“She didn't know what Liam made his coffee with, but it had to be magical sparkles and crack beans, because it was the most delicious stuff she'd ever tasted.”

“If he had any kind of a clue, he wouldn’t be caught dead with that stuff. See what I did there? Caught dead? I crack myself up.” Eve sipped more coffee she probably, at this point, didn’t need.”

“Who are you?" because even now, she couldn't let her questions go. "What are you?"That face that wasn't a face smiled. It was the most terrible thing she'd ever see, ever. "Magnus" he said. "I'm the end.”

“A rap at the back door made her jump, and she peered through the window for a long time before she eased open the door a crack. She left the security chain on. 'What do you want, Richard?'Richard Morrell's police cruiser was parked in the drive. He hadn't flashed any lights or howled any sirens, so she supposed it wasn't an emergency, exactly. But she knew him well enough to know he didn't pay social visits, at least not to the Glass House.'Good question,' Richard said. 'I guess I want a nice girl who can cook, likes action movies, and looks good in short skirts. But I'll settle for you taking the chain off the door and letting me in.”

“It took hours, but all of a sudden as she was drawing the plug-in for a vacuum pump that felt as if it was radiating cold, although she didn't know how, Claire saw . . . something. It was like a flash of intuition, one of those moments that came to her sometimes when she thoughtabout higher-order physics problems. Not calculation, exactly, not logic. Instinct.She saw what he was doing, and for that one second, it was beautiful.Crazy, but in a beautiful kind of way. Like everything Myrnin did, it twisted the basicrules of physics, bent them and reshaped them until they became . . . something else. He's agenius, she thought. She'd always known that, but this . . . this was something else. Something beyond all his usual tinkering and weirdness."It's going to work," she said. Her voice sounded odd. She carefully set the vacuum pumpin its place on the meticulously labeled canvas sheet. Myrnin, who was sitting in his armchair with his feet comfortably on a hassock, looked up. He was reading a book through tiny little square spectacles that might have once belonged to Benjamin Franklin. "Well, of course it's going to work," he said. "What did you expect? I do know what I'm doing."This from a man wearing clothing from the OMG No store, and his battered vampire-bunny slippers. He'd crossed his feet at the ankles on top of a footstool, and both the bunnies' red mouths were flapping open to reveal their sharp, pointy teeth.Claire grinned, suddenly full of enthusiasm for what she was doing. "I didn't expectanything else," she said. "When's lunch?”

“What did I do?" he said. "Cake! It's cake! Delicious cake!”

“Bryn ate her bagel in silence, and by the time she was finished, Liam had already neatly packed her overnight bag and loaded it in MacAllister's car. He even included a new dog bed for Mr. French to travel in confort. Lunch was in moducal little boxes."I think he is Alfred.""Actually, I often wonder if he's Batman.”