Disclaimer:
Suzanne Collins owns Great Games, and I (unfortunately) make no profit from this *shrugs*
Summary:
"Are you afraid? Good... In real life, the monsters win."
The 13 Districts of Westeros take turns hosting an annual inter-district competition. "The Great Games" is a grand tourney where each District chooses one champion a year to compete in a series of broadcasted tasks(usually physically taxing, gory, etc.). The Victor wins fame and fortune, but some Districts have extra incentives...
Cato Steinn wins the 72nd Games, and it looks like his prize is Clove Stark from the South.
(Only it's really Cato Dejanira and Clove Stark from the North, who would both sooner save each other rather than hurt each other, so how did it come to this?)
Reminder: We're in a pseudo-Hunger Games verse in terms of technology. No Capitol, just 13 Districts who take turns hosting the Great Games. District 2 is where the story is currently set, and District 2 is broken into 4 areas: West, East, North, South.
Story so far:
Story so far: Cato Steinn's mother, Maceria, is annoyed that her son's friends (including Devoric and Marvel) have delivered Cato's "prize" to her doorstep. The prize is a girl, one who has been a part of Cato's (and thus Maceria's) life for far longer than she'd like to admit. In Chapter 2, we learned a bit more about Cato's biological father (Caron Dejanira, the first non-East Victor), Cato's maternal grandfather (Tywin Steinn, a Victor himself descending from a long line of Victors), Dr. Bea Tray (Maceria's best friend, also from the West, she is the youngest District 2 citizen to be registered as a physician), and the divisions of District 2 (West = posh, traditionalist, wealthy; East = lower/middle working class; South = the "slums"; North = mountains that are mined). Specifically, we learn that Tywin has a chip on his shoulder regarding needing a male heir to further his family's long line of Victors, and expects Maceria to deliver him the heir by seducing Caron. Maceria marries Caron, but unexpectedly begins to care for her husband (to the point where she considers disobeying her father when he instructs her to dispose of Caron). Maceria considers running away with Caron and her yet-to-be-born second child, and abandoning Cato to Tywin so that her father does not hunt the trio down. But, tragedy strikes, and Caron (from Maceria's perspective) was not there for her when she gave birth to a stillborn daughter. In retribution, she ultimately follows through with her father's orders to dispose of Caron. It's a bit sloppy in that she chooses a poison to cause heart failure. Bea covers for her by doing the autopsy report. Maceria has complicated feelings towards Cato (see Chapter 3 summary), which she deals with by literally ignoring Cato's mistreatment by her father and spending her time drinking and spending money at auctions (which are just excuses that enable her to buy even more alcohol to bypass Tywin's attempts to curb her alcoholism). In Chapter 3, we saw Maceria's POV of Cato's 'obsession' with Clove. Maceria thinks 16-year-old Cato raped and tortured Clove when she was just 15 years old. And then Maceria was informed by her spy that Cato coerced Clove into replaying the same (and worse) in exchange for training lessons from him. This chapter, we find out what really happened between Cato and Clove.
Also in Chapter 3, Cato wins the pre-Games in District 2 (which is how District 2 decides their tribute), and the Great Games in District 13. We see some of Tywin's POV when Cato goes to the Mayor office to collect the 'extra' prize owed to him by District 2 (for him becoming a Victor). Cato tells Tywin he wants his prize to be Clove. Also from Tywin's POV, we learn that Bea and some other unnamed trainees all work for Tywin to report to him on his daughter and grandson; that Tywin killed his wife (remember in Chapter 2, how Maceria was dissuaded from her suspicion of him doing so by Bea?); and that he arranged to have the exposition structure collapse & Bea induce premature labour/ poison Maceria's unborn daughter (remember the tea Bea offered Maceria after Caron left for the Exposition?).
Now we find out what really happened over those years, from Cato's POV! Well, after a little blurb from Maceria in current time, of course
Responses to reviewers and Preview of Chapter 4 Part II at the end of the chapter!
Trigger warning: Non-explicit non-con when you reach the red-light alleys scene. I'll mark it with an '*'
A Monster's Prize & A Victor's Mask
Chapter 4, Part I:
how to wear a mask
"We all wear masks, and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own skin."
~ André Berthiaume
Maceria, age 39
Despite being pleasantly drunk, Maceria is bored.
So, as usual, she decides to seek out her own entertainment. There are no auctions to travel to (her cellar is well stocked from her latest expedition), so she opts to pay a visit to her newest house guest. Maceria opens the elaborate door to one of the West Wing guest rooms, and sees the urchin carelessly tossed onto the bed. The rodent is still very much wrapped in ropes and chains, which are now extended to the bed's bannisters. She is gagged with a filthy cloth.
Maceria carefully approaches the lavishly decorated bed, but is beyond disappointed to see that the girl has been knocked unconscious.
Maceria prods the girl with the bottle in her hand, and then with a shove, but the wretch doesn't stir.
'Probably knocked out from the drugs Cato's motley band of idiots used on her.' How annoying. 'Incompetent fools, robbing me of my show. Oh well, Caron and I can make our own in the winery.'
Maceria is drunk out of her mind when she revisits the princess that has been locked away in the tower.
This time when she opens the door, it is clear that the girl is awake, struggling to dislodge the restraints from the bedposts.
Maceria examines the squirming girl and begrudgingly admits that the girl could be pretty if her face wasn't snarled in hatred and her left cheek wasn't turning blue. Maceria's eyes hone in on the greenish-yellow splotches that borders the blue.
"Hmm." She sing-songs mockingly. "Cato won't be happy that you've been marked."
'By someone other than him, at least.'
The girl's scowl deepens.
Maceria smiles derisively. "Let's have a deal, yes? I've grown bored, again. And you seem not so boring. So how about I remove that dank strip of cloth my son's little underlings stuffed down your throat, and you don't go trying to claw out mine. Deal?"
Clove furrows her brow in suspicion, but ultimately nods. Her eyes are clear now. 'Good.' Games aren't fun when the other player is sleeping.
'I wonder what they drugged you up with… And I wonder if my beastly son will use the same to keep you in his bed.'
Maceria rips out the fabric, doing her best to keep her elegant hand away the urchin's teeth.
Clove starts coughing immediately, parched.
Maceria could offer water, but that's just so far away, so she pours some wine down the girl's throat instead.
Clove coughs harder. "That's foul." She croaks out. "How strong is that stuff?"
Maceria ignores Clove's questions in favour of her own. "I am curious, why not just give in? If Cato wants you, he'll take you. You should be happy to have caught the eyes of a Victor, and such a handsome one at that. You'll never have to work a day in your life." Maceria traces her hand against the plush silk duvet. "Just lay on your back and spread your legs, and you will want for nothing."
Clove scowls. "He wants more than a passive doll."
'Oh, don't worry, I remember Bea's words about the ally and the spy's words about the training. I know exactly how depraved his palate is.''
Maceria takes a larger gulp of her wine, before smirking. "So either adapt to his tastes or become numb to them."
Clove bristles, clearly enraged, but Maceria honestly doesn't know why. She has presented the younger girl with unparalleled wisdom. Bea had been right, 'What an ungrateful wretch.'
"It's disgusting that you can so blithely talk about his… his tastes. He's your son."
"Yes, yes, yes." Maceria swings the bottle in her hand, and nearly knocks Clove in the head with it. "Son, beast, monster. All the same, really. But I'm bored, remember? So then, girl, what is your plan? Some half-arsed dreams of escape?" Maceria's gaze shifts to the large window in the room. "Or perhaps you'll gut me, use my innards as rope to propel yourself down from your tower? Hmm?"
Clove frowns, almost sulking. "He'll grow sick of me eventually."
