I feel the pounding in my head before I open my eyes. I cringe at the pain in my right leg and through gritted teeth I let out a terse breath. I close my eyes, trying to put the pain aside and pretend it's not there. I pick myself up and lean over to inspect my leg. There's a bloodied bandage wrapped around my wound and around the dry ground beneath me is crimson dirt. I grimace at the pain shooting through my leg when I go to touch the wound and see how bad I was cut. I don't even attempt to remove the bandage to see how deep the cut is, I just lie down again and ball up my hand in a fist. I close my eyes to shield myself from the blinding sunlight.

"Hey, you finally up sleepyhead?"

With my elbow draped over my eyes I crack a smile.

"You know Tobias; I'm in a lot of pain right now. I won't hesitate to take you down."

I hear him chuckle. "I never thought I'd here that from the woman I rescued."

I lift my head up and finally look at him. I see his dark hair pulled over his eyes and he wears a childish smile.

"What happened?" I ask, holding my head in my hand.

He looks at me and the smile has faded. Instead it's replaced with a creased forehead and he chews his lower lip slowly. Did he catch the attacker? Did they find Zeke? Is everyone else ok?

"What happened?" I ask again. I feel my heart rate quicken as he takes a cautious step towards me and sits down next to me. Something bad must have happened to rattle him this much. He tries to avoid eye contact with me and gingerly grazes my wound with his knuckles. I can feel as his cool skin makes contact with mine and I flinch away from the shooting pain.

"I'm sorry," he says concerned, "I just need to redress you wound."

I nod and he carefully unties the knot keeping the crimson stained bandage in place. I grit my teeth and take in a sharp breath. He looks up to make sure I'm still ok, and I nod saying its ok. He looks back down at his hands and lifts my leg up to further unwrap the cloth. Once it's unraveled, I see what the damage is. There is a deep gash in my right thigh stretching from inches below my hip to the left side of my knee cap. It starts out as a small gash but widens in the middle. It looks to be three inches across and I can see pink tissue surrounded by excess blood. I close my eyes and try to imagine it's not there. I try to avoid the burning pain in my leg by changing the subject.

"Did you guys find Zeke?"

Tobias finishes rewrapping a new cream colored cloth around my leg. Once he's finished he scoots over next to me, and he's so close I can feel the electricity sparking between us. He hugs his knees loosely with his arms and looks at me.

"Yeah….We found Zeke," he says in a low voice.

I tilt my head and my dirty blond strands fall off of my shoulder and hang in mid-air.

"Is he okay?" I ask him quietly. He shakes out his dark hair and sighs. Something must have happened with Zeke's rescue. But why is he acting so anxious.

"Yeah…He's alright, now." He says.

Why is he acting so strange? What's he hiding from me?

"Tris—I—Well-," He's slipping over words and his face turns sheet white. I've never seen him this anxious. Even in training when he held the knives and threw them at my head he showed no sign of anxiety. I can still feel the cool metal blade against my ear, but that was ages ago.

I put my hand on his knee and coax him to look at me. He lifts his head up and I see his eyes are red at the edges. I take in a breath.

"Tobias what happened?"

"Tris—Zeke was the one who stabbed you."

I stare at him and my jaw drops.

"What?"

"We found him next to you and he was holding one of the knives. You were unconscious and your leg was bleeding really badly. Tris there was so much blood—and he was there—I ran up to him and started asking why he would do something like that. Tris, he just starting screaming and yelling, and I didn't know what to do. So we tied him up and I haven't even been able to look at him."

I run my hands through my hair. My head is pounding and I feel like I can't breathe. Zeke is basically my brother, how could he do this to me?

I start hyperventilating and shaking my head, I can feel goose bumps up and down my arms. Tobias grabs me by the shoulders.

"Tris- you're ok. Everything is ok. He's not gonna hurt you again. I promise." He holds me against his chest and I let tears slowly slip out. My heart feels like a 100 pound weight. And I just. Can't. Breathe.

I clutch at his shirt and he rubs my back and tries to calm me down. I already had one brother betray me. Except Zeke was family I got to choose, and yet he still tried to kill me. Why does this keep happening? Why am I not good enough? Why does no one love me?

I allow myself another five seconds of weakness before meeting his eyes again. I sniffle and drag my arm underneath my nose.

"I'm sorry," I say.

Tobias gives me puzzled look, "You don't have anything to be sorry for. You know you can cry in front of me."

I swallow, "I just don't want to seem weak."

He shakes his head, "Crying isn't a sign of weakness, it's a sign of trying hard for too long to be strong."

I smile and nod. He always knows what to say. It's one thing that I love about him, he truly is the one person I have left to love. I look back up at him and try to steal back my tears.

"I want to talk to him," I tell Tobias. He gives me a concerned look.

"Are you sure? You don't have to."

I feel the fire in my heart. I have to know why. Caleb could never tell me why he did what he did. But Zeke can. I want to understand how he could take a blade and run it against my skin without thinking twice. How he could cause me pain and not care.

It's the first time since I woke up that I see a tan boy tied up against a tree. His hands are bruised a soft red around the area where the rope is digging into his flesh. He hangs his head low and he stares at his stomach. His head rolls to the side and bobs. He cracks open his eyes and cringes away from the sunlight. He looks up underneath his eyelashes and looks over to the tent we are under.

It takes it a moment for us to make eye contact, as his gaze searches around the brown dried up palm fronds that hang fragilely over our heads, to Tobias sitting next to me, to the girl sitting with a fresh wound still bleeding out. His eyes meet mine and his expression changes. Now his eyes are cringed at the corners and he wears a smug look of disgust. In return, all I can give him a weak look that he didn't bother me, that he didn't break me.

But there's no hiding it. I'm in excruciating pain and he caused; another person who has betrayed and hurt me.

I look up at Tobias. "Help me stand up please."

He's hesitant at first and then grabs my right forearm and carefully eases me out of my sitting position. I take in another terse breath before I'm finally standing. I have pain shooting through my leg, but I don't care. I have to talk to him. I need to know why. I take a deep breath and take a step forward.

Author's Note:

Hey guys, hoped you liked the chapter. It's kinda shorter than the others, sorry. If you are still sticking with this fanfic, thank you so much. Let me know what you guys think. And thanks to the people who have reviewed my fanfic, you guys make my day. Have an awesome day!

~Razben