True love was a time-honored way of escaping nearly everything—ogres, witches, bandits, tedious obligations. Her parents wouldn’t like it, but surely even they had to acknowledge that love conquered all.

A keen wit stabs harder than a finely honed argument.

Claude rubs the back of his neck and wrinkles his nose, about to tell me he was never sad. I believe this is called bravado and is not limited to lawyers, or even men, although that combination makes it almost unavoidable.

The world is surprisingly hard to destroy.

I took a break, stretched, tried again, failed, kicked over the music stand (I am not proud of that), and wonder whether I had reached the limits of my musical ability. Maybe I'd never had any. Surely someone with a modicum of talent wouldn't have to work this hard.

An aged monk led me to the infirmary. "He's got the place to himself. Once the other invalids learned there was a dragon coming they miraculously got well! The lame could walk and the blind decided they didn't really need to see. He's a panacea.

Well, listen, I want to talk to Rynald a bit more-""About astronomy? Maybe he'll show you his telescope,

I don't mean to imply that they were cowards...," Maurizio said, shrugging, clearly implying that [they] were cowards.

More insomniacs!' cried the doctor. 'Come in, come in".