A barking laugh rips out of Maceria. 'Oh, you sorry, naïve little fool.' She keeps laughing, and laughing. Gosh, she hasn't laughed like this since the third time she nearly suffocated baby Cato. "Oh you stupid, stupidSouthern wench. Cato has been obsessed with you since he was ten. Years. Old." Maceria pokes the girl's bruised cheek with the open end of her wine bottle, and Clove flinches. "My little beast has been planning your life with him for a long time."
Maceria laughs once more. "Sick of you?" She scoffs. "Spare me."
Clove snarls and renews her efforts to pull herself out of the restraints. "Then I'll kill him. I won't just let him—"
"Why not?" Maceria smiles smugly. "You've let him do a lot of things to you before."
Clove freezes.
"Oh yes, I know all about how you paid him for his training lessons, and about that little alley incident when you were – hmm how old were you again, just 15? You must have been really desperate for that extra coaching. Well, on top of being clueless. You didn't think it odd that he never went after any other girl? He undoubtedly had other offers – girls desperate for their sons to have his eyes and his name and access to his Victor's funds. You didn't think it odd that he kept coming back to you?"
Clove shakes her head slowly, her disbelief growing. "I need to compete. I can win. I won't be dependent on him for the rest of my life."
In that moment, Maceria almost feels sorry for the girl.
In that moment, she is also almost impressed by Cato.
Not proud, dear Gods no, but impressed. The manipulative little bastard knew she came from nothing, knew that the private training every other trainee accessed was out of her range, and then he leveraged that knowledge over her head. 'He found a weakness and exploited it, looks like he grew into a true Steinn despite his looks.'
Maceria sighs almost-pityingly at the girl. "And would Cato let you do that? More than one Tribute has died in those perverse games, and quite a few come back with some crippling injury or another." Maceria can feel her almost-pity twist into something more-than-cruel. "Cato wouldn't want his favourite doll to break." She uses the bottle to poke at the girl's stomach, still tied up with so many restraints. She pokes at it again, harder, just because she can. "He wouldn't want the womb that will hold his heirs damaged in any way."
Clove is quiet for a long time, not meeting Maceria's gaze and plainly lost in her thoughts, before she speaks again. "You… know about the alley?"
'Such a soft whisper from such a rancorous girl.'
Maceria smiles, wider than before. A bit more maniacal too. "I'm the one who suggested it. I had thought it would… discourage you. I thought I'd give him a little power trip over you, and finally end his obsession. Had I known doing it would feed his obsession further, I probably would have just advised he kill you back when you were still a nobody… back when you would have been another faceless corpse in the filthy alleys lining the South. Another Southern corpse that nobody would have given a second thought."
'Now you're the 'Mistress of Knives', a little prodigy the Trainers whisper about, just like Cato."
Perhaps Clove reads Maceria's thoughts from her hazel eyes, because the young girl starts grasping. "My Trainers would want me to compete."
'Oh, this is so much fun.'
Maceria beams.
"Your trainers would rather you breed. After all, two little monsters like you both? Won't you produce just the beastliest little Victors for District 2. One after another, they'll strap you to his bed," she pokes at Clove's restrains. "Just like this. And then they will let him fuck you senseless; encourage him to pound you into the mattress again and again, until you've become nothing more than womb for his seed, spitting out babe after babe until you've shrivelled yourself up."
Clove pales. "I'll carve out my damn womb," she hisses.
Maceria snorts in disbelief. "You really are a pretty, vicious little thing aren't you? It's no wonder he is so obsessed with you. You might just be as monstrous as him."
.x.X.x.
Cato, age 6
Cato's first day at the Training Centre goes so, so well. He is easily the top of his bracket and probably even his Level, besting the others by leaps and bounds in both the formative skills display and the endurance testing. 'Grandfather will be pleased.' He thinks, grinning in relief. Cato will be reporting to his grandfather when he visits the older man's manor for dinner tonight. Despite his eagerness to share his success, it is not just the victories from today's sparring activities that hold the young boy's thoughts. No, it is what happened at the end of the day, after the praise of the Centre trainers ("You're a future Victor, Cato. No surprise, really, given your blood.")
When lessons were finished, many of his classmates were picked up by their fathers.
'Why is my father not here?' Cato frowns. 'Shouldn't I have a dad too?'
Cato is escorted to his mom's manor by one of his mom's servants. He tries to chat with the staff, asking the older woman if she knows where is father is. The lady stiffens. "That is not for me to comment on, Master Cato."
The servant lady does not talk much (at all) after that, despite Cato's multiple attempts to start a conversation. It's fine though, he just recounts his day to her, even if she doesn't respond with anything other than "yes, Master Cato". She seems to want to reply, and there are so many times that she almost smiles. He could swear he saw the corner of her mouth twitch when he said that his favorite part of the day was seeing his best friends Marvel and Devoric, and showing them the 'serious face' he had been practicing in the mirror all last week to look more like his Grandfather.
(Because he looks nothing like his mom, and nothing like his grandfather, and isn't that strange? Marvel has light blonde hair like his own mother and green eyes just like his father, and Devoric looks exactly like his father, right down to the pale eyes and blotchy skin. It would be nice to look like his family, to look like he belonged with them.)
'Maybe I look like my father too?'
Cato doesn't know. He doesn't know his father's name, let alone what the man looks like.
By the time he and the staff walk up to his mom's manor, Cato is brimming with curiosity.
'Is my dad away on a trip? Devoric's father goes on loads of trips to District 1 for work. I wonder when my dad will be back?'
The serving woman leaves him at the door, off to do her other duties. She bows when he thanks her. Cato doesn't understand why they always bow to him, but it's nice to have people closer to his height instead of always staring up at giants, so he supposes it's okay.
He toes off his shoes at the parlor of his mom's manor and one of the other servants scuttle towards him to take them away and to take his summer coat. "Is my Mom here?" he asks the man. The older man bows, points towards the kitchen, and then bows again before hurrying off.
Cato frowns, nervous now. He isn't sure which of his moms he will meet today. Sometimes he comes at a time when she hasn't drunk too much, so she just stares at him, but at least then he can be in the same room with her for a bit.
Other times (most times) are… bad. Those are the times he comes too late.
(Too late happens too often. He doesn't understand that until he is much older -when he is trying to mask memories that he never wanted, while burying his face in the soft neck of a brown-eyed girl. A resilient girl, who was also cursed with a horror of a history that she didn't deserve.)
He cautiously approaches the kitchen. His footsteps echo loudly in the empty hallways against shining - but cold - marble floors. 'I have to fix that.' He thinks. 'Grandfather says Victors walk silently.'
He turns the corner, and he thinks he hears her talking. He finally reaches the kitchen, where her back faces him. She's alone, and she's laughing.
"Did you hear a funny joke?" He asks excitedly. Jokes are funny. It would be nice to hear a joke. It would be nice to laugh with his mom.
She freezes, and slowly turns towards him. Her hazel eyes are as glassy as the half-empty bottle in her grip. When she twists to face him, he can see two more empty bottles behind her. The glass shells are rolling worryingly closer towards the counter's edge. 'I came too late, I always come too late.'
She sneers. "The only joke in my life is you."
She laughs again, harsher than before. Cato flinches, it doesn't sound nice.
'She's drunk. Again.' But Cato is curious enough about his father that he risks asking her about him anyways, even though she is wobbling and her words are slurring and she's cackling hysterically. It is hard to say his question loud enough to be heard over her sharp peals of laughter, but he says the words as clearly as he can.
"Mom… where's Dad?"
Her laughter stops abruptly. An ugly look takes over her face (which is difficult for his mom, because she is so pretty, the way he imagines the Queens of old used to look).
"Dead. Because of you."
Then his mom throws the bottle in her hand at his head.
He ducks, quite adept at dodging the byproducts of her rage. The dark glass shatters against the wall behind him, a shower of shards that bathe his back in golden liquid.
