Color fills her cheeks, and I think it again: that Johanna Reyes might still be beautiful. Except now I think that she isn't just beautiful in spite of the scar, she's somehow beautiful with it, like Lynn with her buzzed hair, like Tobias with the memories of his father's cruelty that he wears like armor, like my mother in her plain gray clothing.

The reason the factions were evil is because there was no way out of them. They gave us the illusion of choice without actually giving us a choice.

I just wanted to thank you' he says, his voice low. 'A group of scientists told you that my genes were damaged, that there was something wrong with me - they showed you the test results that proved it. And even I started to believe it.' He touches my face, his thumb skimming my cheekbone, and his eyes are on mine, intense and insistent. 'You never believed it,' he says 'Not for a second. You always insisted I was... I don't know, whole.

Maybe forgiveness is just the continual pushing aside of bitter memories, until time dulls the hurt and anger, and the wrong is forgotten.

Valuing knowledge above all else results in a lust for power, and that leads men into dark and empty places.

But now, I am also learning this: we can be mended. We mend each other.

I am too strong to break so easily, and I become better, sharper, every time I touch him.