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Divergent
Veronica Roth

Dedication
To my mother,
who gave me the moment when Beatrice realizes how strong
her mother is and wonders how she missed it for so long

Contents
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Excerpt from Insurgent
Chapter One
Chapter Two

Acknowledgments
About the Author
Back Ad
Praise for Divergent
Books By Veronica Roth
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE

THERE IS ONE mirror in my house
...
Our faction
allows me to stand in front of it on the second day of every third month, the day my mother cuts my
hair
...
The strands fall on
the floor in a dull, blond ring
...
I note how calm
she looks and how focused she is
...
I can’t say the
same of myself
...
A lot can happen to a person’s appearance in three months
...
The other factions celebrate birthdays, but we don’t
...

“There,” she says when she pins the knot in place
...
It is too late
to look away, but instead of scolding me, she smiles at our reflection
...
Why doesn’t
she reprimand me for staring at myself?
“So today is the day,” she says
...

“Are you nervous?”
I stare into my own eyes for a moment
...
And tomorrow, at the Choosing Ceremony, I will decide on a
faction; I will decide the rest of my life; I will decide to stay with my family or abandon them
...
“The tests don’t have to change our choices
...
” She smiles
...
”
“Thank you
...
”
She kisses my cheek and slides the panel over the mirror
...
Her body is thin beneath the gray robe
...
But she must hide that
beauty in Abnegation
...
On these mornings when my brother makes breakfast, and my
father’s hand skims my hair as he reads the newspaper, and my mother hums as she clears the table—
it is on these mornings that I feel guiltiest for wanting to leave them
...
Every time it hits a patch of uneven pavement, it jostles me from side to
side, even though I’m gripping the seat to keep myself still
...
We don’t look alike
...
When he was younger, that collection of features looked strange, but now it
suits him
...

He also inherited my mother’s talent for selflessness
...

The Candor man wears a black suit with a white tie—Candor standard uniform
...

The gaps between the buildings narrow and the roads are smoother as we near the heart of the city
...
The bus passes under the elevated tracks
...
Only the Dauntless ride them
...
They
started in the middle of the city and worked their way outward until they ran out of materials
...
We don’t have a
car anyway
...
The gray robe falls from his
arm as he clutches a pole for balance
...
Candor values honesty, but our
faction, Abnegation, values selflessness
...
I grab Caleb’s arm
as I stumble over the man’s shoes
...

The Upper Levels building is the oldest of the three schools in the city: Lower Levels, Mid-Levels,
and Upper Levels
...
In front of it is a
large metal sculpture that the Dauntless climb after school, daring each other to go higher and higher
...
I was the one who ran to get the nurse
...
Caleb is not quite a year older than I am, so we are in the same year
at school
...
My muscles tighten the second we walk in
...
It is likely that we will not walk these halls again after the Choosing Ceremony—once we
choose, our new factions will be responsible for finishing our education
...
My heart rate is already elevated
...

We pause at the split in the hallway where he will go one way, toward Advanced Math, and I will
go the other, toward Faction History
...
“Are you?”
I could tell him I’ve been worried for weeks about what the aptitude test will tell me—Abnegation,
Candor, Erudite, Amity, or Dauntless?
Instead I smile and say, “Not really
...
“Well…have a good day
...
He never answered my question
...
Today the crowd has a new
kind of energy, a last day mania
...
A jacket sleeve
smacks me on the cheek
...
I lose my balance and fall
hard on the ground
...

My cheeks warm
...
A few people stopped when I fell, but none of them
offered to help me
...
This sort of thing has been
happening to others in my faction for months now—the Erudite have been releasing antagonistic
reports about Abnegation, and it has begun to affect the way we relate at school
...
But now they make me a target
...
I do this every morning
...

My father calls the Dauntless “hellions
...
Their
primary purpose is to guard the fence that surrounds our city
...

They should perplex me
...
Instead my eyes cling to them wherever they go
...
The light fixed to the front of the train
clicks on and off as the train hurtles past the school, squealing on iron rails
...
One of the
boys wraps his arm around a girl’s shoulders, laughing
...
I turn away from the window and press through the crowd to
the Faction History classroom
...
We sit at the long tables in the cafeteria, and the test administrators call
ten names at a time, one for each testing room
...

Susan’s father travels throughout the city for his job, so he has a car and drives her to and from
school every day
...

Of course not
...
The rules also say that we can’t prepare for
the test in any way, so I don’t know what to expect
...
They are laughing and shouting
and playing cards
...

A group of Amity girls in yellow and red sit in a circle on the cafeteria floor, playing some kind of
hand-slapping game involving a rhyming song
...
At the table next to them,
Candor boys make wide gestures with their hands
...

At the Abnegation table, we sit quietly and wait
...
I doubt all the Erudite want to study all the time, or that every
Candor enjoys a lively debate, but they can’t defy the norms of their factions any more than I can
...
He moves confidently toward the exit
...
He knows where he belongs, and as far as I
know, he always has
...
He scolded
me for not giving my jump rope to a little girl on the playground who didn’t have anything to play
with
...

I have tried to explain to him that my instincts are not the same as his—it didn’t even enter my mind
to give my seat to the Candor man on the bus—but he doesn’t understand
...
It is that easy for him
...

My stomach wrenches
...

He is plaster-pale
...
I open my mouth to ask him something, but the words don’t
come
...

An Abnegation volunteer speaks the next round of names
...
”
I get up because I’m supposed to, but if it were up to me, I would stay in my seat for the rest of
time
...
I follow Susan to the exit
...
We
wear the same clothes and we wear our blond hair the same way
...

Waiting for us outside the cafeteria is a row of ten rooms
...
Unlike the other rooms in the school, they are separated, not by
glass, but by mirrors
...
Susan grins
nervously at me as she walks into room 5, and I walk into room 6, where a Dauntless woman waits
for me
...
She has small, dark, angular eyes
and wears a black blazer—like a man’s suit—and jeans
...
If I didn’t feel like
my heart had migrated to my throat, I would ask her what it signifies
...

Mirrors cover the inner walls of the room
...

The ceiling glows white with light
...
It looks like a place where terrible things happen
...
”
Her hair is black and straight, but in the light I see that it is streaked with gray
...
“My name is Tori
...
The lights hurt my eyes
...
I try to focus on her and not on the wires in her
hands
...

“Never met a curious Abnegation before,” she says, raising her eyebrows at me
...
My curiosity is a mistake, a betrayal of Abnegation
values
...
Back when I got this, I figured if I always had the sun on
me, I wouldn’t be afraid of the dark
...
“You’re afraid of the dark?”
“I was afraid of the dark,” she corrects me
...
She shrugs
...
”
She stands behind me
...

She tugs wires toward her, attaching them to me, to her, to the machine behind her
...

“Drink this,” she says
...
I swallow hard
...
Just trust me
...
My eyes close
...
I stand in the school cafeteria again,
but all the long tables are empty, and I see through the glass walls that it’s snowing
...
In one is a hunk of cheese, and in the other, a knife the length of my
forearm
...
”
“Why?” I ask
...

I look over my shoulder, but no one is there
...
“What will I do with them?”
“Choose!” she yells
...
I scowl and cross my
arms
...

The baskets disappear
...
I see not a “who” but a
“what”: A dog with a pointed nose stands a few yards away from me
...
A growl gurgles from deep in its throat, and I
see why the cheese would have come in handy
...
But it’s too late now
...
I can’t wrestle it to the ground
...
I have to make a decision
...

The dog snarls, and I can almost feel the sound vibrating in my skull
...
Smelling fear leads them to attack
...

I can’t run
...
Instead I breathe in the smell of the dog’s foul breath and try not to think
about what it just ate
...

What else do I know about dogs? I shouldn’t look it in the eye
...
I
remember asking my father for a pet dog when I was young, and now, staring at the ground in front of
the dog’s paws, I can’t remember why
...
If staring into its eyes is a sign
of aggression, what’s a sign of submission?
My breaths are loud but steady
...
The last thing I want to do is lie down on the
ground in front of the dog—making its teeth level with my face—but it’s the best option I have
...
The dog creeps closer, and closer, until I feel
its warm breath on my face
...

It barks in my ear, and I clench my teeth to keep from screaming
...
The dog’s growling stops, and when I lift my head to
look at it again, it is panting
...
I frown and sit on my heels
...
I cringe, wiping the drool from my skin, and laugh
...
I stretch out a hand, carefully, so I can draw it back if I need to
...
I am suddenly glad I didn’t pick up the knife
...
She

stretches out both hands and squeals, “Puppy!”
As she runs toward the dog at my side, I open my mouth to warn her, but I am too late
...
Instead of growling, it barks and snarls and snaps, and its muscles bunch up like coiled wire
...
I don’t think, I just jump; I hurl my body on top of the dog, wrapping my arms around
its thick neck
...
The dog is gone, and so is the little girl
...
I turn in a slow circle and can’t see myself in any of the mirrors
...

I stand in the aisle and hold on to a pole
...
I can’t see his
face over the top of the paper, but I can see his hands
...

“Do you know this guy?” he asks
...
The
headline reads: “Brutal Murderer Finally Apprehended!” I stare at the word “murderer
...

In the picture beneath the headline is a young man with a plain face and a beard
...
And at the same time, I feel like it would be a bad idea to
tell the man that
...
“Do you?”
A bad idea—no, a very bad idea
...
If I tell him I know the man from the article, something awful will
happen to me
...
I can clear my throat and shrug my shoulders—but
that would be a lie
...

“Do you?” he repeats
...

“Well?”
A shudder goes through me
...
“Nope,” I say, my
voice casual
...
”
He stands, and finally I see his face
...

His cheek is rippled with scars, like his hands
...
His breath smells like
cigarettes
...
Not real
...
“You’re lying!”
“I am not
...
”
I pull myself up straighter
...
”
“If you know him,” he says in a low voice, “you could save me
...
“Well,” I say
...
“I don’t
...
I am lying in the chair in the mirrored room
...
She pinches her lips together and removes electrodes
from our heads
...

I sit forward and wipe my palms off on my slacks
...
Is that strange look on Tori’s face because she doesn’t know how to tell
me what a terrible person I am? I wish she would just come out with it
...
Excuse me, I’ll be right back
...
I wish I felt like crying, because the tears
might bring me a sense of release, but I don’t
...
I have to wipe off my hands every few seconds as the
sweat collects—or maybe I just do it because it helps me feel calmer
...
I can’t do that
...

My mother told me once that we can’t survive alone, but even if we could, we wouldn’t want to
...

I shake my head
...
I have to stay calm
...
I grip the arms of the chair
...
She stands by my feet with her hands in her pockets
...

“Beatrice, your results were inconclusive,” she says
...
”
I stare at her
...
My throat is so tight it’s hard to talk
...
That didn’t happen, which
is why Amity is out
...
“Normally, the simulation progresses in a
linear fashion, isolating one faction by ruling out the rest
...
And
there your insistence upon dishonesty ruled out Candor
...
“Don’t worry about that
...
”
One of the knots in my chest loosens
...

“I suppose that’s not entirely true
...
“Which gives us a problem
...


“On the one hand, you threw yourself on the dog rather than let it attack the little girl, which is an
Abnegation-oriented response…but on the other, when the man told you that the truth would save him,
you still refused to tell it
...
” She sighs
...
”
She clears her throat and continues
...
I have no idea what to make of your indecision in stage one, but—”
“Wait,” I interrupt her
...
My conclusion,” she explains, “is that you display equal aptitude for Abnegation,
Dauntless, and Erudite
...
“…are called…Divergent
...
She walks around the side of the chair
and leans in close to me
...
This
is very important
...
” I nod
...
”
“No
...
Our faces are inches
apart
...
I don’t mean you shouldn’t share them now; I mean you should never share
them with anyone, ever, no matter what happens
...
You
understand?”
I don’t understand—how could inconclusive test results be dangerous?—but I still nod
...

“Okay
...
I feel unsteady
...
You have a lot of thinking to do, and waiting with the
others may not benefit you
...
”
“I’ll let him know
...
I can’t bear to look her in the
eye
...

It’s my choice now, no matter what the test says
...
Dauntless
...

Divergent
...
If I get home early, my father will notice when he checks the house log at
the end of the day, and I’ll have to explain what happened
...
I’ll have to intercept Caleb
before he mentions anything to our parents, but Caleb can keep a secret
...
The buses tend to hug the curb, so it’s safer here
...
We have no use for
them now that there are so few cars
...

Renovation moves slowly through the city, which is a patchwork of new, clean buildings and old,

crumbling ones
...
The Abnegation volunteer agency my mother works for is responsible for most of those
renovations
...
When I watch my
family move in harmony; when we go to dinner parties and everyone cleans together afterward
without having to be asked; when I see Caleb help strangers carry their groceries, I fall in love with
this life all over again
...
It never feels genuine
...
Permanently
...
There are places where the road has completely collapsed, revealing sewer
systems and empty subways that I have to be careful to avoid, and places that stink so powerfully of
sewage and trash that I have to plug my nose
...
Because they failed to complete initiation into whatever faction
they chose, they live in poverty, doing the work no one else wants to do
...
In
return for their work they get food and clothing, but, as my mother says, not enough of either
...
He wears ragged brown clothing and skin
sags from his jaw
...

“Excuse me,” he says
...
“Do you have something I can eat?”
I feel a lump in my throat
...

No
...
I should not be afraid of this man
...

“Um…yes,” I say
...
My father tells me to keep food in my bag at all times for
exactly this reason
...

He reaches for them, but instead of taking the bag, his hand closes around my wrist
...
He has a gap between his front teeth
...
“It’s a shame the rest of you is so plain
...
I tug my hand back, but his grip tightens
...

“You look a little young to be walking around by yourself, dear,” he says
...
I know I look young; I don’t need to be reminded
...
“I’m sixteen
...
I can’t tell if he’s smiling
or grimacing
...
I hear ringing in my ears
...
I feel like it doesn’t belong to me
...
I know what to do
...
I see the
bag of apples flying away from me
...
I am prepared to act
...
”

CHAPTER FOUR

I REACH MY street five minutes before I usually do, according to my watch—which is the only
adornment Abnegation allows, and only because it’s practical
...
If I
tilt it right, I can almost see my reflection over the hands
...
They are made of gray cement, with few
windows, in economical, no-nonsense rectangles
...
To some the sight might be gloomy, but to me their simplicity is comforting
...
Everything—our houses, our clothes, our hairstyles—is meant to help us forget
ourselves and to protect us from vanity, greed, and envy, which are just forms of selfishness
...

I try to love it
...
It doesn’t take long
...
I hear laughter
...
My natural tendency toward sarcasm is
still not appreciated
...
Maybe it’s better that Abnegation
wants me to suppress it
...
Maybe if I fight to make Abnegation
work, my act will turn into reality
...
“What happened? Are you all right?”
“I’m fine
...
I shrug
...

Must have been that liquid they gave us
...
”
I try to smile convincingly
...

“Did you two take the bus today?” I ask
...

“Our father had to work late,” Susan says, “and he told us we should spend some time thinking
before the ceremony tomorrow
...

“You’re welcome to come over later, if you’d like,” Caleb says politely
...
” Susan smiles at Caleb
...
He and I have been exchanging looks for the past year as Susan
and Caleb flirt in the tentative way known only to the Abnegation
...
I have to grab his arm to startle him from his daze
...

He turns to me
...

When he frowns, he looks more like my mother than my father
...
It will be wonderful
...

“Are you going to tell me the truth now?” he asks softly
...
And you’re not supposed to ask
...
Though his words are accusatory, it
sounds like he is probing me for information—like he actually wants my answer
...
“Will you? What happened in your test, Caleb?”
Our eyes meet
...

But I know it when I hear it
...

“Just…don’t tell our parents what happened, okay?” I say
...

I want to go upstairs and lie down
...
But my brother made breakfast this morning, and my mother prepared our lunches, and
my father made dinner last night, so it’s my turn to cook
...

A minute later, Caleb joins me
...
He helps with everything
...

Caleb and I work together without speaking
...
He defrosts four pieces of
chicken
...
My mother
told me once that, a long time ago, there were people who wouldn’t buy genetically engineered
produce because they viewed it as unnatural
...

By the time my parents get home, dinner is ready and the table is set
...
Other people see him as an opinionated man—too opinionated, maybe—but
he’s also loving
...

“How did the test go?” he asks me
...

“Fine,” I say
...
I lie too easily
...
Like my father, she
works for the government, but she manages city improvement projects
...
Most of the time, though, she organizes workers to help the factionless
with food and shelter and job opportunities
...
A problem with the aptitude tests is rare
...
” My mother places a napkin next to each plate on the
table
...
” My mother shrugs
...
Did you two hear about that?”
“No,” Caleb says
...

My brother couldn’t be Candor either
...
We always pass food to the right, and no one eats until everyone is served
...
Not every Abnegation family

is religious, but my father says we should try not to see those differences because they will only
divide us
...

“So,” my mother says to my father
...
”
She takes my father’s hand and moves her thumb in a small circle over his knuckles
...
My parents love each other, but they rarely show affection like this in front of us
...

“Tell me what’s bothering you,” she adds
...
My mother’s acute senses sometimes surprise me, but now they chide me
...
“Well, really, it was Marcus who had the difficult day
...
”
Marcus is my father’s coworker; they are both political leaders
...
Our leaders are selected by their peers for
their impeccable character, moral fortitude, and leadership skills
...
And while the council technically makes decisions together, Marcus is particularly
influential
...
I think
the system persists because we’re afraid of what might happen if it didn’t: war
...
Jeanine Matthews is
Erudite’s sole representative, selected based on her IQ score
...

I look up
...
We aren’t supposed to speak at the dinner table unless our parents
ask us a direct question, and they usually don’t
...

They give us their listening ears after dinner, in the family room
...
His eyes narrow
...
“Sorry
...
”
I raise my eyebrows
...

“Beatrice,” Caleb says quietly
...
I don’t
like to be chastised
...

“It said,” my father says, “that Marcus’s violence and cruelty toward his son is the reason his son
chose Dauntless instead of Abnegation
...
When they do, we remember
...
Tobias was
his only child—and his only family, since his wife died giving birth to their second child
...

I never met Tobias
...
My father often remarked that it was strange, but now it doesn’t matter
...
“That poor man
...
”
“Of his son’s betrayal, you mean?” my father says coldly
...

The Erudite have been attacking us with these reports for months
...
There will be
more, I guarantee it
...
I blurt out, “Why are they doing this?”
“Why don’t you take this opportunity to listen to your father, Beatrice?” my mother says gently
...
I look across the table at Caleb, who has that look of
disapproval in his eyes
...
I am not sure I can live this life of obligation any longer
...

“You know why,” my father says
...
Valuing knowledge
above all else results in a lust for power, and that leads men into dark and empty places
...
”
I nod
...
I am my
father’s daughter
...
They don’t even let Caleb help them, because we’re supposed to
keep to ourselves tonight instead of gathering in the family room, so we can think about our results
...
But I can’t
...

Caleb and I climb the stairs and, at the top, when we divide to go to our separate bedrooms, he
stops me with a hand on my shoulder
...
“We should think of our family
...
“But
...
”
For a moment I stare at him
...

I am so startled by his comment that I just say what I am supposed to say: “The tests don’t have to
change our choices
...
“Don’t they, though?”
He squeezes my shoulder and walks into his bedroom
...
He closes the door
...
I wish I could speak to him like I want to instead of like I’m supposed to
...

I walk into my room, and when I close my door behind me, I realize that the decision might be
simple
...
Tomorrow,
those two qualities will struggle within me, and only one can win
...
A
pale ring of sunlight burns into the clouds like the end of a lit cigarette
...

I have to tilt my head back to see the top of the Hub, and even then, part of it disappears into the
clouds
...
I can see the lights on the two prongs on its roof from my
bedroom window
...
Caleb seems calm, but so would I, if I knew what I was going to
do
...

The elevator is crowded, so my father volunteers to give a cluster of Amity our place
...
We set an example for our fellow faction members,
and soon the three of us are engulfed in the mass of gray fabric ascending cement stairs in the half
light
...
The uniform pounding of feet in my ears and the homogeneity of the
people around me makes me believe that I could choose this
...

But then my legs get sore, and I struggle to breathe, and I am again distracted by myself
...

My father holds the door open on the twentieth floor and stands like a sentry as every Abnegation
walks past him
...

The room is arranged in concentric circles
...
We are not called members yet; our decisions today will make us initiates, and we will
become members if we complete initiation
...
I stand between Caleb and Danielle Pohler, an Amity girl with rosy cheeks and a yellow dress
...
They are arranged in five sections,
according to faction
...

The responsibility to conduct the ceremony rotates from faction to faction each year, and this year
is Abnegation’s
...
Caleb will choose before me
...
Each
one contains a substance that represents each faction: gray stones for Abnegation, water for Erudite,
earth for Amity, lit coals for Dauntless, and glass for Candor
...
I will not speak
...
I will cut into my hand and sprinkle my blood into the bowl of the faction I choose
...
My blood sizzling on the coals
...
My father kisses my forehead and
claps Caleb on the shoulder, grinning
...
Without a trace of doubt
...
I clench my jaw and stare up
at the ceiling, where globe lanterns hang and fill the room with blue light
...
Before she pulls away, she turns her head and whispers
in my ear, “I love you
...
”
I frown at her back as she walks away
...
She must know, or she
wouldn’t feel the need to say that
...
The last time we held
hands was at my uncle’s funeral, as my father cried
...

The room slowly comes to order
...
I try to lose myself in
the blue glow
...
“Welcome,” he says
...
Welcome to the day we
honor the democratic philosophy of our ancestors, which tells us that every man has the right to
choose his own way in this world
...
I squeeze Caleb’s fingers as hard as he is
squeezing mine
...
They stand on the precipice of adulthood, and it is now up to
them to decide what kind of people they will be
...
“Decades ago our ancestors realized that it is not political ideology, religious belief,
race, or nationalism that is to blame for a warring world
...
They divided
into factions that sought to eradicate those qualities they believed responsible for the world’s
disarray
...
What do I believe? I do not know; I do not
know; I do not know
...
”
The Amity exchange smiles
...
Every time I see
them, they seem kind, loving, free
...

“Those who blamed ignorance became the Erudite
...

“Those who blamed duplicity created Candor
...

“Those who blamed selfishness made Abnegation
...

“And those who blamed cowardice were the Dauntless
...
Sixteen years of trying and I am not enough
...

“Working together, these five factions have lived in peace for many years, each contributing to a
different sector of society
...
But the reach of each
faction is not limited to these areas
...
In our factions, we find meaning, we find purpose, we find life
...
More than family,
our factions are where we belong
...
”
The silence that follows his words is heavier than other silences
...

Marcus continues, “Therefore this day marks a happy occasion—the day on which we receive our
new initiates, who will work with us toward a better society and a better world
...
It sounds muffled
...
Marcus reads the first names, but I can’t tell one syllable
from the other
...
The first
girl to choose decides on Amity, the same faction from which she came
...

The room is constantly moving, a new name and a new person choosing, a new knife and a new
choice
...

“James Tucker,” Marcus says
...
He throws his
arms out and regains his balance before hitting the floor
...
When he stands in the center, he looks from the Dauntless bowl to the Candor
bowl—the orange flames that rise higher each moment, and the glass reflecting blue light
...
He breathes deeply—I watch his chest rise—and, as he exhales,
accepts the knife
...
His
blood falls onto glass, and he is the first of us to switch factions
...
A mutter
rises from the Dauntless section, and I stare at the floor
...
His Dauntless family will have the option of visiting
him in his new faction, a week and a half from now on Visiting Day, but they won’t, because he left
them
...
And then time will
pass, and the hole will be gone, like when an organ is removed and the body’s fluids flow into the
space it leaves
...

“Caleb Prior,” says Marcus
...
I watch his feet move to the center of the room, and his hands, steady as they accept the
knife from Marcus, are deft as one presses the knife into the other
...

He breathes out
...
And then he holds his hand over the Erudite bowl, and his blood
drips into the water, turning it a deeper shade of red
...
I can barely think straight
...
Why didn’t I realize that when he told me to think of myself yesterday,
he was also giving that advice to himself?
I scan the crowd of the Erudite—they wear smug smiles and nudge each other
...

“Excuse me,” says Marcus, but the crowd doesn’t hear him
...
Except for a ringing sound
...
Halfway to the bowls, I am sure that I will
choose Abnegation
...
I watch myself grow into a woman in Abnegation robes,
marrying Susan’s brother, Robert, volunteering on the weekends, the peace of routine, the quiet nights
spent in front of the fireplace, the certainty that I will be safe, and if not good enough, better than I am
now
...

I look at Caleb, who now stands behind the Erudite
...
My footsteps falter
...

I set my jaw
...
I have to
...
I look into his eyes—they are dark blue, a strange color—and take it
...
Dauntless fire and Abnegation stones are both on my left, one
in front of my shoulder and one behind
...
Gritting my teeth, I drag the blade down
...
I hold both hands to my
chest, and my next breath shudders on the way out
...
My blood drips onto the carpet between the two bowls
...

I am selfish
...


CHAPTER SIX

I TRAIN MY eyes on the floor and stand behind the Dauntless-born initiates who chose to return to
their own faction
...
When the last girl makes her choice—Amity—it’s time to leave
...
I
walk past the gray-clothed men and women who were my faction, staring determinedly at the back of
someone’s head
...
I look over my shoulder at the last second before I pass
them, and immediately wish I hadn’t
...
At
first, when I feel the heat behind my eyes, I think he’s found a way to set me on fire, to punish me for
what I’ve done, but no—I’m about to cry
...

The people behind me press me forward, away from my family, who will be the last ones to leave
...
I twist my head around to find Caleb in
the crowd of Erudite behind me
...
The easy smile he wears is an act of betrayal
...
If it’s so easy for him, maybe it should be easy for me, too
...

I spent all my time worrying about which faction I would choose and never considered what would
happen if I chose Dauntless
...
I thought only the
Abnegation used the stairs
...
I hear whoops and shouts and laughter all around me, and dozens of
thundering feet moving at different rhythms
...

“What the hell is going on?” the boy next to me shouts
...
I am breathless when we reach the first floor, and the
Dauntless burst through the exit
...
It reflects off the black glass of the Hub
...
My confusion dissipates as I run
...

Abnegation discourages anything done strictly for my own enjoyment, and that is what this is: my
lungs burning, my muscles aching, the fierce pleasure of a flat-out sprint
...

“Oh no,” mumbles the Erudite boy
...

It is good that I spent so much time watching the Dauntless arrive at school
...
The train glides toward us on steel rails, its light flashing, its horn blaring
...
The Dauntless-born initiates are used to doing this by now, so in a second it’s just

faction transfers left
...
We run with the car for a few steps and then
throw ourselves sideways
...
I cling to a handle next to the doorway, my shoulder slamming into the car
...
Gasping, I thank her
...
A short Erudite boy with red hair pumps his arms as he
tries to catch up to the train
...
He falls to his knees next to the tracks as we sail away, and puts his head in
his hands
...
He just failed Dauntless initiation
...
It could happen at any
moment
...
She is tall, with dark brown skin and
short hair
...

I nod
...

I haven’t shaken a hand in a long time either
...
I take her hand, uncertainly, and shake it twice, hoping I didn’t squeeze too hard or
not hard enough
...

“Do you know where we’re going?” She has to shout over the wind, which blows harder through
the open doors by the second
...
I sit down
...
She raises an eyebrow at me
...
“Wind means falling out
...
”
Christina sits next to me, inching back to lean against the wall
...
”
“Does anyone?” She shakes her head, grinning
...
”
Then the wind rushes through the car, and the other faction transfers, hit with bursts of air, fall on
top of one another
...

Over my left shoulder, orange light from the setting sun reflects off the glass buildings, and I can
faintly see the rows of gray houses that used to be my home
...
Who will take his place—my mother or my father? And
when they clear out his room, what will they discover? I imagine books jammed between the dresser
and the wall, books under his mattress
...
Did he always know that he would choose Erudite? And if he did, how did I not notice?
What a good actor he was
...
At least they all knew that I wasn’t selfless
...
Is it a
lingering hint of selflessness that makes my throat tighten at the thought of them, or is it selfishness,
because I know I will never be their daughter again?

“They’re jumping off!”
I lift my head
...
I have been curled up with my back against the wall for at least a
half hour, listening to the roaring wind and watching the city smear past us
...
The train
has slowed down in the past few minutes, and I see that the boy who shouted is right: The Dauntless
in the cars ahead of us are jumping out as the train passes a rooftop
...

The idea of leaping out of a moving train onto a rooftop, knowing there is a gap between the edge
of the roof and the edge of the track, makes me want to throw up
...

“We have to jump off too, then,” a Candor girl says
...

“Great,” a Candor boy replies, “because that makes perfect sense, Molly
...
”
“This is kind of what we signed up for, Peter,” the girl points out
...
He has olive skin and wears a brown shirt
—he is the only transfer from Amity
...

“You’ve got to,” Christina says, “or you fail
...
”
“No, it won’t! I’d rather be factionless than dead!” The Amity boy shakes his head
...
He keeps shaking his head and staring at the rooftop, which is getting closer by the second
...
I would rather be dead than empty, like the factionless
...
Her brown eyes are wide, and she presses her
lips together so hard they change color
...

“Here,” she says
...
”
I take her hand and we stand at the edge of the car
...
A weightless moment, and then my feet slam into solid ground
and pain prickles through my shins
...
I release Christina’s hand
...

“That was fun,” she says
...
I brush grains of rock from my cheek
...
The Candor girl
with crooked teeth, Molly, holds her ankle, wincing, and Peter, the Candor boy with shiny hair, grins
proudly—he must have landed on his feet
...
I turn my head, searching for the source of the sound
...
Behind her a Dauntless boy holds her at
the waist to keep her from falling off
...
“Rita, calm down
...
There is a body on the pavement below us; a girl, her arms and legs
bent at awkward angles, her hair spread in a fan around her head
...
Not everyone made it
...

Rita sinks to her knees, sobbing
...
The longer I watch her, the more likely I am to cry,
and I can’t cry in front of these people
...
We do dangerous things and
people die
...
The sooner that lesson sinks in,
the better chance I have at surviving initiation
...

I tell myself I will count to three, and when I’m done, I will move on
...
I picture the girl’s body
on the pavement, and a shudder goes through me
...
I hear Rita’s sobs and the murmured
reassurance of the boy behind her
...

My lips pursed, I walk away from Rita and the roof’s edge
...
I pull my sleeve up to examine it, my hand shaking
...

“Ooh
...
“Stiff” is slang for Abnegation, and I’m the only one here
...
I hear laughter
...

“Listen up! My name is Max! I am one of the leaders of your new faction!” shouts a man at the other
end of the roof
...
Like someone didn’t just fall to her death
from it
...
If you can’t muster the
will to jump off, you don’t belong here
...
”
“You want us to jump off a ledge?” asks an Erudite girl
...
Her mouth hangs open
...

“Yes,” Max says
...

“Is there water at the bottom or something?”
“Who knows?” He raises his eyebrows
...
I look around
...
Some of them nurse
minor wounds or brush gravel from their clothes
...
He is picking at one of his
cuticles
...

I am proud
...
I walk toward the
ledge and hear snickers behind me
...
I walk up to the edge and look down
...
The building I’m on forms one side of a square with three other
buildings
...
I can’t see what’s at the bottom of
it
...
I will land safely at the bottom
...
My teeth chatter
...
Not with all the people betting I’ll
fail behind me
...

After a few tries, I undo the hooks from collar to hem, and pull it off my shoulders
...
It is tighter than any other clothes I own, and no one has ever seen
me in it before
...
I throw the ball of fabric
at him as hard as I can, my jaw clenched
...
He stares at me
...


I look at the hole again
...
If I don’t do it
now, I won’t be able to do it at all
...

I don’t think
...

The air howls in my ears as the ground surges toward me, growing and expanding, or I surge
toward the ground, my heart pounding so fast it hurts, every muscle in my body tensing as the falling
sensation drags at my stomach
...

I hit something hard
...
The impact knocks the wind out
of me and I wheeze, struggling to breathe again
...

A net
...
I look up at the building and laugh, half relieved and
half hysterical
...
I just jumped off a roof
...
I see a few hands stretching out to me at the edge of the net,
so I grab the first one I can reach and pull myself across
...

“He” is the young man attached to the hand I grabbed
...

His eyes are so deep-set that his eyelashes touch the skin under his eyebrows, and they are dark blue,
a dreaming, sleeping, waiting color
...

“Thank you,” I say
...
Around us is an open cavern
...
It belongs to a dark-haired girl with three silver
rings through her right eyebrow
...
“A Stiff, the first to jump? Unheard of
...
His voice is deep, and it rumbles
...
But “Beatrice” just doesn’t sound right anymore
...
“You don’t get to pick again
...
I can be remade here
...

“Tris,” Lauren repeats, grinning
...
”
The boy—Four—looks over his shoulder and shouts, “First jumper—Tris!”
A crowd materializes from the darkness as my eyes adjust
...
Her screams follow her down
...
Everyone laughs, but
they follow their laughter with more cheering
...
”

CHAPTER SEVEN

WHEN ALL THE initiates stand on solid ground again, Lauren and Four lead us down a narrow tunnel
...
The tunnel is lit at long intervals, so in the dark space between each dim lamp, I fear that
I am lost until a shoulder bumps mine
...

The Erudite boy in front of me stops abruptly, and I smack into him, hitting my nose on his
shoulder
...
The whole crowd has stopped, and
our three leaders stand in front of us, arms folded
...
“The Dauntless-born initiates are with me
...
”
She smiles and beckons toward the Dauntless-born initiates
...
I watch the last heel pass out of the light and look at those of us who are
left
...
Of those, I am the only
Abnegation transfer, and there are no Amity transfers
...
It must require bravery to be honest all the time
...

Four addresses us next
...
“My name is Four
...
“Is there a problem?”
“No
...
We’re about to go into the Pit, which you will someday learn to love
...
“The Pit? Clever name
...
His eyes narrow, and for a second he
just stares at her
...

“Christina,” she squeaks
...
“The first lesson you will learn from me is to keep your mouth shut
...

Four starts toward the shadow at the end of the tunnel
...

“What a jerk,” she mumbles
...

It would probably be wise to be careful around Four, I realize
...

Four pushes a set of double doors open, and we walk into the place he called “the Pit
...
“I get it
...
It is an underground cavern so huge I can’t see the other end of it from
where I stand, at the bottom
...
Built into the

stone walls are places for food, clothing, supplies, leisure activities
...
There are no barriers to keep people from falling over the side
...
Forming the roof of the Pit are panes
of glass and, above them, a building that lets in sunlight
...