His Mom screams.
"How dare you!? How dare you ask me about him! You killed him, you beast, you monster. Get out! Get out! Get out of my damned house!"
He never asks his mother about his father again.
Cato, age 8
He sleuths through the many shelves of the Training Centre library until he comes upon a history textbook with detailed profiles of the more recent Victors. Cato learns a lot from the book.
He learns that Caron Dejanira, Victor of the 52nd Great Games, married Maceria Steinn just two years before he was born.
Cato learns that Caron Dejanira had blond hair and blue eyes, 'just like me', and that he was born in the West. The only non-East Victor ever. He learns that Caron Dejanira spent his time as a Victor by volunteering as a Trainer at the Centre, helping with the Centre's Expositions, and even starting a fund to help poor trainees.
'Caron Dejanira.' Cato whispers the name again and again, with an awed smile on his face. 'Dad.'
And then Cato learns about how an otherwise healthy Victor in the prime of his life died of 'sudden heart failure'.
He shuffles down a few aisles, to the medical section of the library. He doesn't know what heart failure is, so he tries to find a healing textbook from the Training Centre library that will help. One that will tell him all of the things that can cause heart failure. He doesn't understand any of the books he finds. There are too many big words like ventricle and pulmonary edema and isn't bronchiole a type of vegetable? He shakes his head, frustrated at his lack of knowledge, and searches out his Aunt Bea. 'Aunt Bea is a famous doctor, she would know.'
He walks to her condo. It's one of the fancy ones by the hospital, that starts on the first floor but her space goes all the way up to the eighth floor. He knocks on the door, swinging back and forth on his feet until it's opened by Aunt Bea's servant, Gilly. Cato tells Gilly he needs to see Aunt Bea. He is told that Dr. Tray is working late again. So, Cato perches on one of her fancy couches, and waits. She takes long enough that he ends up napping.
Aunt Bea shakes him awake at some late hour, and he finally gets to ask her. "Aunt Bea, is there a way to give someone else heart failure?"
(Because he needs to know if his mom was telling the truth, if he really killed his own Dad.)
Aunt Bea smiles warmly at him. "Of course not, sweet boy. Now get those dreary thoughts out of your mind. How about you tell me more about how you're doing with your training while I walk you back to your Mom's manor, hmm?"
Cato is small, and young, but Grandfather has trained Cato to tell if a person is lying. And he's good at it, with everyone except his mom and Grandfather. He never thought he would have to use the skill on his aunt.
'Aunt Bea lies.'
(It is a sad lesson to learn, but an important one.)
He goes to one of the student doctors in the Training Centre the next day instead. They like to show off, the same way the older trainees do. So he approaches a pair of them, who are laughing in the corner of the cafeteria as they eat their lunch. He asks them the same question. They look worriedly at each other, not subtly at all, before trying to change their faces and reassure him that it isn't possible.
Cato is seething. 'Everyone lies.'
He is out of options, and is considering other people to ask when he happens upon an opportunity by chance (or more so because he needs to get a laceration on his shoulder stitched up – 'stupid Devoric and his stupid knife'). Jon Arryn, one of the older nurses, takes care of a lot of the minor injuries, and so Cato is sent to him.
Cato knows that a lot of the other doctors and nurses don't like Nurse Jon, because he's from the West. Grandfather's words echo in Cato's ears: 'Those from the East matter. Those from the West are beneath us. And those from the South? They are dirt'. And yet, despite what everyone thinks and despite his grandfather's words, Cato likes Nurse Jon. The older man is kind, and when he is stitching up Cato's injuries he always asks him about things other than fighting – like Cato's favourite colour, or his favourite food. (Sometimes, it is nice to have someone who treats him like a person instead of a trainee.)
"Nurse Jon, is there a way to give someone heart failure?" Cato asks, once the man is done suturing Cato's arm.
The man gives Cato a firm look, a knowing look, one that then evolves into sadness and even a bit of pity. "Yes, Cato, there is. But, you best not ask that again."
'Some people tell the truth.'
"Can a kid cause it?"
For a second, Cato thinks he sees rage flicker in Nurse Jon's eyes. But the look is gone so quickly that Cato supposes he might have just imagined the ugly emotion on the kind man's face.
"No, Cato. But an angry adult can."
Cato now understands something he shouldn't, and before going home, he cries in a hidden place. It is his own secret shelter, with walls composed of a thick copse of white-barked trees with red leaves. An isolated area that stands out just enough from the other colorful trees lining the banks of the Trident River.
After his conversation with Nurse Jon, Cato starts spending more nights with his grandfather. Oftentimes, instead of sleeping, Cato spends the lightless hours in an overly large room in his grandfather's house, staring blankly at the ceiling.
("You killed him, you beast, you monster!")
Cato turns into his pillow, his cheek meeting the coolness of the unused half. His eyes are wide open despite the light breaking through the curtains.
(He wonders if his mother is capable of killing him too.)
It is later, when he is memorizing the lineages of all the houses in the East, that he asks his grandfather about his dad.
"My dad was born in the West." Cato pauses. "Is that why I don't have my dad's name?"
Tywin Steinn responds easily, colder than the ice packets given out at the Centre. "You are the Steinn legacy, scion of the greatest House in all of District 2 East." Tywin's eyes tighten. "You would do well to not draw attention to the fact that the West taints your blood."
Cato repeats the same line he has heard a thousand times. "Because those from the East matter. Those from the West are beneath us. And those from the South are less than dirt."
Tywin nods approvingly. "Exactly. Now, repeat the names and current political seats held by House Bolton."
Cato, age 9
Cato is lonely.
Fellow trainees drift towards him because he is strong, because of his name, and every conversation ends with either sycophantic pandering, unsubtle requests for hints and advice, and for the love of the Gods, even allusions to marriage.
Cato distracts himself from his loneliness with training. And sometimes, even Marvel and Devoric make it a bit better. Especially Marvel, who even invites Cato over for dinner at the Dayne home occasionally.
(Of course, something feels off about Marvel and Devoric. Something is strange about the things they ask, and the things they prod him about. But, those are secrets he will uncover much later.)
Cato puts on a mask, mirrors the cold sternness of his grandfather and biting indifference of his mother.
(it's all he knows, all he's been shown, so it's easy to reflect)
Cato goes to dinner with Marvel's parents. Despite hailing from the wealthy House Dayne, Marvel's family was not as well-off as the other branches of his House. The rumour surrounding the family was that Marvel's father – Duncan Dayne – had eloped with Marvel's mother – Jenny Oldstones – who was a woman from a District 7 working class lumber family. This was done against the wishes of Marvel's grandfather, Aegon Dayne. Aegon threatened to disinherit Duncan if he did not leave his wife. Duncan refused. And so, Aegon ripped away Duncan's inheritance, and gave it to another Dayne member instead. Despite the… scandal… swirling about the family, Cato figures his grandfather permits Cato's association with this branch of Daynes because Duncan still holds one of the elected seats on the District 2 Council.
Either way, Marvel's immediate family is normal (or, at least, what Cato suspects a normal family is supposed to be like). There are six siblings in total, with Marvel being the oldest and constantly overtly favoring his youngest twin sisters, Ashara and Allyria. The dinner is a disorderly and riotous, with several hands reaching every which way across the table, multiple conversations being held on top of each other, and even loud snorts of laughing with spittle of food projecting out of some of the children. The two younger boys spend the dinner exchanging mock insults, responding to each other with exaggerated outrage, and challenging each other to fights to the death with pointed forks. Their parents leave the table for a moment, to do Gods knows what, and the oldest girl – the ever prim and proper Glimmer – uses the opportunity to chastise Ashara for bringing a "dirty" doll to the dinner table. Glimmer then tries to remove the doll, much to the grievance of the other childrens' eardrums.
