The raucous cheering settles to a more formal, but sustained, level as the anthem rises over the noise. President Snow arrives as a surprise guest to congratulate us on our tour, and the betrothal. My skin rises in goosebumps as he shakes my hand, smiling benevolently and wishing me happiness in my choice. The dripping irony is lost on the crowd who begin stomping and hooting. He moves to Katniss and when he reaches to embrace her, I have to work against my instinct to shove him off her. She takes his kiss on her cheek and Caesar grabs my shoulders in a joyful, one-armed hug. When I look back at Katniss, she is stepping back from Snow and her back straightens, her chin tipping up. Her face clears and I can't read her expression. They spend the next few minutes joking about how Katniss' mother will receive the news of our impending nuptials and the audience is eating it up. We leave the stage, waving to thunderous applause.
No expense has been spared for the celebration at the mansion. The towering ceiling twinkles with the light of innumerable stars and musicians hover on supported platforms decorated like clouds. Huge sofas and soft chairs are everywhere, and the dance floor is packed, either with dancers or a revolving roster of performers. But the food. Katniss is drawn like a moth to a flame. I can only be happy to see her appetite return, but her manic cheer has me worried. I don't know the cause of it, and so I distrust it. She pulls me along to the tables and stands, taking it all in.
Turning to me, eyes bright, she declares, "I want to taste everything in the room."
"Then you'd better pace yourself," I advise, struggling to maintain my rapturous merriment in the face of her sudden change in demeanor. Now is not the time to let the mask slip, and I put the problem aside for later. For tonight, we are newly engaged and celebrating our victory and our love together with all the wealthiest and most favored in the Capitol.
Katniss is working her way around the tables on the perimeter of the room, her plan to try one bite of each dish. I follow in her wake, finishing decadent treats she can't bear to waste, or taking tastes from her spoon when she is particularly impressed with something. All the while guests are coming up to us, introducing themselves, telling us their favorite part of the Games, showing off whatever version of Katniss' mockingjay pin they have replicated as jewelry, or tattoos, or embroidery. We respond enthusiastically and gushingly each time, all while moving steadily along the tables. Katniss is just starting to slow down, looking slightly queasy, when her prep team flutters over, agog with the excitement of being honored guests at such an amazing assemblage.
"Why aren't you eating?" Octavia giggles to Katniss, holding up a small pastry cradling tiny pearl onions and melty goat cheese.
Katniss shakes her head and groans, "I have been, but I can't hold another bite," sending the trio into trills of laughter.
"No one lets that stop them," scoffs Flavius. They usher us to a table offering row upon row of delicate, stemmed wineglasses holding a viscous looking, clear liquid. "Drink this!"
I lift one to my lips and they burst into hysterics.
"Not here!" Octavia looks horrified.
"You have to do it in there," Venia says, pointing urgently to the restrooms. "Or you'll get it all over the floor!"
I stare at the tiny, innocuous glass and it clicks into focus. "You mean this will make me puke?"
The titter together, clinging to each other in their mirth. "Of course, so you can keep eating," replies Octavia. "I've been in there twice already," she smiles triumphantly. "Everyone does it, or else how would you have any fun at a feast?"
I replace the glass carefully, as though handling a viper that could curl back and sink its fangs into my hand. "Come on, Katniss, let's dance," I say woodenly, and I lead her out onto the floor in silence. Effie has run us through a few of the popular dances, but the floor is so packed we just move in a small circle, barely even able to hear the music. I concentrate on the feel of my arms around Katniss, try to focus on the shining curl that falls from behind her left ear to rest on her soft shoulder.
Try as I might, I can't block out the images that crowd behind my eyes. Back home, I started sneaking baskets of baked goods together at the end of the day. I would bring them to the Hob and Rooba, the butcher, would sell me cuts of meat and Greasy Sae would prepare bowls of soup for me. Bundling these care packages together, I would visit children in the Seam. There was never enough food. The day I saw Katniss in the rain outside the bakery when we were kids was the first day I realized not everyone had as much as we did. And the first day I visited with the food baskets was the first time I realized the extent of the starvation in District 12. I knew it was a hard life in the Seam, but I had no idea how often the children were dying from lack of food. When we went through the districts on the tour, that same look of desperate need met us everywhere we went. They were on the outside, never in the front rows, never on camera, but always present. No wonder they are so ready to rise against a Capitol that promises them protection, but only gives them enough to keep them too weak to fight back.
