Hands Tied Quotes & Sayings

Okay," I sighed. "I don't like it, but my hands are tied. I just want you to know this: if I ever get the chance to betray you, I will. If the opportunity arises to pay you back, I'll take it. You'll never be able to trust me."
"Fair enough," he said. — Darren Shan

You did good, Bunny. You could kick Nikita's ass, hands tied behind your back, blindfolded."
I laugh, feeling a warm glowing coating my insides.
"I highly doubt it, but thanks for the confidence."
I always get this feeling when he praises me. There's a real teacher-pupil thing going on here.
Towle, Samantha (2012-05-22). Original Sin (The Alexandra Jones Series #2) (Kindle Locations 1754-1757). Kindle Edition. — Samantha Towle

Their hands are tied not by ropes but by the greed of the intermediaries that the system has generated, who eat up the farmer's income while it is on its way into his hands. — Faraaz Kazi

Nyx had killed a lot of people. She'd let even more die through neglect. Rhys was just one more. I'm the same person, aren't I? she thought. She had burned herself up, only to come out the other side exactly the same.

Taite's signal would get out, Nyx knew. It would be soon enough to save *her*.

But it would not be soon enough for Rhys.

Nyx hardened her jaw. Her hands and feet were still tied. They'd stripped her of her most obvious weapons. She could just wait this out.

She saw Rhys register that. But there was no shock. Just resignation. He knew her for what she was.

Butcher. Monster.

The same old monster. — Kameron Hurley

I'd like to do what I see in my head. I always feel like I'm directing with one hand tied behind my back. — Julie Davis

It is very difficult to appreciate from the outside what a person in severe anxiety is experiencing. Brown rightly remarked about his friends 'imploring a drowning man [me] to swim when they don't know that under the water his hands and feet are tied. — Rollo May

On one of my birthdays I did 1,000 chin-ups and 1,000 push-ups. For my 70th birthday I towed 70 boats with 70 people in it, my feet and hands tied-my hands were in handcuffs, my feet were tied together-and I towed these boats a mile-and-a-half in Long Beach Harbor. For my 93rd birthday I'm going to tow my wife across the bathtub. — Jack LaLanne

It was - unthinkable: three of the most powerful men in Europe - the world - the Pope, the Emperor Maximilian, and Albrecht - all wanted Luther tied to a stake and burned. Yet each time they reached out to light the fire, Luther snatched the torch from their hands and set fire to their own robes. How was a mere monk able to do this? Because he was protected by the Elector Frederick, who declined to hand over one of his Saxon subjects to other authority. What did Frederick have to gain by shielding Luther? — Christopher Buckley

He leaned back. "What, may I ask, is the nature of our business?" She inclined her head. "Just so. It came to my attention earlier today that you had canceled the seventy-fifth annual Christmas Eve ball. I would have called upon you immediately, but I'm afraid a prior engagement tied my hands until this very moment." He tried to make sense of her words. She was apologizing for not descending upon him more promptly for a meeting he'd never in his wildest dreams anticipated? — Erica Ridley

The surge of ninety thousand poor Central Americans across the border in 2014 proved that. Obama pretended his hands were tied. It's the law! It wasn't the law. So either Obama is stupid or he was deliberately lying, and the smart money is on deliberately lying. — Ann Coulter

Listen to the arts of kids, their hands when tied have wings. — Ymatruz

Violence pervaded their entertainment as well. Tuchman describes two of the popular sports of the time: Players with hands tied behind them competed to kill a cat nailed to a post by battering it to death with their heads, at the risk of cheeks ripped open or eyes scratched out by the frantic animal's claws ... — Steven Pinker

I'm of the mind that life is a risk, every time you leave your house it's a risk, and I see no reason to go through life with my hands tied behind my back for any reason. I'd be foolish to let something stop me from doing what I love to do. — Thomas Jane

My head drops back and I have a fleeting out-of-body moment where I see myself in the window, my hands tied above my head with my legs wrapped around the neck of Chris Merit, while he does delicious things to my body. — Lisa Renee Jones

Ending

I lied.
I wanted you from that moment.
I wanted you, wrapped in starlight and reflections,
To be tied up with strings.
And ropes.
And chains.
I wanted you hanging around my neck
Like a charm I could press to my heart and
Make three wishes on.