Blue lanterns dangle at random intervals above the stone paths, similar to the ones that lit the
Choosing room
...

People are everywhere, all dressed in black, all shouting and talking, expressive, gesturing
...
Are there any old Dauntless? Do they not last that long, or are
they just sent away when they can’t jump off moving trains anymore?
A group of children run down a narrow path with no railing, so fast my heart pounds, and I want to
scream at them to slow down before they get hurt
...
My stomach squeezes
...

“If you follow me,” says Four, “I’ll show you the chasm
...
Four’s appearance seems tame from the front, by Dauntless standards, but
when he turns around, I see a tattoo peeking out from the collar of his T-shirt
...
I squint and see that the floor I stand on now ends at an
iron barrier
...

I look over the side
...

Gushing water strikes the wall beneath me and sprays upward
...

“The chasm reminds us that there is a fine line between bravery and idiocy!” Four shouts
...
It has happened before and it will happen again
...
”
“This is incredible,” says Christina, as we all move away from the railing
...

Four leads the group of initiates across the Pit toward a gaping hole in the wall
...
When we walk in, the Dauntless inside stand
...
They stamp their feet
...
The noise surrounds me and fills me
...

We look for empty seats
...
In the center of the table is a platter of food I don’t
recognize: circular pieces of meat wedged between round bread slices
...

Four nudges me with his elbow
...
“Put this on it
...

“You’ve never had a hamburger before?” asks Christina, her eyes wide
...
“Is that what it’s called?”
“Stiffs eat plain food,” Four says, nodding at Christina
...

I shrug
...
”
She smirks
...
”
“Yeah,” I say, rolling my eyes
...
”
The corner of Four’s mouth twitches
...
I look over my shoulder
...
His face is pierced in so many
places I lose count, and his hair is long, dark, and greasy
...
It is the coldness of his eyes as they sweep across the room
...

“His name is Eric,” says Four
...
”
“Seriously? But he’s so young
...
“Age doesn’t matter here
...
He starts toward our table and drops into the seat
next to Four
...

“Well, aren’t you going to introduce me?” he asks, nodding to Christina and me
...
”
“Ooh, a Stiff,” says Eric, smirking at me
...
“We’ll see how long you last
...
I don’t
understand why, but I don’t want Eric to look at me any longer than he already has
...

He taps his fingers against the table
...

“What have you been doing lately, Four?” he asks
...
“Nothing, really,” he says
...
Everything Eric did—sitting here, asking
about Four—suggests that they are, but the way Four sits, tense as pulled wire, suggests they are
something else
...
“He requested
that I find out what’s going on with you
...
”
“So he wants to give you a job
...
Maybe Eric perceives Four as a potential threat to his
position
...
That’s why
we have to give power to those who do not want it
...

“And you aren’t interested
...
”

“Well,” says Eric
...
”
He claps Four on the shoulder, a little too hard, and gets up
...
I had not realized that I was so tense
...

“We were in the same initiate class,” he says
...
”
All thoughts of being careful around Four leave me
...

“Now I’ve got Stiffs, too?”
“It must be because you’re so approachable,” I say flatly
...
Like a bed of nails
...
He isn’t a dog, but the same rules apply
...
Looking him in the eye is a challenge
...

Heat rushes into my cheeks
...
”
My stomach drops like I just swallowed a stone
...
She raises both eyebrows
...

“I’m developing a theory
...
”

After dinner, Four disappears without a word
...
I don’t know why a Dauntless leader would be responsible for a group of
initiates, but maybe it is just for tonight
...
Christina walks beside me in silence
...

Eric stops in front of a wooden door and folds his arms
...

“For those of you who don’t know, my name is Eric,” he says
...
We take the initiation process very seriously here, so I volunteered to oversee most of
your training
...
The idea that a Dauntless leader will oversee our initiation is bad
enough, but the fact that it’s Eric makes it seem even worse
...
“You have to be in the training room by eight o’clock every day
...
You are free to do whatever
you like after six
...
”
The phrase “do whatever you like” sticks in my mind
...
I had to think of other people’s needs first
...

“You are only permitted to leave the compound when accompanied by a Dauntless,” Eric adds
...
You will notice that
there are ten beds and only nine of you
...
”
“But we started with twelve,” protests Christina
...
She
needs to learn to stay quiet
...
He shrugs
...
At the end of initiation, your
rankings will be determined in comparison with the Dauntless-born initiates
...
So I expect—”
“Rankings?” asks the mousy-haired Erudite girl to my right
...

“Your ranking serves two purposes,” he says
...
There are only a few desirable positions available
...
I know by looking at his smile, like I knew the second I entered the aptitude
test room, that something bad is about to happen
...
”
Pain stabs my stomach
...
And then Christina says, “What?”
“There are eleven Dauntless-borns, and nine of you,” Eric continues
...
The remainder will be cut after the final test
...
I see Christina look at me from the corner of my eye, but I can’t look back at her
...

My odds, as the smallest initiate, as the only Abnegation transfer, are not good
...

“You leave the Dauntless compound,” says Eric indifferently, “and live factionless
...
I remember the factionless
man with the gray teeth, snatching the bag of apples from my hands
...
But instead
of crying, like the Erudite girl, I feel colder
...

I will be a member
...

“But that’s…not fair!” the broad-shouldered Candor girl, Molly, says
...
“If we had known—”
“Are you saying that if you had known this before the Choosing Ceremony, you wouldn’t have
chosen Dauntless?” Eric snaps
...
If you are really
one of us, it won’t matter to you that you might fail
...
”
Eric pushes the door to the dormitory open
...
“Now we have to choose you
...

I have never slept in the same room as a boy before, but here I have no other option, unless I want
to sleep in the hallway
...


I used to have my own room
...
I am used to sleeping in silence
...
I cover my mouth
to stifle a sob
...
I have to calm down
...
I can look at my reflection whenever I want
...

My hands shake and the tears come faster now, blurring my vision
...
It doesn’t matter that I ache at even a split-second memory of their faces
...
I match my inhales to the inhales of the other initiates,
and my exhales to their exhales
...

A strangled sound interrupts the breathing, followed by a heavy sob
...
They come from the bunk next to mine—
they belong to a Candor boy, Al, the largest and broadest of all the initiates
...

His feet are just inches from my head
...
Instead I feel disgust
...
Why can’t he just keep his crying quiet like the rest of us?
I swallow hard
...
The corners of her
mouth turned down
...
I drag the heel
of my hand over my cheeks
...
I almost feel the sound grate in my own throat
...

No
...
No one has to know that I don’t
want to help him
...
My eyes shut and I feel the pull of sleep, but every
time I come close, I hear Al again
...
I will miss my mother and father and Caleb and
evening firelight and the clack of my mother’s knitting needles, but that is not the only reason for this
hollow feeling in my stomach
...

The thought makes me grit my teeth
...


CHAPTER EIGHT

“THE FIRST THING you will learn today is how to shoot a gun
...
” Four presses a gun into my palm without looking at me and keeps walking
...
”
I shouldn’t be surprised that the Dauntless expect us to hit the ground running, but I anticipated
more than six hours of rest before the running began
...

“Initiation is divided into three stages
...
The stages are not weighed equally in determining your final rank, so
it is possible, though difficult, to drastically improve your rank over time
...
Never in my life did I expect to hold a gun, let alone fire one
...

“We believe that preparation eradicates cowardice, which we define as the failure to act in the
midst of fear,” says Four
...
The first stage is primarily physical; the second, primarily emotional; the third, primarily
mental
...
“What does firing a gun have to do with…bravery?”
Four flips the gun in his hand, presses the barrel to Peter’s forehead, and clicks a bullet into place
...

“Wake
...
“You are holding a loaded gun, you idiot
...
”
He lowers the gun
...
I’m surprised he
can stop himself from responding, after speaking his mind all his life in Candor, but he does, his
cheeks red
...
” Four stops walking at the end of the row and turns on his heel
...
So, watch me
...
He stands with his feet apart, holds the gun in both hands, and fires
...
I crane my neck to look at the target
...

I turn to my own target
...
They would say that
guns are used for self-defense, if not violence, and therefore they are self-serving
...
It’s heavy and hard to lift away from my body, but I want it to be as far
from my face as possible
...
The sound hurts my ears and the recoil sends my hands back, toward my nose
...
I don’t know where my bullet went, but I know
it’s not near the target
...

“Statistically speaking,” the Erudite boy next to me—his name is Will—says, grinning at me, “you
should have hit the target at least once by now, even by accident
...

“Is that so,” I say without inflection
...
“I think you’re actually defying nature
...
If I can’t master the first
task they give us, how will I ever make it through stage one?
I squeeze the trigger, hard, and this time I’m ready for the recoil
...
A bullet hole appears at the edge of the target, and I raise an eyebrow at Will
...
The stats don’t lie,” he says
...

It takes me five rounds to hit the middle of the target, and when I do, a rush of energy goes through
me
...
I lower the gun
...

Maybe I do belong here
...
I massage them on my way to the dining hall
...
Every time
I look at him, I hear his sobs again, so I try not to look at him
...
When Tori
warned me that being Divergent was dangerous, I felt like it was branded on my face, and if I so much
as turned the wrong way, someone would see it
...
What if I let my guard down and something terrible happens?
“Oh, come on
...
“We were in
Math together just a few days ago
...
”
“I slept through Math most of the time,” Al replies
...
She snaps her fingers in front of my face
...
“I mean, no offense, but I
probably wouldn’t remember if you did
...
I mean, they still
do, but now you’re not one of them
...
As if I need her to remind me
...
“I’m used to just saying whatever is on my mind
...
”
“I think that’s why our factions don’t usually associate with each other,” I say, with a short laugh
...
Candor’s real problem is with Amity
...

“Can I sit here?” says Will, tapping the table with his finger
...

“They aren’t my buddies,” says Will, setting his plate down
...
Plus, Edward and Myra are dating, and I would rather not be the
third wheel
...
Myra pauses to kiss Edward
...
I’ve only seen a few kisses
in my life
...
Air hisses between my teeth, and I look
away
...
Another part wonders, with a touch of desperation,
what it would feel like to have someone’s lips against mine
...

“She just kissed him
...
When he frowns, his thick eyebrows touch his eyelashes
...
”
“A kiss is not something you do in public
...

“What?” I say
...
“The rest of us are all right with a little affection in
public
...
” I shrug
...
”
“Or you can stay frigid,” says Will, his green eyes glinting with mischief
...
If you want
...
He catches it and bites it
...
“Frigidity is in her nature
...
”
“I am not frigid!” I exclaim
...
“It’s endearing
...
”
The comment only makes my face hotter
...
I force a laugh and, after a few
seconds, it comes naturally
...


After lunch, Four leads us to a new room
...
On the left wall is a green board—a chalkboard
...
Maybe it has something to do with
Dauntless priorities: training comes first, technology comes second
...
Hanging at three-foot intervals along one
end of the room are faded black punching bags
...

“As I said this morning,” says Four, “next you will learn how to fight
...
”
I can’t even think of life as a Dauntless
...

“We will go over technique today, and tomorrow you will start to fight each other,” says Four
...
Those who don’t learn fast will get hurt
...

I catch on as we practice
...
The kicks are more difficult, though he only teaches us
the basics
...
All around me is the sound of skin hitting tough fabric
...

When he stops in front of me, my insides twist like someone’s stirring them with a fork
...

“You don’t have much muscle,” he says, “which means you’re better off using your knees and
elbows
...
”
Suddenly he presses a hand to my stomach
...
My heart pounds so hard my
chest hurts, and I stare at him, wide-eyed
...

Four lifts his hand and keeps walking
...
It’s
strange, but I have to stop and breathe for a few seconds before I can keep practicing again
...

“I’m surprised he didn’t break you in half,” she says
...
“He scares the hell
out of me
...
”
“Yeah
...
He is quiet, and remarkably self-possessed
...
“…definitely intimidating,” I finally say
...
”
From behind us, Will asks, “A tattoo of what?”
“I don’t know
...
“I just want to feel like I’ve actually left the old faction
...
” When we don’t respond, he adds, “I know you’ve heard me
...
“I think you’re right
...
If we want all the way in, we should look the part
...

“No
...
Or pierce my face
...

“Or your nipple?” Will says with a snort
...

Now that training is done for the day, we can do whatever we want until it’s time to sleep
...

The Pit is swarming with people
...
We stumble up the path, climbing higher above
the Pit floor, scattering stones with our shoes
...
“I’m not wearing gray anymore
...
” She sighs
...
”
Ten minutes later I stand in front of a mirror in the clothing place wearing a knee-length black
dress
...
Goose bumps appear on my bare arms
...

Then she holds up a black pencil
...

“You aren’t going to be able to make me pretty, you know
...
She runs
the tip of the pencil along the line of my eyelashes
...

“Who cares about pretty? I’m going for noticeable
...
My heart rate picks up as I
do, like I am breaking the rules and will be scolded for it
...

But I will find new habits, new thoughts, new rules
...

My eyes were blue before, but a dull, grayish blue—the eyeliner makes them piercing
...
I am not pretty—my eyes are too big and my
nose is too long—but I can see that Christina is right
...

Looking at myself now isn’t like seeing myself for the first time; it’s like seeing someone else for
the first time
...
This is someone whose eyes claim mine and don’t release me; this is Tris
...
“You’re…striking
...
I smile at her in the
mirror
...

“Yeah
...
“I look like…a different person
...
“That a good thing or a bad thing?”
I look at myself head-on again
...

“A good thing
...
“Sorry, I’ve just never been allowed to stare at my reflection for
this long
...
“Abnegation is a strange faction, I have to tell you
...
Despite the fact that I have left my old faction behind, I
don’t want to criticize it yet
...
It’s
easy to allocate resources when everyone gets the same thing, but everything is more varied at the
Dauntless compound
...

Christina and I race down the narrow path to the tattoo place
...


Will and Christina flip through books of pictures, elbowing each other when they find a good one
...

I wander around the room, looking at the artwork on the walls
...
Abnegation sees art as impractical, and its appreciation as time that could be spent serving
others, so though I have seen works of art in textbooks, I have never been in a decorated room before
...
I skim the
wall with my fingertips
...
Beneath it is a
sketch of a bird in flight
...
“Pretty, right?”
I turn to see Tori standing there
...
I didn’t expect to see her again
...
” She smiles
...
Beatrice, is it?”
“Tris, actually,” I say
...
I just took a break to administer the tests
...
” She taps her chin
...
You were the first jumper, weren’t you?”
“Yes, I was
...
”
“Thanks
...
“Listen—I need to talk to you about…” I glance over at
Will and Christina
...
“…something
...
”
“I am not sure that would be wise,” she says quietly
...
”
I purse my lips
...
If she won’t give them to me now, I will have to
find a way to make her tell me some other time
...

The bird sketch holds my attention
...
I
know that if I do, it will place another wedge between me and my family that I can never remove
...

But I understand now what Tori said about her tattoo representing a fear she overcame—a
reminder of where she was, as well as a reminder of where she is now
...

“Yes,” I say
...
”
I touch my collarbone, marking the path of their flight—toward my heart
...


CHAPTER NINE

“SINCE THERE ARE an odd number of you, one of you won’t be fighting today,” says Four, stepping
away from the board in the training room
...
The space next to my name is blank
...
A reprieve
...
Her elbow prods one of my sore
muscles—I have more sore muscles than not-sore muscles, this morning—and I wince
...
”
“Sorry,” she says
...
I’m up against the Tank
...
I haven’t had a friend like her before
...

I guess I haven’t really had a friend, period
...
That won’t happen here
...

“The Tank?” I find Christina’s name on the board
...
”
“Yeah, Peter’s slightly more feminine-looking minion,” she says, nodding toward the cluster of
people on the other side of the room
...

She has broad shoulders, bronze skin, and a bulbous nose
...
I hate them
...
They put their hands up by their faces to
protect themselves, as Four taught us, and shuffle in a circle around each other
...
As I stare at him, I realize that even his facial features are big—big
nose, big lips, big eyes
...

I glance at Peter and his friends
...
His hair is orange-red, the color of an old carrot
...

“Peter is pure evil
...
And of course, they believed him, because we were Candor and we couldn’t lie
...
”
Christina wrinkles her nose and adds, “Drew is just his sidekick
...
And Molly…she’s the kind of person who fries ants with a magnifying glass just
to watch them flail around
...
I wince
...

Will stumbles to the side, one hand pressed to his face, and blocks Al’s next punch with his free
hand
...
Al is
slow, but powerful
...

“I think they know we’re talking about them,” I say
...
”
“They do? How?”
Christina fakes a smile at them and waves
...
I shouldn’t be gossiping
anyway
...

Will hooks a foot around one of Al’s legs and yanks back, knocking Al to the ground
...

“Because I’ve told them,” she says, through the gritted teeth of her smile
...
She looks at me
...
Plenty of people have told me that they don’t like me
...
Who
cares?”
“We just…weren’t supposed to hurt people,” I say
...
“I’m reminding them that they aren’t
God’s gift to humankind
...
Will and Al face each other for a few more
seconds, more hesitant than they were before
...
They glance at
Four like they’re waiting for him to call the fight off, but he stands with his arms folded, giving no
response
...

After a few seconds of circling, Eric shouts, “Do you think this is a leisure activity? Should we
break for nap-time? Fight each other!”
“But…” Al straightens, letting his hands down, and says, “Is it scored or something? When does
the fight end?”
“It ends when one of you is unable to continue,” says Eric
...
”
Eric narrows his eyes at Four
...
“In the new rules, no one
concedes
...

“A brave man never surrenders
...
I feel like I am looking at two different kinds
of Dauntless—the honorable kind, and the ruthless kind
...

Beads of sweat dot Al’s forehead; he wipes them with the back of his hand
...
“What’s the point of beating him up? We’re in the
same faction!”
“Oh, you think it’s going to be that easy?” Will asks, grinning
...
Try to hit me, slowpoke
...
I see determination in Will’s eyes that wasn’t there before
...

That is, if he can actually hit Will
...
He dodges another punch, slipping around Al and kicking him hard in the back
...

When I was younger, I read a book about grizzly bears
...
That is how Al looks now
...

I watch the light leave Will’s eyes, which are pale green, like celery
...
He slips from Al’s grasp, dead weight, and crumples to the
floor
...

Al’s eyes widen, and he crouches next to Will, tapping his cheek with one hand
...
For a few seconds, he doesn’t, just lies on the ground with an
arm bent beneath him
...

“Get him up,” Eric says
...
The curl of his lip is cruel
...
Victory
...
Al pulls Will’s arm across his shoulders and drags
him out of the arena
...
I would wish her luck, but I don’t know what good that would do
...
Hopefully her height will help her
...
Al stands for a moment by
the door, watching them go
...
Leaving us with Eric is like hiring a babysitter who spends his
time sharpening knives
...
It is chin-length, black, and pinned back with silver clips
...
She looks nervous, and no wonder—who wouldn’t be nervous after
watching Will collapse like a rag doll?
If conflict in Dauntless ends with only one person standing, I am unsure of what this part of
initiation will do to me
...

I snap to attention when Christina kicks Molly in the side
...
A lock of stringy black hair falls across her face, but she doesn’t brush it
away
...
I am not sure
...
She hits her hard, knocking her down, and pins her to the ground
...

She punches, and Christina moves her head out of the way, but Molly just punches again, and again,
until her fist hits Christina’s jaw, her nose, her mouth
...
I just need something to hold on to
...
This is the first time I have ever prayed for someone to
fall unconscious
...
Christina screams and drags one of her arms free
...
She comes to her knees, holding her face with one hand
...
She screams
again and crawls away from Molly
...

Please go unconscious
...
Al frees his hand and pulls me
tight to his side
...
I had no sympathy for Al the first night, but
I am not cruel yet; the sight of Christina clutching her rib cage makes me want to stand between her
and Molly
...
She holds out a hand
...
“I’m done
...
Al sighs too, his rib cage lifting and falling against my
shoulder
...
He says quietly, “I’m sorry, what did you say? You’re done?”
Christina pushes herself to her knees
...
She pinches her nose to stop the bleeding and nods
...
If he had yelled, I might not have felt like everything inside my stomach was
about to come out of it
...
But his voice is quiet and his words precise
...

“Follow me,” he says to the rest of us
...


I feel the roar of the river in my chest
...
The Pit is almost empty; it is the middle of the afternoon, though it feels
like it’s been night for days
...
We are with Eric, for one
thing, and for another, the Dauntless have different rules—rules that brutality does not violate
...

“Climb over it,” he says
...
Eric will not back down
...
“If you can hang over the
chasm for five minutes, I will forget your cowardice
...
”
The railing is narrow and made of metal
...
Even if Christina is brave enough to hang from the railing for five minutes, she may not be able
to hold on
...

When I close my eyes, I imagine her falling onto the jagged rocks below and shudder
...

She is tall enough to swing her leg over the railing
...
She puts her toe on the ledge
as she lifts her other leg over
...
Then she takes one foot off the ledge
...
I see her face
between the bars of the barrier, determined, her lips pressed together
...

For the first minute and a half, Christina is fine
...
I start to think she might make it and show Eric how foolish he was to doubt her
...
Her face strikes
the barrier, and she cries out
...
She tries to get
a better grip, but now her hands are wet
...
Will I let her fall to her death, or will I
resign myself to being factionless? What’s worse: to be idle while someone dies, or to be exiled and
empty-handed?
My parents would have no problem answering that question
...

As far as I know, Christina hasn’t cried since we got here, but now her face crumples and she lets
out a sob that is louder than the river
...
One of
the droplets hits my cheek
...

“Come on, Christina,” says Al, his low voice surprisingly loud
...
He claps
...
You can do it
...
”
Would I even be strong enough to hold on to her? Would it be worth my effort to try to help her if I
know I’m too weak to do any good?
I know what those questions are: excuses
...
My father’s words
...
No one else cheers her on, but Al brings his big
hands together and shouts, his eyes holding hers
...

I stare at Al’s watch
...
He elbows me hard in the shoulder
...
My voice is a whisper
...
“One minute left,” I say, louder this
time
...
Her arms shake so hard I wonder if the earth is
quaking beneath me, jiggling my vision, and I just didn’t notice
...

I will help her
...

Another wave of water splashes against Christina’s back, and she shrieks as both her hands slip off
the railing
...
It sounds like it belongs to someone else
...
She grabs the bars of the barrier
...

Al’s watch reads 5:00
...

Eric checks his own watch
...
When I blink, I see Rita’s sister on the pavement below the train tracks, limbs bent at
strange angles; I see Rita screaming and sobbing; I see myself turning away
...
“You can come up, Christina
...

“No,” Eric says
...
”
“No, she doesn’t,” Al growls
...
She’s not a coward
...
”
Eric doesn’t respond
...
She grabs his forearm
...

I’m too short to do much good, as I suspected, but I grip Christina under the shoulder once she’s high
enough, and Al and I haul her over the barrier
...

I kneel next to her
...


CHAPTER TEN

THAT NIGHT I dream that Christina hangs from the railing again, by her toes this time, and someone
shouts that only someone who is Divergent can help her
...

Sweat-soaked and shaky from the dream, I walk to the girls’ bathroom to shower and change
...
The word is written smaller
along the bed frame, and again on my pillow
...

Peter stands behind me, whistling as he fluffs his pillow
...

“Nice decorations,” he says
...
I grab the corner of a sheet and yank it
away from the mattress
...
”
“I don’t know what you’re referring to,” he says lightly
...
“And you and I will
never be in the same faction
...
Don’t get angry
...
But every time he fluffs his pillow, I think about punching him in the gut
...
I will have to scrub the bed frame later
...

“Ignore him,” Al says
...
”
“Yeah
...
They are still warm with an angry blush
...
“Did
you talk to Will?” I ask quietly
...
”
“Yeah
...
He isn’t angry
...
“Now I’ll always be remembered as the first guy who
knocked someone out cold
...
At least they won’t antagonize you
...
” He nudges me with his elbow, smiling
...
”
Maybe I was the first jumper, but I suspect that’s where my Dauntless fame begins and ends
...
“One of you had to get knocked out, you know
...
”
“Still, I don’t want to do it again
...
He sniffs
...
”
We reach the door to the training room and I say, “But you have to
...
Maybe he is too kind for Dauntless
...
I didn’t have to fight yesterday, but today I definitely will
...

My opponent is Peter
...
Her face is bruised, and she looks like she is
trying not to limp
...
“Are they serious? They’re really going to make you fight him?”
Peter is almost a foot taller than I am, and yesterday, he beat Drew in less than five minutes
...

“Maybe you can just take a few hits and pretend to go unconscious,” suggests Al
...
”
“Yeah,” I say
...
”
I stare at my name on the board
...
Al and Christina are just trying to help, but the
fact that they don’t believe, not even in a tiny corner of their minds, that I have a chance against Peter
bothers me
...
He’s much faster than she is, so I’m sure Molly will not win today
...
Four told us yesterday to exploit
our opponent’s weaknesses, and aside from his utter lack of likable qualities, Peter doesn’t have any
...
I would like to say that he underestimates me, but that
would be a lie
...

Maybe Al is right, and I should just take a few hits and pretend to be unconscious
...
I can’t be ranked last
...
I can’t remember how to stand
...
I walk to the center of the arena and my guts writhe as Peter comes toward
me, taller than I remembered, arm muscles standing at attention
...
I wonder if
throwing up on him will do me any good
...

“You okay there, Stiff?” he says
...
I might go easy on you if you
cry
...
His mouth is
puckered, like he just swallowed something sour
...

One second Peter and I are standing there, staring at each other, and the next Peter’s hands are up
by his face, his elbows bent
...

“Come on, Stiff,” he says, his eyes glinting
...
Maybe some begging
...
Or I would have kicked him in the side, if he hadn’t caught my foot and yanked it forward,
knocking me off-balance
...

I have to stay on my feet so he can’t kick me in the head
...

“Stop playing with her,” snaps Eric
...
”
Peter’s mischievous look disappears
...
I blink and lurch to the side as the
room dips and sways
...

I am too off-balance to do anything but move away from him, as far as the arena will allow
...
His foot forces the air from my lungs and it
hurts, hurts so badly I can’t breathe, or maybe that’s because of the kick, I don’t know, I just fall
...
I push myself up, but Peter is already there
...
This pain is different, less like a
stab and more like a crackle, crackling in my brain, spotting my vision with different colors, blue,
green, red
...
My face is wet
...
More red, I guess, but I’m too dizzy to look down
...
I cough and drag myself to my feet
...

And Peter spins around me; I am the center of a spinning planet, the only thing staying still
...

On my feet on my feet
...
I punch as hard as I can, and my
fist hits something soft
...
I hear ringing and try to blink some of the black patches out of my eyes; how did
something get in my eye?
Out of my peripheral vision, I see Four shove the door open and walk out
...
Or maybe he’s going to find out why everything’s spinning like a top,
and I don’t blame him; I want to know the answer too
...
Something slams into my side and I
scream for the first time, a high screech that belongs to someone else and not me, and it slams into my
side again, and I can’t see anything at all, not even whatever is right in front of my face, the lights out
...


When I wake up, I don’t feel much, but the inside of my head is fuzzy, like it’s packed with cotton
balls
...

“Is her eye already black?” someone asks
...
Sitting to my right are Will and Al;
Christina sits on the bed to my left with an ice pack on her jaw
...
My lips feel clumsy and too large
...
“Look who’s talking
...
“I was there
...
”
“Did you just make a joke, Tris?” Will says, grinning
...
Oh, and to answer your question—I beat her up
...

“What? He’s good,” she says, shrugging
...
I
just need to stop people from punching me in the jaw
...
” Will winks at her
...
Not too bright, are you?”

“You feeling okay, Tris?” Al says
...
His cheek looks rough, like if he didn’t shave it, he would have a thick beard
...

“Yeah,” I say
...
”
But I don’t know where “here” is
...

Some of the beds have curtains between them
...
This
must be where the Dauntless go when they’re sick or hurt
...
I’ve never seen a nurse with so many piercings in her ear before
...
After all, it wouldn’t make sense for
the Dauntless to make the trek to the city hospital every time they get hurt
...
My mother fell on the sidewalk in front of
our house and broke her arm
...
At the hospital, an Amity woman in a yellow shirt with clean fingernails
took my mother’s blood pressure and set her bone with a smile
...
I thought he was reassuring her, because that’s what selfless people do, but now I wonder if
he was repeating something he had studied; if all his Abnegation tendencies were just Erudite traits in
disguise
...
“He’ll at least get beat up by Edward, who has been
studying hand-to-hand combat since we were ten years old
...
”
“Good,” says Christina
...
“I think we’re missing dinner
...
“I’m fine
...
He has a distinct smell—sweet and fresh, like
sage and lemongrass
...

“I just wanted to tell you that you missed Eric’s announcement
...
“We have to be at the train by eight
fifteen
...
“Thanks
...
Your face doesn’t look that bad
...
“I mean,
it looks good
...
I mean—you look brave
...
”
His eyes skirt mine, and he scratches the back of his head
...

It was a nice thing to say, but he acts like it meant more than just the words
...
I
could not be attracted to Al—I could not be attracted to anyone that fragile
...

“I should let you rest,” he says
...

“Al, are you okay?” I say
...
“A little
...
The question must have embarrassed him,
because I’ve never seen him so red before
...
At least when I cry, I know how to hide it
...
After your fight with Peter
...
“I took a few hits, fell down, and
stayed there
...
I figure…I figure that since I beat Will, if I lose all the rest,
I won’t be ranked last, but I won’t have to hurt anyone anymore
...
“I just can’t do it
...
”
“You’re not a coward just because you don’t want to hurt people,” I say, because I know it’s the
right thing to say, even if I’m not sure I mean it
...
Maybe I do mean it
...
It is because he refuses to act
...
”
“I don’t know,” I say
...
”
“I think bad
...
“Yeah, it’s already hard enough
...

In less than a week, the Abnegation initiates will be able to visit their families for the first time
since the Choosing Ceremony
...

I used to look forward to that day
...

In less than a week, the Dauntless-born initiates will find their families on the Pit floor, or in the
glass building above the compound, and do whatever it is the Dauntless do when they reunite
...

And the transfer initiates with forgiving parents will be able to see them again too
...
Not after my father’s cry of outrage at the ceremony
...

Maybe if I could have told them I was Divergent, and I was confused about what to choose, they
would have understood
...
But I didn’t trust them with that secret, so I will never know
...
I am fed up
...
But there
isn’t much I can do to stop them
...
Later that night, though, I slip out of the room and go
back to the dormitory
...


CHAPTER ELEVEN

THE NEXT MORNING, I don’t hear the alarm, shuffling feet, or conversations as the other initiates get
ready
...

She already wears a black jacket zipped up to her throat
...

“Come on,” she says
...
”
I dreamt that Peter tied me to a chair and asked me if I was Divergent
...
I woke up with wet cheeks
...
My body aches so badly it hurts to breathe
...
Christina offers me her hand
...
We’re supposed to be at the tracks by eight fifteen
...
You just…get ready
...

I grunt
...

Luckily Peter isn’t here to see me struggle
...

I unbutton my shirt and stare at my bare side, which is patched with bruises
...
I change as fast as I can and let my hair
hang loose because I can’t lift my arms to tie it back
...
She is blond like me,
with a narrow face like mine, but that’s where the similarities stop
...
I am not as pale as a sheet
...

By the time Christina comes back, a muffin in each hand, I’m sitting on the edge of my bed, staring
at my untied shoes
...
It will hurt when I bend over
...
Gratitude surges
in my chest, warm and a little like an ache
...

Well, in everyone but Peter
...

“Well, we would never get there on time if you had to tie them yourself,” she says
...
You
can eat and walk at the same time, right?”
We walk fast toward the Pit
...
My mother baked bread
like this once to give to the factionless, but I never got to try it
...
I ignore the pinch in my stomach that comes every time I think of my mother and half walk, half
jog after Christina, who forgets that her legs are longer than mine
...
Every thump of my
feet sends pain through my ribs, but I ignore it
...


“What took you so long?” Will shouts over the horn
...

“Oh, shut up
...

Four stands at the front of the pack, so close to the tracks that if he shifted even an inch forward, the
train would take his nose with it
...
Will hoists
himself into the car with some difficulty, landing first on his stomach and then dragging his legs in
behind him
...

I jog next to the car, wincing, then grit my teeth and grab the handle on the side
...

Al grabs me under each arm and lifts me easily into the car
...
I see Peter behind him, and my cheeks get warm
...
As if Peter didn’t have enough ammunition
already
...
“Or are you a little…Stiff?”
He bursts into laughter at his joke, and Molly and Drew join in
...

“We are all awed by your incredible wit,” says Will
...
“I hear they don’t
object to sissies
...
“Am I going to have to listen to your
bickering all the way to the fence?”
Everyone gets quiet, and Four turns back to the car’s opening
...
The wind presses his shirt to his chest
...

Every few seconds, though, my eyes shift back to Four
...
But I do it without thinking
...
“I mean, beyond the fence
...
“A bunch of farms, I guess
...
What are we guarding the city from?”
She wiggles her fingers at me
...

“We didn’t even have guards near the fence until five years ago,” says Will
...
I also remember that my father was one of the people who voted to get the Dauntless
out of the factionless sector of the city
...
But I would rather not mention that now, or here
...

“Oh, right,” he says
...
”

“Why do you say that?” I ask, a little too sharply
...

“Because you had to pass the factionless sector to get to school, right?”
“What did you do, memorize a map of the city for fun?” says Christina
...
“Didn’t you?”
The train’s brakes squeal, and we all lurch forward as the car slows
...
The dilapidated buildings are gone, replaced by yellow fields
and train tracks
...
I lower myself to the grass, holding the handle to
keep me steady
...
When I walk forward, I
notice that it continues farther than I can see, perpendicular to the horizon
...
Milling around on the other side of the fence are Dauntless
guards carrying guns
...
I stay close to Christina
...
If Peter tries to taunt me, she will defend me
...
Peter’s insults shouldn’t bother me, and I should
focus on getting better at combat, not on how badly I did yesterday
...

Four leads us toward the gate, which is as wide as a house and opens up to the cracked road that
leads to the city
...

Another pinch in my stomach
...
“Once you are a fence guard, there is some potential for advancement, but not
much
...

Four lifts a shoulder
...
As I was
saying
...

If it comforts you, some of them insist that it isn’t as bad as it seems
...
At least we won’t be driving buses or cleaning up other people’s messes like the
factionless,” Christina whispers in my ear
...

