Chapter Text
I’ve spent the last two hours watching today’s recaps of the Reapings for the 74th Hunger Games. The children were nothing to scoff at, but also nothing noteworthy. No wild cards. If that Thresh wins he may be a problem, but I saw an older woman and a teenage girl break down when his name was called. If he wins, he can be controlled.
“I volunteer!”
My attention comes back into laser focus on the events unfolding on the screen. A volunteer from District 12 is…out of the ordinary.
“I volunteer as tribute.” A girl with dark braids and olive skin and a pale blue dress stands resolutely in a crowd of tattered rags and starving children. They all look at her with a mix of pity and fear. I almost give in to the feeling that I should take a breath to steady myself, but I dismiss it. Anxiety is a weakness saved for the powerless. I am already steady.
I find myself leaning towards the screen, my eyes never leaving it. A tiny blonde girl is holding the darker one and screaming, “No, Katniss! No! You can’t go!”
Her name is Katniss.
The small blonde girl gets dragged away by a tall boy, and the bubbly District 12 escort – Euphemia Trinket – asks the dark girl for her name. “Katniss Everdeen.”
Katniss is a type of tuber that grows by swamps. It’s a stupid name for a girl.
“I bet my buttons that was your sister. Don’t want her to steal all the glory, do we? Come on, everybody! Let’s give a big round of applause to our newest tribute!” Trinket trills. No one does.
Slowly, one by one, the crowd does respond. But they don’t clap, or celebrate in any way. They touch three fingers to their lips and then hold them up to dark girl in some kind of salute.
We can’t have that. The girl is clearly dangerous.
But I’m not worried; Katniss Everdeen will likely be dead within the month.
*****
I tune into the tribute interviews live. I always do. It’s good to start learning what makes them tick, what kind of sponsors they may attract, and keep a close eye on the ones who might make it out of the arena.
This year I’m especially paying attention to the District 12 girl.
Katniss Everdeen. The Girl on Fire.
The people of the Capitol already adore her. They think because her stylist is exceedingly talented she must be too. The interviews should prove how wrong they are. Nothing good can come of a girl from District 12 who just happens to have a pretty dress and thinks the rules don’t apply to her.
The large boy from 11 – Thresh – has just walked off the stage. If he wins, he’ll need to develop a personality before he entertains Capitol citizens. After he leaves, Katniss Everdeen walks on wearing another stunning dress. It’s clearly designed to make sure she looks like flames. It’s finally time to find out if she has any talent herself beyond her luck with a bow.
She looks dazed as she walks on to the stage. Clearly, she’s not made of very strong stuff.
“So, Katniss, the Capitol must be quite a change from District Twelve. What’s impressed you most since you arrived here?” asks Flickerman.
“The lamb stew,” the girl chokes out. Her answer certainly hasn’t impressed me most.
Flickerman carries on some banter about his weight, and then moves on to talking about Katniss’ dress. Predictably, the crowd goes wild when she twirls in the dress. She does look stunning, but that doesn’t mean she is stunning. She just has a talented stylist.
Flickerman turns the conversation to the training score.
“So, how about that training score. E-le-ven. Give us a hint what happened in there.” Of course, I know how she got that score – I asked that she was scored high. No one can shoot at the Gamemakers’ table and be allowed to live.
“Um ... all I can say, is I think it was a first.” Katniss replies. It will also be the last.
“You’re killing us,” says Flickerman dramatically. “Details. Details.”
The girl addresses the Gamemakers directly. “I’m not supposed to talk about it, right?”
“She’s not!” Heavensbee shouts in response.
“Thank you,” she says. “Sorry. My lips are sealed.” They damn better be. No one defies the Capitol and lives to tell the tale.
Flickerman switches gears again. “Let’s go back then, to the moment they called your sister’s name at the reaping. And you volunteered. Can you tell us about her?”
“Her name’s Prim. She’s just twelve. And I love her more than anything.” Love. Interesting.
“What did she say to you? After the reaping?” Flickerman asks.
“She asked me to try really hard to win.”
“And what did you say?” prompts Flickerman.
Katniss’ voice is low, deadly. “I swore I would.”
I’m still churning Katniss’ interview over in my head while Flickerman and blond boy from District 12 talk about bread and bathing. Motivated by love. She should be easy enough to control. But shooting an arrow at the Gamemakers’ table doesn’t indicate control. She is a spark. She must be contained.
Flickerman and boy from District 12 have become talking about his suitors. I pay attention; it’s always good to know who people care about.
