The Nevers Best Quotes

Lord Massen: It came three years ago.
Lord Broughton: Third of August, 1896.
Lord Massen: A Monday. Rather gray. Not one case of someone being Touched before then. Not one outside London. Those reported overseas were all here at the time. And not one man of stature afflicted. That’s the genius of it. They came at us through our women.
Lord Allaven-Tyne: They? I’m still not sure I can equate a few bizarre anecdotes with the Mongol horde.
Lord Massen: Only a blind man measures the length of a blade by how much is in his belly.

Lord Massen: This was designed so that we would see the parts and not the whole. Philanthropists like Lavinia Bidlow see the suffering of the afflicted. The common throng see a macabre murderess.
Prince Albrecht: And you see a broken machine.
Lord Massen: That is exactly what I see. The greatest machine. The heart of our empire brought to a shuddering halt by the caprice and ambitions of those for whom ambition was never meant.

Lord Massen: We are the first generation accustomed to the impossible. What women are appalled by today, they will accept tomorrow, and demand the day after that. And the immigrant. And the deviant. That is the power being wielded, and not by us. The blade is in, gentlemen. We need to know whose hand is on the hilt.

Frank Mundi: So you’re going to tell me what was here before you dressed it up, because one more lie, and I’m not on a case, I’m the f***ing Angle of Death.

Penance Adair: [referring to Myrtle] She does speak English. But not with her mouth.

Lucy Best: People been attacking us since they known we was Touched.
Harriet Kaur: Or since always.
Amalia True: This is different. This whole day.
Penance Adair: We knew people would come down on us the more we were thriving.

Lucy Best: It’s about confidence. As my mum used to say, if you can look a man in the eye, you can stab him in it.
Amalia True: Smart woman.
Penance Adair: But also, don’t do that.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: The Touched.
Hugo Swan: Yes. They’re terrible. They’re wonderful. They’re absurd.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Do you even know what the term means?
Hugo Swan: Touched? Yes! No. They’re all, they have, weird, deformities and afflictions.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Do you think they might be hideous?
Hugo Swan: Well, whatever they are, flirt with the ugly one. It creates an unexpected balance.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: I don’t know how to flirt.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: You have to come.
Hugo Swan: Oh! To the opera?
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Well, you know everything about flirting. Plus, you don’t mind when people are odd. It’s how we’re friends.

Hugo Swan: That’s how the club works. It’s all quite delicate. Favors and threats, and then, one shining night where no law yet exists. It’s more than just a club. It’s an ethos.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Sex club is just, that’s just flirting on a much scarier level.
Hugo Swan: You don’t have to flirt. You just have to relax. Endure someone flirting with you.

Hugo Swan: As far as society is concerned, Augustus Bidlow is above reproach, and beneath contempt. He’s perfect.
Housemaid: For what?

Amalia True: Gift like yours, you should be the Royal physician, not patching up gangsters and freaks.
Dr. Horatio Cousens: Gift like mine gets me branded a voodoo witch doctor. I gave up being choosy.
Amalia True: Nothing about me not being a freak?

Penance Adair: I’m not confident in my curtsying.
Amalia True: I’m not confident in my breathing.
Penance Adair: Oh, I wasn’t planning to breathe. I think it’s considered rude.

Penance Adair: [referring to her wound] Does it hurt?
Amalia True: Itches.
Penance Adair: Aah, that’s much worse.

Declan Orrun: I’m genuinely searching for a way that this spins out that I don’t kill you.
Amalia True: It would be better if you didn’t.
Declan Orrun: You’re a rare f***ing bird.

Declan Orrun: My business is mine. Apart from the sanctity of my harmonious marriage, f***-all is exclusive.

Declan Orrun: You’re mad enough to make this worth it. But you’re mad enough to try not to. If it goes that way, I will cut your face to a mess.
Amalia True: This isn’t my face.

Lavinia Bidlow: Language requires not stasis, but specificity. I should be thrilled to excise the word “nice”. It’s vague as paste.

Lord Massen: It is not panicking to abhor something. Neither is it useful to replace a perfectly good Anglo-Saxon word with some foreigner’s flourish. In England, we say “the employed”. What possible benefit in replacing it with “employees”?
Amalia True: The singular. One may refer to a single employee, whereas “the employed” can only be used to describe a mass of people. It doesn’t allow for the idea that a single worker may be a whole and meaningful being.

Lord Massen: I take it then that you are yourselves among the afflicted?
Amalia True: Touched, yes. We don’t consider ourselves afflicted.
Lord Massen: Perhaps some women are more fortunate in the nature of their ailment than others.
Amalia True: That’s true, but more suffer from society’s perception than their own debilitation.

Lavinia Bidlow: Mrs. True tends to be a few steps ahead of the rest of us.
Hugo Swan: A prognosticator.
Amalia True: Nothing so grand.
Hugo Swan: So I shouldn’t ask how I’m going to die.
Lavinia Bidlow: No, but one can safely assume it will involve a French word.

Lord Massen: I’m old and I’ve seen too much change to fight against the tide, but chaos is not change. Shouting for recognition does not make a people worthy of it. There’s a harmony to our world that’s worth preserving.
Amalia True: As I understand it, a harmony is made up of different voices sounding different notes.
Lord Massen: Yes. And one is always above the other.

Maladie: Did you all come in hats? Now all of your brains are naked. No? You shall have a wreath of eels with the tail in your mouth.

Maladie: Devil’s speciality is eels. Which is known by you as a serpent. Oh, but it’s only Adam. It’s all the same when it slithers.

Frank Mundi: I’m sure this must be a very difficult time for you.
Hugo Swan: On the contrary. London’s deadliest maniac was as close to me as Kitty is now.
Katie: It’s Katie.
Hugo Swan: And the presence of sudden death makes one appreciate the act of living.
Katie: He did seem to appreciate it.

Edmund Hague: I like that word. Touched. Like the finger of God gave a few of us a little poke. Woke us up. Every subject gets me closer to finding exactly where it is He touched us.

