(Nervous) author note: Alright guys, remember that note I wrote for the first chapter? If you don't, let me remind you that it promised heartbreak, and angsty, angsty pieces, before any kind of happy ending can even be in sight... So please keep that in mind, and don't hate on me too bad after this chapter! And most importantly: don't give up on the story, it'll all work out... eventually.
Next update may be a week now, depending on things like the weather and the amount of beer to be had while I go abroad to visit a friend ;) Enjoy the extra long chapter until then!
And as usual, i'd like to give a huge thanks to all of you who review! You're awesome!
"There's forty gold pieces, all in all. I counted every single penny," says Greasy Sae, the woman who runs the soup stall in the District 12 shoddy-business marketplace, the Hob.
A gold piece isn't really made of gold, it is only some kind of durable metal forged into large, flat coins and coated in a brackish golden sheen. Never the less, they are worth a good deal, as Panem currencies go. The few times Katiss had earned an entire Goldie from one of her dealings, she could make it last for days in her small family household. And now, somehow, by some miracle, they have forty collected for Gale. It seems impossible.
"Has old age made you both blind and rambling already, Sae?" she mumbles, one eyebrow lifted up.
The older woman, whose age is indescribably hard to tell due to her leathery skin and sun-bleached hair, chuckles darkly, but wiggles a warning finger at the girl by her counter.
"Don't make yourself sound smarter than you are, girl," she scolds in her characteristic, creaky voice. "It makes you seem more like that wayward henchman of yours than what becomes you."
Henchman. Katniss has to stifle a laugh at the ridiculous description, imagining Gale's frowning face if he were here to hear it. He was always kind of touchy when it comes to things that other say about him. Or about her, for that matter.
"But seriously," she insists, scraping the very last trace of stock from the bottom of her empty soup cup. Squirrel and nettles today, among other unspecified specialties. "That can't have been right, I mean, who in the Seam has been able to put in more than a few coppers?"
"None of them, of course," says Greasy Sae, who is currently busying her hands cracking up a small pile of bones from the two squirrels Katniss sold her yesterday, to recook them for a second batch of stock.
Katniss frowns, finally letting her spoon clatter down in the cup. It's only because the soup kitchen owner has a good eye to her that she has been able to get a small meal for lunch. Otherwise, she'd be left with nothing but boiled tesserae grains, which offer very little by way of nutrition. She had been up at the crack of dawn again today, more energized than in a long time and looking forward to another whole day in the woods, just like the day before. That plan, however, had been crushed to mere dreams as she'd reached the district fence, and found the cursed thing alight with electricity. They must be sending her a warning, she thinks, because what else would explain why they have bothered to turn on the power now, when things is as calm as they ever get in the middle of the Games?
Therefore, here she is, hanging out at the Hob for her lunch break, since she felt she couldn't stand the risk of any more encounters with strangers at school, be they friendly or not. She has important things to check in on too, obviously: namely the collection for sponsoring Gale that has been going at the underworld market over the past weeks at partly her own initiative.
"We've had hoards of miners coming in, you know. They keep sending the foreman of each crew here with whatever each of the crewmembers can spare. Good lads, the lot of them."
There's a note of satisfaction in Sae's voice, and Katniss feels it too: the subtle, stubborn kind of Seam pride, that comes from generations of hard work and the headstrongness needed to conquer fear. The miners are their people's very own kind of everyday heroes, as each workday is almost a war down underground, without so much as a thank you from the Capitol. They know, better than most, the meaning of hard work, and in Twelve, labour is the key to respect.
"But still," she says one more time, "it doesn't add up. Even if half of the families here put in a little, and then the odd donation from townies-"
"Townies?" interrupts Darius the Peacekeeper, who has strutted over in the middle of things, and is now leaning on the counter beside Katniss.
She rolls her eyes meaningfully, mutters something about merchant girls under her breath, but then barges on: " - that's still only twenty or at the most thirty. Where's the rest from?"
"Oh, merchant girls, huh? Am I detecting a note of jealo-"
Katniss shoves at the guy beside her, shutting him up but not wiping the exasperatingly smug grin of his face, at all. Luckily, she's too used to Darius being an ass to even bother caring about what he says.
