Drums of Autumn (Outlander, #4)

by Diana Gabaldon

Each ghost comes unbidden from the misty grounds of dream and silence. Our rational minds say, ‘No, it isn’t.’ But another part, an older part, echoes always softly in the dark, ‘Yes, but it could be.’ We come and go from mystery and, in between, we try to forget. But a breeze passing in a still room stirs my hair now and then in soft affection. I think it is my mother.

An Englishman thinks a hundred miles is a long way; an American thinks a hundred years is a long time.’

‘Nothing is lost, Sassenach; only changed.’ ‘That’s the first law of thermodynamics,’ I said, wiping my nose. ‘No,’ he said. ‘That’s faith.’

It doesn’t matter what happens; no matter where a child goes – how far or how long. Even if it’s forever. You never lose them. You can’t.’

What a mystery blood was – how did a tiny gesture, a tone of voice, endure through generations like the harder verities of flesh?

That only by forgiveness could she forget – and that forgiveness was not a single act, but a matter of constant practice.