And here, in the debauched, extravagant Capitol, this is where all their backbreaking effort ends up. The food they bend their backs tending, the resources they risk their lives to gather, the materials they spend countless, dreary hours producing, all of it is discarded so cavalierly as the effortless, bottom-less supply that it is.
"You go along thinking you can deal with it," I choke out, "thinking maybe they're not so bad, and then-" I clamp my teeth over my words. Kind Portia, devoted Junius, twittering Effie. They are all part of this. They all live off the sweat and labor of the districts, and they offer nothing in return.
"Peeta, they bring us here to fight to the death for their entertainment," Katniss says in a low voice. "Really, this is nothing by comparison."
"I know," I say, the vehemence rising against my throat, "I know that. It's just sometimes I can't stand it anymore. To the point where…" the sea of empty headed, tittering, decadent party guests feels like it's pulling me under and I'll drown. "I'm not sure what I'll do," I finish desperately. I look around at them all, so secure in their place in the world, and I want to tear down the walls, flood the mansion with the starving children from the districts. And here we are, playing right along with them. "Maybe we're wrong, Katniss," I hiss.
"About what?" she asks.
"About trying to subdue things in the districts," I whisper. As soon as it leaves my mouth I wish I could pull it back. This is so far from the time and place for such a comment that I want to kick myself. "Sorry," I mutter. Be careful, Mellark, I admonish myself.
"Save it for home," she says, but before I can respond, Portia brings over a heavy-set man wearing the most uncomfortable looking collar I think I have ever seen.
I recognize him from the individual skills portion of the Games training. He was soppingly drunk and singing about the sister of a Peacekeeper last time I saw him. His name is Plutarch Heavensbee, apparently, and he is the new Head Gamemaker. My skin crawls when he asks to cut in with Katniss but I smilingly transfer her hand to his, warning with a sly wink that he not get too attached, and make my way off the dance floor. Portia smiles and asks for a dance, but I beg off, telling her my head is pounding from the stuffy room and I need to get some air. I can't reconcile my liking for her and the fact that she's a citizen of the Capitol, like all the rest of these greedy, selfish leeches.
I step outside onto the balcony, and while the air is cool and fresh, the company is just as crowded. People surge around me, trying to take photos and ask questions and touch my clothes. One young woman slithers up to my side, her emerald green dress cut so low it exposes a good three inches below her navel. She smiles seductively, her eyes of flame-like orange meeting mine steadily. She runs a hand down my sleeve and asks if she can see my artificial leg. Another girl joins on my other side, she wears only a thin strip of leather across her chest, and another around her hips, and she slides her hand across my shoulder while agreeing she'd like to see too. I tell them Portia would strangle me if I ruin the line of the outfit she so carefully prepared for me and they giggle as though I've made the first joke in creation. Two more girls and a pair of men, one young, one older, crowd in and they are all trying to touch me, making thinly veiled innuendos and batting their eyes at me. I extricate myself by saying I'm expected to meet Katniss, and leave behind their forlorn sighs of disappointment. Back in the ballroom, more hungry-eyed people begin to converge on me and I look desperately for somewhere to go. A door swings open and a white-jacketed baker emerges holding a tray laden with gorgeously decorated cakes. With a relieved grin, I disappear into the kitchen.
I feel the tension ease when I step into the familiar surroundings. The noise level is the same, but comforting rather than stressful. Wandering through the stations, I make my way to the pastry chef and stand quietly behind him until he's free for a second.
"Excuse me," I say softly, touching his elbow to get his attention. He turns, looking harried, and then his jaw drops and his face goes blank. "Sorry," I say, with an apologetic smile. "My name's Peeta Mellark, can I ask you some questions?"
