Pyre

Epilogue 2

TRIS POV

"Come on, Tris."

My arms begin to tremble. I hang my head between my shoulders so that I am staring at the dusty training room floor. There is nothing to distract me there, and I groan sharply as my abdominal muscles tighten with a burn.

"You're not giving up. You're not. You have ten seconds left," Tobias urges.

He makes it look effortless in his plank position next to me. The scoff I try to make ends up sounding like a wheeze.

"...seven, six, five..."

"You're not helping," I say, turning my head to face him.

With a soft laugh, he finally tells me that my time is up. I collapse unceremoniously to the ground, the sweat on my face starting to become cold.

"I'm out of shape," I state.

"You just had a kid," Tobias reminds me.

As if that is an excuse. My eyes shift as far up as they can go at his response before I roll onto my back. After a moment, he is leaning over me, tall and conceited, offering me his hand.

"I would have kept up with you today if the circumstances were fair," I inform him, walking away.

He catches up to me and traps me in his arms, smiling into my neck. "I have no doubt about that."

It probably isn't socially appropriate for us to be standing so closely, but I find that I could care less about such things. His chest is broad and defined against my back, and I find myself leaning back into him, content.

"Why is your heart racing, Tris?" he murmurs against my ear.

Biting my lip to resist grinning widely, I turn my head to retort, when we are suddenly interrupted by Uriah.

"Woah, break it up!" he calls from the fighting ring. "There are children present!"

We glance over to see Christina and her Erudite boyfriend, Shawn, accompanied by the kids. Emberly rushes over to me, and I kneel down so I can catch her in a hug.

"Did you have fun with Christina?" I ask.

"I draw pitcher, Mama," she says excitedly, displaying an adorable disaster of colors on a page.

"I love it," I tell her encouragingly. "You'll have to tell me all about it." Then I rise and address Christina. "I hope they weren't too much trouble?" It was only a couple of hours that she looked after them, but one thing I have learned as a parent is to expect the unexpected.

"Not at all," she says with an eye roll. And then seriously adds, "They're always so well behaved."

"They really are," Shawn attests, wrapping an arm around Christina's waist.

I smile at him. Ever since they have been allowed to become close due to the absence of faction visiting restrictions, he has become a part of our tightly-knit group. It is an opportunity he would not have had years ago, but now it is becoming a common thing to associate outside of one's faction. In fact, even Uriah has been seeing an Amity girl named Katie.

Tobias takes the carrier from Christina with a thanking nod and removes the slightly fussy baby from it with great care. At barely a month old, Aaron is very delicate, more so than we were used to with Emberly since we didn't find her until she was older.

I watch Tobias murmur something as he holds him to his shoulder, reaching down to run his hand over Emberly's head when she shuffles over for attention.

Uriah, Shauna, and Zeke join us then. After taking turns sparring, I notice that Uriah is lazily limping with his prosthetic leg to give it a break.