Days ​of Magic, Nights of War (Abarat 2.) 1 csillagozás

“You know what the Good Book has to say about witchcraft,” he said. “Thou shall not suffer a witch to live.”
“Those old hypocrites. They talk about killing witches but the Good Book’s full of magic. Turning the Nile to blood and parting the Red Sea. What’s that if it’s not good old-fashioned magic? Want a little water into wine? No trouble! How about raising that dead man Lazarus? Just say the word!”

“If that’s a polite way of asking me if I’m not too antiquated to be going off facing the Five Beasts of Efreet on my own, let me remind you what St. Catham of Dette says: ‘We will bring the Infernal Enemy to its knees with wisdom, not sticks.’”
“Diamanda, dear. St. Catham was eaten alive from the toes up, over a period of nineteen days. I don’t think you should be quoting her.”

But how had the island gotten here? Her question was answered as soon as her traveler islands reached shallower water. The tiny island ahead of her lifted itself up out of the surf, and the bushy green head of an animal with vast, kindly eyes turned back toward her and smiled.
She had no words. What do you say to a smiling island?

“‘The greatest of these is Hap’s Vault’ . . . blah, blah, blah . . . ‘discovered by Lydia Hap’ . . . blah, blah, blah . . . ‘It is Miss Hap who was the first to suggest the Chamber of the Skein.’ ”
“What’s the Skein?” Candy said, becoming a little more interested now.
“I quote: ‘It is the thread that joins all things—living and dead, sentient and unthinking—to all other things—’”
Now Candy was interested. She came to stand beside Malingo, looking at the Almenak over his shoulder. He went on reading aloud. “‘According to the persuasive Miss Hap, the thread originates in the Vault at Huffaker, appearing momentarily as a kind of flickering light before winding its way invisibly through the Abarat . . . connecting us, one to another.’”

She’d seen all kinds of visions, including one that she’d dreamed of many times since: a woman walking on a sky full of birds, while fish swam in the watery heavens around her head.