Another 3rd-to-1st person switch.
And yes, I really did look up 'baize'. (Creative name, Writting2StayHalfSane. Kudos. )

The heat of the girl's small fire wafted onto my face. It felt amazing—like Adam's gentle touch along my cheek in the morning… what I wouldn't give for that warmth.

I listened to the dry noise her hands made as they rubbed against each other, then her palms reopened to the flames and she emitted a quiet sight of contentment. Jealously raged inside me as I dared to stretch the tiniest bit further from behind the palm trunk I was pressed against. If she hears me, I'm dead. But the snow that encases my frigid toes doesn't look like it's going to stop falling anytime soon, and it's really cold…

The trunk creaked.

The girl's head snapped around, hands reaching instantly for the strips of dry bark resting on the snow beside her. Her wide eyes glanced around frantically, trying to take in every angle of her little camp at once. My heart threatened to give me away... how could she not hear its crazy beat? Trying to breath as silently as possibly, I slid gently back into the evening shadows. Please let her not see me. Please, please, please… let her think she's hearing things… don't see me, ….

"Who's there?"

No…

"I know you're out there. Show yourself!"

Her soft snarl hit the surrounding palms in an almost gentle way… which only made her more frightening. Who is she? Not a Career, that much was apparent by her one measly pack and lack of apparent weapons. And the scabbing gash on her neck—I'd bet she'd run into a few other tributes already. So she isn't from 1, 2, or 4… 3 is dead…5? No, that girl had been much more petite, tiny even. 6?

In an act of complete spontaneity, I stole one more glance around the trunk. Same brown hair, though it's a bit mussed and sand-strewn. Same pale skin, typical of 6's. My mind struggled to connect the snarling threat to the soft-spoken 6 girl from the interviews… but the arena changes people. This girl's no exception.

"Where are you?" she hissed, slowly getting to her feet. "There's only one of you, I can tell… if you show yourself, I won't kill you instantly… Cote's honor."

I didn't know what Cote was, but assumed it was some sort of important 6 symbol as I carefully put my life on the line and emerged from the shadows, crunching conspicuously in the snow. It was one of those moments that you look back on and wonder how you could be so stupid… but in the moment, I don't even know what I was thinking. About the fire, probably. How good the flame's heat would feel on my frigid hands…

She had a heavy coat, but her legs, hands, and feet were just as bare as mine. She spun towards me as soon as the snow snapped beneath my flimsy sandals, baring her strip of bark threateningly. Now that I saw it better, it wasn't even a weapon at all. Just some dry bark. Nothing to be afraid of, Baize. Pull yourself together.

"Where are you from?" she demanded, not lowering her anticlimactic bark.

"Eight," I croaked, voice rusty from disuse.

Her gaze narrowed a bit. "You're the engaged girl, right?"

The reminder was as unwelcome as ever, and I could hardly keep my voice even as I replied. "Yes."

Tears fought behind my eyes, forcing me to blink double-time to fight them.

"Prove it."

I swallowed hard and held up my left hand for her to see. The light from her fire glinted off the smooth bronze surface, highlighting it on my finger. Despite the biting cold, the metal was as warm as it had always been against my skin… my only reminder of who I really am, outside this alternate reality of an arena where it can go from tropical to arctic in a matter of hours…

She studied the ring carefully. "Do you have any weapons?"

"No," I said honestly. And it's not like I could have many deadly tools hidden under my tight tank or tiny shorts.

"Supplies?"

"No-not anymore. My pack was taken by the little boy from Ten."

This seemed to amuse her. "He's the one who's been hopping around the palms, right?"

"Yes." My teeth clashed together almost as quickly as my heart beat against the confines of my chest.

"Alright. Come on." She waved me forward with her bark grudgingly. I didn't hesitate in rushing toward the dancing flames and sighed deeply when their heat hit me.

"That feels amazing," I breathed, opening my palms to the fire.

"Just another plus of our arena. This bark is incredible—super fibrous equals super flammable." She knelt beside me on the dry sand that the fire had rid of the constant snow. A few flakes still fell, as if it were about to stop snowing altogether… but it had been like this for hours, taunting us with the looming possibility of the return of heat. I tried not to let it get to me anymore, and instead concentrated on listening to the soft hiss each flake made as it landed in the flames.

"Analyse, by the way," she said off-handedly as she pulled her coat tighter around herself.

"Baize."

"What's a baize?"

"Felt-like fabric… it covers gaming tables and luxury stools…"

"Ah…" She nodded thoughtfully, as if trying to picture my namesake or remember it from the Capitol.