Penance Adair: Trouble makes you troublesome. But nothing sets you off like good fortune.

Penance Adair: I belong here. And you. And all of us that’s Touched. We’re woven into the fabric of the world, and we’re meant to be as we are. We find Mary. We get her singing. They’ll all come to us, and they’ll be safe.
Amalia True: They won’t be safe.
Penance Adair: Less lonely then. And that’s a start.
Amalia True: It’s a start.

Amalia True: We all want Miss Brighton safe. Work with us.
Frank Mundi: Our men will find Maladie.
Amalia True: In Primrose’s drawers?

Lavinia Bidlow: Three of the Touched declared war on society. Right now, every one of us, of you, is suspect. Lucy Best can break things by touching them. Primrose Chattoway…
Penance Adair: Primrose is a child, and meek as a kitten.
Lavinia Bidlow: When a kitten reaches ten feet, you call it a tiger. I shouldn’t have to explain this to you.

Amalia True: I didn’t realize when we met what a name he was. “A voice of conservative Parliament.” Anti-union, anti-Suffragism, anti-Belgian.
Lavinia Bidlow: Gilbert Massen and I agree on almost nothing. It is the bedrock of our friendship.

Penance Adair: I thought everyone was in a panic.
Lavinia Bidlow: It’s society. Doing nothing is how we panic.

Lord Broughton: Mrs. True made more of an impression on you than Maladie did. Do you think she’s at the root of our feminine plague? Or in league with whoever is?
Lord Massen: I don’t know. But she’s not a fool. And she’s not a f***ing baker.

Lord Massen: You’re up early.
Hugo Swan: I can leave my coffin by day, if the smog’s thick enough. You haven’t read it? The Irishman, Bram Stoker.

Lord Massen: I heard an ugly rumor the other day.
Hugo Swan: Well, all rumors are ugly, Massen. No one whispers about virtue.

Hugo Swan: [to Massen] Horror and fascination go arm in arm. You should have read the Stoker.

Hugo Swan: And as for the Touched, well, they have a right to earn a living. I doubt even you can change that.
Lord Massen: I used to think your father’s mind went to field because your brother Caleb drowned. More likely, it’s because you didn’t. Well, I assure you, you’re about to.

Penance Adair: Do you ever wonder why Miss Bidlow started The Orphanage that she’s never comfortable in?
Amalia True: I’m not sure she’s comfortable anywhere. She didn’t pick this cause out of a hat. She knows what it’s like to be dismissed.

Desirée Blodgett: Desirée Blodgett. I usually just go by the first name, if you’re wondering where you’ve heard of me.
Amalia True: I haven’t.
Desirée Blodgett: Desirée, Diva of Desire. No? Well, I’m a whore. A bit renowned. I’ve cultivated an impressive clientèle. Especially given that I’m not exactly Mitzi Dalti, am I?

Amalia True: [referring to her clients who like to talk to her] And you have information on these men?
Desirée Blodgett: Oh, f***, no. I can’t remember a word.

Frank Mundi: Mrs. True. I hope this means you have something useful to say.
Amalia True: That depends.
Amalia True: [slaps him]Do you feel like talking?
Frank Mundi: I feel like talking about you spending a week in a cell.

Amalia True: A song. That’s Mary’s “turn”. A song only the Touched can hear.
Frank Mundi: What’s it about?
Amalia True: Hope.

Clara: I want to hear it. You sang for Maladie. Now sing for me. If you sing, and I hear it, it means I’m finally Touched. It means I’m worthy.
Mary Brighton: I can’t. And you’re not.

Annie Carbey: I don’t mind crazy, boss. I can’t work with stupid.

Mary Brighton: [to Maladie] It comes when I’m afraid. When I’m sad, the song, it helps. I knew that you would hear it, and maybe it might be a reassurance. A sense that you needn’t act only from pain.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: [after revealing he’s Touched] It’s a feminine trait, isn’t it?
Penance Adair: Oh, there’s men that have it.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: I am a monster.
Penance Adair: You know you’re not though.

Penance Adair: How does it feel? To fly?
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: It feels like flying.

Mary Brighton: What is it you’re after?
Maladie: Thorns! All I see is a crown.

Maladie: [to Mary] My agony’s made me special, but you. You’re nothing. You’re pleasant, and He fills your throat. Lets you make my pain little.

Maladie: I don’t want what I want. Go out in the world and show me this magical symmetry. It’s broken. It’s designed to be broken. Gears crushing gears. He means for this to hurt.
Mary Brighton: I don’t know where my song comes from. But God doesn’t want us to hurt.

Maladie: They say you s**t when you hang.

Frank Mundi: So, these ripplings. They let you see the future, but you can’t control when they come, or what you see, or why.
Amalia True: Every day’s an adventure.
Frank Mundi: Can you change it? Can you see the beach, then go to the woods?
Amalia True: No.

Frank Mundi: Do you feel anything? Rage, or victory maybe, or failure?
Amalia True: Mostly I feel calm. I know where I am in a fight. It’s one of the few times I do.
Frank Mundi: I know what you mean. I don’t get the part where you know what you mean.
Amalia True: I’ve had more experience with violence than I would have liked.
Frank Mundi: Your late husband?

Frank Mundi: How does Mary fit in?
Amalia True: I don’t think she does. Mary makes you feel love. Feel loved. Which is terrifying. For someone who, someone like her. Maladie felt a power greater than pain.
Frank Mundi: Do you think Mary might cure her?
Amalia True: Is it ever that simple?

Penance Adair: You see, people think the electricity is in the wire. But it’s everywhere. The air’s thick with it, and it moves, it circles. And not just in the circuit, but all across the air.

Lavinia Bidlow: No, they’re not our guests. They are my charity. I brought them here to help them. To prove that the Touched are not a threat. Yet you seem determined to prove that they are.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Miss Adair is every inch a lady. She’d never overstep.
Lavinia Bidlow: Is it every inch then?

