I apologize for asking the obvious, but I have learned in matters magical to always state what I think is happening, because it so often is not what … - Michael Kurland

Lord Darcy nodded. “It is difficult to look for something that you hope doesn’t exist,” he said. “I suppose we can all use the practice.”

Life and the life processes are but an unimportant part of the whole that is the universe; intelligence and the designs of intelligence but a pattern drawn on sand. And yet that pattern which is life can pull into its weave much that is not of life, and give it a reason, a function, and a purpose that transcends the life that made it, in all physical measures of mass, distance, and duration.
So is entropy thwarted in some small measure, in random pockets throughout the universe.

My Lord, I am not a superstitious man," Master Sean said. "Being a sorcerer leaves little room for superstition. A superstitious magician is unable to manipulate symbols properly, and symbolism is a large part of magic.