Lunch." I said. "Immediately. I'm going to wither away to absolutely nothing. Then you'll be racked with guilt." "I doubt it.

It's very ugly' I said generously. 'But it looks as though it would laugh at snow. And, if you hit a deer it would hiccup, and keep going.

This is Rilke. I wish I had written it for you.

I'm trying to make you think I'm a decent person. Telling you I saw you naked while I was another species does not help my case

She attempted to turn again; I held on. I wasn't holding tight enough to keep her, but she wasn't pulling hard enough to get away.

Tell me what it's like. The race." "What it's like is a battle. A mess of horses and men and blood. The fastest and strongest of what is left from two weeks of preparation on the sand. It's the surf in your face, the deadly magic of November on your skin, the Scorpio drums in the place of your heartbeat. It's speed, if you're lucky. It's life and it's death or it's both, and there's nothing like it.

His eyes were frighteningly alive, the curve of his mouth savage and pleased. It suddenly didn't seem at all surprising that he should be able to pull things from his dreams. In that moment, Blue was a little in love with all of them. Their magic. Their quest. Their awfulness and strangeness. Her raven boys.