AN: Okay, I don't think I've ever written anything in my life as fast as I've been writing this! Your reviews and support is astounding, and I just wanted to thank everyone so very much! Those of you who review as guests, I will say thank you here, as I can't say it to you personally. I do respond to all the reviews I can, so if you have a question or want a reply, leave an email or sign in! Your feedback is no less appreciated than all the rest. Happy reading!
Chapter Four: Learning to Breathe
The next day went on in much the same way as the first one. Lilla woke and met Uriah for breakfast, and then went with the other Transfers to the gun range at 8:00. Eric was nowhere to be seen, but Four was on the floor waiting for them, and Max stood on the overpass, observing. It was annoying just how much relief Lilla felt when she saw the more domineering leader's absence.
She and Tris lined up with their guns for practice, with Will and Christina on Lilla's other side, and Al beside Tris. Surrounded by her new friends, she was surprised to find that she could push her stress and pain to the side a bit and focus on the task at hand. Four started the lesson almost immediately, walking behind the Initiates, giving instruction and correction as needed. Lilla could feel eyes on her every once in a while, but every time she glanced his way, he was focused on someone else. It grated on her nerves.
"Four keeps glancing at you," Christina said after a while, her whisper covered by the resounding bangs of the firearms. "You sure do know how to get the wrong kind of attention, girl!"
"He hasn't said a word to me," Lilla returned. "He can glare all he likes, as long as he doesn't try to pull me from training again."
"I thought Eric pulled you."
Their conversation, held between shots, was almost as grating as Four's eyes on Lilla's back, but she bit back the irritated response. Most likely, snapping at Christina wouldn't offend the former Candor (who seemed to have an innate talent for making people angry with her blunt comments), but she didn't want to risk alienating one of her first friends on only the second day of training.
"He did it on Four's recommendation," she replied instead.
"Really?! What have those two got against you? You know it's bad if two guys who so obviously hate each other are working together against you already!"
"I have no idea," Lilla lied, keeping her eyes trained on her target so the human lie detector beside her couldn't see them. It was only a half-lie. She knew what Tobias had against her. He was distinctly unhappy that she was in Dauntless. Eric was more of a mystery, really, but she thought he probably just had it in for anyone he saw as weak, and dismissed it at that. Christina scowled, but let it go when her attention was drawn by Will's teasing from her other side. When the other girl wasn't looking, Will shot Lilla a wink and continued keeping their friend occupied. She gave him a grateful smile and kept shooting. Her shots continued to go wide of the mark.
"Keep both eyes open. You are focusing too much with the left one, so you're going wide. You need your peripheral vision too, in a combat situation" she heard her brother's voice behind her, making her tense. "Adjust your stance a bit," he continued, pulling her leg back for more balance and straightening her shoulders as gently as possible. He was painfully aware that pulling her shoulders would hurt her, but it wouldn't do to let her continue to shoot poorly either. He hoped Zeke got her fixed up soon, or he thought he might go mad. "If you relax your shoulders and tense your core, you'll have better aim, and you won't get tired as fast."
"Yes, Four," she bit out, tension making her snippy, "thank you." But she did as he told her, and sure enough, her shooting began to improve a bit. Her brother moved on, and Lilla relaxed again, as much as she was able.
It felt like a blow to Four's chest when she snapped out his nickname in such a bitter tone, but he couldn't blame her. He'd betrayed her, he knew, and that wasn't going to change. Was it too late already to be close again? If it wasn't yet, would it be once she was safely a member of Dauntless? He didn't know if he, were he in her shoes, could ever forgive the brother who left her to hell all alone for two years, and then treated her like a pariah when they were finally reunited. He just prayed Zeke would be able to help.
Once the morning hours on the range were over, Lilla returned to her dorm, rather than joining her friends in the mess hall. Her arms ached, but she was satisfied with the small improvement she'd seen in her shooting, with Tobias' – Four's, she reminded herself ruthlessly – help. She wasn't hungry, and collapsing into bed for an hour was much more appealing than being surrounded by so many people, all eating and talking, laughing raucously. There was always so much noise in the Dauntless compound, more than she'd ever heard in her life.
"You shouldn't miss meals, Mouse," a voice said from the doorway, not long after she'd fallen into her cot, face down, "You need the energy for training."
"I thought you were going to leave the nicknames to your brother," she replied, not even bothering to pick her head up.