"Oi, Glimmer! Let up, will you? Just let Ash keep her damned doll." Marvel scowls, rubbing his ears and likely hoping no permanent damage was caused by Ashara's piercing wails.
(Allyria squeals in affront. "It's my doll!" / "No, it's mine!" Ashara howls.)
Glimmer gasps. "Marvel Dayne, you watch your mouth! I'm going to tell mother that you swore! And no, I will not 'let up', because it is simply not appropriate to bring a toy to the dinner table, especially when we have a guest."
Marvel sighs, faced with a brick wall of his unrelenting sister, and turns towards the easier of his siblings to manipulate. "Ashy, why don't you play hide and seek with the doll? I can send it to hide, and you can find it later?"
Ashara pauses her argument with Allyria, seeming to take the offer into consideration.
Allyria pipes up. "Can I play with Rhaenys?!"
Marvel frowns. "Rhaenys?"
Ashara scowls. "Her name is Elia."
Glimmer rolls her eyes at Marvel. "The doll."
Marvel looks at Allyria's clearly finished plate, which she displays to her older brother proudly. "Sure Ally, go play with… Rhae-Eli-the doll. And then Ashara can join you when she finishs her dinner." He stares pointedly at the latter girl's half eaten supper. Allyria squeals in delight, grabs the doll from Ashara's begrudgingly loosened grip, and scampers out of the kitchen in the time it takes Cato to blink.
Ashara seems discontent, still. Unsurprising, really, given that the girl hadn't agreed to the dismissal of her doll and twin. She looks at Marvel, with all the seriousness in the world, and continues to barter. "You sent away my doll. So I want a hug."
Marvel looks confused at her request.
"Hugs make everything better." She says, with all the inherent wisdom of a four-year-old.
Cato feels something twist in his gut.
'What's a hug feel like?'
Cato wishes he had parents. True ones, like Marvel. He wouldn't care if they were rich. He wouldn't care if meals were loud and chaotic. He wouldn't care that there were dirty dolls at the dinner table.
(Anything is better than lonely meals on a mahogany table. The few times his grandfather joins him, the meals are filled with questions on his training. The few times Cato joins his mother, she spends the time drinking, each glass causing more and more hatred to spill from her eyes whenever she looks upon him)
Cato isn't allowed to befriend staff. "Beneath you, and distractions besides," according to Grandfather.
Cato and Marvel are about to head to the River to skip some stones. Before they leave the Dayne's house ('home', he corrects himself), Marvel's mother hugs the blonde-haired boy. Marvel brushes her off jokingly. She pats his head. "Come back soon, okay? And try not to get into any trouble, please?"
Marvel smiles. "Ya, ya, Mom. You got it." She kisses his forehead before he playfully bats her away with flushed cheeks, a glance towards Cato, and an embarrassed: "Mom." Jenny Dayne laughs warmly at her son's flustered state before waving them both out the doors.
Cato is struck with an envy so visceral, he cannot breathe.
Cato, age 10
It is the first day back from winter holiday (well, for most… 'holidays' for Cato just meant extra training under Tywin Steinn).
Cato strides into the Training Centre flanked Marvel and Devoric. The other two boys are still in Level 2, but hold the second and first ranking, respectively. Respectable positions, especially for their ages (both being about two years older than Cato). Cato is somewhat-newly in Level 3, but has already made the top ranking, largely due to his utter thrashing of Level 3's first ranked last week.
There are two others who tag along behind the trio, Joffrey and Lancel Waters. The two brothers snivel, whine, and are just too freaking incompetent for Cato's liking. Unfortunately, he is forced to tolerate their presence because their father was the Deputy Mayor to Cato's Grandfather. 'By the Gods, six years in, and they are still mid-ranked in Level 1. Useless. Absolutely useless.'
All the Levels gather in the Centre's main hall for daily morning assembly. Other than the weekly sparring matches, where any trainee could challenge another and where Trainers set up specific matches, the morning assembly is the only time other than meals where trainees in different levels interacted. 'Well, other than specialty classes, sometimes.'
Usually, Cato filters out all the irrelevant information being announced, which tends to be most of it. Sometimes, the Trainer of the day truly does just drone on and on and on. Even worse, today the Trainer named Euron was gracing the stage with his presence. Just looking at Euron gives Cato the creeps. 'By the Gods, that Trainer is slimy. And way too in love with the sound of his own damned voice—'
"…pleased to welcome a new addition to our Training Centre…"
Cato's attention snaps back to Euron. New trainees rarely join, so he is curious, and he can tell his companions are as well.
"…Clove Stark. She'll be joining Level 2…"
'Even more interesting. I would think they would start her at Level 1.' She must have some degree of skill, which is even more surprising given her appearance. She's… small. Both in height and in mass, with delicate looking arms. Cato almost snorts. 'She looks like she can be toppled by a strong breeze.'
Devoric is chatting with (to) Cato after assembly, Marvel and the inept duo having trailed off somewhere else.
Devoric sneers. "I hear she's from the South." He says the word 'South' the way most people say the word 'maggot.' "How dare she strut up here, like she has any right to breathe the same fucking air as us."
Cato nods to show he is still listening, but in truth he is a mile away in his head, wondering if he should focus on swordsmanship or spear-throwing today. 'Perhaps neither, and foraging instead? May as well since no one left in Level 3 provides any real challenge. If they would just hurry up and promote me to Level 4, I wouldn't have to wait for the end of the week to face trainees that actually pose some degree of difficulty.'
(Later on, Cato will reflect and suspect Devoric probably did what he did next out of some misguided attempt to regain Cato's attention.)
The new girl walks by them, Euron having just guided her towards the platform between where the Level 3 and the Level 2 trainees train.
"Hey, Gutter Rat!" Devoric calls out, loud enough for those in the immediate vicinity, including the new girl as well as a few Trainers and trainees, to hear.
She freezes. Her back is to them, so Cato can't make out the rest of her reaction.
"Ya, you. Southslide slut." He continues to jeer, and some of the nearby Trainees snort (even Euron smirks) at Devoric's… wit. Empowered by the growing crowd's acceptance, Devoric gives the girl an exaggerated look, from head to toe. "Little thing like you won't last too long with us. But, I bet your type can get some sick type's rockers off down in that whorehouse you were found in. Why not tramp on back over there, before your customers sludge up our streets, looking for their favourite pretty Stark cun—'
She turns abruptly, eyes blazing. Despite the burning rage in her eyes, the girl's words are ice. "Spar. You, me. Now."
Devoric… Devoric laughs. He laughs so hard, he starts heaving. "Oh, fuck, am I going to enjoy putting a little bitch like you in her place." He smirks. "I'm going to teach you not to talk back to your betters, rat."
Euron points them towards one of the sparring matts. Of course, the duo have gathered a larger crowd now.
The match is over so quickly, most of the audience is left in shock.
Cato is left in awe.
'She beat Devoric. First ranking. On her first day.'
Her legs are still wrapped around his neck, Devoric's pallor growing and he gasps for air the girls tightening grip won't allow. She calls out that if he (or anyone, based on how loudly she is giving her warning) dares to insult her again, "I'll break your neck, and no Trainer or Training rules are going to save you."
Because that's what they're doing, Euron approaching and coaxing her to release her strangling hold on Roose Bolton's son.
She does, and leaves Devoric heaving (not from laughter, not this time).
She turns, and meets Cato's gaze directly for the first time. Their eyes collide, dark brown locking onto cobalt blue. It feels like a challenge.
'Shall I depose you next?' She seems to be threatening.
Cato's fists tighten, and his stomach lurches in anticipation. It's been so long since he's had a worthy opponent. He has been indomitable ice for years, and here she comes, all fierce fire and searing skill, scorching her way through his expectations. He wonders what it would be like to fight her – even wonders what it would be like to just to be near her – to be so close to such a destructive blaze.
