Gwen smiled. "Hardly. Bedraggled is being in the full throes of nicotine withdrawal, and after a week on a bus with a group of senior citizens, falling into a cave, and landing on a body." "And then getting tossed back a few centuries, with no idea of what's going on," Chloe agreed. "Naked, too, weren't you?" Gwen nodded wryly. Gabby blinked. "I gave you my plaid," Drustan protested indignantly.

My city. I pondered that phrase, wondered why Barrons felt that way. He never said “our world.” He always said “your world.” But he called Dublin his city. Merely because he'd been in it so long? Or had Barrons, like me, been beguiled by her tawdry grace, fallen for her charm and colorful dualities? I looked around “my” bookstore. That was what I called it. Did we call the things of our heart our own, whether they were or not?

I want you to go to the Ancient Languages Department at Trinity College tomorrow morning, Ms.Lane.

I love books, they're in my blood.

I want purple trews, lass," Drustan called over the door. "No," she said irritably. "And a purple shirt.

He looked blank. “He’s the one who’s been doing the magic against us?” “Duh,” I said. “Doona be ‘duh’ing me, lass,” he growled, his burr thickening.

He'd surely been spawned by some cataclysmic event of nature, not born.