Marie

“Sharpened by hate. Strengthened by love.”
― Pierce Brown, Red Rising

“Death isn't empty like you say it is. Emptiness is life without freedom, Darrow. Emptiness is living chained by fear, fear of loss, of death. I say we break those chains. Break the chains of fear and you break the chains that bind us to the Golds, to the Society. Could you imagine it? Mars could be ours. It could belong to the colonists who slaved here, died here." Her face is easier to see as the night fades through the clear roof. It is alive, on fire. "If you led the others to freedom. The things you could do, Darrow. The things you could make happen." She pauses and I see her eyes are glistening. "It chills me. You have been given so, so much, but you set your sights so low."
"You repeat the same damn points," I say bitterly. "You think a dream is worth dying for. I say it isn't. You say it's better to die on your feet. I say it's better to live on our knees."
"You're not even listening!" she snaps. "We are machine men with machine minds, machine lives …"
"And machine hearts?" I ask. "That's what I am?"
"Darrow …"
"What do you live for?" I ask her suddenly. "Is it for me? Is it for family and love? Or is it just for some dream?"
"It's not just some dream, Darrow. I live for the dream that my children will be born free. That they will be what they like. That they will own the land their father gave them."
"I live for you," I say sadly.
She kisses my cheek. "Then you must live for more.”
― Pierce Brown, Red Rising

“Death is easy when you've already tried to find it.”
― Pierce Brown, Red Rising

“I can trust you."
"How do you know?" she says again.
This is when I kiss her. I cannot give her the haemanthus. That is my heart, and it is of Mars- one of the only things born from the red soil. And it is still Eo's. But this girl, when they took her... I would have done anything to see her smirking again. Perhaps one day I'll have two hearts to give.”
― Pierce Brown, Red Rising