But I trapped the want
And the words inside my mouth.
I buried those secret things under my tongue,
Biting down until blood and bitterness
Filled my mouth
And poured down the back of my throat.

In the beginning, you said, there was only water.
But what about the end?

I closed my eyes and lay flat
With my back to the ocean
And my face to the sky.
I lifted my hands and caught ribbons of wind
Underneath my fingernails.
I rode the water for so long,
I forgot what my skin felt like when it was dry. — Autumn Doughton

She touched his face and tied his hair back for him. Her hands were cool. He had never felt anything pleasanter in all his life than the touch of her hands. He reached out for her hand. She was not there, she had gone. — Ursula K. Le Guin

Finn caught my expression and cuffed my chin. "What?"
"I'm feeling especially Hank Shelby-ish at the moment, Clyde. Mean and ugly. I need a miracle makeover, and I don't think I can pull one out of a Wally bag."
"We've come this far, Bonnie Rae. We can find a dress in a party town like Vegas with our hands tied behind our backs. We have five hours, and we're in walking distance of everything. Don't cry, Hank. We'll find you a pretty dress." He winked at me, and I gave him a smile, but Finn had no idea what he was getting into. I decided not to even try to explain — Amy Harmon

Your hands are tied in action, but your hands are not tied in imagination and everything springs forth from the imagination. Everything. — Esther Hicks

The power of the witch is in her hair. The ones who killed her knew this. They cut off her long tresses, tied them into devil's shoelaces, and bound her hands and feet. — A.A. Attanasio

The first thing I did when I was forty years old, I put handcuffs on and I jumped off Alcatraz prison and swam to San Francisco handcuffed. That made national publicity. Then, there were three or four years where I would do more difficult feats. Another birthday I towed a thousand pound boat across the Golden Gate. On my 65th Birthday I towed 65 boats a mile and a half in Tokyo. On my 70th Birthday I towed 70 boats with 70 people in it with my feet and hands tied a mile and a half in Long Beach ... My next Birthday I will be 93. I'm gonna tow my wife across the bathtub. — Jack LaLanne

An adventure differs from a mere feat in that it is tied to the externally unattainable. Only one end of the rope is in the hand, the other is not visible, and neither prayers, nor daring, nor reason can shake it free. — William Bolitho

If I have renounced the search of truth, if I have come into the port of some pretending dogmatism, some new church, some Schelling or Cousin, I have died to all use of these new events that are born out of prolific time into multitude of life every hour. I am as bankrupt to whom brilliant opportunities offer in vain. He has just foreclosed his freedom, tied his hands, locked himself up and given the key to another to keep. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

When Hel and I were Fivers, a Barbarian raiding party took us prisoner. I was trussed like a festival-day goat, but they tied Helene's hands in front of her with twine and propped her on the back of a pony, assuming she was harmless. That night, she used the twine to garrote three of our jailers and broke the necks of the other three with her bare hands.
"They always underestimate me," she said afterward, sounding puzzled. — Sabaa Tahir

Sofiowka was found the next morning, swinging by the neck from the wooden bridge. His severed hands were hanging from strings tied to his feet, and across his chest was written, in Brod's red lipstick, ANIMAL — Jonathan Safran Foer

He's (George Steinbrenner) the one who gave me a chance to get to the World Series. This is where I wanted to be all along. We had a couple of nice offers from other teams, but I tied my agents' hands. I told them I wanted to be a Yankee. — Roger Clemens

Your circumstance is ultimately tied to your choices; you create your own destiny. Individual development is up to you - it is your responsibility. You have all eternity to grow and progress to become all you can be. Whether the journey is swift of protracted is ultimately in your hands. — Mark Ireland

Oh honestly, Whyborne, don't put up such a fuss. I swear, you men have your entire egos tied to the functioning of a few inches of flesh."
"More than a few," Griffin said with a smirk.
I buried my face in my hands and wished the mummy's curse were real and might strike me down immediately. — Jordan L. Hawk

Republican isolationists had certainly tied the hands of every U.S. president, year after year - berating Franklin Roosevelt in particular and his attempts to ready the nation for inevitable attack. — Nigel Hamilton

Are you holding her?" Wrath asked.
There was a pause. "As soon as I get this bow tied in the back - hold on, girlie. Okay, up you go. She's in a pink dress that Cormia made her by hand. I hate pink. I like it on her, though - but keep that to yourself."
Wrath flexed his hands. "What's it like?"
"Not totally hating pink? Pretty fuck - ehrm, frickin' emasculating."
"Yeah."
"Do not tell me Lassiter's been metrosexualizing even you. I heard he talked Manello into going for a pedicure with him - but I'm praying that's just gossip."