Lavinia Bidlow: You cannot complete a sentence without exposing yourself. If the guests suspect that Miss Adair has social ambitions, or is using a “turn” to bewitch a weak-minded bachelor, the reports of this event could be disastrous for us, and possibly dangerous for her!
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: You always assume the worst of everybody.
Lavinia Bidlow: They seldom disappoint.

Lavinia Bidlow: [to Augie] There is a path that cannot be trodden. A private indiscretion is one thing, but you are not clever enough to keep a mistress. And we cannot have a girl who is Touched, and Irish, bear the Bidlow name. If you regard Miss Adair, you must think more of her reputation, and less of her every inch.

Dr. Edmund Hague: You are a very special person. You know why? Neither do I. I keep looking for that spark. The Touch. But darn it.

Hugo Swan: Augustus Cyril Aspinal Bidlow.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Augustus was an emperor. He conquered Egypt. And he was never described as a weak-minded bachelor. I’ve had a spot of brandy.
Hugo Swan: A spot? You’ve had the whole Dalmatian.

Hugo Swan: [to Augie] The Touched are the future. Particularly, your future.

Hugo Swan: Massen thinks the Touched are a plague. I think they’re a goldmine. One that I’ve dug out.

Hugo Swan: We are forever second sons, you and I. Worse, my older brother is dead, and yours is a woman. It’s time we made our mark.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: The Touched are the future.

Maladie: Would you like to beat me some more?
Amalia True: All your pain. Your rage. At some point, it’s what you are. And pain despises hope. I know. But Mary’s song isn’t just hope. We can gather people like us, and make sure your angels can’t hurt anyone else.
Maladie: But I don’t care about anyone else. No, wait. You don’t care about anyone else.

Amalia True: I don’t know how to do this. This riddle-me s**t. It’s beneath you.
Maladie: Well, no, it isn’t.

Maladie: You’re the woman who sheds her skin.
Amalia True: You mean my dress.
Maladie: I mean, your friends. I mean, well, you know, “A friend’s the one you trust to trust you back.”

Amalia True: I do have a mission. I didn’t ask for it. I’m not cut out for it. But it matters. And it requires sacrifice.

Penance Adair: [after Amalia shoots herself to save Mary] You nearly died, you great idiot!
Amalia True: You nearly died.
Penance Adair: But not by my own hand! There’s not a place in Heaven for them who scorn the gift of life.

Amalia True: I knew Horatio would have time to sew me back up. I missed the vital organs, silly.
Penance Adair: No, you didn’t!
Horatio Cousens: No, you didn’t.
Amalia True: Oh. I thought…
Horatio Cousens: Either you don’t know anatomy, or you don’t know how to aim.
Amalia True: Well, it was a bad gun.

Mary Brighton: They’re odd. I’m odd. It’s odd, what I do. I’ve been ignoring it, Frank. Ignored a lot of things. Which you know that I do.

Frank Mundi: I’m sorry for your terrible day.
Mary Brighton: You know, I always thought that I’d be the one saying that to you.

Hague’s Assistant: I can discern emotion when I see a face. But telephones. Angry people get louder, but also quieter.
Dr. Edmund Hague: Ah, you are an incomplete machine. All people are. That’s how it works.

Dr. Edmund Hague: I was just saying, a few days ago, dark as the day we found it. And now, ain’t we got fun?
Lavinia Bidlow: You are an American, and confounded by the mother tongue. This is not fun. This is war.

Annie Carbey: Is that the mission you were going on about? Mary Brighton brings in all the Touched with her little lullaby, then we overthrow the monarchy.
Amalia True: Nothing that grand. Or that small.

Amalia True: You know we’re dying. The Touched. We’re being attacked, locked up, and thrown in the street. Not everyone got such a formidable turn. And it’s getting worse. You have enemies you don’t know about yet.
Annie Carbey: So I should hide with your sad little gaggle? I’m fine all by myself.

Penance Adair: Amalia, come and see my soul trapped in a jar. If you rub it, I’ll give you wishes. You’ll never guess what the fire was.
Amalia True: It’s opium, my love.
Penance Adair: But it was the air. But also the cloud that wanted thunder, but was too gentle to hold it.

Penance Adair: Did you feel the thunder that wasn’t?
Amalia True: I feel it all the time.
Penance Adair: We have the best jobs.

Amalia True: Bonfire Annie, a flat no. Mary’s too shaken to sing. Myrtle’s “turn” is being incomprehensible. I am really racking up the wins. Oh, and I created Maladie.
Horatio Cousens: You know you didn’t. You made a difficult choice.
Amalia True: She doesn’t know that. I still hardly remember her. Makes it worse, somehow.

Horatio Cousens: Right, you tried to bring Bonfire Annie into the fold. That’s not a difficult choice. That’s just reckless. She’s a killer, for Christ’s sake.
Amalia True: I’m a killer.
Horatio Cousens: You’re a soldier, and Penance isn’t one.
Amalia True: She will be.
Horatio Cousens: That’s a terrible fate to wish on a friend.
Amalia True: Do you think anything that’s happening has to do with what I wish?

Amalia True: Well, you know young people these days. They never listen.
Horatio Cousens: Yeah, and they’re not going to learn it from you.

Horatio Cousens: It’s not fun watching you throw yourself at danger like you think it’s going to propose. Coming here, to patch you up over and over.
Amalia True: It could be fun.
Horatio Cousens: Amalia, we’ve been through this.
Amalia True: It was fun. It was more than fun.

Amalia True: Do you think it’s easy for me?
Horatio Cousens: Nothing’s easy for Amalia True. She has the weight of the world.
Amalia True: I’m sorry I can’t be more generous about being your mistake.

Amalia True: Waiting is only painful when you’re not doing anything else.
Penance Adair: The gospel of Amalia True, patron saint of patience, and ironically, fist-punching.

Amalia True: Miss Adair, you’re surprisingly sprightly this morning.
Penance Adair: I had a vision in the night in between vomits.

Amalia True: Penance Adair, have you just invented the amplifier?
Penance Adair: Ah, you gave it away! And you gave it a very dull name. I’ll be calling it The Brightener.
Penance Adair: [to Mary] It’s a play on words involving your name.

