I do like the world quite a lot.

I wonder if everyone who faces death hurts like this. It's as though for the first time I realize how much just being alive makes my body ache. But I don't want that ache to stop.

Words can fall hard like a boulder loosed from a cliff. Words can drift unnoticed like a weed seed on a breeze. Words can sing.

They finished laughing and caught their breaths, and looked at each other, and Ani thought Geric looked at her too long, as though he forgot he was looking, as though he did not wish to do anything else. She looked back. Her took heart took its time quieting down.

Get back in my cot, girl," said Gilsa. "You're sickly." No, I'm not," said Ani. Oh, no? Well, maybe stubbornness is a sickness, did you ever think of that?

I know I would crumble if I lost you.

Ani told them all...telling more than needed telling, the stories clarifying and unifying themselves in her mind as she let them spill out of her mouth.