...She's understood the power of stories. Their magical ability to refill the wounded part of people.

And then he was kissing her, and she was struck by his nearness, his solidity, his smell. It was of the garden and the earth and the sun. When Cassandra opened her eyes, she realized she was crying. She wasn't sad, though, these were the tears of being found, of having come home after a long time away.

A way of looking at you that told you she was listening, that she understood all you were saying, and all you weren't.

In each man's heart there lies a hole. A dark abyss of need, the filling of which takes precedence over all else.

Cassandra wondered at the mind's cruel ability to toss up flecks of the past. Why, as she neared her life's end, her grandmother's head should ring with the voices of people long since gone. Was it always this way? Did those with passage booked on death's silent ship always scan the dock for faces of the long-departed?

She hadn't wanted to be loved carefully, only well.

You make a life out of what you have, not what you're missing.