Her er jeg anonym. Ingen kjenner meg som den jeg var tidligere, eller fortiden min. Her er det ingen som vil meg vondt. Jeg har aldri opplevd det før. Det er veldig godt.

Fortsatt bor det et lite barn i meg. Jenta som trenger et fang å krype opp i, to armer som omslutter meg. Men i speilet ser jeg en kvinne på snart førti år. Det er barnet fra fortiden jeg av og til hører stemmen til. Det er hun som vil tas vare på. Ikke meg. Jeg klarer utmerket godt å ta vare på meg selv.

Traumer. De tar aldri pause. Hviler ikke. De følger deg, innhenter deg selv om årene går, tiår. Fortiden er ikke død.

Hun så det ingen andre gjorde, handlet slik ingen andre gjorde. Kanskje det var fordi hun var utenfra, uten bindinger til lokalsamfunnet.

En venn er en som kan sangen i ditt hjerte og som kan synge den for deg når du selv har glemt ordene.

Hva hadde hun uten pappa? Ingenting. Hun hadde ingenting med pappa heller, men da var hun i alle fall ikke alene. Mamma klarte ikke å være alene.

All that beauty, it’s wrapped around loneliness. You think I didn’t taste it? You’re practically hollow.

He danced with the sky instead, and the sky dropped him like a rotten plum.

In the past, he had told her that all he ever wanted was the truth, as plain as she could make it.

So you are a child of love. It seems right, that you were made by love.’ She had never thought of herself in that way, but after he said it, it struck her as a fine thing, to have been made by love.

[He] broke away. It was quick as shattering – a lurch and he was up, leaving behind the jagged edges of the moment.

‘To take from the universe, you must give,’ said Akiva. ‘But . . . why pain? Couldn’t you give something else? Like . . . joy?’ ‘It’s a balance. If it were something easy to give, it would be meaningless.’ Karou said, ‘You really think joy is easier to come by than pain? Which have you had more of?’ He gave her a long look. ‘That’s a good point.

Her ignorance was like standing in pure dark that could be either a closet or a vast, starless night.

Long life is a burden, when it’s spent in misery.

‘Beauty,’ Brimstone had scoffed once. ‘Humans are fools for it. As helpless as moths who hurl themselves at fire.’

After she had cried, she felt at once hollow and . . . better, as if the salt of all her unshed tears had been poisoning her, and now she was cleansed.

Like mold on books, grow myths on history.

Have you ever asked yourself, do monsters make war, or does war make monsters?

The snow-laden trees watch me, uncaring and indifferent, as my world goes up in invisible flames.

I feel hands ghost over my head, my back, shades of unformed comfort. She doesn’t know what to do, but she’s still trying. I wipe the tears away and sniff. “I’m fine. You can go back to sleep.” I expect her to argue, to chime something happy and insist on staying up with me. She drops her hand and glides back to her bed without another word. It’s better than comfort. It’s respect - for my words, for my need to cry in peace, alone and in the dark.