The woman behind the counter wipes her none too clean hand on a rag hanging from her belt, and chooses to answer her question while serving up a bowl of soup. "Well, it's an anonymous donation, strictly speaking, but then again since you're you…" she leans forward, dull grey eyes shining with the light that gossip will always bring to curious people's faces. "The Mayor himself gave it to me," she whispers, adding a little nod at the end as if that confirms the truth of the statement. "Said he couldn't blame the kid for not trying, he said. Even if that daughter of his won't probably last another day. I don't think it's allowed really, but he gave me fifteen gold pieces all the same."
This information does not really surprise Katniss, the way it clearly excites Greasy Sae, since after all, she had given Madge's family a gift, precious by her standards. Why shouldn't they reciprocate by their own income? It is, however, an astonishing amount of money for a collection to be presented as from the District's poorest, and she's thankful for the extra boost, since gifts are precious this far into the Games.
"So you're taking it to the Justice Building this evening?" she asks, as she hops down from her stool to head back to school.
Just when the hardy cook is about to answer, there's shouting from closer to the entrance to the market, where a collection of shoddy men are gathered around a rather good-sized TV. Since Gale is rather well known in the Hob, someone had thought it suitable to put in a screen there, "for support", as they had put it when they'd dragged Katniss over to show it two weeks prior. This way, they had joked with Head Peacekeeper Cray when he came in to buy his weekly stash of liquor, no one could complain they weren't keeping up with mandatory viewings, at least. Never mind whatever other gambling, fraud and smuggling they were up to on a regular basis.
Katniss finds herself unwillingly drifting closer to the brightness of the flashing screen, as she hears Gale's name repeated, and sees fingers pointing to the screen. When she gets close enough, there he is: poised halfway up in a tree, right where the trunk splits up into a canopy of branches, where he has built himself a little shelter using the rain-proof canvas that he's found in Rue's backpack. By the looks of him, he's been sitting there for hours, whittling new wooden arrows from suitable sticks that he must have spent a lot of time collecting. He has shot another wild bird, which hangs plucked and cooked in a plastic bag on a branch, and is using the feathers from it to fasten on the end of each arrow for balance. It's meticulous work, but he's seemingly going through the motions mechanically, while the emptiness in in eyes tells her his mind is far, far away.
From what she's heard, he didn't do much at all the day before, simply found this spot in which he's in, climbed up to build this shelter, and then slept, hunted and got himself water. His face looks void of emotion, controlled, but she can tell, just by the small tension in his jaw, that such is not the case. Why would it be? He knows, just as well the as commentators are pointing it out, that now begins the truly hard part. The wait, the game of patience and pure strategy, where all tributes left are potential winners, and where the Gamemakers will soon step it up, keep them constantly on their toes. She hopes for the life of her that what he's doing in this idle state is formulate a new plan, but she can be none too sure, seeing as how he's clearly beginning to wane under the constant pressure in the arena, with the amount of bloodshed he's seen recently. And caused, too, she realises all of a sudden. She wonders if that is what goes through his mind now - the constant surging pain of guilt - or if he's strong enough to handle it. That forsaken knife which has killed both tributes from District 1 is still in his hand, and she wonders how he found the discipline to pull it out of the dead boy's throat, in the middle of everything.
"Geez, he looks like death," comes the snide remark from Darius, still dawdling along next to her by the TV.
Katniss snorts, catching the eye of one of the men in the gathering, and rolling her eyes. "If it were you in there, Darius, you wouldn't just look like it."
The retort draws out a round of sardonic chuckles from around them, but the man in question just grins, unconcerned by her taunting.
"Wouldn't you be heartbroken then, sweetie?" he croons in his exaggerated manner, and tugs once on the end of her long braid.
"Aw leave the poor girl alone," drawls old Grant, the local forger of knives and other small weapons that can be traded in the Hob, for those who have the means. "It's her boyfriend on screen now, she doesn't want your ugly face in the way."
Katniss just sighs aloud, knowing full well it's no use telling them Gale is not her boyfriend, since all the fun these men get to have in life is from teasing others. She's learned to live with it, especially since the fact that they mock her is a sign that she's accepted in here, that she's one of them.
The screen shows a similar shot of the two last standing Careers, where they are slumped down on rocks by the lakeside just off their camp, each holding a make-shift fishing rod that they've made from whatever scrap supplies they've been able to salvage after the pile had been blown up. They don't look nearly as relaxed and confident now, since it's evident that their basic survival skills are just that: basic.
