Written for Arianna Le Fay.

This story is an AU of my already AU fanfic, The Sweetest Mockery. If you haven't already been reading it, then I highly recommend you check that out first before reading this fic. But either way, the premise of both stories is that because Haymitch and Maysilee pulled off the star-crossed lovers routine during their Games, both of them became Victors, and over the years they've had several children. Both Sweetest Mockery and this fic focus on their middle daughter and child Ember, and even more specifically on her relationship with Cato. Unlike Sweetest Mockery, this fic ended up being told completely from Cato's POV.

This first section is the least angsty section of the entire story. I apologize in advance for any heartache you may experience. You may want to have some tissues at hand.

ACT ONE: PASSION

Song Suggestion: "Fix You" by Coldplay

I.

Cato is just as surprised as everyone else when Ember Abernathy waltzes up to him during training. The sword he is practicing with purposely slices dangerously close to her, as he decapitates yet another dummy.

She doesn't flinch.

He ignores the sweat running down his face. "What do you want, Twelve?"

"Pretend to be friendly with me."

The strangeness of the request gives him pause. "Why?"

"I'm trying to piss off a Gamemaker."

He wonders if she's entirely right in her head. "And you want to drag me into this stupidity?"

"She won't retaliate against you, just me. It's a personal dispute."

Cato is intrigued, despite himself. "Give me details and I'll play along."

Ember Abernathy considers his offer. "Fine," she agrees. "Don't make it obvious you're looking, but one of the Gamemakers is my sister."

He glances at the balcony out of the corner of his eye. A Gamemaker, young and blond and bearing a stunning resemblance to Maysilee Donner, is watching them. The Gamemakers' identities are usually kept secret from the general public, for fear of corruption and bribery, with the sole exception of the Head Gamemaker, who is the face and voice of his or her colleagues. Cato, like everyone else in Panem who's endured broadcasted feature specials about the Abernathy family for his entire life, knows that the eldest Abernathy daughter (Lorraine?) ended up at the Capitol somehow, but he never knew specifically that she became a Gamemaker. "And you want to piss her off."

"Yes."

"Any particular reason, or just sibling rivalry?" Cato wonders why she isn't milking her familial relationship, to increase her odds (or rather, her little brother's odds; everyone in Panem heard during District 12's Reaping about how she volunteered for the sole purpose of ensuring Cedric Abernathy lives) of winning.

"I hate her." There's something strange in her voice that Cato can't identify—but it doesn't sound quite like hatred. "She told me to stay away from the Careers, you in particular, to stay out of trouble, yada yada. So obviously, I'm going to do the exact opposite."

Cato can't help his gruff laugh, and he feels the force of many pairs of eyes burning into him. Ember Abernathy has a forthright, brutally honest kind of charm, and against his will, he feels it winning him over.

This could be fun.

She places her hands on her hips. Ember Abernathy, he decides, is one of those girls who looks extremely attractive when angry, or on the verge of it. "So I told you the details. Now it's time for you to uphold your end of the bargain. Pretend to be friendly with me."

Cato smirks. "I can do better than friendly."

Her blue eyes grow suspicious. "What do you mean?"

"Humor me."

He can see her visibly struggling to heed his request, but in the end, she nods. So he swoop in and kisses her hard.

Cato thinks he hears a feminine gasp from the Gamemakers' balcony, but he's too busy discovering the pleasure of Ember Abernathy's lips to give it much thought.

II:

Ember Abernathy loves her brother. This is a fact. And normally, Cato isn't the type to complain about familial affection. He himself is in possession of it, after all. But it's hard to enjoy kissing a pretty girl when her twelve-year-old twerp of a brother stares at you in disgust while you're doing it.

Since Ember has yet to call off her scheme to get on her Gamemaker sister's nerves—and she herself isn't complaining about it—Cato has taken to publicly kissing her, in full view of the Gamemakers and the other tributes, as often as he can get away with it. Everyone else's attention doesn't bother him. Just Cedric Abernathy's, for some reason. The little nerd's death glare makes him feel like he's doing something pornographic, not just making out with his sister.

