Ascend (The Cure Chronicles #3)

by K.A. Riley

emotions, like people, exist within a hierarchy. Some are more powerful than others, and as it turns out, joy is stronger than sorrow. Bliss outweighs pain—and the human mind, as I know all too well, has an incredible capacity for forgetting how acute our pain can be. It’s how we survive. It’s how we manage to walk away from trauma yet go on living. Without relief, we would wallow in misery all day, every day.

Hope has to be the most beautiful human expression there is.

We don’t need to storm into the Arc, guns blazing. Turns out all we needed was a girl, a red dress, and a whole lot of rage.”

If we become the thing we despise, there’s nothing left to fight for.”

But I want to be more than a weapon. I want a life, Finn. Otherwise, what are we fighting for?”

I will not breathe in the stench of death. I will not give the Duchess that satisfaction.