Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries

Perhaps it is always restful to be around someone who does not expect anything from you beyond what is in your nature.

One doesn’t need magic if one knows enough stories.

Get inside! You're bleeding!""I will not bleed any less indoors, you utter madwoman.

If anyone were to claim greater happiness in their careers than I do in poking about sunlit wildwoods for faerie footprints, I should not believe it.

The Folk were of another world, with its own rules and customs—and to a child who always felt ill-suited to her own world, the lure was irresistible.

I prefer your company, Em."He said it as if it were obvious. I snorted again, assuming he was teasing me. "Over the company of a tavern filled with a rapt and grateful audience? I'm sure you do.""Over anyone else's company." Again, he said it with some amusement, as if wondering what I was doing speculating about something so evident. "You are drunk," I said."Shall I prove it to you?""No, you shan't," I said, alarmed, but he was already sweeping to the floor, bending his knee and taking my hand between his."What in God's name are you doing?" I said between my teeth. "And why are you doing it now?""Shall I make an appointment?" he said, then laughed. "Yes, I believe you would like that. Well, name the time when it would be convenient for you to receive a declaration of love.""Oh, get up," I said, furious now. "What sort of jest is this, Wendell?""You don't believe me?" He smiled, all mischief, a look I'd seen from other Folk, enough to know not to trust him one inch. "Ask for my true name, and I'll give it to you.""Why on earth would you do that?" I demanded, yanking my hand back."Oh, Em," he said forlornly. "You are the cleverest dolt I have ever met."I stared at him, my heart thundering. Of course, I am not a dolt in any sense; I had supposed he felt something for me and had only hoped he would keep it to himself. Forever. Not that a part of me didn't wish for the opposite. But that was when I assumed his feelings in that respect were equivalent to what he felt for any of the nameless women who passed in and out of his bed. And why would I lower myself to that, when he and I already had something that was vastly more valuable?

I knew you wouldn’t believe it. Just because you have a heart filled with the dust of a thousand library stacks does not mean everybody does.

Were you expecting me to throw myself at you? Would you have then said a dozen pretty things about my eyes or hair?" "No, it would have been, 'Get off me, you imposter, and tell me what you did with Emily.

...books became my best friends.

I wish to know the unknowable. To see what no mortal has seen. To peel back the carpeting of the world and tumble into the stars.

I was delighted to sit in the corner with my food and a book and speak to no one.

I will never again believe you to be incapable of hard work." He shuddered, "Being capable is not the same as being inclined, Em.

If I frightened my cat as I had Shadow, she'd ignore me for days, or possibly put a curse on me, but then cats have self-respect.

How was it that I suddenly had faerie kings, plural, demanding to marry me?

And you shall shut yourself away forever in those old stones with your books and your mysteries like a dragon with her hoard, having as little association with the living as possible and emerging only to breathe fire at your students.

if something is impossible, you cannot be terrible at it

I have never needed rescuing before. I suppose I always assumed that if I ever did, I would have two options: rescue myself or perish.

The worst of it was that Bambleby had warned me away from the tree - if I descended into a murderous rage, or turned into a tree myself, he would be very smug about it.

There's a bump in your nose now."He glared at me. "There is not.""Your mouth is lopsided."He opened his mouth to argue, but then he just let out a weary groan. "What is the point? I am hideous. I can't wait to change myself back again.""Don't. I prefer you like this."He looked surprised, then he began to smile. "Do you?""Yes," I said. "You blend into the background. I could almost forget about you entirely. It's refreshing."Naturally, he found a way to twist this into a compliment. "And am I ordinarily a distraction to you, Em?

I may be of use to you yet, my dear dragon.

Wanting to be through with this quickly, I leaned forward and kissed him.Almost. I lost my nerve halfway there, somewhere around the moment I noticed he had a freckle next to his eye and wondered ridiculously if that was something he would remove if I asked it of him, and instead of a proper kiss, I merely brushed my lips against his. It was a shadow of a kiss, cool and insubstantial, and I almost wish I could be romantic and say it was somehow transformative, but in truth, I barely felt it. But then his eyes came open, and he smiled at me with such innocent happiness that my ridiculous heart gave a leap and would have answered him instantly, if it was the organ in charge of my decision-making."Choose whenever you wish," he said. "No doubt you will first need to draw up a list of pros and cons, or perhaps a series of bar plots. If you like, I will help you organize them into categories."I cleared my throat. "It strikes me that this is all pointless speculation. You cannot marry me. I am not going to be left behind, pining for you, when you return to your kingdom. I have no time for pining."He gave me an astonished look. "Leave you behind! As if you would consent to that. I would expect to be burnt alive when next I returned to visit. No, Em, you will come with me, and we will rule my kingdom together. You will scheme and strategize until you have all my councillors eating out of your hand as easily as you do Poe, and I will show you everything---everything. We will travel to the darkest parts of my realm and back again, and you will find answers to questions you have never even thought to ask, and enough material to fill every journal and library with your discoveries.

If you do not admit kindness from others, you cannot be surprised when they fail to offer any.

How is it that you know how to befriend wild faerie dogs and ferret out Words of Power, yet you missed one of the fundamental rules of dryadology---namely, not cutting wicked kings out of trees.""I've learned my lesson, thank you," I snapped. "Should you end up trapped in one, I won't let you out.""You shall have to. I know you too well, Em. You could never survive without having someone around to snarl at.

A drop landed on the back of my hand, and I realized to my dismay that I was crying. Never in my adult life had I had someone looking out for me. Everything that I have wanted or needed doing, I have done myself. And why not? I have never needed rescuing before. I supposed I always assumed that if I ever did, I would have two options: rescue myself or perish.

[...] my ridiculous heart gave a leap and would have answered him instantly, if it was the organ in charge of my decision-making.

There was something about the stories bound between those covers, and the myriad species of Folk weaving in and out of them, each one a mystery begging to be solved. I suppose most children fall in love with faeries at some point, but my fascination was never about magic or the granting of wishes. The Folk were of another world, with its own rules and customs---and to a child who always felt ill-suited to her own world, the lure was irresistible.

Your mortal lover has a mind like crystals," she said. "Sharp and cold. I would like her for my own.""That's very thoughtful of you," was all he said in reply to this statement, which was appalling on a great many levels."Truly," the woman pressed. "Would you trade her? Your power is of the summerlands, but I will gift you with the hand of winter.""Thank you," Wendell said; he seemed to be struggling to hold back laughter. "But I am satisfied with my hands as they are. And unless you have a key to my forest kingdom across the sea, I will not be trading my mortal lover today."I was going to kill him.

The snow had ceased, and the sky was a soft eggshell color, the mountains dreaming under their woolen blankets. There was a loveliness in the forest's absence of color, its haunted dark framed by grey-white boughs, as if the snowfall had winnowed it down to the essence of what a forest is.

My life has been one long succession of moments in which I have chosen rationality over empathy, to shut away my feelings and strike off on some intellectual quest, and I have never regretted these choices, but rarely have they stared me in the face as bluntly as they did then.

I should, I suppose, mention here that I am perhaps ninety-five percent certain that Wendell Bambleby is not human.