Amalia True: [to Mary] Just because you can enjoy yourself, and be entertaining, doesn’t mean you weren’t kidnapped a week ago.

Mary Brighton: Has there been any word of Maladie?
Amalia True: I imagine she’s licking her wounds. Or punching them.

Mary Brighton: You’re keeping secrets.
Amalia True: Every woman keeps secrets. Every Touched woman keeps a great deal more.
Mary Brighton: That’s a dodge.
Amalia True: Was there a question?

Amalia True: What is it you’re looking for? A conspiracy? A cult? I’m not asking you to cut off your toes.
Mary Brighton: I’m looking for you.
Amalia True: I’m right here.
Mary Brighton: Are you?

Amalia True: Three years ago, I woke up knowing things that I shouldn’t, and was declared insane. Which for a time, I thought I was. So, yes. I keep secrets. I also drink when I shouldn’t, fight when I needn’t, and f*** men whose names I do not learn. I get nervous in crowds. I see things that aren’t there. When I meet someone, the first thing I think of is how to kill them. I do have some good qualities. I genuinely like horses.

Mary Brighton: [to Amalia] What is it you know that you shouldn’t? You want me to sing so that more people will come here? Maybe I’m struggling because I don’t know if they should.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Hugo, this isn’t a schoolyard prank. There are things being done here that are illegal. And quite possibly immoral.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: What I did that night was not the conduct of a gentleman, I know.
But we didn’t break any laws. That I know of.
Hugo Swan: What you did, they don’t have laws for.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Then I didn’t break any.

Mrs. Beechum: [to Massen] Unions is just organized laziness, if you don’t mind my saying. Should be grateful for a wage and your guiding hand.

Lord Massen: The degradation of progress. We build homes to keep other people out, and then build machines to let them all in.

Lord Massen: Because the measure of a thing’s worth is how quickly it arrives.

Penance Adair: Can you believe that man? “Electronics is nothing for a girl to be dabbling in.” Have you ever seen me dabble, Myrtle? I’ll dabble his face.

The Colonel: [to Horatio] I never lie. I never boast. As it happens, a wealthy patient is waiting for you within. A new client, of whom you’re not remotely afraid.
Maladie: Hush, Colonel. Don’t take away his fear. He might need it.

Horatio Cousens: Do you want to show me the wound?
Maladie: Yes, sir, doctor, sir. It’s a persistent little pinhole. Kiss it better.
Horatio Cousens: There’s still a bullet fragment in there. I’ll have to take it out before I can help you. This is going to hurt.
Maladie: Promise?

Frank Mundi: One day, you’re going to walk into a place that don’t think you’re charming. Don’t think your money’s charming.
Hugo Swan: My money is adorable.

Hugo Swan: I’m worked to the bone, Inspector. Whilst I’ve had nothing of worth from you about Amalia True, or The Orphanage. Do you know what it cost to arrange that raid?
Frank Mundi: What do you think I’ll find, hmm? A bunch of girls longing to leave the safety of their community to come whoring for you?
Hugo Swan: A few. You do have a talent for it.

Hugo Swan: Amalia True. I do not believe she has any interest in giving the Touched a safe haven. Do you?
Frank Mundi: No. Seeing the future, that ain’t her whole story. She has a purpose.

Hugo Swan: Look at you. A shadow afraid of shadows. Such a lonely life.
Frank Mundi: Yeah? Where are all your friends then?

Clara: My toes itch.
The Colonel: The ones you’ve got, or the ones you haven’t?
Clara: Both.

Lucy Best: [referring to the man Amalia just killed] F*** a drumstick, he’s ugly.

Mary Brighton: Frank, you’re a good man. But there’s a part of you that you hate. I won’t say any more. Except that, I will never hate you. Not for who you are. You’ll always be the man that I call when there’s trouble, and when there’s not trouble, I guess.

Amalia True: I love them, you know.
Penance Adair: Who?
Amalia True: Dresses. I think they’re just wonderful.

Annie Carbey:  [referring to Amalia] So is this what we can expect? A leader who doesn’t lead?
Horatio Cousens: Are you looking to fill that position?
Annie Carbey:  She does have the nicest room.

Annie Carbey:  You know True should have been there. I’ve shown more respect for Mary, and I’m her kidnapper.
Horatio Cousens: Amalia misses the point of things, as often as not. But if that chair is warm when she sits in it, she’ll know why.
Annie Carbey:  You don’t think I can best her?
Horatio Cousens: I don’t think you want her job. It’s very draining.

Horatio Cousens: We don’t want more violence.
Annie Carbey:  This is London, Doctor. There’s always more.
Horatio Cousens: I still don’t see how you can go from working for Maladie, to being here with Amalia.
Annie Carbey:  You really think they’re that different?

Penance Adair: True still not back? I swear to Jesus, I would…
Amalia True: Have you not finished discussing my faults? Come on, Penance. Jesus awaits.
Penance Adair: He already knows what I was going to say. And I’ll add a few Hail Marys for that later.

Amalia True: [imitating Penance] Ah, Lord, Mary Brighton trusted you, and you failed her.
Penance Adair: Is that what you think?
Amalia True: I think the longer we wait to find the killer, the greater the chance we never do.

Penance Adair: True, I can’t imagine how many funerals you’ve been to, but…
Amalia True: None. We don’t do that when I’m from. We don’t have enough time and we don’t have enough ground.

Penance Adair: You know better than anyone what pain does when you don’t make time for it.
Amalia True: All time does is run out.

Amalia True: I was left here, completely alone, with nothing but a mission I was never actually given. No orders, no objectives. They left me here, and they f***ed right off. Maybe they died. Who cares? I’m here, where a woman can be killed just for having a voice, which will be the world’s f***ing epitaph if I can’t do something other than make it worse.
Penance Adair: I know your burdens, True. But is vengeance going to make the world better?

Amalia True: Cops, the church, the Purists, and our masked freaks. There’s no shortage of people who hate us. But only a few are powerful or inventive enough to have gotten Kroos out of prison undetected.