"It's hard for all of us, coming here," she continued, more gently now. "But I think your story takes the cake. Was it a mentor angle idea, or are you really…?"

"I'm really engaged," I answered, trying to keep my tone emotionless.

"I'm so sorry."

We sat in silence, listening to the flakes hiss and the flames spit for a while... just enjoying being able to sit next to another person without worrying about being stabbed.

"I thought I was going to do this by myself. And I can. But maybe an alliance wouldn't kill me…" she mused. Her bright eyes shot up to mine, the unspoken question apparent in her gaze.

"Yes," I sighed. The heat was beginning to thaw my frozen core, gently warding away the ice that had taken root inside me for the past two days. "Allies it is."

"I'm glad you agree."

As I watched the thin wisps of smoke our little fire gave off, a new idea hit me, sprung from archives of watching years of Games. The kids that make the fires are always the easiest kills… "Won't this make us easy to find?"

Her expressive eyes lit up. "Oh, I hope so."

She smiled at my confused look. "This whole place is rigged to go up in flames if we're attacked. It would be especially good if the Careers came around—they have their fancy coats and hats and scarves that would be kindling to bark-fire."

"How…? We get out unharmed, right?"

"Oh, yeah. Between those two palms—it's a break in the fire wall that ignites fifteen seconds after the original blaze."

Everybody knows that 6's are smart, but this was… a whole different league of problem solving. I'm sure she would be able to explain it to me if I asked, though her fancy terminology would be lost on a girl who worked in clothing factories back home.

"Then what happens?"

"Hopefully, the flames will spread east—while we escape west, where I'm ninety-eight percent sure there's a body of salt water."

"Alright…"

"Don't get all worried about it. I know what I'm doing." She seemed perfectly comfortable with the idea of springing a massive forest fire in a jungle of snow… I decided I liked this girl. Opposites attract, I guess.

"How've you been getting along?" she asks as if we were sitting together at dinner and just conducting a polite conversation.

"Horrible. I was starving, and on the brink of a dehydrated death when the snow came. I hope it doesn't make you sick to drink it—"

"Beaver fever."

"What?"

"If you eat too much snow, you get Beaver fever. And get nauseous, unstable, and light-headed. Stop eating the snow."

"Alright… then I just about died of hypothermia. And now's now."

"I think they purposefully gave us all these blankets and jackets and warm supplies. The Gamemakers, I mean. Because they say dying by hypothermia is actually a pretty nice way to go. Painless. You get all warm and fuzzy and just kind of… go."

Having accepted the fact that she knew everything, I didn't ask how she came across that bit of information. "You seem to be doing pretty well."

A ghost of a smile touched her lips. "Well enough. My best friend is the bark—it's edible, if you chew it soft. Delicious fire-baked." Analyse jumped to her feet suddenly, insisting on showing me how to strip a trunk of the stringy bark, then how to chew it and bake it. It tasted like dirt, but food's food, and I wasn't about to complain.

And as we stretched out on our backs by the fireside, I realized that I was almost happy. In the arena. With a stranger. And no…. Adam…

Tears leaked from the corners of my eyes and escaped down my temples as my throat close up. A huge wave of misery smashed down on my chest, knocking any breath out of my lungs and leaving me feeling more alone than ever, despite my ally less then a foot away. Don't think like that. You'll be home in no time. Don't think like that.

But when I closed my stinging eyes, I could only see his smiling face, waiting patiently in the doorway of that tiny house of his, edges of his eyes crinkling playfully as he watches me approach… I run up the walkway, headlong toward the little deck… stretch out my arms with that smile I reserve just for him… and crash, hard, into an invisible barrier. I smash my fists against it, hard, my knuckles bruising as I call out to him… but he just stands there, smiling as ever, waiting patiently for the girl who will never reach him…

"Baize? Are you… alright?"

Analyse's voice sliced into my consciousness none too gently. My eyes cracked open to the palm-printed white sky of the arena I was trapped in, and I had to remind myself to breathe.

"Fine," I said, sitting up. "How about I take first watch?"

She didn't seem like she liked the idea very much, but agreed willingly enough and stretched back out on the sand. "Don't hesitate to wake me up if you hear or see anything, okay?"

I nodded, and watched her eyes close and breath slow to a steady chant of sleep.

And suddenly I was alone again. With no one looking out for me… just Baize.

A short one, I know.

Even so, I'm spoiling you by giving you two chappies in one weekend. Now you have no choice but to love me forever ;). Sorry about any spelling/grammar issues- my current beta is down, leaving me to fend off errors by myself. Which, as you can tell from the previous chapters, is not nearly as good.

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May the odds be ever in your favor.
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