Four: A Divergent Collection (Divergent Series Story)

by Veronica Roth

I open my palm over the coals. I feel like they’re burning in my stomach, filling me to the brim with fire and smoke. I am free.

“My name is Four,” I say. “Call me ‘Stiff’ again and you and I will have a problem.” He rolls his eyes, but I know I’ve made myself clear. I have a new name, which means I can be a new person. Someone who doesn’t put up with cutting comments from Erudite know-it-alls. Someone who can cut back. Someone who’s finally ready to fight. Four.

I was so disturbed by the fight that I never thought about what beating Eric meant—that I am now first in my initiate class. I may have chosen Dauntless as a haven, but I’m not just surviving here, I’m excelling. I stare at Eric’s blood on my knuckles and smile.

I am not Tobias Eaton, not anymore, never again. I am Dauntless.

This is what Eric’s new system creates: A brave human being has just defeated one of her worst fears in less than five minutes, an ordeal that takes most people at least twice that time, but she’s terrified to go back into the hallway, to be seen as weak or vulnerable in any way. Tris is Dauntless, plain and simple, but this faction isn’t really Dauntless anymore.

I squeeze her hand, lightly, and it registers through my turmoil and my exhaustion that though I’ve touched her half a dozen times—each one a lapse in judgment—this is the first time she’s ever done it back. Then she turns and runs to catch up with her friends. And I stand in the hallway, alone, grinning like an idiot.

I lift my head. It was working before, focusing on her. Her racing heart, her body against mine. Two strong skeletons wrapped in muscle, tangled together; two Abnegation transfers working on leaving tentative flirtation behind.

I was afraid that if she knew about Marcus, she would look at me with pity, and she would make me feel weak, and small, and empty. But she saw Marcus and she looked at him, with anger and without fear. She made me feel, not weak, but powerful. Strong enough to fight back.

As I say her name, I realize how I know her. She’s Andrew Prior’s daughter. Beatrice. Tris.

One thing I know: For helping me forget how awful the world is, I prefer her to alcohol.

I can’t leave now. I like her too much. There, I said it. But I won’t say it again.

We work, and dream. We fight, and we laugh, and we fall in love. We move. And we mend.