Soul Music

In theory it was, around now, Literature. Susan hated Literature. She'd much prefer to read a good book.

It was sad music. But it waved its sadness like a battle flag. It said the universe had done all it could, but you were still alive.

She got on with her education. In her opinion, school kept on trying to interfere with it.

Death strode away, stopped, and came back. He pointed a skeletal finger at The Duck Man. WHY, he said, ARE YOU WALKING AROUND WITH THAT DUCK? "What duck?" AH. SORRY.

We're on a mission from Glod.

But this didn't feel like magic. It felt a lot older than that. It felt like music.

TO CHANGE THE FATE OF ONE INDIVIDUAL IS TO CHANGE THE WORLD.

Sometimes the only thing you could do for people was to be there.

The universe danced towards life. Life was a remarkably common commodity. Anything sufficiently complicated seemed to get cut in for some, in the same way that anything massive enough got a generous helping of gravity. The universe had a definite tendency towards awareness. This suggested a certain subtle cruelty woven into the very fabric of space-time.

Most horses don't walk backwards voluntarily, because what they can't see doesn't exist.

I MAY HAVE ALLOWED MYSELF SOME FLICKER OF EMOTION IN THE RECENT PAST, said Death, BUT I CAN GIVE IT UP ANY TIME I LIKE.

The hippo of recollection stirred in the muddy waters of the mind.

Or -- and this she knew was a far more accurate way of looking at it -- the book was true and reality was lying.

There are millions of chords. There are millions of numbers. And everyone forgets the one that is a zero. But without the zero, numbers are just arithmetic. Without the empty chord, music is just noise.

The fastest way to travel is to be there already.

It was raining in the small, mountainous country of Llamedos. It was always raining in Llamedos. Rain was the country's main export. It had rain mines.

In my experience, what every true artist wants, really wants, is to be paid.

It is said that whomsoever the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad. In fact, whomsoever the gods wish to destroy, they first hand the equivalent of a stick with a fizzing fuse and Acme Dynamite Company written on the side. It's more interesting, and doesn't take so long.

The universe was bad enough without people poking it.

There are the people of the day, and the creatures of the night. And it's important to remember that the creatures of the night aren't simply the people of the day staying up late because they think that makes them cool and interesting. It takes more than heavy mascara and a pale complexion to cross the divide.

Words have always had the power to change the world.

Susan hated Literature. She'd much prefer to read a good book.

The Captain of the Watch says if you're still in the City by sunrise he will personally have you buried alive.

She had a tall bearing and a tall voice and a tall manner, and was tall in every respect except height. Amazingly, she'd apparently been able to keep this a secret from people.

Certain things have to happen before other things. Gods play games with the fates of men. But first they have to get all the pieces on the board, and look all over the place for the dice.

You see the lighted windows and what you want to think is that there may be many interesting stories behind them, but what you know is that really there are just dull, dull souls, mere consumers of food, who think their instincts are emotions and their tiny lives of more account than a whisper of wind.

The Library didn’t only contain magical books, the ones which are chained to their shelves and are very dangerous. It also contained perfectly ordinary books, printed on commonplace paper in mundane ink. It would be a mistake to think that they weren’t also dangerous, just because reading them didn’t make fireworks go off in the sky. Reading them sometimes did the more dangerous trick of making fireworks go off in the privacy of the reader’s brain.