Then, the picture is split into three sections, one showing Gale, on of the Careers, and the third taken up by a live picture of the Hunger Games official announcer, Claudius Templesmith. He's seated on a lavish couch in the Games studio, legs crossed and wearing a ridiculously large, plastered-on smile.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he begins, and in the two other sections they can see the tributes snapping their heads up, evidently hearing the same thing too. "The Capitol, our beloved Gamemakers and honoured President Snow himself, are pleased to announce, that there has been a change of rules."
What now? Katniss finds herself unconsciously chewing on a fingernail, anxious energy coursing through her body. Whatever devilish new plan the Gamemakers have come up with, it can't be anything good…
"The new rule is," continues Templesmith, "that from now on, if the two last standing tributes are both from the same district, they will both be crowned Victors. I repeat: there can now be two Victors, but only if they're the male and female tributes from the same district."
There's a long silence, during which Cato and Clove lower their eyes from the Capitol seal in the sky, to stare astonished at each other.
Then the announcer cuts short the proclamation by finishing with a cheery: "Happy continued Hunger Games, and may the odds be ever in your favour."
The screen goes back to show only Gale up in his shelter, and the cameras close in to show his face in detail.
His eyes are slightly widened, alight with new purpose, but strangely, he does not look too surprised. A little smirk – that confident one that earned him much swooning in the run-up to the Games – grazes his lips, and his shoulders are squared, readied for action. One little words escapes his lips, almost like he isn't aware he's saying it:
"Madge."
And Katniss feels her stomach beginning to churn faster, in a chaotic mix of worry and confusion and something much darker, poisonous and angry. Of course she's worried, because this new rule is purposefully set up to make Gale take on the burden of her life as well as his own, while for the Careers it's only helpful. What could Madge possibly have to give Gale by way of protection, more than what she's already done? But then, perhaps he feels like he owes her now, like he has to do this since she's saved his life by risking her own. She does not like it one bit, even if she knows she should be happy that this is a chance for Madge to survive, too. The Mayor's daughter would still be counted as her friend, wouldn't she?
But where is she? In the last almost whole week, there hasn't been so much as a single picture showing the female tribute from Twelve, and Katniss thinks that it must mean that even the Gamemakers are uncertain of her whereabouts. But neither has her image flashed in the sky or her cannon gone off, so she's clearly out there somewhere.
She can see in his eyes the determination to find her, and knows that whatever scraps of plans he might have come up with so far are now erased, and replaced with that one sole goal: to get them both home in one piece.
"Well, what do you know," says Greasy Sae with mild surprise in her rasping voice, and receives agreeing hums from the crowd. Katniss can only concur in silence, and wait and see where this is going she guesses. In the meantime, there is school to attend, since spending the night in jail is not exactly a priority of hers, but that's the threat that still hangs over her head, should she skip classes anymore. She trudges out in the bright daylight, a stark contrast from the murkiness inside the Hob, wondering to herself how much there could possibly be to know about something so dull as coal.
That evening, as soon as Katniss and Prim gets home from school, the TV sparks to life with a loud crackling noise, followed by the Capitol anthem and a pleasant, but resigned voice that announces: "Please take you seats in front of your closest screen. The Capitol of Panem is pleased to grant you a broadcast of the continued events in the 74th Annual Hunger Games."
Katniss groans aloud, gazing longingly out the window at the overcast sky, knowing that finally, the weather is perfect for hunting, and if she would just escape this stupid viewing, she could get them more food than she has been able to in weeks. If only…
"Katniss," Prim says quietly, looking at her with serious blue eyes. "You know you have to stay here, don't you? Otherwise…"
And Katniss doesn't even really need to see the frightened set of her little sister's face, to realise that it's futile to hope for any hunting to be done today. With a frustrated sigh, she plops herself down in the stiff couch in their living room.
"Do you need any help making dinner?" she hopefully asks her mother, who's over in the kitchen and puttering about.
"We're having what's left over from last night," she replies, not turning away from her work but waving a hand at the wooden stove where the pot of stew is still sitting.
"But what about Hazelle and the kids? Do they have anything left? And should they be watching this on their own…?"
Her mother turns around then, fixing her with her direct and yet so distant gaze. "There's nothing you can do abut that now. Hazelle is a resourceful woman, she can handle this on her own."
To be honest, Katniss knows that, too. But what she's really worried about is having to sit through this whole viewing, without any distractions whatsoever, because she's got a very, very bad feeling about what's going to happen next.