-Wrath & Zsadist — J.R. Ward

We exchanged wry military grins that told each other how much we hated those fly-blown pieces of shit who tied the hands of decent men and called it politics. — Hugh Laurie

How pleasant,' Dona said, peeling her fruit; 'the rest of us can only run away from time to time, and however much we pretend to be free, we know it is only for a little while - our hands and our feet are tied. — Daphne Du Maurier

In fact you've got your hands tied behind your back when somebody chooses to take a low road in to you, there is nothing you can do about it, and so you just live with it and move on. — Robert Redford

The Wall is hundreds of years old too; or over a hundred, at least. Like the sidewalks, it's red brick, and must once have been plain but handsome. Now the gates have sentries and there are ugly new floodlights mounted on metal posts above it, and barbed wire along the bottom and broken glass set in concrete along the top. No one goes through those gates willingly. The precautions are for those trying to get out, though to make it even as far as the Wall, from the inside, past the electronic alarm system, would be next to impossible. Beside the main gateway there are six more bodies hanging, by the necks, their hands tied in front of them, their heads in white bags tipped sideways onto their shoulders. There must have been a Men's Salvaging early this morning. I didn't hear the bells. Perhaps I've become used to them. We — Margaret Atwood

I've nothing against people as a general rule, but people don't tend to have the sort of answers I'm looking for." The fence post just above Jackaby's head exploded in a spray of splinters with a resonating BLAM! A woman stood in the open doorway across from him, a plain white apron tied around her waist and a fat-barreled rifle in her hands. "Of course, people do have a way of surprising you from time to time," my employer added. — William Ritter

I went up above the quay past the steps to the hotel. I saw a man through the window with a beer in his hand, and another man with a basket full of eggs. I was feeling heavy now, and tired, and I stood there leaning backwards with my hands crossed behind my back at the end of the breakwater before I walked on to the beach on the other side and some way along on the hard-frozen white sand. It had started to blow a bit, and it was still cold with no snow, so I took off my scarf and tied it round my head and ears and sat down in the shelter of a dune and blew into my hands to warm them before I lit a cigarette. Poker ran along the edge of the water with a seagull's wing in his mouth, and I was so young then, and I remember thinking: I'm twenty-three years old, there is nothing left in life. Only the rest. — Per Petterson

I'm pragmatic. I like efficiency. I want to read what's in front of me and not have my hands tied. — Susan Brooks

Look, it's three to one and your hands are tied' 'You're right,'Reyna growled.'Get another six of you in here and it might be a fair fight — Rick Riordan

Art is the need to create; but in its essence, immense and universal, it is impatient of working with lame or tied hands, and of making cripples and monsters, such as all pictures and statues are. Nothing less than the creation of man and nature is its end. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Now you're just being selfish," Dominic said to Jaime, shaking his head. "You have that body for the rest of your life. I only want it for one night."
Not in the mood to hear his packmate making moves - no matter how playful - on the female he intended to claim, Dante growled. "Dominic, no. Not to Jaime."
"But - "
"No."
Dominic sighed in resignation. "Okay, fine."
Noticing that Trey seemed to find the whole thing extremely amusing, Dante raised a brow at him. "It's funny now that he's not saying this shit to Taryn?"
Trey smiled. "Of course."
"I've always got some stored up for my gorgeous Alpha female," said Dominic with an impish grin.
Instantly Trey's smile fell from his face. "Dom, don't do it."
Dominic held his hands up, pleading innocence. "I was just going to ask her if she went to Boy Scouts ... because she has my heart all tied in knots."
Taryn groaned and chuckled at the same time. — Suzanne Wright

