“Somehow I knew that no matter what I chose to tell or to keep secret, he would understand.”

“I swear on St. Francis, the patron saint of all animals.” Seeing Poppy’s hesitation, Beatrix added enthusiastically, “If a band of pirates kidnapped me and took me to their ship and threatened to make me walk the plank over a shiver of starving sharks unless I told them your secret, I still wouldn’t tell it. If I were tied by a villain and thrown before a herd of stampeding horses all shod in iron, and the only way to keep from being trampled was to tell the villain your secret, I—”

“You’re mad,” he said in a low voice, “if you think I would leave you now. I’ll see you safe and well no matter what it takes.”

“I thought about the future, the oceans and continents he would cross, far away from everyone who knew and loved him. Far outside the sphere of his mothers prayers. Among the women of the future, there was one who would know his secrets and bear his children, and witness the changes the years worked on him. And it wouldnt be me.-Liberty Jones”

“You're so sweet . . . Cinda ... I knew you would feel like this ... I knew it would be this way. Put your arms around me . . . ah, Cin. . .”

“I had to let go of him. But I knew that as long as I lived, I would feel the phantompain of his absence.”

“If only I could visit you as a foreigner goes into a new country, learn the language of you, wander past all borders into every private and secret place, I would stay forever. I would become a citizen of you.”