At first, there's a half-hour of following the events of all tributes still left alive, a number which suddenly is down to only six: both from District 2, a girl from Five, the boy from Eleven, and Gale and Madge.
Katniss swears under her breath as it dawns on her what that entails. She's surprised that no one has been here yet, but supposes that the quick deaths of Rue, Marvel and the boy from Three threw the Gamemakers a little off guard.
"Interviews, right?" mutters Prim, apparently having just thought of the same thing.
Usually, as soon as the only tributes left are the final eight, they send reporters out to the districts to film their families, as they answer questions about their loved ones in the Games. She can think of nothing that she'd be less inclined to participate in.
When the turn comes to show Gale on screen, it soon becomes obvious that his doings are by far the most interesting, whereby the cameras are bound to linger on him for the remainder of the broadcast. He has left his shelter, packed it all up in the small backpack that he has inherited from Rue, and set out in a straight line for the Cornucopia once again - quite a brave move of him, considering all the bad things that have happened to him in that spot. To begin with, they're shown a short summary of what he's been up to during the afternoon, and so they see him skirt around the edge of the clearing, cautiously watching out for any sign that Cato or Clove are about to leave their campfire. When he gets to the other side, he begins scouting around, looking closely along the forest floor for any sign of disruption. That way, he eventually finds the spot where Madge had hidden from her persecutors after her escape, marked with flattened bushes, and an abundance of dried, browning blood. From there, it's a breeze for a hunter as competent as Gale to track her movements through the underbrush.
Then they snap back to real time, and suddenly, the landscape is different from any Katniss has seen so far in the Games this year. No one has bothered to go very far this way, but avoided the rocky, sterile scenery where it's obvious food will be scarce and shelter even scarcer. Gale is wading through the shallows along the riverbank, following it steadily upstream. By now, it's early evening in the arena as well as in Twelve, and the sun is still shining at an angle that makes the water beneath his feet sparkle and glow, manipulates his eyes to be the exact same shade of golden grey. Every now and then, he bends down, fidgets with something along the ground, and then continues with more determination in his steps. He's following a trail, clearly, and by the way his steps slow down, he's getting closer. Finally, he stops and scans his eyes over every inch of the shallow rocky pool he's stepped out into. The long, subtle ascent has left him quite far up a hillside, where the river has thinned into a stream, murmuring pleasantly as it flows from a water source not far off. Right in the spot where he has stopped, the water is pooling up to form a round little clearing, edged with rocks and stones of various sizes. On the far side, a sort of small waterfall fills of the pond, and the outlet which he just stepped in over is narrow, with a dense sprinkling of reed and moss covering it. Thus, the place is somewhat sheltered, but also, more importantly, there's nowhere further to go from there.
Like a hunter close on the trail of his prey, Gale freezes in place as soon as he enters the clearing, taking tabs of the situation before barging in on the unknown. When he's sure nothing unexpected is going to jump out on him, he steps fully into the pool, its water only high enough to reach the ankles of his impermeable boots.
"Madge?" he calls out softly, looking right and left in search.
First, there's only stillness, but then, from the middle of absolute nowhere, as if detached suddenly from the surface of the rocks, a slim, pale hand reaches out. Gale snaps his eyes immediately to the movement, and flinches in surprise when he sees it.
A strained cough resounds across the pond from where the hand is hovering is seemingly thin air, and in the still bright sunrays, it looks as if the rocks there turn three-dimensional, unfold from the ground and tremble. The hand grows out to become an entire arm, and behind it, there's a shadow of something more hiding.
Gale reaches the riverbank, hunches down beside the strange sight, and tentatively reaches out his own hand toward it. In one pull, the camouflage cover comes off, to reveal the blond, deathly pale girl underneath.
Madge blinks, narrowing her eyes to shelter them from the sudden brightness, and coughs again, trying to get her voice working. "Gale," is all that comes out in recognisable speech, but it's enough to make him respond with a small smile.
"Hey there," he says, deposing of the sheet that used to cover her to the side. "In case we were playing hide and seek, I won."
Madge smiles, closing her eyes, but his own smile quickly wanes, as he takes a good look at her current condition. It's not a pretty sight: cuts still criss-cross her cheek and down the skin to her arms, dirt is smeared in her hair and on her clothes and deep in her injuries, making them slightly swollen - and most worrying, is the giant gash in her upper right leg.