Sophie did this?" He said, not for the first time. They were standing at the foot of Jessamine's bed. She lay flung upon it, her chest rising and falling slowly like the famous Sleeping Beauty waxwork or Madame du Barry. Her fair hair was scattered on the pillow, and a large, bloody welt ran across her forehead. Each of her wrists was tied to a post of the bed. "Our Sophie?"
Tessa glanced over at Sophie, who was sitting in a chair by the door. Her head was down, and she was staring at her hands. She studiously avoided looking at Tessa or Will. "Yes,"Tessa said, "and do stop repeating it."
" I think i may be in love with you, Sophie," said Will. "Marriage could be on the cards."
Sophie whimpered. — Cassandra Clare

It's essential not to have an ideology, not to be a member of a political party. While the writer can have certain political views, he has to be careful not to have his hands tied. — Manuel Puig

We hand the meat over to Greasy Sae in the kitchen. She likes District 13 well enough, even though she thinks the cooks are somewhat lacking in imagination. But a woman who came up with a palatable wild dog and rhubarb stew is bound to feel as if her hands are tied here. — Suzanne Collins

In the horrible places, the battle for control escalates until you get tied down or locked into your Geri-chair or chemically subdued with psychotropic medications. In the nice ones, a staff member cracks a joke, wags an affectionate finger, and takes your brownie stash away. In almost none does anyone sit down with you and try to figure out what living a life really means to you under the circumstances, let alone help you make a home where that life becomes possible. This is the consequence of a society that faces the final phase of the human life cycle by trying not to think about it. We end up with institutions that address any number of societal goals - from freeing up hospital beds to taking burdens off families' hands to coping with poverty among the elderly - but never the goal that matters to the people who reside in them: how to make life worth living when we're weak and frail and can't fend for ourselves anymore. — Atul Gawande

I can whitewash your little trip out to OR-Kappa-2722 for you. I can sweep it under the rug if you like. You can go back to leading Rapier Squadron and having your hands tied by Command, by Major Deso, by politicians who don't recognize what's happening right before their eyes. I can make it all go away, Poe." She leaned forward. "Or you can join the Resistance and help us stop the First Order before it's too late." "Where do I sign up?" Poe asked. — Greg Rucka

The scene unfolded before him as though he were a ghost.
His mother stood on the raised stump, her body tied to the tall stake behind her. A pile of wood encircled her feet. Only a small crowd had gathered in the courtyard, despite his father's commands that all should attend. Alasdair sobbed at her feet, calling out to her. The young Alasdair climbed on the pile and clutched her flowing gown. She had been dressed in her finest, not stripped down to her chemise like the handmaid who stood tied to a post beside her. His father had always liked a display. Alasdair's hands reached and passed over his mother's large pregnant belly. With that, she sobbed, too. "Oh, Ali, be good for Momma. I'll see you in the pearly white heaven that God has promised us. Be steadfast, son. Trust your heart."
"Light it," his father ordered. — Jean M. Grant

There are a lot of times that we feel like our hands are tied - 'I have no control over if I'm going to lose my job.' 'I have no control over if I'm going to be able to pay my bills.' You've got to realize that that's where your trust comes in. You have to trust God, and keep your hope, because your hope is what produces your faith. — Victoria Osteen

I don't have many fears other than being unemployed, homeless, friendless, rejected by my family, covered with honey and tied to a bed of fire ants, the flying monkeys from The Wizard of Oz, squash, computer paper, ghosts named Maggie, falling out of the space shuttle right before it leaves the Earth's atmosphere, licorice, elves, lawnmowers, unwashed hands, waking hours and being romantically linked to Madonna and Alex Rodriguez. — Cary Clack

Did you dream of me?" he asked.
"Yes," she admitted grudgingly. She had. She'd dreamed of his hands caressing her, of his mouth devouring her.
His lush lips inched into a surprised but pleased smile.
"You were naked," she told him.
His grin spread; his eyes gleamed with satisfaction.
"And tied up ... "
He arched his eye brows in smug expectation. "I did not know the idea of bondage would please you."
"Oh, I love the idea of typing you up." She paused dramatically. "Just like in my dream, you'll be secured to an ant-hill and the little things will eat you alive. — Gena Showalter

