The man billed as Prospero the Enchanter receives a fair amount of correspondence via the theater office, but this is the first envelope addressed to him that contains a suicide note, and it is also the first to arrive carefully pinned to the coat of a five-year-old girl.
Dreams have a way of turning into nightmares.
I liked the idea of having actual magic performed as stage magic, so you could assume that it was just a trick, that something is all smoke and mirrors, but there's that, like, feeling at the back of your mind: What if it's not?
A show without an audience is nothing, after all. In the response of the audience, that is where the power of performance lives.
Bailey feels oddly at ease. As though he is closer to the ground, but taller at the same time. His concerns about his future no longer weigh so heavily on him as he exits the tent, turning right down the curving path that winds between the striped tents.
Unusual yet beautiful. Provocative while remaining elegant.
I have tried to let you go and I cannot. I cannot stop thinking of you. I cannot stop dreaming about you.
I wanted you to have a place where you felt safe enough to cry if I could not be with you.
They want to believe that magic is nothing but clever deception, because to think it real would keep them up at night, afraid of their own existence.
It is a matter of perspective, the difference between opponent and partner," Tsukiko says. "You step to the side and the same person can be either or both or something else entirely. It is difficult to know which face is true.
Do you know why I gave my daughter permission to marry your father?
Have a theory that she is in love with the dream of someone and not an actual person.
My train was late that day. the day I saw you drop your notebook. Had it been on schedule we never would have met. Maybe we were never meant to.
Something about the circus stirs their souls, and they ache for it when it is absent.
I suppose there will never be a lack of things to say, of stories to be told and shared.
That is a complicated matter. The heart of the tale and the ideas behind it are simple. Time has altered and condensed their nuances, made them more than story, greater than the sums of their parts. But that requires time. The truest tales require time and familiarity to become what they are.
You're not destined or chosen... You're in the right place at the right time, and you care enough to do what needs to be done. Sometimes that's enough.
Scent is often underestimated, when it can be the most evocative.
Chandresh relishes reactions. Genuine reactions, not mere polite applause. He often values the reactions over the show itself. A show without an audience is nothing, after all. In the response of the audience, that is where the power of performance lives.
I choose to do my work to the best of my own abilities, and leave others to their own.
I draft quickly and then revise, a lot.
I don;t think there's anything wrong with being a dreamer. There is not. But dreams have ways of turning into nightmares.
There are no more battles between good and evil, no more monsters to slay, no maidens in need of rescue. Most maidens areare perfectly capable of rescuing themselves in my experience,at least the ones worth anything in any case.
Time is a peculiar thing. You'll learn that eventually.
Timing is a sensitive thing.
He turns and walks away, moving so quickly that the candle flames shiver with the motion of the air. I miss you, Isobel says as he leaves, but the sentiment is crushed by the clatter of the beaded curtain falling closed behind him.
When you meet someone new who instantly gets you, your sense of humor and your attitudes and your worldview, even if theirs are different - and you get them in return. You both talk and talk and agree and laugh and nod and yes, yes, of course you should get another round of drinks.
There is so much that glows in the circus, from flames to lanterns to stars. I have heard the expression trick of the light applied to sights within Le Cirque des Rêves so frequently that I sometimes suspect the entirety of the circus is itself a complex illusion of illumination.
He spends the majority of the evening in the company of Celia Bowen, whose elaborate gown changes color, shifting through a rainbow of hues to compliment whoever she is closest to.
Why haven't you asked me how I do my tricks? Celia asks, once they have reached the point where she is certain he is not simply being polite about the matter.
Secrets have power, and that power diminishes when they are shared, so they are best kept and kept well.
Tarot is just stories on cards.
You are no longer quite certain which side of the fence is a dream.
It would not have been my choice for her, but a child should not have their choices dictated for them.
It frightens me how much I like it, Celia finishes, turning her face back to his. How tempting it is to lose myself in you. To let go. To let you keep me from breaking chandeliers rather than constantly worrying about it, myself.
Though I have seen a great deal of the sights, traveled a number of the available paths, there are always corners that remain unexplored, doors that remain unopened.
There may be decisions to make, and surprises in store. Life takes us to unexpected places sometimes. The future is never set in stone, remember that.
Sharing secrets, real secrets, important ones, with even one other person, will change them.
It is a flowing waterfall of alchemical and astrological symbols, ancient marks for planets and elements all emblazoned in black ink upon her fair skin.
Follow your dreams Bailey. Be they Harvard or somehing else entirely. No matter what that father of yours says, or how loudly he might say it. He forgets that he was someone's dream once, himself.
I am tired of trying to hold things together that cannot be held, Celia says when he approaches her. Trying to control what cannot be controlled. I am tired of denying myself what I want for fear of breaking things I cannot fix. They will break no matter what we do.
The sound of his pencil scratching against paper is as methodical and precise as the ticking of the clock in the corner.
Because everything requires energy, she recites obediently, eyes still focused on her hand. We must put effort and energy into anything we wish to change.
During the hours spent watching the sheep as they wander aimlessly around their fields, he even wishes that someone would come and take him away, but wishes on sheep appear to work no better than wishes on stars.
When she opens her eyes, they are standing on the quarterdeck of a ship in the middle of the ocean. Only the ship is made of books, its sails thousands of overlapping pages, and the sea it floats upon is dark black ink.
When the beaded curtain parts with a sound like rain, it is Marco who enters the fortune-teller’s chamber, and Isobel immediately flips her veil from her face, the impossibly thin black silk floating back over her head like mist.
When all of this is over, no matter which one of us wins, I will not let you go so easily. Agreed?
Just because you could never decide which one of us you were in love with does not make us interchangeable.
