My tiny scary friend is coming

You really think joy is easier to come by than pain? What have you had more of?

It was sadness, lostness, and the worst thing about it was the way it seemed like a default—like it was there all the time, and all her other expressions were just an array of masks she used to cover it up.

Your soul sings to mine. My soul is yours, and it always will be, in any world.

She may have been the one whose name meant music, but his sounded like it. Saying it made her want to sing it, to lean out a window and call him home. To whisper it in the dark.

There was darkness, and monsters vast as worlds swam in it.

His lips made a grim twist that was like the joyless cousin of a smile.

It is a condition of monsters that they do not perceive themselves as such. The dragon, you know, hunkered in the village devouring maidens, heard the townsfolk cry ‘Monster!’ and looked behind him