“Handsome lad like you. There must be some special girl. Come on, what’s her name?” says Flickerman.
The boy sighs. “Well, there is this one girl. I’ve had a crush on her ever since I can remember. But I’m pretty sure she didn’t know I was alive until the reaping.” I roll my eyes. Teenagers can be so dull.
“She have another fellow?” asks Caesar.
“I don’t know, but a lot of boys like her,” says the boy.
“So, here’s what you do. You win, you go home. She can’t turn you down then, eh?” says Flickerman encouragingly. Oh sure she can’t turn him down after she’s seen his true nature. After she’s seen him turn into a killer on national television.
“I don’t think it’s going to work out. Winning... won’t help in my case,” says the boy. Maybe he’s smarter than I thought.
“Why ever not?” replies Flickerman. The boy blushes beet red and stammers out. “Because...because... she came here with me.” For a second there is pin drop silence, and then the crowd goes wild.
Now that I was not expecting.
*****
Katniss Everdeen’s pin is a motherfucking mockingjay. Not just any mockingjay pin, the same pin Haymitch Abernathy’s ally wore during the second Quarter Quell.
I hate mockingjays. They’re a mistake. An abomination. They never should have existed. The male jabberjays should never have been able to mate with mockingbirds, and their offspring should not have been viable. I should have killed them all when I had the chance.
I remember another girl from District 12. Same dark skin, same dark hair. “A mockingjay’s a bona fide bird,” she had told me. She had been a liar.
Katniss Everdeen walks through the woods of the arena just like they’re the woods around District 12 – the vegetation is similar enough – and she climbs trees like she’s been doing so her whole life, mockingjay pin beaming on her chest.
I make a note to have a chat with the Token Review Committee. Things like this shouldn’t be allowed in. The pin could be used as a weapon. And it’s already been in the Games before, we can’t have re-dos.
And why are there real mockingjays in the damn arena. I must have them banned from the Games. We can’t maintain order and peace in Panem while include such a blatant symbol of chaos of in the Games.
She’s getting way too close to the edge of the arena. I feel lighter as I see the first fireball fly towards Katniss Everdeen, and I watch to find out if the Girl on Fire will burn.
*****
Katniss Everdeen and the District 11 girl were using the mockingjays in the arena to communicate. It’s poetic justice that the District 11 girl is about to die.
Katniss Everdeen smiles as she follows the sound the abominations are makings as they mimic the District 11 girl’s songs. Then she runs when the girl screams. Everdeen kills the District 1 boy without blinking. She’s clearly just as brutal as the rest of the people in the Districts. When the time comes, she will kill without mercy. Never trust a tribute in a pretty dress; those are the most dangerous ones.
Everdeen crouches in front of the dying girl and takes her hand.
“You have to win,” the dying girl says.
“I’m going to. Going to win for both of us now,” Everdeen lies. She doesn’t know that.
“Don’t go,” District 11 begs.
“Course not. Staying right here,” Everdeen pulls the girl into her lap.
“Sing,” the dying girl asks. I freeze. Sing? She can’t sing. No, there’s no way she can sing.
Deep in the meadow, under the willow
My stomach drops into my lower intestine.
A bed of grass, a soft green pillow
Lay down your head, and close your sleepy eyes
And when again they open, the sun will rise.
As the little girl from District 11 dies in Katniss Everdeen’s lap, I remember another little girl in another District 12 tribute’s lap. Not in the arena, but in the forest behind District 12. And not being sung to death, just to a peaceful calm.
Here it’s safe, here it’s warm
Here the daisies guard you from every harm
Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true
Here is the place where I love you.
I resist the urge to vomit. From panic or disgust or both, I do not know.
Deep in the meadow, hidden far away
A cloak of leaves, a moonbeam ray
Forget your woes and let your troubles lay
And when again it’s morning, they’ll wash away.
My mind goes back to the day at the lake. It was the first time I was really able to articulate why the Games are important. People cannot forget the war, and how horribly the Districts treated the Capitol. It cannot be repeated. Without law and order, the Districts and the Capitol both will fall to chaos.
I remember feeling calm and safe and warm as Lucy Gray sang. I was full of freshly caught fish and foraged berries and Sejanus’ mother’s cookies. I thought song had been banned in District 12 right after I left it. It seems we must increase surveillance.
Here it’s safe, here it’s warm
Here the daisies guard you from every harm
Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true
Here is the place where I love you.