Often you will find the opposite situation. The author seems to have interesting ideas, but he is not able to illustrate them with decent examples. If a grandmaster is commenting on one of his own games, then there is usually not any problem: his general thoughts are closely tied up with what is happening on the board. But as soon as he starts writing an article or book on a different theme the difficulties begin, as he may not have suitable material to hand. — Mark Dvoretsky

In response to my question about how we might rein in the empire, he said, That's why I'm meeting with you. Only you in the United States can change it. Your government created this problem and your people must solve it. You've got to insist that Washington honor its commitment to democracy, even when deomcratically elected leaders nationalize your corrupting corporations. You must take control of your corporations and your government. The people of the United States have a great deal of power. You need to come to grips with this. There's no alternative. We in Brazil have our hands tied. So do the Venezeulans. And the Nigerians. It's up to you. — John Perkins

He uncovered the boat, his hands working the knots like he'd been doing it his whole life. Under the tarp was an old steel rowboat with no oars. The boat had been painted dark blue at one point, but the hull was so crusted with tar and salt it looked like one massive nautical bruise.
On the bow, the name Pax was still readable, lettered in gold. Painted eyes drooped sadly at the water level, as if the boat were about to fall asleep. On board were two benches, some steel wool, an old cooler, and a mound of frayed rope with one end tied to the mooring. At the bottom of the boat, a plastic bag and two empty Coke cans floated in several inches of scummy water.
"Behold," Frank said. "The mighty Roman navy. — Rick Riordan

I have a sudden urge to drag her out of her seat, bend her over my knee, spank her, and then fuck her over my desk with her hands tied behind her back. — E.L. James

There is no bitterness in Wind In His Hair's heart," he began. "Our minds may choose different paths, but some part of every heart will always be as one. All my life I have been a warrior, and I will not change. I will not die as anything else.
"The whites have taken much from me. They have taken my brothers, my wives, my children. Now they want to take me off the earth upon which I walk. Maybe they will kill me now, and if they do, so be it. I will not take their hands. I will keep my ponies' tails tied up for war."

- Wind In His Hair — Michael Blake

This is my brother we're talking about, Maximus." "You'll take his part before mine?" Oh, he knew it was a mistake even before the words left his lips. Her shoulders squared. "If I must. We shared a womb. We're flesh and blood, tied together forever, both physically and spiritually. I love my brother." "As you don't me?" She stopped, her chemise in her hands before her. For a moment her shoulders slumped and then she raised her head. His goddess. His Diana. "When you've tired of me," she said softly, precisely, "Apollo will still be my brother. Will still be there for me." "I'll never tire of you," he said, knowing with every thread of his soul that he spoke the absolute truth. — Elizabeth Hoyt

Film is such an extraordinary rich medium which can handle so many different modes of operation, combining together in the same place all these extraordinary disciplines which may be executed in their own right - music, writing, picture making of all kinds, and I often feel that some filmmakers make films with one eye closed and two hands tied behind their backs. — Peter Greenaway

Then the anguish increased to unendurable massivity and nightmare dimensions, making her scream and vomit. She wanted ... to have her dark curls shaved to an aquamarine prickle, because they grew into her porous skull and curled inside. Jigsaw pieces of sky or wall came apart, no matter how delicately put together, but a careless jolt or a nurse's elbow can disturb so easily those lightweight fragments which became incomprehensible blancs of anonymous objects, or the blank backs of 'Scrabble' counters, which she could not turn over sunny side up, because her hands had been tied by a male nurse with Demon's black eyes. — Vladimir Nabokov

My dad and I, we used to play baseball. I was the catcher. Which I liked. Until one day, I saw this game on TV, and I said, Hang on, how come their catcher doesn't have his hands tied to his ankles? — Emo Philips

Remember that your tracks are one strand of the web woven endlessly in the hand of god. They're tied to those of the mouse in the field, the eagle on the mountain, the crab in its hold, the lizard beneath its rock. The leaf that falls to the ground a thousand miles away touches your life. The impress of your foot in the soil is felt through a thousand generations. — Daniel Quinn

Men of high learning and abilities are few in every country; and by taking in those who are not so, the able part of the body have their hands tied by the unable. — Thomas Jefferson

The notion that the campus has its hands tied if a woman is not willing to go to the police, if the woman is only willing to go so far as, "I just don't want to see him in my dorm anymore," is ridiculous. If that's as far as she's willing to go, then we need to accommodate that. And a university needs to be able to accommodate it. — Claire McCaskill

Because she could still feel Michael Evans violating her. She could still feel his hands slapping at her as he tied her down, feel the knife he'd used to carve her up. — Lexi Blake

Fighting with siblings, especially the little ones, has always, and will always be the same. You fight with your hands tied behind your back. You know that you'll lose. But you still fight back, either you want to annoy them or let them feel the extra satisfaction of beating you after a long fight. No matter which of the two ways you take, it clearly shows that you love them. A lot. — Nishanth Anchan K.N.

