The Moonlight Market Quotes

“Now, beauty is not a size or a shape, an outfit or a color. Real beauty is something that shines. The rest is only glamour. This girl was both dark and luminous, like a copper beech in the sun. Luminous was her brown skin, and her eyes were every shade of leaf, from guinea gold to forest-floor black. She was wearing a yellow dress. Her hair was a crown of autumn fire. And yes, she was very beautiful. But her beauty was none of these things. And although by the time she had left, Tom could barely remember her clothes, or the shape of her face, or the color of her eyes, or the exact shade of her skin, he knew he would always remember that shine.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Long ago, and far away, the Butterfly King met the Moth Queen. They were very different. She was nocturnal and he loved the sun; she was fierce and warlike, and he was a gentle dreamer. And they were both from different worlds. He was from a land of towers, and trains, and roads, and airplanes; she was from a land of dreams, and silent wings, and falling leaves.
But Love has always found a way of defying boundaries. And after warring for a time, and making their share of mistakes, and overcoming many dangers and obstacles, they were at last united in love, and thus united their people. And with the help of the Spider Mage and his web, they passed through the Honeycomb, and led the way back to the Kingdom all who chose to follow them there.
There, they were crowned, and made their pledge-- she in a garland of autumn leaves, he in a circlet of spider silk-- to rule the Kingdom wisely; to fight against injustice and fear; to honor their love, and to guard it well, and to tend it, and give it time to grow.
And if she was not always moderate in the way she expressed herself, and if he was sometimes a little naïve, this surprised no one, and was only to be expected. But between them, they ruled both wisely and well; with passion and moderation. And when their children were born, she taught them how to stand their ground and how to fight for what they loved; and he taught them how to see their world and appreciate its beauty.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Love never ends--- but it changes. In some cases, it grows like a tree, stronger and more fruitful. In others, it changes nature, like chrysalis to butterfly.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“He was close to her now, close enough to smell her scent, which was like bluebells in the rain, and the aroma of a forest in spring, and the peppery sweetness of petrichor.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Tom Argent had once loved fairy tales. When he was very young, he had loved to read about princes, and kings, and queens, and fairies, and goblins, and magic. He even liked to pretend that he was the son of a fairy queen, or a pirate king, who had been adopted by humans, and one day would claim his kingdom.
His parents had grown concerned at this. They had never hidden the fact that Tom was adopted, and they knew that all children liked to pretend. But Tom's imagination was especially vivid. He loved his parents very much, but they were afraid that this daydreaming might lead him to reject them one day. And so, they had both gone out of their way to discourage his love of fairy tales.
Whenever they saw him with his books, they would tell him: 'Stories aren't real. Magic is just an illusion. Fairies don't exist, Tom. Only trust what you can see.'
Then, on his seventh birthday, they had given Tom a camera, and the books of fairy tales had vanished swiftly and silently overnight, to be replaced by magazines devoted to different types of lens, in which the young Tom Argent had found another kind of magic. But looking at these images of the mysterious girl, he felt as if he had returned to the world of those long-ago storybooks, and it felt both exciting and wonderful, and deeply, darkly dangerous.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“There's daylight names and midnight names. Daylight names are safe enough. A spider brings good luck before midnight, but bad luck after. And you look to me like the kind of young man who needs good luck, and to keep out of dark rooms.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“As he grew, the young Prince became very dear to the Spider Mage. He had his mother's charm and grace, without her volatile nature. He had his father's intellect, without his anger and sullenness. And he had a kind and loving heart, which longed for one thing only: for his parents to love each other, as he loved them both.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“He had become aware of the eyes of the Daylight Folk on him. Hopeful, expectant, suspicious or dazed, they watched him from the parapet and from the crenellations of the Natural History Museum, their wings spread like banners against the sky. And now he could see the Midnight Folk, too, drawn by whatever mystery had been at work on these rooftops: Atlas, and Luna, and Diamondback, and Cinnabar. For a moment, Cinnabar stood aloof on the parapet. Then Brimstone held out his hand to her, and she went to join him.
My people, Tom thought to himself, and put up his hand to cover a smile. It was ridiculous, of course, and yet it felt so natural. As natural as being in love. As natural as flying.
