...wings—-vast shimmering wings, their reach so great they swept the walls on either side of the alley, each feather like the wind-tugged lick of a candle flame.

Was there any fate more bitter than to get what you long for most, when it's too late?

The thing he wished for most was a thing he had never wished for at all, not until he had discovered her. And it came true that night, and many nights after. A brief and shining span of happiness, it was the pivot point around which his whole life spun.

It was sadness, lostness, and the worst thing about it was the way it seemed like a default—like it was there all the time, and all her other expressions were just an array of masks she used to cover it up.

...the air seeming to gather around her like held breath. As if this whole place were a story about her.

Mercy, she had discovered, made mad alchemy: a drop of it could dilute a lake of hate.

Brimstone once told me that to stay true in the face of evil is a feat of strength.