"Eh, you're little and grey. It fits. Want to eat with me and Uriah? He's up in my room, and it's quieter there than the mess hall."
Lilla considered it for a long moment. Did she want company? Not really. But he was right about missing meals. It was sort of her default response to stress to have little appetite, but with the rigors of the Initiates' lessons, she knew she needed the nutrition.
"Sure," she finally agreed, "Thanks."
The walk up to the private apartments was quiet. Zeke could see that Lilla was tired, and he didn't press her to talk. If he was going to help, he needed to take it slow. Uriah was in on it now, and they had the bones of a plan. Although he suspected his brother was struggling against the desire to simply pin the girl down and make her stay still long enough for her wounds to be treated, the younger man was reacting with a steely determination that would serve him well.
"Hey Mouse!" Uriah greeted when they entered the room. There were several containers of various kinds of food spread out on the small counter near one wall, and the Dauntless-born Initiate already had plates made up for the three of them. They sat down to eat peacefully, but soon the room was filled with Uriah's chatter. He spoke of his fellow Initiates, the training, his brother's job on guard duty in the city, the job he wanted… Surprisingly enough, Lilla found her friend's endless speech comforting, rather than overwhelming as she found the others. She'd spent so long in silence, that talking didn't come naturally to her anymore. Once, when she was still with her brother, she'd been able to speak to him, although rarely to anyone else. Now, she felt as if there was a constant gag on her tongue. Her mind whirled, but her mouth rarely seemed to react. Even with Eric, who irritated her to no end with his arrogant, casual cruelty, she felt unable to tell him what she really thought of him. Instead, she reacted with cool silence and carefully proper responses that seemed to piss him off anyway. When had she stopped wanting to react to bullies? When she was little, she would stand up brashly to her father, even when it was more prudent to remain still and quiet. She would yell back when he tormented Tobias and herself, even knowing it would earn her worse punishment. Tobias had always been the more reasonable one. Over time, she'd learned to keep her mouth shut, but it was when her brother left, she thought, that she'd stopped caring.
And now… now he seemed almost as cold as Eric sometimes. But then again, so was she. The two years they'd been apart had changed them both, not necessarily all for the better.
"Hey… Mouse… Lilla!" Uriah's sudden voice interrupted Lilla's darkening thoughts loudly, right in her ear, and she jumped back, spilling her half-empty plate in the process. She had zoned out of the conversation pretty quickly, and he was growing concerned for his friend. Her eyes were somewhere else; and it was not a good place, wherever they were.
"You good?" the younger brother asked, his warm gaze worried, as his older sibling started to clean up the mess. Lilla just nodded and joined Zeke in cleaning. In a moment, the food was gone and the plate set aside.
"I'm sorry," she apologized, twisting the fingers of one hand over the others.
"No worries," the owner of the apartment assured her with a gentle smile. "You must be exhausted."
"It's only day two."
"Yeah, but the Transfers always take the first week or so to settle into the schedule. You want to crash on my bed until lunch is over? It would be more comfortable than your dorm cot."
"I don't," Lilla started to refuse the offer, her Abnegation kicking in, but in the end, she was as exhausted as he thought, and with a grateful look, she nodded. Uriah and Zeke moved off the bed as the small girl stretched out on her stomach. The younger brother produced a light blanket, but she was already drifting off as he laid it over her. They had almost an hour still that she could rest, and the brothers moved off to the other half of the small apartment to let her take the time.
"Do you think she's sick already?" Uriah asked, his dark eyes not leaving his friend's prone form. "Or is she really just tired?" His brother had explained the situation the night before, in detail. He knew Lilla was suffering from injuries to her back, caused by her father's vicious beatings. It explained a lot really. The way she held herself so rigidly; the way she refused any clothes that revealed even an inch of skin. Even her lack of care and fear made more sense, if she'd been leaving under the abuse of her father for her whole life. They were all observations he'd made over the past two days, but before he hadn't had the glue to put them together. And the conclusion made his blood boil.
"If she's not, she will be soon," Zeke replied, keeping his voice down to allow their guest the rest she needed, "Her workout this afternoon isn't going to help anything either. Four says we have to act fast, or it will only get worse."
"How could anyone's father do this to them?" the sixteen-year-old demanded with a crack of his hands, furious energy spilling out of him after keeping it contained all morning. "How didn't I see it before?!"
"You've only known her for a few days, man. You gotta chill. Once we figure out how to make her admit it, I have the supplies to help."