I don’t expect Four to answer, but he looks levelly at Peter and says, “I was first
...
They would look
innocent to me if I didn’t know what a terrible person he is
...
I remember what he said on the first day, about working in the
control room, where the Dauntless monitor the city’s security
...
To me he belongs in the training room
...
The Dauntless have limited options
...
We can work in the Dauntless compound, drawing tattoos
or making weapons or even fighting each other for entertainment
...
That sounds like my best option
...
And I might be factionless by the end of stage one
...
A few Dauntless guards glance in our direction but not many
...

The man driving wears a hat, a beard, and a smile
...
The
back of the truck is open, and a few other Amity sit among the stacks of crates
...

“Beatrice?” an Amity boy says
...
One of the Amity in the back of the truck stands
...
Robert
...
Who else transferred? Did Susan? Are there any Abnegation initiates this year? If Abnegation is
fizzling, it’s our fault—Robert’s and Caleb’s and mine
...
I push the thought from my mind
...
He wears a gray T-shirt and a pair of blue jeans
...
I stiffen
...
I don’t move a muscle until he releases me
...
“Beatrice, what happened to you? What happened
to your face?”
“Nothing,” I say
...
Nothing
...
Molly folds her arms and laughs
...
“What did you think Tris was short for?”
“Oh, I don’t know…weakling?” She touches her chin
...
“Oh wait, that doesn’t start with Tris
...
”
“There’s no need to antagonize her,” Robert says softly
...
“Why don’t you get back in your truck?
We’re not supposed to fraternize with other faction members
...

“Right
...
She walks away smiling
...
“They don’t seem like nice people
...
”
“You could go home, you know
...
”
“What makes you think I want to go home?” I ask, my cheeks hot
...
” He shakes his head
...
You
should be happy
...
This is it
...
The Dauntless guards seem to
have finished examining the truck
...
“Besides, Robert
...
”
“Wouldn’t it be easier if it was, though?” he says
...
A girl in the back has a
banjo on her lap
...

Robert waves to me, and again I see another possible life in my mind’s eye
...

The Dauntless guards close the gate and lock it behind them
...
I bite my
lip
...

I push the thought out of my head
...

Four steps away from the fence, where he was talking to a female Dauntless guard with a gun
balanced on her shoulder a moment before
...

I cross my arms
...
”
“I don’t think a smaller time frame makes it any less unwise
...
My head jerks back, but he doesn’t take his
hand away
...
“You know, if you could just learn to attack first, you
might do better
...
“How will that help?”
“You’re fast
...
”
He shrugs, and his hand falls
...
”
“It wasn’t something I wanted to watch,” he says
...
“Looks like the next train is here
...
”

CHAPTER TWELVE

I CRAWL ACROSS my mattress and heave a sigh
...
I have gotten used to aching every time I move, so now I move better,
but I am still far from healed
...
Luckily this time, I was paired against
Myra, who couldn’t throw a good punch if someone was controlling her arm for her
...
She fell down and was too dizzy to get back up
...

The second I touch my head to the pillow, the door to the dormitory opens, and people stream into
the room with flashlights
...

“Everybody up!” someone roars
...
Eric
...
Four stands among them
...
I stare back and forget that all around me the transfers are
getting out of bed
...
I snap out of my daze and slide out from beneath the
blankets
...
She folds her arms and stares at Eric
...

“You have five minutes to get dressed and meet us by the tracks,” says Eric
...
”
I shove my feet into shoes and sprint, wincing, behind Christina on the way to the train
...
They don’t seem surprised to see us
...

We make it to the tracks just behind the Dauntless-born initiates
...
I
make out a cluster of long gun barrels and trigger guards
...

Next to the pile are boxes of what looks like ammunition
...

Written on it is “PAINTBALLS
...
I laugh
...

We rush toward the pile
...
I shove the box in my pocket and sling
the gun across my back so the strap crosses my chest
...

Four checks his watch
...
How long is it going to take you to memorize the train
schedule?”

“Why should I, when I have you to remind me of it?” says Eric, shoving Four’s shoulder
...
It grows larger as it comes closer, shining against the
side of Four’s face, creating a shadow in the faint hollow beneath his cheekbone
...
Four turns around as I fall into stride next to the car and holds out a hand
...
Even the muscles in his forearm are taut, defined
...

Once everyone is in, Four speaks up
...
Each team will have an even mix of
members, Dauntless-born initiates, and transfers
...
Then the second team will get off and do the same
...
“This is a Dauntless tradition, so I suggest you take it seriously
...

“Sounds like the kind of question someone not from Dauntless would ask,” says Four, raising an
eyebrow
...
”
“Four and I will be your team captains,” says Eric
...
“Let’s divide up transfers
first, shall we?”
I tilt my head back
...

“You go first,” Four says
...
“Edward
...
The moonlight makes his eyes bright
...
”
A faint undercurrent of laughter fills the car
...
I don’t know whether to
be angry at the people laughing at me or flattered by the fact that he chose me first
...
“Or are you just picking the weak
ones so that if you lose, you’ll have someone to blame it on?”
Four shrugs
...
”
Angry
...
I scowl at my hands
...
And it gives me a bitter taste in my mouth
...

“Your turn,” says Four
...
”
“Christina
...
Christina is not one of the weak ones
...
”
“Will,” says Four, biting his thumbnail
...
”
“Drew
...
So she’s with me,” says Eric
...
”
I stop listening once they’re finished with us
...
What do we have in common?
Once they’re halfway through the Dauntless-born initiates, I have an idea of what it is
...
All the people on Eric’s team are broad and strong
...
We will all be faster than Eric’s team, which will probably be good for capture the flag—I
haven’t played before, but I know it’s a game of speed rather than brute force
...
Eric is more ruthless than Four, but Four is smarter
...

“Your team can get off second,” says Eric
...
He smiles a little
...
”
“No, I know that you’ll lose no matter when you get off,” says Eric, biting down briefly on one of
the rings in his lip
...
”
We all stand up
...
If
any of the four of us had to end up on the same team as Eric, Peter, and Molly, at least it was him
...

The train is about to dip to the ground
...

Just before I jump, someone shoves my shoulder, and I almost topple out of the train car
...
Before they can try it
again, I jump
...
Fierce pleasure courses through me and I smile
...

One of the Dauntless-born initiates touches Four’s shoulder and asks, “When your team won,
where did you put the flag?”
“Telling you wouldn’t really be in the spirit of the exercise, Marlene,” he says coolly
...
She gives him a flirtatious smile
...

“Navy Pier,” another Dauntless-born initiate calls out
...

Handsome
...
They kept the flag at the carousel
...

No one objects, so we walk east, toward the marsh that was once a lake
...
But
it is difficult to imagine that much water in one place
...

“Yeah
...
He looks over his shoulder, and for a second his expression is
full of longing
...

I am less than a mile away from my brother
...
I
shake my head a little to get the thought out of my mind
...
I can’t think about him any day
...
We still need the bridges because the mud beneath them is too wet to
walk on
...

Once we cross the bridge, the city changes
...
In front of us is a sea of crumbling concrete and broken
glass
...
It’s hard to see where I’m
going, because it’s after midnight and all the city lights are off
...

“Scared of the dark, Mar?” the dark-eyed Dauntless-born initiate teases
...
But she turns it off anyway
...
There’s nothing especially brave about wandering dark streets
with no flashlight, but we are not supposed to need help, even from light
...

I like that
...
And I want to be ready for it
...
A strip of land juts out into the marsh, and rising from it is
a giant white wheel with dozens of red passenger cars dangling from it at regular intervals
...

“Think about it
...
For fun,” says Will, shaking his head
...

“Yeah, but a lame version of Dauntless
...
“A Dauntless Ferris wheel wouldn’t
have cars
...
”
We walk down the side of the pier
...
Whoever left these places left them by
choice and at their leisure
...

“Dare you to jump into the marsh,” says Christina to Will
...
”
We reach the carousel
...
Four takes the flag out of his pocket
...
“I suggest you take this time to
formulate a strategy
...
Arguably, it is the most important aspect
...
What good is a prepared body if you have a scattered mind?
Will takes the flag from Four
...

“Yeah? You think?” Marlene plucks the flag from Will’s fingers
...
“But someone’s got to do it
...
Wait for them to come to us, then take them
out,” suggests Christina
...
“I vote we go all out
...
”
Everyone bursts into the conversation at once, their voices louder with each passing second
...
Four sits down on the edge of the carousel, leaning against a plastic
horse’s foot
...
The muscles in his arms are relaxed; his hand rests on the back of his neck
...

I close my eyes briefly
...

What would I say if I could shout above the sniping behind me? We can’t act until we know where
the other team is
...
The best way to find them is not to argue about how to search for them, or how
many to send out in a search party
...

I look over my shoulder to make sure no one is watching
...

When I stare up at the Ferris wheel from the ground, my throat feels tighter
...
The only good thing about its height is
that it is built to support weight
...

My heart pumps faster
...
Each support is only as wide as my shoulders, and there are no
railings to hold me in, but climbing a ladder is better than climbing the spokes of the wheel
...
It’s rusty and thin and feels like it might crumble in my hands
...
The movement hurts my ribs, and I
wince
...
I don’t know why it doesn’t startle me
...
Maybe because his
voice is low and smooth and almost soothing
...
Four
stands behind me with his gun slung across his back, just like mine
...

“I came to find out what you think you’re doing
...
“I don’t think I’m doing anything
...
“All right
...
”
I pause a second
...
But if he insists on coming with me, it
is probably because he doubts me
...

“Undoubtedly,” he replies
...
It has to be
...
He moves faster than I do, and
soon his hands find the rungs that my feet leave
...
He sounds breathless
...
”
I stare down at the pavement
...
Above

me is a platform, just below the center of the wheel
...
I don’t even think about
how I will climb back down
...

The higher we go, the stronger it will get
...

“Learning about strategy,” I say
...
”
“Teamwork,” he repeats
...
It sounds like a panicked breath
...
“Teamwork doesn’t seem to be a Dauntless priority
...
I press closer to the white support so I don’t fall, but that makes it hard
to climb
...
I can barely see my team under the awning
...

Four says, “It’s supposed to be a priority
...
”
But I’m not really listening, because the height is dizzying
...
It isn’t the height that scares me—the height makes me
feel alive with energy, every organ and vessel and muscle in my body singing at the same pitch
...
It’s him
...
Or
turn to liquid
...

My hand almost misses the next rung
...

A cloud passes over the moon, and the light shifts across my hands
...
“You learn strategy so you can use it
...
“Are you all right, Four?”
“Are you human, Tris? Being up this high…” He gulps for air
...
If I fall now, I will die
...

A gust of air presses against my left side, throwing my body weight to the right
...
Four’s cold hand clamps around one of my hips, one of his fingers
finding a strip of bare skin just under the hem of my T-shirt
...

Now I can’t breathe
...
I feel the ghost of where his hand
was, his fingers long and narrow
...

“Yes,” I say, my voice strained
...
Judging by the blunted ends of metal rods, it
used to have railings, but it doesn’t anymore
...
Without thinking, I put my legs over the side
...

“You’re afraid of heights,” I say
...
“When I make decisions, I pretend it doesn’t exist
...
I can’t help it
...

I have been staring at him too long
...

“Nothing
...
I have to focus
...

The city is pitch-black, but even if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t be able to see very far
...

“We’re not high enough,” I say
...
Above me is a tangle of white bars, the wheel’s
scaffolding
...
Or as secure as possible
...
I grab one of the bars above my head and pull myself up
...

“For God’s sake, Stiff,” he says
...
I shove my foot onto
the place where two bars cross and push myself up, grabbing another bar in the process
...
Every thought I have condenses into that
heartbeat, moving at the same rhythm
...

This is crazy, and I know it
...
Heat tears through my chest, and I smile as I grab the next bar
...
When I feel steady, I look down at
Four
...

I can’t breathe
...
Four grabs a bar
with each hand and pulls himself up, easy, like he’s sitting up in bed
...
It is a stupid thing for me to think when I am one
hundred feet off the ground
...
When I look at the city again, the building
isn’t in my way
...
Most of the buildings are black against a navy sky,
but the red lights at the top of the Hub are lit up
...

Beneath the buildings, the streets look like tunnels
...

Then I see a tiny pulsing light on the ground
...

Four stops climbing when he’s right behind me and looks over my shoulder, his chin next to my
head
...

“Yeah,” he says
...

“It’s coming from the park at the end of the pier,” he says
...
It’s surrounded by open space,
but the trees provide some camouflage
...
”
“Okay,” I say
...
We are so close I forget where I am; instead I notice
that the corners of his mouth turn down naturally, just like mine, and that he has a scar on his chin
...
I clear my throat
...
I’ll follow you
...
His leg is so long that he finds a place for his foot easily and guides his
body between the bars
...

I step down with one foot, pressing my weight into one of the crossbars
...

I’m dangling from the scaffolding with my toes swinging in midair
...

“Four!”
I try to find another place to put my foot, but the nearest foothold is a few feet away, farther than I
can stretch
...
I remember wiping them on my slacks before the Choosing
Ceremony, before the aptitude test, before every important moment, and suppress a scream
...
I will slip
...
“Just hold on, I have an idea
...
He’s moving in the wrong direction; he should be coming toward me, not
going away from me
...
My fingers are dark red, almost purple
...

I won’t last long
...
Better not to look
...
I hear Four’s
sneakers squeak against metal and rapid footsteps on ladder rungs
...
Maybe he left
...
Maybe this is a test of my strength, of my
bravery
...
I count my breaths to calm down
...
In, out
...
Come on, do something
...
The bar I’m holding shudders, and I scream through my
clenched teeth as I fight to keep my grip
...

Air wraps around my ankles and wrists as the wind gushes up, like a geyser
...
I’m
moving—toward the ground
...
But
I’m picking up speed
...

Every muscle in my body tenses as I hurtle toward the ground
...
My legs collapse beneath me and I
pull my arms in, rolling as fast as I can to the side
...
I roll again, and the bottom of
the car skims my shoulder
...

I press my palms to my face
...
If I did, I’m sure I would just fall back down
...
I let him pry my hands from my eyes
...
The warmth of his skin overwhelms the
ache in my fingers from holding the bars
...

“Yeah
...


After a second, I laugh too
...
I am aware of
how little space there is between us—six inches at most
...
I
feel like it should be smaller
...
The wheel is still moving, creating a wind that tosses my hair
back
...
I try to sound casual
...
”
“I would have, if I had known,” he says
...
Come
on, time to get their flag
...
In other factions, he would give me time to recover, but he is Dauntless, so he smiles at me
and starts toward the carousel, where our team members guard our flag
...
I still feel weak, but my mind is awake, especially with his hand on me
...
Our flag is behind her, a glowing triangle in the dark
...
One of them has his hand on a
horse’s head, and a scratched horse eye stares at me between his fingers
...

“Where’d the others go?” asks Four
...

“Did you guys turn on the wheel?” the older girl says
...
“If I lose again this
year, the shame will be unbearable
...
“We know where they are
...

“Yes, while the rest of you were twiddling your thumbs, Tris climbed the Ferris wheel to look for
the other team,” he says
...

Four looks at me
...
I tense my shoulders, about to shrug and say I don’t know, and then an image of the pier stretching
out beneath me comes into my mind
...

“Split in half,” I say
...
The other team is
in the park at the end of the pier, so the group of four will charge as the group of three sneaks behind
the other team to get the flag
...
I don’t blame her
...
“Let’s get this night over with,
shall we?”
Christina joins me in the group going to the right, along with Uriah, whose smile looks white
against his skin’s bronze
...
I stare at
its tail curling around his earlobe for a moment, but then Christina starts running and I have to follow
her
...
As I run, I realize that only

one of us will get to touch the flag, and it won’t matter that it was my plan and my information that got
us to it if I’m not the one who grabs it
...
I pull my gun around my body, holding my finger over the trigger
...
We slow down
so our footsteps aren’t as loud, and I look for the blinking light again
...
I point, and Christina nods, leading the way toward it
...
I hear puffs of air as paintballs go flying
and splats as they find their targets
...
Uriah takes aim and shoots the last guard in the thigh
...

I sprint to catch up to Christina
...
I reach for
it, and so does Christina
...
“You’re already the hero of the day
...
”
She gives me a patronizing look, the way people sometimes look at children when they act too
adult, and snatches the flag from the branch
...
Uriah’s voice joins hers and then I hear a chorus of yells in the distance
...
Maybe she’s right;
I’ve already proved myself today
...

The shouts of triumph become infectious, and I lift my voice to join in, running toward my
teammates
...
I can’t reach her, so I stand off to the side, grinning
...

“Well done,” Four says quietly
...
Wind coming through the doorway of
the train car blows his hair in every direction
...

Al groans
...
And the world is conspiring against you,” says Will
...
Their chests and backs are
splattered with blue and pink paint, and they look dejected
...
That is the benefit of not holding the flag right now—I am no one’s
target
...

“So you climbed the Ferris wheel, huh,” says Uriah
...

Marlene, the girl with the flirty smile, follows him
...

“Pretty smart of you
...
“I’m Marlene
...
At home, being compared to an Erudite would be an insult, but she says it like a
compliment
...
“The first jumper tends to stick in your head
...

Uriah takes one of the paintballs from his gun and squeezes it between his thumb and index finger
...

Marlene collapses in giggles
...
The scent of fish oil wafts through the train car
...
He coughs and makes exaggerated gagging sounds
...

If my entire life is like this, loud laughter and bold action and the kind of exhaustion you feel after a
hard but satisfying day, I will be content
...


CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE NEXT MORNING, when I trudge into the training room, yawning, a large target stands at one end of
the room, and next to the door is a table with knives strewn across it
...
At least it
won’t hurt
...
The sight of him makes me feel like all the air in the room is heavier, bearing down
on me
...
Today I can’t
pretend
...
“You will resume fighting then
...
Everyone pick up three knives
...
“And
pay attention while Four demonstrates the correct technique for throwing them
...

“Now!”
We scramble for daggers
...

“He’s in a bad mood today,” mumbles Christina
...

But I know what she means
...
Winning capture the flag is a
matter of pride, and pride is important to the Dauntless
...

I watch Four’s arm as he throws a knife
...
He hits the
target each time, exhaling as he releases the knife
...
My mother told me that when I was learning how to knit
...
So I spend the first few minutes practicing
without a knife, finding the right stance, learning the right arm motion
...

“I think the Stiff’s taken too many hits to the head!” remarks Peter, a few people down
...
I shut out Eric’s
pacing, and Peter’s jeering, and the nagging feeling that Four is staring at me, and throw the knife
...
The blade doesn’t stick, but I’m the first person to hit the
target
...
I can’t help myself
...
“Remember what a target is?”
Next to me, Christina snorts, and her next knife hits the target
...
His knives clatter to the floor,
or bounce off the wall
...

The next time he tries and misses, Eric marches toward him and demands, “How slow are you,
Candor? Do you need glasses? Should I move the target closer to you?”
Al’s face turns red
...
It
spins and hits the wall
...

I bite my lip
...

“It—it slipped,” says Al
...
He scans the other initiates’ faces—everyone has
stopped throwing again—and says, “Did I tell you to stop?”
Knives start to hit the board
...
The look in
his eyes is almost rabid
...
“But everyone’s still throwing
...
”
“I think you can trust your fellow initiates to aim better than you
...
“Go get your knife
...
I don’t think he’s afraid to; he just
knows that objecting is useless
...
He’s reached the limits of his
compliance
...

“Why not?” Eric’s beady eyes fix on Al’s face
...
“Yes, I am!”
Honesty is his mistake
...

“Everyone stop!” Eric shouts
...
I hold my small dagger tightly
...
” Eric looks at Al
...
”
I drop the dagger and it hits the dusty floor with a thud
...

“Stand in front of the target,” says Eric
...
He walks back to the target
...
” Eric looks over his shoulder
...
He has dark circles
under his eyes and a tense set to his mouth—he’s as tired as we are
...
”
“Is this really necessary?” says Four
...
His face and
body are tense, alert
...
No matter how casual Four sounds, the question is a challenge
...

At first Eric stares at Four in silence
...
Seconds pass and my fingernails bite my

palms
...
“Here, and
everywhere else
...
His grip on the knives
tightens and his knuckles turn white as he turns to face Al
...
Anger
bubbles in my chest, and bursts from my mouth: “Stop it
...
He gives me
such a hard look that I feel like he’s turning me to stone
...
I am stupid for speaking up
while Eric is here; I am stupid for speaking up at all
...
“It doesn’t prove anything except that you’re
bullying us
...
”
“Then it should be easy for you,” Eric says
...
”
The last thing I want to do is stand in front of that target, but I can’t back down now
...
I weave through the crowd of initiates, and someone shoves my shoulder
...
“Oh, wait
...
”
I recover my balance and walk toward Al
...
I try to smile encouragingly, but I can’t
manage it
...
I look at Four’s knives: one in his right hand, two in his left hand
...
I try to swallow, and then look at Four
...
He won’t hit me
...

I tip my chin up
...
If I flinch, I prove to Eric that this is not as easy as I said it was; I
prove that I’m a coward
...
Understand?”
I nod
...
It
is just a flash in the air, and then I hear a thud
...
I close my eyes
...

“You about done, Stiff?” asks Four
...
“No
...
” He taps the spot between his eyebrows
...
He passes a knife from
his left hand to his right hand, and I see nothing but his eyes as the second knife hits the target above
my head
...

“Come on, Stiff,” he says
...
”
Why is he trying to goad me into giving up? Does he want me to fail?
“Shut up, Four!”
I hold my breath as he turns the last knife in his hand
...
It comes straight at me, spinning, blade over handle
...

This time, when it hits the board, my ear stings, and blood tickles my skin
...
He nicked
it
...

“I would love to stay and see if the rest of you are as daring as she is,” says Eric, his voice smooth,
“but I think that’s enough for today
...
His fingers feel dry and cold, and the look he gives me claims me, like
he’s taking ownership of what I did
...
What I did had nothing to do with
him
...

Fear prickles inside me, in my chest and in my head and in my hands
...
But he just lifts his hand from my shoulder and keeps walking
...
I wait until the room is empty and the door is shut before looking at him
again
...

“Is your—” he begins
...

“Yes, I did,” he says quietly
...
”
I grit my teeth
...

Why should I thank you?”
“You know, I’m getting a little tired of waiting for you to catch on!”
He glares at me, and even when he glares, his eyes look thoughtful
...

“Catch on? Catch on to what? That you wanted to prove to Eric how tough you are? That you’re
sadistic, just like he is?”
“I am not sadistic
...
I wish he would yell
...
He leans his face
close to mine, which reminds me of lying inches away from the attack dog’s fangs in the aptitude test,
and says, “If I wanted to hurt you, don’t you think I would have already?”
He crosses the room and slams the point of a knife so hard into the table that it sticks there, handle
toward the ceiling
...
I scream, frustrated, and wipe some of the blood from
my ear
...
I think of Visiting Day like I think of the world ending:
Nothing after it matters
...
I might see my parents again
...

Which is worse? I don’t know
...
Frowning, I stare at my leg
...
I let the pant leg fall and look over my shoulder at the back of
my thigh
...

I step to the side so I stand in front of the mirror
...
I pinch my side, where a layer of fat used to hint at curves to come
...

Dauntless initiation has stolen whatever softness my body had
...
I wrap my towel around me again and leave the girls’ bathroom
...

When I open the dormitory door, a weight drops into my stomach
...
They look up when I walk in and start snickering
...

I walk to my bunk, trying to pretend like they aren’t there, and fumble in the drawer under my bed
for the dress Christina made me get
...

I jump back, almost hitting my head on Christina’s bunk
...
I should have known he wouldn’t let me get away
that easily
...
”
“Get away from me
...

“This isn’t the Hub, you know
...
” His eyes travel down
my body, not in the greedy way that a man looks at a woman, but cruelly, scrutinizing every flaw
...

This will be bad
...

Out of the corner of my eye, I see a clear path to the door
...

“Look at her,” says Molly, crossing her arms
...
“She’s practically a child
...
“She could be hiding something under that towel
...
I duck under Peter’s arm and dart toward the door
...
The towel
slips from my hand and the air is cold on my naked body, making the hair on the back of my neck
stand on end
...
I sprint down the hallway and into the bathroom and lean against the door, breathing hard
...

It doesn’t matter
...

A sob bursts from my mouth, and I slap my hand over my lips to contain it
...
I shake my head like the motion is supposed to make it true
...
The dress is plain black, with a V-neck that shows the tattoos on
my collarbone, and goes down to my knees
...
I want to hurt them
...
I want to, so I will
...
I hope it’s with Peter
...
I squint to see the blackboard
across the room
...

“I got held up,” I say
...
Please let it be Peter, please,
please…
...

“A little what?”
Four moves away from the board
...
Not Peter, but good
enough
...

My fight is last on the list, which means I have to wait through three matches before I face her
...
Edward is the only one who can beat Peter
...

“Go easy on me, okay?” Al asks Christina
...

The first pair—Will and Myra—stand across from each other in the arena
...
Across the room, Four leans against the wall and yawns
...
It doesn’t take long
...
Christina lost to her, which means she’s good
...
If she can’t hit me, she can’t hurt me
...
Al falls after a few hard
hits to the face and doesn’t get back up, which makes Eric shake his head
...
Though they are the two best fighters, the disparity between them is
noticeable
...
It’s obvious
...

By the time the three matches are done, my nails are bitten to the beds and I’m hungry for lunch
...
Some of my anger
has faded, but it isn’t hard to call back
...
Look at her
...

Molly stands across from me
...
“God, you’re pale, Stiff
...
She always does
...
As her body shifts forward, I duck and
drive my fist into her stomach, right over her bellybutton
...

She’s not smirking anymore
...

I hear Four’s voice in my head, telling me that the most powerful weapon at my disposal is my elbow
...

I block her next punch with my forearm
...
She grits her teeth
and lets out a frustrated groan, more animal-sounding than human
...
She
pulls her head back just in time, and my elbow grazes her chin
...
There’s something she’s
not protecting, I know it
...
I watch her for a
few seconds
...
Molly and I have the same flaw in combat
...

I aim an uppercut low, below her bellybutton
...
As she gasps, I sweep-kick her legs out from under her, and
she falls hard on the ground, sending dust into the air
...

My mother and father would not approve of my kicking someone when she’s down
...

She curls into a ball to protect her side, and I kick again, this time hitting her in the stomach
...
I kick again, this time hitting her in the face
...
Look at her
...

I pull my foot back again, but Four’s hands clamp around my arms, and he pulls me away from her
with irresistible force
...

She groans, and I hear a gurgling in her throat, watch blood trickle from her lips
...
“Stop
...
He stares at me
...

“I think you should leave,” he says
...
”
“I’m fine,” I say
...

I wish I could say I felt guilty for what I did
...


CHAPTER FIFTEEN

VISITING DAY
...
My heart leaps and then plummets when I
see Molly hobble across the dormitory, her nose purple between strips of medical tape
...
Neither of them is in the dormitory, so I change quickly
...

Everyone else dresses in silence
...
We all know that we might go to the
Pit floor and search every face and never find one that belongs to us
...
As I pinch a stray hair from my
pillow, Eric walks in
...
“I want to give you some
advice about today
...
“…which I doubt, it is best not to seem too attached
...
We also take the phrase ‘faction before blood’ very seriously here
...

Understand?”
I understand
...
The only part of that speech that Eric meant
was the last part: We are Dauntless, and we need to act accordingly
...

“I may have underestimated you, Stiff,” he says
...
”
I stare up at him
...

If Eric thinks I did something right, I must have done it wrong
...
I slip out of the dormitory
...
I don’t try to catch up
...

Al is missing
...
Maybe
he’s already there
...
I check my clothes—am I covered up?
My pants are tight and my collarbone is showing
...

Who cares if they approve? I set my jaw
...
These are the clothes my faction
wears
...

Clusters of families stand on the Pit floor, most of them Dauntless families with Dauntless initiates
...
I spot Drew and Molly standing alone at one end
of the room and suppress a smile
...

But Peter’s did
...
Neither of his parents looks like him
...
Do they know what kind of person their son is?

Then again…what kind of person am I?
Across the room, Will stands with a woman in a blue dress
...
He
talked about having a sister once; maybe that’s her
...
Standing behind
Christina is a young girl, also a Candor
...

Should I even bother scanning the crowd for my parents? I could turn around and go back to the
dormitory
...
My mother stands alone near the railing with her hands clasped in front of her
...
I start toward her, tears jumping into my eyes
...

She came for me
...
She sees me, and for a second her expression is blank, like she doesn’t know who I
am
...
She smells like soap and laundry detergent
...
She runs her hand over my hair
...
I hold her until I can blink the moisture from my eyes, and then pull back to
look at her again
...
She touches my cheek
...
“You’ve filled out
...
“Tell me
how you are
...
” The old habits are back
...
I shouldn’t let the conversation
stay focused on me for too long
...

“Today is a special occasion,” she says
...
It is my
gift to you
...
She should not be giving me gifts, not after I left her and my father
...
The last week and a half has
been more affectionless than I realized
...

“Just one question
...
“Where’s Dad? Is he visiting Caleb?”
“Ah
...
“Your father had to be at work
...
“You can tell me if he didn’t want to come
...
“Your father has been selfish lately
...
”
I stare at her, stunned
...
I can’t tell by looking at her if she’s angry
...
But she must be; if
she calls him selfish, she must be angry
...
“Will you visit him later?”
“I wish I could,” she says, “but the Erudite have prohibited Abnegation visitors from entering their
compound
...
”
“What?” I demand
...
Why would they do that?”
“Tensions between our factions are higher than ever,” she says
...
”

I think of Caleb standing among the Erudite initiates, scanning the crowd for our mother, and feel a
pang in my stomach
...

“That’s terrible,” I repeat
...

Standing alone at the railing is Four
...
Either his family doesn’t like to come together, or he
wasn’t originally Dauntless
...
” I lean closer to her and say, “He’s kind of intimidating
...

I find myself nodding without thinking
...
I want to
steer her away from him, but just as I’m about to suggest that we go somewhere else, he looks over
his shoulder
...
She offers him her hand
...
My name is Natalie,” she says
...
”
I have never seen my mother shake hands with someone
...
The gesture looks unnatural for both of them
...

“Four,” he says
...
”
“Four,” my mother repeats, smiling
...
” He doesn’t elaborate
...
I’ve been
overseeing her training
...
“I know a few things about Dauntless initiation, and I was worried
about her
...
Then he says, “You
shouldn’t worry
...
I hope it isn’t noticeable
...
“You look familiar for some reason, Four
...
“I don’t make a habit of associating
with the Abnegation
...
She has a light laugh, half air and half sound
...
I
don’t take it personally
...
“Well, I’ll leave you to your reunion
...
The roar of the river fills my ears
...
Or maybe he believes the articles the Erudite
release about us—them, I remind myself
...

“Is he always like that?” she says
...
”
“Have you made friends?” she asks
...
I look over my shoulder at Will and Christina and their families
...

Before we can get to Will and Christina, though, a short, round woman with a black-and-whitestriped shirt touches my arm
...

“Excuse me,” she says
...
“Oh—you mean Al? Yes, I know him
...
He is tall and as
thick as a boulder
...

“I’m sorry, I didn’t see him this morning
...

“Oh my,” Al’s mother says, fanning her face with her hand
...
I almost had a panic attack on the way down here
...
A few weeks ago I might have found that question offensive, but now I spend too
much time with Candor transfers to be surprised by tactlessness
...
“Dauntless, yes
...
”
My mother, I see, wears the same smile I do
...
Of course
she isn’t curious—she’s Abnegation
...

I introduce my mother to Will and Christina, and Christina introduces me to her mother and her
sister
...
She glares at my mother
...

My mother purses her lips, but of course, doesn’t say anything
...
”
“Oh, certainly not
...
“She’s a council member’s
wife is what she is
...
You think I
don’t know that you’re just hoarding goods to distribute to your own faction while we don’t get fresh
food for a month, huh? Food for the factionless, my eye
...
“I believe you are mistaken
...
Ha,” Cara snaps
...
A faction of happy-go-lucky
do-gooders without a selfish bone in their bodies
...
”
“Don’t speak to my mother that way,” I say, my face hot
...
“Don’t say
another word to her or I swear I will break your nose
...
“You’re not going to punch my sister
...
“You think so?”
“No, you’re not
...
“Come on, Beatrice
...
”
She sounds gentle, but her hand squeezes my arm so hard I almost cry out from the pain as she

drags me away
...
Just before she reaches it, though, she
takes a sharp left turn and walks down one of the dark hallways I haven’t explored yet
...
“Mom, how do you know where you’re going?”
She stops next to a locked door and stands on her tiptoes, peering at the base of the blue lamp
hanging from the ceiling
...

“I said no questions about me
...
How are you really doing, Beatrice? How have the
fights been? How are you ranked?”
“Ranked?” I say
...
”
I don’t know how easy it is to find out what another faction does during initiation, but I suspect it’s
not that easy
...
”
“Good
...
“No one looks too closely at the bottom
...
Don’t tell anyone
...

I look into my mother’s eyes, which are pale green and framed by a dark smudge of eyelashes
...
Those lines get deeper when
she hums
...

This is my mother
...

“They were inconclusive,” I say softly
...
” She sighs
...
We don’t know why
...
Stay in the middle of the pack, no matter what you do
...
Do
you understand?”
“Mom, what’s going on?”
“I don’t care what faction you chose,” she says, touching her hands to my cheeks
...
”
“Is this because I’m a—” I start to say, but she presses her hand to my mouth
...
“Ever
...
Divergent is a dangerous thing to be
...

“Why?”
She shakes her head
...
”
She looks over her shoulder, where the light from the Pit floor is barely visible
...
The smell from the dining hall floats over my nose,
sweet and yeasty: baking bread
...

“There’s something I want you to do,” she says
...
So I want you to go find him and tell him to research the simulation serum
...
“You want me to go hang out

at the Erudite compound for the day, you had better give me a reason!”
“I can’t
...
” She kisses my cheek and brushes a lock of hair that fell from my bun behind my
ear
...
It will make you look better if you and I don’t seem attached to each other
...

“You should,” she says
...
”
She walks away, and I am too stunned to follow her
...
It’s delicious
...
”
And then she’s gone
...
She remembered this hallway
...

My mother was Dauntless
...
Four
took it down yesterday so he could calculate our stage one rankings
...
“Your parents were looking for you
...

I sit down next to him on the bed
...
He wears black shorts
...