Spider pulled at the silver thread again. Between his fingers, Tom now saw an intricate cat's cradle of light that seemed to extend in multiple directions. 'With this, you can go anywhere,' said Spider, lifting the cradle of light. 'You could stay here, in London Before. You could go back to the London you know. Or you could reclaim your Kingdom, and lead your people home. Your choice.' He passed the cat's cradle over Tom's head. As it touched him, the net of light settled over Tom's shoulders, becoming a kind of mantle: golden, soft as spider silk, light as woven thistledown. He made the same gesture over Charissa, and she too was draped in gossamer. And with the mantle came a scent of green woods and of summertime; of distant spices, unnamed blooms, and blackberries, and honeycomb.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“This story isn't over.' He pulled again at the loose thread, winding it around his thumb. The thread was long and silvery, like a thread of moonlight. Spider's skillful fingers teased and pulled on the delicate thread. And as they did so, the Daylight Folk gradually became aware of the cloud of butterflies and moths returning. Softly, they settled onto the stones and terracotta tiles of the roof. Softly, they settled onto the stones of the parapet where Spider sat. Softly, they clustered and blossomed and bloomed, hanging like grapes in the luminous air-- and soon the onlookers started to see a figure-- no, two figures-- taking shape among them. For a moment, it was impossible to see more than an outline. But as the shapes became clearer, the Daylight Folk were able to see a man and a woman, hand in hand. Their faces were almost familiar, and yet not quite the same as before: the woman small-featured and freckle-faced; the man dark-haired and soulful. Each of them was staring at the other in amazement.
'Tom?' said Charissa.
'Charissa?' said Tom.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“You were always the King of Much Too Late.'
'And you were always the Queen of my heart,' said Burnet, and held out his arms to her.
For a second, Vanessa said nothing. Her angry profile was turned away; her dark hair shimmered silver. Burnet put his arms around her, and for a moment, she turned her face into the curve of his shoulder...
Then the air gave a giant sob, as if rushing in to fill a space, and the interlaced pair dispersed into dazzling fragments. Millions of butterflies and moths exploded into the turbulence, fluttering madly to escape; bright wings torching the London smoke into a cacophony of colors.
Golden-winged and orange-tipped; peacock-eyed and painted; speckled, stippled, spotted; striped; fretting the kaleidoscope air. And then, they slowly began to dissolve like smoke into the atmosphere.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Vanessa called me Moth. But Charissa told me I hadn't declared my true colors yet. What did she mean?'
'She meant that your allegiance remains undetermined,' said Burnet. 'Argent is a name that can refer both to a Moth and a Butterfly. It means that you choose your colors, instead of having them imposed by birth.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“And running through his story, from adolescence to adulthood, always by moonlight, but bright as the sun, there was Charissa. But this was a different Charissa to the one he thought he knew; that fierce and cynical Moth girl, loyal only to herself.
Here was Charissa as a girl, hopeful and filled with laughter. Here, as an adolescent, wise one moment, childish the next. Here, she glanced out from the pages as an adult, a lover, a friend; dancing in the firelight, poised against the starry sky. Here, she was trusting, loving, unmasked, gentle and filled with confidences. Here, by the light of the full moon, she was not only beautiful, she was by far the most beautiful woman Tom had ever seen.
And now Tom Argent realized what he should have guessed before, what he should have seen in her eyes while he had been dazzled by someone else. She was the girl on the bridge, the one who had kissed him so tenderly. Hers was the shine he had recognized, reflected in Vanessa. She had been the memory contained in the flower seller's gift, the flower that only blossoms once, like innocence---
Like true love.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“And in among all of it was the light, reflecting against the sooty stone; a light that looked like sunlight shining through cathedral glass; a light that danced like marsh fire over the rooftops and houses. That was what Charissa called their glamour, Tom thought; the strange and marvelous energy that all the Daylight Folk possessed. Whatever the glamours the Midnight Folk used were focused on hiding and camouflage; but the enemy's charm and flamboyance drew him like---
A moth to a flame.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Tom followed her gaze. Above them, the narrow ribbon of sky was starting to show the first signs of dawn. Out of the London smoke, it came-- blush pink, absinthe green, ice blue, lemon yellow---
'That isn't the dawn,' said Tom.
And now through the colors, Tom thought he could see figures and patterns against the sky: patterns like magic lantern shapes against a screen of vibrant silk.
The Daylight Folk.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Cinnabar smiled. He saw that her teeth had been drilled to take a row of diamond studs that shone like tiny LEDs. Once more, he remembered those flower pictures, taken through filtered reality. Those once-familiar daisies and ferns, roses and lilies and love-in-a-mist, had the same ominous beauty when stripped of the light we see.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“And with that, he stepped out from the darkness of the tunnel mouth to find himself in a kind of cave; the air was warm with sandalwood, and nutmeg, and allspice, and cardamom, and the Moths were all around him.

For a moment, Tom was breathless with the beauty of the Midnight Folk. In the semi-darkness, their wings shone with a faint luminescence and their skin gleamed with unearthly tattoos, like something under black light. Their hair was braided with feathers and rags, and all of them seemed to be covered with a powdery dust that twinkled and shone against their skin, setting the shadows darkly aflame. And all around them lay a pattern of those vivid tracks, as if the luminescence could be transferred to their surroundings by touch; each set of prints a different shade in troubled, alien colors.