Just like all those years ago at the lake, the mockingjays take up the song. I find the song just as disconcerting as I did all those years ago. The mockingjays’ voices are metallic, in a way, but recreate the song perfectly. Their screeches send shivers down my spine, and my muscles tense like they want to run.
I expect her to leave now. She cuts supplies off of the dead bodies lying around her – now that they’re dead, they’re just a source of resources to her – and begins to walk away. But then she stops, and kneels, and gathers up an armful of flowers. As she lays the flowers around the District 11 girl’s body, I, for the first time, see her as another player in the Games. The larger Games. She understands how the pieces she is allowed to see move, and if she wins, I will make sure she understands there are much bigger and more powerful pieces that she cannot even begin to imagine. She will be made to understand that she cannot avoid being a piece in the Games.
The dead girl looks almost peaceful as she lies in the false bed of flowers. A reminder that even a girl who’s District can be made to seem innocent.
*****
The rule change is Seneca Crane’s idea, and I approve. If he keeps having good ideas like this one, I may just not kill him for letting Katniss Everdeen get away with taunting the Capitol in the arena. When the rule change is announced, Everdeen screams the District 12 boy’s name like an idiot. Unfortunately, no other tributes were near her and no one heard.
Now, the two star-crossed lovers from District 12 – I can’t help but sneer when I think of the tagline – are cuddling in a cave in the depths of the arena. She’s playing him, I can tell. I understand her mentor, Haymitch Abernathy. He’s cunning. He won his Games by cheating the system and now he thinks he’s going to do so again. She received broth when her and the boy first kissed, so then she kissed him again. It’s unbelievable to me that the entirety of Panem doesn’t see through her act. She’s playing him to survive, just like Lucy Gray Baird played me. And when he gives her what she needs, she’ll turn on him.
The rule change isn’t permanent, of course. If District 12 are the last two standing, the rule change will be rescinded. The Gamemakers will realize that there was an error, and that will be announced in the arena and throughout Panem. There can only be one Victor. And then Katniss Everdeen will have to murder the boy she’s pretending to be in love with, and all of Panem will see the twisted Game the girl was playing all along.
*****
“Greetings to the final contestants of the 74th Hunger Games. The earlier revision has been revoked. Closer examination of the rule book has disclosed that only one winner may be allowed,” Claudius Templesmith’s voice booms into the arena and resonates through all of Panem. This is the moment I’ve been waiting for. The rest of the Games were child’s play. This will show to the entire country what Katniss Everdeen really is.
Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark stare at each other.
“If you think about it, it’s not that surprising,” Mellark says softly. So he is the smarter one. He reaches for his knife, and in the blink of eye Everdeen has an arrow pointed at his heart, even as he is dropping his knife into the lake.
Yes.
Everdeen drops her weapons too.
“No,” the boy says. “Do it.” He puts the weapons back in Everdeen’s hands. Love makes people so stupid.
The boy and the girl continue arguing about who should get to die. Mellark takes his bandage off his leg, so even if she doesn’t kill him he’ll likely bleed out and die soon enough. Everdeen tries futilely to rebandage his leg.
“Katniss,” he says. “It’s what I want.”
“You’re not leaving me here alone,” she replies.
“Listen,” Mellark says as he pulls Everdeen to her feet. “We both know they have to have a victor. It can only be one of us. Please, take it. For me. I love you so much, and I have loved you for as long as I can remember. You have a family, you have people who depend on you. My life would be empty if I went home and left you in this arena.” As the boy continues professing his love – I almost pity him – I see Everdeen begin to think. She takes the nightlock berries out of the pouch on her belt and pours some into the boys hand, and then her own.
No.
They stand with their backs to each other, and she holds the berries out for all to see. For the Capitol to see. For me to see. Well, I’m watching you, Miss Everdeen. And I don’t like what I’m seeing.
The fire in her eyes is unmistakable. She knows what this means. This is not the selfless act of a stupid girl in love. This is the rebellious move of a manipulative tribute who’s decided she will not play by the rules.
The berries have just barely entered both of their mouths when Claudius Templesmith frantically declares them both victors of the 74th Hunger Games.
I make a note to myself to make sure he and Seneca Crane are dead by the end of the week.
*****
The hovercraft headed to District 12 is nice enough. It’s nothing like the hovercraft that flew me out of District 12, all those years ago, but it feels the same. It was snowing then too. The woods, I’m convinced, haven’t changed at all. I stare out the window as the hovercraft flies over them, and remember how the trees look impossibly tall when looking up at the sky from the ground.
