Rambling Beauty

Chapter Nine

The Snow Mansion

As soon as Colletta had finished her dinner (or watched everyone finish their extravagant dinners), she asked to be excused and hurried as nonchalantly back to the Death Room, as she had dubbed it in her head. She had memorized the way there when she went back to her room and had no trouble locating it again. Locking the door behind her, she surveyed the room at large, trying to wrap her head around what was going on. There was a reason why that death had been changed, and she was going to find out what it was. Colletta settled down by the box that she had been in earlier and set to work, pulling out all the other files to see if there was anything else on Apollon Gray.

What she found instead were more cover ups. Almost every one of them had happened at feasts her grandfather had hosted. Some of the names were foreign to her, Like Cadmus Darington, or Reginald Horburt. But some stuck out to her like a sore thumb. Michelangelus Wright had been a political adversary of his some years back, for instance. She stopped reading the cause of deaths after a while after the millionth heart attack. It would look to anyone who looked to closely like a lot of people had heart attacks at her grandfather's feasts. Instead, she decided to try to find something that linked the victims.

Starting with Apollon's file, she carefully scanned each page for some ort of information on him, aside from what she already knew. She had thought about asking who he was at dinner, but thought better of it. She didn't want to e too suspicious, after all.

When Colletta reached a section on Apollon Gray's professional life, she felt like a complete idiot. How could she forget her own family history? Apollon Gray, she recalled, was the old Vice President. He had been lined up to take Charlus Spin's, the late President who ran the country before her grandfather, position, but then died of a heart attack at the feast her grandfather had thrown in his honor. It had been a horrible time for the country, taking place only a few years after the Dark Days had ended. Her grandfather had even given her a first hand account of the night.

Closing the file, Colletta shoved the box away from her. How many other people had been killed? She wasn't sure she wanted to know, but part of her needed to know. She started on another box and was at least relieved to see that the coroner had become more creative in his fake deaths. One man's death had been lamed on bad shellfish. She looked for the person's name and gasped in recognition. Peter Mars had been her favorite member of her grandfather's cabinet. She had been sad when he died, but now it was like someone had stuck a knife in her heart. He had been older, older than her grandfather even, and always had some story or candy or a small gift for her whenever she saw him. She didn't want to read anymore files.

Making sure she put everything back carefully, she left the room in a daze. Why were these even here? And what did her grandfather have to do with any of it?

"Miss Snow, are you okay?"

Colletta started at the voice and looked up to see Charlotte hovering around her, concern written on her face. "What?"

"I asked if you were okay." Charlotte repeated, feeling Colletta's forehead for a fever. "You don't feel warm. Should I send for tea?"

Colletta nodded. Tea had a way of making everything better. Or at least it made everything feel better. When the servant girl left, she changed out of her dress, which was now dirtied by a thin layer of dust, and pulled on the pajamas that Charlotte had been laying out for her. She was already tucked into been when the other girl returned, carrying a silver tray laden with a porcelain tea set.

The next morning brought with it a sense of duty to Colletta. After a fitful night's sleep, and several nightmares involving dead people trying to poison her, she decided that she owed it to the victims of the poisonings to uncover the truth about every one of their murders and figure out who had commissioned them. Something told her that there was more to this than just a couple poisonings, and Colletta was determined to figure out the conspiracy behind it all. Besides, although she wasn't a very superstitious person, she had a sneaking suspicion that with her luck, their vengeful spirits would come back and haunt her if she didn't figure it all out. With that in mind, she happily made her way down to breakfast, where she even let her mother fill her plate with assorted fruits and bread.

"Where is everyone else?" She asked, when she realized that it was just her and her mother.

"Cardemina is still in bed and the others are at work. They ate earlier." Her mother responded robotically.

"Oh." That made sense, Colletta supposed, taking a sip of hot coffee. "And how are you feeling today, mother?"

The woman let the faintest of smile ghost her lips. "Well, thank you."

After a few more strained attempts at conversation, Colletta was becoming bored. And very frustrated. If she could make the effort to eat a whole meal, couldn't her mother make the effort to connect with her daughter? She had even cleared her plate for once! She was about to excuse herself to go do some more uncovering before her morning lessons when her mother's fine china cup clattered to the table and her mother collapse face first into her hands.

"Mother!" Colletta gasped, rushing to her side. "Are you alright?"

She was debating calling for help when she realized that her mother was crying. Her mother, who only ever portrayed anger, was actually crying!

"Oh, honey!" She sobbed, throwing her arms around Colletta in a tight embrace. "I am s-s-so sorry for yesterday! I'm sorry I didn't listen to you. He could've raped you! And it would have all been my fault!"

Colletta was thrown. Not only was this the most emotion that her mmother had ever shown, but she was apologizing! For something that was only partially her fault, too! She hugged back tightly, trying to reassure her.