Annie Carbey:  Wait, does that mean Massen killed Mary? Did the ripplings tell you that?
Amalia True: They tell me I don’t get to plan my own day. They’re not treasure maps.

Penance Adair: Mary’s death needs to be answered, and not with another death. And it’s not just about what’s right. We’re hated right now. Our first response cannot be hate. We’ll be lined up in the streets.
Annie Carbey:  And they may have killed Mary exactly for that purpose. Make us do something they can rain hell on us for.
Penance Adair: See? Annie agrees, and she’s terrible.

Horatio Cousens: Now, Miss Bidlow, she means well, and I know she does good work for the Touched, but it doesn’t make her a friend.
Amalia True: So she goes on the list, with her terrible, bird-watching brother.
Penance Adair: He’s the ringleader. You know, he likes birds. Birds are stupid.
Amalia True: And it’s high time you told him that.

Desirée Blodgett: Sometimes pretending you feel good makes you feel better. Trust me.

Hugo Swan: It’s no secret that you loathe me.
Frank Mundi: That don’t mean you’re innocent.

Hugo Swan: Are we done?
Frank Mundi: Oh, we’re done, Swann. Across the board. And our little arrangement, my debt, is done. Because I got something over you now. I don’t f***ing care.

Penance Adair: Oh, you are a monster. And you’re going to go to prison. I don’t care how rich you are.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: What’s happening? What’s happening?! I don’t know what’s happening.
Penance Adair: You just confessed to the murder of Mary Brighton, and I made a wax recording of it.

Penance Adair: You didn’t kill Mary?
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Is that bad? It’s…
Penance Adair: Of course you didn’t. You’re as gentle as a blush. But you’re still terrible.

Penance Adair: I cried, which seems petty now to think about, but I don’t have a lot of experience with men. Certainly not of your class, which from what I’ve seen…
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: No, nobody is quite as barbaric as the well-to-do. Your Lucy had me figured out.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Miss Adair, I would give anything if you would erase that day from your mind.
Penance Adair: That’s not how it works.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: No. No. Nor should it be.

Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Remember my transgressions, so that I may re-earn your trust honestly, over time. If we are to be acquainted, I shall endeavor… No, no, no, no! Damn acquaintance. Acquaintance is exhausting. I just, I want to be your friend, Miss Adair. I want to become your friend.

Penance Adair: Do you think your sister did the murder then?
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: What?

Annie Carbey: Just keep your head down.
Nimble: Never have, never will.

Lord Massen: You think that I had something to do with your friend’s death.
Amalia True: Did you? It would save me such a lot of time.
Lord Massen: I’m going to have to disappoint you, I’m afraid. No one at the club is vying for credit either, though I will keep an ear out.

Amalia True: Whoever did have Mary Brighton killed was making a public statement.
Lord Massen: Like stepping on stage and murdering six people.
Amalia True: A different message.
Lord Massen: The same messenger.

Amalia True: You’ll take the part of the mastermind behind Mary’s death.
Lord Massen: And you’ll be the irate inspector?
Amalia True: I’ll be Mary. Why would you want me dead?
Lord Massen: I doubt that I do. I’m not entirely clear what your “turn” is. A beacon of some sort? Anyway, benign, and you’re an inoffensive woman. No history of radicalism, I assume.

Amalia True: So why me? Why not kill that widow, Mrs. True? She’s a willful creature, and the leader of this motley coven.
Lord Massen: Which means she must have enemies. Her death might be tragic, but perhaps not unexpected. You, on the other hand, are a pure and blameless woman.
Amalia True: And all in white, no less. A statuesque beauty with a mass of auburn hair, and great shining eyes. Christ, I’m not just a beacon. I genuinely resemble a lighthouse.

Amalia True: It isn’t just a warning. It’s about hope. It’s about pulling the heart out of the orphans.
Lord Massen: I would think so. In fact, I would say, Miss Brighton, that you are a casualty of war.
Amalia True: So we’re at war.

Lord Massen: If I am your killer revealed, behold the lion, Great Britain. An empire unparalleled, and unmerciful in its self-preservation.
Amalia True: My enemy is England. Well, that narrows it down. Thank God I came.
Lord Massen: I said your killer. Your enemy, Miss Brighton, is the scum who caused this plague, the fools who call it power, and the woman who should have known what would happen to you in that park. Unless, of course, she did.

Horatio Cousens: [referring to Massen] So he confessed without confessing.
Amalia True: It was honestly impressive.

Amalia True: [referring to Massen] Even if he gave the order, he’s part of something much bigger. Pull out one piece, it would be replaced in a day.
Amalia True: [as Penance looks at her disapprovingly] And damn it, it’s wrong. He’s a human being who’s alive, damn it.

Annie Carbey:  We still need a response. If we let murder slide, it will only slide down. Whatever’s next will be worse.
Horatio Cousens: Even I know that’s true.

Frank Mundi: What do you want?
Maladie: I want everyone to stop lying. Can you see to that?
Frank Mundi: I will try.
Maladie: I have to think about my reputation. Things never come back when they go away.

Amalia True: Christ, it was all already there. The questions, the absences, the money you swore you didn’t steal, so we’d assume you did.
Lucy Best: I figured that’d get a bit tired.
Amalia True: You clean my study, but you can’t make your own bed. I am such an idiot.

Lucy Best: What do you want, True?
Amalia True: I want it to be someone else!

Amalia True: You were the first woman, the first woman to walk through those doors! The one I could lean on instead of protecting, that understood the world the way that I do.
Lucy Best: You don’t know f*** about the world. All your war stories. You don’t know which war. Oh, oh, it’s awful. Because you’ve left bodies on the field, and you’re all damaged.

Lucy Best: It’s been three years since I’ve touched another person. And Massen, he says he’ll find a cure.
Amalia True: Of course he tells you that.
Lucy Best: And what are you telling us? A better world? How many of your precious orphans would be lining up to be free of your better world if they had half a chance?