I close my eyes and swallow the fury that rises in my throat and push away my memories of my last time in the forest. Of her. Lucy Gray Baird.
I stare at her dark grey eyes as they glare at me from behind my eyelids. She’s not real. She’s not here. She’s still just 16 years old in my dreams. Though she’s no longer the only 16 year old girl who haunts them.
Katniss Everdeen.
I force myself to open my eyes. This girl, this teenager, has convinced the Districts that they can rebel. I’ll tell her it’s her fault and the fault of those berries, but I know it’s more than that. It was her allyship with the District 11 girl, the fact that she volunteered but not for the glory, that fact that she has spirit.
Well, my dear, spirit can be crushed.
The hovercraft lands behind the Justice Building, and I make my way to the Victor’s Village. Her mother is terrified when I walk in the door, but I ignore her and just ask her where her daughter is. When her mother responds that the girl’s on a walk, I smile sweetly and ask if I may wait in the study until she returns. The woman nods, and I walk towards the room. I know where it is; I’ve been in Victor’s homes before.
It’s about an hour before the girl arrives in the house, and then walks into the study.
“I think we’ll make this whole situation a lot simpler by agreeing not to lie to each other,” I tell her. “What do you think?”
“Yes, I think that would save time.”
“My advisors were concerned that you would be difficult, but you’re not planning on being difficult, are you?” I ask.
“No,” she answers, meeting my eyes with Lucy Gray Baird’s.
“That’s what I told them. I said any girl who goes to such lengths to preserve her life isn’t going to be interested in throwing it away with both hands. And then there’s her family to think of. Her mother, her sister, and all those…cousins.” I know they’re not cousins. Now she knows too.
I suggest we sit down, and then explain the political quagmire she’s created.
“I have a problem, Miss Everdeen. A problem that began the moment you pulled out those poisonous berries in the arena. If the Head Gamemaker, Seneca Crane, had had any brains, he’d have blown you to dust right then. But he had an unfortunate sentimental streak. So here you are. Can you guess where he is?” I ask. Everdeen nods. Good. I love not needing to spell everything out.
“After that, there was nothing to do but let you play out your little scenario. And you were pretty good, too, with the love-crazed schoolgirl bit. The people in the Capitol were quite convinced. Unfortunately, not everyone in the Districts fell for your act.”
The smallest of creases forms between her eyebrows, and the sides of her lips turn down. She doesn’t know. That’s good. Information isn’t flowing between the Districts as much as I’d worried.
“This, of course, you don’t know,” I smooth over like my previous statement had been a mistake and not a test. “You have no access to information about the mood in other Districts. In several of them, however, people viewed your little trick with the berries as an act of defiance, not an act of love. And if a girl from District 12 of all places can defy the Capitol and walk away unharmed, what is to stop them from doing the same? What is to prevent, say, an uprising?”
“There have been uprising?” Everdeen asks.
“Not yet. But they’ll follow if the course of things doesn’t change. And uprisings have been known to lead to revolution. Do you have any idea what that would mean? How many people would die? What conditions those left would have to face? Whatever problems anyone may have with the Capitol, believe me when I say that if it released its grip on the Districts for even a short time, the entire system would collapse.”
She looks surprised. At what, I’m not sure. My directness, perhaps? Or maybe she just doesn’t believe that I care about Panem. Well, she didn’t live through the aftermath of the Dark Days. She doesn’t know that I’ve seen the brutality the Districts are capable of.
“It must be very fragile, if a handful of berries can bring it down.”
“It is fragile, but not in the way that you suppose.” I respond.
Her mother knocks and offers me tea. I’m nice and charming, everything a benevolent President of Panem should be. I don’t think this has an impact on Everdeen, but her mother seems to calm a bit. The cookies on the tray she brings in are clearly Peeta Mellark’s handiwork. I wonder if her mother went to ask Mellark for cookies after I came here, to support the rouse of the love story. Though I don’t really believe the mother is that duplicitous, or even the boy. It’s all Everdeen. I turn my attention back to her.
“I didn’t mean to start any uprisings,” she says.
I believe her. I tell her so, and then go on to explain, “It doesn’t matter. Your stylist turned out to be prophetic in his wardrobe choice. Katniss Everdeen, the girl who was on fire, you have provided a spark that, left unattended, may grow into an inferno that destroys Panem.”
“Why don’t you just kill me now?” she asks bluntly.