"Mother, it's not your fault that Julius Dalton is a pompous, arrogant, piece of shit slime ball. That is entirely his fault. And maybe some of the blame belongs to his parents for not teaching him any better."

The older woman pulled back, smoothing the hair out of Colletta's face. "I just want the best for you so much sometimes that I don't stop and think about how it will affect you." She paused and took a deep breath. "Cole, honey, I'm not going to be around forever. I don't know when the sickness will take me, but it will sooner or later, and I won't be there to take care of you. I thought that if I could get you to marry well, then you would be set. I-"

"Mom." Colletta interrupted before she made herself sick with worry. "Granddaddy won't let anything happen to me as long as he is around. And then after that, I've seen my inheritance as it stands right now. Believe me, I'm already set. And if I'm ever written out of the will, then I still be able to take care of myself. I'm only fifteen, I have my whole life to earn my own small fortunes. So that's not an issue. I don't need a man to take care of me."

Her mother smiled and Colletta relaxed. The last time she had been this worked up about something, she had been bed-ridden for weeks.

"I admire that about you so much, Cole." Her mother finally said, her eyes glistening with pride. "You are so much stronger than I could ever be. If I had had your determination when I was your age, who knows where I'd be now. Certainly not here, married to your father."

"I thought you loved daddy."

Her mother scoffed, drawing her hand from her daughter's cheek. "Colletta, the man I married is incapable of love. We only married because he was a Snow and I was the prettiest girl who was eligible to marry him. My parents were well connected within the Snow empire and I was too weak, and too greedy, to say no when he proposed to me. And I have been paying for that mistake ever since. You and your brother are the only good that had come from our union."

"What about Mina?" Surely the only actually good person in the family counted too, right?

Her mother blanched and started back-pedaling. "Siblings," she said. "I meant siblings, not brother." Colletta grinned at the opportunity to tease her mother, but the woman was well prepared for that. "It is getting late, Colletta. You have your lessons to get to. I will see you at tea."

As her mother left, Colletta couldn't help but to deflate a little. It would most likely be a while before her mother ever opened up to her like that again.

After her morning lessons, Colletta decided it would be most prudent to not even go to lunch. She wouldn't eat anyways, unless her mother was there and guilted her into it. She invented a migraine as an excuse for her absence and headed to the Death Room. With a notebook in hand to jot down anything suspicious, she entered the room and got to work. In her Political Science lesson that morning, she had come up with a game plan for how to tackle the room instead of reading about past governments and what worked in them. It was the same thing every lesson. Control your citizens and you will have absolute power. Don't let them step out of line even by an inch or you will loose that power. She hated it and hoped that her grandfather would catch drift of what her tutor was trying to teach her. The lessons were starting to go into more detail about how to run an infrastructure like Panem lately, though, which had her worried. More than once her grandfather had let slip that he thought Panem would flourish in her hands. Did that mean that he was trying to set her up a his successor? She didn't want to run a country. Hell, all Colletta cared to do with her future was to get by without anyone's help.

Shaking her head to clear the cluster of thoughts that were getting her absolutely nowhere, she flipped open her notebook to the plan she had outlined (her tutor had been so proud of her for taking notes on her reading). First thing on her list was to find some connection between all the people. So far her only lead with her grandfather. She was still debating whether or not to ask him about the people, but was afraid to get him involved. What if he figured out what she was doing? He would put a stop to it, for sure. Clearly this room was supposed to be off limits. She wouldn't be surprised if the entire hallway was supposed to be off limits. With a sigh she got started on the boxes, opening the one she had left off at.

Colletta had gotten through the rest of the box before her hour was up. She only had two more lessons before she was officially done for the day. With a stretch, she put the box back where it had been and made a mental note of which box it was.

AN: So, here's a nice little update for you: Rambling Beauty has gotten almost a hundred hits in only a week. We're almost at the six hundred mark, people. How exciting is that? You know what's not exciting? I don't know if any of those people liked what they read or not. Not a single review. It hurts my feelings. But I'm super excited that people read it!

Okay, now that I've gotten review mongering out of the way, we get to see some real plot in this chapter! I know, you thought that this would be a plotless love story, didn't you? Well, Colletta has a life apart from Finnick, though he does make an appearance soon, so if that's the only reason you read this, then rejoice! You can start actually reading it now! Now that I'm writing this every day, I'm going to try to update once a week, if not more often. It depends entirely on how behind I am in my word count and whether or not I have time to edit.

Also, I've discovered some major inconsistencies. I won't go back and fix them until November is over. Probably not until the story is over, actually. So, you know, can you hang in there? Or if you spot something, can you point it out to me. I try to edit the best that I can before posting, but I know that I don't catch everything.

And now too end this monstrosity of an author's note. Be kind and review.