“Omens were all very well, but sometimes it would help if people just wrote things down.”

“Witches knew that mysterious omens were around all the time. The world was always very nearly drowning in mysterious omens. You just had to pick the one that was convenient.”

“When it came down to it and the life-or-death decision had to be made, then it was made by you, because you were the witch. And sometimes it wasn't a decision between a good thing or a bad thing, but a decision between to bad things: no right choices, just... choices.”

“Look, this is just the cemetery. It's got bylaws and things! It's not Transylvania! There's just dead people here! That doesn't make it scary, does it? Dead people are people who were living once! You wouldn't be so worked up if there were living people buried here, would you?”

“Omens are everywhere in this world you just have to find the one that fits.”

“He'd always known that the world was an interesting place, and his imagination had peopled it with pirates and bandits and spies and astronauts and similar. But he'd also had a nagging suspicion that, when you seriously got right down to it, they were all just things in books and didn't properly exist anymore.”

“There are all kinds of darkness, and all kinds of things can be found in them, imprisoned, banished, lost or hidden. Sometimes they escape. Sometimes they simply fall out. Sometimes they just can't take it any more.”