“Publicly?” I ask, eyebrow raised. “That would only add fuel to the flames.”
“Arrange an accident, then,” she counters. The same steps I went through in my own head when the Games ended.
“Who would buy it? Not you, if you were watching,” I reply.
“The just tell me what you want me to do. I’ll do it,” she says desperately.
I pick up a cookie and transition the conversation to Peeta Mellark.
“How is the love of your life?” I ask.
“Good.” She glares at me.
“At what point did he realized the exact degree of your indifference?” I ask, dipping one of the beautifully frosted cookies into my tea.
“I’m not indifferent.” Everdeen says, unconvincingly.
“But perhaps not as taken with the young man as you would have the country believe,” I counter.
“Who says I’m not?”
“I do. And I wouldn’t be here if I were the only person who had doubts. How’s the handsome cousin?”
Everdeen’s eyes widen slightly. “I don’t know…I don’t,” she stutters.
“Speak, Miss Everdeen. Him I can easily kill off if we don’t come to a happy resolution. You aren’t doing him a favor by disappearing into the woods with him each Sunday.” I don’t have camera’s everywhere in the woods – yet – but there are cameras by the entrance. And I can image where they go quite clearly.
She swallows. “Please don’t hurt Gale,” the girl whispers. “He’s just my friend. He’s been my friend for years. That’s all that’s between us. Besides, everyone thinks we’re cousins now.”
“I’m only interested in how it affects your dynamic with Peeta, thereby affecting the mood in the districts,” I say coolly.
“It will be the same on the tour. I’ll be in love with him just as I was,” she pleads. So she is being honest, at least right now.
“Just as you are,” I correct.
“Just as I am,” she confirms.
“Only you’ll have to do even better if the uprisings are to be averted. This tour will be you only chance to turn things around.” I wonder if she knows how genuinely honest I’m being with her in this moment.
“I know. I will. I’ll convince everyone in the Districts that I wasn’t defying the Capitol, that I was crazy with love,” she says. Well she’s not being very convincing right now.
“Aim higher in case you fall short,” I say as I stand.
“What do you mean? How can I aim higher?” she asks.
“Convince me.” I say. I pick up my book as I walk around the desk and head towards the door. She’s not watching me, she’s staring straight out the window. I lean in towards her ear and whisper menacingly, “By the way, I know about the kiss.”
*****
I’ve been watching Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark make their way through the Districts. Their disruptive opening to the Victor Tour in Eleven has quieted to a nearly robotic reading of approved cue cards. I don’t know what Peeta Mellark was thinking – even if he says it on a stage, there is no way the Eleven tributes families will receive any portion of Twelve’s winnings. I wonder if the two of them planned it.
The two Victors go through the motions of love at every step on their tour. I am not convinced its anything more than just the motions. They hold hands, they kiss, they stare into each other’s eyes, but that’s it. The District audiences cannot be quelled, they surge forward toward Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark at every stop.
I pity Peeta Mellark. His act, I believe. In fact, I’m certain it’s not an act. He’s been in love with the girl for his entire life, and now she’s pretending to care for him to save her own skin. The Districts are not convinced. They see her as some kind of symbol. The mockingjay, so I’m told. Of course the Districts would name the symbol of their pitiful rebellion after the defiled offspring of a muttation.
When Peeta Mellark proposes to Katniss Everdeen on live television, I go to congratulate them. As I dig my fingers in Katniss Everdeen’s arms, she meets my eyes and raises her eyebrows. Did I convince you? I can tell she’s asking.
Her eyes look just like Lucy Gray Baird’s. I remember her meeting my eyes to tell me she cared for me. I remember her telling me Billy Taupe wasn’t important to her anymore. I remember believing her. Well I am no longer so foolish as to believe the casual flirtations of a girl from District 12.
The Districts are on the brink of rebellion and it is your fault you and your stupid berries and your stupid songs why did you hold out the berries, what were you trying to prove? What were you trying to prove when your family fed me berries when you kissed me by the lake what was it what was it why did you leave. You left to go find katniss and now she’s here and she knows your songs too but when she sings the songs aren’t meant to please me they’re meant to destroy me.
Still meeting Katniss Everdeen’s steel grey eyes, I shake my head ever so slightly. You have not convinced me. You will never destroy me. I will not give you that power. I will not give you that confidence.