Anyway, the reason Cato is complaining about Ember's attachment to her brother is that she almost never leaves Cedric's side, which means if Cato wants to kiss her so they can maintain this plot to drive Lorraine Abernathy insane, he has to endure Baby Abernathy's almost tangible resentment.

One day, Cato is stealing one last kiss from Ember before they part ways for lunch—he always sits with the other Careers, and she refuses to sit with them—when a glob of mashed potatoes splats the side of his head.

He turns to catch the culprit, and he spots Cedric standing on his chair, spoon still poised in his hands, distinctly unrepentant.

Somehow, instead of fury, all Cato feels is amusement. "Good aim, nerd," he says, to the surprise of all the other tributes, including Cedric, including Ember. As he wipes potato off his face, he catches the expression on Ember's face.

She's smiling, the first genuine smile she's given him.

Food still on his cheek, he can't help going on for one last kiss. For real this time.

III:

It's when Cato begins to actively seek out Ember, and not just to make out with her, that he realizes he might be in trouble. He learns from somebody or other that Ember likes to hang out on the rooftop garden. He prowls around up there one evening and comes across her reading a book while sprawled on a blanket.

She startles when he plucks it out of her hand, intentionally obnoxiously, to see its details. "Did no one ever teach you not to take other people's belongings without permission?"

Cato smirks as he returns it. "How do you have the time to read right now? Shouldn't you be making plans with your parents about the Games?"

"Probably," she admits without sounding too troubled. "But once I'm in the arena, I'm going to have zero privacy. Cameras 24/7, you know. I'm going to take advantage of any alone time while I still can. We all know I'm never going to have it again once the Games start."

He remembers how Ember has publicly written herself off in the Games. Not because she has no chance of winning—because honestly, she could be a top contender, considering how her parents have trained her since she was young, like the Careers but not quite—but if her brother Cedric is to live, then she must die.

Cato is not happy with that thought. He tells himself it's because he might never find as good a kisser as Ember after the Games.

(He tells himself that.)

Then Cato makes the mistake of asking Ember what her book is about, and he idles away at least an hour with her, listening to her talk, and to his horror (but not really horror), he finds that he enjoys it.

IV:

During his interview, Caesar Flickerman directs their conversation toward the topic of Ember.

"So, Cato, a little birdie told me that you're rather, ah, amorous, with a certain Miss Abernathy. What drew you to her?"

His attention flies toward Ember, whose interview dress makes her look preternaturally radiant. Her face is an attractive shade of pink as the cameras follow Cato's gaze toward her.

Never looking away from her, he hears himself say, "Ember Abernathy is a force of nature. Trying to turn your back on her is just as impossible as trying to stop the sun from rising."

The Capitol swoons.

Cato doesn't give a fuck about them.

That night, after the interviews, he goes up on the off chance she's there instead of spending what little time she has left with her family: with Cedric, with her mentor-parents, with the baby sister (Summer?) they tote around.

His gamble pays off.

She's still in her interview dress, but she's scrubbed off her makeup, and her hair is awry around her head. Cato's blood runs hot, and soon he's pressing her against a trellis.

He doesn't want to lose this tomorrow.

"You should join me," he tells her in between kisses. "At the Cornucopia. Stick with me and the Careers."

Her eyes are sad as they entrap him. "The others wouldn't accept Cedric."

She's right. Clove would sooner kill the boy from Twelve than ally with him.

They don't say goodbye. As Cato turns his back on her, he can't decide whether or not he wishes to see her in the arena.

V:

Four days into the Games, he runs into her. Her face is covered in soot from the Gamemakers' firewall, her hair is a mess, and she's overall filthy from the Games.

She might be the most beautiful thing he's ever seen.

