“We’re in a nest of secrets here. Don’t let down your guard.”

“So this was a nest of radicals. She thought a hotbed of sedition would involve more gunpowder and secret handshakes, and less shuffling of feet and passing the sugar.”

“Don’t sneeze, don’t point at anybody with your little finger, don’t scratch your left eyebrow, don’t angle your knife so that it reflects light in somebody’s eyes unless you’re challenging them to a duel...”

“Oh, Neverfell, you’re just not made for undercover work. You can’t lie, my dear, and I can. Leave Madame Appeline and the Doldrums to me. Stay here and keep your head down.”

“She’s got us, she’s got us all. Caverna. She doesn’t want to let us go. Do you know what she’s like? A huge trap-lantern with us inside her, digesting us really, really slowly, and not wanting to let any of us go. Maybe that’s the worst kind of prison – not knowing you’re in a prison. Because then you don’t fight to get out.”

“Every time I do what you say I tumble a bit farther down this well of darkness, an' this here is a drop too deep an' too dark for me. I have to stop falling while I can still see a bit of the sky.”

“I feel like I’m holding my breath all the time, never knowing when my lungs will just give up. The air we’re supposed to breathe is up above – I can feel it.”