Amalia True: It wasn’t supposed to be like this. I don’t know what happened.
Lucy Best: How do you know how it’s supposed to be? Did you do this? Did you make this nightmare?
Amalia True: I just got left behind.
Lucy Best: Of course you got left behind. What good are you? You, a leader?

Amalia True: Your boss told me today that we’re at war. I didn’t start it. I didn’t even volunteer. But he’s right. I hope he told you what happens to spies during wartime.
Lucy Best: Is that what this is? There’s rules of engagement. And not just you needing to take your failure out on someone.

Lucy Best: [as Amalia pulls out her gun] You think Penance will forgive you for this? You think Mary would?
Amalia True: And that’s where you lose me.

Maladie: This wasn’t the plan. Well, it was your plan, wasn’t it? I’m just your instrument. I’ve always been your instrument. Why won’t you play me? Why?

Amalia True: She said I had no idea what anyone is going through here. I hate that she’s right. But I can’t get close to them. Lucy’s proof of that.

Amalia True: [to Penance] You are the strangest person I’ve ever met. It’s why you’re the one I trust.

Penance Adair: Augie Bidlow’s Touched. Birds. He sort of controls them.
Amalia True: I’ll be damned. Do you think that’s why Lavinia took up the cause?
Penance Adair: He’s certain she doesn’t know. I think he’s afraid to tell her.
Amalia True: But he’s not afraid to tell you.

Amalia True: What did she say?
Harriet Kaur: [translating Mary’s son] She said, “You’re not alone.”
Amalia True: Well, I think we could all feel that.
Harriet Kaur: You, Mrs. True. She said it to you.

Harriet Kaur: [translating Mary’s son] She said to everyone, all of us, to gather, and protect each other. Because of the dark.

Harriet Kaur: Those aren’t Mary’s words, are they? That was someone else talking through her.
Penance Adair: That’s right.
Harriet Kaur: Then who? Who do we need to find?

Lavinia Bidlow: Our hopes for a cure were childish. Its power grows by the day. There’s a fever spreading through London. Do you forget we’re on the eve of a public execution? You think that’s coincidence?
Dr. Edmund Hague: I think it’s justice. When we hang someone in America, we watch.

Dr. Edmund Hague: Maladie killed great men of my profession. Friends. I may seem all numbers, but I am still a man. I am still capable of rage. Of pettiness, and hope. The two of us have been more exposed down here than anyone, but your moral compass hasn’t fluttered. I’m still capable. Neither of us has sprouted wings. This creature isn’t all-powerful. If Satan himself is in there, I doubt he’s a match for Lavinia Bidlow.

Lavinia Bidlow: We’re taking a terrible risk. It means to destroy us.
Dr. Edmund Hague: If we’ve lost hope, it already has.

Annie Carbey: Ah, so you liked it? Telling all to Desirée. Of course you did. You are so predictable.
Nimble: Hey, it’s Mrs. True’s orders. And talking to Desirée, baring the soul, among other things, it takes a weight off. Among other things.

Nimble: Men. We truly are the unfairer sex.

Harriet Kaur: They’re hanging Maladie for being Touched.

Effie Boyle (Maladie): You don’t want this hanging either.
Frank Mundi: No, I want order. I want the wicked punished and the good protected.
Effie Boyle (Maladie): Then do something besides sitting at your desk ogling the Touched women.

Effie Boyle (Maladie): I’m the only one showing the human side of the Touched. Mundi, people can print whatever they want. I am still in favor of the truth.

Lavinia Bidlow: Why don’t they just bring guns and shoot her themselves?
Male Diner: We are not murderers, madam.
Lavinia Bidlow: No, you just like to watch. At least Maladie has a work ethic.

Lavinia Bidlow: Yes, the more barbaric we humans are to each other, the more we pamper our pets.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Or maybe the more we need them.

Hugo Swan: He’s pressing charges. This is insane!
Frank Mundi: Lord Humphries was badly burned.
Hugo Swan: Bertie Humphries is a bully, and a coward, and he wasn’t burned, he was frozen. And he was frozen because he will not hear the words, “Don’t touch!”

Hugo Swan: What a strange fate. We’ve become men with offices.
Frank Mundi: Yeah. It’s like looking in a mirror.

Frank Mundi: You ain’t a man with an office. You’re a pimp with a gimmick, and you’re playing with fire.
Hugo Swan: Again, it wasn’t fire…
Frank Mundi: It was someone’s life!

Frank Mundi: [to Hugo] Tomorrow, we are going to kill a woman for the public’s entertainment. Because that’s what London is now. It is Jack the f***ing Ripper grown into a whole city. You’re in entertainment. You should come. Get in the dirt, smell the blood. Then you’ll know what’s on your hands.

Hugo Swan: Frank, why did you take a job you hate?
Frank Mundi: Because I work with the people who love it.

Effie Boyle (Maladie): Oh, I’m not after your story.
Hugo Swan: But you are after something.
Effie Boyle (Maladie): Something you can’t get me.
Hugo Swan: So it’s a challenge, is it?
Effie Boyle (Maladie): You’d like that.
Hugo Swan: I’d like it more over a plate of oysters at Pegini’s.
Effie Boyle (Maladie): We’re both much too busy to spend the afternoon seeing who gets to use who, but there is something you can do for me.

Penance Adair: That bird seemed awful keen on my ablutions.
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Well, I mean, it’s a bird. I didn’t even know you were bathing, and that was a redwing, anyway. They never listen to a word, I think.

Penance Adair: It’s just, the madness of all this. It’s as though sin is in bloom. People doing what they oughtn’t, or doing nothing. It’s like we’re being tested, but it’s that dream where the test’s over, and you’ve not found your pencils.

Penance Adair: But you’re telling me the truth?
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: I would never betray your trust.
Penance Adair: Wouldn’t sneak a quick glance at what a husband’s meant to see?
Augustus ‘Augie’ Bidlow: Never.
Penance Adair: Well, is my naked frame a source of dullness then?

Declan Orrun: You mustn’t rush, my sprouts. It ain’t a hanging if she don’t swing.