She raises a dark brow.
He smirks in response.
'Game on, Clove Stark.'
Grandfather gets him a dog, of all things, for his 11th birthday.
It's so unexpected, so bewildering, and such an amazing gift, that Cato is rendered completely speechless.
"Well? What will you name it?" Tywin demands.
It's not that large of a dog. Medium-sized, coming up to his knee when it stands on all fours. It's energetic, and covered in a dark brown, almost black, coat. 'Almost the same shade of brown as—' He mentally shakes the image of Clove Stark out his head.
(only not really, not really at all.)
"Blaze." Cato smirks, as he pets the creature's head. "His name is Blaze."
In one of her daily drunken stupors, Maceria warns Cato that he will regret Blaze.
"Stupid boy, you'll regret that gift when it opens."
Cato ignores her. She's not even making sense, because Cato already opened the gift box that Blaze was in on his birthday.
'You're just jealous because I have someone who cares about me now, unlike you.' He thinks viciously. Or then again, maybe he says it. Because his cheek is burning. Did she just slap him? Whatever. Not like it matters, she won't remember his words tomorrow morning anyways.
Blaze's hackles rise, and he growls at Maceria for the attack.
Cato grins and scratches behind Blaze's ears affectionately. "Good boy. You get a treat when we get to Grandfather's house."
He watchers Clove finish her spar against Marvel, winning embarrassingly easily.
Marvel is a better loser than Devoric ('not difficult, a troll would be a more gracious loser than Devoric Bolton'), and congratulates her on a "spar well fought."
Marvel's words aren't bitter at all. But that is because it's Marvel's eyes that give away the rage at losing to a girl, a younger girl, a younger girl from the South.
Cato saw it all happen from his perch on the platform, where he was taking a water break after winning his own spar against one of the mid-ranked Level 4 trainees. Clove and Marvel were the last spar of the day, so the trainees are now free to go for the evening.
Cato lets them filter out before he approaches her.
He wants to tell her that she did well. Instead he hears himself say, "you take too long to draw your knives."
Clove makes him wait until she is finished downing her own water before she deigns to respond. "And you," she smirks haughtily, "rely too much on strength over speed. You're slow."
'What nerve!' He glowers, before turning and strutting towards the exit. 'I am not slow!'
(He isn't. Not now. But he will be when it matters most, sometime in the future, and 'too slow, too slow, too slow; if only I had realized sooner, I could have saved her,' will be his new lullaby because of it).
They spar the next week. He wins.
But not easily.
"I guess I wasn't as slow as you thought. But, you still take too long to draw." He tells her, offering her a hand. "You were almost a challenge."
She swats the proffered assistance away, furious. "Fuck off." She snarls at him, wiping the blood from her split lip before pulling herself off of the ground.
'Red is a nice colour on her,' he thinks.
They spar again. At least once every two weeks. She's still in Level 2 (thought Cato isn't sure why) and he's in Level 3, so their only real opportunities to do so are the end of the week spars.
He starts to look forward to them, and he suspects that, just maybe, she does too.
They snark at each other outside of sparring, giving backhanded compliments while trading haughty advice and outraged indignation.
Cato, age 12
Blaze is Cato's truest friend. His only friend, really.
It is nice, having someone who is genuinely happy to spend time with him. (Blaze and him will spend hours in the evening chasing each other around the Trident after they finish his finishes laps together.)
It is nice, having someone who cares when he comes home. (Blaze excitedly bounds up to Cato every time he enters the foyer, jumping up eagerly and playfully barking a hello.)
It is nice, having someone talk to. (Blaze sits with him at meals, and sleeps at the foot of his bed. Blaze is Cato's constant companion.)
It is nice until it isn't nice. (Nice turns into a nightmare he will never forget.)
"No!" Twelve-year-old Cato sobs. "Please!" He begs and pleads. "No! I won't! I won't do it!" But he does. Because Tywin Steinn does not accept no. Tywin Steinn does not accept weakness. And Tywin Steinn does not believe in mercy.
Once again, Cato finds the secret shelter encased by large white-barked trees and roofed by their shiny red leaves. The roof is a bit patchy this time, since the leaves have begun to fall. (It may be a bit battered, but the hideaway still stands.)
For the second time, Cato cries while huddled in his hidden place near the banks of the Trident River. His arms encircle his knees and his hand grips Blaze's collar.
He is alone. Truly alone in every way now.
"Why are you crying?"
Cato rips his face out of his arms when he hears her voice.
There is no room for denial, his cheeks are stained with tears and his eyes feel puffier than they've ever been, and he's pretty sure there's dry and wet snot on his shirt.
A part of him wants to scream at her to go away.
But the larger part, the part that craves for someone to care about him, tells her. "My dog… my dog died."
For a minute, her eyes soften. But then she lifts a disbelieving brow and scoffs. "That's hardly a reason to—" She cuts herself off abruptly.
She looks at him, truly looks at him, and maybe she sees that there is more to the story. She approaches him slowly, and then reaches out a hand. He doesn't understand what she is doing, and his confusion paralyzes him.
For a second he thinks her hand is coming towards his neck, but before he can shove the outstretched limb away, it instead stops on his shoulder.
She stiffly pats it. "There, there." She says. It sounds so strained and forced and awkward that Cato laughs. Even though he thought he would never be capable of laughter again. Because at least she tried, at least she truly looked.
They stay there, silent. Well, she stays silent, standing vigil over him as he crouches and continues to cry at the base of the white-barked tree. When he feels as though he has run out of tears, he wipes his face and stands. If he is shaky in his ascent, she makes no comment on it. He starts looking about the ground, trying to find a fallen leaf that isn't cracked. He almost gets frustrated, before he turns to see Clove offering him a large, unbroken, carmine leaf.
'It's just what I need.'
He walks down the river, and lets the collar float away on it.
He turns, and she is still behind him, giving him the strangest look. His cheeks burn, he is so embarrassed that she saw him so… so… so…
"You should wash your face in the Trident. It's reaching dusk now. So if you cool your face with the river water, and then use the stones under the puffy parts of your eye, the dimming lights should be enough to get home so that no-one who runs into you will suspect… anything."
He nods.
She turns to leave.
"Thanks." He pushes the word out quickly and quietly, before he loses the nerve to speak.
She doesn't respond, just continues to walk away.
When she leaves his sight, his hand slowly comes up to cover his shoulder – the place where she had touched him with her palm. It buzzes strangely, and he isn't sure if he wants to rub off the feeling or rub it deeper into his skin.
(Years later, she will tell him that she realized the collar was soaked in blood. She will tell him that she once had her own dog – a wolf – that met a tragic end too.)
'Victors need to be capable of killing without hesitation. No matter the person. You let sentiment cloud your mind, and this will be all the more painful because of it. I told you to never get attached, and you failed to head my lesson. This is consequence.'
Cato, age 13
An Annual Exposition is today.
Each trainee has to go through three spars (against a trainee below, at, and above their level) as well as participate in four specialist competitions.
Cato beat every one of his competitors in his combat spars, even the one against a mid-ranked Level 5 despite Cato still being a mid-ranked Level 4. Moreover, Cato won three of the four specialist competitions that he participated in (swordsmanship, the obstacle course, and spear-throwing).
Of course he lost knife throwing.
(Clove won that one. And the foraging, stealth, and archery competitions).
She may have won all her specialist competitions, but she lost one of her spars. Level 2 against a Level 4. Her against him.
So in the end, he wins the Exposition, which will hopefully sate Tywin, who was no doubt watching Cato's every performance with pinpoint precision from the central spectator box.
