In woods where the woodsmen told lies, maybe it was the wolves who told the truth.

This is what it is to live in the world. You have to give yourself over to the cold, at least a little bit.

He squeezed Steve's shoulder possessively. "Oh, Zero. He is not you, I must admit. He does not have your bravery, your nobility, your je ne sais quoi, and all he talks about is this magical place called 'Canada'.

Sometimes superheroes are born, sometimes they are made. Sometimes they make themselves. Sometimes all it takes is will.

She understood. They were plastic flowers of words—but they looked nice on the surface.

A boy got a splinter in his eye, and his heart turned cold. Only two people noticed. One was a witch, and she took him for her own. The other was his best friend. And she went after him in ill-considered shoes, brave and completely unprepared.

Now, the world is more than it seems to be. You know this, of course, because you read stories. You understand that there is the surface and then there are all the things that glimmer and shift underneath it. And you know that not everyone believes in those things, that there are people—a great many people—who believe the world cannot be any more than what they can see with their eyes. But we know better.