“If you only would!" He added rather diffidently: "If you would not mind remembering that I am a military court of inquiry. It makes it easier for me to report to the general if you say things dully and in the order that they happened.”

“Tessa exploded "I am not asking you to maul me in the Whispering Gallery! By the Angel, Will, would you stop being so polite?!"He looked at her in amazement. "But wouldn't you rather-""I would not rather. I don't want you to be polite! I want you to be Will! I don't want you to indicate points of architectural interest to me as if you were a Baedecker guide! I want you to say dreadfully mad, funny things, and make up songs and be-" The Will I fell in love with, she almost said. "And be Will," she finished instead. "Or I shall strike you with my umbrella.""I am trying to court you," Will said in exasperation. "Court you properly. That's what all this has been about. You know that, don't you?""Mr. Rochester never courted Jane Eyre," Tessa pointed out."No, he dressed up as a woman and terrified the poor girl out of her wits. Is that what you want?""You would make a very ugly woman.""I would not. I would be stunning."Tessa laughed. "There," she said. "There is Will. Isn't that better? Don't you think so?""I don't know," Will said, eyeing her. I'm afraid to answer that. I've heard that when I speak, it makes American women wish to strike me with umbrellas."Tessa laughed again, and then they were both laughing, their smothered giggles bouncing off the walls of the Whispering Gallery. After that, things were decidedly easier between them, and Will's smile when he helped her down from the carriage on their return home, was bright and real.”

“You're just afraid," I flung at him. "Of what would happen to you and your life at court if you were to carry Elisandra away. Of what your father would say. Of what Bryan would do to you."Now he, too, looked angry. "I am afraid of many things, but those are not the fears that keep me from action," he said.I turned my back on him. "Then I don't understand you," I said.I heard the door open. "No," he said, "and you never have.”

“I am yours to command, my queen,” he whispered, making my heart clench in complete, helpless love. “I will obey, even if you order me to cut out my own heart. Even if you order me to the hell that is the Winter Court Elysium.”

“Isn't it splendid to think of all the things there are to find out about? It just makes me feel glad to be alive--it's such an interesting world. It wouldn't be half so interesting if we know all about everything, would it? There'd be no scope for imagination then, would there?But am I talking too much? People are always telling me I do. Would you rather I didn't talk? If you say so I'll stop. I can STOP when I make up my mind to it, although it's difficult.”

“[Grandfather] would manufacture funnies with Grandmother before she died about how he was in love with other women who were not her. She knew it was only funnies because she would laugh in volumes. 'Anna,' he would say, 'I am going to marry that one with the pink hat.' And she would say, 'To whom are you going to marry her?' And he would say, 'To me.' I would laugh very much in the back seat, and she would say to him, 'But you are no priest.' And he would say, 'I am today.' And she would say, 'Today you believe in God?' And he would say, 'Today I believe in love.”