Everyone has left, but Cato is – unsurprisingly – still there. He is waiting for Tywin to finish accepting praise on his behalf, while the man networks and discusses whatever it is that Mayors are supposed to discuss with the other important spectators that showed up.
Cato's gaze flits about, and he notices that Clove left her wrist tape on the bench just before he is approached by Tywin. The Mayor has just finished with his last fan/colleague/voter/sponsor/whomever.
Most people would leave her wrist tape be, because most trainees don't bother collecting the materials that they are given by the Training Center. They just leave the items where they are, and the Centre custodians take care of it. However, Cato has noticed that Clove never leaves the items she is given, that she always pockets any of the items that the Centre gives away for free—
"You lost."
Tywin's baritone is an unpleasant way to be pulled from his thoughts on Clove.
"Just one station, Grandfather. I won the others."
Tywin frowns.
"You lost."
Cato's fists clench as he frowns at the floor.
Tywin firmly grips Cato's chin and forces his gaze back to meet to the older man's furious stare.
"Tell me. Tell me how you lost." He growls out, the grip on Cato's chin tightening uncomfortably with every word.
"Because I'm more accurate with my knife-throwing than he is. Pretty self-explanatory, Mayor Steinn."
'Clove.' He recognizes her voice, even without looking behind his shoulder to confirm who has interrupted Tywin's burgeoning rant.
Tywin slowly releases Cato's chin, and smiles coldly at the girl, who had somehow unknowingly come up behind Cato. ('I can see why she won stealth,' he thinks fondly.)
"Congratulations on your winnings, Miss. Stark."
Clove smiles back. "Thank you, Mayor Steinn. But I think we both know that the person who deserves the praise is the one in front of you. After all, he did win the entire Exposition."
Cato doesn't meet her gaze, but he doubts she is searching for his at the moment either. A fact that is confirmed when she walks towards her wrist tape.
"Have a lovely evening Mr. Mayor." She says impishly, as she tosses the roll of tape in her hand and strolls towards the exit.
'Clove.'
Clove is the first person to ever stand up for him against Tywin. Even his own mother abandoned him to the Mayor, repeatedly.
Cato doesn't see the small quirk of his lips. Or the softening of his eyes. Or the way he nervously scratches the back of his neck and gazes a wistfully at where her wrist tape was.
Unfortunately, Tywin does.
Clove is strong, fast, skilled.
She has big, rounded brown eyes and a smattering of freckles over her nose and a couple on her forearms too. She has pale skin covering a lean frame, but it seems to be tanned from time spent outdoors.
She looks almost like the ceramic doll that Marvel's sisters own. Only Clove is steel, not something so delicate as ceramic.
She has a pouty mouth and a sharp tongue. She has warm dark brown locks that look soft even if she always keeps them out of her face in a harsh pony tail.
Clove can be snarky, and smart, and funny.
The elastic snaps when he tosses her onto the mat during one of their spars, and her hair is let loose. Cato's cheeks burn, and he is momentarily distracted.
'Clove is pretty.'
Cato, age 16
Clove is attractive, and Cato is not the only one who has noticed.
Cato is passively doing some biceps curls at the weight training area for Level 5 trainees when he hears them. An older student in Level 3 talking about her to his friend. He hears the little shit talk about how the Training Centre uniform looks on her, hears him describe what he wants to do to her – what he wants to make her do to him - in disgusting detail.
The next thing Cato knows, his arm is pressed across the bastard's neck, shoving the redhead against the wall, as the slimy git gasps for air.
"The next time you insult her, I'm going to rip out your tongue." He warns in Tywin's voice.
She stalks up to him later, frazzled.
"I can fight my own battles."
And then the crazy girl shoves him into the lockers.
He is dumbstruck. She is perhaps the recipient of the only protective act he has ever done, and she throws his kindness back in his face. She doesn't make any sense, ever, at all.
(She will tell him what the real issue is in the future. She will tell him that half of her appeal to them was that he claimed her as his. They couldn't beat him in a spar, and couldn't beat him to a crown, so they went after her, seeking to beat him in other ways.)
It is the weekly sparring session again. And of course, she challenges him.
They spar.
He wins. Again. Again. And again.
All three of three rounds.
The last round ends with her on her back. He keeps her felled with his body overlying hers, and his hands forcing her arms down.
She snarls, clearly frustrated that she has yet to beat him.
His gaze follows her expression, landing on the soft pink shade of her chapped lips.
He wonders what it would be like to kiss her.
He suspects she'd taste like salvation... whatever that means.
(But actually, their first kiss will taste like a lie. And their second kiss will taste like guilt.)
She wins.
Not the spar, but she wins a round, and that is a feat no trainee their age but her can claim.
She had come at him from behind, and when he had felt her breath on his neck, when he felt her lips behind his ear, he had hesitated and she had taken the opening.
(He wonders if she realizes how she won. He hopes not. That last thing he needs is to worry about her… seducing him in between dodging her sharp blades)
He can't forget the echo of her breath against his neck.
They have a second spar with each other, unofficial, in the forest. No spectators.
She wins one round again, and there is no breath on his neck that he can blame it on. She is just that skilled now.
He is proud. Stupidly so, but he doesn't know why.
He follows her home after Training ends on the day that he loses to her. It isn't for any nefarious purpose, he is just, well he is curious. He knows nothing about her. And he wants to know. He wants to know who she is outside of the Training Centre.
(He learns. He learns a lot)
He follows behind her, struggling to stay hidden from her range of awareness. And as he stalks her along the streets, she talks him further and further away from the Training Centre. Along the way, he sees her deft hands pickpocketing, and he is amazed. Because he wouldn't have been able to tell if he wasn't so focused on her, and even then he has a hard time discering exactly what movements her hands are making.
She moves in a circle through the streets, eventually ending up along the forest that lines the Trident. It's a different part than where Cato's hideout is. Instead, she stops in a section of the forest that borders the East and the South. It's a park area that is frequently patrolled by officers who prevent loitering (and occasionally exercise their justice over straying Southerners).
Cato sees what looks like a bundled sleeping bag – one of the kinds they used to practice survival training with at the Training Centre – and a Centre backpack at the top of one of the trees.
She sighs. "Why are you following me, Cato?"
Of course she realized he was following her. He figured that out and gave up trying to be subtle about it a few blocks away from the Training Centre. He steps forward until he is standing in front of her. He nudges his shoulder at the tree and frowns. "Is this where you sleep?"
She shrugs. "I find places. It's really none of your concern."
The offer leaves Cato's lips before his mind processes it. "Stay with me. We have plenty of empty roo—"
She snorts. "I don't need your pity. I have done more than well enough without you and—"
"It's not pity" Cato cuts her off in return.
She smiles mockingly. "Then what do you want in exchange. No one does anything without wanting something in return."
His gaze is drawn to the curve of her mouth when she smiles. He doesn't realize, but he stares at her lips for too long.
When Clove notices, she immediately shoves him away from her. Her eyes wide in disbelief and fury and … fear?
"Get away from me!" she shouts.
He realizes then, what she thinks he wanted.
"No, that's not what I… I didn't mean… I wouldn't make you… I didn't mean that!" He fumbles with his words horribly.
"Yes, you did." She snorts and turns away from him. "I should have known. You're disgusting and you're just like every other entitled 2 East bastard–"
Cato's mind freezes at her implication, and his stumbling is over. He reaches forward and firmly grabs her arm, forcibly spins her back to face him.
"Like who?" He growls out.
Clove doesn't respond. She stays silent, likely having realized she said too much.
His grip tightens.
"Tell me Clove."
Something in Cato's gut tightens in an awful, horrible way. He remembers the words from the Level 3 trainee, remembers what the son of a bitch said he would do to her. Cato wonders now if anyone ever acted on the words.