“You didn’t want to see them?” I say
...
“I’d have to tell them, and they would know if
I was lying
...
“What’s wrong with how you’re doing?”
Al laughs harshly
...
I’m not doing well
...
Couldn’t you tell them that, too?”
He shakes his head
...
I mean, they said they wanted me to
stay in Candor, but that’s only because that’s what they’re supposed to say
...
They wouldn’t understand if I tried to explain it to them
...
” I tap my fingers against my knee
...
“Is that why you chose Dauntless?
Because of your parents?”
Al shakes his head
...
I guess it was because…I think it’s important to protect people
...
Like you did for me
...
“That’s what the Dauntless are supposed to do,
right? That’s what courage is
...
”
I remember what Four told me, that teamwork used to be a Dauntless priority
...
Or threatened Will’s sister
...
“Maybe it will be better once initiation is over
...
“I guess we’ll see tonight
...
It’s better to be here, in silence, than in the Pit, watching everyone
laugh with their families
...
I feel
good when I do something I know he would be proud of, like it makes up for all the things I’ve done
that he wouldn’t be proud of
...
“Like I could actually fit in here, the same
way you do
...
Suddenly I freeze, my cheeks
hot
...
But I was
...
Instead I sit forward so his arm falls away
...

“Tris, I…,” he says
...
I glance at him
...

“Um…sorry,” he says
...
Sorry
...
I could tell him that my parents rarely held hands
even in our own home, so I have trained myself to pull away from all gestures of affection, because
they raised me to take them seriously
...

But of course, it is personal
...
What is more personal than that?
I breathe in, and when I breathe out, I make myself smile
...
I brush off my jeans, though there isn’t anything on them, and stand up
...

He nods and doesn’t look at me
...
“I mean…because of your parents
...
I don’t know what I would say if I didn’t
...
Yeah
...
“I’ll see you later, Tris
...
When the dormitory door closes behind me, I touch a hand
to my forehead and grin a little
...


Discussing our family visits would be too painful, so our final rankings for stage one are all anyone
can talk about that night
...

My rank can’t be as bad as it used to be, especially after I beat Molly, but it might not be good
enough to get me in the top ten at the end of initiation, especially when the Dauntless-born initiates are
factored in
...
We are uncomfortably close to
Peter, Drew, and Molly, who are at the next table over
...
They are speculating about the ranks
...

“You weren’t allowed to have pets?” Christina demands, smacking the table with her palm
...
“What is the point in providing food and
shelter for an animal that just soils your furniture, makes your home smell bad, and ultimately dies?”
Al and I meet eyes, like we usually do when Will and Christina start to fight
...
I hope this awkwardness between us doesn’t last long
...

“The point is…” Christina’s voice trails off, and she tilts her head
...
I
had a bulldog named Chunker
...
We laughed so hard
...
Of course I want to live with an animal that eats all my food
and destroys my kitchen
...
“Why don’t you just get a dog after initiation if you’re
feeling that nostalgic?”
“Because
...
“Dogs are sort of
ruined for me
...
”
We exchange looks
...
My heart jumps
unsteadily in my chest
...
It keeps me from having to lie to my friends
about my results
...
Don’t tell anyone
...

“You mean…killing the dog, right?” asks Will
...
Those with an aptitude for Dauntless picked up the knife in the simulation and
stabbed the dog when it attacked
...
I tug my
sleeves over my wrists and twist my fingers together
...
“I mean, you guys all had to do that too, right?”
She looks first at Al, and then at me
...
”
“Hmm?”
“You’re hiding something,” she says
...
”
“What?”
“In Candor,” says Al, nudging me with his shoulder
...
That feels normal
...
”
“Oh
...
“Well…”
“See, there it is again!” she says, pointing at my hand
...
How can I lie about my results if they can tell when I’m
lying? I’ll have to control my body language
...
Is that
what an honest person does?
I don’t have to lie about the dog, at least
...
”
“How did you get Dauntless without using the knife?” says Will, narrowing his eyes at me
...
I got Abnegation
...
Tori reported my result as Abnegation, so that is what is in the system
...
I keep my eyes on his for a few seconds
...
Then I shrug and stab a piece of meat with my fork
...
They have to believe me
...
“Why?”
“I told you,” I say, smirking
...
”
She laughs
...
I should not
lie to my friends
...
Christina
taking the flag
...

After dinner we go back to the dormitory, and it’s hard for me not to sprint, knowing that the
rankings will be up when I get there
...
At the door to the dormitory, Drew

shoves me into the wall to get past me
...

I’m too short to see over the crowd of initiates standing near the back of the room, but when I find a
space between heads to look through, I see that the blackboard is on the ground, leaning against
Four’s legs, facing away from us
...

“For those of you who just came in, I’m explaining how the ranks are determined,” he says
...
The number of points you earn
depends on your skill level and the skill level of the person you beat
...
I don’t reward preying on the
weak
...
”
I think his eyes linger on Peter at that last line, but they move on quickly enough that I’m not sure
...
”
Molly lets out an unpleasant noise, like a snort or a grumble
...
“That said, it is extremely difficult to rank high at the end of
initiation if you rank low in stage one
...
When I finally do, I look away
...

“We will announce the cuts tomorrow,” Four says
...
Four of you could be factionless
and none of them
...
Or any combination thereof
...
”
He hangs the board on the hook and steps back so we can see the rankings:
1
...
Peter
3
...
Christina
5
...
Tris
Sixth? I can’t be sixth
...
And
losing to me seems to have lowered hers
...

7
...
Al
9
...

I glance at Christina
...
She isn’t the only one
...

Then it falls
...
She points at Christina
...
She wears a smug smile
...

He pockets the chalk and walks past me without glancing in my direction
...

Apparently they remind Molly, too
...
“You are going to pay for this
...
If she had exploded, her anger would have been spent quickly, after a punch or two
...
Leaving means I have to be on my guard
...
He just walks to his bunk and sits down, untying his
shoelaces
...
He can’t possibly be satisfied with second place
...

Will and Christina slap hands, and then Will claps me on the back with a hand bigger than my
shoulder blade
...
Number six,” he says, grinning
...

“It will be, don’t worry,” he says
...
”
“Well, let’s go, then,” says Christina, grabbing my arm with one hand and Al’s arm with the other
...
You don’t know how the Dauntless-borns did
...
”
“I’m just going to go to bed,” he mumbles, pulling his arm free
...
But lingering at the back of my mind
is the fact that Christina and Will are my competitors
...

I just hope I don’t have to betray them in the process
...
The dormitory used to seem loud to me, with all the breathing,
but now it is too quiet
...
Thank God the Dauntless compound
is usually loud
...

Even if they did, they probably wouldn’t want to discuss her
...
It’s supposed to make it easier for

them to change their allegiance from family to faction—to embrace the principle “faction before
blood
...
She asked me to tell Caleb to research the simulation serum—why?
Does it have something to do with me being Divergent, with me being in danger, or is it something
else? I sigh
...
Now they swirl
in my head, and I doubt I’ll be able to sleep until I can answer them
...
My eyes aren’t adjusted to the
dark, so I stare into pure black, like the backs of my eyelids
...

A heavy thud
...
I throw the blankets back
and stand on the stone floor with bare feet
...
Another scream pierces my ears
...

I walk toward the sound, slowly so I don’t trip over anything
...
I don’t
want to see where the screaming is coming from
...

The lights come on
...
Surrounding his head is a halo of
blood, and jutting between his clawing fingers is a silver knife handle
...
The blade is stuck in Edward’s eye
...
Someone else screams too, and someone yells for
help, and Edward is still on the floor, writhing and wailing
...

“Lie still,” I say
...

Edward thrashes again and I say it louder, sterner
...
Breathe
...

I smell something foul
...

“Take it out!” he yells
...
A laugh bubbles in my stomach
...
I
have to suppress hysteria if I’m going to help him
...

“No,” I say
...
Hear me? Let the doctor take it out
...
”
“It hurts,” he sobs
...
” Instead of my voice I hear my mother’s voice
...
I was five at
the time
...
” I try to sound firm, like I’m not idly reassuring him, but I am
...
I suspect that it won’t
...
My hands and knees are soaked with
blood
...

Drew
...


After they take Edward away, I carry a change of clothes into the bathroom and wash my hands
...
There
isn’t much to say
...
I change into the pants I brought and throw the soiled ones in the trash
...
Someone needs to clean up the mess in the dormitory, and since I doubt I’ll ever be able
to sleep again, it might as well be me
...
”
“Should we tell someone?”
“You really think the Dauntless will do anything?” I say
...

For a half hour after that, I kneel alone on the floor in the dormitory and scrub at Edward’s blood
...
Myra is gone; she probably
followed Edward to the hospital
...


“This is going to sound weird,” Will says, “but I wish we didn’t have a day off today
...
I know what he means
...

I have not spent much time alone with Will, but Christina and Al are taking naps in the dormitory,
and neither of us wanted to be in that room longer than we had to
...

I slide one fingernail under another
...
Will and I walk with no sense of purpose
...

“We could visit him,” suggests Will
...
I know that as soon as he says it, but a laugh rises in my throat anyway, and I let it out
because it’s harder to keep it in
...
Sometimes
crying or laughing are the only options left, and laughing feels better right now
...
“It’s just so ridiculous
...
I want to cry because something terrible happened, and I saw it, and I could not see a way
to mend it
...
The Dauntless have rules against attacking someone like that,
but with people like Eric in charge, I suspect those rules go unenforced
...
But here…in Dauntless…bravery won’t do us any good
...

The faction manifestos were written after the factions formed
...

“You have?” I frown at him
...
Of course you have
...
”
“One of the lines I remember from the Dauntless manifesto is, ‘We believe in ordinary acts of
bravery, in the courage that drives one person to stand up for another
...

He doesn’t need to say anything else
...
Maybe Dauntless was formed with
good intentions, with the right ideals and the right goals
...
And the
same is true of Erudite, I realize
...
Now they pursue knowledge and ingenuity with greedy hearts
...
I have not thought about it before
...
It isn’t only because the
thought of living factionless, in complete isolation, sounds like a fate worse than death
...
Maybe we can become
brave and honorable again
...
”
“Okay
...

As we walk toward the Pit, I repeat the line Will quoted to myself so I don’t forget it
...

It is a beautiful thought
...
Across the room, Myra’s bunk looks the same way
...
”
“Even Myra?”
“She said she didn’t want to be here without him
...
” She shrugs,
like she can’t think of anything else to do
...
“At least they didn’t cut
Al
...
The Dauntless decided to spare
him until the next stage
...

Christina shrugs again
...
I don’t remember their names
...
Someone drew a line through Edward and Myra’s names, and
changed the numbers next to everyone else’s names
...
Will is second
...
We
started stage one with nine initiates
...


CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

IT’S NOON
...

I sit in a hallway I don’t recognize
...

Maybe if I bring my bedding here, I will never have to go to the dormitory again
...

I pinch the bridge of my nose
...
If I can’t be with her, the least I can do is act like her sometimes
...

I switched from gray sneakers to black sneakers a week ago, but the gray shoes are buried in one of
my drawers
...

“Tris?”
I look up
...
He waves along the Dauntless-born initiates he walks with
...

“You okay?” he says
...
”
“Yeah, I heard about that guy Edward
...
The Dauntless-born
initiates disappear around a corner
...
“Want to get out of here?”
“What?” I ask
...
“Come on
...
”
I briefly consider my options
...
Or I can leave the Dauntless compound
...

“The only initiates they usually let come are ones with older siblings in Dauntless,” he says
...
Just act like you belong
...
A look I can only describe as Dauntless mania enters his eyes, but
rather than recoil from it, as I might have a few weeks ago, I catch it, like it’s contagious
...
We slow when we reach the Dauntless-born initiates
...

“She just saw that guy get stabbed in the eye, Gabe,” says Uriah
...
No one else says anything, though a few of them give me sidelong
glances like they’re sizing me up
...
If I act the
wrong way, they won’t let me run with them
...

We turn another corner, and a group of members stands at the end of the next hallway
...

“Let’s go,” one of the members says
...
The other

members follow him, and we follow them
...
I catch myself before falling forward and start to climb
...
“Usually locked
...
By then, a door at the top of the
staircase is open, letting in daylight
...

I feel like I have done this a thousand times before
...
I feel the vibrations in the
ground
...
I crack my knuckles and bounce once on my toes
...

Uriah gets in before me, and people press behind me
...
Uriah grabs my arm
to steady me
...
Uriah and I sit against one of the walls
...
“Zeke never told me
...
He points across the room at a boy sitting in the doorway with his
legs dangling out of the car
...

“You don’t get to know
...
She extends her hand
...
”
I shake her hand, but I don’t grip hard enough and I let go too quickly
...
It feels unnatural to grasp hands with strangers
...

“I know who you are,” she says
...
Four told me about you
...
“Oh? What did he say?”
She smirks at me
...
Why do you ask?”
“If my instructor is talking about me,” I say, as firmly as I can, “I want to know what he’s saying
...
“He isn’t coming, is he?”
“No
...
“It’s probably lost its appeal
...
”
He isn’t coming
...
I ignore it and nod
...
But I also know that at least one thing does scare him: heights
...
She must not know that if she speaks of
him with such reverence in her voice
...
I am too curious; I always have been
...
“We were initiates together
...
” She scratches the back of her neck, her expression
suddenly serious
...
”
She gets up and stands behind the members sitting in the doorway
...

“Here we go!” shouts Shauna
...

The other members follow her, a stream of black-clothed, pierced people not much older than I am
...
The train is going much faster than it has every other time I’ve
jumped, but I can’t lose my nerve now, in front of all these members
...

Uriah and I jog to catch up to the members, along with the other initiates, who barely look in my
direction
...
The Hub is behind us, black against the clouds, but the buildings around
me are dark and silent
...

We turn a corner and spread out as we walk down Michigan Avenue
...

As soon as I lift my eyes to scan the buildings, I know where we’re going: the empty Hancock
building, a black pillar with crisscrossed girders, the tallest building north of the bridge
...
Jostling one
another with their elbows, they push through a set of doors at the building’s base
...
I step through it instead of opening it and follow the members
through an eerie, dark entryway, crunching broken glass beneath my feet
...

“Do the elevators work?” I ask Uriah, as quietly as I can
...
“You think I’m stupid enough not to come here early
and turn on the emergency generator?”
“Yeah,” says Uriah
...
”
Zeke glares at his brother, then puts him in a headlock and rubs his knuckles into Uriah’s skull
...
Or at least faster
...

I grin at the sight of Uriah’s disheveled hair, and the elevator doors open
...
A girl with a shaved head stomps on my toes on the way in and doesn’t
apologize
...
Uriah stares at his reflection
in the elevator doors and pats his hair down
...

“One hundred,” I say
...
“Be nice
...
“Why don’t you
know that?”
She doesn’t respond
...

The elevator zooms upward so fast my stomach sinks and my ears pop
...
We pass twenty, and thirty, and Uriah’s hair is finally
smooth
...
Ninety-eight, ninety-nine, and the elevator comes

to a stop at one hundred
...

“I wonder how we’ll get to the roof from…” Uriah’s voice trails off
...
There is a gaping hole in the ceiling of the
hundredth floor
...
The ladder
creaks and sways beneath his feet, but he keeps climbing, whistling as he does
...

Part of me wonders if this is a suicide mission disguised as a game
...

I climb the ladder after Uriah
...
I remember his fingers on my hip again, how they kept me from falling, and I almost
miss a step on the ladder
...

Biting my lip, I make it to the top and stand on the roof of the Hancock building
...
I have to lean against Uriah to keep from
falling over
...
In the other direction is the city, and in many ways it is the same, lifeless and with
limits I do not know
...
Attached to one of the poles on top of the tower is a steel cable as thick
as my wrist
...
Zeke grabs one and attaches it to a pulley that hangs from the steel cable
...
I don’t know
where it ends
...

We’re going to slide down a steel cable in a black sling from one thousand feet up
...

All I can do is nod
...
She wriggles forward on her stomach until most of her
body is supported by black fabric
...
He pulls her, in the sling, to the edge of the building and counts down
from five
...

Lynn gasps as Shauna hurtles toward the ground at a steep incline, headfirst
...
Shauna stays secure in the sling for as long as I can see her, and then she’s too far away, just a
black speck over Lake Shore Drive
...
Somehow I am the first initiate in line, right in front of Uriah
...

Still, there is a part of me that groans, I have to wait for seven people? It is a strange blend of
terror and eagerness, unfamiliar until now
...
He stretches his arms wide as Zeke shoves him down the steel cable
...
They act like they have done this a thousand times before,
and maybe they have
...
What happens between initiation and membership
that transforms panic into delight? Or do people just get better at hiding their fear?

Three people in front of me
...
Two people
...
One person
...

And then it’s my turn
...
I try to climb in, but I have trouble; my hands are
shaking too badly
...
He takes my arm and helps me get in, facedown
...
I
stare down the building’s steel girders and black windows, all the way to the cracked sidewalk
...
And a fool for enjoying the feeling of my heart slamming against my sternum and
sweat gathering in the lines of my palms
...
“I have to say, I’m impressed that you aren’t screaming
and crying right now
...
“She’s Dauntless through and through
...
”
“Careful, brother, or I might not tighten your straps enough,” Zeke says
...
“And
then, splat!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Uriah says
...
”
Hearing him talk about his mother, about his intact family, makes my chest hurt for a second, like
someone pierced it with a needle
...
” Zeke tugs on the pulley attached to the steel cable
...
He looks down at me and says,
“Ready, set, g—”
Before he can finish the word “go,” he releases the sling and I forget him, I forget Uriah, and
family, and all the things that could malfunction and lead to my death
...

I feel like I am without substance, without weight
...
The air is so cold and so fast that it hurts my
face
...

Held secure by the straps, I throw my arms out to the side and imagine that I am flying
...
I can
imagine, up here, how the marsh looked when it was full of water, like liquid steel as it reflected the
color of the sky
...
I am pure adrenaline
...
I should scream, like any rational human being would, but when I open my mouth again, I just
crow with joy
...

I look down and the ground smears beneath me, all gray and white and black, glass and pavement

and steel
...
I try to pull
my arms to my chest again, but I am not strong enough
...

I don’t slow down for another minute at least but sail parallel to the ground, like a bird
...
The wind teased it into knots
...
I reach behind me and work to
undo the straps holding me in
...
A crowd of
members stands below
...

In order to get down, I have to trust them to catch me
...
It is a braver act than sliding down the zip line
...
I hit their arms hard
...
I don’t know which hands hold me and
which hands don’t; I see grins and hear laughter
...

“Um…” All the members stare at me
...
I know why my father said the Dauntless were a pack of madmen
...

“When can I go again?” I say
...
I think of climbing the stairs with the Abnegation, our feet finding the same rhythm, all of us
the same
...
We are not the same
...

I look toward the Hancock building, which is so far from where I stand that I can’t see the people
on its roof
...
I follow the pointed finger toward
a small dark shape sliding down the steel wire
...

“I bet he’ll cry
...
He would get punched so hard
...
Everyone laughs again
...
I hope
...
We line up beneath him and
thrust our arms into the space between us
...
I grab another arm
—I’m not sure who it belongs to, there are too many tangled hands—and look up at her
...
She nods
...
”

I still smell like wind when I walk into the cafeteria that evening
...
Then Shauna waves to me and the
crowd breaks apart, and I walk toward the table where Christina, Al, and Will sit, gaping at me
...
In a way, it is satisfying to see stunned
looks on their faces
...

“Where were you?” asks Christina
...
“He was
leaving with some of the members and he begged them to let me come along
...
Some girl named Lynn stepped on me
...
”
“Yeah,” I say
...
“I’m glad to be back, though
...
I caught sight of myself in a window on
the way into the compound, and my cheeks and eyes were both bright, my hair tangled
...

“Well, you missed Christina almost punching an Erudite,” says Al
...
I can
count on Al to try to break the tension
...
”
“Which she was completely right about,” adds Will
...
Big mistake
...
If I smile enough, maybe I can make them forget their jealousy, or hurt, or
whatever is brewing behind Christina’s eyes
...
“While you were off having fun, I was doing the dirty work of defending your
old faction, eliminating interfaction conflict…”
“Come on, you know you enjoyed it,” says Will, nudging her with his elbow
...
He was standing…”
Will launches into his story, and I nod along like I’m listening, but all I can think about is staring
down the side of the Hancock building, and the image I got of the marsh full of water, restored to its
former glory
...

It’s the first time I have been really eager to be one of them
...


CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

AS FAR AS I can tell, the second stage of initiation involves sitting in a dark hallway with the other
initiates, wondering what’s going to happen behind a closed door
...
The Dauntless-born
initiates and the transfers were separated during stage one, but we will be training together from now
on
...

“So,” says Lynn, scuffing the floor with her shoe
...

“Me,” he says
...
” She says it casually, turning the ring in her eyebrow with her fingertips
...
”
I almost laugh
...
I am almost starting to expect them
...
“Who’s first?”
“Uriah,” she says
...
You know how many years we’ve spent preparing for this?”
If she intends to intimidate us, it works
...

Before Peter can respond, Four opens the door and says, “Lynn
...

“So you’re first,” Will says to Uriah
...
“Yeah
...

“Not really
...
“At
least, so I’m told
...
We sit in silence for twenty minutes
...

Then the door opens again, and Four calls another name
...

Each minute wears into me like a scrape of sandpaper
...
Drew’s leg bounces, and Uriah’s fingers tap against his knee,
and I try to sit perfectly still
...
Terrifying us at every opportunity
...
“Come on, Tris
...

Drew sticks out his leg to trip me, but I hop over it at the last second
...

When I see what’s inside, I recoil immediately, my shoulders hitting his chest
...
Beside it is
a familiar machine
...
There is a computer screen on a

desk in the corner
...
He squeezes my arms and pushes me forward
...
I don’t succeed
...
“We’re taking that literally
...
”
I touch a wavering hand to my forehead
...
It takes all the willpower I have
for me to steer myself toward the chair and sit down in it again, pressing my skull into the headrest
...

“Do you ever administer the aptitude tests?” I say
...

“No,” he replies
...
”
I don’t know why someone would avoid the Abnegation
...
My body tenses
...
He taps something, and I tilt my head back to see what it is
...
The liquid in the syringe is tinted orange
...
I don’t usually mind needles, but this one is huge
...
”
“How does it work without wires?”
“Well, I have wires, so I can see what’s going on,” he says
...
”
He turns my arm over and eases the tip of the needle into the tender skin on the side of my neck
...
I wince and try to focus on his calm face
...
This simulation is different from the aptitude test,”
he says
...

The brain’s electrical activity is then transmitted to our computer, which then translates your
hallucination into a simulated image that I can see and monitor
...
You stay in the hallucination until you calm down—that is, lower your heart
rate and control your breathing
...
I feel the trademark symptoms of fear:
sweaty palms, racing heart, tightness in my chest, dry mouth, a lump in my throat, difficulty breathing
...

“Be brave, Tris,” he whispers
...
”
His eyes are the last thing I see
...
The air smells like smoke and burns my
nostrils
...

I hear fluttering, like the pages of a book blown by the wind, but there is no wind
...

A shadow swoops overhead
...
I feel its weight and the prick of talons and fling my arm forward
to shake it off, my hand batting at it
...
A feather
...
A black bird the size of my forearm turns its head and focuses one beady eye on me
...
It digs in its talons and doesn’t move
...
Thunder rumbles and I hear the patter of rain on the
ground, but no rain falls
...
Still cringing away from the crow, I look up
...
The crows descend in a single mass, diving toward the
earth, hundreds of beady black eyes shining
...
I
scream as they surround me, feathers flapping in my ears, beaks pecking at my shoulders, talons
clinging to my clothes
...
My hands hit solid
bodies but do nothing; there are too many
...
They nip at my fingertips and press against my
body, wings sliding across the back of my neck, feet tearing at my hair
...
They scream against me
...
I open my eyes and it pecks at my
face, its beak hitting me in the nose
...

I am screaming; I am sobbing
...
“Help!”
And the crows flap harder, a roar in my ears
...
I gasp for air and my mouth fills with feathers, feathers down my throat, in my
lungs, replacing my blood with dead weight
...
I am dying; I am dying; I am dying
...
Be brave
...
I cry out to him, inhaling feathers and exhaling “Help!” But there will be no
help; I am alone
...
Its beak wedges past my lips and scrapes my teeth
...
I spit and clench my teeth to form a barrier, but
now a fourth crow is pushing at my feet, and a fifth crow is pecking at my ribs
...
I can’t, I can’t
...


Breathe
...
It has been hours since I was alone in
the field; it has been days
...
My heart pounds hard in my chest
...
I breathe again, my face wet with tears
...
I
extend my arms and breathe
...
I let the flapping of wings and the squawking and the pecking and the prodding continue,
relaxing one muscle at a time, resigning myself to becoming a pecked carcass
...

I open my eyes, and I am sitting in the metal chair
...

I moan and pull my knees to my chest, burying my face in them
...
“Don’t touch
me!” I sob
...
The hand shifts awkwardly over my hair, and I remember my father stroking
my hair when he kissed me goodnight, my mother touching my hair when she trimmed it with the
scissors
...

“Tris
...

“Tris, I’m going to take you back to the dorms, okay?”
“No!” I snap
...
“They
can’t see me…not like this…”
“Oh, calm down,” he says
...
“I’ll take you out the back door
...
My body is trembling and I feel so weak I’m not sure I
can stand, but I have to try
...
Even if
they don’t see me, they’ll find out, they’ll talk about me—
“Nonsense
...
I blink the tears from my eyes, wipe my cheeks with
the heel of my hand, and let him steer me toward the door behind the computer screen
...
When we’re a few hundred yards away from the room, I
yank my arm away and stop
...
“What was the point of that, huh? I wasn’t aware that when I
chose Dauntless, I was signing up for weeks of torture!”
“Did you think overcoming cowardice would be easy?” he says calmly
...

He doesn’t say anything, just stands there as I cry
...
“I want to go home,” I say weakly
...
My choices are here or the factionless slums
...
He just looks at me
...


“Learning how to think in the midst of fear,” he says, “is a lesson that everyone, even your Stiff
family, needs to learn
...
If you can’t learn it, you’ll need to get
the hell out of here, because we won’t want you
...
” My lower lip trembles
...
I’m failing
...
“How long do you think you spent in that hallucination, Tris?”
“I don’t know
...
“A half hour?”
“Three minutes,” he replies
...
Whatever you
are, you’re not a failure
...
“Tomorrow you’ll be better at this
...
”
“Tomorrow?”
He touches my back and guides me toward the dormitory
...

Their gentle pressure makes me forget the birds for a moment
...

“It wasn’t a ‘what’ so much as a ‘who
...
“It’s not important
...
” We reach the door to the dormitory, and he leans against the wall, sliding his hands into
his pockets
...
”
“So they don’t go away?”
“Sometimes they do
...
” His thumbs hook around his belt
loops
...
That’s impossible
...
”
I nod
...
That is how they seemed, anyway
...

“Anyway, your fears are rarely what they appear to be in the simulation,” he adds
...
The expression warms his eyes
enough that I forget he’s my instructor
...

“When you see one, do you run away screaming?”
“No
...
” I think about stepping closer to him, not for any practical reason, but just because
I want to see what it would be like to stand that close to him; just because I want to
...

I step closer and lean against the wall too, tilting my head sideways to look at him
...
Six inches
...
Less than six
inches
...

“So what am I really afraid of?” I say
...
“Only you can know
...
There are a dozen things it could be, but I’m not sure which one is right, or if there’s
even one right one
...
I bite the inside of my cheek and watch Four
carefully
...
My admission doesn’t appear to
bother him
...
”
“What changed?”
“The leadership,” he says
...
Six years ago Max and the other leaders changed the training methods to make them more
competitive and more brutal, said it was supposed to test people’s strength
...
Bet you can’t guess who the leaders’ new protégé is
...
They trained him to be vicious, and now he will train the rest of us to
be vicious too
...
Their training didn’t work on him
...
”
“So he was their second choice for leadership
...
“And you were their first
...
Jealous, even though he has what he wants
...
I must be right
...
But I know
how Four feels about personal questions
...

“Do I look like I’ve been crying?” I say
...
” He leans in close, narrowing his eyes like he’s inspecting my face
...
Even closer, so we would be breathing the same air—if I could remember to
breathe
...
A more serious look replaces his smile as he adds, “You look tough as nails
...
He holds a piece of paper in both hands
...
“The recent transfer of Beatrice and Caleb Prior, the children of Andrew
Prior, calls into question the soundness of Abnegation’s values and teachings
...
Christina, standing on the edge of the crowd, looks over her shoulder and
spots me
...
I can’t move
...
Now the Erudite are attacking my
father
...
“Molly Atwood, a fellow Dauntless transfer,
suggests a disturbed and abusive upbringing might be to blame
...
‘She was telling her father to stop doing something
...
’”
So this is Molly’s revenge
...

She smiles
...
If I knocked them out, I might be doing her a favor
...
Or I try to demand, but my voice comes out strangled and scratchy, and I have
to clear my throat and say it again
...
Some, like Christina, look at me in a pitying
way, their eyebrows drawn in, their mouths turned down at the corners
...
Peter turns last, with a wide smile
...
My face burns
...
His eyes scan the paper again
...
Perhaps the answer is that we have entrusted our city to a group of proselytizing
tyrants who do not know how to lead us out of poverty and into prosperity
...
Instead, I lift my heel and stomp as hard as I can
where the bones in his foot connect to his toes
...

Then I throw myself at Molly, hoping the force of the impact will surprise her and knock her down,
but before I can do any damage, cold hands close around my waist
...
“My father, you coward!”
Will pulls me away from her, lifting me off the ground
...
I have to burn it; I have to destroy it; I have to
...
Once the
door shuts behind him, he lets go, and I shove him as hard as I can
...
He stands in front of the door
...
Calm down
...
“Calm down? Calm down? That’s my family they’re talking about, that’s my
faction!”
“No, it’s not
...
“It’s your old faction, and
there’s nothing you can do about what they say, so you might as well just ignore it
...

“Your stupid ex-faction isn’t just insulting Abnegation anymore
...
”
Will laughs
...
They’re arrogant and dull, and that’s why I left them, but they aren’t
revolutionaries
...
”
“They don’t want people to listen, they want people to agree,” I reply
...
” I touch my palms to my cheeks
...
”
“Hey
...

I nod, but I don’t believe him
...

The door opens again, and Christina and Al walk out
...
“Want to come with us?”
I smooth my hair
...
Even if Will let me, I am outnumbered there
...

I have enough to worry about without anxiety about my family
...
She shrieks as he charges through the crowd
...

My shoulder still burns
...

It is a circle with a flame inside it
...
They are a part of life here, just as integral to
my initiation as learning to fight
...
I don’t bother objecting to her makeover attempts anymore
...

Will and I walk behind Christina and Al
...

“Why?” I say
...
Because you’re…sensible
...
His teeth are white and straight
...
“You?”
He laughs
...
”
I don’t ask what that means
...
“It’s basically a struggle between your thalamus,
which is producing the fear, and your frontal lobe, which makes decisions
...
“Sorry
...
Just a habit
...
“It’s interesting
...
He cringes and adjusts his grip on her legs
...
I am worried about him
...
He laughs so hard he has to grab
the railing for balance
...
I had begun to think of Four as rigid, like a soldier, and forgot that
he’s also eighteen
...
“Instructor alert
...
“He’d probably make us play chicken or something
...
Remember when he put the gun up to Peter’s head? I think Peter wet
himself
...

Will doesn’t argue with me
...

“Tris!” Four calls out
...
Four pulls
away from the railing and walks up to me
...
I don’t blame them for staring
...

“You look different
...

“So do you,” I say
...
“What are you doing?”
“Flirting with death,” he replies with a laugh
...
Probably not a good
idea
...
” I’m not sure I like Four this way
...

“Didn’t know you had a tattoo,” he says, looking at my collarbone
...
His breath smells thick and sharp
...

“Right
...
He glances over his shoulder at his friends, who are carrying on
without him, unlike mine
...
”
I am tempted to ask him why he wants me to hang out with him, but I suspect the answer has
something to do with the bottle in his hand
...
“Drunk?”
“Yeah…well, no
...
“Real, I guess
...
”
“Nice of you
...
”
His words surprise me, and my heart leaps
...
I laugh
...
” He winks at me
...
I smile
...

Then Al rushes at me like a rolling boulder and throws me over his shoulder
...

“Come on, little girl,” he says, “I’m taking you to dinner
...

“I thought I would rescue you,” Al says as we walk away
...
“What was that all
about?”
He is trying to sound lighthearted, but he asks the question almost sadly
...

“Yeah, I think we’d all like to know the answer to that question,” says Christina in a singsong
voice
...
” I shake my head
...
He didn’t even know what he was saying
...
“That’s why I was grinning
...
”
“Right,” says Will
...
He was close enough to hear what
Four said to me about looking good
...
I
don’t want to make him feel worse
...
My mother knit scarves for the
neighborhood kids
...
There was a fire in the fireplace and
peace in my heart, as I was doing exactly what I was supposed to be doing, and everything was quiet
...
Peace is restrained; this is
free
...
In, out
...

“It’s just a simulation, Tris,” Four says quietly
...
The last simulation bled into my life, waking and sleeping
...
Sudden fits of terror in the shower, at breakfast, on the way here
...
And I am not the only one who feels this way; I can tell
...


I am in darkness
...
This time
there is no field; there are no crows
...
What monsters will creep from
the darkness and steal my rationality? How long will I have to wait for them?
A blue orb lights up a few feet ahead of me, and then another one, filling the room with light
...
I search for Christina and find her standing among them
...
Their stillness
makes my throat feel tight
...
I touch it, and my fingers find glass, cool
and smooth
...
There is a pane above me; I am in a glass box
...
It doesn’t budge
...

My heart beats faster
...
Someone taps on the wall in front of me
...
He
points at my feet, smirking
...
I crouch to see where the water is coming from, but it seems to be coming from nowhere,
rising up from the box’s glass bottom
...
He joins the crowd of
initiates
...
It now covers my ankles
...

“Hey!” I say
...
I hit the glass harder
...
She leans over to Peter, who stands beside her, and whispers something in his
ear
...

The water covers my thighs
...
I’m not trying to get their attention
anymore; I’m trying to break out
...
I step back and
throw my shoulder into the wall, once, twice, three times, four times
...

“Help!” I scream
...
I will die in this tank
...


I see Will standing among the initiates, and something tickles at the back of my mind
...
Come on, think
...
It’s hard to breathe, but I have to try
...

My body rises, weightless in the water
...
Gasping, I press my face to the glass above me, sucking in as much air as I can
...

Don’t panic
...
I thrash in the water, smacking
the walls
...
The simulation is all in
your head
...
If it’s in my head, I control it
...
The
initiates’ passive faces stare back at me
...

