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What if I mess up?"" Oh, you will. You'll mess up, you'll make mistakes, you'll break things. Some you'll be able to piece together, and others you'll lose. That's all a given. But there's only one thing you have to do for me."" What's that?"" Stay alive long enough to mess up again.Victoria Schwab
2
You wanted to feel alive, right? It doesn't matter if you're monster or human. Living hurts.Victoria Schwab
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She cracked a smile. "So what's your poison" He sighed dramatically, and let the truth tumble off his tongue. "Life." "Ah, " she said ruefully. "That'll kill you.Victoria Schwab
4
People were messy. They were defined not only by what they'd done, but by what they would have done, under different circumstances, molded as much by their regrets as their actions, choices they stood by and those they wished they could undo. Of course, there was no going back - time only moved forward - but people could change. For worse. And for better. It wasn't easy. The world was complicated. Life was hard. And so often, living hurt. So make it worth the pain. .Victoria Schwab
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I’ve been thinking.” “A dangerous pursuit.” “Indeed.Victoria Schwab
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What are you?" she asked. "A monster, " said Kell hoarsely. "You'd better let me go." The girl gave a small, mocking laugh. "Monsters don't faint in the presence of ladies." "Ladies don't dress like men and pick pockets, " retorted Kell. Her smile only sharpened. "What are you really?" "Tied to your bed, " said Kell matter-of-factly. "And?" His brow furrowed. "And in trouble.Victoria Schwab
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Lying is easy. But it's lonely."" What do you mean?"" When you lie to everyone about everything, what's left? What's true?"" Nothing, " I say." Exactly.Victoria Schwab
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I am Sunai, ” he said. “I am holy fire. And if I have to burn the world to cleanse it, so help me, I will.Victoria Schwab
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Da used to say that lies were easy, but trust was hard. Trust is like faith: it can turn people into believers, but every time it's lost, trust becomes harder and harder to win back.Victoria Schwab
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I am a man, not a movement, ” he said. “But if a movement is what it takes to end this war, then I will play my part.Victoria Schwab
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I mean, most people want to escape. Get out of their heads. Out of their lives. Stories are the easiest way to do that.Victoria Schwab
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Yeah, I mean, most people want to escape. Get out of their heads. Out of their lives. Stories are the easiest way to do that.Victoria Schwab
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Don’t tell me you’re afraid of heights, ” she said, shimmying along the edge.“ Not heights, ” he murmured. “Just falling.Victoria Schwab
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He leans in, resting his weathered hand on the bed. "Treat all the bad things like dreams, Kenzie. That way, no matter how scary or dark they get, you just have to survive until you wake up.Victoria Schwab
15
He was like one of those pictures full of small errors, the kind you could only pick out by searching the image from every angle, and even then, a few always slipped by. On the surface, Eli seemed perfectly normal, but now and then Victor would catch a crack, a sideways glance, a moment when his roommate's face and his words, his look and his meaning, would not line up. Those fleeting slices fascinated Victor. It was like watching two people, one hiding in the other's skin. And their skin was always too dry, on the verge of cracking and showing the color of the thing beneath.Victoria Schwab
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Sing you a song and steal your soul.Victoria Schwab
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His gaze settles on the discarded book. He leans, reaching until his fingertips graze Dante's Inferno, still on its bed of folded sheets. "What have we here?" he asks." Required reading, " I say." It's a shame they do that, " he says, thumbing through the pages. "Requirement ruins even the best of books.Victoria Schwab
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Listen to me, ” he said, pulling off his coat. “You need to stay awake.” She almost laughed, a shallow chuckle cut short by pain. He tore the lining from the Colton jacket. “What’s so funny?”“ You’re a really shitty monster, August Flynn.Victoria Schwab
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Do you ever wonder why music brings a soul to surface? What makes beauty work as well as pain?Victoria Schwab
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You really are like him, your father."" I can't tell whether you think that's good or bad."" What does it matter? It's simply true.Victoria Schwab
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...something more than the sum of its parts-Victoria Schwab
22
Everything that rises will fall. Empires, societies, governments. None of them lasts forever. Why? Because even though they are the products of change, they become resistant to change. The longer a society survives, the more it clings to its power, and the more it resists progress. The more it resists progress- resists change- the more its ciizens demand it. In response, the society tighten its grip, desperate to maintain control. It's afraid of losing its hold.Victoria Schwab
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Doubt is like a current you have to swim against, one that saps your strength.Victoria Schwab
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But the fact is, dreams catch us with our armor off.Victoria Schwab