"That's really infected," mutters Prim, who is curled up against the opposite armrest from Katniss, their leg tangled together in the middle.
"Will she live?" asks Katniss in a low voice, finding herself worried despite her better judgement.
"Not without medicine, she won't," says their mother in a sharp, matter-of-fact tone, coming over to the couch and sinking down in the middle seat, forcing her daughters to move their legs away. On a tray in her lap are three bowls of steaming hot stew, along with three slices of bread left over from the day before.
Katniss takes her bowl and spoon and balances them against the armrest, deep in thoughts. If it were her mother or Prim out there, they'd know what to do. They'd know what medicinal plants to find to ease the infection, and they'd know how to stop a fever from escalating. For her own part, she knows very little of the sort, only the most basic of remedies and the most acute of field care, and she knows Gale is even worse off than that.
Not even Madge's father is so rich he can afford the precious medicine she needs, and who else is going to sponsor her in this weak, useless state? The prospect of having double Victors from Twelve this years seems impossibly remote.
Gale is not a squeamish kind of guy – far from it, he has no trouble gutting the carcass of a deer or butchering the rabbits that get trapped in his hunting contraptions – but the thing is, he has absolutely no real knowledge about healing. The particularly ugly wound in front of him seems to stare him down tauntingly, and he can't take his eyes off it, no matter how gruesome the sight, with its oozing of yellow fluid, infected, swollen skin and large amount of dried blood. No matter how much the sight makes his belly churn with unease.
Pulling himself together, and tearing his eyes away to look instead at the pale face of the girl in front of him, whom he's now sworn by simple ability to take care of, he mutters to himself, "Alright, what's the first step?"
"'s no use," slurs Madge, still curled up in the same position on the riverbank where he found her.
"Don't be stupid," he retorts, standing up again to dispose of his backpack. "You'll be fine." Maybe, if he says it with enough conviction, it'll be true.
She smiles, almost like she would have laughed if she had the chance, and answers reasonably, "I'm pretty sure it's infected."
No shit, thinks Gale, but aloud, he only sighs. "Well, let's try and clean it out, then, shall we?"
It's a slow, agonizing process, but eventually, he manages to get her to sit upright, remove her clothing, and submerge her body in the clear water of the pond. The gentle drift washes over her skin, and the whole thing looks oddly peaceful - until he fetches some strips of cloth to wash her injured leg, that is. She grimaces, and she bites down hard on her lip until it's almost bleeding, but all in all, she takes it surprisingly well. He worries that might be because she has had next to nothing to eat in six days, and that she's already started to lose connection to her body, so he tries to get her to talk instead of drifting off, like she seems to be doing every other minute.
They end up talking - a word here and there mainly - about home, about happier times when they were younger and less weighted down by responsibilities. Gale talks of his little sister some more, and Madge mentions her collection of coloured papers that she'd find in the market on Sunday afternoons after the weekly commerce. Strange interest for a girl with a large collection of dolls, she comments.
Then, finally, it's over, and Gale is just about to move on to other chores at hand, but she catches his arm with a weak hand, and holds him in place by her side. Her eyes glitter with slanted sunlight, and with something else too - like the inner brightness of memories past.
"Do you remember," she says, her voice no longer raspy, but very soft, "when we were little kids, you kissed me once? Dab smack on the lips and all, behind a stall in the market."
Gale actually blushes, the slightest colouring spreading across his cheekbones and a foolish little smile twitching on his lips for a short moment in confirmation that he remembers, too.
"Why did you do that?"
Her question is not unanticipated, but despite the fact that he is well aware this conversation has to happen, he can feel his throat closing up. His answer comes out a little hoarse, but he hopes that it can pass for overwhelming emotion.
"I told you," he says, forcing his suddenly nervous gaze to stay focused on hers, "there's only ever been one girl for me."
"Really?" She frowns slightly, not angered, but more like confused, and her eyes have widened into large, green pools of wonder. "I thought you were just making it up," she says quietly, her voice coarse but vulnerable. "You know, because of – well…"
Gale cringes inwardly, but tries not to let it show on his face, carefully keeping an open expression in place. Because of her, yes; She-whom-he-must-not- think-about.
He swallows the thick lump forming in his throat. This is it - no bad feelings allowed. "Do you really think I'm such a bad person?" he presses out, making it seem as effortless as he possibly can, firing off his best easy smile for good measure.
In her usual, disarming way, Madge regards him for a long moment before answering. When she does, however, her smile is lit up from within.