(She's alive.)

They eye each other warily. He knows she's trying to decide if he wants to kill her (no), if killing him would increase her brother's chances of winning (yes), if she wants to kill him (uncertain).

(The world watches with bated breath.)

He puts down his sword first. Her knife soon follows.

"Where's your brother?" he asks, seeing no sign of Cedric in the vicinity.

"He's safe."

They both hear it at the same time: the other Careers drawing near, wondering where Cato went.

"Go," he hisses, and then she's gone.

Somewhere in the Capitol, his mentor is probably bashing his head against the wall for his "weakness."

VI:

Soon after the Careers' supplies are destroyed, Cato comes across them. He arrives just in time to see Cedric Abernathy shooting Marvel in the neck.

There's a heavy feeling in Cato's chest. He liked Marvel. Given the chance, he even thinks they might have been friends.

Ember is crouched over a tiny body, tangled in a net, one of Marvel's spears straight through the little girl's middle. Cato barely has time to comprehend what happened when Cedric turns his next arrow toward him.

"Ced," his sister says softly. "Don't."

"Why not?" the little boy demands. "He's just like him." The vitriol is targeted at Marvel's corpse. "He would've killed Rue, too."

"Cato let me go."

Cedric's arms tremble. The bow lowers.

Cato feels like an intruder as he watches the Abernathys waste precious time organizing an impromptu funeral for the little girl. Cedric cries as he places flowers around the girl. Ember, although solemn, is dry-eyed.

He wonders if it's because deep down, in a very dark part of her, she's grateful that it wasn't Cedric who died.

Cato watches them grieve for the girl from Eleven, so tiny and young, a girl whom, if she were from Two, the Academy would never have thought about sending into the Games, for lack of experience and age. So why is it okay when the other Districts send them?

He sees Marvel's body being picked up by the hovercraft, and he realizes no one has mourned him. In the Games, it's normal not to mourn dead tributes, especially not ones from your district, especially not ones you yourself have killed, as is the case with Cedric. But somehow, it feels wrong now not to do so.

Cato watches the three-finger salute that Ember and Cedric give to the little girl in farewell. And although Marvel is within the bowels of the hovercraft now, he does the same for the boy who might have been his friend.

VII:

Clove no longer trusts him. And if he's honest, she has good reason not to. Because at this point, he is extremely uncertain whether he would pick his district partner or Ember Abernathy, if it comes down to it. So even though Cato goes back to meet up with Clove after watching that little girl's funeral, Clove disappears soon after.

He's on his own now. For some reason, he's not as upset about it as he thought it would be. At least he won't have to stab Clove in the back—if she hadn't done it to him first—if the final two came down to them. Two's tributes always ally with each other, and it's not uncommon for them to be the last two standing. When that happens, it's not unheard of—expected, even—for them to turn on each other, and where there was once camaraderie, now there is a desperate thirst to defeat the other and win.

If he's lucky, someone else will get to Clove first.

When he arrives at the feast, it's to the sight of Clove pinning Ember to the ground, one of her deadly knives at the corner of the other girl's mouth. Cato reaches for his sword, not knowing to whose defense he intends to come.

(He tells himself that.)

Thresh gets there before him, and in the blink of an eye, Clove is dead.

Ember isn't.

(He can breathe.)

She exchanges words with Thresh, who then grabs the Districts 11 and 2 backpacks (that one is Cato's, he needs that) before taking off.

Ember meets his gaze, across the clearing. She stands up shakily. Her lips say nothing, but her eyes speak volumes. She grabs the District 12 backpack and darts away.

Cato stands there for a moment, staring at Clove's body until it's picked up by the hovercraft. He feels a pang of loss, the loss of someone from home, and a pang of sadness, that someone with as much skill and potential as Clove—although certainly not the kindest or most likeable person—is so easily, needlessly dead.

And he feels a pang of anger. But it isn't directed at Thresh.