Therese leaned closer toward it, looking down at her glass. She wanted to thrust the table aside and spring into her arms, to bury her nose in the green and gold scarf that was tied close about her neck. Once the backs of their hands brushed on the table, and Therese's skin there felt separately alive now, and rather burning. — Patricia Highsmith

Vitoller always waved his arms when he spoke; if you tied his hands behind his back he would be dumb. — Terry Pratchett

Kiss the feet of Popes provided their hands are tied. — Napoleon Bonaparte

Darien softly kissed her forehead and then her nose. "By blindfolding you, I had taken away one of your most powerful senses. And by doing so, I heightened your remaining ones. I tied your hands because it was easier than fighting with you to remain still. Now, my sweet one, how does a nice hot bath sound to you? — T.M. Sulsona

Don't forget to let your reader feel the emotions of the scene. If you get all tied up with the mechanics of where the hero's hands are and not about how they make the heroine feel, then the scene will read flat. — Catherine Bybee

Ghana was a particularly relevant example for us subjects in the remaining colonies and dominions of the British Empire. There was a growing confidence, not just a feeling, that we would do just as well parting ways with Her Majesty's empire. If Ghana seemed more effective, as some of our people like to say, perhaps it was because she was smaller in size and neat, as if it was tied together more delicately by well-groomed, expert hands. — Chinua Achebe

Sir? What are you doing?" I asked. "Investigating," Jackaby replied flatly. "Well, you can't just walk into someone's yard unannounced. Besides, doesn't investigating usually involve questioning people?" "I've nothing against people as a general rule, but people don't tend to have the sort of answers I'm looking for." The fence post just above Jackaby's head exploded in a spray of splinters with a resonating BLAM! A woman stood in the open doorway across from him, a plain white apron tied around her waist and a fat-barreled rifle in her hands. "Of course, people do have a way of surprising you from time to time," my employer added. The — William Ritter

I don't like it, but my hands are tied. I just want you to know this: if I ever get the chance to betray you, I will. If the opportunity arises to pay you back, I'll take it. You'll never be able to trust me. — Darren Shan

She's in the closet." Bric and I exchange a glance. "I gagged her. I didn't fucking know what to do. I just - Goddammit. I just grabbed the ball gag from the drawer, hooked it on her, tied her hands behind her back, and threw her in our closet." "OK, — J.A. Huss

The political system is broke. It doesn't matter who the leader is if you are frozen in time and your hands are tied. Social media is so strong that minority groups get a huge say. — Gerry Harvey

If your
hands are tied towards
anyone who's in need of
a helping hand, let your
tangue also be tied — Nathanael Kanyinga

It was a matter of not living lavishly but enjoying what you had, growing things with your hands, working hard, but not being tied to a nine-to-five job, and generally feeling that there's more to life than money. — John Sulston

You know who you should ask about this? My pal Ray, who works with me. He could tell you all about this." Lily's dad nodded. "Except he was taken out of the office a few days ago with his hands tied behind his back and a bandanna tied as a gag on his mouth." Her father thought for a second. "Huh. He hasn't been in to work since. I wonder if he has the flu. — M T Anderson

In Search of Honor'."They tied my hands behind my back and led me up three flights of stairs. The damp, cold, and darkness increased as we ascended, and I berated myself for having left my jacket in the cell below. When we could go no higher, they freed my hands and unlocked one of the heavy doors. Then shoving me inside, they slammed it shut. — Donna Lynn Hess