A shadow passes behind her eyes, and then she smiles widely. It’s for the cameras, I’m sure. I’ve just told her she cannot win, there is no way she should smile brightly after that. But her smile is too wide, too wild. It’s possible she’s lost her mind.
*****
The original card for the Third Quarter Quell said that the Reaping age would be expanded to include young adults up to the age of twenty-five. To remind the districts that there is no age at which they are beyond the power of the Capitol. I replaced that card with one that announced that tributes would be reaped from the existing pool of Victors.
When I spoke to Katniss Everdeen in her home, I told her there was no way to kill her and make it look like an accident. I realized later I was wrong. There was still one way. I could put her back in the Arena. I could turn her death into sport. The citizens of the Capitol will be sad until the entertainment of the Games picks up. The people of Districts will be sad until they see their precious Girl on Fire murder Victors of their own Districts in cold blood. Putting her back in the Arena is the perfect plan. It’s the only way. It’s the only way to kill her without making her a martyr. If she dies in the Arena, after having killed a few famous and beloved Victors herself, she’ll die infamous. When push comes to shove, she might even kill the boy. Peeta Mellark. Let’s see how quickly the people throw away the Girl on Fire then.
Tonight is the final night of interviews. The Victors have all made their own version of impassioned pleas to stop the Games. Finnick Odair reads a poem that several people in the audience believe is about them but I know is about Annie Cresta. Joanna Mason says there’s no way the makers of the Games predicted this bond between the Victors and the Capitol. Surely, if they had known, they wouldn’t have made the rule? But all of that is noise. I am waiting to see what Katniss Everdeen does.
She walks on stage wearing the wedding gown the Capitol voted on. It’s a shame, she would have made a beautiful bride. A handful of Capitol citizens have already been clamoring to get to spend time with Everdeen and Mellark one-on-one. They would have made fantastic double act.
The crowd goes wild when they see. Caesar Flickerman spends over a minute trying to quiet the audience so he can talk. And when he does talk, it’s still all about the wedding dress.
Good. Wedding dresses are safe topics.
“So, Katniss, obviously this is a very emotional night for everyone. Is there anything you'd like to say?” Flickerman asks.
“Only that I'm so sorry you won't get to be at my wedding ... but I'm glad you at least get to see me in my dress. Isn't it just ... the most beautiful thing?” She spins to show off her dress. And then she begins to smoke. She keeps spinning, and the dress is falling away, there’s another dress underneath and its black and made off little feathers and when Katniss raises her arms I see what she is before she explains it.
A mockingjay.
White hot rage rises in my chest. I hate her.
*****
Katniss Everdeen screams Peeta Mellark’s name when he hits the forcefield. He’s thrown back to the ground, and she throws herself of top of him. Like that will do any good.
Finnick Odair shoves Everdeen off of Mellark and starts doing chest compressions. I wonder why he’s helping, but only for a moment. If Mellark dies, Everdeen will kill Odair without hesitation. She’s already tried to kill him today. Odair is just saving his own skin so he can get back to his precious Annie. He is only thinking of himself. Odair is smart, but he is still District.
When Mellark gasps for air as he comes back to life, Everdeen sobs uncontrollably. It’s disgusting. And real.
It’s definitely real.
That’s interesting.
I can use that.
*****
Peeta Mellark is tied to a chair on the other side of the chamber. The walls are blank, and the chamber is empty save for his chair, mine, the television set, and the interrogator.
“So Peeta,” I smile gently, “What did you see?”
He looks at me with eyes wide in terror. His face has a purple, sunken look to it, like a wild animal that’s been starved and kept in a cage. His whole body shines with a sheen of sweat. So much for the most charming Victor since Finnick Odair. I could have gotten such a good price for Peeta Mellark.
“It wasn’t real,” he whispers.
“Are you sure?” I ask, keeping my voice mild and curious.
“It wasn’t real,” he stares at the television as if it will affirm his statement.
I lean forward in my chair. “Peeta, look at me.” His eyes dart back and forth between my face and the television. “Peeta,” I repeat, slightly more forcefully. He stares at me.
“Everything you just saw was real. During your first Games, Katniss tried to kill you. She dropped a tracker jacker nest on you specifically, because she wanted you dead. She came back later that day to make sure you were dead. When she found you alive, she cut your leg so badly it got infected. She is the reason you only have one leg. She’s the reason you almost died. She wanted you dead.”
The whole time I’ve been talking, Mellark’s eyebrows have furrowed close together into a frown, like he’s trying to understand what I’m saying and just can’t wrap his mind around it.