I scream again and shove the wall with my palm
...
A cracking sound
...
I slam my other hand next to the first and drive another
crack through the glass, this one spreading outward from my palm in long, crooked fingers
...
I kick the wall
...

The pane shatters, and the force of the water against my back throws me forward
...

I gasp and sit up
...
I gulp and shake out my hands
...

“What?” I ask
...
”
“I don’t know
...
I swing my legs over the side of the chair, and
when I stand, I feel steady
...

He sighs and grabs me by the elbow, half leading and half dragging me out of the room
...
He stares at me in silence
...

“What?” I demand
...

I stare at him, fear pulsing through me like electricity
...
How does he know? I must have
slipped up
...

I should act casual
...
“I suspected it last time, but this time it’s obvious
...
I’ll delete the footage, but unless you want to wind up dead at the
bottom of the chasm, you’ll figure out how to hide it during the simulations! Now, if you’ll excuse
me
...
I feel my heartbeat in my
throat
...
I didn’t know that was an act of Divergence
...
I need answers, and I know who has
them
...

There aren’t many people out, because it’s midafter-noon and most of them are at work or at
school
...
She looks up
when I walk in
...
She glances at the other tattoo artist, who is too focused on what he’s doing
to notice us
...
”
I follow her behind the curtain that separates the two rooms
...
Tori draws the curtain shut and sits in
one of the chairs
...

“What’s going on?” she says
...
” I nod a few times
...
”
“Ah
...
“What does it mean to be…” I hesitate
...
“What the hell am I? What does it have to do with the simulations?”
Tori’s demeanor changes
...
Her expression becomes guarded
...
“Someone who can then manipulate the simulation
or even shut it down
...
“Someone who,
because you are also Dauntless…tends to die
...
Tension builds inside
me until I can’t stand to hold it in anymore—I have to cry, or scream, or…
I let out a harsh little laugh that dies almost as soon as it’s born and say, “So I’m going to die,
then?”
“Not necessarily,” she says
...
I deleted your
aptitude results from the system immediately and manually logged your result as Abnegation
...
”
I stare at her in silence
...
She sounds steady, if a little urgent, and I’ve never
suspected her of being unbalanced, but she must be
...
Even if individuals are capable of it, the leaders of a faction can’t possibly be
...
“The leaders of the Dauntless wouldn’t kill me
...
Not
anymore
...
”
“Oh, you think so?” She plants her hands on her knees and stares right at me, her features taut with
sudden ferocity
...

“Yeah
...
He and I both transferred from Erudite, only his aptitude test was inconclusive
...
Said it was a suicide
...
” She shakes her
head
...
Even the thought sounds ridiculous to me
...

Her sleeves are rolled up, so I can see a tattoo of a river on her right arm
...
“In the second stage of training, Georgie got really good, really fast
...
So the instructors took a special
interest in him
...
Whispered about him all the time
...
And the next day, Georgie was gone
...
I could
be so good that all the instructors took notice
...
“Just changing the simulations?”
“I doubt it,” she says, “but that’s all I know
...
“About manipulating the
simulations?”
“Two kinds of people,” she says
...
Or people who have experienced it
themselves
...
Or secondhand, like me
...
He doesn’t want me dead
...
I can’t let him distract me
...
”
“If I had it figured out, I would have told you by now
...
“The only
thing I’ve come up with is that changing the simulation isn’t what they care about; it’s just a symptom
of something else
...
”
Tori takes my hand and presses it between her palms
...
“These people taught you how to use a gun
...
You think they’re above hurting you? Above killing you?”
She releases my hand and stands
...
Be careful, Tris
...
I have not walked this tunnel since the day of
the Choosing Ceremony
...

I walk it surefooted now
...

It has been four days since I spoke to Tori
...
The first article accuses Abnegation of withholding luxuries like cars and fresh fruit from
the other factions in order to force their belief in self-denial on everyone else
...

The second article discusses the failings of choosing government officials based on their faction,
asking why only people who define themselves as selfless should be in government
...
It makes a lot of sense, which makes
me suspect it is a call for revolution wrapped in the clothing of rationality
...
The net stretches across the gaping hole, just as it did when I last saw
it
...
I would not have been able to lift my body up with just my arms when I first
got here, but now I do it almost without thinking and roll into the center of the net
...
It is dark blue and
starless
...

The articles troubled me, but I had friends to cheer me up, and that is something
...
After the second article, Uriah and Marlene taught me a card game, and we played for
two hours in the dining hall
...
More than that, I want to remember why I came here, and why I
was so determined to stay here that I would jump off a building for it, even before I knew what being
Dauntless was
...

I wanted to be like the Dauntless I saw at school
...

But they were not members yet; they were just playing at being Dauntless
...
I didn’t know what fear was
...
In one I was tied to a stake and Peter set a fire beneath my
feet
...
In the third, I watched as my family slowly bled to death
...
I know what fear is now
...
In my mind I stand
at the edge of the roof again
...
I ball the shirt up and hurl it at Peter’s
chest
...
No, I was wrong; I didn’t jump off the roof because I wanted to be like the
Dauntless
...
I
wanted to acknowledge a part of myself that Abnegation demanded that I hide
...
I reach with my toes as far as I can,
taking up as much of the net as possible
...


I hold my head in my hands and breathe deeply
...
When I lift my head, I see that Four
is watching me
...

“You don’t have to explain it to me,” he replies
...
You don’t want to shoot
them
...
”
“In the simulation is the only time I get to see them,” I say
...
I twist my fingers together and pull them
apart
...
I wake to bloody hands
every morning
...
You ever just…miss your family?”
Four looks down
...
“I don’t
...
”
It is unusual, so unusual it distracts me from the memory of holding a gun to Caleb’s chest
...

Are you like me? I ask him silently
...
His eyes hold mine, and as the silent seconds pass, he
looks less and less stern
...
I have been looking at him too long, but then, he has
been looking back, and I feel like we are both trying to say something the other can’t hear, though I
could be imagining it
...

I push the door open and hurry down the hallway
...
I shouldn’t be able to think of anything but initiation
...
Drew doesn’t sleep—he just stares at the wall, curled in a ball
...
My nightmares and chewed fingernails pale by
comparison
...
Is it being Divergent that
makes me steady, or is it something else?
When I get back to the dormitory, I expect to find the same thing I found the day before: a few
initiates lying on beds or staring at nothing
...

Eric is in front of them with a chalkboard in his hands, which is facing the other way, so I can’t see
what’s written on it
...

“What’s going on?” I whisper
...

“Rankings for stage two,” he says
...


“There aren’t
...
”
I nod
...
Eric lifts
the board above his head and hangs it on the nail
...

My name is in the first slot
...
I follow the list down
...
Peter is second, but when I look at the time listed by his name, I realize that the margin
between us is conspicuously wide
...
Mine is two minutes, forty-five seconds
...

I nod, still staring at the board
...
If Peter and his friends hated me before, they will despise me now
...
It
could be my eye next
...

I search for Al’s name and find it in the last slot
...
I want to console Al
...

Peter turns slowly, every limb infused with tension
...
He walks toward his bunk, but at the last second, he
whips around and shoves me against a wall, a hand on each of my shoulders
...

“How did you do it, huh? How the hell did you do it?”
He pulls me forward a few inches and then slams me against the wall again
...
Will grabs Peter
by his shirt collar and drags him away from me
...
“Only a coward bullies a little girl
...
“Are you blind, or just stupid? She’s going
to edge you out of the rankings and out of Dauntless, and you’re going to get nothing, all because she
knows how to manipulate people and you don’t
...
”
Peter storms out of the dormitory
...

“Thanks,” I say, nodding to Will
...
“Are you trying to manipulate us?”
“How on earth would I do that?” I scowl at him
...
”
“I don’t know
...
“By acting weak so we pity you? And then acting tough to
psyche us out?”
“Psyche you out?” I repeat
...
I wouldn’t do that
...
I can tell he doesn’t believe me—not quite
...
She looks at me without
sympathy and adds, “She’s not acting
...
Will follows
...
The first and the last
...
He sits down on the edge of his bed
...

“Sure,” he says
...
I look away
...
Anyone with eyes could see
that Al is not all right
...
“You can improve your rank if you…”
My voice trails off when he looks up at me
...
There is no strategy for stage two
...

“See?” he says
...
”
“I know it’s not
...
His chin wobbles
...
All of this
is easy
...
”
“Yeah, it is
...
“You aren’t helping me by pretending it isn’t
...
”
I feel like I just walked into a downpour, and all my clothes are heavy with water; like I am heavy
and awkward and useless
...
I want to help him
...

“I…,” I start to say, meaning to apologize, but for what? For being more Dauntless than he is? For
not knowing what to say?
“I just…” The tears that have been gathering in his eyes spill over, wetting his cheeks
...
”
I nod and turn away from him
...
The door
clicks into place behind me, and I keep walking
...
This is not the first time I have failed my family since I got here, but
for some reason, it feels that way
...

This time, I did not know what to do
...


I somehow find the hallway I sat in the day Edward left
...
I close my eyes and pay attention to the cold stone beneath me and breathe
the musty underground air
...
Uriah jogs toward me
...
Lynn is holding a muffin
...
” He crouches near my feet
...
”
“So you just wanted to congratulate me?” I smirk
...
”
“Someone should,” he says
...
So quit moping and come with us
...
”
The idea is so ridiculous I can’t stop myself from laughing
...
Lynn narrows her eyes at me, but Marlene grins
...
“You’re practically guaranteed a top ten spot if you
keep it up
...

“And too Abnegation to ‘celebrate,’” remarks Lynn
...
“Why are you shooting a muffin off Marlene’s head?”
“She bet me I couldn’t aim well enough to hit a small object from one hundred feet,” Uriah
explains
...
It works out well, really
...
We get there in under
a minute, and Uriah flips on a light switch
...

“They just keep these lying around?” I ask
...
” Uriah pulls up his shirt
...
I stare at the tattoo, trying to figure out what it is, but then he lets his
shirt fall
...
“Go stand in front of a target
...

“You aren’t seriously going to shoot at her, are you?” I ask Uriah
...
“It’s got plastic pellets in it
...
What do you think we are, stupid?”
Marlene stands in front of one of the targets and sets the muffin on her head
...

“Wait!” calls out Marlene
...

“Mmkay!” she shouts, the word garbled by food
...

“I take it your ranks were good,” I say to Lynn
...
“Uriah’s second
...
Marlene’s fourth
...
He squeezes the trigger
...
She didn’t even blink
...

“You miss your old faction?” Lynn asks me
...
“It was calmer
...
”
Marlene picks up the muffin from the ground and bites into it
...
That’s what Eric says, anyway,”
Lynn says
...

“Four says it’s to prepare us
...
”

I nod
...
I get glimpses of it every so often—the
Dauntless cheering when I jumped off the building, the net of arms that caught me after zip lining—but
they are not enough
...
Shauna, Zeke, and Four walk in just as Uriah fires at another
target
...

“I thought I heard something in here,” says Four
...
“You’re not supposed to be in here after hours
...
”
Uriah wrinkles his nose at his brother and puts the pellet gun away
...

“You wouldn’t tell Eric,” says Lynn, eyeing Four suspiciously
...
As I pass him, he rests his hand on the top of my back to usher me out,
his palm pressing between my shoulder blades
...
I hope he can’t tell
...
I start to follow them
...
I turn toward him, wondering which version of Four I’ll see now—the
one who scolds me, or the one who climbs Ferris wheels with me
...

“You belong here, you know that?” he says
...
It’ll be over soon, so just hold
on, okay?”
He scratches behind his ear and looks away, like he’s embarrassed by what he said
...
I feel my heartbeat everywhere, even in my toes
...
I am not sure which option is smarter, or better
...

I reach out and take his hand
...
I can’t breathe
...
For a long moment, we stay that way
...
Maybe now he thinks I’m stupid, or strange
...


I get back to the dormitory before anyone else does, and when they start to trickle in, I get into bed
and pretend to be asleep
...
If I can make it through initiation, I will be Dauntless, and I won’t have to see them anymore
...
I don’t want to lose
them
...

After at least a half hour of racing thoughts, I roll onto my back and open my eyes
...
Probably exhausted from resenting me so much , I think with a
wry smile
...


I get out of bed to get a drink of water
...
My bare feet
make sticky sounds on the floor as I walk, my hand skimming the wall to keep my path straight
...

I tug my hair over one shoulder and bend over
...
I creep closer to them, trusting the dark to keep me hidden
...
” Eric’s voice
...
A female voice; cold and
familiar, but familiar like a dream, not a real person
...
The
simulations, however, reveal who the Divergent rebels are, if there are any, so we will have to
examine the footage several times to be sure
...
I lean forward, my back pressed to the stone, to see who
the familiar voice belongs to
...
“Your first priority is always
finding them
...
”
“I won’t forget
...
Whoever that voice belongs to, she is pulling
the strings; she is responsible for Eric’s leadership position; she is the one who wants me dead
...

Then someone grabs me from behind
...
It smells like soap and it’s big enough to cover
the lower half of my face
...

“Ow!” a rough voice cries
...
” That voice is higher than the average male’s and clearer
...

A strip of dark cloth covers my eyes, and a new pair of hands ties it at the back of my head
...
There are at least two hands on my arms, dragging me forward, and one on my
back, shoving me in the same direction, and one on my mouth, keeping my screams in
...

My chest hurts
...

“Wonder what it sounds like when a Stiff begs for mercy,” Peter says with a chuckle
...
”
I try to focus on the hand on my mouth
...
His identity is a problem I can solve
...

The palm is sweaty and soft
...
The soap smell is
familiar
...
The same smell surrounds Al’s bunk
...

I hear the crash of water against rocks
...
I press my lips together to keep from screaming
...

“Lift her up, c’mon
...
I scream too, knowing that
no one can hear me here
...
I will
...
Judging by its
width and curvature, it is a metal railing
...
My
breaths wheeze and mist touches the back of my neck
...
My feet leave the ground, and my attackers are the only thing keeping me from falling into the
water
...
“You sure you’re sixteen, Stiff? Doesn’t feel like you’re more
than twelve
...

Bile rises in my throat and I swallow the bitter taste
...
I bite my tongue to keep from screaming
...

Al’s hand slips from my mouth
...
I recognize his low, distinct voice
...
This time, I bite down as hard as
I can on the first arm I find
...
Something hard
strikes my face
...
It would have been pain if adrenaline wasn’t
coursing through me like acid
...
I bang my elbow
against stone and bring my hands up to my head to remove the blindfold
...
I gasp and cough and claw at the back of my head
...
A scream of pain bursts from my
mouth, and I feel dizzy
...
I drag my heavy hand
up, taking the blindfold with it, and blink
...
I
see someone running toward us and someone running away—someone large, Al
...

Peter wraps a hand around my throat and lifts me up, his thumb wedged under my chin
...
His pale face is contorted
and his teeth are gritted, and he holds me over the chasm as spots appear on the edges of my vision,
crowding around his face, green and pink and blue
...
I try to kick him, but my legs are
too short
...

I hear a shout, and he releases me
...
I hook my elbows over
it and groan
...
The world dips and sways around me, and someone is on the Pit
floor—Drew—screaming
...
Kicks
...

I blink a few times and focus as hard as I can on the only face I can see
...

His eyes are dark blue
...

I close my eyes, and hands wrap around my arms, right where they join with the shoulder
...
I
press my face into his shoulder, and there is a sudden, hollow silence
...
I hear the sound of
running water again, but this time it’s from a faucet and not from the chasm
...

The pain is a constant throb in my head and cheek and ribs
...
I see a blue patchwork quilt under my head and wince as I tilt my head to see
where the water sound is coming from
...
Blood from his knuckles turns the sink water
pink
...
His expression is
placid as he examines his cuts, turns off the water, and dries his hands with a towel
...

He turns off the bathroom light and gets an ice pack from the refrigerator in the corner of the room
...

“Your hands,” I croak
...
He rests his knee on the mattress and leans over
me, slipping the ice pack under my head
...

What do you have to lose? I ask myself
...

“Tris,” he says, speaking against my fingers, “I’m all right
...

“I was coming back from the control room
...
”
“What did you do to them?” I say
...
“Peter and Al ran
...
At least, I think that’s what he was trying to say
...
He adds bitterly, “In what condition, I can’t say
...
But white-hot triumph
races through me at the thought of Drew in the infirmary, and I squeeze Four’s arm
...
My voice sounds tight and fierce
...
I want to break something, or hit something, but I am afraid
to move, so I start crying instead
...
I see no sympathy in his eyes
...
He pulls his wrist free and, to my surprise, rests his hand on the side of my
face, his thumb skimming my cheekbone
...

“I could report this,” he says
...
“I don’t want them to think I’m scared
...
He moves his thumb absently over my cheekbone, back and forth
...
”
“You think it would be a bad idea if I sat up?”
“I’ll help you
...

Pain rushes through my body in sharp bursts, but I try to ignore it, stifling a groan
...
“You can let yourself be in pain,” he says
...
”
I bite down on my lip
...

“I suggest you rely on your transfer friends to protect you from now on,” he says
...
I feel Al’s hand against my mouth again, and a sob jolts my body forward
...
“But Al…”
“He wanted you to be the small, quiet girl from Abnegation,” Four says softly
...
No other reason
...

“The others won’t be as jealous if you show some vulnerability
...
”
“You think I have to pretend to be vulnerable?” I ask, raising an eyebrow
...
” He takes the ice pack from me, his fingers brushing mine, and holds it against my head
himself
...
Four stands up
...

Sometimes I see him as just another person, and sometimes I feel the sight of him in my gut, like a
deep ache
...
”
The idea nauseates me
...
I lift my eyes to his
...
”
“I don’t think you get it
...
“They touched me
...
“Touched you,” he
repeats, his dark eyes cold
...
” I clear my throat
...
“But…almost
...

He is silent and still for so long that eventually, I have to say something
...
It is more important for you to be safe
than right, for the time being
...
My stomach writhes, partly because I know he
makes a good point but I don’t want to admit it, and partly because I want something I don’t know
how to express; I want to press against the space between us until it disappears
...

“But please, when you see an opportunity…” He presses his hand to my cheek, cold and strong,
and tilts my head up so I have to look at him
...
They look almost predatory
...
”
I laugh shakily
...
”
“Do me a favor,” he says, “and don’t call me that
...
” He takes his hand from my face
...
”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

I DON’T GO back to the dorms that night
...
Four sleeps on the floor and I sleep on his bed, on top of the quilt,
breathing in the scent of his pillowcase
...

The rhythm of his breaths slows, and I prop myself up to see if he is asleep
...
His eyes are closed, his lips parted
...
Who is he when he isn’t Dauntless, isn’t an instructor,
isn’t Four, isn’t anything in particular?
Whoever he is, I like him
...
He is not sweet or gentle or particularly kind
...
That is all I need to know
...

I wake to aches and pains
...
I am almost too short to see myself in it, but when I stand on my tiptoes, I can see
my face
...
I hate the idea of slumping into the
dining hall like this, but Four’s instructions have stayed with me
...
I
need the protection of seeming weak
...
The door opens and Four walks in, a towel in hand
and his hair glistening with shower water
...

“Hi,” I say
...
I wish it didn’t
...
“Not bad,” he says
...
I’m lying—my head is throbbing
...
It could be worse
...

Every muscle in my body tightens as his hand drops to my side, where I got kicked
...

“And your side?” he asks, his voice low
...
”
He smiles
...
”
“Peter would probably throw a party if I stopped breathing
...
”
I laugh, and then wince, covering his hand to steady my rib cage
...
When his fingers lift, I feel an ache in my chest
...
And I want to stay here with him
...

“I’ll go in first,” he says when we stand outside the dining hall
...
”
He walks through the doors and I am alone
...
I am weak already
...
It’s difficult to take deep breaths, so I take short, shallow ones
...
They attacked me to make me feel weak
...

I pull away from the wall and walk into the dining hall without another thought
...
Uriah, at the table next to Will and Christina’s, lifts his hand to wave at me
...

I sit next to Will
...

Uriah slides into the seat next to me, leaving his half-eaten muffin and half-finished glass of water
on the other table
...

“What happened?” Will asks, lowering his voice
...
Peter sits there, eating a piece of toast and
whispering something to Molly
...
I want him to hurt
...

Drew is missing, which means he’s still in the infirmary
...

“Peter, Drew…,” I say quietly
...
It
hurts to stretch out my hand, so I let myself wince and hunch over
...
“And Al
...

“Are you all right?” Uriah asks
...
It brings a
bitter taste to my mouth to show him that he scares me, but I have to
...
I have to do
everything I can to make sure I don’t get attacked again
...

My eyes burn, and it’s not artifice, unlike the wincing
...
I believe Tori’s warning now
...
If I’m not careful, I could die
...
My new family
...
“It isn’t fair
...
That’s why he grabbed Edward in his sleep and stabbed
him in the eye
...
“Al, though? Are you sure, Tris?”
I stare at my plate
...
But unlike him, I’m not going to leave
...
“I’m sure
...
“He’s been acting…I don’t know
...

Ever since stage two started
...
I drop my toast, and my mouth drifts open
...
His face is swollen and purple
...
He keeps his eyes down on the way to his table, not even

lifting them to look at me
...
He wears the satisfied smile I wish I had
on
...

I shake my head
...
Someone—I never saw who—found me right before…” I gulp
...
“…I got tossed into the chasm
...

“Maybe
...
” I lift a shoulder
...
”
Christina gives me a sad look
...

“We have to do something about this,” Uriah says in a low voice
...
“Looks like that’s been taken care of already
...
That’s pain they can get over,” replies Uriah
...
That
will damage their futures
...
”
Four gets up and stands between the tables
...

“Transfers
...
“Follow me
...
“Be careful,” he tells me
...
“We’ll protect her
...
Will is on my left,
Christina is on my right
...
“For taking the flag when you earned it
...
”
I’m not sure if it’s smart to forgive her or not—to forgive either of them, after what they said to me
when the rankings went up yesterday
...
And Four told me to rely on my friends
...
Uriah and
Marlene, who were on my side even when I seemed strong, or Christina and Will, who have always
protected me when I seemed weak?
When her wide brown eyes meet mine, I nod
...
”
I still want to be angry, but I have to let my anger go
...

Most of the time I like heights, so I grab Will’s arm like I need his support—but really, I’m lending
him mine
...

Four turns around and walks backward a few steps—backward, on a narrow path with no railing
...
That is, until Four’s eyes shift to my arm
around Will’s, and all the humor drains from them
...
Is he…
jealous?
We get closer and closer to the glass ceiling, and for the first time in days, I see the sun
...
They creak under my feet, and I
look down to see the Pit and the chasm below us
...
The surrounding buildings are half-collapsed and appear to be abandoned, which is
probably why I never noticed the Dauntless compound before
...

The Dauntless mill around the glass room, talking in clusters
...
Above me, two ropes
stretch across the room, one a few feet higher than the other
...

Four leads us through another door
...
The room is lit by a series of old-fashioned fluorescent tubes with plastic covers—
they must be ancient
...
It has been disabled for our purposes, so this isn’t what it will be like the next time you
see it
...

“Through your simulations, we have stored data about your worst fears
...
Some of the obstacles will be
fears you previously faced in your simulations
...
The difference is that you are
aware, in the fear landscape, that it is a simulation, so you will have all your wits about you as you go
through it
...
I don’t know if that’s a
relief, because I can’t be detected, or a problem, because I won’t have the advantage
...
”
How many fears will I have? I think of facing the crows again and shiver, though the air is warm
...
I
remember when he said that
...
Right before he put a gun to Peter’s head
...

“That is because it requires you to control both your emotions and your body—to combine the
physical abilities you learned in stage one with the emotional mastery you learned in stage two
...
” One of the fluorescent tubes above Four’s head twitches and flickers
...

“Next week you will go through your fear landscape as quickly as possible in front of a panel of
Dauntless leaders
...
Just as
stage two of initiation is weighted more heavily than stage one, stage three is weighted heaviest of all
...
Even Drew, who makes it look painful
...
Becoming Dauntless
...

“You can get past each obstacle in one of two ways
...
One way to face a fear of drowning is to swim deeper, for example
...
“So I suggest that you take the next week to consider your fears and develop strategies to
face them
...
“What if one person only has seven fears and someone else
has twenty? That’s not their fault
...
“Do you really want to talk to me about
what’s fair?”
The crowd of initiates parts to make way for him as he walks toward Peter, folds his arms, and
says, in a deadly voice, “I understand why you’re worried, Peter
...
”
Peter stares back, expressionless
...
” His mouth curls in a smile
...
Christina’s shoulders shake with suppressed laughter
...


When we get back to the dorm that afternoon, Al is there
...

Christina edges closer to me
...
Pain stabs my stomach
when I see him
...
The scent of lemongrass and sage, once pleasant, turns sour in my nose
...
“Can I talk to you?”
“Are you kidding?” Will squeezes my shoulders
...
”
“I won’t hurt you
...
“I just want to say that
I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I don’t…I don’t know what’s wrong with me, I…please forgive me,
please…
...

Somewhere inside me is a merciful, forgiving person
...
I swear she exists, and she hurts for the repentant
boy I see in front of me
...

“Stay away from me,” I say quietly
...
I say, my voice low, “Never come near me again
...
His are dark and glassy
...

“If you do, I swear to God I will kill you,” I say
...
”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

“TRIS
...
She beckons to me, and I cross the kitchen to stand beside
her
...
The beady eye of a crow stares
back at me, its wing feathers pressed to the side of the pot, its fat body covered with boiling water
...

“Tris!” I hear again
...
Christina stands next to my bed, her cheeks streaked with
mascara-tinted tears
...
“Come on
...
Christina grabs my hand and pulls me out of
the dormitory
...
Something terrible has happened
...
It’s Al
...
A crowd has gathered around the ledge, but
everyone stands a few feet from one another, so there is enough space for me to maneuver past
Christina and around a tall, middle-aged man to the front
...
They both grunt from the effort,
heaving their weight back so the ropes slide over the railing, and then reaching forward to grab again
...

The shape falls with a thud on the Pit floor
...
A
body
...
She turns her head into my shoulder
and sobs, but I can’t look away
...

The eyes are open and empty
...
Doll’s eyes
...
The lips are blue
...
My lungs burn; my next breath rattles on the way in
...

“One of the initiates,” says someone behind me
...
“He pitched himself over the ledge
...
Could have been an accident
...
You think he tripped over his shoelace and…
whoopsies, just stumbled fifteen feet forward?”
Christina’s hands get tighter and tighter around my arm
...
Someone kneels next to Al’s face and pushes his eyelids shut
...
Stupid
...
It isn’t
...
My chest is so tight, suffocating, can’t breathe
...
The stone is rough under my knees
...
Al’s sobs; his screams at night
...
Still can’t breathe
...

When I blink, I see the top of Al’s head as he carries me on his back to the dining hall
...
He is big and warm and clumsy
...
That is death—shifting from “is” to
“was
...
Someone has brought a large black bag to put the body in
...
A laugh rises in my throat and flops from my mouth, strained and gurgling
...
Halfway through the laugh, I clamp my mouth shut, and it sounds more like
a groan
...
I run
...
She hands me a steaming mug that smells like peppermint
...

She sits down across from me
...
Tori
said they want to acknowledge death as soon as it happens
...
I don’t know why that
surprises me
...
Everyone gathers to support the deceased’s family, and
no one has idle hands, but there is no laughter, or shouting, or joking
...
It makes sense that funerals would be the opposite here
...
“It will make you feel better, I promise
...
But I sip it anyway
...
I didn’t realize how deeply cold I was until I wasn’t anymore
...
Not ‘good
...
“I don’t think ‘good’ will happen for a while
...
“How long…” I struggle for the right words
...
” She shakes her head
...
Some days I feel
fine
...
It took me a few years to stop plotting revenge, though
...

Her eyes go vacant as she stares at the wall behind me
...
More like I’m…waiting for my
opportunity
...

“Time to go,” she says
...
When I lift my hand from the mug, I realize that I’m shaking
...
My hands usually shake before I start to cry, and I can’t cry in front of everyone
...
All the people that were
milling around earlier are gathered by the ledge now, and the air smells potently of alcohol
...
Tori grabs my arm and steers me away
...
Christina’s eyes are swollen
...
He offers it to me
...

“Surprise, surprise,” says Molly from behind me
...
“Once a Stiff,
always a Stiff
...
Her opinions shouldn’t matter to me
...
“Something about your dad,
and the real reason you left your old faction
...
But it is the easiest one to address
...
My knuckles sting from the impact
...
I don’t remember forming a fist
...
Will grabs her collar and pulls her
back
...
Both of you
...
A fight would be a welcome distraction, especially
now that Eric is climbing onto a box next to the railing
...
I wonder what he’ll say
...
Someone who is truly selfless does not think of
himself often enough to desire death
...

“Quiet down, everyone!” shouts Eric
...
Eric says, “Thank you
...
”
The mutters stop too, leaving just the rush of water in the chasm
...
But we
did not choose a life of ease when we became Dauntless
...
If I
didn’t know him, I would think that smile is genuine
...
“The truth is, Albert is now
exploring an unknown, uncertain place
...
Who among us is
brave enough to venture into that darkness without knowing what lies beyond it? Albert was not yet
one of our members, but we can be assured that he was one of our bravest!”
A cry rises from the center of the crowd, and a whoop
...
Their roar mimics the roar of the water
...
Will slides his arm around her shoulders and pulls her to his side
...

“We will celebrate him now, and remember him always!” yells Eric
...
“To Albert the Courageous!”
“To Albert!” shouts the crowd
...
“Albert!
Al-bert! Al-bert!” They chant until his name no longer sounds like his name
...

I turn away from the railing
...

I don’t know where I’m going
...
I walk down
a dark hallway
...

I shake my head
...
Pride is what killed Al, and it is the flaw in every
Dauntless heart
...

“Tris
...
Four stands behind me, just inside the blue circle of light
...


“What are you doing here?” I ask
...

“Shouldn’t you?” he says
...
They look black in this
light
...
I feel a twinge of guilt and shake my head
...
”
“Ah
...
I don’t blame him
...
“He throws himself off a ledge and Eric’s
calling it brave? Eric, who tried to have you throw knives at Al’s head?” I taste bile
...
“He wasn’t brave! He
was depressed and a coward and he almost killed me! Is that the kind of thing we respect here?”
“What do you want them to do?” he says
...
He can’t hear it and
it’s too late
...
“It’s about everyone watching! Everyone who now sees hurling
themselves into the chasm as a viable option
...
My face burns and my heart pounds, and I try to keep myself under control, but I
can’t
...
“None of it! Never
...

“Careful, Tris,” he says, his eyes still on the wall
...
“That I should be careful? That’s it?”
“You’re as bad as the Candor, you know that?” He grabs my arm and drags me away from the
drinking fountain
...

His face is so close to mine that I can see a few freckles spotting his nose
...
” He sets his hands on my shoulders, his fingers pressing, squeezing
...
“They are watching you
...
”
“Let go of me,” I say weakly
...
Some of the weight on my chest lifts now that he isn’t
touching me
...
They show me something unstable inside of him, and instability
is dangerous
...

He doesn’t answer my question
...
”
“Oh, right
...
“Stabbing my ear with a knife and taunting me and yelling at me more
than you yell at anyone else, it sure is helpful
...
“I was
reminding you that if you failed, someone else would have to take your place
...
Every time he spoke, it

was to remind me that if I gave up, Al would have to take my place in front of the target
...

“Because you’re from Abnegation,” he says, “and it’s when you’re acting selflessly that you are at
your bravest
...
He wasn’t persuading me to give up
...
The thought makes me ache now
...
My friend
...

I can’t hate Al as much as I want to
...

“If I were you, I would do a better job of pretending that selfless impulse is going away,” he says,
“because if the wrong people discover it…well, it won’t be good for you
...
They try to make you think they care about what you
do, but they don’t
...
They want you to think a certain way
...
So you won’t pose a threat to them
...
His shirt is just tight enough that I can see his collarbone and the faint
depression between his shoulder muscle and his bicep
...
If I was tall, my narrow build would be described as “willowy” instead of
“childish,” and he might not see me as a little sister he needs to protect
...

“I don’t understand,” I say, “why they care what I think, as long as I’m acting how they want me
to
...
Am I wired like the
Abnegation, or the Dauntless?
Maybe the answer is neither
...

“I might not need you to help me
...
“I’m not weak, you know
...
”
He shakes his head
...
Because you’re small, or a girl,
or a Stiff
...
”
He leans his face close to mine and wraps his fingers around my chin
...

When was the last time he held a gun, or a knife? My skin tingles at the point of contact, like he’s
transmitting electricity through his skin
...
” My body tenses at the edge in his voice, so I am coiled as tight
as a spring, and I forget to breathe
...
”
“Why…” I swallow hard
...
I’ve seen it
...
” He releases me but
doesn’t pull away, his hand grazing my jaw, my neck
...
Want
to see you awake
...
I can’t remember deciding to do that
...
I pull
myself against his chest, wrapping my arms around him
...

After a moment he touches the small of my back, pressing me closer, and smoothes his other hand
over my hair
...
I squeeze my eyes shut
...

“Should I be crying?” I ask, my voice muffled by his shirt
...
Why not me? Why am I not
like him—and why does that thought make me feel so uneasy, like I’m teetering on a ledge myself?
“You think I know anything about tears?” he says quietly
...
I don’t expect Four to reassure me, and he makes no effort to, but I feel better
standing here than I did out there among the people who are my friends, my faction
...

“If I had forgiven him,” I say, “do you think he would be alive now?”
“I don’t know,” he replies
...

“I feel like it’s my fault
...

“But I should have
...
”
“Maybe
...
”
I frown and pull back
...
It is a line straight from one of my father’s lectures at our weekly
meetings
...
“This is where I am now
...
”
He gives me a conflicted look and touches his lips to my forehead, right between my eyebrows
...
I don’t understand this, whatever it is
...
He
doesn’t move; he just stays there with his mouth pressed to my skin, and I stay there with my hands on
his waist, for a long time
...
Both my shoulders sting from the tattoo needle
...

Tori was the only one in the tattoo place, so I felt safe getting the symbol of Abnegation—a pair of
hands, palms up as if to help someone stand, bounded by a circle—on my right shoulder
...
But that symbol is a part of my identity, and it felt
important to me that I wear it on my skin
...
This
is where Al stood
...
Water hits the
wall and sprays up, misting my face
...
I got a copy of every report the Erudite have released in the
last six months
...

I stare at the first one
...
Her sharp-butattractive eyes stare back at me
...
Christina crumples the first report into a ball and hurls it into
the water
...
He takes the next report and tears it to shreds
...
He does it without Christina’s malice
...
Whether he believes what
they’re saying or not is unclear, and I am afraid to ask
...
They were trying to develop a longer-lasting
serum for the simulations,” he says
...

