Chosen Ones (The Chosen Ones, #1)

by Veronica Roth

There were harsher, more violent forms of it too, but smiles weren’t weapons against them.

Some of them shouted her name, and she ignored them, like she always did. Matt’s weapons were generosity, kindness, social grace. Sloane’s were detachment, a tall stature, and a relentlessly flat affect.

And she would tarnish too. Always famous but always fading, the way old movie stars were, carrying ghosts of their younger selves in their faces. It was a strange thing, to know with certainty that you had peaked.

“I’m tired of being special,” Albie said with a shaky laugh. “I’m tired of being celebrated for the worst thing that ever happened to me.”

And maybe that was the entire problem with them—he didn’t see her; he saw who she could be with a few adjustments, and all she wanted was to stay busted and be left alone.

Sometimes Sloane wondered if the world had been worth saving.

It was not the first time she had been called that word, and it wouldn’t be the last, but there was a certain violence in it—the way it made her anger small and petty, the way it reduced her entire self to some narrow, foolish thing.

“What?” she said, and he just shook his head and drove on, going as fast as the little cart could carry them.

Sometimes she felt like Albie was the only person in the world who knew her. And it was because he wanted nothing from her, not sex, not love, not secrets. There was no currency between them.

We are animals, after all. And don’t let your housecat fool you into thinking that animals are nothing more than fuzzy, whiskered creatures who wish us no ill. Nature is bloody, and as a whole, it favors strength over compassion.

“Yes,” Aelia said. “This building is primarily an academic institution, the Cordus Center for Advanced Magical Innovation and Learning.” “Camel,” Nero said. “Camel?” Sloane frowned. “C-A-M-I-L,” Nero said, “or, as the students fondly call it, the Camel.”

“I didn’t say you were normal, just . . . better. Steadier.” “Well,” Sloane replied, “I know how to do this. Fight the big bad, dodge the government goons. Same script, different movie.”

All she could think about was how everything that happened now—including getting pulled into a parallel dimension—would be After Albie. Like a new era. Sloane AA. Some things split your life in half.

In other words, magic is a mirror. It reflects us back to ourselves, and we may not always like what we see.

She knew that scissors wouldn’t do her any good against either ridiculously powerful sorcerers or walking corpses—as Mox had pointed out when he saw her take them—but she hated to be without tools.

“A humdrum girl in a magical world,” Ziva wheezed. “What are you going to do, trim my fingernails?” “Underestimating my resourcefulness didn’t work out so great for you last time,” Sloane said. “Remember?”

“So you don’t really work at the Tankard, I take it?” she said. “I do, actually,” he said brightly. “Weekends and the occasional mid-week shift.”

“How does that work with . . .” Sloane paused. “Your other job?” “My other job is only demanding at certain times,” Mox said. “And it doesn’t pay very well.”

“You don’t do a lot of traveling,” she said to him once they were seated. Her words found a shape in the air, like smoke. “I do magic,” he said, and he chewed his thumbnail. “Never been good at the other stuff.” “Like . . . basic existence?”

“Feels like you’re trying to take me apart,” he said without looking away from the window. “You’re hard to figure out,” she said. He raised his eyebrows. “So are you.” “No, I’m not.” Sloane shook her head. “You just haven’t been to my world.”

“You said you were at a funeral when you were brought here,” he said. “Whose was it?” It had been a long time since she had thought about Albie. He crept into her mind, of course, when she wasn’t vigilant. In unguarded moments before she fell asleep or when she woke up thinking about what she might tell him, only to realize she would not be telling him anything ever again. But she had not tried to think of him.

You don’t pick the act and then force the desire. You know the desire—the exact shade of it—and then choose the act accordingly.”

At least stitching up zombie soldiers was distracting.

I mean, not everyone would be able to stomach such a activity

“Hey,” the man grunted. “Just got this thing clean.” “Well,” Sloane said, scowling, “it’s my first time sewing rotten flesh back together, so you’ll have to forgive me being a little clumsy about it.” “ ’S not rotten,” the man said. “ ’S rotting.” Ziva’s teeth whistled as she laughed. “Don’t take offense, Pete. She’s a little wound up right now.” Sloane gritted her teeth and tied off the last stitch. She didn’t bother to keep it neat. Pete—what a ridiculous name for a zombie.

Oh stop being a baby, Pete 😒

They were both giving her odd looks. “Where,” Ziva said to Mox, “did you find this fucking nerd?”

😂😂😂😂🤣

Knowing magic was about knowing yourself, she thought. If you could be honest with yourself, you could better predict what your magic could do. Only how was anyone supposed to know themselves that way?

“Nobody ever prepared me for what came after. They just assumed I would never find out.”

Z😢