"And do you know how? I mean… if it's as bad as you say… maybe we should just take her up to the infirmary, whether she likes it or not."
Zeke sighed. He wasn't sure how he'd gotten pulled into this. Well, that wasn't true. After everything they'd been through together in the past two years, he'd do anything for Four. And he knew the other man would do the same for him. But really, wasn't this something her brother should be handling, rather than two young men she'd met only a few days ago? Still, he could see the truth in his friend's reservations. Now how to explain it to his younger, more impulsive brother?
"I have training in field dressing wounds, Uriah. If we drag her to the infirmary, they could pull her out of training. If Four handles it, and it gets out that they're related, she could be made a target. She can't be seen as weak – for either reason – if she wants to survive and make it in to Dauntless. She's got enough going against her as it is."
"So what? We wait? And what happens if she does what her idiot brother did, and isn't found before she stumbles off the Chasm!?"
"Quiet," Zeke snapped with a significant glance at the sleeping girl. "We won't let that happen. For today, we watch her. Tonight we talk to Four together." He paused, seeing his brother's scowl. "Don't give me that look, and don't give him your attitude," he ordered. "He's doing the best he can with a crap situation."
"He left her. From the looks of it, to be tortured by their own father," Uriah insisted stubbornly, "Decent people don't do that. If I was Lilla, I'd never say another word to him again, and spend every minute I could making him miserable."
"That," the elder replied, punching his younger sibling on the arm none too gently, "is because you are a vindictive, violent man with a temper a mile wide."
"True," Uriah admitted with a careless shrug, "But at least I'm loyal." Zeke winced. He hoped his brother wouldn't say anything like that to Four, who was already beating himself black and blue over this. He wondered absently, looking over the sleeping girl with a critical eye, if it wouldn't be better for everyone if she had gone to Amity. Lilla wouldn't be in danger, the healers from the kindest faction could look after her, his brother wouldn't have half his focus on another Initiate when he should be training, and his best friend wouldn't be tearing himself to shreds.
The guys let Lilla sleep until the last possible second, and when Uriah walked her to the Transfers' training area, she admittedly felt a little better.
"Thanks Uriah," she whispered, before waving slightly and slipping into the training room where she knew the other transfers were congregating. She wasn't looking forward to another round with the punching bag, but hoped that at least Eric would be absent from this lesson as well.
Her hope was dashed as soon as she walked in the room. There, right at the front, was the enigmatic, easily angered leader she was least hoping to see. And no Four.
Eric saw the Abnegation fluff scuttle in the door, waving to someone as she did, and sneered on reflex. She was on the edge of being late, but since two more rushed in behind her, he kept his peace and started the lesson.
"Well Initiates," he barked, enjoying as they all stiffened up at the sound of his voice, "I spent my morning with the Dauntless-born today, and I've gotta say, I have a feeling we'll be seeing a lot of you Transfers transferring right back out. Straight to the factionless." There was some nervous shifting, and a whisper or two that were silenced with the first hint of a glare their way. He couldn't help but notice that the fluff didn't react at all. "This is the second, and last full afternoon you'll have to practice on a dummy. Later this week, we'll pair you up for a real fight. Make good use of this time, children, or you will get hurt when those smart enough to do so pound you into the mat." With those less than kind words, and a single gesture, he sent the group to the dummies and punching bags to work on their skill.
His cold, dark eyes roamed over the practicing Initiates in stony silence for a while. Some showed potential. Edward, the former Erudite boy clearly had both training and talent, but his girl Myra was hopeless. Peter, Molly, and Drew were middle of the road, but the first had a vicious look that reminded Eric strongly of himself. He could use that. The other two were too stupid to bother with.
The group containing the two Abnegation girls, however, was the curiosity. Or, more accurately, the Abnegation girls themselves. Tris, the first jumper, had no strength in her blows, but she struck the training dummy with a solid determination that could be put to use if she would just stop being such a timid little twit about it. Christina, Will, and Al – all spaced around her – were not terrible, but they were nothing special either. They wouldn't be the first to go, but they might still find themselves out on their asses before the initiation was over. If they did make it, they wouldn't be top. Then there was the fluff. Lilla, his mind conjured the name for him, as well as the emotionless way she'd delivered it up on the roof. He'd lied to Sinade, that day in the mess hall, when he said he didn't know who she was. This girl was far too infuriating to forget her name.