Like…a walking, talking computer
...
I should just ask
...
“I don’t know
...
And maybe it would be nice if we had more cars and…fresh fruit and…”
“You do realize there’s no secret warehouse where all that stuff is kept, right?” I ask, my face
getting hot
...
“I just think that comfort and prosperity are not a priority for Abnegation, and
maybe they would be if the other factions were involved in our decision making
...

“Hey now,” says Christina, brushing Will’s shoulder with her fingers
...
”
I bite back what I was about to say and stare at the stack of paper in my hands
...
I’ve noticed it
...
I can’t
imagine what good can come of saying such terrible things
...
If Jeanine can make people believe that my father and all the other Abnegation leaders are
corrupt and awful, she has support for whatever revolution she wants to start, if that’s really her plan
...
They drift
back and forth, back and forth until they find the water
...

“It’s bedtime,” Christina says, smiling
...
”
I turn away from the chasm and see movement on the right side of the Pit
...

“That sounds great, but I have to talk to Four about something,” I say, pointing toward the shadow
ascending the path
...

“Are you sure you should be running around here alone at night?” she asks
...
I’ll be with Four
...

Christina is looking at Will, and he is looking back at her
...

“All right,” Christina says distantly
...
”
Christina and Will walk toward the dormitories, Christina tousling Will’s hair and Will jabbing
her in the ribs
...
I feel like I am witnessing the beginning of something, but
I’m not sure what it will be
...
I try to make my footsteps as quiet as
possible
...
I don’t intend to talk to Four—at least, not
until I find out where he’s going, late at night, in the glass building above us
...
Through the windows I see the city lights, glowing now but petering out even as I
look at them
...

Across the room, Four stands at the door to the fear landscape
...

“Since you’re here,” he says, without looking over his shoulder, “you might as well go in with me
...
“Into your fear landscape?”
“Yes
...
And right now, it’s set to put us through mine
...
He doesn’t lift his eyes
...
”
He holds up the syringe, and I tilt my head to better expose my neck
...
When he’s done, he offers me the black box
...


“I’ve never done this before,” I say as I take it out of the box
...

“Right here,” he says, touching a spot on his neck with his fingernail
...
He doesn’t even flinch
...
He knew that I would follow him up here
...
Either way is fine with me
...
His fingers are cold and brittle
...
He opens the door
with his free hand, and I follow him into the dark
...
I keep my breaths even and hold firmly to Four’s hand
...

The door clicks shut behind us, taking all the light with it
...
I inch closer to him so my arm is against his and my chin is near his shoulder
...

“See if you can figure that out too
...
The ground I stand on is no longer made of cement
...

Light pours in from all angles, and the city unfolds around us, glass buildings and the arc of train
tracks, and we are high above it
...

Then the wind starts
...
He removes
his hand from mine and wraps his arm around my shoulders instead
...
He forces breath in and out
through an open mouth and his teeth are clenched
...

“We have to jump off, right?” I shout over the wind
...

“On three, okay?”
Another nod
...
After we take the first step, the rest is
easy
...
We fall like two stones, fast, the air pushing back at
us, the ground growing beneath us
...
I loved that rush the day I chose Dauntless, and I love it now
...

I get up and help him to his feet
...
I slam into Four, my head hitting his collarbone
...
The space is so narrow that Four has to pull his arms into his chest to fit
...
The room is
just big enough to accommodate his size, and no bigger
...

He makes a guttural noise
...
I can barely see his
face, it’s so dark, and the air is close; we share breaths
...


“Hey,” I say
...
Here—”
I guide his arms around my body so he has more space
...
His body is warm, but I feel only his bones and the muscle that wraps
around them; nothing yields beneath me
...
Can he tell that I’m still built like a child?
“This is the first time I’m happy I’m so small
...
If I joke, maybe I can calm him down
...

“Mmhmm,” he says
...

“We can’t break out of here,” I say
...
“So what you need to do is make the space smaller
...
Right?”
“Yes
...

“Okay
...
Ready?”
I squeeze his waist to pull him down with me
...
I realize that
we won’t fit with all this space between us, so I turn and curl into a ball, my spine against his chest
...

We are a jumble of limbs
...

“Ah,” he says, his voice raspy
...
This is definitely…”
“Shh,” I say
...
”
Obediently, he slips both arms around my waist
...
I am not enjoying this
...

“The simulation measures your fear response,” I say softly
...
“So if you can calm your heartbeat down, it will move on to the next
one
...
”
“Yeah?” I feel his lips move against my ear as he speaks, and heat courses through me
...
” I roll my eyes
...

“Okay, okay
...
“Feel
my heartbeat
...
”
“Feel how steady it is?”
“It’s fast
...
” I wince as soon as I’m done speaking
...
Hopefully he doesn’t realize that
...
Focus on that
...
”
I breathe deeply, and his chest rises and falls with mine
...
Maybe talking about it will help us…somehow
...

“Um…okay
...
“This one is from my fantastic childhood
...
The tiny closet upstairs
...
I remember being punished—sent to my room without dinner, deprived of
this or that, firm scoldings
...
The cruelty smarts; my chest aches for him
...

“My mother kept our winter coats in our closet
...
“I don’t really want to talk about it anymore
...
Then…I can talk
...
”
“Okay
...
“Why is your heart racing, Tris?”
I cringe and say, “Well, I…” I search for an excuse that doesn’t involve his arms being around me
...
” Not good enough
...
”
“Of course you’re not
...
”
He laughs again, and when he does, the walls break apart with a crack and fall away, leaving us in
a circle of light
...
I scramble to my feet and brush myself
off, though I haven’t accumulated any dirt that I’m aware of
...
My back
feels cold from the sudden absence of him
...
He’s grinning, and I’m not sure I like the look in his eyes
...
”
“I think my aptitude test ruled that one out pretty well
...
“The aptitude test tells you nothing
...
“What are you trying to tell me? Your test isn’t the reason you ended up
Dauntless?”
Excitement runs through me like the blood in my veins, propelled by the hope that he might confirm
that he is Divergent, that he is like me, that we can figure out what it means together
...
“I…”
He looks over his shoulder and his voice trails off
...
She is completely still, her features plain—if we walked away right now, I would not
remember her
...
On it is a gun and a single bullet
...
The fear is unrelated to the threat to his life
...

“You have to kill her,” I say softly
...
”
“She isn’t real
...
” He bites his lip
...
”
“If she was real, she would have killed you already
...
” He nods
...
This one’s not…not so bad
...
”
Not as much panic, but far more dread
...
He clicks the bullet into the chamber
and holds the gun out in front of him, both hands around it
...


As he exhales, he fires, and the woman’s head whips back
...
I
hear her crumple to the floor
...
We stare at her fallen body
...

Don’t be ridiculous
...

“C’mon,” I say
...
Keep moving
...
As we pass the table, the woman’s
body disappears, except in my memory and his
...

But something puzzles me: These are supposed to be Four’s worst fears
...
It seems like the simulation is
grasping at any fears it can find within him, and it hasn’t found much
...

A dark figure moves ahead of us, creeping along the edge of the circle of light, waiting for us to
take another step
...
He holds his hands behind
his back
...

“Marcus,” I whisper
...
”
“Is he…” I look from Marcus, who walks slowly toward us, to Four, who inches slowly back, and
everything comes together
...
His name was…“Tobias
...
A belt is curled around one of his fists
...

“This is for your own good,” he says, and his voice echoes a dozen times
...
When the Marcuses blink again, their eyes turn into empty, black pits
...
A shiver crawls up my spine
...
For once the Erudite were right
...
His posture sags
...
The first Marcus yanks his arm back, the belt sailing over his shoulder as he prepares
to strike
...

I dart in front of him and the belt cracks against my wrist, wrapping around it
...
I grit my teeth and pull as hard as I can
...

I swing my arm as fast as I can, my shoulder socket burning from the sudden motion, and the belt
strikes Marcus’s shoulder
...
Tobias pushes me behind him so he stands between me and Marcus
...

All the Marcuses vanish
...

“That’s it?” I say
...
Only four fears
...
” I look over my shoulder at him
...
His eyes are wide and seem almost vulnerable
under the room’s lights
...
If we were not here, I would describe the look as awe
...

He wraps his hand around my elbow, his thumb pressing to the soft skin above my forearm, and
tugs me toward him
...
His lips slowly move against my cheek, then his arms tighten around my shoulders, and
he buries his face in my neck, breathing against my collarbone
...

“Hey,” I say softly
...
”
He lifts his head and slips his fingers through my hair, tucking it behind my ear
...
His fingers move absently over a lock of my hair
...

“Well
...
I try to ignore the nervous electricity that pulses through me every second
he touches me
...
”
I let my hands drop and casually wipe them on my jeans, hoping he doesn’t notice
...
He laces his fingers with mine
...
“I have something else to show you
...
I monitor the pressure of my hand carefully
...
I never used to
understand why people bothered to hold hands as they walked, but then he runs one of his fingertips
down my palm, and I shiver and understand it completely
...
“Four fears
...
“They haven’t changed, so I keep going in
there, but…I still haven’t made any progress
...
“Because you still care about things
...
”
“I know
...
I’ve never noticed it before—it blended in with the rock wall
...

I don’t want to ruin the moment, but I have to know about his aptitude test
...

“You were going to tell me about your aptitude test results,” I say
...
” He scratches the back of his neck with his free hand
...
I want to know
...
” He smiles
...
He leads me up and down, across small gaps
and over angular ridges
...
The soles of my shoes mark each rock with
a wet footprint
...
I sit beside him
...

He releases my hand
...

“These are things I don’t tell people, you know
...

I lace my fingers together and clench
...
The roar of the chasm ensures that we won’t be overheard
...

“My result was as expected,” he says
...
”
“Oh
...
I am wrong about him
...
And
technically, I also got an Abnegation result—according to the system
...

“Out of necessity
...
He doesn’t need to give one
...

“You had to get away from your dad,” I say
...
“That, and I’ve always felt that I don’t quite belong among the Dauntless
...
”
“But you’re…incredible,” I say
...
“I mean, by Dauntless standards
...
How could you not belong here?”
He shrugs
...
I am not sure what to make of that
...
All your life you’ve
been training to forget yourself, so when you’re in danger, it becomes your first instinct
...
”
Suddenly I feel heavy
...
My first instinct is still selfpreservation
...
”
“That’s not entirely true
...
“That girl who let someone throw knives at her to spare
a friend, who hit my dad with a belt to protect me—that selfless girl, that’s not you?”
He’s figured out more about me than I have
...
I frown at him
...
”
“Maybe you were cut out for Candor, Four, because you’re a terrible liar
...
I look down at our hands
...
Hands made for fine, deft movements
...

“Fine
...
“I
watched you because I like you
...
“And don’t
call me ‘Four,’ okay? It’s nice to hear my name again
...
My cheeks warm,
and all I can think to say is, “But you’re older than I am…Tobias
...
“Yes, that whopping two-year gap really is insurmountable, isn’t it?”
“I’m not trying to be self-deprecating,” I say, “I just don’t get it
...
I’m not pretty
...

“Don’t pretend,” I say breathily
...
I’m not ugly, but I am certainly not pretty
...
You’re not pretty
...
“I like how you look
...

You’re brave
...
“You aren’t giving
me that look
...
”

“Well,” I say
...
”
For a second his dark eyes are on mine, and he’s quiet
...
The river roars and I feel its spray on my ankles
...

I tense up at first, unsure of myself, so when he pulls away, I’m sure I did something wrong, or
badly
...
I wrap an arm around him, sliding my hand up his neck and into his
short hair
...
And when we
rise, hand in hand, I realize that if we had both chosen differently, we might have ended up doing the
same thing, in a safer place, in gray clothes instead of black ones
...
Every time I push the smile from my face, it fights its way
back
...
I let my hair hang loose and abandon my uniform of loose shirts
in favor of one that cuts across my shoulders, revealing my tattoos
...
Her eyes are still swollen from
sleep and her tangled hair forms a fuzzy halo around her face
...
“Sun shining
...
”
She raises an eyebrow at me, as if reminding me that we are in an underground tunnel
...
“You may never see it again
...
My heart pounds because I know that at some
point in the next half hour, I will see Tobias
...
The seat on my left stays empty
...

I grab a piece of toast from the plate in the middle of the table and start to butter it with a little too
much enthusiasm
...
It would be like refusing to
breathe
...
His hair is shorter, and it looks darker this way, almost black
...
I smile at him and lift my hand to wave him over, but he sits down next to Zeke
without even glancing in my direction, so I let my hand drop
...
It is easy not to smile now
...

I shake my head and take a bite
...
Maybe he changed his mind about liking me
...

“Today’s fear landscape day,” says Will
...
” Uriah shakes his head
...
My brother told
me
...

“You know, it really isn’t fair that you all get insider information and we don’t,” Will says, glaring
at Uriah
...

Christina ignores them
...
”
“Why?” I ask
...
I bite my lip and wish I could take it back
...
” She rolls her eyes
...
He acts so tough that he’s probably afraid of marshmallows and really bright sunrises or
something
...
”
I shake my head
...
”
“How would you know?”

“It’s just a prediction
...
He wouldn’t let everyone see that
...
For a second, his eyes shift to mine
...
Then he looks away
...

“Two years ago,” she says, “I was afraid of spiders, suffocation, walls that inch slowly inward and
trap you between them, getting thrown out of Dauntless, uncontrollable bleeding, getting run over by a
train, my father’s death, public humiliation, and kidnapping by men without faces
...

“Most of you will have anywhere from ten to fifteen fears in your fear landscapes
...

“What’s the lowest number someone has gotten?” asks Lynn
...
”
I have not looked at Tobias since we were in the cafeteria, but I can’t help but look at him now
...
I knew that four was a low number, low enough to merit a
nickname, but I didn’t know it was less than half the average
...
He’s exceptional
...

“You will not find out your number today,” says Lauren
...
”
I give Christina a pointed look
...

“For the purposes of this exercise, though, each of you will only face one of my fears, to get a
sense for how the simulation works
...
I was standing in the back, so I will go
close to last
...

Because I’m not hooked up to the computer as I wait, I can’t watch the simulation, only the
person’s reaction to it
...
” Then it’s my turn
...

Then the scenery changes and the kidnapping begins
...
It is too dark to see
...
I hear the roar of the water
...
The image of
myself falling into darkness flashes into my mind, the same image that I now carry with me in my
nightmares
...

I knew they would come back for me; I knew they would try again
...
I

scream again—not for help, because no one will help me, but because that’s what you do when you’re
about to die and you can’t stop it
...

The hands disappear, and the lights come on
...
My
body shakes, and I drop to my knees, pressing my hands to my face
...
I lost all logic, I lost
all sense
...

And everyone saw me
...

I hear footsteps
...

“What the hell was that, Stiff?”
“I…” My breath comes in a hiccup
...
”
Something within me snaps
...
Heat races through my body, driving the weakness out
of me, and I smack him so hard my knuckles burn with the impact
...

“Shut up,” I say
...


CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

I PULL MY jacket tight around my shoulders
...
The sun shines pale
against my face, and I watch my breaths form in the air
...
I
just have to make sure that tomorrow, when I go through my own fear landscape, I prove them wrong
...
Today I’m not sure
...
The impulse to cry is gone
...
I feel more like myself
...
And I
am someone who does not let inconsequential things like boys and near-death experiences stop her
...
Am I?
I hear the train horn
...
Where do they begin? Where do they end? What is the world like beyond them? I walk
toward them
...
Eric warned us not to appear too attached to our parents on Visiting
Day, so visiting home would be betraying the Dauntless, and I can’t afford to do that
...

I know I’m not allowed to leave without supervision, but I can’t stop myself
...
Pumping my arms, I run alongside the last car until I can grab the handle and
swing myself in, wincing as pain darts through my sore body
...
I don’t want to go back, but choosing to quit, to be factionless, would be the bravest thing
I have ever done, and today I feel like a coward
...
I let my hand trail over the edge of the
car so it presses against the wind
...
Caleb has a place in every
memory of my childhood; he is part of my foundation
...
The Erudite live in large stone buildings that overlook the marsh
...
They dip down to street level just before
they bend to travel east
...

The train dips and slows, and I jump
...
I walk down the middle of the street, heading south, toward the marsh
...

I turn left
...
How will I find Caleb here?
The Erudite keep records; it’s in their nature
...
Someone
has access to those records; I just have to find them
...
Logically speaking, the
central building should be the most important one
...

The faction members are milling around everywhere
...
” The color has also come to signify
their faction
...
I have grown used to dim lighting and dark
clothing
...
Becoming Dauntless has made me noticeable
...
I pull the rubber band from my hair and shake it from its knot before I
walk through the front doors
...
The room is huge, silent, and smells like dustcovered pages
...
Bookcases line the walls on either
side of me, but they seem to be decorative more than anything, because computers occupy the tables in
the center of the room, and no one is reading
...

I should have known that the main Erudite building would be a library
...
It is twice my height and four times my width and depicts an attractive
woman with watery gray eyes and spectacles—Jeanine
...

Because she is Erudite’s representative, she is the one who released that report about my father
...

Beneath her is a large plaque that reads KNOWLEDGE LEADS TO PROSPERITY
...
To me the word has a negative connotation
...

How could Caleb have chosen to be one of these people? The things they do, the things they want,
it’s all wrong
...

I walk up to the desk just beneath Jeanine’s portrait
...
“His name is Caleb
...

“He’s my brother
...
Heads turn in my direction
...
” My voice is terse
...
He’s an initiate
...

I turn, and Caleb stands behind me, a book in hand
...
Even though he looks different and I’m
not allowed to love him anymore, I run at him as fast as I can and throw my arms around his
shoulders
...

“You have glasses,” I say
...
“Your vision is perfect, Caleb, what
are you doing?”
“Um…” He glances at the tables around us
...
Let’s get out of here
...
I have to jog to keep up with him
...
Now we just call it “Millenium,” and it is a stretch of bare
land and several rusted metal sculptures—one an abstract, plated mammoth, another shaped like a
lima bean that dwarfs me in size
...
He takes off his glasses and shoves them in his pocket, then runs a hand through
his hair, his eyes skipping over mine nervously
...
Maybe I should be too
...
But I’m just not
...

“I wanted to go home,” I say, “and you were the closest thing I could think of
...

“Don’t look so pleased to see me,” I add
...
“I’m thrilled to see you, okay? It’s just that this
isn’t allowed
...
”
“I don’t care,” I say
...
” His voice is gentle; he wears his look of disapproval
...
”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
I know exactly what it means
...

“I just don’t want you to get hurt
...

“What happened to you in there?”
“Nothing
...
” I close my eyes and rub the back of my neck with one hand
...
I can’t even summon the will to think
about it
...
“You think you made the right choice?”
“I don’t think there was one,” I say
...
People stare at us as they walk past
...
He’s still
nervous, but maybe it’s not because of how he looks, or because of me
...
I grab his
arm and pull him under the arch of the metal bean
...
I see my
reflection everywhere, warped by the curve of the walls, broken by patches of rust and grime
...
I didn’t notice the dark circles under his eyes before
...
In his reflection, his head is small and pressed in on one
side, and his arm looks like it is bending backward
...

“Something big is happening, Beatrice
...
” His eyes are wide and glassy
...
”
“Do you believe her?”
“No
...
I don’t…” He shakes his head
...
”
“Yes, you do,” I say sternly
...
You know who our friends are
...
That, I think, is our true
reflection; it is as small as we actually are
...
”
“This isn’t Candor
...
There are people who are so smart they know how
to manipulate you
...
I don’t think you would know
...

“Yeah
...
“At least I know what I’m a part of, Caleb
...
”
His voice hardens
...
”
“With pleasure,” I say
...
”
“You saw her?” He looks hurt
...
“The Erudite don’t let the Abnegation into their compound anymore
...

I should never have left
...

The crowd on the sidewalk thins, and I look up to see why
...

“Excuse me,” one of them says
...
”

One man walks so close behind me that I feel his breath against the back of my head
...
Beyond the library the floors change
from wood to white tile, and the walls glow like the ceiling of the aptitude test room
...

I try to stay calm
...
What do you do if someone
attacks you from behind? I envision thrusting my elbow back into a stomach or a groin
...
I wish I had a gun
...

What do you do if you’re attacked by two people at once? I follow the man down an empty,
glowing corridor and into an office
...

A woman sits behind a metal desk
...
The same face dominates the Erudite library;
it is plastered across every article Erudite releases
...

“Sit,” Jeanine says
...
Her liquid gray
eyes focus on mine
...
”
“Sit,” she says again
...

I heard it in the hallway, talking to Eric, before I got attacked
...
And
once before—I heard it…
“It was your voice in the simulation,” I say
...
”
She is the danger Tori and my mother warned me about, the danger of being Divergent
...

“Correct
...
“I looked
up your test results, Beatrice
...
It was never recorded,
and your results had to be reported manually
...
”
“Did you know that you’re one of two people ever to get an Abnegation result and switch to
Dauntless?”
“No,” I say, biting back my shock
...
So it is really just him
...
Right now I don’t care how unique he is
...

“What made you choose Dauntless?” she asks
...
“Aren’t
you going to reprimand me for abandoning my faction and seeking out my brother? ‘Faction before
blood,’ right?” I pause
...

Her mouth pinches for a second
...

I set my hands on the back of the chair I refused to sit in and clench my fingers
...
The train takes a lazy turn in the distance
...

Again, it failed to be recorded
...
”
“Because Erudite developed the simulations, we have an…understanding with the Dauntless,
Beatrice
...
“I am merely concerned for the competence of our
technology
...
She doesn’t care about the technology—she
suspects that something is awry with my test results
...
And if my mother wants Caleb to research the simulation serum, it is
probably because Jeanine developed it
...
But the look she gives me reminds me of the look in the attack dog’s
eyes in the aptitude test—a vicious, predatory stare
...
I can’t lie down in
submission now
...

I feel my pulse in my throat
...
Maybe my simulation administrator was distracted because he was worried I would throw
up, and he forgot to record it
...
”
“Do you habitually have a sensitive stomach, Beatrice?” Her voice is like a razor’s edge
...

“Ever since I was young,” I reply as smoothly as I can
...
I can’t seem tense, even though I feel like my insides are writhing within me
...
“To what do you attribute the
ease with which you complete them?”
“I’m brave,” I say, staring into her eyes
...
Brash,
aggressive, impulsive
...
I should be what she expects
...
“I’m the best initiate
they’ve got
...
I will have to go further with this to make it
convincing
...
“It’s because I was bored
...

Lies require commitment
...
”
“So you don’t miss your parents?” she asks delicately
...
“No
...
They’re not my family anymore
...
I picture my mother
standing behind me with a comb and a pair of scissors, faintly smiling as she trims my hair, and I
want to scream rather than insult her like this
...

“…that you agree with the reports that have been released about the political leaders of this city?”
The reports that label my family as corrupt, power-hungry, moralizing dictators? The reports that
carry subtle threats and hint at revolution? They make me sick to my stomach
...

I smile
...


One of Jeanine’s lackeys, a man in a blue collared shirt and sunglasses, drives me back to the
Dauntless compound in a sleek silver car, the likes of which I have never seen before
...
When I ask the man about it, he tells me it’s solar-powered and launches into a lengthy
explanation of how the panels on the roof convert sunlight into energy
...

I don’t know what they’ll do to me when I get back
...
I imagine my feet

dangling over the chasm and bite my lip
...
He takes my arm and leads me into the building without thanking the driver
...

He stands between me and the door that leads inside
...
Other than
that, he is completely still
...

The faint pop of his knuckle-cracking is all I hear apart from my own breaths, which grow faster by
the second
...

“Welcome back, Tris
...
”
He walks toward me, carefully placing one foot in front of the other
...
“Exactly,” he adds, louder this time, “were you thinking?”
“I…” He is so close I can see the holes his metal piercings fit into
...
”
“I am tempted to call you a traitor, Tris,” he says
...
I have heard him say terrible things
...
He is not a maniac anymore; he is perfectly controlled, perfectly poised
...

For the first time, I recognize Eric for what he is: an Erudite disguised as a Dauntless, a genius as
well as a sadist, a hunter of the Divergent
...

“Were you unsatisfied with the life you have found here? Do you perhaps regret your choice?”
Both of Eric’s metal-ridden eyebrows lift, forcing creases into his forehead
...
“…by venturing
into another faction’s headquarters
...
He would kill me if he knew what I was, I can feel it
...
I am alone here; if something happens to me, no one will know and no one will see it
...
Or, because you
seem to be so attached to your previous faction…perhaps I will be forced to reconsider your friends’
ranks
...
”
My first thought is that he couldn’t do that, it wouldn’t be fair
...
And he is right—the thought that my reckless
behavior could force someone else out of a faction makes my chest ache from fear
...
“I…”
But it is hard to breathe
...
Tobias walks in
...

“Leave the room,” Eric says, his voice louder and not as monotone
...
His expression, too, changes, becomes more mobile and animated
...

“No,” Tobias says
...
There’s no need to drag her here and interrogate her
...
” Eric snorts
...
He is
trying to tell me something
...
What advice has Four given me recently?
The only thing I can think of is: pretend some vulnerability
...

“I…I was just embarrassed and didn’t know what to do
...
Then I pinch my leg so hard that tears well up in my eyes, and I look up at Eric, sniffing
...

“You tried to what?” asks Eric
...
“And I rejected her, and she went running off like a five-year-old
...
”
We both wait
...
“Isn’t he a little too old for you, Tris?” he says, smiling again
...
“Can I go now?”
“Fine,” Eric says, “but you are not allowed to leave the compound without supervision again, you
hear me?” He turns toward Tobias
...
And that none of the others try to kiss you
...
“Fine
...
I sit down on the
pavement and wrap my arms around my knees
...

It might have been twenty minutes and it might have been an hour
...

I stand and cross my arms, waiting for the scolding to start
...

“What?” I say
...
I bat
his hand away
...
”
He shakes his head and looks at the dilapidated building to his right, which is made of brick and
barely resembles the sleek glass spire behind me
...
No one builds with brick
anymore
...
“You can be either cruel instructor or concerned boyfriend
...
” I didn’t mean to use it so flippantly, but it’s too late now
...
”
“I am not cruel
...
“I was protecting you this morning
...
“You would
never win
...
”

I open my mouth to object, but I can’t
...
He’s
right
...

“You didn’t have to insult me to prove something to them,” I say finally
...
He rubs at the
back of his neck
...
”
“I didn’t think it would affect you this way
...
“Sometimes I forget
that I can hurt you
...
”
I slide my hands into my pockets and rock back on my heels
...
He did what he did because he believed in my strength
...
No one has ever been so convinced of my
strength
...
Only our lips touch
...
“You always know exactly what to do
...
“How I
would handle it, if you and I…” He pulls back and smiles
...
” I shrug
...
For a moment he stands there, his eyes closed, breathing my air
...
I feel the quickness of his breath
...

“Yes,” he finally says
...
“You think we convinced him you’re just a silly girl?”
“I hope so,” I say
...
I’m not sure I convinced the Erudite, though
...
“There’s something I need to tell
you
...
” He glances around
...
Don’t tell anyone where
you’re going
...


“Where have you been all day?” Christina asks when I walk back into the dormitory
...
“I looked for you outside, but I couldn’t find you
...
The thought of telling her the truth about where I was makes me feel exhausted
...
I walked around for a long time,” I say
...
He
yelled at me, I apologized…that’s it
...


“Good,” she says
...
”
She looks over my head at the door and then stands on her tiptoes to see all the bunks—checking if
they’re empty, probably
...

“Can you be a girl for a few seconds?”
“I’m always a girl
...

“You know what I mean
...
”
I twirl my hair around my finger
...
”
She grins so wide I can see her back row of teeth
...
”
“What?” I demand
...
“Well, right after your
little episode, we ate lunch and then we walked around near the train tracks
...
And then he just stopped, and leaned in,
and…kissed me
...
“I mean, you know
...
”
“No!” She laughs
...
We just kept walking and talking like nothing
happened
...
”
“How long have you known you liked him?”
“I don’t know
...
But then little things…how he put his arm around me at the funeral,
how he opens doors for me like I’m a girl instead of someone who could beat the crap out of him
...
Suddenly I want to tell her about Tobias and everything that has happened between us
...
I don’t want her to
think that my rank has anything to do with my relationship with him
...
”
“Thanks,” she says
...
And I thought it would be a while before I could feel that
way…you know
...
Some of the initiates have
already packed their things
...

Those with government jobs will move to the glass building above the Pit
...
I won’t have to look at Al’s empty bed
...
“It’s like we just got here
...
”
“You miss it?” I lean into the bed frame
...
” She shrugs
...
I mean, everyone at home is just as loud as
everyone here, so that’s good
...
You always know where you stand with everyone,
because they tell you
...
”
I nod
...
The Abnegation aren’t
manipulative, but they aren’t forthright, either
...
” She shakes her head
...
All day, every day
...
“They give you this stuff they call truth serum and sit you in front of everyone and
ask you a load of really personal questions
...
Like the worst about you is already in the open, so why not
just be honest?”
I don’t know when I accumulated so many secrets
...
Fears
...
Candor initiation would reach things that even the simulations
can’t touch; it would wreck me
...

“I always knew I couldn’t be Candor
...
Plus, I like to be in control of my own mind
...

“Anyway,” she says
...
When she pulls the door
open, a moth flutters out, its white wings carrying it toward her face
...

“Get it off! Get it off get it off get it off!” she screams
...

“It’s gone!” I say
...
“You’re afraid of…moths?”
“They’re disgusting
...

I keep laughing
...

“It’s not funny!” she snaps
...
A little
...

He draws himself into a train car as it passes with bewildering ease and pulls me in after him
...
His fingers slide down my arms, and he holds me by the
elbows as the car bumps along the steel rails
...

“What is it you need to tell me?” I shout over the cry of the wind
...

He sinks to the floor and pulls me down with him, so he’s sitting with his back against the wall and
I’m facing him, my legs trailing to the side on the dusty floor
...
He presses his palms to my face, his index fingers sliding behind
my ears, and pulls my mouth to his
...
The air is cold, but his lips are warm and so are his hands
...
I’m glad the air is so loud he can’t hear me sigh
...
A split
second later I realize that my hand is on his hip
...
I should move it, but
I don’t want to
...
I
do
...


He sits up straighter and I feel his hands on my shoulders
...
He unzips my jacket a few inches, and I press my
hands to my legs to stop them from shaking
...
This is Tobias
...
He pulls away and looks carefully at the tattoos just above my
collarbone
...

“Birds,” he says
...
”
I try to return his smile
...
One for each member of my family,” I say
...
He tugs me closer, pressing his lips to each bird in turn
...
His
touch is light, sensitive
...
He touches my cheek
...
”
I nod and open my eyes
...

The wind is not as strong now that the train has slowed
...

Tobias lifts a hand and points at a cluster of buildings, so far away they are the size of a fingernail
...
Erudite headquarters again
...
”
“No one else has noticed?” I say, frowning
...
It may be because they don’t want to
cause a problem over something so small
...

“But it made me wonder what the Erudite are doing that requires night light
...

“Two things you should know about me
...
“It is my nature to expect the worst of them
...
”
I nod
...

“A few weeks ago, before training started, I was at work and I found a way into the Dauntless
secure files
...
Thinly veiled commands, supply lists, maps
...
And those files were sent by Erudite
...
Listening to my father insult Erudite all my life has
made me wary of them, and my experiences in the Dauntless compound make me wary of authority
and human beings in general, so I’m not shocked to hear that a faction could be planning a war
...
Something big is happening, Beatrice
...

“War on Abnegation?”
He takes my hands, lacing his fingers with mine, and says, “The faction that controls the
government
...
”
My stomach sinks
...
“Evidently the Erudite now want to speed up the process
...
”
“But,” I say, “why would Erudite team up with Dauntless?”
And then something occurs to me, something that hits me in the gut and gnaws at my insides
...

I stare wide-eyed at Tobias
...

“I wonder,” he says, “how they plan to get us to fight
...
They could coerce some of us into
fighting with misinformation, or by appealing to greed—any number of ways
...
They would need to make
sure that all their weaknesses are shored up
...

“I don’t know,” I say
...
It is a quiet affair
...
One of the older members reads the Abnegation manifesto,
which is a short paragraph about forgetting the self and the dangers of self-involvement
...
Then they all share a meal, each person serving food to the
person on his left
...

Initiation day plunges the Dauntless compound into insanity and chaos
...
I fight my way through them to get a plate of
food at lunch and carry it back to the dormitory with me
...

The dormitory, at least, is quiet
...
I just grabbed what looked good to me
at the time, and now that I take a closer look, I realize that I chose a plain chicken breast, a scoop of
peas, and a piece of brown bread
...

I sigh
...
It is what I am when I’m not thinking about what I’m doing
...
It is what I am even when I appear to be brave
...
I have to warn my family about
the war the Erudite are planning, but I don’t know how
...
Today I have
to focus on what awaits me
...

I eat like a robot, rotating from chicken to peas to bread and back again
...
In two hours I will walk to the fear landscape room with the other initiates,
go through my fear landscape, and become Dauntless
...

When I finish, I bury my face in my pillow
...

“Time to go,” she says
...

I rub my eyes to press the sleep from them
...
The other initiates are in
the dormitory, tying shoelaces and buttoning jackets and throwing smiles around like they don’t mean
it
...
The torture will be
over soon, but can we forget the simulations? Will we ever sleep soundly again, with the memories of
our fears in our heads? Or will we finally forget our fears today, like we’re supposed to?
We walk to the Pit and up the path that leads to the glass building
...
I
can’t see daylight because the soles of shoes cover every inch of glass above us
...
I walk up the stairs with Christina, and the crowd
chokes me
...
The heat
of so many bodies around me makes it difficult to breathe
...
A
break in the crowd reveals what they are all clustered around: a series of screens on the wall to my

left
...
The screen on the left shows a black-clothed girl in
the fear landscape room—Marlene
...
Thank God no one out here will see my fears either—just my reactions to them
...
It picks up for a second and then decreases
...
The screen on the right shows
her time
...
Tobias stands just inside a
door on the left side of the room that I barely noticed the last time I was here
...
I walk past him without looking at him
...
A line of people sit in
chairs in front of it
...
The others are also older
...

Behind them is another line of chairs, all occupied now
...

“Hey, Tris!” Uriah calls out from across the room
...

Only four of them are left; the rest have gone through their fear landscapes already
...

“You can sit on my lap, if you want
...
“It’s fine
...
”
I also don’t want Tobias to see me sitting on someone else’s lap
...
Max, Eric, and a few others shake off the simulation daze and walk out
...

