Above the entrance is a frieze: a wyvern and a winged horse are frozen in bas-relief, and there is an empty space, where a third carving might once have been.
The train terminus, in SANDMAN #67: "The Kindly Ones:11"
And this occurs at the same moment that a customer at Lux's, drunk and flirtatious, peeks beneath Mazikeen's half-mask. He satisfies his curiosity, as he loses, one after the other, his drink, his lunch, and his sanity. Mazikeen has no patience with men.
A brief aside, in SANDMAN #67: "The Kindly Ones:11"
Hmph. If you don't let me in, I will turn you into a demon half-face waitress night-club lady with a crush on her boss, and I'll make it so you've been that from the beginning of time to now and you'll never ever know if you were anything else and it will itch inside your head worse than little bugses.
Delirium threatens Mazikeen, in SANDMAN #68: "The Kindly Ones:12"
So: exeunt the spider women, stage left. Look on their works, ye mighty, and clean yours with bleach.
Hal's reaction to Zelda's death, in SANDMAN #68: "The Kindly Ones:12"
"You're crying."
"Lord Shaper is in dire need, and he doesn't love me."
"Would it be better if he was in dire need, and did love you?"
Cluracan and Nuala, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
Since I killed my son... the Dreaming has not been the same ... or perhaps I was no longer the same. I still had my obligations... But even the freedom of the Dreaming can be a cage, of a kind, my sister.
Dream, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
And the poison spills into Loki's mouth and eyes; he writhes, and a city falls: and in the moment of pain he gains a certain clarity. The master manipulator realizes how, ultimately-- how strangely, how elegantly-- he too had been manipulated. Perhaps the sound he makes is laughter.
Another aside, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
Dream? Give me your hand.
Death, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
"But I did look for you. All over."
"Hmph. Where were you looking? Patagonia? Mars? The Emerald City?"
"Um. Places like that."
Delirium and Barnabas, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
I had the hubris originally to regard myself as a collaborator, as a co-author. Very rapidly I found myself reduced to the status of character, following something of a disagreement in the fundamental direction of the Creation.
Lucifer, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
"So you see, it was innocent. It really was. Just bad luck."
"Rosalita... there isn't any innocent. There isn't any guilty. There's just dead."
Rose and Hal, at Zelda's funeral in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
"What did we make? What was it, in the end?"
"What it always is. A handful of yarn; a little weaving and stitching; some embroidering perhaps. A few loose ends, but that's only to be expected."
The Fates, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
It's the same old story... Whatever it turns into on the way, whatever it is you originally undertake to spin or knit or weave, keep it going long enough and, in the end, my lilies, it's always a winding sheet.
One of the three Fates, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
<snf> At least it's not a moral. Worse than beginnings, morals. I've got no time for them. No time at all.
One of the three Fates, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
Never mind. There. For good or bad. It's done.
It all comes down to this, in SANDMAN #69: "The Kindly Ones:13"
The family did not send to ask from whom the messenger had come; it was not the first time that messengers had visited them, after all. And there are some powers that no one, not even the Endless, seeks to inquire into too deeply.
Invitations are delivered in SANDMAN #70, part one of "The Wake"
One for sorrow, two for sorrow, three for sorrow, four for for for I don't know but I'm all bored of sorrow, five for three two one, six for gold, seven for a magpie who tells me where to go...
Delirium, in SANDMAN #70, part one of "The Wake"
Our brother is dead. We have come for the cerements and for the books of ritual, which are in your keeping.
Desire, in SANDMAN #70, part one of "The Wake"
And the state of his bathroom -- I'm not one to gossip, but there are things crusted on his sink that have not simply developed intelligent life but have in all probability by now evolved their own political systems.
Cain describes Abel in in SANDMAN #70, "The Wake" part one
Eblis O'Shaughnessy: you were created and gifted by five of the Endless, but you can neither dream nor, ultimately, destroy, and that shall be your triumph and that shall be your tragedy.
Destiny, in SANDMAN #70, part one of "The Wake"
If you bring me back to life, my death will have no meaning. I had a fine existence. I was a good place. I spent a little time in the waking world. I even fell in love, once, a little. I lived a good life and it ended. Would you take that away from me?
Fiddler's Green, in SANDMAN #70, part one of "The Wake"
And the Lady Bast, her fur thinning and her eyes milky and dim, summons all the power at her disposal, pulls together tiny strands of belief, a handful of instants of half-hearted worship. At a cat show in Glasgow, a teenage boy stares at a one-year-old Abyssinian and, for a moment, he sees a goddess. Head held high, eyes clear, fur sleek, she walks to the Dreaming.