He turns to the wheat field, where Thresh is hiding. Thresh has his pack, and Cato needs that pack. That's why he's going after the boy from Eleven. It's the only reason.

He's lost his taste for killing.

VIII:

Cato doesn't want to kill them.

He, Ember, and Cedric are the only tributes left. The three of them are all trapped on top of the Cornucopia, which is surrounded by mutts. They have the tributes' eyes—Marvel's, Clove's, Glimmer's, Thresh's—and it makes him sick to the core.

Cato stands on one end of the Cornucopia's roof, Ember and Cedric on the opposite. Nobody moves to kill anyone else. He and Ember stare at each other, and he wonders if the world can hear how his heart is pounding.

What will happen if they just do nothing?

They soon find out the answer, when the stalemate draws out too long for the Gamemakers' liking. Without warning, a candy pink bird swoops down from the sky. Its razor-sharp beak pierces Cedric's shoulder, causing him to topple off the Cornucopia, into the mutts' waiting jaws.

Ember screams. She tries to jump after her brother, but Cato grabs her around the waist before she can throw her life away (the first of many times he will do this). "CEDRIC! CEDRIC! CEDRIC!" She shrieks her brother's name over and over again, until her throat is bloody. Then she's sobbing, and Cato presses her face into his chest, his hands covering her ears, desperately hoping that he's preventing her from seeing or hearing her baby brother gruesomely dying.

But the mutts seem intent on extending Cedric's death for as long as possible. Soon, the little boy isn't even screaming anymore, and the silence is even more haunting than his cries of pain. But no cannon has sounded.

Cato lets go of Ember, now limp and unmoving. He picks up Cedric's bow and his last arrow, both of which the boy dropped when the pink bird drove him to his death. His aim isn't as good as Cedric's, but it's good enough to put the young boy out of his misery.

The cannon sounds.

But now Cato has a new problem. He refuses to kill her. He won't have her blood on his hands, too.

But just as before, the decision is taken out of his hands.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the Victors of the Seventy-Fourth Hunger Games!"

The fuck? No rule change was announced these Games about the number of tributes winning. Ember's parents, the so-called star-rossed lovers, were supposed to have been the one and only exception, ever, with no chance of a repeat.

Cato looks at Ember, curled up in a fetal position on the metal roof of the Cornucopia. He thinks it would have been kinder of the Gamemakers to have let her die as well.

IX:

The post-Games spectacle is hell. For him, but especially for Ember. Somehow, the Capitol has spun their relationship (whatever it is) into another tale of star-crossed lovers, just like her parents', but with a touch of love at first sight.

Maysilee Donner and Haymitch Abernathy sit stoically in the audience, and the shadows of many sleepless nights are evident on their faces. As are signs of the many tears they have shed in recent days, for the son whom they watched die and whom they will never see again.

Ember is borderline comatose beside him on the loveseat they've provided this year. Cato ends up answering all of Caesar's questions, and Caesar is smart enough to know not to push Ember into speaking. Cato begins to think they might get through this.

Then the recap reel starts to play.

Whenever Cedric is featured—which is quite often—Ember's eyes regain a spark of life. But they both know what's coming. When the Cornucopia scene starts, Cato pulls her toward him and covers her ears, just like he did during the actual event.

The Capitol seems to realize that it wasn't just any tribute who died at the Cornucopia, but Ember's brother, one of the Abernathys they so loved to celebrity-stalk over the years. When Caesar calls for applause, the cheers are muted.

X:

He returns to the rooftop garden. He doesn't expect Ember, who's in a perpetual state of shock, to be up there. But she is.

"How are you feeling?"

She doesn't answer him. She just keeps staring over the city, into the distance, at some sight he's incapable of seeing.