The Pope is an idol whose hands are tied and whose feet are kissed. — Voltaire

On January 12, on a firing range located in a small valley called San Juan, at the end of the island in the province of Oriente, hundreds of soldiers from the defeated army of Batista had been lined up in a trench knee-deep and more than fifty yards long. Their hands were tied behind their backs, and they were machine-gunned there where they stood. Then with bulldozers the trenches were turned into mass graves. There had been no trial of any kind for those men. — Armando Valladares

I don't believe that Nature's powers
Have tied her hands or pinioned ours,
By marking on the heavenly vault
Our fate without mistake or fault.
That fate depends on conjunctions
Of places, persons, times, and tracks,
And not on the functions
Of more or less of quacks. — Jean De La Fontaine

As Shane threaded between the cars and crossed the lot, all Crystal could do was stare. At the determination in his sexy, powerful stride. At the way those jeans hung on his lean hips and came down around a pair of losely tied brown boots. At the way the breadth of his shoulders pulled the slate blue button-down tight across his chest. Hands in his pockets, he gave her a crooked smile that made her belly flutter and her cheeks heat.
"Hey darlin'," he said as he stepped up on the sidewalk.
"Hi," she said. — Laura Kaye

We can see through all your disguises: the paths of day, the paths of darkness, whichever paths you take - we're right behind you, following you like a trail of smoke, like a long tail, a tail made of girls, heavy as memory, light as air: twelve accusations, toes skimming the ground, hands tied behind our backs, tongues sticking out, eyes bulging, songs choked in our throats. — Margaret Atwood

It is impossible for us to make any real advance until we take to heart this great truth, that without freedom of choice, without freedom of action, there are not such things as true moral qualities; there can only be submissive wearing of the cords that others have tied round our hands. — Auberon Herbert

Bluebell, you couldn't take me if I was blindfolded and had both hands tied behind my back."
"Bluebell?" Illium narrowed his eyes. "That's it, Barbarian. — Nalini Singh

She opens the book. Each sheet has one or two antique photographs stuck with corner tabs. The images are neither black and white nor gray, but hold that brownish gold of time and exposure to air.

"This man is your great grandfather. Look at that face, Pedro. It is a mean mean face." He's standing in front of a wood pile, holding an axe. "I think he was only a teenager there, a long time before he met my mother. But look how handsome he was. And how mean."

It's funny the way she smiles when she talks about him. Saying he's mean has a perverse joy for her, as if she can stick her tongue out at him and his hands are tied so he can't slap her for doing it. She's right, though. There's no lingering smile, no potential for mirth in the burlap of his skin. I notice snow on the ground at his feet, but he's wearing a thin, unbuttoned shirt, showing no sign of cold. — Laurie Perez

CBS News reported in 2004 that Saudi Arabia recently beheaded 52 men and one woman for various crimes, including murder, homosexuality, armed robbery, and drug trafficking. The CBS Report revealed that "A condemned convict is brought into the courtyard, hands tied, and forced to bow before an executioner, who swings a huge sword amid cries from onlookers of 'Allahu Akbar!' Arabic for 'God is Great. — John Price

Coffee?" Isabelle finger-combed her hair and tied a cotton scarf around her head. "No, merci, it is too precious." The old woman gave her a smile. "No one suspects a woman my age of anything. It makes me good at trading. Here." She offered Isabelle a cracked porcelain mug full of steaming black coffee. Real coffee. Isabelle wrapped her hands around the mug and breathed deeply of the familiar, never-again-to-be-taken-for-granted aroma. Madame — Kristin Hannah

I don't get to put my hands on you nearly enough. It has definitely been a while since I last tied you up." Camille laughed, "You're still into that?" "Of course I'm still into that." "I sure can't tell." "Don't make me spank you just to show you that I mean business." "Promises promises," she laughed. — Lena Skye

Everything has strings leading to everything else. We're all so tied together. We're all in a net, the net is waiting, and we're pushed into it by one single desire. You want a thing and it's precious to you. Do you know who is standing ready to tear it out of your hands? You can't know, it may be so involved and so far away, but someone is ready, and you're afraid of them all. And you cringe and you crawl and you beg and you accept them
just so they'll let you keep it. And look at whom you come to accept. — Ayn Rand

If these things are alchemical," said Sofia, "I'd better be the one to have a look at them."
"If it could be dangerous, I'm going as well," said Lorenzo.
"And me," said Conte
"Great! We can all go! It'll be fun!" Locke waved his tied hands at the door. "But hurry it up, for fucks sake. — Scott Lynch