Instinctively, he looked for Charissa's colors in the crowd. But she was nowhere to be seen. Instead, he was surrounded by the dangerous shine of the enemy. He saw them only in slices of light against the velvet darkness. The tip of a wing; the gleam of an eye; the mystic spiral of a tattoo that seemed to move across the skin.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“The Mage's powers were almost gone, and his web, which had once spanned the worlds, had shrunk to little more than rags.
And yet he clung to the hope that somehow the lost Prince could be found; his Aspect made whole, his inheritance restored. Using his web of dreams, he found fragments of the Prince that had been forgotten and overlooked, cocooned in the darkness of London Beyond. And he placed each one of these cocoons with a human family, good folk oblivious to their origin, unmindful of their destiny. Thus were these royal hatchlings kept far away from the two warring tribes until it was time for their coming of age, and for the plan that the Spider Mage had formed to be put into action.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“The young Prince arrived in this world, lost and very frightened. The thread he had followed was broken, and he had no means of spinning another. His friend, the Spider Mage, was too far away to hear his cries, and this world of cruelty and noise was too much for him. Even the air was unbreathable. And so he crept into World Below, and wept to himself in the darkness. As he wept, his grief was so great that he broke into a cloud of butterflies and moths, each one a fragment of himself, that scattered into the darkness of the tunnels beneath the city. Some of them found their way to the light. Others stayed in the darkness. Some slept. And they became two separate groups-- one living underground, one in the light, both yearning for the world they had left, and for the chance to be whole again.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“She gave a sudden, luminous grin. 'Typical chrysalis,' she said. 'Pretty as peaches. Thick as mince.'
Then she turned and made for the door, looking almost insubstantial in the shadows. Tom watched as she vanished down the steps. And looking down on to the street, he saw her hesitate, and then, finding the street deserted, spread out the skirts of the garment that he'd assumed was a long brown coat...
Except that it wasn't a coat. It was wings-- wings the color of cobweb, and dappled sunlight on water, and rain...
I've seen this before, said a voice in his mind. It came with a fleeting memory-- a voice in the moonlight, the touch of a hand, a scent of smoke and roses. I've seen this before, thought Tom once again, as Charissa flew into the night.
His hand crept into his pocket, where something-- a dead leaf? No, a flower-- seemed to be caught in the lining. With the thought came a memory: of a moon like a Christmas bauble; a kiss as light as a moth's wing; a long-necked guitar that fell from a bridge into the moonlit water.
I must have dreamed that, Tom thought, and yet it didn't feel like a dream. And it came with the sound of voices of vendors selling flowers and fruit, and the scent of marchpane and gingerbread, burnt sugar, and smoke, and spices.
The Market!”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“There once was a girl of the Moth Folk, dark-winged, strong, and fearless. Her eyes were like the starlit sky; her footfall soft as shadow. And although she was lovely, love had no place in her heart, for hers was the tribe of the Moth King, who had waged a war on love, for ever and ever.
But love, like all forbidden things, was fascinating to her. Every night of the clear full moon, she would go to the Moonlight Market and watch the traders sell their wares: printed books of every kind; pomegranates of the south; wines from the islands; gems from the north; flowers that bloomed only once in their lives. But she only had eyes for the sellers of charms and glamours. Here, there were spells for a broken heart, or to spin dead leaves into gold, or to rekindle a memory, or to summon the western wind. Most of all, there were love spells: tiny bottles of colored glass with stoppers worked in silver filled with potions made from the heart of a rose, or the tail fin of a mermaid. Here were glamours to melt a lover's heart: candles of every color; tokens of remembrance; silk-bound books of poetry.
But among all the love-knots and bonbons and pressed flowers and handkerchiefs, the Moth girl never truly saw the nature of her enemy, for it seemed to her that Love was weak, and simpering, and faithless. She told herself she was too strong to fall for its blandishments. Until one day, at the Market, she saw a boy with a glamorie-glass in his hand, standing by a display of books, and stories, and legends, and memories.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Are you with Vanessa?' said Tom.
He wasn't sure why he'd asked that, but there was something about them that reminded him of Vanessa's friends. Something vaguely theatrical; a shout of color against the grime. A shine, which was more than the warmth of their skin or the luminous quality of their eyes. Just as Charissa and her friend had seemed to be creatures of the night, these people were the opposite. Light seemed to radiate from them somehow, reflecting against the sooty stones.
The little girl smiled. 'I'm Swallowtail. This is Argus. We're friends of Vanessa's. We'll take you to her.'
And, catching Tom's hand in hers, she and Argus led him through the silent streets of King's Cross, towards his doom and his heart's desire.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Then she spread the wings of her coat, revealing the shimmering lining. Except he saw it wasn't a coat. It was wings-- huge, brown, beautiful wings, dappled in the street light. Not a bird's wings, but more like the wings of a moth, all silk and starlight spreading out against the smoky London sky. For a moment, she stood there, wings spread; shock-headed, wild-eyed, a thing from a dream.