Bast prepares for the wake, in SANDMAN #70, part one of "The Wake"
Somewhere in the night, entities bigger than storm-clouds are building a house of remembrance. The people on the ground are waiting for the building to be finished before they go inside. They wait awkwardly, shuffling and making small-talk, in the wasteland that was once the heart of the Dreaming. Everybody's here. You're here.
Preparations, in SANDMAN #71, part two of "The Wake"
I am not here to mourn him. I mourned the loss of my love a long time ago. I am here to say goodbye to a stranger who once did me a good turn. And to the man who gave my son the death he craved.
Calliope, in SANDMAN #71, part two of "The Wake"
"Your predecessor, he told me there weren't any gryphons left in the waking world."
"Arimaspia is as far from the waking world as it is from the Dreaming, great lord."
Matthew and the new gryphon, in SANDMAN #71, part two of "The Wake"
"The one I hate is where I'm just an actor on a strange television version of my life. Have you ever had that dream?"
"Doesn't everyone?"
"I don't."
Superman, Batman, and Martian Manhunter, in SANDMAN #71, part two of "The Wake"
We were never loves, and we never will be, now. I do not regret that, however. I regret the conversations we never had, the time we did not spend together. I regret that I never told him that he made me happy, when I was in his company. The world was the better for his being in it. These things alone do I now regret: things left unsaid. And he is gone, and I am old.
Lady Bast, in SANDMAN #72, part three of "The Wake"
The bonds of family bind both ways. They bind us up, support us, help us, and they are also a bond from which it is difficult, perhaps impossible to extricate oneself.
Desire, in SANDMAN #72, part three of "The Wake"
I cared for him, very much. He was so wise; he seemed so certain of the rightness of his actions. And I, who do nothing but doubt, admired that in him. He was a creature of hope, for dreams are hopes, and echoes of hopes, and I am a creature of despair.
Despair, in SANDMAN #72, part three of "The Wake"
I think of the first Despair sometimes, said Despair. It must be over a hundred thousand years since anyone thought of her but me. An eyeblink, and she is forgotten. And you will forget: death or life will take him from your minds. I know, whispered Despair, in her distant, empty voice. But I shall remember him.
Despair, in SANDMAN #72, part three of "The Wake"
Something Dian used to say to me. She'd say, "Wes, don't say anything unless you've got something to say." Advice I took to heart. She would also say, "It's a long, long trail that has no turning." And how right she was.
Wesley Dodds, in SANDMAN #72, part three of "The Wake"
I'm not a young man anymore. I'm retired now. But I sometimes think that all the things in my life that have made it worth the living have been as a result of my connection to the dead gentleman.
Wesley Dodds, in SANDMAN #72, part three of "The Wake"
It's astonishing how much trouble one can get oneself into, if one works at it. And astonishing how much trouble one can get oneself out of, if one simply assumes that everything will, somehow or other, work out for the best.
Destruction, in SANDMAN #72, part three of "The Wake"
For a start, we never even noticed the Renaissance. The Renaissance was a load of bloody Italians poncing around claiming to be the golden age of the Greeks come around again. Nobody in England had even heard of the Renaissance until it had been over for centuries.
Hob Gadling, in SANDMAN #73, epilogue to "The Wake"
"C'mon, Robbie. There weren't any black queens of England."
"Catherine of Aragon."
"She wasn't black. She was Spanish."
"There were a lot of Moors and Africans in Spain and Italy in the old days. Remember Othello? Trust me, if Catherine of Aragon had been in Alabama in the 1950s they'd have made her ride in the back of the bus."
Guenevere and Hob, in SANDMAN #73, epilogue to "The Wake"
"When I first met you I thought you were gay."
"Why? 'Cos I'm English?"
"Uh-uh. Because you seemed to know so many people who were dead."
"... That's not funny."
"No. It's not, is it?"
Guenevere and Hob, in SANDMAN #73, epilogue to "The Wake"
"They're all having a marvelous time. It's great."
"Well, thank you, little Miss Sunshine."
Death and Hob Gadling, in SANDMAN #73, epilogue to "The Wake"
Birds of a thousand colours danced in the sky when I was a boy. They brightened the day with their intricate songs. "We are who we choose to be," sang the goldfinch, when the sun was high. "I dream about dreams about dreams," sang the nightingale, under the pale moon.
Master Li, in SANDMAN #74, "The Exile"
Old friend, in my mind only do I write you this letter, but it is a splendid letter, with perfect brushwork. Old hands do not shake or cramp when the letter is written on the air.
Master Li, in SANDMAN #74, "The Exile"