“Sometimes life just doesn't allow for a totally happy ending.”

“Don't ya wanna hear the secret?' his eyes were narrow and mean, despite the glaze of rum. Louer drained his glass and slammed it to the bar. 'You get happy by learnin' to say 'yes' to what life offers you, but stay happy by rememberin' when to start sayin' 'no'.”

“Love isn't simple, Katie, and neither is life. Things that are worth having are sometimes complicated, and they evoke complicated emotions. You know, one of the reasons people often turn to alcohol or drugs is that they can't deal with complications.”

“Take what comes and live life without complaint. What will be, will be. Life is a woman's gift; death is God's.”

“And while I got that about him, he never seemed to understand or believe it when I told him I wasn't like that. That I was happy to coast. To drift and summersault like a dried-out leaf in the late fall, hoping to avoid the rake, the collecting pile, the compost heap.”

“For two years I've read the scrolls and learned the language, and I know more about magick than anyone here...You ask what the greatest power is, and I know that niether the dwarf magick of Terus, nor the dragon power of Victus is superior, even though I should say that Terus is because my father's a Mender and his spells come from the Green book. Even the elf magick that is so rare that none in Darton is a master or matron of it, is still just one of the three colours and no better than any other. That's the whole point of the system, and it's stupid...None of the scrolls explain anything, and niether do you. Instead we have to run around an obstacle course, trade jewels between rings and sit here and write rubbish answers to a trick question. And to end it all we have to listen to a Wizard from Celenia and hope to hear some more spells. Well I know as many spells as anyone here, but they're as useless as whistling to me.”

“sometimes you don't need a goal in life, you don't need to know the big picture. you just need to know what you're going to do next!”