“But…she loves me. She wouldn’t…she wouldn’t do that.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Then why would she drop a tracker jacker nest on you?” I ask, as if I’m explaining something painfully simple to a child.
His brows furrows more and he strains slightly against his chains. “She didn’t…I don’t know…she saved my life!” he exclaims.
“She only saved your life to save her own skin. She was pretending to love you so you would protect her. She played you for a fool,” I nearly snarl. I can hear Lucy Gray Baird cackling.
For a second Mellark curls into himself and looks like he might cry. Then, he screams. “You’re LYING! You’re a LIAR. Katniss and I LOVE each other. She would never hurt me she would NEVER HURT ME SHE – ”
The interrogator slaps Mellark across the face. “You will speak to the President with respect,” he commands.
“It’s no matter, Jupiter,” I say, with a casual wave of my hand. “Love makes people do crazy things.” Jupiter nods and steps back. I return my attention to Mellark.
“Peeta,” I begin, “Katniss did hurt you. Did you not see the video?”
“I did, but –”
“She did not love you. You loved her. She used you. She manipulated your love for her own survival.”
For once, Peeta Mellark has no words.
“I have never been anything but honest with you. I have always told you like it is, haven’t I Peeta?”
He glares at me and doesn’t respond.
I continue, “I have always been honest with you, and now I want you to do something for me.”
“I already told you, I don’t know anything! And neither does Katniss!” Peeta yells. After all this, why is he protecting her?
“I believe that you don’t know anything.” I do, in fact, believe this part of his story. “You care about the people of Panem, don’t you?”
He nods hesitantly.
“Good. Then I want you to call for a ceasefire. With all this bloodshed, it’s possible the human race may just die out. You don’t want that, do you?”
He shakes his head slightly.
“It’s settled then. Tomorrow you will make the call for a ceasefire on camera, and we will broadcast you to all of Panem.”
And Katniss will see how broken you are, I think to myself.
He think about it a moment. “If I do this, will you promise to grant Katniss amnesty? She doesn’t know what she’s doing with District 13, they’re manipulating her, she would never have wanted people to die.” The boy constantly underestimates Everdeen’s thirst for blood. I know her. She and Lucy Gray Baird are cut from the same cloth. She will do anything to get what she wants. The boy should just be worrying about himself.
“Yes, if you do this convincingly, and do indeed cause a ceasefire, I will grant Katniss amnesty.” I’m lying of course. There’s no way this will make a ceasefire. I just want to bait Katniss and weaken the rebellion.
“And my family? My parents and my brothers? Will they be safe?”
They are already dead, my boy. “Yes, your family will be safe,” I respond.
He nods. “I’ll do it then.”
Love really does turn people into idiots.
*****
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
I can’t breathe.
They strung up a man they say murdered three.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met at midnight in the hanging tree.
I remember Arlo Chance’s body dangling by its neck from the gallows, swaying slightly from the force of the fall.
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where the dead man called out for his love to flee.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met at midnight in the hanging tree.
“Run, Lil! Run!” it’s as if Arlo’s voice plays in my head. First, in his voice, then in the voice of the mockingjays. It repeats and screams and bounces off the sides of my head and then it sounds like Lucy Gray Baird except she’s laughing and taunting me to run. But she doesn’t tell me where to go.
“I’m just going to go find some Katniss,” she says, after she’s done laughing.
But now Peeta Mellark is shouting and I remember seeing the guards beat him but he’s still shouting “Run, Katniss! Run!” and then he’s screaming her name.
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
District 13’s propaganda is airing through the Capitol broadcast. Katniss Everdeen, the Girl on Fire, the Mockingjay, is sitting by lake I sat by so many years ago. She’s sitting right where Lucy Gray would have found the katniss she claimed to go looking for. But Lucy Gray didn’t go looking for katniss she left me she went looking to hurt me but she found Katniss anyway and she’s right here. Hurting me.
Katniss is singing Lucy Gray Baird’s song from Lucy Gray Baird’s lake and wearing a pin modeled after Lucy Gray Baird’s bonafide damned bird.
Where I told you to run so we'd both be free.
“Run, Katniss! Run!”
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met at midnight in the hanging tree.
Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Wear a necklace of rope side by side with me.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met at midnight
In the hanging tree.
The Mockingjay stops singing and then the mockingjays take up her song. And then the broadcast ends.
“The show’s not over until the Mockingjay sings,” Lucy Gray’s voice tinkles in my ear.
