The Lost Story

by Meg Shaffer

“You aren’t afraid of rats, are you?” “Only the two-legged kind.”

And that’s why the world has Holy Grails—not because the world needs Holy Grails but because the world needs heroes.

“I want to be courageous, I swear. I just would prefer to be courageous inside my house.”

The kitchen even looked the same as it had since it was built in the aesthetically challenged seventies.

“I don’t know what’s worse, that he doesn’t remember I’m in love with him or that he doesn’t remember he was in love with me.”

If you’ve never believed any impossible things before, now is a good time to start.

When you have drunk spiced wine with a queen and a crow, nothing can shock you anymore.

“Not just a pub. It’s the pub where C. S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien used to fight about their imaginary worlds,” he said. “They had a writers’ club that met here, the Inklings.”

Ask any question in an infinite universe, and the answer is yes. Always yes.”

“Like riding a bike,” Jeremy said. “If the bike could bite you.

all wheel, no hamster.”

“If you can’t find her now, maybe she’s where she wants to be.”

Joy is quieter than people think it is. Especially the joy of getting back something you thought was lost forever.”

“You’re a prince. You’re a knight,” Granny said. “In the Ghost Town, you both are dinner.

“You lose the moon the same way you lose hope,” she said. “One day, you look up, and it’s gone.”

all that was left of the woman who’d lost the moon.

A place between…” “Between what? Heaven and Hell?” “Between your last breath and your last chance.”

With her eyes closed, she kept singing and remembering all her favorite days, especially the easy days, the lazy days, the days when she didn’t know the definition of fear.

If you keep writing…you can change your whole life.’

Fairy tales need heroes. Heroes need dragons. Princes and knights need enemies.

When you’re on the Painted Sea, you can watch the stars falling.”

Here the stars actually fall. And if you’re fast enough and lucky enough, you can catch one with a net.”

How strange to find that so many of his half-forgotten dreams had been memories.

“I am a knight of Shanandoah. We have a code of honor. I don’t remember all of it, but gallantry in matters of the heart was mentioned once or thrice.”

“Your entire kingdom exists because someone liked your story.

books are magic. Maybe even the strongest magic there is.