"You think that piece of shit from Level 3 was the only one?" She looks at the ground, refusing to meet his gaze. "How many times do you think I've shoved a Trainer's hand off my thigh? Or had to avoid older trainees' painfully unsubtle attempts to get me in a locked room?" She sneers. "Why do you think I'm still in Level 3, Cato? I've been performing on par with you for years."
She finally rips her gaze from the ground, and when she looks at him, it is with such a profound fury that it almost looks like hatred. "People from the East don't like it when people from the South, or even West, do well at anything. Don't tell me you didn't notice. Why do you think Jon Arryn is still a nurse and has been refused entrance into the medical Academy multiple times, even though he is the smartest of them all? Why do you think no one cared when your daddy popped dead? Why do you think the Training Centre Head told me to 'make use of the opportunities given' when I told him that Euron tried to shove his tongue down my throat. Why do you think that same Head told me I was being 'overly sensitive' when I stopped Euron by shoving the knife from my boot into his arm?"
Her eyes are searing in their hatred – and it is hatred, he recognizes it plainly now.
"You fucking elitist East side snobs, thinking yourselves entitled to everything and everyone. You may as well put up a literal wall to bar us off, you've made enough figurative ones."
She stops herself, breathing deeply, trying to catch her breath after her rant.
Cato wants to… console her. But he isn't sure how. He doubts this is the kind of injustice that will be ameliorated with a pat on the shoulder.
She continues. "You probably think you've worked hard for your rank. And you're good, you know. You really are. But, don't kid yourself into thinking that you're some self-made Victor. When that crown is put on your head, it'll be because you had access to every means needed to put it there. You never had anyone tell you it wasn't yours to wear."
She refused to come back with him, and perhaps that is a good thing, because the moment he enters his mother's house his anger at Clove's situation manifests as a rampage. He throws vases and relics and rips into his mother's fancy paintings.
For every hardship he thought he had, he realizes she has had it worse.
(She is an orphan, he knows it in his gut now, and he doesn't even know what happened to her parents. But he bets it was terrible, he knows this because she has never mentioned them. Not once.)
The idea that fucking Euron, that other trainers and trainees had… had propositioned her, had dared to touch her, with no repercussions…
Cato's blood is boiling.
Not just at the circumstance, not just at the Head and Euron and all those other shits, but at himself too.
His mother interrupts his rampage.
And then… and then she…
Maceria Steinn is truly a monster, he can't believe what he has just heard her suggest.
(he feels guiltier and angrier when he wonders If he is much better than his mother, recalling how, for a second – just for the briefest of seconds – he had considered taking a kiss from Clove as payment)
His mother is (relatively) sober when she suggests the idea of assaulting Clove as some sort of vengeance for her defeating him. Her sobriety only makes the suggestion more horrifying.
'I'm not like you.' Cato tells himself. 'I'm not a monster. I'd never hurt her, ever. Especially not like that.'
He offers to train her. His offer saying the words he cannot. 'Let me save you.'
She declines. The fierce look in her eyes responding, 'I can save myself, just fine.'
Later that week, she loses too quickly to him.
Cato can easily infer that something is wrong with her.
So once again, he finds himself following her after training.
Last time, she had clued into his tailing her quite early on. This time, whatever holds her thoughts must be all consuming, because she doesn't appear to notice him at all.
They walk away from the Training Centre, through East, through the separating forest line, and through the South to the very end. Then he sees her enter an area that sends off all his internal warning bells.
"What are you doing in the Red-Light Alleys, Clove?"
The crowd grows, the light of dusk fades.
He loses her in the crowd.
His heart clenches. He frantically searches through the throngs of drunkards and whores and sleazy clients and shady figures.
'No. No. No. Clove, Clove where are you?'
*trigger
He finds her.
In an alley.
Under a man who has his hands on her throat while thrusting his hips inside of her, her clothing ripped from her body.
Cato sees red. An all-consuming almost-black red.
In hindsight, he would have pulled the attacker off of her, and given the bastard a slow and painful death. Flaying. Gelding. Ripping off his fucking nails one by one for daring to break Clove.
But Tywin's training takes over, and his red rage is honed efficiency, so all he does is snap the bastard's neck.
('Snap, crack, dead, done.')
He looks over to Clove who is staring wide-eyed at the corpse he has just shoved off of her nearly-naked body.
She's still, stuck in a stupor.
His fury doesn't abate. "Clove! Clove? Clove?!" He shakes her shoulders roughly. "Clove, look at me. Look at me. Why didn't you defend yourself? Why didn't you stop him? You fucking idiot. Why the hell did you come to this fucking area—."
"No." she shakes her head, dazed, still starring dazedly at the man's cooling body. "No, no, no." The shaking gets worse, her entire body is thrashing now. "No, you ruined it!" She screams at him, and then she starts sobbing. He has never seen her cry before.
He's seen her staunching blood flow from a broken nose while getting her dislocated shoulder reset, without a shedding a single tear. And now – his eyes see her hands. 'What the fuck did that son of a bitch do to her wrists?!'
There is gross bruising and bones in odd angles along her entire right and left hands.
But here she is, screaming.
He tries to calm her down, and is largely unsuccessful. She becomes hysterical, hitting him, trying to claw at his face by only reaching his neck. Which is so stupid of her, because be he knows doing so must be further damaging her wrists. 'You stupid, stupid girl.' He holds her arms steady by her elbows, and tries his best to calm her down. "Tell me." He tells her. "Tell me why you let him do that to you."
Because he knows that she let him. Because she is the strongest trainee apart from him, who always carries at least two knives on her at a time, and that man was just a man.
"My sister." Clove sobs. "He has my sister, and you just ruined the only way I had to get her back!"
He takes stock of her other injuries. The ones he can see, at least. It's bad, especially her wrists. Her hands… they might not be unusable after this. She needs a good physician, now, and the Training Centre won't be available until tomorrow. He doesn't know where Jon Arryn lives, and he is the only man Cato knows who might have considered helping her without questions.
Clove refuses to be taken to the District 2 Hospital.
"No one can know, please Cato. No one can ever know."
There is one option.
'She's the competition,' hisses a voice in his head that sounds too much like Tywin. 'Let her hands be crushed, there are other ways you can enjoy her company.'
He shoves the voice into the deepest corner of his mind, shuts the lock, and chains it up twice. He doesn't ever want to hear that voice again. Besides, Cato justifies to himself that he is helping her because he hasn't beaten her yet since his defeat, and it won't feel like a true victory anymore if her wrists are spoiled, and she was the only decent training partner he had. He repeats this to himself, even though knows it isn't true; he knows he is helping her because he cares about her and because she doesn't deserve this.
He covers her bruised and bloody exposed form with his jacket, and then gently lifts her into his arms before making his way through the streets. He tries to stay in the shadows, but honestly, no one seems to bat an eye at the fact that he is carrying a girl that could be unconscious. She has long since stopped struggling, but he wonders if anyone would have bothered to help her even if she did.
Instead of struggling against him, she whispers a horrible story.
"We needed money. We had no place to live, and it was the rainy season. We were cold. We were starving. And it was just the both of us after… after ..." she tapers off.
"And I tried to steal, but there were so many times that I got caught before I got good, and each time I would get beaten and Senna, Senna couldn't take me coming back bloody anymore."
(he doesn't think to ask why two little girls were abandoned. Not tonight. That is not a story he hears until much later).
"So she went to fucking Baelish. And she… she started to work in the brothel. And I slept there at night, in one of the closets, and ate their food. At first, Senna came to me at least once every night. But then she came back less and less. And when she did come, I couldn't recognize her, not anymore. So I spent my time while she was… working… I spent that time practicing. And the next term, I got accepted into the Training Center. Into the scholarship spot that your dad's fund set up. So I strode up to that damn brothel after they told me I was accepted, and tried to tell her we could leave. Because I could take care of us now. But Baelish…" She scowls. "He didn't even let me see her. He told me that I had to buy her. Senna had started using those stupid drugs, the ones that they give to make the brothel girls forget, and he said he would charge her for them if she left him."