I love it all. I don't want to go through my career with one hand tied behind my back. I love making kids happy. I love the midnight audience. I like intense dramas. And I like high-adrenaline action films. — Nicolas Cage

I woke up in a dark room. The first thing I noticed was that my hands and wrists were not tied. That made me frustrated, because that meant that I was somewhere really isolated. It meant that they thought, and were probably correct, that I had no chance of escaping. — Embee

He made no empty promises, nor the craven excuse that his hands were tied by more powerful forces in the world than himself. — Mario Puzo

He drove a truck because he thought everybody should drive a truck- that driving around in car was like living with your hands tied behind your back — Rainbow Rowell

What was the power that induced strong soldiers to put off their jackets and shirts, and present their hands to be tied up, and tortured for hours, it might be, under the scourge, with an air of ready volition? The moral coercion of despair; the result of an unconscious calculation of chances that satisfies them that it is ultimately better to do all that, bad as it is, than try the alternative. These unconscious calculations are going on every day with each of us, and the results embody themselves in our lives; and no one knows that there has been a process and a balance struck, and that what they see, and very likely blame, is by the fiat of an invisible but quite irresistible power. — J. Sheridan Le Fanu

I limped forward, sidestepping Rafe's efforts to stop me. I kept a safe distance but looked sternly at Griz. "Put your hands behind your back. Now."
He eyed me uncertainly, but then slowly did as I instructed. "Good," I said. "Now, after they tie you up, you must give me your word you won't try to escape, and if Kaden should try, you must promise that you'll strike him down."
"How would I do that with my hands tied?" he asked.
"I don't care how you do it. Fall on him. That should stop him. Do I have your word?"
He nodded. — Mary E. Pearson

Darkis pointed toward the dwarf sitting btween them on the ground. "Uh, don't you think that's a bit much?"
Turi and Ethis each held separate ropes around the bound hands and feet of the dwarf. A gag was tied tightly over hi mouth.
Ethis considered the prisoner for a moment before replying. "No, it seems a resonable precaution." "Why? What did he do?" Darkis said. The chimera looked at each other, thier blank faces considering for a moment. "He kept promising not to escape," Thuri answerd at last. "He promised not to escape," Darkis asked, his brow furrowed with the puzzle, "and so you tied him up?"
"He wouldn't shut up about it," Ethis replied, his large eyes blinking indignantly. "He kept going on and on about how we could trust him and how he had nowhere to run and how he was glad it was us who took him as a slave captive of war."
"It was unnerving," Thuri finished. — Tracy Hickman

wanted to make him know that he had friends in this world tied to him by something stronger than blood, ties that could never fade or dissolve. That he would never be hungry or cold or motherless while I still drew breath. That he didn't need two hands, or a street address, or clean lungs, or social grace, or a happy disposition to be precious and irreplaceable. That no matter what our future held, my first task would always be to kick a hole in the world and make a space for him where he could safely be his eccentric self. Most — Hope Jahren

He was the person for whom the clock was always running out, the game was always tied, and the ball was always in his hands. — Michael Lewis

Swish, the net sounded like the blast of a cannon, signaling the game was tied at 64. Dave then saw the second shot in his mind before even going into his pre-shot routine. The ball tickled the front rim, brushed against the backboard, and then dropped through the net. The home crowd erupted as Dave backpedaled toward the opposing rim. Central High attempted a last-second shot that fell short into Breslin's hands. The fans rushed onto the floor as the number two train came roaring into the station, bringing Dave back from his glorious past back into the oppressive heat of the present. — Phil Wohl

She's missing," he said, in that same worried tone. He cast his hands out and looked around the empty practice field, as if he somehow expected to see her appear there. "Nobody's seen her since midmorning yesterday. I've looked everywhere for her, but there's no sign."
Missing?" Will repeated, not quite understanding. "Missing where?"
Horace looked up at him with a sudden flare of asperity. "If we knew that, she wouldn't be missing would she?"
Will put up his hands in a peacmaking gesture.
You're right!" he said. "I didn't realize. I've been a little tied up trying to get these archers organized. Surley somebody must seen her last night. Her room servants for example? — John Flanagan