I am anything I wish to be. The world cannot choose for me. No, it is for me to choose what the world shall be.

In Mosca’s experience, a ‘long story’ was always a short story someone did not want to tell.

My child, you have a flawed grasp of the nature of myth-making. I am a poet and storyteller, a creator of ballads and sagas. Pray do not confuse the exercise of the imagination with mere mendacity. I am a master of the mysteries of words, their meanings and music and mellifluous magic.

It was hopeless. She was flawless. She was a sunbeam. Mosca gave up and got on with hating her.

True stories seldom have endings. I don't want a happy ending, I want more story.

It did seem hard to be doing something heroic while everyone was too busy to notice.

We always find it difficult to forgive our heroes for being human.