Cato remembers Ember Abernathy. He remembers the girl on fire. He remembers a force of nature. He remembers the girl who asked him to help piss off her sister. He remembers the girl he kissed. He remembers the girl who kissed him back. He remembers the sister who loved her little brother, to the point that she would have sacrificed herself for him. He remembers a girl who was so full of life, even when she was prepared to die.

He fears that girl was killed in the arena, after all.

Cato tries to take her hand in his, but her fingers are limp and unresponsive. Her blue eyes, once bright and vivacious, are now dull and glassy. Whatever it was that made Ember Abernathy Ember Abernathy is gone. Stolen. Torn from her.

His anger simmers.

He notices something beneath a bench and picks it up. Cato recognizes it as the book Ember was reading before, her bookmark still in its place. He wonders, if Ember hadn't come out of the arena, if he hadn't come up here and found the book, would it have been left abandoned on the ground, forever waiting for its owner to return?

Cato opens the book, and he begins to read aloud where Ember left off. He wonders if she hears a single word he says.

XI:

Cato soon realizes the only reason they are both alive is that Snow willed it.

The president's summons for him, on their last day before they ship out from the Capitol, surprise him. He has no choice but to accept, obviously.

"You were always my favorite to win," Snow tells him in between sips of wine, which Cato declined. "Seneca was in favor of an underdog, but you and I know that strength is what wins you victory."

Cato doesn't respond. Snow doesn't ask him to.

"The little...romance, between you and Ember was an interesting development. The Capitol fell in love with the idea of a repeat of her parents' Games. But two star-crossed lovers defying the Capitol again, and succeeding? No, I couldn't have that again. At least, I couldn't have the two lovers making that choice again. But if I made the choice this time? To spare you two, out of magnanimity and condescension? That suits me very well, indeed."

When Cato finally speaks, it's to ask a question that's been haunting him. "Why kill her brother like that?"

Snow's mouth curls into a smile. "Well, we couldn't have the people believing I was going soft in my old age, could we?"

Cato's fist clenches.

"Now, Cato, I didn't ask you here just to reminisce about the past. We must speak of the future. I think the both of us—and most others in Panem—know there was only one real Victor this year, and that was not Miss Abernathy."

He isn't so sure that he won either, though.

"Officially, Ember is entitled to all the same prizes as you. But you must be properly rewarded. It wouldn't be fair for you otherwise."

Cato feels dread spreading through his body.

"When you and Ember leave the Capitol tomorrow, she will be going with you to District 2."

He hates himself for not feeling entirely displeased at the idea. "She isn't going home?"

"Cato, District 2 is her home now."

XII:

Haymitch Abernathy is drunk when he corners Cato, shortly before their trains are to depart. "I don't know what you want with her, you little shit, but if you so much as lay a finger on her, I'm gonna make you wish you were the one who died at the Cornucopia."

Cato might have felt compassion for Haymitch (Cedric really does—did—look just like his father), if he weren't so aggravated that the old man thought he would hurt Ember, after everything they've been through. (But perhaps, perhaps, the old Cato, the Cato before Ember, would have.) "You don't tell me what to do, old man."

The older Victor looks like he might punch Cato in the face, but the other Victor of the Second Quarter Quell stops him. "My husband isn't feeling well," Maysilee tells Cato. "You'll have to forgive him." To Haymitch: "I'll take care of this. Find Cinna, he'll help you." So Haymitch stumbles off, in grief and in pain.

Cato rubs the back of his neck. "I won't hurt her," he tells Ember's mother.

"I didn't think you would," she answers honestly. (Why doesn't she? How does she know anything about him?) "It's nice to hear it all the same."

"What did you want from me?"

Maysilee's familiar blue eyes (if Cedric looks—looked—like Haymitch, Ember looks like her mother, but dark-haired) force him to face her. "Ember is never going to come back to Twelve again. Only for one day, during the Victory Tour, but that's it. When she isn't in the Capitol, she'll be in District 2 for the rest of her life. I don't know what life is like in Two. And I don't entirely know what happened between you and my daughter. But I am asking you, begging you, whether any of it was real or not, to please watch over her for me. I think you see as clearly as I do that Ember is far from okay, and I don't know when she'll be okay again. If you have any compassion at all, please take care of her for me."

