“They lay on their heathery beds and listened to all the sounds of the night. They heard the little grunt of a hedgehog going by. They saw the flicker of bats overhead. They smelt the drifting scent of honeysuckle, and the delicious smell of wild thyme crushed under their bodies. A reed-warbler sang a beautiful little song in the reeds below, and then another answered.”

“Last night, instead of sleeping,he just lay behind her, listening to her breathe and thinking that sound was sweeter than any song he’d ever heard her sing. And his Stella had a beautiful voice, never heard better.”

“Men and women, they were beautiful and wild, all a little violent under their pleasant ways and only a little tamed.”

“Night smelt the way Havoc’s songs sounded. It smelt of steel and rushlights and the marsh welcoming a misstep and anger souring like old blood.”

“A little light in the dark night A faint voice is calling you This way! This way! This flickering, wavering little voiceLike dew, like a bonfireThe voice of insectsthe sound of the water You can never lose themonce you've heard them...”

“For the first time in four billion years a living creature had contemplated himself and heard with a sudden, unaccountable loneliness, the whisper of the wind in the night reeds.”