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Katniss can still feel the fire. If it’s the fire from the bombs that killed Prim or the fire from the dress Cinna made… it gets harder to discern by the minute. It gets blurry, and all memories starting from the day of the Reaping, all the way up to her shooting Coin, all of them are filled with ashes and fire, even if it is only in the background, like a distant cry.
When the memory of the fire gets too bad, she shoots up from her place in her chair, clawing at her skin and at her hair, sure that she will feel the warmth, that her skin will melt and she will end her days like a flaming, human torch.
Like Prim.
In a way, her sister had ended the war. At least for her. Even if it isn’t right. Even if she had to be on fire too. It’s almost like a bad joke: Prim deserved to live. Katniss didn’t.
So it's sort of fitting: it started with fire and it ended with it. Katniss, the girl who was on fire. The girl who took her sisters place in the game. The sister who burned to death.
Full circle.
Only when Peeta comes, and holds her and whispers so quietly that she can’t hear it, does she get rid of the burning feeling everywhere. He’s like her safe haven and she can’t breathe again, without inhaling the smoke and the ashes, the air thick with the people she’s killed.
She lets Peeta hold her and comes back, clean of the fire.