XXV

It was late, almost midnight, when we left the
initiates’ wing. But the Pit was still busy, if not busier than before. Made sense that Dauntless would have its share of night owls.

I was quiet for much of it. I was tired, especially since I hadn’t slept much last night, and fatigued from the long training session. But my mind was awake, buzzing like the faint hum of the blue nightlights. Ace and I sat near the chasm, sharing muffins from the Dauntless dining hall. I found myself running my fingers over the scar on my collarbone, over and over and over.

Ace noticed. “Where’s the usual million questions?”

I shrugged. They were there. But I wasn’t really sure which one to pick.

“You and Eric,” I finally said. “Are you two...friends?”

“We were in the same initiate class,” she said. “He transferred from Erudite.”

“What’s with ‘Dishwater?’”

“And the million questions are back,” said Ace. But she didn’t answer, just reached over and stole a chocolate chip from the top of my muffin.

I resumed touching the scar. A match for the fading one on my hand. The skin of the hands healed quickly; the skin over the heart did not. I had the option to get the newer scar removed, but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to do that. I had broken my vow with the gun and now I was afraid that even the scar would fade too fast. The avoidance in me wanted to forget the scar, forget the nightmare, forget the gunshot that echoed forever in my ears.

“Your tattoos,” I said. “Where did you get them?”

Ace gave me a strange look, then stood, as if she sensed the request on my tongue.

She led me up the web of ladders and bridges to a small shop in the rock wall. When we stepped inside, we were greeted by a Dauntless woman with long braids and dark eyes. She stepped away from the area she had been cleaning, which featured a chair and a small desk with a mirror.

“Ace,” she smiled. “Got your message. I’ll pass it on.”

“Thank you,” said Ace. “You closing soon?”

The woman shrugged. “I’ll make an exception.” Her eyes flicked to me. “Who’s it for?”

“Me,” I said quietly.

Nodding, the woman extended her hand for me to shake. “I’m Tori.”

“Tris,” I replied. I was getting the hang of my new Dauntless name.

“Nice to meet you, Tris. What’ll it be?”

I looked around at the artwork on the walls. Dauntless flames were everywhere. Blades and skulls and spiders and barbed wires. Art was a rarer thing nowadays, more common in Amity than anything. I supposed this was the Dauntless version of an artist’s studio.

When I turned back to Tori, I saw her eyes resting on something below my face—my scar, peeking above my collar. She said to Ace, “Is this her?”

Ace nodded.

“They don’t look on tattoos too fondly in Candor,” said Tori.

For some reason, I wasn’t surprised that she knew me.

“I know. I’m really sure,” I told her.

Tori inclined her chin, then said, “Follow me.”

She took me back to the chair and handed me a book of designs to look at while she finished cleaning her equipment. It took me a while to find what I was looking for. But when I did, I pointed to it, and then pulled down my shirt collar to show her the scar.

“A rose,” I said. “With the scar as the stem.”

I touched the ridges of the faded stitches, soon to become thorns. A new vow. That whatever I became, however I healed, I would never forget.

+ + +

The trains were off for the night. I would have to stay in Dauntless until morning.

Ace promised she would have me back to Candor in time to get ready for the day, but I was still worried. Sneaking into Dauntless by night was one thing; sneaking out of it by day was another. What if someone saw me? What if something happened and I was late? What if—

I stole a glance at Ace as she unlocked her apartment door. She had four different keys for four different padlocks. Her face was focused, concentrated, and, god, so beautiful. Inadvertently, I gulped.

— what if I never made it through the night?

Ace’s apartment was large, but spartan in design. A kitchenette, a door that opened to a small bathroom, a double bed with a blue patchwork quilt tucked tight, almost Abnegation-style. The plain white wall at the back was decorated with one thing, black spray paint reading “FEAR GOD ALONE”. Ace hung her leather jacket in a closet next to three identical jackets.

“You can use my shower. There’s clean shirts in the top drawer if you want something else to sleep in,” she told me. “And take the bed.”

“What about you?”

She didn’t answer, just got a beer from the fridge and stepped onto the balcony. Thunder rumbled through the open door and a gust of wind blew through the studio. But even when the lightning began to light up the sky, Ace just sat there, sipping her beer and watching the storm.

I found the nightclothes in the chest of drawers, folded in neat upright rows. The hot water knob of her shower was stiff from disuse, so I just used cold. The only mirror in the bathroom was tucked away inside the medicine cabinet. The efficiency, the care put into Ace’s living space, it all reminded me so painfully of Abnegation. When I tried to think about how the factionless lived—or even how the Dauntless, another faction, lived—I had never imagined that it could be so close to home.

I found a pair of stretchy shorts with a string that I had to wrap all the way around my waist for it to stay. Ace’s smallest black shirt still hung far below my fingertips. The collar of this one was much deeper, exposing the bandage over my new tattoo.

I stepped out and sat on the bed. I could still see Ace on the balcony. It was raining now; her hair, face, and clothes were soaked. I pushed open the balcony door just a crack.

“Hey, I’m done with the shower,” I said. “Do you, uh, still need it?”

Ace just tilted her beer up again.

“Not yet,” she said.

“Okay,” I said. “I’m going to bed.”

“Night.”

“Goodnight, Ace.”

I went to close the door, but then she turned and said, “Wait.”

“Yeah?”

“How’d you know about the McCandless family? Did Irene tell you?”

I hesitated. “I think I’m getting better at playing against the odds,” I told her. “My mom’s maiden name is McCandless. She and Irene look alike. She also had marks on her ears, and I just figured out that they’re closed piercings. So I made an educated guess about where they came from. They say that the likelihood of having fraternal twins is hereditary on the mother’s side, and my brother and I are fraternal, so I’ve probably got a good network of cousins with twins. At least I hoped. I can’t believe I’m right.”

Ace nodded and finished off her beer. “Was Erudite somewhere in that aptitude test too?”

I shrugged. “It’s just logical. Or luck.”

“Logical, genius, lucky, same thing.”

Perhaps.

“So Tris McCandless,” said Ace. “That’s what we call you while you’re down here, huh?”

“All we can hope is that we don’t run into a real McCandless kid,” I nodded.

“Used to ride with a couple of them on the train. I could get them to vouch for you.”

“Would they?”

“Sure,” Ace said. “They’re so much like you, I can’t believe I didn’t see it before. All nasty little troublemakers.”

I couldn’t help but smile. She wasn’t wrong.

Above our heads, lightning shattered the sky, white fissures on blue wine-bottle glass. A deafening thunderclap followed a split second later, and the rain began to fall harder. Still, Ace didn’t move, just tilted her head up and felt the water on her face. I closed the door more, leaving only an inch to speak to Ace.

“Do you do this often?” I asked.

“Every time it rains,” she said.

“Why?”

“Feels good on the burns.”

I opened my mouth to ask the question that had lingered on my tongue ever since I first saw her flying from the Dauntless train—how she had gotten the burns. But I held myself. Ace would tell me when she felt comfortable.

“Can I join you?”

“Not tonight,” she said.

Would there be more nights like this?

“Get some sleep,” she continued. “We’ll leave early, so no one notices you’re gone.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“You’re welcome,” she said, clearly surprised by the gratitude. “Thank you, in fact.”

“What for?”

She turned to give me a look. Not a smirk, since her mouth was still frowning, but not a glare, since she wasn’t mad. But something decidedly warm nonetheless. “For not asking about the burns.”

I smiled. “Goodnight, Ace.”

“Goodnight...Tris.”

When I climbed into bed and pulled the covers around me, I looked out the balcony door again. Ace was still sitting in the rain, staring out at the lightshow.

She was smiling.