Declan Orrun: If I ever crash, I like a nice fat horse in front of me to take the brunt.

Declan Orrun: What the f*** do you want?
Lord Massen: I want London under control.
Declan Orrun: Meaning yours.
Lord Massen: Meaning not overrun by monsters.

Declan Orrun: [to Massen] There’s nothing natural about order, Gilly. There’s chaos. Savagery. And then there’s men like us, who carve out just enough order to make ourselves absolutely necessary. You didn’t come here because you’re afraid of the pretty ladies. You just get ugly men to murder them.

Lord Massen: We have a common enemy. Someone, some group, is rewriting the rules of reality. If we don’t find a way to control it…
Declan Orrun: You know why they call me the Beggar King? Hmm? Because I had f***-all, and men followed me anyway. The Touched are going to change things. So did the f***ing longbow. I’ll adapt.

Lord Massen: [to Declan] It’s become apparent to me that if London is going to be saved from chaos, it needs to see chaos. What I want from you is just enough.

Penance Adair: [referring to Amalia killing Lucy] No, you would never.
Amalia True: No, I would. I wanted to. That’s how you know I didn’t. And, yes, I miss Lucy too.

Penance Adair: Well, what about forgiveness? I mean, forgiveness still exists in the world, doesn’t it? Or did we come up with a cure? Was kindness just germs all along?

Penance Adair: It’s just, I always say that I won’t make weapons. But most of my gimcracks, they could kill someone in the wrong circumstances.
Amalia True: So could a candlestick. A pail of water.
Penance Adair: They’re violent things, my engines. Sometimes energy itself, it just seems relentless.

Amalia True: How did you sleep?
Penance Adair: Standing up, with my eyes open. And working. I didn’t sleep.

Amalia True: This is the legal execution of a genuine threat who is also violently unhappy.
Penance Adair: So it’s a mercy killing.
Amalia True: Sometimes it’s a mercy.
Penance Adair: But this time it’s a lynching. For them to crow at, and for us to expect. It’s a noose in a row of nooses, next to a row of nooses.

Amalia True: If you get hurt, and you will get hurt…
Penance Adair: Oh, yes. Because I know, I’m a child. I’ve not been in battle. I’ve not killed and eaten a dozen fierce men.
Amalia True: I also haven’t.

Penance Adair: But I am in the world. I am a part of God’s world. And I don’t believe He means for us to go backwards, killing each other for sport.
Amalia True: We’ll go save a dozen people tomorrow. Children.
Penance Adair: That’s not the point.
Amalia True: Kittens?

Penance Adair: Something inside me broke. It snapped like a rib, True, and it hurts. I will not live with the thought that I ignored that sign.

Amalia True: There are things you can’t come back from.
Penance Adair: That’s a theory you’re awful anxious not to test.

Penance Adair: It’s about the girls. All of them, in here and all out there. Not just their safety. It’s about how they see the world. A part of them breaks, or goes quiet for always when the world turns beastly. When we just let it.

Amalia True: The future of the world depends on what I’m doing.
Penance Adair: The future of the world depends on the present. Isn’t that why you’re here?
Amalia True: I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know how it got this far, or what I’m doing next. I know what I’m not doing. I’m not mistaking my pain for an idea.

Penance Adair: I’m going to the square to stop that hanging. I’m going to save Maladie. That’s mad, right? Acting like she’s still a child of God. Well, we all are. We all have a soul, no matter what viciousness people are spewing. I am going to pluck Maladie right from out their bigoted claws, and let the world see that the Touched are not here to be slaughtered for show. I have practiced saying this, and I feel sweaty!

Annie Carbey: [to Penance] I always assumed Maladie had a plan to escape. Never guessed it was you.

Lord Massen: Developed a taste for blood, have you?
Hugo Swan: Blood, yes. Just not blue.

Penance Adair: [after Maladie seemingly hangs herself] She didn’t want to be rescued.
Frank Mundi: No. She wanted people to see. An audience. She’s going to kill us. Everyone who came to see her die.

General Pecking: What the hell’s happening?
Lord Massen: F***ing electricity.

Penance Adair: Go alright?
Amalia True: [nods] You?
Penance Adair: It was a riot.

Knitter: There’s still time. Nobody has to die.
Stripe: Yeah. Feel like someone’s going to.

Knitter: You know what? You win.
Stripe: What did I win?
Knitter: Whatever you want. Whatever’s here that’s going to make you step up and give a s**t.

Stripe: [referring the Galanthi] Why didn’t they come before? What about the five billion people that your great rainosaurs came too late to save?
Knitter: They’re not gods.
Stripe: Then stop praying to them.

Knitter: Can you do one thing for me? Can you just hope that we make it right? I’m not afraid to fight, if that’s what it takes. But it has to be for a purpose. It has to matter. To you.
Stripe: You don’t get to ask that.
Knitter: I just did.
Stripe: No. You cannot.

Stripe: I am not going to die waiting on a savior.
Knitter: You’re just really insistent that we have to die.
Stripe: Because this close is where we always end up. It’s where we all fold. This close, change is too scary, even for the people who fight for it.

Knitter: I’ve done things that you can’t imagine. And the spores, they didn’t make me brilliant, or brainwashed. They were a question. And it turns out that nothing will crack this world harder than one gentle question. So, yes. I hope, for a better world.

Knitter: [to Stripe] You were right. It was always going to end like this.

Stripe: [as Knitter is dying] The Galanthi is going back for help. Believe me, okay? I believe there’s hope. Please hope.

Gert: It’s Varnum you’re mooning over. He’s not got the money to marry. Has he even said he would if he could?
Amalia True: He’s made no kind of promise.
Gert: I like him the better for that. You’ve got to be thinking of your future, Molly. Your real future. Not the one that’s in your head.

Gert: [referring to Varnum, after Amalia’s married Thomas] Asked after you.
Amalia True: After me?
Gert: Invited us all to attend his housewarming, sweet boy. Of course his wife’s seven months in, and a barren woman’s bad luck in an expectant home, so I just thanked him for you. That’s the man you should have gone after. I always said.