"No, Gale," she mumbles, reaching out a frail hand to run her fingers down his cheek. "I really don't."
A little while later, Gale gazes down on the scarred, weak-looking figure beneath him, where she lays with her lower half submerged in water. He sits hunched by her side, close enough to see her every injury in excruciating detail, since all she's wearing is her underwear. Through the luminescent surface of the clear stream, her fair skin seems to shimmer unearthly, like she could just dissolve with a strong current and drift away in the water.
"Madge, come on, we need to get you out of here," he says, reaching out to touch her shoulder, check so that she's still awake. She can't afford to drift away in the clutches of sleep now, when she's so close to the oblivion of death that she may just never come back.
The girl turns her face an inch in his direction, tries to open her eyes without much success. "Hmm?" she mumbles, her face relaxed and serene in the warm glow of the sun.
He sighs, runs a hand through his tousled hair in exasperation. "Let's put your clothes back on. They're still wet, but you're kind of burning up, so…"
In response, she only grunts, as if to say whatever you think is best and closes her eyes again. With another sigh, he tries to talk himself into doing this, since after all, he's already been the one to undress her, wash her wound free of dirt, and clean her clothes. How much personal space could really be left between them? He straightens up, goes over to retrieve her now sun-warm pants, shirt and jacket, along with some extra clean socks that were left in Rue's backpack – all that's available for bandaging her wound. While he draws her up out of the water and tries to ease the articles of clothing on without disrupting any of the gashes; angry red marks on her skin, she is limp and unresponsive like a rag doll. From time to time, she tries to listen to his pleas for her help, tries to lift an arm or hold back with her leg as he threads on her trousers. They've got a large hole in top of the right leg, where the knife broke through, and her foot keeps getting stuck there for several tries. It's not until he swears aloud in frustration that she opens her eyes again, as if drawn back to awareness by his voice.
She stays at least half-awake as he laces his boots back on, throws on his small pack and lifts her up in his arms, like we would a small child. She doesn't fit all that well, really, with her long limbs, but her head comes to rest on his left shoulder, and the pleased sigh she utters then makes him thinks she is rather enjoying the situation. Of course, she is too out of it to actually appreciate what the situation is.
"Stay with me now, all right Madge?" he begs her, because by now the fear is beginning to catch up with him. There's not much left that he can do, besides get her somewhere sheltered and relatively safe, give her time to… Heal? Any other outcome is unthinkable, now that even the rules of the Games have been bent in their favour.
Gale starts back down the current of the stream, walking with careful steps along the bankside, but still in the water, which reaches almost up to the top of his sturdy boots. If anyone comes looking for them, he wants to have covered his tracks as much as possible. Along the way, his eyes keep flickering with worry to her face, to check if she's awake or not, since her pulse is too weak to feel through their layers of clothing, and he doesn't trust the heat of her feverish skin to tell him. He whispers in her ear: "Stay awake. Stay strong," time and again, hoping she'll hear him and understand.
Gradually, the evening turns into night as he walks. He watches her tousled golden curls bounce with his every step, fly away with the wind, and tries to think of something. He sincerely doubts he'd recognize the wondrous plants that Rue had used to draw out the infection in his Tracker-Jacker stings, even if he would be so lucky as to find them. Any other healing plants that he may have ever known about grows in the deepest, darkest forest, and certainly not in this sparsely vegetated rocky landscape. In the end, all he can think about is to clean out the wound once more, put a fresh bandage on it, get some simple nourishment in her stomach and hope for the fever to cease. Or for sponsors, of course – now there's a route he hadn't even considered, in all his frenzied practicality. It's far into the Games, and gifts are bound to be as good as priceless at this stage, but at least, he has a good idea of how to pull it off.
He wonders if all the human species of womankind would despise him, if they knew what he is plotting right now - has been plotting all along. At the very least, he knows one exemption to that theory, but then again, maybe in this case her opinion is less than objective. He feels a deep twinge of guilt when he thinks about that particular girl, knowing that what he has in mind is deceit in two very real ways. But if it's also the key to survival, then how can it be the wrong thing?