Then, as Tom watched open-mouthed, she flew off, soundlessly, into the night.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Walking over the moonlit bridge, Tom found himself drawn deeper and deeper into the world of the market. Here, it was crowded, noisy; buzzing with scents both familiar and strange. The sharp aroma of some herbal stuff seemed to dominate this part of the bridge; the scented smoke was strongest around a little stall named Madcap, from which a pipe-smoking vendor was selling brightly colored pouches, marked at the price of Three days a twist. Next to him, a person of indeterminate gender was folding sheets of colored paper into origami birds, which they released into the air with a papery flutter of wings.
In spite of the crow woman's warning, Tom snapped a few more pictures. A dancer on the side of the bridge, her wings spread wide against the night. A diminutive woman with a whole haberdasher's shop balanced on her head: tiny drawers full of bobbins and lace, and packs of slender needles, and pincushions, and safety pins, and multicolored twists of silk. Next to her, cross-legged on the ground, an old woman in a drab overcoat was making garlands and buttonholes from baskets of strange-looking flowers that released an unfamiliar, intoxicating aroma. Her brown face lit up when she caught sight of Tom.
'Collector! What's it to be today? Another adventure? Your heart's desire? I know. True love!' And she picked up a white flower from one of her baskets and held it out to him with a smile. Its scent was complex, dark and sweet; the scent of a summer garden at night.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“In the semi-darkness, Tom thought he saw faces-- or were they masks?-- that seemed to be covered in feathers or fur. And there was a summery scent of sun-ripened fruit; of night-blooming flowers; of new-baked bread; and frying mushrooms, and bilberry wine, and sandalwood, and cedar, and musk; and fresh-laundered sheets all wild from the wind. Now he could hear music, too; the sound of flutes and fiddles and distant voices raised in song; the soft, persistent rhythms of drums; the distant chirp of silver bells.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“What he found was astonishing. Every wall was plastered with posters and flyers. Some were like the ones he'd seen on the brick wall at King's Cross; others seemed to advertise specific market traders. Some were old and faded; some seemed much more recent. Some sounded quite ordinary-- Cocksfoot & Sable: Fine Ales and Cheeses; Clancy's Rustic Furnishings-- and some were more unusual. Tom frowned over Yellow Belle's Night-Woven Yarns, and felt his heart beat faster at Spindle Ermine's Love Spells. What kind of a market was this? He thought he understood Bird-Cherry's Flowers and Fruits, or Straw Dot's Most Accurate Timepieces, and even Scarlet Tiger Sleeve Tattoos-- but what was he to make of Pretty Pinion Wing Repairs or Mother Shipton, Laundress of Dreams, or Pale Eggar's Glamours and Charms, or Dusky Sallow's Evercoats?”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“Vanessa had changed her yellow dress for one of a vibrant butterfly-blue, and her curly dark hair had been braided into an elaborate coronet. Gold bracelets gleamed on her brown arms, reflecting tiny flecks of gold onto her skin. Surrounded by glass and chrome and lights, she was the most magical being Tom had ever seen.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“In this new and luminous world, words like 'glamorie-glass' made sense, and daylight names were shields, designed to hold back the approach of night. The thought of this girl at night conjured up pictures of Van Gogh's Starry Night, and comets, and lightships, and the taste of her skin, torched to silver in the moonlight---
The girl looked amused. It occurred to him that she must be used to men being fools around her. 'I'm Vanessa.'
'Vanessa. Vanessa. I'm Tom,' he said. 'And where are you from, Vanessa?' It was an excuse to keep saying her name, which sounded to him like a cat's-paw of wind across the bright surface of a lake.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“And, at that, picking up his parcel of books, Spider began to walk purposefully down the road, a river of light at his ragged heels, his spindly shadow beside him.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“It was early April, when the light was at its sweetest, and on those sunny spring mornings, Tom sometimes felt the skin of the world ready to peel away at a touch, revealing beauty underneath-- beauty, and sometimes horrors. A dandelion clock, growing between the cracks in the pavement. A girl, coming back from a night on the town, caught in an unguarded moment. An old homeless man with a bundle of books, packing away his cardboard bed and muttering darkly to himself, unaware that the morning sun had given his head a corona of fire.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market

“But Tom was no believer in fairy tales and miracles. He could walk through a bluebell wood and not see a single fairy--- not that there were any bluebell woods in London, but there were parks with ancient trees, and markets filled with spices and fruits from countries a thousand miles away, and people of all races and types, and cobbled alleys that echoed with ghosts, and ships that only appeared by night, and secret plague pits under the ground.”
― Joanne Harris, The Moonlight Market