And she wasn't afraid of him. That was a rub. Eric prided himself on scaring the wits out of each year he'd had the displeasure of Initiating into Dauntless, starting with his own. What was it about this girl, that she didn't care if she was staring death in the face? He'd had his thumb on her windpipe, could have pressed hard enough over her jugular to make her pass out, to kill her even, and all she'd done was insist on returning to the training room. But he'd seen a look in her eye once or twice, one that told him she did have something to fear. He needed to know what that something was.
He was Dauntless, through and through, but his roots were Erudite. And solving puzzles was a purely Erudite pastime. Lilla, he decided, was a puzzle. He wasn't sure if he wanted to solve her, or break her. But in the meantime, he'd make sure she didn't get cut. Where would the fun in that be?
"Tighten up, Fluff," Eric roared, materializing behind Lilla's dummy and holding it still. "Hit the damn thing, don't swat at it! What are you going to do when you're facing something that hits back!?" She fought down her heart, which suddenly felt as if it was in her throat in response to the roar, and gave her instructor a curt nod, tightening her core muscles. It hurt. Holding her back straight and her middle tight was more painful than she'd expected, and there was a flash of that pain over her features before she could conceal it. But the intimidating man had already moved on to his next target and she was, thankfully, allowed to continue.
This continued on for the rest of the afternoon. Eric was taunting, infuriating, and often needlessly cruel with his comments and criticisms. She felt the glimmer of anger simmering in her chest, but didn't rise to the bait, even when he took to tormenting Al instead. The large boy took what the leader dished out in stewing silence, bolstered by his friends' sympathetic looks. Despite the less than stellar instruction methods, Lilla found herself making use of the advice concealed in the taunts. By the end of the lesson, her punches and kicks were more accurate and forceful than before, but she didn't think she held much hope of making it through a real fight.
When the lesson was released and they were sent to dinner, she was moving stiffly despite her best efforts. It wasn't out of place, at least. All the Transfers seemed to be sore from the exercise, so her stilted motions went unnoticed. By most.
From his seat in the mess hall, Zeke watched his friend's little sister enter with her fellow Transfers. Uriah would be down to dinner soon, and they intended to meet up with Four afterward, but for the time being he simply observed. He would be back on duty in the city in a few days, so whatever good they could do would have to be done before then.
Lilla moved carefully, but she didn't seem quite as bad as he'd expected after her long afternoon. Four would be pleased, at least.
It didn't take long for Uriah to join his older brother, greeting the other Dauntless at the table with a nod before dragging Zeke off to his apartment. The brothers walked quietly side by side, joined near the living quarters by Four. It wasn't until they were all safe behind the closed black door that anyone spoke.
"Zeke, Uriah," Four greeted solemnly.
"Hey man," his friend replied, but the younger brother remained steely and silent.
"Zeke explained what's going on?"
"He did," Uriah replied bitingly. "He explained that you can't take care of your own sister, so we are going to do it."
"Uriah," Zeke growled in warning, but Four didn't reprimand the Initiate. It wasn't anything he hadn't already thought of himself.
"Then you know what's at stake," he replied with a nod. "My hands are tied. Lily's stubborn and strong, but she doesn't have an endless supply of energy. If I'm right – and I almost certainly am – her whole back at the very least is thoroughly torn up. Without treatment, the lacerations will turn septic, and she'll get sick. I nearly died, when the fever made me careless. I won't watch that happen to her."
"So why don't you do it, huh?" Uriah challenged, despite his brother's warning. He felt nothing but contempt for the Dauntless before him. "If you care so damn much, why'd you leave her there in the first place?"
"Because I won't make this harder on her than it already is," Four returned calmly. "If I'd stayed, neither of us would have ever gotten out. If I help her now, she could end up Factionless, or worse." He let the pain in his eyes show as he met the warm brown ones of his sister's first friend. "If she's cut, it will be because she can't keep up, not because someone who's afraid of me taking their place hurts her to get to me. And if she is cut, I'll follow her out without hesitation." This statement stalled the younger man. He could see the sincerity in Four's eyes, hear it in his voice, as he professed that he'd leave Dauntless before letting his sister be on her own again. That, along with the raw edge to his instructor/friend that he'd never seen before, softened him minutely.
"How do we get her to admit it?" he asked quietly. This was out of the Dauntless-born's depth. He and Zeke had grown up without parents, but no one had ever been cruel to them. They'd had enough food and protection from their faction, and affection from each other. He'd been in fights, many of them, but no one had ever struck him from pure malice, especially someone as close as a father. And, though he cared for Lilla already, he didn't know her well enough to know how to make her see reason. She was easily the most intriguing girl he'd ever met, and he already knew they would be friends for as long as he could imagine, but he hadn't had a chance to get to know her yet. Not really.
