» divergent characters · Beatrice 'Tris' Prior
Beatrice "Tris" Prior is the protagonist of the Divergent trilogy. The first two books Divergent and Insurgent are written from her point of view, while the third and final book Allegiant is written from both her and Tobias "Four" Eaton's perspectives. Beatrice is born in the Abnegation sector to Andrew and Natalie Prior; she also has an older brother, Caleb Prior. having a narrow face with grayish-blue eyes and curly blonde hair. She has a tattoo of three ravens on her collarbone leading down to her heart, each one representing each of her family members; she also has a Dauntless seal on her left shoulder and an Abnegation seal on her right shoulder.br />
In Divergent, she is sixteen years old when she has to take the Aptitude test, which determines which faction a person is most suited for. During the test, Beatrice's test administrator, a woman from Dauntless named Tori Wu, finds out that Beatrice is Divergent and has an aptitude for three factions: Dauntless, Erudite and Abnegation. To save Beatrice from danger, Tori deletes the test results and warns her not to tell anyone about it. During the Choosing Ceremony, Beatrice chooses Dauntless. The new Dauntless initiates board the train. Beatrice meets fellow Dauntless initiates, Christina and Peter, both from Candor and Will who is from Erudite. The initiates jump from the train onto a nearby rooftop. Max, one of the Dauntless leaders, meets them and tells them to jump from the rooftop to get to the entrance of the Dauntless compound below. Beatrice is the first to jump. She meets Tobias "Four" Eaton, one of the instructors for the Dauntless initiates, and Eric, another Dauntless leader. Beatrice decides to rename herself "Tris." She later learns that only the top ten initiates will become members; instead of being dejected by the news, she becomes more determined to get through initiation. Tris befriends fellow initiates Will, an Erudite transfer and Al from Candor. During Tris's first physical match, she is paired against Peter and is badly beaten. During a game of Capture the Flag, Tris is on Four's team and plays a major part in their team's victory. During knife-throwing practice, she has a row with Eric when he places Al in front of the target despite Al's fear of getting hit by the knives. Tris volunteers to stand in place of Al while Four throws knives at the target behind her. He accidentally-on-purpose nicks her ear. On visiting day, her mother comes to meet her. Natalie tells her to ask her brother about the Erudite's simulation serum before leaving. Tris realizes her mother was originally from Dauntless. The second phase of initiation involves putting the trainees in simulations of their fears to monitor their response, only ending once they calm down. Tris fears being devoured by crows, but she manages to calm down; she wakes up in a fit and is comforted by Four. During her second simulation, Tris is in a glass box filling with water while her fellow initiates watch and tease her. Tris bangs on the glass until it breaks, and the simulation ends. Because she was able to manipulate the simulation, Four realizes she is Divergent and tells her to hide this or else she may end up dead. She faces four more fear simulations in which she is being burned on a stake by Peter, drowning in the middle of an ocean, watching her family bleed to death and shooting them while she was held at gunpoint. During this time she also finds out through Four that Erudite are planning to attack Abnegation by using Dauntless and that Four's real name is Tobias Eaton. At the end of initiation, Tris ranks first. The Dauntless are also injected with another serum which supposedly will help in tracking down people in case of someone going missing but instead it is used to induce a simulation which hypnotizes them to attack the Abnegation. However, since Tris and Four are both Divergent this does not work on them. They then try to escape but are caught and presented to Jeanine Matthews, the Erudite leader, who sentences Tris to death, because she was shot while attempting to escape with Four, while Four is injected with another serum which affects Divergents and is sent to oversee the attack from the control room in Dauntless headquarters. Tris is placed in a real tank filling with water, but she is saved by her mother. Natalie, her mother, is killed during the escape, and Tris is later forced to shoot Will who tries to attack her while he is under the influence of the simulation. Tris heads back to the Dauntless compound with her father, Caleb and Abnegation leader Marcus Eaton, Four's father. Tris finds Four in the control room. Under the influence of a simulation, Four attacks her but she refuses to kill him, crying out a plea to the real Four, hoping the simulation will be broken. This leads Four to break out of his simulation and stop the Erudite simulation and free the Dauntless. Tris and Four board the train to Amity with the others.
In Insurgent, Tris, Four, Marcus, Caleb and Peter reach the Amity sector, where the Abnegation survivors are hiding. She overhears a conversation between the Amity leader, Johanna Reyes, and Marcus that Abnegation leaders died protecting a secret. Soon Dauntless and Erudite traitors arrive to capture Abnegation. They recognizes Four's tattoos and during a fight Tris, Four, Caleb, and Susan manage to escape by jumping on a train and meets with Edward who is now a part of factionless and meets their leader Evelyn who is Four's mother. later she and Four go to Candor and their under truth serum influence, she reveals to Four that she has killed Will. She injures Eric, during his attack on Candor. She later surrenders herself to Erudite to save Dauntless, where she finds out that her brother is working for Jeanine but is later able to escape with Four and Peter. She joins Marcus Eaton in order to obtain the information stolen by Erudite from Abnegation and transfer it to every faction. When Four finds about this, he is shocked and angry at her, but they later reconcile and she hopes that they will have no secrets from each other.
Tris dies in Allegiant, after discovering that the US government agency, the Bureau of Genetic Welfare, has decided to wipe the memories of all people in Chicago to prevent the closure of their last experiment and tries to wipe the memories of the board members, initially surviving the death serum, but being shot to death later by David.
Beatrice 'Tris' Prior is portrayed by Shailene Woodley.