Broken Wings

"Here did she fall a tear, here in this place, I'll set a bank of rue, sour herb of grace." - Shakespeare, Richard II

She's born a month early, tiny and frail, a firstborn child no one thinks will live.

They underestimate her even then.

oooOOOooo

She's named after an herb that blooms the color of sunlight, a pretty and delicate name that fits her.

The flowers close at night, folding up as if quietly going to sleep.

He wonders if it feels like dying.

oooOOOooo

He's named after a way of harvesting wheat, flailing the crop, a violent reaping.

It's fitting in a way, he supposes. He's strong. He's good at destroying.

oooOOOooo

He finds a mockingjay with a broken wing when he's seven. His parents tell him it won't live but he tends it, cupping it in his hands and splinting the wing, feeding it and keeping it warm. Eventually it heals and he releases it into the orchards.

It's the first kind thing he's ever done in his life, and he wonders at the time if it might not be the last.

oooOOOooo

She whistles them home from the orchards at the end of the day.

She should have been born a bird, he tells her once, darting through the trees and having no work except whistling her tune.

She stands on her toes to look up at him and a mockingjay lands on the branch above her head.

oooOOOooo

She loves music.

It's a useless thing to love, one that won't put food in her stomach or clothes on her back, and it means nothing to him.

But she loves it.

She's only a little girl, after all.

oooOOOooo

He tells himself if there's any decency left in the world, any mercy, she won't be Reaped. Anyone else but not her.

They call her.

oooOOOooo

There's no volunteers, not that he expected there to be. People may murmur about how young she is, how tragic it is, but not enough to die in her place.

His hands clench into fists as they call his name.

oooOOOooo

Her hand slips into the middle of his palm and his fingers close around it, swallowing it up. He could break her between his hands without the least effort, crush her into dust.

But he won't.

She's like that bird when he was a child, a little broken thing that he pasted back together, a strong spirit tucked in a delicate body. He vows he won't be the one to kill her.

It's the second kind thing he's done in his life.

oooOOOooo

She's twelve years old. It should be a crime, he thinks, to kill a girl before she even turns thirteen, before she grows up, like killing a fledgling before it learns to sing.

The Capitol doesn't agree with him.

oooOOOooo

She's fast.

It's something at least, the only thing that might keep her alive.

They're never coming home, either of them, of course.

oooOOOooo

He doesn't see her again after they enter the arena. He doesn't stay with her or take her with him into the field.

Someone will kill her, he knows. It won't be him.

oooOOOooo

He hears the mockingjays stop singing mid tune, all sound cut off in an instant, silence so deafening he can't hear his pounding heartbeat.

He knows then that she's dead.

He sees her face in the sky that night, nestled against the stars and the never-ending darkness surrounding it. She looks younger in the picture, her fragile features making her age painfully obvious, golden eyes quietly lit with the ghost of a smile in a mockery of life.

He knew it all along. There wasn't a chance in the world for her, not when it came right down to it. He knew at the beginning that she'd never live to see thirteen.

The camera focuses in as a single tear escapes his eyes and runs down his face like a droplet of blood.

He hadn't known that he remembered how to cry.

oooOOOooo

He goes to the Feast.

The District 2 girl is already there, holding down the girl from 12, a knife to her face. Her lips are forming words, taunting insults, names, Rue.

She's clenched between his hands before he even realizes it, dangling in midair as he shouts as her, as she screams and struggles.

He breaks her.

She's small and it's absurdly simple but all his strength goes into it, rage, revenge, it doesn't seem to matter. She slips out of his hands and strikes the ground, twisted and dying.

The District 12 girl is crouched in front of him, eyes wide, expression frozen. His hands are trembling but his voice is steady as he lets her go.

He grabs both backpacks and runs as he hears Cato behind him, shouting the dying girl's name in a voice that hardly sounds human, mingling with the sound of the mockingjays. He'll be coming for him soon, him and not the girl on fire.

It's the third kindness. The last one.

oooOOOooo

The birds stop singing when he dies.