Amalia True: Well, God makes His plans, so here we are.
Dr. Campbell: Sometimes it feels like God made His plans long before He met us.

Amalia True: [after she commits suicide and Strip finds herself in her body] What are the f***ing rules? Because this “Christmas Carol” crap is so specific to my three-term focus.
Matron: [slaps her twice] You will keep a civil tongue in this house. You will be meek and grateful to God that you have been delivered from your own sinful act.
Amalia True: And now I know the rules.

Amalia True: [to Maladie] You know, Sarah, a friend’s the one you trust to trust you back.

Amalia True: I’m a Stripe. I go, and I do. And no one said “go”. I got no mission. I should be dead. Why aren’t I dead? Why are my hands so tiny?

Mrs. Hundley: I highly doubt the Lord Himself presented to you as a great light.
Maladie: I know what I saw.
Mrs. Hundley: You’re an unreliable witness, my dear. You’re in an asylum.
Amalia True: So are you.

Horatio Cousens: You seem to have avoided infection, despite the Thames best efforts.
Amalia True: Believe it or not, I’ve been in worse.

Horatio Cousens: Are you from America?
Amalia True: South Coast Canada. Or, yes. Or, no. I’m a baker.

Amalia True: Has there been anything about a light in the sky, from the day I ended up here? Someone saw, or in the news?
Horatio Cousens: Is that why you went in the river? A light?
Amalia True: No, I think it’s why I came out. Has anyone been better? Smart, or compassionate, or… You know what? Never mind. I sound like I belong in this place.

Horatio Cousens: [referring to his own powers] Aliens from the future gave us magic powers. It was staring me in the face.
Amalia True: Well, you’ve seen ailments you can’t explain last few weeks, yeah?
Horatio Cousens: Here in the ward, yes. But I’m not…
Amalia True: Insane?
Horatio Cousens: A woman.

Amalia True: The spores don’t affect everyone they hit. I never understood why. But they don’t normally cause random powers. There’s a pattern I’m missing.

Amalia True: Should I trust you? Do you think I’m insane?
Horatio Cousens: Maybe. Maybe your alien was.

Amalia True: No one’s spored, empathically enhanced. There’s no one here to guide us. To say here’s what needs to change.

Amalia True: I was a mistake. A mean joke. I’m a Stripe. I’m not good. I’ve got issues you literally don’t have names for yet. I might be why the spores were s**t.

Amalia True: Why would it put me in this? Yeah, this doughy little frame. It’s perfect. I got world-class tits, but I can’t see over a chair.
Horatio Cousens: It’s a good frame. And nobody was using it.

Amalia True: I got to get out of this place.
Horatio Cousens: Then you might not want to say “f***” quite so often. And give me back my morphine.
Amalia True: F***!

Amalia True: You didn’t say anything, did you? About us, or the mission?
Maladie: You don’t have to ask me that. You’re the one I trust to trust me back.

Dr. Edmund Hague: Well, first of all, that you two may be among the Touched. That’s what they’re calling these people who’ve blossomed these last few months. Touched.
Maladie: They called me that already.

Dr. Edmund Hague: They tell me that you can see the future.
Amalia True: No, I feel it. Suddenly. Like I’m falling down. But I’m not. And then later, I do.

Lavinia Bidlow: You had every reason to expect a positive outcome from the hearing.
Amalia True: I had no reason to expect a positive outcome.
Lavinia Bidlow: Because of your “turn”? Did you see the coming rejection?

Amalia True: I practically run the place. For free. If you have any head for numbers, you can do the lack of maths.
Lavinia Bidlow: I have an extraordinary head for numbers. I also know that people will often do everything in their power to keep from getting the thing they want.

Horatio Cousens: [referring to the building] What do you think?
Amalia True: I think I am starting to like this body after all. Oh, the place. It’s dreary as f***. And it’s definitely filled with the angry ghosts of murdered children.

Horatio Cousens: [referring to the orphanage] Possible charges?
Amalia True: Some Irish girl. I think she builds things. Not Patience, but something weird. Sadness O’Religionface. I don’t know. God, I hope she drinks.

Horatio Cousens: I thought you were boasting before. But you might actually be the worst person for this job.
Amalia True: No, I’m going to be great. I’m going to bring us all harmony and peace.

Amalia True: [after finding the Galanthi] I told everyone you were going to save them. Save the world. That you’re hope. But you’re not. Not for Lucy. Not for Mary. And Sarah? What a team, you and me, except no you. No wisdom. No plan. Just people to leave behind, over, and over, and… I’m doing it now. I left Penance because you said, “Find me.” I left my heart to come talk to you. Talk to me!

Amalia True: [to the Galanthi] Why are you hiding? Why did it go so wrong? Was it me? Did my wreck of a brain cause all this s**t? I woke up in this world, in this body that I can’t fit into. Who is this? Who the f*** am I? You should have brought Knitter. She believed. And I took that from her. She died in despair. My despair. It should have been anyone else. Someone not broken. Someone taller.

Penance Adair: [Galanthi shows Amalia the future] It is upsetting. The future being so grim for everyone. But we’ll just change it all up.
Amalia True: You make it sound so simple.
Penance Adair: No. It’s work. It’s a life’s work. Like as not to drive us mad, or get us killed. And we’ll never know if we’d done enough, or done it right. But what in the world is as rare and nourishing as a life’s work? As I see it, God gave me a gift. And by way of recompense, He’s given me another.
Amalia True: Any idea what we do next?

Myrtle Haplisch: [Galanthi shows Amalia the future] Oh, Amalia. This is a long time from that little cave. This I will need you to forget.

Amalia True: I didn’t find out who our enemy is.
Penance Adair: But you found something out.
Amalia True: It’s time to tell them. Everything. The future. The Galanthi. The fight that’s coming.
Penance Adair: Feels right.

Amalia True: My name is Zephyr. Zephyr Alexis Navine.
Penance Adair: Well, I’m very pleased to meet you.
Amalia True: Me too.