So this was a nest of radicals. She thought a hotbed of sedition would involve more gunpowder and secret handshakes, and less shuffling of feet and passing the sugar.

Perhaps illnesses could be left behind, just like small, badly concealed china corpses.

Push something in someone’s face, and they will shove it away reflexively. Threaten to snatch it away from them, and sometimes they become convinced that it is what they want.

Sometimes fear made you angry. Perhaps after years anger cooled, like a sword taken from a forge. Perhaps in the end you were left with something very cold and very sharp.

If you want someone to tell you what to think," the phantom answered briskly, without looking up, "you will never be short of people willing to do so." . . . "Come now," he said at last, "you can hardly claim that I have left you ignorant. I taught you to read, did I not?

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.

It was all very well being told that she could do nothing to make things better. Neverfell did not have the kind of mind that could take that quietly. She did not have the kind of mind that could be quiet at all.