“Transfers, the order in which you go through the final test was taken from your rankings as they
now stand,” Tobias says
...
”
That means five people will go before I do
...
He and I exchange glances when Eric
sticks Drew with the needle and sends him into the fear landscape room
...

The fear landscapes are not interesting to watch from the outside
...
After a few minutes, I close my eyes instead of watching and
try to think of nothing
...
I just have to remember that I have the power to manipulate the simulations,
and that I have practiced it before
...
It takes her half as long as it takes Drew, but even Molly has trouble
...
At one point she even screams at the top
of her lungs
...
All I can do now is get past this obstacle
...
Then Will
...
I don’t watch them
...
And then my name
...
”
I open my eyes and walk to the front of the observation room, where Eric stands with a syringe full

of orange liquid
...
I imagine that the serum is liquid adrenaline rushing through my veins,
making me strong
...


CHAPTER THIRTY

I AM READY
...
Tobias said that stage three is about mental preparation—coming up with strategies to
overcome my fears
...
I bounce on the balls of my feet as I wait for the
first fear to appear
...

The ground beneath me changes
...
A
green sky replaces the exposed pipes above me
...
Tobias told
me to figure out what this simulation means
...
It’s about control
...

This time, I do not hit the bird as hard as I can
...
What combats powerlessness? Power
...

A lump forms in my throat and I want the talons off
...
My gun
...
I spin on my heel, aiming the gun at the sky, and see the cloud of dark feathers
descending
...

As I aim and shoot, I feel the same rush of power I felt the first time I held a gun
...
I stand in the dark again
...
I crouch down and slide my hand along a
cold, smooth panel—glass
...
The tank again
...
This is not about the water; it is about my inability to escape the tank
...
I just have to convince myself that I am strong enough to break the glass
...
I
slam my palm against the wall in front of me, expecting the pane to break
...

My heartbeat speeds up
...
I have to calm down
...
I lean against the wall behind me and kick as
hard as I can
...
My toes throb, but nothing happens
...
I can wait for water to fill the tank—and it’s already at my knees—and try to
calm down as I drown
...
No
...

I can’t
...
I am stronger than the glass
...
My mind will make it so
...
The glass is ice
...
The
glass is—

The glass shatters under my hand, and water spills onto the floor
...

I shake out my hands
...
I’ve faced it before in
simulations
...

What feels like a solid wall hits me from the side, forcing the air from my lungs, and I fall hard,
gasping
...
Beneath
me is a rock with a jagged edge, slick with water
...
Out of the corner of my eye, I see a dark sky and a blood-red moon
...
I hit my chin against the stone and wince
...
I stretch my arm and find the edge of the rock
...
I cling as hard as I can, but I am not strong enough—the
water pulls me and the wave throws my body back
...
My
lungs scream for air
...
I gasp, and
another wave hits me, this one harder than the first, but I have a better hold
...
I must be afraid of being out of control
...

With a scream of frustration, I throw my hand forward and find a hole in the rock
...
Once my feet are free, I get up and throw my body into a run, into a sprint, my feet quick on the
stone, the red moon in front of me, the ocean gone
...
Too still
...
I look down and see rope wrapped
around my chest, my arms, my legs
...
I
am high above the ground
...
They are the initiates, carrying
torches, and Peter is at the front of the pack
...
A laugh starts somewhere in the
center of the crowd and rises as voice after voice joins it
...

As the cackling grows louder, Peter lowers his torch to the wood, and flames leap up near the
ground
...
I don’t struggle against the
ropes, as I did the first time I faced this fear
...

This is a simulation
...
The heat from the flames rises around me
...

“Smell that, Stiff?” Peter says, his voice louder than even the cackling
...
The flames are getting higher
...
“That’s the smell of your burning flesh
...

“Know what I smell?” My voice strains to be louder than the laughter all around me, the laughter
that oppresses me as much as the heat
...

I stare through the flames at Peter, the heat bringing blood to the surface of my skin, flowing through
me, melting the toes of my shoes
...


Thunder roars above my head, and I scream as a flame touches my fingertips and pain shrieks over
my skin
...
A line of lightning sprawls over the sky and I feel the first drop on my forehead
...

Sheets of rain fall around me, and I hear sizzling over the laughter
...
The ropes fall away, and I push my hands through
my hair
...

I smooth my shirt down, and when I look up, I stand in my bedroom in the Abnegation sector of the
city
...
The lights are off, but the room is lit by the moonlight coming
through the windows
...
I turn toward it, confused
...
I am not allowed to have mirrors
...
My eyes skip to the window behind me
...

Cold drops down my spine like a bead of sweat, and my body goes rigid
...
He is the
man with the scarred face from the aptitude test
...
I
blink, and two men appear at his left and right, just as still as he is, but their faces are featureless—
skin-covered skulls
...
I press my shoulders to the mirror
...
The noise vibrates in my rib
cage, it is so loud, and then the scarred man and his two companions begin to walk with slow, careful
movements toward me
...
I know it
...
This is a simulation
...
It is not a mirror but a closet door
...
It will be hanging against the right wall, just inches away from my hand
...

I bite my lip and fire at the scarred man
...
My lip aches from biting it so hard
...
The glass creaks under the pressure of their hands, and then
cracks, and then shatters
...

I don’t have enough bullets in my gun
...
I pull back into the closet and shut the door in front of me
...
I need a
solution
...
I can’t fight them off
...
The fear landscape will register my slowing heartbeat and my

even breath and it will move on to the next obstacle
...
The wall behind me creaks
...
It is not a
wall but another door
...
Smiling, I crawl
through the hole and stand
...
I am at home
...
I forgot, for a second, that I was in Dauntless
headquarters
...

But I’m not afraid of Tobias
...
Maybe there’s something behind me that I’m
supposed to focus on
...

A bed?
Tobias walks toward me, slowly
...
He smiles down at me
...
Familiar
...
I thought it would be impossible to forget I was in
a simulation
...

His fingers find my jacket zipper and pull it down in one slow swipe until the zipper detaches
...

Oh, is all I can think, as he kisses me again
...

My fear is being with him
...

But this obstacle doesn’t feel the same as the others
...

He slides his hands down my arms and then squeezes my hips, his fingers sliding over the skin just
above my belt, and I shiver
...
I have been attacked by crows and men
with grotesque faces; I have been set on fire by the boy who almost threw me off a ledge; I have
almost drowned—twice—and this is what I can’t cope with? This is the fear I have no solutions for
—a boy I like, who wants to…have sex with me?
Simulation Tobias kisses my neck
...
I have to face the fear
...

I look Simulation Tobias in the eye and say sternly, “I am not going to sleep with you in a
hallucination
...
I feel
something other than fear—a prickle in my stomach, a bubble of laughter
...
He feels strong
...

And he’s gone
...
I must be the only initiate with this fear
...

I almost forgot about this one
...
A spotlight shines from the ceiling, its source unknown, and
standing in the center of its circle of light are my mother, my father, and my brother
...
It is female, but harsh, like it’s cluttered with rocks and broken
glass
...

The barrel of a gun presses to my temple, a cold circle against my skin
...
I wipe my sweaty palm on my pants and
look at the woman through the corner of my eye
...
Her glasses are askew, and her eyes are
empty of feeling
...

“Do it,” she says again, more insistent this time
...
”
I stare at Caleb
...
“Go ahead, Tris,” he says softly
...
It’s okay
...
“No,” I say, my throat so tight it aches
...

“I’ll give you ten seconds!” the woman shouts
...
The last time I saw him, he gave me a look of contempt,
but now his eyes are wide and soft
...

“Tris,” he says
...
”
“Eight!”
“Tris,” my mother says
...
She has a sweet smile
...
”
“Seven!”
“Shut up!” I shout, holding up the gun
...
I can shoot them
...
They’re
asking me to
...
They aren’t even real
...

“Six!”
It isn’t real
...
My brother’s kind eyes feel like two drills boring a hole in
my head
...

“Five!”
I have no other option
...
Think
...
The urgency making my heart race
depends on one thing, and one thing only: the threat to my life
...

“Two!”
I release the trigger of my gun and drop it
...

Shoot me instead
...


CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

THE LIGHTS COME on
...
I sink to my
knees, wrapping my arms around my chest
...
I
rub my arms to get rid of the goose bumps
...
Every muscle in my body relaxes at once and I breathe
freely again
...
It
seemed like bravery to me before, but now it seems more like masochism
...
Max, Eric, Tobias, and a few people I don’t know walk into the room
in a line, standing in a small crowd in front of me
...

“Congratulations, Tris,” says Eric
...
”
I try to smile
...
I can’t shake the memory of the gun against my head
...

“Thanks,” I say
...
He
beckons to one of the unfamiliar people behind him
...
He opens it and takes out a syringe and a long needle
...
The orange-brown liquid in the syringe reminds me of what they inject
us with before simulations
...

“At least you aren’t afraid of needles,” he says
...
Just a precaution
...

“Not often
...
“This is a new development, courtesy of the Erudite
...
”
My stomach twists
...
But I also can’t refuse
...

“All right,” I say, my throat tight
...
I pull my hair away from my neck and tilt
my head to the side
...
The deep ache spreads through my neck, painful but brief
...

“The banquet is in two hours,” he says
...
Good luck
...
He pauses by the door and beckons for
me to follow him, so I do
...
He smiles at me
...


“I heard a rumor that you only had seven obstacles to face,” he says
...
”
“You…you weren’t watching the simulation?”
“Only on the screens
...

“They seemed impressed
...
”
“I would be surprised if you weren’t ranked first,” he says
...
The crowd is still there, but it is thinner now that the last person—me
—has gone
...
I stay close to Tobias’s side as they point, but I can’t walk
fast enough to avoid some cheers, some claps on the shoulder, some congratulations
...
I smile back at them
...
” I bite my lip
...
Why?” he says
...
” I kick a pebble to the side of the path
...
“Because if you want peace and quiet, you can
stay with me until the banquet
...

“What is it?” he asks
...

“Let’s go,” I say
...

“Want some water?” he says
...
” I hold my hands in front of me
...
His hand cradles the side of my head, his long fingers
slipping through my hair
...
Heat spreads through
me slowly
...

His lips still on mine, he pushes the jacket from my shoulders
...
I don’t know why I feel this way
...
I press my palms to my face, covering my eyes
...

“Don’t tell me it’s nothing
...
He grabs my arm
...
Look at me
...
The hurt in his eyes and the anger in his
clenched jaw surprise me
...
This…whatever it is
...
He steps back, shaking his head
...
”

“I am not an idiot,” I say
...
So if you’re just looking for…um, you know…that…”
“What? Sex?” He scowls at me
...
”
I feel like he just punched me in the stomach
...
I press my hands to my abdomen and look away, fighting
off tears
...
Nor am I the yelling type
...

“I’m going to leave now,” I say quietly
...

“No, Tris
...
I push him away, hard, but he grabs my
other wrist, holding our crossed arms between us
...
“What I meant was that you aren’t like that
...
”
“You were an obstacle in my fear landscape
...
“Did you know that?”
“What?” He releases my wrists, and the hurt look is back
...
I bite my lip to keep it still
...
I’ve never been
involved with someone before, and…you’re older, and I don’t know what your expectations are,
and…”
“Tris,” he says sternly, “I don’t know what delusion you’re operating under, but this is all new to
me, too
...
“You mean you haven’t…” I raise my eyebrows
...
Oh
...
“Um
...
”
“Well, you assumed wrong
...
His cheeks are bright, like he’s embarrassed
...
He takes my face in his hands, his fingertips cold and his
palms warm
...
I promise
...
But this has nothing to do with his kindness
...
I am on edge
...
I want him to kiss
me, I want him to; I am afraid of where it might go
...
He pulls back
with a puckered brow
...

“No
...
It’s healed, I just…wanted to keep it covered up
...
I pull my sleeve down and slip my shoulder out of it
...
They rise and fall with my bones, which stick
out farther than I’d like
...
It sends a thrill through my stomach
...
Something else, too
...

He peels the corner of the bandage away
...

“I have the same one,” he says, laughing
...
”

“Really? Can I see it?”
He presses the bandage over the tattoo and pulls my shirt back over my shoulder
...
“Only…partially
...
He lifts his eyes to mine and unzips his sweatshirt
...
I don’t feel like laughing now
...

His eyebrows pull to the center of his forehead, and he grabs the hem of his T-shirt
...

A patch of Dauntless flames covers his right side, but other than that, his chest is unmarked
...

“What is it?” I ask, frowning
...

“I don’t invite many people to look at me,” he says
...
”
“I can’t imagine why,” I say softly
...
”
I walk slowly around him
...
The symbols of each faction are
drawn there—Dauntless at the top of his spine, Abnegation just below it, and the other three, smaller,
beneath them
...
It makes sense that he would tattoo himself with the
symbol of Dauntless, his refuge, and even the symbol of Abnegation, his place of origin, like I did
...
“We’ve all started to put down the virtues of the
other factions in the process of bolstering our own
...
I want to be brave, and
selfless, and smart, and kind, and honest
...
“I continually struggle with
kindness
...
“It doesn’t work that way
...
”
I traded cowardice for cruelty; I traded weakness for ferocity
...
“We have to warn them, you know
...
”
“I know,” he says
...
”
He turns toward me
...

“Is this scaring you, Tris?”
“No,” I croak
...
“Not really
...
”
“What do you want?” Then his face tightens
...

He nods too, and takes my hands in his gently
...
His eyes
lowered, he pushes my hands up, over his abdomen and over his chest, and holds them against his
neck
...
My face is hot, but I shiver anyway
...

“Someday,” he says, “if you still want me, we can…” He pauses, clears his throat
...
I feel his heartbeat against my cheek, as fast as my own
...

I turn my head and kiss the hollow beneath his throat
...

He bends his head and kisses me slowly
...
”
“Four and Six,” I say
...
I know exactly how we fit together, his arm around
my waist, my hands on his chest, the pressure of his lips on mine
...


CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

I

face carefully as we walk to the dining hall, searching for any sign of
disappointment
...

If anything, he seems lighter now than he was before
...

When we reach the entrance, we separate
...
He enters second, a minute later, and sits down next to Zeke, who hands him a dark bottle
...

“Where did you go?” asks Christina
...
”
“I just wandered around,” I say
...
”
“You have no reason to be nervous,” Christina says, shaking her head
...
”
I detect a note of jealousy in her voice, and again, I wish I could explain that I was well prepared
for the simulation, because of what I am
...

“What job are you going to pick?” I ask her
...
Training initiates,” she says
...
You know, fun stuff
...
I could work for the
Dauntless leaders—but they would kill me if they discover what I am
...
“I think being a transfer would
help me
...
“Because that’s
what Peter wants
...
”
“And it’s what I want,” adds Will
...
Forgot about them
...
“Oh God
...
”
“No, it isn’t,” she says
...
Will squeezes her hand
...
“The leaders who were watching your fear
landscape…they were laughing about something
...
“I’m glad my terror amuses them
...

“No
...
“You always bite the inside of your cheek when you lie
...
”
I stop biting the inside of my cheek
...

Will covers his mouth immediately
...
I was afraid of…intimacy,” I say
...
“Like…sex?”
WATCH TOBIAS’S

I tense up
...
Even if it was just Christina, and no one else was around, I
would still want to strangle her right now
...
I try to throw flames from my eyes
...

“What was that like?” she says
...
Faceless…unidentifiable male,” I say
...

“Moths,” repeats Will
...
Everywhere
...

“Terrifying,” Will says with mock seriousness
...
Tough as cotton balls
...
”
A microphone squeals somewhere, so loud I clap my hands over my ears
...
After
the tapping is done and the crowd of Dauntless is quiet, Eric clears his throat and begins
...
Eloquence is for Erudite,” he says
...
I wonder
if they know that he was an Erudite once; that under all the pretense of Dauntless recklessness and
even brutality, he is more like an Erudite than anything else
...
“So I’m going to keep this short
...
And a
slightly smaller pack of new members
...
”
At the word “congratulations” the room erupts, not into applause, but into the pounding of fists on
tabletops
...

“We believe in bravery
...
We believe in freedom from fear and in
acquiring the skills to force the bad out of our world so that the good can prosper and thrive
...
”
Even though I know Eric probably doesn’t believe in any of those things, I find myself smiling,
because I believe in them
...

More pounding fists, this time accompanied by whoops
...
“The rankings, I know, are what everyone is really waiting
for
...
The rankings will appear on the screen behind me
...
Next to the number one is my picture, and the name “Tris
...
I didn’t realize it was there until it was gone, and I didn’t have to feel it
anymore
...
First
...

I forget about war; I forget about death
...
I
hear cheering and laughing and shouting
...


1
...
Uriah
3
...
Marlene
5
...
I suppress a sigh
...

6
...
Christina
I smile, and Christina reaches across the table to hug me
...
She laughs in my ear
...
It’s Uriah
...

“Congratulations!” I shout
...
He releases me, laughing, and runs into a crowd of Dauntlessborn initiates
...
I follow the list down
...

Eleven and twelve are Molly and Drew
...
Drew, who tried to run away while Peter held me by the throat over the
chasm, and Molly, who fed the Erudite lies about my father, are factionless
...

Will and Christina kiss, a little too sloppily for my taste
...
Then I feel a tap on my shoulder and turn to see Tobias standing behind me
...

“You think giving you a hug would give away too much?” he says
...
”
I stand on my tiptoes and press my lips to his
...

A moment later, Tobias’s thumb brushes over the injection site in my neck, and a few things come
together at once
...

One: Colored serum contains transmitters
...

Three: Erudite developed the serum
...

I break away from the kiss and stare wide-eyed at Tobias
...


I shake my head
...
” I meant to say not here
...
But he has to know how important it is
...
“Okay?”
He nods
...
I don’t even know how to think straight
...


CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

I TRY TO get Tobias alone after the rankings are announced, but the crowd of initiates and members is
too thick, and the force of their congratulations pulls him away from me
...

I wake to squeaking mattresses and shuffling feet
...
I open my mouth to ask her what she’s doing, but
then I notice that across from me, Will is putting on a shirt
...

“Christina,” I hiss
...
“Christina!”
She just keeps tying her shoelaces
...
Her eyes are open, but blank, and her facial muscles are
slack
...
And everyone else looks just like her
...
All the initiates fall into a line when they finish dressing
...
I grab Will’s arm to keep him from leaving, but he moves
forward with irrepressible force
...
He just drags me along with him
...

I fumble for my shoes
...
I tie my shoes in a hurry, pull on a jacket, and sprint
out of the room, catching up to the line of initiates quickly, conforming my pace to theirs
...
I
mimic them as best I can, but the rhythm feels strange to me
...
Max
stands in the hallway, watching us
...
I tense as I pass him
...
He’ll notice I’m not
brain-dead like the rest of them and something bad will happen to me, I just know it
...

We climb a flight of stairs and travel at the same rhythm down four corridors
...
Inside it is a crowd of Dauntless
...
I can’t see what the piles are until I am a
foot away from them
...

Of course
...
So now the entire faction is braindead, obedient, and trained to kill
...

I pick up a gun and a holster and a belt, copying Will, who is directly in front of me
...
I
grit my teeth
...

Once I’m armed, I follow Will and the other initiates toward the exit
...
I would rather die
...
My list of options narrows, and I see the path I must take
...
I will save my family
...
A blanket of calm settles over me
...
I can’t see Will ahead of me, or anything ahead of
him
...
My knee hits something else
—a step
...
They didn’t see that
...

Please let it be too dark
...
I focus on matching my rhythm to his as I reach the top of the stairs, passing another
Dauntless leader
...

Well, not the only people
...
And if I am awake, that means
Tobias is too, unless I am wrong about him
...

I stand next to the train tracks in a group that stretches as far as I can see with my peripheral vision
...
One by one, my fellow initiates climb into the train
car in front of us
...
The faces on
my left are unfamiliar, but I see a tall boy with short hair a few yards to my right
...
I don’t know how to get to him without attracting
attention
...

The car in front of me fills up, and Will turns toward the next one
...
The people around me are all taller
than I am; they will shield me
...
Too much movement
...
Please don’t catch me
...
I take the next hand without looking at it, and climb as gracefully as I can into the
car
...
My eyes twitch up, just for a second, to see his face
...
Was I wrong? Is he not Divergent? Tears spark behind my
eyes, and I blink them back as I turn away from him
...
And then
something peculiar happens: fingers lace with mine, and a palm presses to my palm
...

My entire body is alive with energy
...
He is awake
...

I want to look at him, but I force myself to stand still and keep my eyes forward as the train starts to
move
...
It is meant to comfort me, but it
frustrates me instead
...
I need to look at him
...
I don’t know how long I’ve been
standing there, but my back aches, so it must have been a long time
...


Right before we jump down from the car, I see Tobias turn his head in my periphery, and I glance
back at him
...
”
“My family,” I say
...
Tobias walks in
front of me
...
I pass the place I went every six months with my
mother to pick up new clothes for our family; the bus stop where I once waited in the morning to get
to school; the strip of sidewalk so cracked Caleb and I played a hopping, jumping game to get across
it
...
The buildings are dark and empty
...
No one seems to be doing
anything
...

I start to hear popping sounds
...
I clench my jaw
...

Far ahead of us, I see a Dauntless soldier push a gray-clothed man to his knees
...
The soldier takes her gun out of her holster and, with sightless eyes, fires a
bullet into the back of the council member’s skull
...
It’s Tori
...

Keep walking
...
Keep walking
...
When I step over his hand, I almost burst into
tears
...
I stand as still as I can, but all I want to
do is find Jeanine and Eric and Max and shoot them all
...
I breathe quickly through my nose
...
From the corner of my left eye, I see a gray blur collapse to the pavement
...

The Dauntless soldiers carry out unspoken orders without hesitation and without question
...
A sea of black-clothed soldiers guard the doors
...
Maybe they are already dead
...
Soon
the leaders will notice that whatever signals everyone else is getting, I’m not getting them
...
I see a lock of long, greasy hair, and a silver
earring
...
He pokes my cheek with his index finger, and I struggle against the impulse to slap his
hand away
...

“Oh, they can see and hear
...
“They receive commands from our computers in the transmitters we injected them with…” At

this, he presses his fingers to the injection site to show the woman where it is
...

Still, still, still
...
”
Eric shifts a step to the side and leans close to Tobias’s face, grinning
...
“The legendary Four
...
My heart pounds so
hard I feel it in my skull
...
Eric tilts his head
...
She must be a Dauntless leader if she can give Eric
permission
...
”
“Too bad you didn’t just take Max up on his offer, Four
...

My lungs burn; I haven’t breathed in almost a minute
...
I press the barrel to Eric’s forehead
...

My index finger hovers over the trigger
...

“You won’t shoot me,” Eric replies
...
But I can’t murder him; I can’t
...
He screams and grabs his foot with both hands
...
I don’t wait to see if
the bullet hits her
...

If we can make it to the alley, we can disappear into the buildings and they won’t find us
...
I hear footsteps behind us, but I don’t look back
...
I stumble behind him
...

The pain is sharp and sudden, beginning in my shoulder and spreading outward with electric
fingers
...
I lift my head to see
Tobias’s knees by my face, and yell, “Run!”
His voice is calm and quiet as he replies, “No
...
Tobias helps me up, supporting my weight
...
Dauntless soldiers surround us and point their guns
...
His face is a sickly white
...
”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

I LEAN HEAVILY

on Tobias
...
Blood trickles down my
side
...

The gun barrel pushes me toward a door guarded by two Dauntless soldiers
...
Jeanine
sits behind the desk, a phone against her ear
...
“It needs to be well guarded, it’s the
most important part—I’m not talk—I have to go
...
They remind me of melted steel
...
He must be a Dauntless leader—or maybe a recruit
who was removed from the simulation
...
” She takes her glasses off, folds them, and sets them on the desk
...

“You,” she says, pointing at me, “I expected
...
But you…”
She shakes her head as she shifts her eyes to Tobias
...
“Everything
about you checked out: test results, initiation simulations, everything
...
”
She folds her hands and sets her chin on top of them
...
“Why don’t you tell me?”
Her mouth curls into a smile
...
That your
Divergence is weaker
...
Like she’s amused
...
If I didn’t have a bullet in my shoulder, I might
...
“Consider me awed
...
I had almost forgotten about this side of him—the part that is more likely to
explode than to lie down and die
...
” Tobias
closes his eyes
...
”
If Tobias’s comments bother Jeanine, she doesn’t let on
...

She wears a blue dress that hugs her body from shoulder to knee, revealing a layer of pudge around
her middle
...
He
slides his arm around me, supporting me from the waist
...
There is no rush,” she says lightly
...
You see, it perplexed me that the Divergent were immune to the serum that I developed, so I
have been working to remedy that
...
Luckily I have another batch to test
...

Why would it be any different now?
She smirks at me
...
” She sidesteps her desk,
skimming the surface with her finger
...
And I probably won’t live long enough to figure it out
...
“It requires a strong will to manipulate a simulation, last time I
checked
...
”
“I am not a fool,” says Jeanine
...
We are tired of being
dominated by a bunch of self-righteous idiots who reject wealth and advancement, but we couldn’t do
this on our own
...
”
“Improved,” Tobias says, snorting
...
“Improved, and working toward a world in which people will live
in wealth, comfort, and prosperity
...
“All that wealth…doesn’t come from
nowhere
...
“As is Abnegation
...
”
Absorbed into the Dauntless army
...
She
wants everyone to be pliable and easy to control
...
He raises his voice
...
You will be
dead before the day is out, you—”
“Perhaps if you could control your temper,” Jeanine says, her words cutting cleanly across
Tobias’s, “you would not be in this situation to begin with, Tobias
...
“The second you orchestrated an attack
against innocent people
...
” Jeanine laughs
...
I would expect
Marcus’s son to understand that not all those people are innocent
...
“Can you tell me
honestly that you wouldn’t be happy to discover that your father was killed in the attack?”
“No,” says Tobias through gritted teeth
...
”
They stare at each other for a few seconds, long enough to make me feel tense to my core, and then
Jeanine clears her throat
...
”

She stands and walks a few steps to the left, her hands clasped in front of her
...

“Therefore, it was necessary that I develop a new form of simulation to which they are not immune
...
That is where you come in
...
“You are correct to say that you are strong-willed
...
But
there are a few things I can control
...
I lean my temple into Tobias’s shoulder
...

The pain has been so constant for the past few minutes that I have gotten used to it, like a person gets
used to a siren’s wail if it remains consistent
...
I see no vicious glee in her eyes, and not a hint of the sadism I
expect
...
She sees problems and forms solutions based on the data
she collects
...

She didn’t have an army, so she found one in Dauntless
...
Divergence is just another problem for her to solve, and that is what makes her so
terrifying—because she is smart enough to solve anything, even the problem of our existence
...
“So I created a new serum that will adjust your
surroundings to manipulate your will
...
”
Monitored—or robbed of free will
...

“You will be the first test subject, Tobias
...
“You are too injured
to be of much use to me, so your execution will occur at the conclusion of this meeting
...
It’s hard to blink the tears back when I see the terror in Tobias’s wide,
dark eyes
...
His voice trembles, but his look is stern as he shakes his head
...
”
“I’m afraid you don’t have much of a choice in the matter,” replies Jeanine lightly
...
I forget my pain and the terror of approaching death and for a moment, I am grateful that the
memory of that kiss will be fresh in my mind as I meet my end
...
With no more warning than the
tightening of his muscles, Tobias lunges across the desk and wraps his hands around Jeanine’s throat
...

It takes two Dauntless soldiers to pull Tobias away from Jeanine and shove him to the ground
...
I lunge toward them, but another guard slams his hands against my shoulders,
forcing me against the wall
...

Jeanine braces herself against the desk, spluttering and gasping
...
No matter how mechanical she seems, she’s still human; there are
tears in her eyes as she takes a box from her desk drawer and opens it, revealing a needle and
syringe
...
Tobias grits his teeth and elbows one of the
guards in the face
...
He goes limp
...

“Let him up,” says Jeanine, her voice scratchy
...
He does not look like the sleepwalking Dauntless soldiers;
his eyes are alert
...

“Tobias,” I say
...

Tobias looks over his shoulder
...
Before the guards
can stop him, he closes a hand around my throat, squeezing my trachea with his fingertips
...

“The simulation manipulates him,” says Jeanine
...
“By altering what he sees—making him confuse enemy with friend
...
I gasp, drawing a rattling breath into my lungs
...
Controlled by the simulation, he will now murder the people he called innocent not
three minutes ago
...

“The advantage to this version of the simulation,” she says, her eyes alight, “is that he can act
independently, and is therefore far more effective than a mindless soldier
...
He struggles against them, his muscles taut, his eyes focused on me, but not
seeing me, not seeing me the way they used to
...
We’ll want a sentient
being there to monitor things and, as I understand it, he used to work there
...
“And take her to room B13,” she says
...
That flapping hand commands my execution, but to her it is just crossing off
an item from a list of tasks, the only logical progression of the particular path that she is on
...

They drag me down the hallway
...
I bite a hand that belongs to the Dauntless man on my right and smile as I taste blood
...


CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

I WAKE IN the dark, wedged in a hard corner
...
I touch my
throbbing head and liquid slips across my fingertips
...
When I bring my hand back down,
my elbow hits a wall
...
The bulb is blue and dim when it’s lit
...
The room is small, with concrete walls and no
windows, and I am alone in it
...

I see a small opening near my feet
...

The trembling starts in my fingertips and spreads up my arms, and soon my body is shuddering
...

My right arm is numb
...
I can’t panic now
...
The worst thing that can happen
to me now is that I drown in this tank
...
That is the worst
thing I can imagine
...

If I refuse to give up now, it will look brave to whoever watches me with that camera, but
sometimes it isn’t fighting that’s brave, it’s facing the death you know is coming
...

I’m not afraid of dying, but I want to die a different way, any other way
...
My foot
bounces off, and I kick again, so hard my heel throbs
...
The impact makes the wound in my right shoulder burn like
it got stuck with a hot poker
...

The video camera means they’re watching me—no, studying me, as only the Erudite would
...
To prove that I’m a coward
...
I am not a coward
...
If I focus on breathing, I can forget that I’m about to die
...
Water tickles my ankles, then my calves, then my thighs
...
I breathe in; I breathe out
...

I breathe in
...
I breathe out
...
It has been a long time since I thought about God, but I
think about him now
...
I am glad, suddenly, that I shot Eric in the foot instead of the
head
...
Instead of kicking my feet to stay abreast of it, I push all the air from
my lungs and sink to the bottom
...
I feel its movement over my face
...
I blow
bubbles from my mouth
...
I close my eyes
...


I let my hands float up to the top of the tank
...

When I was young, my father used to hold me over his head and run with me so I felt like I was
flying
...
I open my eyes
...
I must be close to death if I’m seeing things
...
Suffocating is painful
...

I hear a bang, and the glass cracks
...
I turn away as the glass shatters, and the force of the water throws my body at the
ground
...

“Beatrice,” she says
...
”
She pulls my arm across her shoulders and hauls me to my feet
...
I stumble beside her over broken glass and through water and out an open doorway
...

My feet slip and slide on the tile as we walk down the hallway, as fast as my weak legs can muster
...
The bullets hit
them both in the head, and they slump to the floor
...

She wears a sleeveless shirt
...

No wonder she never changed clothes in front of me
...
“You were Dauntless
...
She makes her jacket into a sling for my arm, tying the sleeves around my
neck
...
Your father and Caleb and some others are hiding in a
basement at the intersection of North and Fairfield
...
”
I stare at her
...
How well did I
actually know my mother?
“There will be time for questions,” she says
...
Then she touches my cheek
...
”
She runs to the end of the hallway, and I run after her
...
My mother has worked there for as long as I
can remember, so I’m not surprised when she leads me down a few dark hallways, up a dank
staircase, and into daylight again without interference
...

“I’ve been watching the trains since the attacks started,” she replies, glancing over her shoulder at
me
...
But it was always my intention to save you
...
“But I betrayed you
...
”
“You’re my daughter
...
” She shakes her head
...
Human beings as a whole cannot be good for long before the bad creeps back in and poisons us
again
...

I know now isn’t the time for conversation
...

“Mom, how do you know about Divergence?” I ask
...
Seeing how many bullets she has left
...
I recognize her expression as the one she wears when she
threads a needle
...
“I was only safe
because my mother was a Dauntless leader
...
I chose Abnegation
...

“But I wanted you to make the choice on your own
...
”
“Every faction conditions its members to think and act a certain way
...
For
most people, it’s not hard to learn, to find a pattern of thought that works and stay that way
...
“But our minds move in a dozen different directions
...
It means we can’t be
controlled
...
”
I feel like someone breathed new air into my lungs
...
I am not Dauntless
...

And I can’t be controlled
...
I peek over her shoulder and see a few
Dauntless with guns, moving to the same beat, heading toward us
...
Far behind
us, another group of Dauntless run down the alley, toward us, moving in time with one another
...
I watch her long eyelashes move as she blinks
...
But at least I have something of hers in my brain
...
The alley on the right, down to the basement
...
” She cups my cheeks
...
“I’m going
to distract them
...
”
“No
...
“I’m not going anywhere without you
...
“Be brave, Beatrice
...
”
I feel her lips on my forehead and then she runs into the middle of the street
...
The Dauntless start running
...
As I run, I look over my shoulder to see if any Dauntless
follow me
...

I whip my head over my shoulder when I hear them fire back
...

My mother stiffens, her back arching
...
A patch of blood spreads over her shoulder
...
I blink again, and I see her smile as she sweeps my hair trimmings into a pile
...
She is motionless and without breath
...
My cheeks are hot and wet with tears I

didn’t feel beginning
...

Pain stabs through me as everything I am made of collapses, my entire world dismantled in a
moment
...
If I lie down now, this can all be done
...

I feel Tobias brushing my hair back before the first simulation
...
I
hear my mother telling me to be brave
...
Somehow I get up and start running
...


CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

THREE DAUNTLESS SOLDIERS pursue me
...
One
of them fires, and I dive, scraping my palms on the ground
...
I throw myself around the corner and click a bullet into the
chamber of my gun
...
I point the gun into the alley and fire blindly
...

Just one set of footsteps now
...
My finger squeezes the trigger, but not hard enough to fire
...
A shaggy-haired boy with a crease between his
eyebrows
...
Dull-eyed and mindless, but still Will
...
In an instant, I see his finger poised over the trigger and hear the bullet slide into the
chamber, and I fire
...
Can’t breathe
...
I know because that’s where I aimed it
...
North and Fairfield
...
I blink a few
times
...

