“I have tried to be a generous narrator and care for my girl as best I can. I cannot help that readers will always insist on adventures...”

“I cannot help that readers will always insist on adventures, and though you can have grief without adventures, you cannot have adventures without grief.”

“Readers will always insist on adventures, and though you can have grief without adventures, you cannot have adventures without grief.”

“I just want to know...if I am special,’ finished September, halfway between a whisper and a squeak. ‘In stories, when someone appears in a poof of green clouds and asks a girl to go away on an adventure, it’s because she’s special, because she’s smart and strong and can solve riddles and fight with swords and give really good speeches, and . . . I don’t know that I’m any of those things. I don’t even know that I’m as ill-tempered as all that. I’m not dull or anything, I know about geography and chess, and I can fix the boiler when my mother has to work. But what I mean to say is: Maybe you meant to go to another girl’s house and let her ride on the Leopard. Maybe you didn’t mean to choose me at all, because I’m not like storybook girls. I’m short and my father ran away with the army and I wouldn’t even be able to keep a dog from eating a bird.”

“Have I ever done anything of my own, an act or state that arose from Elefsis, and not careful, exquisite mimicry?Have they?”

“I wish you the best that can be hoped for, and no worse than can be expected.”

“Truly, Autumn is my season,” the scarlet beast chorted. “Spring and Summer and Winter all begin with such late letters! But Autumn and Fall, I have loved best, because they are best to love.”