Once, he heard someone state an old proverb, from the times before even Panem, saying that all is fair in love and war, and it sticks to his mind now, since this is both. He wields those words as a weapon against his own guilt-ridden thoughts every time they pop up during the remainder of the evening and night, as he walks down the stream until darkness has begun to fall in earnest, and Madge has begun to utter small noises of discontentment every time his steps are the least bumpy. He finds them a good enough hideout in between some rocks, where they'll be as hidden from sight as is possible in this unforgiving landscape. It's not ideal, but with her camouflage canvas as a curtain across the opening, it's as good as it's going to get. He can't get them any further today. He finds a stray few twigs to build a fire with, which he will risk doing only because he deems it highly unlikely there will by any tributes close by to see the smoke, and in the end, the small cave is reasonably warm and feels surprisingly homey. He thinks it's just his mind playing tricks on him since he's sick of being cold and alone, but it's nice nevertheless, to have someone there with him, and someone from home at that.
He sits by the frail fire, chews on the last leg of wild bird and heats up a cup of warm water with a choice few herbs and scraps of meat in it for Madge to drink, every now and then casting worried glances toward her where she's lying swept up tightly in the sleeping bag beside him on the ground. When it's done, he makes her sit halfway up, noticing how her cheeks are now flaming hot and feverishly red, compared to their spooky whiteness from before. He doesn't know if it's a good or a bag sign, but in all honesty, there's nothing he can do, but hope. And one more thing…
So after he has made her drink a few chugs of the broth, and she looks up at him with her green eyes simmering dizzily, he looks right back, and strokes away her matted hair from her forehead with a gentle hand. And he knows there's only one answer to her question, when she asks him with words slightly slurred:
"Would you kiss me again, if I asked you?"
So he continues to gaze into her eyes, reassuringly, while letting a soft smile spread across his lips and everything else in the world fall away from his mind. Then he lowers his face halfway down to hers, and answers, close enough for his quiet words to reach her: "No need to ask."
Keeping her eyes locked on his the rest of the way, until the last fraction of a distance, when they fall close of their own accord; he puts his lips softly on hers. They're too warm, and chapped, but surprisingly soft, and her hair and skin somehow still smells like soap and pleasant girly things. Despite her height, and her self-assured attitude, she feels small and fragile in his hold, like something delicate that he must care for, should put all his effort into protecting. And because of that, it doesn't really matter that in the back of his mind, something is screaming for him to stop, that this is not right, or that his heart is only half fluttering, and half clenching in agony.
After a short moment, he pulls back, but knows all too well that if he opens his eyes, she will see that consuming doubt in them, which means they will see it too, so instead, he leans their bodies closer together, and gently folds her head down onto his shoulder, leaning his own on top. He can still feel the contented sigh that escapes her, and sort of feel her smile in the air around her, like radiation.
She nuzzles into his hold, but after that, the strain of staying awake becomes too much, and she goes limp and heavy against him in sleep. Thankfully, thus she is none the wiser when from outside the makeshift home, comes the light ringing of silver bells that signifies a gift has been grated them from a sponsor. It's no surprise to Gale, but how could he have ever foreseen that the gift he'd be given at this precise moment, would be something to make him feels so infinitely much worse than he already does? In the parcel that comes with the parachute are two things:
First, and on the expected side, is a roll of proper bandages and a note from Haymitch, sneering at him: "Nice start, but not nearly enough."
And then there's another package; a whole loaf of soft wheat bread, still steaming slightly from the oven and crusted with a sprinkling of whole seeds, and two perfect, steel-tipped arrows. He recognises the first as the stuff that the baker in Twelve makes, and the second as the handicraft of none other than the old black-market armorer in the Hob, the kind that Katniss trades for hard-earned money when she absolutely needs them to take down bigger prey.
Gale stares at them for a good, long while, dumbfounded, before picking the precious gifts up, inspecting them closely for any sign of falsification. But he finds none, and thus the only explanation is the obvious one: that this is a gift scraped together by the people back home; by his friends and family and trading acquaintances, who all barely have enough to get by for themselves. His hands trails along the metal hilt of the arrows, and he thinks that he has a strong inclination of whose idea this must have been from the beginning, a thought that is nagging, grating at his determination and pulling at his insides like a storm struggling to break free.
It's with heavy feet that the drags himself back into the cave, stowing away his new gifts for the morning and collapsing down onto the ground beside the dying embers of the fire in exhaustion; and it's with even heavier conscience that he realises it will eventually be too cold to sleep there, and moves over to lie side by side with the sleeping girl whose body is radiating heat. For sure, he thinks, right before dreamless sleep draws him under, the Games are far from over.