“They are all so beautiful,' she said. He looked down at her. 'Not half so beautiful as you are,' he said. 'Nor do they speak to me, nor touch me. Even Fourpaws will not touch me. Beauty, will you marry me?”

“All you did was sit there, he said. Why are you so tired?I sat very diligently, she said.”

“Can you trust me, he said. Not will you. Can you.Can I trust him?What do I have to lose?”

“Then marry me. For I love you, and I do not believe there is anything so wrong with you. You are fair in my eyes and you lie fair on my heart.”

“She looked up at once, pierced to the heart by the sorrow in his voice and knowing, from the question and the sorrow together, that he had no notion of what had just happened to her, nor why. From that she pitied him so greatly that she cupped her hands again to hold a little of the salamander's heat, not for serenity but for the warmth of friendship. But as she felt the heat again running through her, she knew at once it bore a different quality. It had been a welcome invader the first time, only moments before; but already it had become a constituent of her blood, intrinsic to the marrow of her bones, and she heard again the salamander's last words to her: Trust me. At that moment she knew that this Beast would not have sent such misery as her father's illness to harry or to punish, knew too that the Beast would keep his promise to her, and to herself she made another promise to him, but of that promise she did not yet herself know. Trust me sang in her blood, and she could look in the Beast's face and see only that he looked at her hopefully.”

“But--no--splendid is not the right word. they are splendid, but they are--they are so friendly. Oh dear!' she said, and looked up at him, half laughing, half embarassed. 'How childish that sounds! But so many of the beatiful things in the rooms beneath us--push you away--tell you to stand back--order you to admire and be abashed. These--these draw you in. These make you want to stay and--and have them for company. Yes, that's right. But I--I am still making them sould like a--like--sort of comfortable, though, am I not? Like a bowl of warm bread and milk and an extra pillos, and that's not it at all. They are not comfortable. Indeed, I feel that if I lived with them for long, I should have to learn to be...better, or greater, myself. If this Queen of the Heavenly Mountain looked down at me from my bedroom wall every day, soon I should have to go looking for the path to her domain. I wouldn't be able to help myself.”

“Tell me who you are. You need not tell me your name. Names have power, even human ones. Tell me where you live and what you do with your living.”