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Twelve
They call her the Little Selkie because she is twelve years old when she wins, and she wins entirely because of a fluke.
It’s a few days into the Games, and the tributes have scattered to the winds. Short of the usual bloodbath at the Cornucopia, where the District 4 boy died saving his district partner, nothing else has happened. The citizens of the Capitol are bored.
(And a bored Capitol is never a good thing.)
So the Gamemakers start an earthquake.
Here is an unexpected result: the Arena has a huge dam. Because of the earthquake, the dam falls. And the monstrous flood that follows is beyond even the Gamemakers’ ability to control.
Within two hours, over half of the remaining tributes are dead.
Dylan may be the youngest of the tributes, but she is still District 4 and the sea is her second home. Three days later, she is fished from the icy waters of the flooded Arena, the last tribute still alive.
Thirteen
A thirteen-year-old tribute is hardly any better than twelve, especially when the tribute in question is a scrawny blond boy from District 5 with a reputation of being whiny, obnoxious, and too weak to even throw a decent punch.
The Arena is a mountain-like terrain with a vast cave system of labyrinthine tunnels, caverns, and hidden death traps. The second the Games start, Evariste does exactly what everyone expects of a young weakling and disappears into the nearest tunnel.
Through what seems to be sheer luck and unexpected stubbornness, he survives until the final eight. Then his luck runs out, and he’s spotted by a pair of Careers.
They chase him towards a dead end. The Capitol’s citizens smirk in anticipation of the violence. Their smirks give way to total confusion when the burly District 2 tribute charging ahead suddenly topples over, clawing at the gossamer-thin garroting wire strung round his neck. He had run straight into the trap.
In the split second his partner pauses to gape in shock, Evariste slits both of their throats from ear to ear.
(Three things the Capitol is delighted to discover about Evariste: He has an eidetic memory. He has mapped out every inch of the Arena’s deadly layout. And he is very, very good at acting.)
By the time the others realize that behind the mask of the so-called weakling lurks a ruthless genius, it’s already too late. The Capitol roars its approval as the last cannon booms and their newest Victor bows and waves with a smile as empty as the Arena.
Fourteen
The Games this year take place in the wide, open plains, with wild flesh-eating horses and very little cover to hide in.
(Bridget of District 7 might be small and weak, but she has a natural-born affinity with horses, even carnivorous ones.)
The Capitol quickly dubs her “The Red Rider” for the endless trail of blood and victims she leaves in her wake.
Fifteen
Gabrielle from District 11 is gorgeous, witty, and deadly, and half the Capitol is in love with her before the Games even begin.
Thanks to her Mentor, a grouchy old Victor known only as Puss, she receives gift after gift after gift in the Arena and wins her Games in a matter of days.
(Dealing with the Capitol’s hungry attention is, of course, an entirely different sort of Game.)
Sixteen
Emerys has trained with a bow since before he could walk.
His Games take place in a densely wooded forest, with tree trunks thicker than a grown man’s waist and twisting branches just sturdy enough to support a sixteen-year-old boy’s weight.
(From high up above, he can almost pretend that it’s just ants he’s shooting, not children.)
(Almost.)
Seventeen
Nobody expects Lucien from District 11 to live for very long, not after the dazzling spectacle that was Gabrielle. He’s smarmy and slippery and clearly not much of a threat, having scored a lowly 3 on his training assessment. His only use is that he somehow knows how to make the most amazing wine, something the Careers take great delight in.
So he’s just amusing enough to be allowed to live, day after day, until in the end it’s just him and three other Career tributes, holed up in the Cornucopia and laughing over drinks and a shared meal. Tomorrow will be the day their alliance ends, but for their last night of peace as almost-friends, the Careers silently agree to an unofficial truce.
Lucien’s already deep in his cups, making a dramatic fool of himself to the great amusement of his audience. They’re laughing so hard that they start falling over in drunken hysterics.
It’s not until the cannons start to boom that the Capitol slowly realizes that they’re not tipsy; they’re dead, every single one of them.
Clear-eyed and expressionless, Lucien casually dumps out the rest of the poisoned wine. Nightlock berries look very similar to grapes, especially when liquified.
Eighteen
Angelique has spent her whole life under the radar and is so very close to being safe. But what else is she supposed to do when yet another thirteen year old from District 5 gets picked out of the drawing?
(After what Evariste pulled off a couple of years ago, everyone knows the Careers will tear sweet, harmless Odile limb from limb the second she steps foot in the Arena.)
Volunteering fixes a target on her back, and that, combined with her natural athleticism and proficiency with weapons means Angelique has no chance of hiding how lethal she is. Even her own district partner, Acri, shies away from her like shadows beneath steel. It’s her Mentor who teaches her how to spin their fear into a tool, a way to ensure that she’ll have just enough of the Capitol’s favor to be kept alive.
It works. The Careers approach her for an alliance but Angelique, sick with the idea of hunting people down like sport, declines.
(What Angelique doesn’t know is that they offer the same to Acri, who accepts without hesitation.)
Even though her Mentor warns her again and again not to make friends in the Arena, Angelique just can’t help herself. She teams up with Pate from District 10, a gentle blacksmith’s apprentice with a sweetheart waiting back home, and Alastryn of District 7, who saves their lives over and over again when it comes to finding edible food. As the days pass and they fend off Career attacks, muttations, and whatever horrors the Gamemakers can imagine, Angelique takes the thought that she’ll have to eventually kill them and shoves it far far away.
Then they’re both tortured and murdered by Acri and the Careers, and there is a week-long blank in Angelique’s memory that she refuses to fill in.
(The Capitol loves to refer to her as their Avenging Angel. Angelique fights the urge to throw up every time she hears it.)
She leaves the Arena covered head to toe in blood and gore, none of it her own.