"So I saved up every penny I could from my fund's allowance. Sold any of the free extra supplies we got. Stole my food instead of buying it. I needed to buy Senna her freedom back. And I went to him three days ago, told him how much money I had, and he told me it wasn't enough." She pauses. "But that… that it could be enough, if I gave him something else too."
He stops in the back alley behind a familiar condo. He settles her down softly so she is seated upright on the pavement.
Cato looks at her grimly. "This doctor…" Cato isn't sure how to say it, so he doesn't bother trying to filter it. "This doctor will only fix you if they think I'm the one who hurt you."
Clove's eyes go blank again, like before, and her voice goes hollow. "Would you like a turn then, Cato? Is that the cost of your kindness?"
He rips the sleeve of his shirt. And when he stuffs it into her mouth, he finally incites a reaction of her. Her eyes widen in betrayal. For a moment she tenses, then she closes her eyes and tries to lie down, no doubt expecting the worst from him.
He takes out the knife from her boot, where he knows she keeps it always.
"This will hurt. Bite on that cloth when it gets too much. Neighbors actually do care about screams from alleys in the East."
He hates every minute of it, hates the look of his name in her skin.
(he relives being 11, and carving up Blaze, whose coat was the same shade as Clove's hair, and Blaze bled red, and Clove bleeds red, and he can hear her muffled screams the way he heard Blaze's whimpers.
But this is different from Blaze.
He hurt Blaze to save himself. He hurts Clove so he can save her.
So he carves his first name into her abdomen because he knows exactly what Bea will suspect when she sees a half dressed Clove enter her apartment, bloody and bruised and half-dressed in his jacket. After all: Bea lies, his mother couldn't have poisoned his father on her own, and Bea wrote the report that said 'heart failure, natural cause'. Cato knows that Bea will do anything for his family, including cleaning up this mess if she thinks Cato is the one responsible.
Of course, Bea will tell his mother. Then his mother will think she was right about him all along.
He's carving the "R" into Clove's alabaster skin now.
(But what do his mother's thoughts matter? He stopped caring about her opinion long ago, when she dropped him off at his grandfather's doorstep because she'd rather raise a glass than raise a child. Because she left him at a dinner table after seeing how Tywin treated 10-year-old Cato, and the stupid tea-cup from that decisive dinner is still proudly displayed in the glass cabinet, reminding him every visit how unwelcome he is in her manor, and sometimes he dreams of her suffocating him in a crib).
He finishes saving/butchering Clove. He instructs her to walk to the door. Gilly will answer. He tells her to show Gilly the wound.
"I'll take care of the body in the alley." He tells her. "I'll hide it in the river. I can probably drag it by—"
Clove says not to bother. He asks if it will be traced to her and she looks at him, her growing pallor worrying him even as she smirks self-deprecatingly. "Haven't you learned yet? No one cares about dead bodies in the South, Cato."
Once he sees her being shuffled quietly into the house by Gilly, he makes it just over one block before he runs behind a bush and vomits until he is retching on air.
When he looks in the mirror the next morning, he sees the evidence of her hysteria on her neck.
His mother smirks knowingly at the gauges in his neck that evening at dinner.
"And here I was, doubting your capacity for cruelty." She says mockingly.
His grip on his fork tightens.
"Then again, I bet she liked it rough. Screamed your name in ecstasy when you carved it into her."
His vision starts going red.
It is silent for a while.
(he uses the silent to cut into his steak, imaging the knife was slicing into Maceria's throat. The blood seeping out of the meat could match the liquor lining her throat.)
"Duncan sent out an invitation. Marvel's birthday is coming up soon isn't it?"
Cato is only half-listening, trying his best to keep the knife on the meat instead of her neck.
"I've heard recycling used things is good for the environment."
'What are you getting at, you fowl excuse for a person?'
"A recycled gift, how novel. Perhaps Marvel would enjoy a round with your new doll?"
Cato shoves his plate off the table. The broken shards dance against the floor, moving to the music of his mother's cackling, as he storms out of the dining room.
.x.X.x.
Maceria, age 39 (continued)
Maceria snorts in disbelief. "You really are a pretty, vicious little thing aren't you? It's no wonder he is so obsessed with you. You might just be as monstrous as him."
Maceria doesn't know what reaction she is expecting, but it isn't the knowing little smirk that twists the Southern urchin's lips.
"Hmm." Clove mocks. "My grand plan? Well, let's see. Perhaps I'll poison him, a poison that will cause his heart to fail."
Maceria freezes.
Clove continues.
"But not before I have his child first. Then I'll ignore the child after killing its father, leave it with an abusive beast of a grandfather, encourage my son to rape little girls, lush away the rest of my years as a maudlin monster, and—"
Maceria slaps Clove so hard, the girl must be seeing stars.
Clove spits out blood, and gives Maceria a wolfish scarlet-stained grin. "I know things too. I know you're more a monster than Cato ever was."
A/N:
Full disclosure: In case anyone wasn't aware, I revamped this story as a GOT fic titled "The Great Game." My primary focus when I update this set will be that fic, but I will try to keep up with this fic as well. That is why there are a lot of GOT / ASOIAF references in here, in case anyone was wondering. I tried to replace/swap as much as I could to not disrupt flow. But again, given the fact that the reception for the GOT fic has been stronger than this one, this story will likely take longer to update that the other one.
PLEASE REVIEW! What do you like? What do you not like? Any Grammar/spelling/formatting mistakes (if you see these, pretty PLEASE point them out to me so I can fix them! This chapter is probably especially littered with them since I kind of just wrote, skimmed, and posted instead of doing my usual editing. I might try to come back one day to fix it, especially since I bet there were some parts that were pretty heavy-handed and not subtle at all).
Preview Chapter 4: Part II
She breathes over his lips. "I don't think you stopped because you hated it or it revolted you. No, I think you stopped because you were afraid you liked it a lot more than you should."
-x-
And so he finds himself running through the Red-Light Alleys again, this time hunting down a different Stark girl.
-x-
"I would rather die than have to see your face. You're the sire of every terrible thing that ever happened to me. Let me at least die for myself after giving up my life for you."
-x-
"Do you want me to stay?" he asks quietly.
"I don't want you to leave." She admits with a small smile.
-x-
Cato remembers Marvel consoling a young Ashara, and figures it's worth a shot. "Did you… umm… need a hug?"
Clove rases a brow. "A hug?"
Cato flushes. "I've heard hugs make everything better. I mean, after that, but you know, after what happened the other night I understand if you don't want, I mean." He fumbles grandly, unsure of how to convey that he thinks she needs a hug -*-*-*- versus wondering if she is okay with physical contact like hugs after what happened in the alley.
"I don't want a hug Cato" He feels his stomach sink a bit, until she adds softly. "But… thanks."
-x-
"No one is better off without their mother."
"Have you met mine?"
"You really despise her that much?"
"The feeling is mutual, I assure you. In some ways, Tywin is preferable only because he still has a use for me.'
-x-
"I wasn't born in the South."...Cato's ears perk up at her quiet words. He is unbearably curious as to where this mysterious girl is truly from. She answers without him asking. ..."The North." She says, almost reverently. "I was born in the North."... Confused, because what brought her to the South of all places?... "My father... trusted someone he shouldn't have."
-x-
"Marry me."
Responses to Reviewers
Guest – thanks so much for your review and kind words! Hopefully this chapter was worth the wait!
Professor R.J Lupin1 – thanks so much for taking the time to review! Again, hopefully this chapter was worth the wait ;)