Cato has no answer to that, except this: "I will."

XIII:

Snow has decided to place the two of them in the same house in the Victors' Village. Cato doesn't mind, and Ember doesn't say anything either way.

She hasn't said anything since before the Games ended. The last thing Cato heard her say was Cedric's name, on the Cornucopia, before her voice betrayed her and gave out.

Cato settles Ember in the best room in the house, spacious and warm, with tall windows that let the morning sunlight flood in. It has a view of the majestic mountains near Two. He often finds her curled up on the window seat, staring outside, but he isn't sure if she's really seeing anything.

His family isn't sure what to make of her. His father, Cato knows, finds Ember's survival an affront to the rules of the Games, but given that it was Snow himself who decided to break the rules, his father says nothing about it. He tends to ignore Ember's existence altogether, and he often uses the word "Victor" in the singular form, rather than the plural.

His older sister, Vespasia, tried to get Ember to speak, but gave up in frustration when Ember failed to react to anything she said. His younger sister, Laelia, quickly grew bored with Ember's continued silence.

His mother doesn't show it, but Cato knows she pities Ember. When his mother visits, he sometimes finds her sitting beside Ember in companionable silence, sometimes quietly murmuring to the girl without expecting any answers back. Cato doesn't know if Ember is aware of anything his mother is saying, but he's grateful all the same.

His older brother, Tiberius, nearly blows Cato's fuse. Tiberius took one look at Ember and quips, "I guess what they say is true. To the Victor really do go the spoils."

Cato manages to get a good punch in Tiberius's smarmy face before their father forcibly separates them.

Through it all, Ember says and does nothing.

XIV:

He wakes up suddenly one night. He's always been a light sleeper—he was trained to be—so sometimes the slightest sound is enough to jolt him awake. But before he can roll over and go back to sleep, he hears the noise again, and he recognizes it as weeping.

Immediately, he gets up and crosses the hall to Ember's room. There's a mass of blankets on her bed, and quiet sobs escape from somewhere within. Cato sits on the mattress and gently peels away blanket after blanket, until her miserable face is exposed to the air.

"He's dead. They killed him. Rain killed him. He's dead. It's my fault. I couldn't save him. I should have died. It should've been me. Why wasn't it me? Why couldn't I have died?"

Once again, Cato pulls her to his chest, but this time he doesn't cover her ears. There's nothing to deafen her to tonight. He knows nothing he can say will make it better, so he simply strokes her hair until she cries herself to sleep.

XV:

Cato wakes up again in the morning, but he thinks he must be dreaming when he goes downstairs and finds Ember making breakfast.

It takes her a moment to look up at him after he enters the kitchen. Her blue eyes are clearer than they have been in weeks. "Good morning," she says quietly, and it's the sweetest sound he's ever heard.

"Good morning," he answers, and he means it.

XVI:

He takes her to his favorite hiking trails, the ones he's never shared with anyone before so that no one disrupts his solitary treks. The sunshine gives life to her skin, pallid from so much time cooped up indoors. Her eyes are animated by the exercise. When she trips over a tree root, she laughs as she dusts herself off.

(His heart feels peculiar.)

Cato helps her up. Once she's on her feet, though, she doesn't let go. She entwines her fingers with his, and they continue their hike with their hands clasped tightly together.

She gasps. "What is that?" Because her hand is still holding his, he's dragged with her to investigate what caught her eye: unusual but beautiful flowers, somewhere in between blue and purple, blooming along the edge of the trail.

Cato is pleased when he realizes he knows the answer to her question, because it's one of his little sister's favorite flowers. "Those are columbines. Laelia loves them. Says their name comes from how the petals look like doves clustered together, supposedly. I personally don't see it."

