“Poor little place,' he murmured with a sigh.She heard him. He said the most melancholy things, but she noticed that directly he had said them he always seemed more cheerful than usual. All this phrase-making was a game, she thought, for if she had said half what he said, she would have blown her brains out by now.”

“And you're not leaving," she said. "Promise me."It was as if she had asked him to promise to keep breathing, to notice sunshine, to permit the spinning of the earth. What choice did he have? Even if he left her, she would be camped in his heart, an insistent and willful presence. She would match her strides to his on any journey he ever took; she would lie beside him on any bed.Amalie, he said, "that's the easiest promise I've ever had to make.”

“He said, and his voice was strained as if he had had a mortal wound, 'Gwenhwyfar-' He so seldom spoke her formal name, it was always my lady or my queen, or when he spoke to her in play it was always Gwen. When he spoke it now, it seemed to her she had never heard a sweeter sound. 'Gwenhwyfar. Why do you weep?'Now she must lie, and lie well, because, she could not in honor tell him the truth. She said, 'Because-' and stopped, and then, in a choking voice, she said, 'because I do not know how I shall live if you go away.”

“She remembered a story she had once heard: a woman had gossiped about her neighbors and later regretted what she said. She went to the rabbi and asked how she might take back her words. He instructed her to take a feather pillow to the top of the highest hill and tear it open, letting the feathers fly every which way. Then, the rabbi said, she should return to him and he would tell her what to do. She did as he said and when she returned, he told her to go outside and gather the feathers. But that's impossible, she cried. They're already scattered all over the village. He looked at her and smiled. The same is true of your words, he said.”

“I think you’re my hero,' she said. Only half-kidding.He stared at her, the picture of incredulity. 'Most people,' he said, 'think I am a very bad man.'She studied his eyes to try to find out if that bothered him. He didn’t seem bothered by them. He seemed discomfited by her. 'Well,' she said at last, 'maybe you’re a very good dragon.”

“When he entered after her, she saw that he meant to come straight to her, and she raised a hand. "No," she said. "Wait."His footsteps halted. He had always listened to her, hadn't he? Had always heard her."-Emma and Julian”