Rail Quotes

“What happens when a leader misses his steps on the ladder is what happens when a train misses the rail. Be on track.”

“Toad must have been very accustomed to traveling this way, balanced on the back rails of a rushing buggy, but Melena was not. She gripped the sides and white-knuckled the rails with her knapsack sandwiched between her knees. Hazel was clamped onto the roof, grinning like an alligator in the sun. And Toad lounged like a cat.”

“Across the sea fat kings watched and were gleeful, that something begun so well had now gone off the rails (as down South similar kings watched), and if it went off the rails, so went the whole kit, forever, and if someone ever thought to start it up again, well, it would be said (and said truly): The rabble cannot manage itself.Well, the rabble could. The rabble would.He would lead the rabble in managing.The thing would be won.”

“Stop fighting me!" he said, trying to pull on the arm he held.He was in a precarious position himself, straddling the rail as he tried to lean over far enough to get me and actually hold onto me.“Let go of me!” I yelled back.But he was too strong and managed to haul most of me over the rail, enough so that I wasn’t in total danger of falling again.See, here’s the thing. In that moment before I let go, I really had been contemplating my death. I’d come to terms with it and accepted it. I also, however, had known Dimitri might do something exactly like this. He was just that fast and that good. That was why I was holding my stake in the hand that was dangling free.I looked him in the eye. "I will always love you."Then I plunged the stake into his chest.It wasn’t as precise a blow as I would have liked, not with the skilled way he was dodging. I struggled to get the stake in deep enough to his heart, unsure if I could do it from this angle. Then, his struggles stopped. His eyes stared at me, stunned, and his lips parted, almost into a smile, albeit a grisly and pained one."That’s what I was supposed to say. . .” he gasped out.Those were his last words.”

“Gundar, seeing Halt upright for the first time in two days, stumped up the deck to join them.'Back on your feet then?' he boomed cheerfully, with typical Skandian tact. 'By Gorlag's toenails, with all the heaving abd puking you've been doing, I thought you'd turn yourself inside out and puke yourself over the rail!'...'You do paint a pretty picture, Gundar,' Will said...'Thank you for your concern,' Halt said icily...'So, did you find Albert?' Gundar went on, unabashed. Even Halt was puzzled by this sudden apparent change of subject.'Albert?' he asked. Too late, he saw Gundar's grin widening and knew he'd stepped into a trap.'You seemed to be looking for him. You'd lean over the rail and call, 'Al-b-e-e-e-e-e-r-t!' I thought he might be some Araluen sea god.''No, I didn't find him. Maybe I could look for him in your helmet.'He reached out a hand. But Gundar had heard what happened when Skandians lent their helmets to the grim-faced Ranger while onboard ship...'No, I'm pretty sure he's not there,' he said hurriedly.”

“More than two dozen kids lined a low railing around the gazebo. They were all tied to it by a rope leash that gave them no more than a few feet of movement. Neck to rail, like tethered horses. Each of the kids was weighed down by a concrete block that encased their hands. Their eyes were hollow, their cheeks caved in.Astrid used a word that Sam had never imagined coming from her.“Nice language,” Drake said with a smirk. “And in front of the Pe-tard, too.”A cafeteria tray had been placed in front of each of the prisoners. It must have been a very recent delivery because some were still licking their trays, hunched over, faces down, tongues out, licking like dogs.“It’s the circle of freaks,” Drake said proudly, waving a hand like a showman.In a crusty old wheelbarrow to one side, three kids were using a short-handled shovel to mix cement. It made a heavy sloshing sound. They dumped a shovelful of gravel into the mix and stirred it like lumpy gravy.“Oh, no,” Lana said, backing away, but one of the Coates kids smashed her behind the knee with his baseball bat, and she crumpled.“Gotta do something with unhelpful freaks,” Drake said. “Can’t have you people running around loose.” He must have seen Sam start to react because he stuck his gun against Astrid’s head. “Your call, Sam. You so much as flinch and we’ll get to see what a genius brain really looks like.”“Hey, I got no powers, man,” Quinn said.“This is sick, Drake. Like you’re sick,” Astrid said. “I can’t even reason with you because you’re just too damaged, too hopelessly messed up.”“Shut up.”

“You only go through High School once, but if you go through the way we did, that's enough.”

“Barbecue is the third rail of North Carolina politics.”

“You and I come by road or rail, but economists travel on infrastructure.”