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.

Cassandra's grandmother smiled then, only it wasn't a happy smile. Cassandra thought she knew how it felt to smile like that. She often did so herself when her mother promised her something she really wanted but knew might not happen.

Nell was not one for friends and had never hidden her distaste for most other humans, their neurotic compulsion for the acquisition of allies.

After all, it's the librarian's sworn purpose to bring books together with their one true reader.

Those who live in memories are never really dead." The House At Riverton

The happiest folk are those that are busy, for their minds are starved of time to seek out woe.

She's one of the few people able to look beyond the lines on my face to see the twenty-year-old who lives inside.