"Bring her here for dinner tomorrow, like you did for lunch today," Four said, suddenly sounding more monotone before. "She doesn't like noise much, so a quiet place will be tempting. If you can manage it, pretend to horse around and slap her on the back or something like that. She won't be able to hide the pain." He winced at the memory of that burn, that raging, sizzling pain that lingered on the skin for so long after one of his father's lashings. Even the barest brush over torn skin hurt, rekindled the fire with every contact. A slap to the back would be excruciating, and he knew even someone as practiced at it as Lily couldn't hide her reaction.
It about killed him to suggest it, but he had no other ideas. Uriah opened his mouth immediately to protest. He was tempted to try to strike the older man. What the hell was Four thinking?! But Zeke's hand stalled him.
"You want us to force her to reveal it, so we can convince her to let us help?" the older brother asked seriously. He wasn't sure he liked this plan at all. Four nodded.
"What the hell dude!?" Uriah's silence ruptured. "You want me to hurt her?!"
"I want you to make her accept the help," the strained man replied. He sounded almost broken. "She's stubborn," he insisted, "So stubborn. I…" His eyes finally left the floor to meet Uriah's. He had to make the younger man understand. "When we were kids, she let herself be beaten with a hot iron rather than reveal that it was something I'd done that pissed our father off. She's been keeping secrets for nearly sixteen years, and she won't give them up now without a fight. The quickest, most painless way to get them in the long run is to force the matter." He ran his hands through his short, messy hair, almost pulling it in frustration. "Don't think for a second that I like this. She's my baby sister, mine to protect, and in so many ways I can't. But I will protect her in whatever way possible, even if it's from herself."
Uriah considered his brother and friend for a long time. Could he really do this? Knowingly hurt his new friend, even to protect her? He realized, suddenly, that he didn't have much choice if he wanted to help. It was the only way to do it, and keep it a secret from those who would use the information to hurt Lilla.
"Fine," he finally grumbled, "but I swear if this doesn't work, I'm coming after you."
"I don't doubt it," Four assured him. "And I'm glad Lily has such a good friend in you."
"You call her Lily?"
The instructor cringed. He hadn't even realized he'd slipped into using his sister's nickname. She didn't go by Lily anymore, and probably hadn't for two years now. Mistakes like that were a good way to get her hurt. The leadership had their eye on Four, and he was well aware of it. Some, like Max, wanted to recruit him more than anything else, but others were threatened by him, and would use anything to make sure he was kept out of the top positions. Despite the fact that they'd already been offered and refused.
"Not anymore," he sighed, before turning and leaving the other two young men. He just hoped their plan worked. He didn't know what they would do if it didn't.
While Lilla's new friends and brother plotted to help her, she sat in the midst of her fellow Transfers and picked at the food Al had piled on her plate. She wasn't sure why they all seemed to think she couldn't make her own plate, but she didn't have the energy to protest.
"You got better today," Tris said kindly as they ate, watching the other Abnegation girl with a bit of concern. She couldn't imagine speaking as little as Lilla did. Even in their former Faction, where questions were not allowed, she'd always spoken fairly freely with her family. Her brother especially. Caleb… She wondered how he was doing in Erudite.
Lilla nodded gratefully and continued to eat.
"Why don't you talk, Lilla?" Al asked, startling the girl a bit with the direct question.
"I talk."
"Nah," Will disagreed, eyeing the smallest of them around Christina's head as if she presented some interesting anomaly. "The average human speaks somewhere around 16000 words a day. Even taking into account the less verbose tendencies of Abnegation, you don't come anywhere near average."
"Alright Erudite know-it-all," Christina snorted, poking Will in the side playfully. "Leave the poor girl alone. No one wants your book-chat here."
"Yeah," Al joined in the teasing, "Just like no one wants your Candor truth!"
"You were Candor too."
"I was a terrible Candor, and you know it!"
"That's the truth."
The group of friends shared a laugh as Al and Christina continued to bicker. It quickly escalated from a verbal spat to flying bread and fruit. Lilla ducked the airborne food, but chuckled along with the others as the tension lessened after their harrying day.
For the first time, she realized, she thought she might be learning to breathe.