*****
I thought there was no way the rebels would kill children. I invited the Capitol’s children to stay in my home for protection. With the children here, they would be safe. With the children here, I would be safe. The Districts believe children are innocents, that’s why they hate the Games. They’d never murder children in cold blood.
They even sent in their own medics to take care of the wounded. They went in to keep the children safe.
I was wrong.
The rebels killed the children.
President Coin is using my own playbook against me.
*****
I hear the door to my rose garden open, and hear nearly silent footsteps walk inside. The footsteps approach slowly; I turn to see a burnt and broken Katniss Everdeen reach towards a white rose as if it could kill her. I wait until she’s picked up the pruning shears to announce my presence, and she startles so badly she accidently cuts off the flower.
“I was hoping you’d find your way to my quarters,” I say lightly once she can see me. “There are many things we should discuss, but I have a feeling your visit will be brief. So first things first,” I pause to cough up blood onto my handkerchief. “I wanted to tell you how very sorry I am about your sister.”
Katniss flinches.
“So wasteful, so unnecessary. Anyone could see the game was over by that point. In fact, I was just about to issue an official surrender when they released those parachutes.” I stare at her intently, willing her to believe me. "Well, you really didn't think I gave the order, did you? Forget the obvious fact that if I'd had a working hovercraft at my disposal, I'd have been using it to make an escape. But that aside, what purpose could it have served? We both know I'm not above killing children, but I'm not wasteful. I take life for very specific reasons. And there was no reason for me to destroy a pen full of Capitol children. None at all.” Coin however, had plenty of reason.
I start to cough again. Speaking this much when my health is already weakened is taking a toll. When I finally stop and make eye contact with Katniss again, she’s regarding me with suspicion.
“However, I must concede it was a masterful move on Coin's part. The idea that I was bombing our own helpless children instantly snapped whatever frail allegiance my people still felt to me. There was no real resistance after that. Did you know it aired live? You can see Plutarch's hand there. And in the parachutes. Well, it's that sort of thinking that you look for in a Head Gamemaker, isn't it? I sure he wasn't gunning for your sister, but these things happen.”
Katniss’ eyes widen slightly. I continue.
“My failure was being so slow to grasp Coin's plan. To let the Capitol and districts destroy one another, and then step in to take power with Thirteen barely scratched. Make no mistake, she was intending to take my place right from the beginning. I shouldn't be surprised. After all, it was Thirteen that started the rebellion that led to the Dark Days, and then abandoned the rest of the districts when the tide turned against it. But I wasn't watching Coin. I was watching you, Mockingjay. And you were watching me. I'm afraid we have both been played for fools.”
I’ve spent the better part of my waking hours in this garden sorting through the past days’ events. How Coin blindsided me so strongly when I had managed to keep tabs on nearly everything and everyone else. How power hungry she really was. How she needed to use the Mockingjay to unite the Districts, because there was no way they would follow Coin alone. And now, how she desperately needs at least the appearance of the Mockingjay’s endorsement to maintain a hold on the Presidency. The people of the Districts don’t know her, don’t trust her. Katniss doesn’t either. What better way to fully turn Katniss to her side that making it look like I killed her dear sister? The girl has always been emotional, and killing her sister would be sure to ignite her fury.
President Coin is using my own playbook against me. And she will not succeed. If I go down, I’m bringing everybody down with me.
“I don’t believe you,” Katniss tells me in a raspy voice.
I smile slightly and shake my head. She does believe me. She just doesn’t want to. “Oh, my dear Miss Everdeen. I thought we had agreed not to lie to each other."
*****
My hands are tied behind my back in the middle of the City Circle. President Coin – she declared herself President awfully quickly – stands on a balcony in the mansion I used to call my home. The Mockingjay walks up the road followed by District 13’s army. The whole thing is just as full of circus as any Hunger Games event.
The Mockingjay raises her bow and points the arrow at my heart. Her grey eyes meet mine, and it’s like we’re both rehashing the conversation we had in my rose garden. I wonder if this is what Lucy Grays Baird’s eyes would have looked like if she’d lived to be 17.
I smile just slightly, because I know that Katniss knows that everything I told her in the garden was true. There was no reason for me to kill all those children. And, the two of us agreed not to lie to each other.
Her arrow angles up, and less than a second later I hear Coin drop dead.
Even with her army and her plans, Coin too was outsmarted by a girl from District 12. The bitch will never be President.
I laugh until I can’t breathe.
Snow lands on top.