“Life should be good - Life should be very, very good - and the only duty we have to the dead is to make it good for ourselves and other people.”

“They'd manage. Her ghost from the future had said so. He'd been right about the bad coming. Now she had to trust good would come as well.”

“Maybe everyone is crazy up in these mountains. Maybe the air up here makes you absurd, the scent of flowers and rock and snow. And I've never spoken like that to anyone in my life before. You're my only friend here, you know that? And you're fifty years away.”

“Have you noticed how every tree is different here? All twisted by the wind and snow, but if that was all, they should have been twisted in the same way. It's as though every tree has made up its own mind exactly how it wants to grow.”

“With life came loss. The war and the years since had taught her that. There's be sadness in her life to come, as well as happiness. Even the most blessed lives had both. She'd live them as they came.”

“Lady Dance's music wasn't a magic charm. I'd misunderstood. We had all failed to understand. The song and dance didn't stop us dying. It just stopped the fear of death swallowing us up while we were still alive. 'Rejoice,' came the soft voice of Lady Dance in my mind. 'Watch the moon and stars...' Death had ruled my life till I met Lady Dance. Her dance had set me free.”

“At least in a book I am away from my body for a while. But I want to do things, not just read about them. I want my life.”