The Initiate: A Divergent Story. Veronica Roth

buttoned just beneath her throat. She’s pretty, but that’s not the first thing I notice about her. Her sharpness is.

      And beyond that—it could just be my imagination, but does she look a little afraid?

      Amar runs into the lobby, ignoring the protests of the Erudite at the front desk, and yells, “Hey, Noses! Check this out!”

      All the Erudite in the lobby look up from their books or screens, and the Dauntless burst into laughter as Amar turns, mooning them. The Erudite behind the desk run around it to catch him, but Amar pulls up his pants and runs toward us. We all start running, too, sprinting away from the doors.

      I can’t help it—I’m laughing too, and it surprises me, how my stomach aches with it. Zeke runs at my shoulder, and we go toward the train tracks because there’s nowhere else to run. The Erudite chasing us give up after a block, and we all stop in an alley, leaning against the brick to catch our breath.

      Amar comes into the alley last, his hands raised, and we cheer for him. He holds up the flask like it’s a trophy and points at Shauna.

      “Young one,” he says. “I dare you to scale the sculpture in front of the Upper Levels building.”

      She catches the flask when he throws it and takes a swig.

      “You got it,” she says, grinning.

      By the time they get to me, almost everyone is drunk, lurching with each footstep and laughing at every joke, no matter how stupid it is. I feel warm, despite the cool air, but my mind is still sharp, taking in everything about the night, the rich smell of marsh and the sound of bubbling laughter, the blue-black of the sky and the silhouette of each building against it. My legs are sore from running and walking and climbing, and still I haven’t fulfilled a dare.

      We’re close to Dauntless headquarters now. The buildings are sagging where they stand.

      “Who’s left?” Lauren says, her bleary eyes skipping over each face until she reaches mine. “Ah, the numerically named initiate from Abnegation. Four, is it?”

      “Yeah,” I say.

      “A Stiff?” The boy who sat so comfortably beside Amar looks at me, his words running together. He’s the one holding the flask, the one determining the next dare. So far I’ve watched people scale tall structures, I’ve watched them jump into dark holes and wander into empty buildings to retrieve a faucet or a desk chair, I’ve watched them run naked down alleyways and stick needles through their earlobes without numbing them first. If I was asked to concoct a dare, I would not be able to think of one. It’s a good thing I’m the last person to go.

      I feel a tremor in my chest, nerves. What will he tell me to do?

      “Stiffs are uptight,” the boy says plainly, like it’s a fact. “So, to prove you’re really Dauntless now … I dare you to get a tattoo.”

      I see their ink, creeping over wrists and arms and shoulders and throats. The metal studs through ears and noses and lips and eyebrows. My skin is blank, healed, whole. But it doesn’t match who I am—I should be scarred, marked, the way they are, but marked with memories of pain, scarred with the things I have survived.

      I lift a shoulder. “Fine.”

      He tosses me the flask, and I drain it, though it stings my throat and lips and tastes bitter as poison.