“But it is human, is it not, to long for that from which we are barred?”

“It is queer, but my love and longing for the world are always deepened by my absence from it; it's wondrous, don't you think, that a person can swing from despair to gleeful hunger, and that even during these dark days there is happiness to be found in the smallest things?”

“Even the most pragmatic person fell victim at times to a longing for something other.”

“Nell was not one for friends and had never hidden her distaste for most other humans, their neurotic compulsion for the acquisition of allies.”

“Cassandra wondered at the mind's cruel ability to toss up flecks of the past. Why, as she neared her life's end, her grandmother's head should ring with the voices of people long since gone. Was it always this way? Did those with passage booked on death's silent ship always scan the dock for faces of the long-departed?”

“He had the vague sense of standing on a threshold, the crossing of which would change everything.”

“...which fairy-tale princess ever chose her maid over her prince?”