"Dovelike or not, they're gorgeous." Ember plucks one, looks at it thoughtfully, and sticks it behind Cato's ear.

He finds that he doesn't mind at all, not when she beams at him like that.

XVII:

His family isn't sure what to make of her. His father can no longer ignore her, now that she's actually talking and interacting with people. So he just remains stony in her presence, and now he's the silent one when they're in the same room.

Vespasia decides that Ember's earlier silence wasn't a personal insult to her, after all, and now gaily chats with the younger girl. Laelia decides that she quite likes Ember when she acts like a human and is often perched on her lap.

His mother doesn't show it, but Cato knows that she is pleased by Ember's change. What he doesn't know is why his mother so frequently glances between him and her.

Tiberius is quiet. Then, just before his family is about to leave, his brother comments, "I didn't know trophies could talk."

Dead silence. Cato prepares to punch him again.

"You know, just because you have trouble winning over a girl the real way doesn't mean your brother is incapable of it."

Dead silence, again, as everyone stares at Ember. Cato didn't realize until now how much he missed that look of shameless unrepentance that was once so characteristic of her.

Vespasia cackles. "She's got you there, Ty."

Tiberius turns red and stomps out.

Cato thinks he could kiss Ember, right then and there. But he waits until his family leaves.

He didn't realize until now how much he missed kissing Ember.

XVIII:

A package from Twelve arrives shortly before Ember's birthday. Cato has been expecting it, and he quickly hides it before she can see it. Ever since Ember began talking again, she's also started making phone calls back home. There isn't much she can say, since the phones are certainly bugged, but Cato overhears how she giggles with her cousin Madge, how she reassures her father that she's okay, how she teases her little sister, and how she has quiet, lengthy discussions with her mother.

One day, Ember passed the phone to him. Bewildered, he took it.

"Thank you," Maysilee Donner told him.

One time, several of Ember's friends back home were gathered around Madge's phone, and Ember orally introduced him to Katniss, Peeta, and Gale. They were wary of him at first, but by the end of the group conversation, Cato thought they seemed to have accepted him.

A few weeks ago, Maysilee asked to speak to him again. "We want to send Ember some things for her birthday. Will you make sure she doesn't open her presents early?"

On the day of her birthday, Cato tickles Ember awake. She mercilessly beats him with her pillow before yanking him down for a long kiss. Breakfast is cold by the time they make their way downstairs.

With his mother's help, Cato has individually wrapped each of the presents that Ember's friends and family sent, and they wait for her in a neat stack on the kitchen table. He watches her tear into them with delight.

From Katniss and her little sister, a homemade bottle of perfume, made from flower petals. Cato catches a whiff of it; it smells just like Ember.

From Peeta the baker, a tin of cinnamon cookies decorated with uncannily accurate icing flowers. Ember is able to identify each bloom as from her garden at home.

From Gale and his family, a handknit scarf in radiant shades of red and yellow and orange. Smiling, Ember says that it was likely a group effort: Gale hunted whatever game was needed to be traded for the dyes, his baby sister picked the colors, his little brothers helped make the yarn from the Everdeens' goat's wool, and his mother did the actual knitting.

From her cousin Madge, a disc, with the words "Ember's Song" written in an elegant hand on the cover. When Ember plays it, beautiful piano music fills the room. Her cousin, Ember explains, loves to play the piano, and she'd taken up composing just last year.

From her parents: a framed family photo (the last one they took before the Games, Ember murmurs as she gazes at Cedric's face), a copy of the new novel by her favorite author (she'd completely forgotten that the book was coming out), and her mother's mockingjay pin.

Cato remembers that pin. It was her token in the arena. He remembers it being returned to Maysilee Donner after the Games. Now, her mother is giving it back to Ember.

(What do her parents mean by that?)

And finally, from Cato.

