Chapter two…. Yay!
SO first, I will just say thanks to my three (I know, but I have only just started.) reviewers, Cato4ever, Niss12 and Ceasar-Flickerman.
(And Althea? You can't be good at everything )
And I honestly hope more people will review…
(and yes, I named her Liliana. You know why? So her nickname can be Lily, therefore acknowledge both Rue and Prim)
Also, sorry if this is a little long-winded. I thought it needed some background.
Liliana Everdeen-Mellark ran through the woods with her weapons. Behind her chased a boy with a sword. His face was gory, covered in blood, and his hair matted. She winced at his looks, and yet after so many weeks, she knew she looked no different.
She kept running until her legs could run no more- literally. She was standing in front of a cliff. She turned and began to back up, her breath heaving in her chest as the boy advanced on her, grinning menacingly and holding his sword up in a ready stance.
Lily kept backing up on the crumbling ground, but just as he was about to swipe her with it, her foot stepped backwards to meet only air. She gave a stricken look, her arms waving frantically in an attempt for balance, and then she was falling….
Falling…
Falling…
Bang.
Lily's entire body jolted skywards, her eyes flying open in a soundless scream. She was in cold sweat, but still bleary from her dream. She certainly wasn't sure whether the bang was from the arena cannon in her dream, or a knock on the door.
She blinked her bleary eyes in an attempt to abolish the sleep addling her brain.
Maybe it was the knock on her door. Though it was still shut as ever, a smiling lone figure stood in front of her door. Though it was dark, she could somehow make out the coco coloured skin and curly dark hair. As happy as the girl seemed, Lily couldn't stray her eyes away from the spear protruding out of the middle of her chest.
The little girl beckoned with her small finger, and let it fall back to her side.
She knew this girl, but not physically; she knew her from old movies, gory things that was Panem's history. Lily pushed the stifling blankets off of her body and stood, body still weak from shock, and padded slowly, curiously towards her door.
Rue beckoned once more with her tiny pinky, and then proceeded to fade. Lily cried out and reached out her hand as to grab her clothes. She didn't grab the girl, however. What she grabbed was the bunch of clothes and her arrows hanging off of her door handle.
Slowly she registered that what she thought she had seen wasn't real, and just a product of her tired mind, and she scowled. She knew that the 'apparition' linked with both her dream, and what would happen today.
She marched to her curtains and tore them apart roughly, squinting through the light as to see what was happening outside, silently hoping she had been wrong. What she saw were millions of sad District 12 people wearing the best they only reserved for today.
Her heart sank as she realised she was right.
It was reaping day.
The sun hadn't fully risen yet, and so far it was only the eldest people milling around the area, so Liliana thought it safe to go hunting.
You could see evidence of her talents hanging in her room; the leopard-skin rug (she still didn't understand how a leopard of all creatures, had wandered into the woods), her bow and arrows hanging on her door, her merit certificate for both teaching kids how to paint and helping teach the young ones survival skills in whim of the Games, and various paintings she had made in times of boredom.
She was going hunting, however, because it was the second most relaxing thing to do (first being painting, but she had broken her last paint-brush). Lily quickly changed, ignoring the bath (she would have one later) and pulling on her best hunting boots. She swiftly scrawled a note to her parents and, after grabbing her weapons, slinked away towards the woods.
A year after the war had ended, people had decided it best to put the electric fences back up. It wasn't because of poaching, no: it was because of the animals themselves. Both mutts and normal animals had grown restless, and decided that, scratch the rules, they would go attack the humans, the people who had life so much better than themselves.
After about a week of children going missing, the best fighters of twelve marched into the woods and replaced the fence. The only problem with what they did was that the used the old electric fence.
It wasn't too hard for Lily to crawl through the hidden hole in the fence, and once she had, she immediately searched for animal tracks: berries and roots would be there all day, but animals? You had to find them before they were aware.
First she checked her traps and snares for any animals, so they wouldn't rot, then once she had collected her catches, she began to search the forest quietly for animals.
After successfully downing a squirrel (through the eye), she leapt out of her tree to retrieve her catch. Upon reaching where it lay, however, she found it gone.
Searching with her eyes, she saw an overlarge shoe peeking around a tree. She swiftly shot an arrow directly beside the shoe, and smirked to hear a male cry of fear. Her smirk soon left her as the rest of his body appeared.
His name was Robin Vendavalla. He was one of the many who had teased her as a child, and one of the many who had continued to.
When the two of them had been young, his father had fallen ill from a deathly disease. Nobody had known what it was, so when they had sent for Liliana's grandmother to assess what had happened, it was too late.
Though Mrs Everdeen, and Liliana's own brother Finnick, had tried their best, he died a week later. Secretly, Lily thought this was the reason that Robin resented her: both the fact that her family couldn't save his, and that she had a living, healthy father.
Ever since that day Liliana had hunted for the Vendavalla's. It wasn't because she felt sorry for them; her family happened to be friends with them. She had always believed that Jennifer Cartwright and her daughter Briony hadn't deserved what they had gotten: Robin? Not so much.
After scowling at each other for a few minutes, Robin turned on his heel and swiftly ran away, taking her prize with him. As she watched him run, she mused about his hair: How had the colour come to such a red? And she felt a little pity. If he were to get put in the Games, it would be impossible to camouflage it.
Lily, with her dark hair in a plait and her tall, willowy body, only had one feature that would let her down: her eyes, which were a spectacular shade of electric blue.
Lily shook her head and swiftly collected her days catch, and began to head home.
First, however, she would make a little detour while Robin was still hunting…..
Woohoo! Another chapter up!
So again, sorry for it being so long-winded, but if you are reading the end of the chapter, thanks for bearing with me!
So, yes, I would appreciate comments…. Virtual cookie for those who do!
Thanks,
ChocolateFudgeSmudge
