What a pity every child couldn't learn to read under a willow tree.

How right- how incredibly, utterly right- and how impossible!

Who would guess," he teased, "that I'd ever see you on a rooftop with straw in your hair?" Kit giggled. "Are you saying I've turned into a crow?" "Not exactly." His eyes were intensely blue with merriment. "I can still see the green feathers if I look hard enough. But they've done their best to make you into a sparrow, haven't they?

What a pity every child couldn't learn to read under a willow tree.

All the way up the river she's been holding back somehow, waiting. Now you'll both have to wait. I'm not going to disappoint her, Kit. When I take you on board the Witch, it's going to be for keeps.

the demons that make a person afraid are the hardest to cast out.

From that first moment, in a way she could never explain, the Meadows claimed her and made her their own.