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“Your parents are dead, you are not fine, and nothing is going to be okay. This is not news to you. But from now until May you are still Neil Josten and I am still the man who said he would keep you alive.”
― Nora Sakavic, The Raven King

“Do girls need kid-glove treatment? I thought they were tougher than that."
Dan's grin was approving. "Most of us are. Some of us are like boys, though, and have delicate egos.”
― Nora Sakavic, The Raven King

“Why don't you like girls?"
Nicky looked startled by the interruption, but he rallied quickly and made a face. "They're so soft."
Neil thought about Renee's bruised knuckles, Dan's fierce spirit, and Allison holding her ground on the court a week after Seth's death. He thought about his mother standing unflinching in the face of his father's violent anger and her ruthlessly leaving bodies in their wake. He felt compelled to say, "Some of the strongest people I've known are women."
"What? Oh, no," Nicky hurried to say. "I mean literally soft. Too many curves, see? I feel like my hands would slide right off. It's totally not my thing. I like…" He drew a box with his fingers as he searched for words. "Erik. Erik's perfect. He's a total outdoors junkie, rock climbing and hiking and mountain biking, all that awful bug-infested fresh-air stuff. But oh my god, you should see what it does to his body. He's like this, all hard edges." He drew another box. "He's stronger than I am, and I like that. I feel like I could lean on him all day and he wouldn't break a sweat.”
― Nora Sakavic, The Raven King

“But Neil Josten was a Fox. Andrew called his home; Nicky called him family. Neil wasn't going to lose any of it.”
― Nora Sakavic, The Raven King