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Wesley's touch lingers on my skin. His music echoes through my head. I remind myself as I scrub my skin that we are both liars and con artists. That we will always have secrets, some that bind us and some that cut between us, slicing us into pieces.Victoria Schwab
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Everything hurts. I don't know how to make it stop. It hurts when I breathe. It hurts when I think. I feel like I'm drowning, and it's my fault, and I don't know how to be okay. I don't know if I CAN be okay. I don't know if I should be allowed to be okay.Victoria Schwab
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The only way to truly record a person is not in words, not in still frames, but in bone and skin and memory.Victoria Schwab
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There are no monsters in the dark.Victoria Schwab
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We do it, Jackson, because compassion must be louder than pride.Victoria Schwab
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Imagine a place where the dead rest on shelves like books.Victoria Schwab
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The worse thing you can do in a fight is stop moving. When someone attacks, they create force, movement, momentum, but you'll be okay as long as you can see and feel the direction of that force and travel with it.Victoria Schwab
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Ignorance may be bliss, but only if it outweighs curiosity. Curiosity is a gateway drug to sympathy.Victoria Schwab
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The first trick to lying is to tell the truth as often as possible. If out start lying about everything, big and small, it becomes impossible to keep things straight and you'll get caught. Once suspicion is planted it becomes exponentially harder to sell the next lie.Victoria Schwab
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He manages a sad smile. “An omission is not the same thing as a lie, Miss Bishop. It’s a manipulation.Victoria Schwab
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Even if surviving wasn't simple, or easy, or fair. Even if he could never be human. He wanted the chance to matter. He wanted to live.Victoria Schwab
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Kell managed an echo of her smile, and [Lila] gasped. "What's that on your face?" The smile vanished. "What?""Never mind, " she said, laughing. "It's gone.Victoria Schwab
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For one, dazzling, infinite moment, August felt like he was standing on a precipice, the end of one world and the beginning of another, a whisper and a bang.Victoria Schwab
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Cole steps forward, his fingers reaching around my shoulders, and kisses me. It is sudden and smooth and soft as air against my lips. The wind whips around us, tugging at the fabric of our clothes, but not pulling us apart. And then it's gone, the cool pressure against my lips, and my eyes are open and looking into two gray eyes like river rocks."/ That's/ what you wanted to show me?"" No, " he says, his fingers slipping down my arms as he leads me off the path and out, away from Near. "That was just in case.Victoria Schwab
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I’m willing to walk in darkness if it keeps humans in the light.Victoria Schwab
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He wondered about himself (whether he was broken, or special, or better, or worse) and about other people (whether they were really all as stupid as they seemed).Victoria Schwab
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Magda looks at me as if I've gone mad. Or I've grown up. It's kind of the same thing.Victoria Schwab
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A person chose their path. Or they made a new one.Victoria Schwab
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August stared at her, aghast. "Did I know that kissing you would bring your soul to surface? That - THAT - would have the same effect as pain or music? No, I must have missed that lesson." She stared at him, agape. "August, was that sarcasm?Victoria Schwab
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Be lost. Give up. Give In. in the end It would be better to surrender before you begin. be lost. Be lost And then you will not care if you are ever found.Victoria Schwab
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Like I said, Kenzie. Everything ends. I’m not afraid to die, ” you say with a wan smile. “I just hope I’m smart enough to stay dead.Victoria Schwab
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That's how he saw climbing, a physical exercise in positive and negative space. The vast expanse of white drawing the small, person-shaped speck into sharp relief.Victoria Schwab
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Properly buried."" Properly kept."" That is the way with witches."" And with all things.Victoria Schwab
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Well, " I ask, leaning over him, "do you wish to stay?"" I do."" And why is that, Cole?" I say, tipping toward him so that our noses nearly brush." Well, " he says with a smile, "the weather's quite nice.Victoria Schwab
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Every weakness is a place to slide a knife.Victoria Schwab
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If Verity's sins were knives, quick and vicious, then Prosperity's were poison. Slow, insidious, but just as deadly.Victoria Schwab
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Lying is easy. But it’s lonely.Victoria Schwab
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There were two kinds of monsters, the kind that hunted the streets and the kind that lived in your head. She could fight the first, but the second was more dangerous. It was always, always, always a step ahead.Victoria Schwab