I kneel next to the door
...
Noise might attract
Dauntless soldiers
...
After a few seconds I clamp my hand over my mouth to
muffle the sound and scream again, a scream that turns into a sob
...
I still
see Will
...
A curled lip
...
Light in his eyes
...
It was him or me
...
But I feel dead too
...

I wipe the tears from my face
...

The door opens, and Caleb stands in the doorway
...
He stares at me for a
few seconds and then throws his arms around me, his hand pressing to the wound in my shoulder
...

“Beatrice
...

He drags his thumb under his eyes, catching the moisture
...

The room is dimly lit, but I see familiar faces, former neighbors and classmates and my father’s
coworkers
...
Marcus
...
I will not do that; I will not think of him
...
“Did Mom find you?”
I nod
...

“My shoulder,” I say
...
I
sink to my knees
...
A sob rises within me,
desperate for release, and I choke it back
...
She was married to a
council member, but I don’t see him here
...

Someone else carries a lamp from one corner to the other so we have light
...
There is no better place to need help than a room full
of members of Abnegation
...
He’s wearing gray again
...

My father comes to me, lifts my arm across his shoulders, and helps me across the room
...

“They tried to drown me,” I say
...
I researched the simulation serum and found out that
Jeanine was working to develop long-range transmitters for the serum so its signal could stretch
farther, which led me to information about Erudite and Dauntless…anyway, I dropped out of initiation
when I figured out what was happening
...
“I’m
factionless now
...
“You’re with us
...
Caleb peels the square of fabric away, revealing first the Abnegation tattoo on my
right shoulder and second, the three birds on my collarbone
...

I lie on my stomach
...

“Have you ever taken a bullet out of someone before?” I ask, a shaky laugh in my voice
...

A lot of things about my parents might surprise me
...

“This will hurt,” he says
...
Pain spreads through my body and I scream through gritted
teeth, crushing Caleb’s hand
...
Tears run
from the corners of my eyes and I do as he tells me
...

“Got it,” he says
...

Caleb looks at my father and then at me, and then he laughs
...

“What’s so funny?” I say, sniffling
...


My father cleans the skin around my wound with something cold
...

I nod
...

“One,” he says, “two…three
...
Of all the pain I have suffered today—the pain of getting
shot and almost drowning and taking the bullet out again, the pain of finding and losing my mother and
Tobias, this is the easiest to bear
...

Caleb helps me sit up and separates the hems of his two shirts, pulling the long-sleeved one over his
head and offering it to me
...
It
is baggy and smells fresh, smells like Caleb
...
“Where is your mother?”
I look down
...
I don’t want to have this news to begin with
...
“She saved me
...

My father looks momentarily stricken and then recovers himself, averting his glistening eyes and
nodding
...
“A good death
...
So I just nod
...
My mother’s death was brave
...
It isn’t just brave that she died for me; it is brave that she did it
without announcing it, without hesitation, and without appearing to consider another option
...
Time to face the rest of the room
...

Because of that, and because I am Dauntless, it’s my duty to lead now
...

Marcus gets up
...

“We are only safe here for so long,” Marcus says eventually
...
Our
best option is to go to the Amity compound in the hope that they’ll take us in
...
“This whole thing is masterminded by the Erudite
...
”
“Not giving orders,” my father says
...
They’re in a
simulation and they don’t know what they’re doing
...
“The mind control doesn’t affect me
...

“No
...
” Marcus shakes his head
...

“Waking up and realizing what you’ve done…”

The room goes quiet, probably as all the Abnegation imagine themselves in the place of the
Dauntless soldiers, and that’s when it occurs to me
...

“What?” Marcus says
...
“The Erudite won’t have an army
...
This will be over
...
“Even without the Dauntless helping them, the Erudite
will find another way to—”
“And how are we supposed to wake them up?” Marcus says
...
“The program
...
”
“Easier said than done,” Caleb says
...
We can’t just appear at the Erudite
compound and start poking around
...
Jeanine
...
You can’t just leave it undefended
...
The control room where
Tobias used to work
...
And the Dauntless computers
...
“It makes sense
...
As of yesterday, I technically became Dauntless, but I don’t feel
like one
...

I guess I am what I’ve always been
...
Divergent
...

“It’s an informed guess,” I say, “and it’s the best theory I have
...
“What kind of help
do you need, Beatrice?”
The question stuns me, as does the expression he wears
...
He speaks
to me like I’m a peer
...
The latter is more likely, and more painful
...
”

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

ERUDITE AND DAUNTLESS forces are concentrated in the Abnegation sector of the city, so as long as
we run away from the Abnegation sector, we are less likely to encounter difficulty
...
Caleb was the obvious choice, since he knows the
most about the Erudite plan
...
And my father acted like his place was assumed from the beginning
...
We stand next to the railroad tracks, which will
carry us into danger
...

He checks his watch
...
”
“Should be here any second,” I say
...

I shake my head
...
We’ll run next to the car for a few feet and then
climb inside
...
It won’t be as easy for the rest of them, but we
can’t stop now
...
I bounce on the balls of my feet as the lights grow larger and larger, and then the
front of the train glides past me, and I start jogging
...

Caleb jumps, landing hard and rolling on his side to get in, and he helps Marcus
...
They move away from the doorway, but I stand on the
edge with one hand on a handle, watching the city pass
...
It would be smarter to go in the back entrance, the one that requires
jumping off a building
...

I am surprised my father didn’t ask that question, but he, like me, is watching the city
...
It looks peaceful from a distance, and inside those
walls, it probably is peaceful
...

I shake my head
...

“There were some things I needed to learn
...

“How to be selfless,” I say
...
”
“Is that why you got Abnegation’s symbol tattooed on your shoulder?” Caleb asks
...


I smile faintly back and nod
...
”

The glass building above the Pit reflects sunlight into my eyes
...
Almost there
...
”
“Jump?” Caleb asks
...
”
“Onto a roof,” I add
...
”
Half of bravery is perspective
...
Now, preparing to jump off a moving train is nothing, because I have done more difficult things
in the past few weeks than most people will in a lifetime
...
If I survive, I will undoubtedly go on to do far more difficult
things than even that, like live without a faction, something I never imagined possible
...
If he and Marcus go first, I can
time it so they have to jump the shortest distance
...
It’s a chance I have to take
...
I don’t wait to see if he makes it
...
He sits down on the gravel, and I push
Caleb in front of me
...

I take a few steps back to give myself a running start and leap out of the car just as the train reaches
the end of the roof
...
My knees ache, and the impact shudders through my body, making
my shoulder throb
...
Caleb and my father stand
at the edge of the roof, their hands around Marcus’s arms
...

Somewhere inside me, a vicious voice chants: fall, fall, fall
...
My father and Caleb haul him onto the roof
...
The thought of what comes next has me preoccupied
...
I hear
their shuffling footsteps behind me and step onto the ledge
...
I stare down at the hole in the ground, seven stories below me, and
then close my eyes as the air blows over my face
...
They look confused
...

“Don’t think,” I say
...
”
I turn, and as I turn, I lean back, compromising my balance
...
I relax my muscles as much as I can before I hit the net, which feels
like a slab of cement hitting my shoulder
...
I land on my knees on the platform, my eyes blurry
with tears
...
I stand with some difficulty
...
“Over here!”
Breathing heavily, Caleb crawls to the side of the net and drops over the edge, hitting the platform
hard
...

“How many times…have you…done that?” he asks between breaths
...

He shakes his head
...
When he stands on the platform, he leans and
vomits over the side
...

The cavern is empty and the hallways stretch into darkness
...
If we can find Dauntless soldiers, we can find the computers
...
Marcus stands on the platform, white as a sheet but unharmed
...

“Yes,” I say
...
“No need to be so
defensive, Beatrice
...

“Do you have a plan, Beatrice?” my father says
...
” And it’s true
...

I’m also not sure it will work
...

We walk down the hallway that leads to the Pit, which is striped with light every ten feet
...
Someone must have seen us
...
The spark from the gun flashed across the room by the door that leads
to the Pit
...

“Yes,” my father says
...
”
I run to the side of the room
...
I am small enough to hide in it, if I turn to the side
...
Maybe
...

“Whoever’s there,” a voice shouts, “surrender your weapons and put your hands up!”
I turn to the side and press my back to the stone wall
...
Another gunshot fires into silence
...


I can’t win a fight, but if I can move fast enough, I won’t have to fight
...
A few yards away, I realize that I know that dark hair that
always gleams, even in relative darkness, and that long nose with a narrow bridge
...

Cold slips over my skin and around my heart and into the pit of my stomach
...
He looks around, but his eyes search the air above me
and beyond me
...

I lick my lips, sprint the last few steps, and thrust the heel of my hand up
...
My body jolts with nervous energy
and as his eyes squint, I kick him in the groin
...
I
grab it and press the barrel to the top of his head
...

He lifts his head, and I click the bullet into its chamber, raising an eyebrow at him
...

“Because they figured out that you already have murderous tendencies and wouldn’t mind killing a
few hundred people while conscious,” I say
...
”
“I’m not…murderous!”
“I never knew a Candor who was such a liar
...
“Where are the
computers that control the simulation, Peter?”
“You won’t shoot me
...
“They think that because I’m small, or a
girl, or a Stiff, I can’t possibly be cruel
...
”
I shift the gun three inches to the left and fire at his arm
...
Blood spurts from the wound, and he screams again, pressing his
forehead to the ground
...

“Now that you realize your mistake,” I say, “I will give you another chance to tell me what I need
to know before I shoot you somewhere worse
...

He turns his head and focuses a bright eye on me
...
And on the way in
...

“They’re listening,” he spits
...
The only way I’ll tell you is if you get
me out of here
...

“You want me to take you,” I say, “the person who tried to kill me…with me?”
“I do,” he groans
...
”
It feels like a choice, but it isn’t
...

“Fine,” I say, almost choking on the word
...
”

I hear footsteps behind me
...
My father and the
others walk toward us
...
He wears a gray T-shirt beneath it
...
As he presses the fabric to the blood
running down Peter’s arm, he looks up at me and says, “Was it really necessary to shoot him?”
I don’t answer
...

In my head, I see him standing before Tobias with a belt in hand and hear his voice echo
...
I look at him for a few seconds
...

“Let’s go,” I say
...
”
“You want him to walk?” Caleb demands
...
“No
...
Where do we go, Peter?”
Caleb helps Peter to his feet
...
“Eighth floor
...

I walk into the roar of the river and the blue glow of the Pit, which is emptier now than I have ever
seen it before
...
I keep my gun in hand and start toward the path that leads to the glass ceiling
...
It reminds me of the endless field in my crow nightmares
...
We pass the tattoo place
...

“Now is the perfect time,” he says, “because you will soon get the opportunity to shoot someone
again, and if you don’t realize—”
“Realize what?” I say without turning around
...
Now it’s your turn
...
”
“What makes you so sure that you know what it is?” I say
...
“We have more important things to do
right now
...
A few months ago I would not have dared to snap at my father
...
But something changed when they shot my mother
...

I hear my father huff and puff over the sound of rushing water
...

Before I ascend the metal stairs that will carry me above the glass ceiling, I wait in darkness and
watch the light cast on the Pit walls by the sun
...
The guards make their rounds every minute and a half, stand for
twenty seconds, and then move on
...
When they see me, they will kill me, if they can,” I tell my

father quietly
...
“Should I let them?”
He stares at me for a few seconds
...
”
I climb the stairs carefully, stopping just before my head emerges
...

The bullet does not hit the guard
...
I fire again and duck as bullets
hit the floor around me with a ding
...

One guard down
...
I tilt the gun back and fire at the guard running toward me
...
Luckily it is his shooting arm, because he drops his gun and it skids across the floor
...
A bullet whizzes past my head, so close to hitting me that it moves my hair
...
By some miracle, one of the bullets hits a guard, and my eyes water uncontrollably from
the pain in my shoulder
...
I’m sure of it
...
I lie flat on my stomach and point both guns at him, my arms
resting on the floor
...

Then something surprising happens
...
Telling me to go
...

“All clear!” I shout
...

Slowly I get to my feet, holding my right arm against my chest
...
I am running
along this path and I will not be able to stop, will not be able to think of anything, until I reach the
end
...

“I think you and Marcus should stay here with him,” I say, jerking my head toward Peter
...
Make sure no one comes after us
...
If I go up into the building, I probably won’t come back down
...
When did I decide on this
suicide mission? Why wasn’t it more difficult?
“I can’t stay here while you go up there and risk your life,” says Caleb
...

Peter sinks to his knees
...
For a second I almost feel bad for him, but
then I remember Edward, and the itch of fabric over my eyes as my attackers blindfolded me, and my
sympathy is lost to hatred
...

I approach one of the fallen guards and take his gun, keeping my eyes away from the injury that
killed him
...
I haven’t eaten; I haven’t slept; I haven’t sobbed or screamed or even
paused for a moment
...

Level eight
...

I glance at my father
...
For protecting Caleb,” my father says
...
Two guards stand ready with guns in
hand, their faces blank
...
I hear
bullets strike glass
...
My
father stands above them, his gun still held out from his body
...
Guards run down the hallway on the left
...
I could run down the right hallway, but if the guards
came from the left hallway, that’s where the computers are
...

My father jumps out of the elevator and sprints down the right hallway, drawing the Dauntless
guards after him
...
That hallway will
end
...
I peer over the fallen guard’s back
...
One of them fires at his
stomach, and he groans so loud I can almost feel it in my chest
...
And again
...
Blood spills over his hand and the color drains from his face
...

“Dad,” I say
...

He slumps to the ground
...

His mouth opens like he’s about to say something, but then his chin drops to his chest and his body
relaxes
...
I want to
rest my head on the ground and let that be the end of it
...

But what I said to my father before was right—for every second that I waste, another Abnegation
member dies
...

I push myself up and run down the hallway, turning right at the end
...
I
open it
...
There are
dozens of them, each one showing a different part of the city
...
The Hub
...
The ground level of the building below us,
where Caleb, Marcus, and Peter wait for me to return
...

One of the screens has a line of code on it instead of an image
...

It is the simulation, the code already compiled, a complicated list of commands that anticipate and
address a thousand different outcomes
...
Sitting in the chair is a Dauntless soldier
...


CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

TOBIAS’S HEAD TURNS, and his dark eyes shift to me
...
He stands
...
He raises his gun
...

“Tobias,” I say, “you’re in a simulation
...
“Or I’ll fire
...
Jeanine also said that the simulation made Tobias’s friends into
enemies
...

I set my gun down at my feet
...

“I did,” I say
...
Tongues of flame press behind my eyes
...

I run at him, grabbing his wrist
...
The bullet hits the wall behind me
...
He drops the gun
...
I know that already
...
I dive for the
gun, but before I can touch it, he grabs me and wrenches me to the side
...
My head jerks
to the side and I cringe away from him, flinging my hands up to protect my face
...
I kick the gun back with my
heel so he can’t grab it and, ignoring the throbbing in my jaw, kick him in the stomach
...
The pain makes my vision go black
at the edges
...
He pulls his foot back like he’s about to kick me, and I roll onto my
knees, stretching my arm out for the gun
...
I can’t shoot him, I can’t
shoot him, I can’t
...

He grabs me by my hair and yanks me to the side
...

He is in there somewhere
...

Did his grip falter? I twist and kick back, my heel hitting him in the leg
...
I flip over onto my back
and point the gun at him
...
“I know you’re in there somewhere
...

My head throbs
...

“Tobias, please
...
I am pathetic
...
“Please
...
” He walks
toward me, his movements dangerous, fast, powerful
...
“Please see me,
Tobias, please!”

Even when he scowls, his eyes look thoughtful, and I remember how his mouth curled when he
smiled
...
I am not sure if I love him; not sure if that’s why
...
I am sure that nothing is worth killing him for
...
I volunteered to die instead, that time, but I can’t imagine how that would
help me now
...

My father says—used to say—that there is power in self-sacrifice
...

He pushes the barrel into my forehead
...
I reach out and rest my hand on his chest so I can feel his heartbeat
...

The bullet clicks into the chamber
...
Maybe it will just be a bang, and the lights will lift, and I will
find myself in another world
...

Can I be forgiven for all I’ve done to get here?
I don’t know
...

Please
...
He stares at me with the same ferocity but doesn’t move
...
He is Divergent
...
Any simulation
...
“It’s me
...
His body is stiff
...
I can feel it
against my cheek
...
A thud as the gun hits the floor
...
I cry out as he pulls me back
...

“Tris,” he says, and it’s him again
...

His arm wraps around me and he lifts me up, holding me against him, his hands clutching at my
back
...

He sets me down and stares at me, his fingers brushing over my forehead, my eyebrows, my
cheeks, my lips
...
His eyes are
bright with tears
...
It makes me hurt
...
All the throbbing in my head comes back, and the
ache in my shoulder, and I feel like my body weight doubles
...

“How did you do it?” I say
...
“I just heard your voice
...
I pull back and wipe my cheeks with the heels of my
hands and turn toward the screens again
...
Tobias was so
paranoid when I was railing against Dauntless there
...

Now I know why
...

“I don’t know if you were running it so much as monitoring it,” I say
...
I have
no idea how, but Jeanine made it so it could work on its own
...
“It’s…incredible
...
”
I see movement on one of the screens and see my brother, Marcus, and Peter standing on the first
floor of the building
...

“Tobias,” I say tersely
...
I can’t look at what he’s
doing
...
He holds the gun I gave him straight out from his body, like he’s

ready to use it
...
Don’t shoot
...
Don’t shoot
...
My brother and Marcus and Peter
crouch on the ground with their arms over their heads
...
A cluster of black around my brother
...

He presses the screen again, and everyone on the first floor goes still
...

And then the Dauntless move
...

All the tension in my chest unravels, and I sit down, heaving a sigh
...

“I have to get the data,” he says, “or they’ll just start the simulation again
...
It is the same frenzy that must be happening on the streets
...
There is only
one—it’s at the far end of the room, on the bottom
...
Black-clothed men and women drop to the ground
...

“Got it,” says Tobias, holding up the computer’s hard drive
...
He offers it to me, and I shove it in my back pocket
...
I point at the screen on the right
...
” He wraps his arm across my shoulders
...
”
We walk together down the hallway and around the corner
...
I
can’t stop myself from looking for his body
...
A strangled
scream escapes me
...
Bile leaps into my throat and I throw up against the wall
...
I clamp my hand over my mouth to contain a sob
...
Five seconds of weakness and then I get up
...
Three, four
...


I am not really aware of my surroundings
...
There is a shouting crowd of Dauntless soldiers dressed in black
...

Caleb runs to me when I walk through the doors, and I fall against him
...

“Dad?” he says
...

“Well,” he says, almost choking on the word, “he would have wanted it that way
...
His entire body goes rigid as

his eyes focus on Marcus
...

Marcus walks up to Tobias and wraps his arms around his son
...
I watch his Adam’s apple bob up and down and his eyes lift to the ceiling
...

Tobias winces
...
I remember the belt stinging on my wrist in Tobias’s fear
landscape and slip into the space between them, pushing Marcus back
...
Get away from him
...

“Stay away,” I hiss
...

“Tris,” Tobias says
...
If I could find a way to smack that look off his face, I would
...

“What are you talking about?” Marcus says quietly
...

“Stay away from him or I’ll decide I no longer care
...
Marcus’s eyes stay on mine for a few seconds,
and I can’t help but see them as black pits, like they were in Tobias’s fear landscape
...

“We have to go,” Tobias says unsteadily
...
”
We walk over unyielding ground toward the train tracks
...
I feel a twinge of regret
...

“Sorry,” I mutter
...
His fingers are still shaking
...
“That’s where the others went
...
“What do you think they’ll do?”
I don’t know how Candor will respond to the attack
...
But they may not fight the Erudite either
...
Eventually Tobias picks me
up, because I am dead on my feet, and I lean my head into his shoulder, taking deep breaths of his
skin
...

The truth is, I will not feel safe as long as Peter and Marcus are with us
...
The cruelty of fate is that I must
travel with the people I hate when the people I love are dead behind me
...
Where are Christina and Tori now? Wandering the streets, plagued
with guilt for what they’ve done? Or turning guns on the people who forced them to do it? Or are they
already dead too? I wish I knew
...
If she is still alive, Christina will find Will’s body
...
I
know it and the guilt strangles me and crushes me, so I have to forget it
...

The train comes, and Tobias sets me down so I can jump on
...
I wiggle my body inside and sit against the
wall
...
My enemies
...

The train turns, and I see the city behind us
...
The kindness of
Amity will comfort us for a while, though we can’t stay there forever
...

Tobias pulls me against him
...

“My parents,” I say
...
”
Even though I said it, and even though I know it’s true, it doesn’t feel real
...
That feels important
...
“To them there was no better way to show you
...

“You nearly died today,” he says
...
Why didn’t you shoot me, Tris?”
“I couldn’t do that,” I say
...
”
He looks pained and leans closer to me, so his lips brush mine when he speaks
...

I run my fingers along the tendons in his hand and look back at him
...
” He smiles a little
...
”
“That’s sensible of you,” I say, smiling too
...
”
I feel his laughter against my side, his nose sliding along my jaw, his lips pressing behind my ear
...
”
I laugh a little
...
”
“Fine,” he says
...
”
I kiss him as the train slides into unlit, uncertain land
...

I reach into my pocket and take out the hard drive that contains the simulation data
...
Marcus’s eyes cling greedily to the movement
...
Not quite
...


Abnegation and Dauntless are both broken, their members scattered
...

I do not know what life will be like, separated from a faction—it feels disengaged, like a leaf divided

from the tree that gives it sustenance
...
I have
no home, no path, and no certainty
...

I suppose that now, I must become more than either
...

Will
...
Dead
...

Tobias crouches in front of me, his hand on my left shoulder
...
I take a deep breath and hold it in an attempt to
relieve some of the pressure that is building in my chest
...
Now it does
...

“Tris, come on,” Tobias says, his eyes searching mine
...
”
It is too dark to see where we are, but if we are getting off, we are probably close to the fence
...

The others jump off one by one: Peter first, then Marcus, then Caleb
...
The
wind picks up as we stand at the edge of the car opening, like a hand pushing me back, toward safety
...
The impact hurts the bullet
wound in my shoulder
...

“Okay?” I say when I see him sitting in the grass a few feet away, rubbing his knee
...
I hear him sniff like he’s fending off tears, and I have to turn away
...
The fence towers over us, too high and flexible to climb over, too sturdy to knock down
...
“Where are they?”
“They were probably under the simulation,” Tobias says, “and are now
...
“Who
knows where, doing who knows what
...
What happened to our friends, our peers, our leaders, our factions?
There is no way to know
...

“Let’s hope the Erudite didn’t think to change this combination,” he says as he types in a series of
numbers
...

“How did you know that?” says Caleb
...

“I worked in the Dauntless control room, monitoring the security system
...

“How lucky,” says Caleb
...

“Luck has nothing to do with it,” Tobias says
...
”
I shiver
...
I never thought about

it that way before, and now that seems foolish
...
Caleb wipes his cheeks every few
seconds, and I know he’s crying but I don’t know how to comfort him, or why I am not crying myself
...


Pinpricks of light are the first sign that we are nearing Amity headquarters
...
A cluster of wooden and glass buildings
...
My feet sink into the ground, and
above me, the branches grow into one another, forming a kind of tunnel
...
The sharp, sweet smell of rotting apples mixes with the scent of wet earth in
my nose
...
“I know where to go,” he says
...
All the buildings except the
greenhouses are made of the same dark wood, unpainted, rough
...
The contrast between the laughter and the stone stillness within me is jarring
...
I would be shocked by the lack of security if we were not at Amity
headquarters
...

In this building the only sound is of our squeaking shoes
...

Marcus stops before an open room, where Johanna Reyes, representative of Amity, sits, staring out
the window
...
A scar stretches in a thick line from just above her right eyebrow to her lip,
rendering her blind in one eye and giving her a lisp when she talks
...
She would have been a beautiful woman if not for that scar
...
She walks toward him with her arms open
...

“The other members of your party got here a few hours ago, but they weren’t sure if you had made
it,” she says
...
I didn’t even think to worry about them
...

“Oh my,” she says, her eyes lingering on the blood soaking Peter’s shirt
...
I
can grant you all permission to stay the night, but tomorrow, our community must decide together
...
I of course ask you to turn over any weapons you might have
...
I am still wearing a gray shirt
...

At that moment, his smell, which is an even mixture of soap and sweat, wafts upward, and it fills
my nose, fills my entire head with him
...
Not here
...


Tobias hands over his gun, but when I reach behind me to take out my own concealed weapon, he
grabs my hand, guiding it away from my back
...

I know it’s smart to keep one of our guns
...

“My name is Johanna Reyes,” she says, extending her hand to me, and then Tobias
...
I am impressed by her awareness of the customs of other factions
...

“This is T—” Marcus starts, but Tobias interrupts him
...
“This is Tris, Caleb, and Peter
...
Outside Dauntless headquarters, I remember why he hid that name from the
world
...

“Welcome to the Amity compound
...
“Let
us take care of you
...
An Amity nurse gives me a salve—developed by Erudite to speed healing—to put on
my shoulder, and then escorts Peter to the hospital ward to mend his arm
...
Susan is there, and some of our old neighbors, and rows of wooden tables as long as the room
itself
...

I cling to Tobias’s arm
...

One of the Abnegation puts a cup of steaming liquid under my nose and says, “Drink this
...
No dreams
...
I grab the cup and drink it fast
...
And as I drain the last drops from the
cup, I feel myself relaxing
...
That is
all
...
But I am not running through the streets of
the city or the corridors of Dauntless headquarters
...

I shift, and wince as something digs into my back
...

For a moment I see Will standing before me, both our guns between us—his hand, I could have shot
his hand, why didn’t I, why?—and I almost scream his name
...

I get out of bed and lift the mattress with one hand, propping it up on my knee
...
Once it is out of sight and no longer pressed to my skin, my
head feels clearer
...
I am wearing the same clothes I wore last
night
...
On it is the simulation data that controlled the Dauntless, and the record of what the
Erudite did
...
Part of me thinks it would be a good idea to destroy it, but
I know it contains the only record of my parents’ deaths, so I’ll settle for keeping it hidden
...
I sit on the edge of the bed and try to smooth my hair down
...

The door opens, and Tobias steps halfway in, the door dividing his body in half
...
It’s a strange color on him, too bright, but when he leans his head back against the
doorframe, I see that it makes the blue in his eyes lighter
...
” He quirks his eyebrows and adds, with a touch of
melodrama, “To decide our fate
...
“Never thought my fate would be in the hands of a bunch of Amity
...
Oh, I brought you something
...
“Pain medicine
...
”
“Thanks
...
The medicine tastes like old lemon
...
” He smiles
...
Initiation days, Choosing Days
...
I was about to
rattle off a few more holidays, but only the Abnegation celebrate them
...
And anyway, the idea that we would
celebrate anything right now is so ludicrous I don’t continue
...
” His smile fades
...
I haven’t told him about Will yet
...
Just the thought of saying the words out loud makes me feel so heavy I could break through the
floorboards
...
” I shake my head a few times
...
I’m awake
...
” I am still shaking my
head
...
Then he tilts his head
down and kisses me, sending a warm ache through my body
...
When he touches me, the hollowed-out feeling in my chest and stomach is
not as noticeable
...
I can just try to forget—he can help me forget
...
“Sorry
...
”
For a moment all I can think is, How could you possibly know? But something about his expression
reminds me that he does know something about loss
...
I don’t
remember how she died, just that we attended her funeral
...
The image is fleeting, and it could be my imagination, not a memory
...
“I’ll let you get ready
...
The floor is dark brown tile, and each shower stall has
wooden walls and a plastic curtain separating it from the central aisle
...

The stream of water is cold, so I wouldn’t want the extra minutes even if I could have them
...
The pain medicine Tobias gave
me worked fast—the pain in my shoulder has already faded to a dull throb
...
It contains some yellow and red,
from the Amity, and some gray, from the Abnegation, colors I rarely see side by side
...
It’s something they would
think to do
...
The sleeves come down to my fingertips, and I roll them
up too
...

Someone knocks on the door
...

I open the door for her
...
I search her
face for a sign of what she has lost—her father, an Abnegation leader, didn’t survive the attack—but I
see only the placid determination characteristic of my old faction
...
“I’m sure we can find some better ones for you if the
Amity allow us to stay
...
“Thank you
...
Do you need my help with your hair? Or your shoes?”
I am about to refuse, but I really do need help
...
”
I sit down on a stool in front of the mirror, and she stands behind me, her eyes dutifully trained on
the task at hand rather than her reflection
...
And she doesn’t ask about my shoulder, how I was shot, what happened when I left
the Abnegation safe house to stop the simulation
...

“Have you seen Robert yet?” I say
...
I wonder if their reunion will be anything like Caleb’s and mine
...
“I left him to grieve with his faction as I grieve with mine
...
”
I hear a finality in her tone that tells me the subject is closed
...
“Our leaders were about to do something
wonderful
...
” Susan blushes
...
I didn’t mean to be
curious; I just noticed things
...
”
She nods and keeps combing
...
And I can’t help but marvel at Susan’s assumption that whatever they were doing was
wonderful
...

If I ever did
...

“Sometimes,” I say
...
I stare
hard at my reflection until she finishes
...

I keep staring, but I don’t see myself
...
My eyes wet with tears, I rock back
and forth on the stool, trying to push the memory from my mind
...

I see a sewing kit on the dresser
...

I feel calm as I undo the braid in my hair and comb it again
...
I close the scissors over the hair by my chin
...

I cut in as straight a line as I can, using my jaw as a guide
...
Locks of blond hair surround me on the
floor in a semicircle
...


When Tobias and Caleb come to get me later, they stare at me like I am not the person they knew
yesterday
...
Grabbing hold of facts in the midst of shock is
very Erudite of him
...

“Yeah,” I say
...
too hot for long hair
...
”
We walk down the hallway together
...
I miss the way my
footsteps echoed in the Dauntless compound; I miss the cool underground air
...

We exit the building
...
It
smells green, the way a leaf does when you tear it in half
...
“The Abnegation, I mean?”
“Not to my knowledge,” says Tobias, glancing at Caleb
...
”
“I don’t need to mention it
...
” Caleb frowns at him
...
”
“And you don’t think you’re too old to be with my little sister?”
Tobias lets out a short laugh
...
”
“Stop it
...
A crowd of people in yellow walks ahead of us, toward a wide, squat
building made entirely of glass
...
I
shield my face with my hand and keep walking
...
Around the edge of the circular greenhouse, plants and
trees grow in troughs of water or small pools
...
But that fades from my mind when the crowd
before me thins and I see the rest of the room
...
Its branches are spread over most of the greenhouse, and its roots
bubble up from the ground, forming a dense web of bark
...
I should not be surprised—the Amity spend
their lives accomplishing feats of agriculture like this one, with the help of Erudite technology
...
I
learned in Faction History that the Amity recognize no official leader—they vote on everything, and
the result is usually close to unanimous
...

The Amity sit on the floor, most with their legs crossed, in knots and clusters that vaguely resemble
the tree roots to me
...
My eyes search the
crowd for a few seconds before I realize what I’m looking for: my parents
...
Tobias touches the small of my back, guiding me to the edge of
the meeting space, behind the Abnegation
...
”
I find a small smile to give him, and lean into him when I sit down, my arm against his
...
All conversation in the room ceases before I can draw
my next breath
...

Every second chafes
...

“We have before us today an urgent question,” she says, “which is: How will we conduct
ourselves in this time of conflict as people who pursue peace?”
Every Amity in the room turns to the person next to him or her and starts talking
...

“They don’t care about efficiency,” Tobias says
...
Watch
...
A young man shifts so
that his small circle becomes a large one with the group next to him
...

I can only hear pieces of what they say: “Peace—Dauntless—Erudite—safe house—involvement—”
“This is bizarre,” I say
...

I give him a look
...
“They each have an equal role in government; they each feel equally
responsible
...
I think that’s beautiful
...
“Sure, it works for the Amity
...
“I guess we’ll find out
...
I expect them to address the rest of us, but instead they stand in
a circle with Johanna and the other spokespeople and talk quietly
...

“They’re not going to let us argue with them, are they,” I say
...

We are done for
...
She angles her body toward us and folds her hands in front of her
...
We
need each other to survive, and we have always cooperated with each other,” says Johanna
...
”
Her voice is honey-sweet, and moves like honey too, slow and careful
...

“We feel that the only way to preserve our relationships with both factions is to remain impartial
and uninvolved,” she continues
...
”
Here it comes, I think
...
The first is that no weaponry of any
kind is allowed on the compound
...
The third is that the conflict may not be
discussed, even privately, within the confines of this compound
...
We will report this to
Erudite, Candor, and Dauntless as soon as we can
...

“You are welcome to stay here if and only if you can abide by our rules,” she says
...
”
I think of the gun I hid under my mattress, and the tension between me and Peter, and Tobias and
Marcus, and my mouth feels dry
...

“We won’t be able to stay long,” I say to Tobias under my breath
...
Now the corners of his mouth have disappeared into a
frown
...
”

Acknowledgments
Thank you, God, for your Son and for blessing me beyond comprehension
...
Molly O’Neill, also known as the Editor of
Wonder—I don’t know how you manage to have a sharp editorial eye and a huge heart at the same
time, but you do
...

Katherine Tegen, who runs an amazing imprint
...
Brenna Franzitta, Amy Vinchesi, and Jennifer Strada,
my production editor, copy editor, and proofreader (respectively), also known as
grammar/punctuation/formatting ninjas—your work is so important
...

Jean McGinley, Alpha Wong, and the rest of the subrights team, who have made it possible for my
book to be read in more languages than I will ever be able to read, and thanks to all the amazing
foreign publishers who have given my book a home
...
The brilliant people over in sales, who have done so much
for my book, and who, I’ve heard, have almost as much love for Four as I do
...

Nancy Coffey, literary agent legend, for believing in my book and for giving me such a warm
welcome
...

Shauna Seliy, Brian Bouldrey, and Averill Curdy, my professors, for helping me to drastically
improve my writing
...
Sumayyah
Daud, Veronique Pettingill, Kathy Bradey, Debra Driza, Lara Erlich, and Abigail Schmidt, my beta
readers, for all their notes and enthusiasm
...

My friends, who stick with me even when I’m moody and reclusive
...
Ingrid and Karl, my sister and brother, for their unfailing love and enthusiasm, and Frank,
for talking me through the hard stuff—your support means more to me than you know
...


About the Author
VERONICA ROTH graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in creative writing
...
It was indeed a transforming choice
...
Roth lives
near Chicago
...

You can visit her online at WWW
...
COM
...
AuthorTracker
...


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