For several weeks, a construction crew has been coming into the backyard to build what Cato claimed was going to be a shed. All the tarps are gone now, to reveal that there is, in fact, no shed.

It's a greenhouse, ready to be filled with seeds and potted plants and flower bulbs and anything Ember ends up choosing from the catalog of everything available at the local nursery.

(Ember doesn't talk about her garden in Twelve much—you can only chat about plants for so long—but Cato sees the look in her eye when she does, and he sees the look in her face whenever she's investigating a strange new bloom, like with the columbines on their hike.)

She tackles him to the ground, and neither cares about the grass stains on their clothes as they kiss.

XIX:

Cato is asked to visit the Academy, where he trained for most of his life, so he can talk to the current students and answer any questions.

Ember is invited as well.

She has to think about it, but eventually she decides to go. She's curious about how the Academy runs.

Aside from a quick introduction, Cato does all the talking, as Ember shows no inclination to speak before a crowd of Career hopefuls. He can tell that she's also unnerved by the former Victors lined up against the wall in the back, watching them both with intense stares.

Cato's spiel is essentially the same speech that every new Victor from Two gives when asked to speak to the students, and most of their questions are the same ones asked every time.

Then one of them has a question for Ember.

"How does it feel to be a Victor knowing that you didn't deserve it?"

Cato recognizes the asker as an obnoxious punk from the year below him. The giggles scattered through the audience, and the smug looks on some of the previous Victors' faces, tell him that the punk is not alone in this sentiment.

Ember handles it masterfully. "Why don't you come onstage for a minute?"

The boy swaggers up and deliberately checks her out. Cato clenches his jaw, but he waits. Ember has a plan.

"Spar with me."

The punk, who clearly thinks Ember is no challenge—Ember did kill in the arena, but only in self-defense, and the Academy trainees see that as weak—swings half-heartedly for her. She nimbly dodges and clocks him, unawares, in the face so he's sprawled on his back on the ground.

No one asks anymore questions.

XX:

They go to his family's house for dinner. Tiberius has excused himself, claiming something at work is holding him up, but everyone knows even after all this time, he just doesn't want to face Ember again, after the way she verbally burned him.

Cato's father pulls him aside after the meal, and they go to his study. "I see you're becoming quite attached to her."

He's not becoming attached. He's already attached, and has been for quite some time. But Cato knows his father has a point to make, so he waits.

"Don't be."

Cato frowns. "Why?"

"No good will arise from getting entangled with any Abernathys, I promise you that, Cato. That family has no future in Panem."

He narrows his eyes. "What are you getting at, Father?"

"Troubled times are coming. You don't want to be on the wrong side when they do. And the Abernathys will be on the wrong side. The girl has a pretty face, and I can see why you're so fond of her. But don't let it become anything serious. You'll want to be able to sever ties with her when the time comes."

Cato stands there, still as a statue. Finally, he says stiffly, "Please excuse me, it's getting quite late. Good night, sir." He leaves the study. When he and Ember leave the house, and he reaches out for her hand, he can feel his father's glare boring into his back.

XXI:

On his birthday, he declines his family's invitation to dinner again. There's only one person with whom he wants to spend the day.

They go hiking, as they usually do when the weather suits and they have no other demands on their time. They discover a new trail, which takes them to a small waterfall, and the two of them have a water fight. In the end, both are thoroughly drenched, and both are thoroughly happy.

Upon returning home, Cato showers. Drying his hair with a towel, he emerges into his room, where he finds Ember snuggled on his bed, reading a book and wearing one of his shirts, which is clearly oversized on her.

(His shirt, and nothing else.)

Her smile beckons him. He accepts the invitation and joins her. The book is tossed onto the floor. The shirt follows.

"This is just as much a present for me as it is for you," she tells him.

All the better.

If there is such a thing as paradise, Cato thinks later that night, as Ember sleeps in his arms, this is it. And he doesn't ever want to give it up.

To be continued...

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