We spend the next fifteen minutes discussing technique and he takes me back out to the banquet room, trailing his team, to look closely at examples and talk about different approaches. It's getting late and I regretfully offer my thanks just as Katniss finds me. She looks tired, but not anxious and I watch her fondly as she peruses the cakes thoughtfully, deciding which to try first. It's good to see her without the frantic edge to her eyes. "Effie said we have to be on the train at one," I remind her. "I wonder what time it is?" I scan the room for a clock but can't see one anywhere.
She lifts a delicate chocolate pansy from a cake and tastes it blissfully. "Almost midnight," she answers absently.
Effie materializes behind her, bustling us toward the door at her most business like. "Time to say thank you and farewell," she chirps, her disappointment at leaving tempered only by her delight at keeping to a schedule. We make our good-byes to a random seeming sampling of people before we're on our way out the gigantic front doors. By the time Cinna, Portia and Haymitch are all accounted for we're being picked up by the driver and fighting our way through the streets crowded with people celebrating our engagement, or our victory, or just the fact that they want to celebrate.
True to her word, we're all on board and the train is pulling out at one o'clock sharp. Two silent avox servers haul a barely conscious Haymitch to his room and the rest of us settle around the table with tea for our final orders from Effie. After some small details she orders us all straight to bed, we still have the Harvest Festival at home tomorrow. Everyone heads for their rooms and I shower quickly and get ready for bed. I'm so tired my eyes are burning when I slide open the door to Katniss' room. The lights are on but she's sprawled on the bed, fast asleep.
I stand over her silently, watching her sleep. Her breathing is deep and even, her eyelids fluttering lightly to a dream only she can see. Switching off the lights, I ease myself onto the edge of the bed and unstrap the prosthetic. Scrubbing a hand through my hair roughly, I sit quietly in the dark, listening to her breathe. In her sleep, she reaches a hand for me and I take it in mine. After a few minutes, I lie down beside her, sliding my arm under her and gathering her close to me. She sighs gently and burrows her face into my neck, arms wrapping tightly around me. One leg tosses across mine, twining her closer until she relaxes into deeper sleep, no space between us at all. Holding her safe, I stare into the blackness as we rumble through the night toward home.
The night fades to morning and I sleep for a couple hours once the sun is up. When I wake, the windows are bright with afternoon light. Katniss lies with her back pressed to me, head pillowed on my arm and clutching my hand. I rub my free hand across my eyes and rest my wrist on my forehead. She jerks slightly and I feel her smile against my arm. Her breathing lightens and she stirs awake. Turning toward me, her eyes meet mine and I see her trying to sort reality from dream.
"No nightmares," I murmur.
"What?" she asks blearily.
"You didn't have any nightmares last night," I tell her. I think it's the first night we've spent together on the tour that she didn't wake me at least twice with her screams. I don't know what to make of this.
"I had a dream, though," she says, her voice fuzzy and warm. "I was following a mockingjay through the woods. For a long time. It was Rue, really. I mean, when it sang it had her voice." Her eyes grow distant and she looks relaxed.
"Where did she take you?" I ask softly, brushing her hair back off her forehead.
"I don't know," she says. "We never arrived. But I felt happy."
"Well, you slept like you were happy," I say quietly.
"Peeta," she asks, rolling back a little to look at me more clearly. "How come I never know when you're having a nightmare?"
"I don't know," I say, considering it. "I don't think I cry out or thrash around or anything. I just come to, paralyzed with terror."
"You should wake me," she chides gently.
"It's not necessary," I shrug. "My nightmares are usually about losing you," I tell her. "I'm okay once I realize you're here." I think of the black nights stretching in front of me, the terrors I'll have to go back to facing on my own. "Be worse when we're home and I'm sleeping alone again."
I slide my arm free and sit up on the edge of the bed, my back to her. Reaching for my prosthetic, I strap it tightly and stand up. She stretches a hand out and with gentle fingers traces where the plastic meets flesh. A shiver runs up my spine and I turn to look at her. She is beautiful, lying rumpled and flushed from her happy dream in the blankets.
"It's almost over," I tell her in a low voice. "We better get ready to be home." And I walk down the hall to my own cold, empty room.