’t like the cause of death had been a mystery."
"Darlington had always loved this part of Halloween, the tide of happy strangers arriving on his shores, hands outstretched."
"That day at Lighthouse Point, that sunburned, freckled boy had seen the old roller coaster."
"When full dark fell and the stream of children in their goblin masks slowed to a trickle, Darlington put on his own costume."
"Alex parted with Dawes near the divinity school, at a sad horseshoe-shaped apartment building in the grad school ghetto."
"Don’t judge a book, Stern. Nothing is ever just anything."
"Every weekend night, every party is a series of these bargains, but Halloween compounds it all."
"Halloween was a night when the dead came alive because the living were more alive."
"Blood magic is strictly regulated on Halloween. It's too appealing to the dead."
"My lady, we could erase them entirely. For a fair price."
"She touched her fingers to his face, lifted his chin."
"The Bridegroom was pacing back and forth in the yellow light of the streetlamp."
"We're ready for the new moon. I have every hope that the rite will work."
"I think he could be persuaded to come up on the weekends and continue your education and training."
"Alex, everything you say may be true. But there is no proof of what attacked you."
"The easiest way is not to form a bond to begin with."
"He was too old to believe in magic, but he needed to believe that there was something more to the world than living and dying."
"You’re going to have to make some choices," he’d said. "I know you want to honor your grandfather’s memory, but you should do what’s best for you."
"You can’t begin to imagine the opportunities that will open for you there."
"You have no idea what the world is like, Daniel. You’re still a child, and I envy that."
"My name is Elliot Sandow," he said. "I have an offer for you."
"You went to the underworld," said Dawes. "You earned a treat."
"And are you going to threaten me?" Dawes kept her eyes on her cup of cocoa, her spoon circling around and around.
"I’m not going to let this go any further, I promise."
"He’s the chief suspect in a murder investigation. You understand that, right?"
"Being left-handed was seen as a sign of demonic influence."
"Your reaction was … extreme. But Salome was in the wrong."
"I don’t know my type." Was he really trying to flirt his way out of this?
"Don’t worry. I won’t snitch. But Salome saw you. You might have to keep her quiet too."
"What do you think is going to happen here? There’s less than thirty thousand dollars in the trust for your college education."
"You don’t want to mess with my case. I see you anywhere near Woodland, I will fuck your life so hard, you’ll never walk straight again."
"Ariel," Hellie had said. "That’s an angel’s name."
"You didn’t have to do it. You didn’t have to."
"I let you die. To save myself, I let you die."
"That’s right. He’s in the infirmary with a busted hand."
"One moment I was standing in my new office, talking to Daisy, and then … I was no one."
"Guys like this never noticed the help. But North was right."
"Quit following me around and go hunt down Tara."
"Sorry! You’re breaking up!" Alex released the plug in the drain.
"She should have checked in on the victima from Skull and Bones’s latest prognostication sooner."
"How else would Tara have cultivated her crops without inviting suspicion?"
"The little vine unfurled, a lone white bud appearing from its leaves."
"She left a couple days ago. Took the rest of the semester off."
"I might have seen the guy once or twice. Why?"
"The Marsh Botanical Garden sat at the top of Science Hill."
"You don’t always have to come out swinging. What are you so angry at?"
"He acted like he thought it was funny, but I could tell it pissed him off."
"The plan was trickier than Alex had anticipated."
"It’s not just the vessel. It’s the tea itself."
"Let’s hope we’ve got more on our side than luck."
"You’re going to help me, right? You’re going to protect me?"
"He’s not on the other side. He’s not behind the Veil."
"Technically. Someone could survive being consumed by a hellbeast. Just no one human."
"I want to live to grow old. I want to sit on my porch and drink foul-smelling tea and yell at passersby."
"Once you are chump, is like a tattoo. Everyone can see it."
"You owe me for fentanyl. Six thousand dollars."
"He’d brought it up to me just in passing, an academic exercise, a wild theory, a possible subject for his graduate work."
"I know you’re not around, but did you ever find anything about severing connections to Grays?"
"I’d never gotten into the hard stuff. I’d been too afraid of what might happen if I lost too much control."
"I’d do it. I’d throw myself on Salome Nils’s mercy to be let back into Wolf’s Head."