My hands still sting from when Katniss pushed me back into the urn after I confessed my deepest secret to the entirety of Panem. I start to change my thin bandages, but eventually I give up and hope that the stinging will keep me awake. My arm is still throbbing painfully from where Cato first attacked me with his sword, but I don't have time to change that bandage even though it's soaked with my blood.
Orella is getting irritable as myself and Glimmer fumble around, gathering our things together.
"If you don't hurry up right now I'll kill the pair of you," she says with menacing exasperation.
"I'd like to see you try, darling," says Glimmer as she swings a sheath of arrows over her shoulder. The only bow and arrows in the arena. I think to myself, my eyes examining the perfectly sculptured silver arrows. One way or another, I had to get this fantastic piece of weaponry to Katniss. Glimmer's slender fingers brush the fine, sharp tip of one of the arrows and gives me a fixated stare. "Unfortunately, these are mine, so take your eyes off it." she quips and then turns on her heel to join the others.
I stoop and slip one small knife into my belt. I tighten my grip around my single spear and trudge after her, my eyes monitoring the darkness of the woods growing vastly around me. My leg feels heavy due to the bruise deep in my thigh, so I have a odd limp. I try and focus on putting one foot in front of the other evenly and soundlessly, but the pain prohibits this and I am left to sway as I step on my left foot.
Cato and Clove are walking a little way ahead the rest of the group, their heads bowed together in a quiet conversation. I hear Clove laugh, a quaint and sweet laugh which you would not believe came from the lips of a ruthless, skilled killer. I saw her practising with her knives just before we left, and it scares me. It openly scares me that someone could simply raise a weapon and kill another human with out any forethought, no consideration to their family, friends or what they have to live for.
Step carefully.
If I don't take care and watch my mouth, control my actions, these people will kill me and my one true love.
"Hurry up, lover boy," shouts Marvel, snapping me out of my thoughtful haze. The careers have sped up, the smoke rising above the line of the trees getting closer, so close that I can begin to smell the ashy sent of burning pine. It's an almost comforting smell until my side begins to wheeze under the pressure of running on the forests uneven surface.
Then it dawns on me what awaits us at the site of this fire that has been lit, and then there she is, a girl huddled up next to a now ebbing fire. The gentle residing flames light one side of her face, which is soft, fresh and young. My chest tightens as Cato struts around her sleeping figure and kicks her hard in the side.
It's almost as if only the sight of a career would have pulled her from her stupor, she springs up right and opens her mouth to scream, but with one kick Cato has her on the ground, winded.
"Please!" she rasps, her chest rising and falling rapidly as her body tries tremendously to keep her moving. "Please don't kill me," Clove's weight pins her left arm to the mossy ground painfully. "I'll do anything!" she squeals as Cato twists his foot down on her right arm, glaring down at her.
As the sword splits through her chest I look away, but there isn't a way I can block out the ear splitting scream of pure pain, fear and unknowing feelings bursts from the girls open mouth.
Glimmer laughs as Cato pulls the sword back and wrinkles his nose up as he wipes the blood off on the moss of a near by tree. Marvel slaps him on the back and Clove gives her congratulations by brushing her hand gently across his own, but I think I am the only one to realise.
"Twelve down and eleven to go!" cries Orella, and this is met by another round of cheers from the group, I feel I should join in to keep them convinced I am not scared of death, but I can't bring myself to cheer over the death of a person.
The girl had no supplies, so once Glimmer has made sure that there is nothing to collect we straighten up as dawn begins to waver in the sky.
"Better clear out before the body starts stinking," says Cato. We nod and start off back to the Cornucopia, in the general direction in which we came from. After a short distance, Clove stops us all.
"Shouldn't we have heard a cannon by now?"
"I'd say yes. Nothing to prevent them from going in immediately." murmurs Marvel.
"Unless she isn't dead." perks up Orella, eyeing Cato as if he's the weaker one. Cato glares back.
"She's dead, I stuck her myself." he sneers directly at her.
"Then where's the cannon?" she snaps back again, and I can feel an argument forming on their tongues.
"Someone should go back, make sure the job's done." cuts in Glimmer who is absent-mindedly fiddling with a pristine arrow between her fingers again.
"Yeah, we don't want to have to track her down twice." says Orella.
"I said she's dead!" Cato side steps towards the girl and towers over her, his eyebrows knitted in a firm arrow. Before an argument can break out I make my move.
"We're wasting time," I step forward myself and train my eyes on Cato and Orella. "I'll go finish her and lets move on." Cato then moves his gaze to me, as if scanning me, looking my up and down with what appears to be a smirk.
"Go on, then, Lover boy," he says calmly. "See for yourself." I nod and walk back to where the embers are still flickering little orange dancing shapes over the trunks of the trees surrounding the small clearing. I gently place my spear down on the ground once I know that I'm far enough from the careers for them not to hear my words.
"Hello," I whisper softly. There is the tiniest sound of a scuffling and I approach the figure of the girl who is quietly choking on a mouth full of blood. When she seems me her eyes widen and he furiously attempts to push herself up. "I'm not going to hurt you, really." I try my best to keep my voice steady as my eyes gradually take in the scene before me.
Her arm is bent at an odd angle where Cato stepped on it, and that itself if bleeding badly. But the pool of blood around the girl is from the gaping wound in her chest, drenching her entire being in a thick reddish glow of death. I can almost taste the metallic tang in the air. She pushes air from her nose and once she finally twigs I can't be a threat, her eyes relax. Even I know, and she knows that she'll be dead any moment now, and I want to be with her when she does go. Maybe I could have stopped Cato from doing it...
No, I couldn't have.
I kneel down by her side and take her trembling hand in mine, gently squeezing her small palm. Her eyes rest on mine and somehow I manage a smile.
"What's your name?" I say gently and give her hand another squeeze of reassurance. Her breath is hoarse and painful even to watch.
"Oliva."
With a residing huff of air, her body goes slightly limp and I close my eyes for a brief moment. When I open them her hand has slipped from mine and fallen onto the ground, leaving my own palm lathered in red liquid. I take out my knife and slide it across the pool on the forest floor so that the careers are not suspicious, then get to my feet.
I am about to leave after collecting my spear before I turn and look down on the figure.
"Goodbye, Oliva." I mumble respectively, before I can't look at the small piece of lost life any more.
I return quietly to the careers, and by their faces I seem to have interrupted a conversation.
"Was she dead?" asks Cato snidely.
"No. but she is now," I return as strongly as I can and lean on my spear after placing the sharp end in the ground. Suddenly the cannon fires and resonates in the arena around me, I breathe out a shaky breath and nod to prove my point. "Ready to move on?" There is a murmur of assent and we start off at a jog back to the Cornucopia. I start to think about Katniss again, as usual. My mind often wonders to what she's doing, how she's feeling. I know she is safe as we saw the faces of the dead tributes in the sky last night and her gentle face wasn't there, and the only cannon since was Oliva's. Safe being the adoptive word... she could be hiding, injured, and I could be the only one able to save her. What if she died today, tomorrow. I don't know what I'd do if she died, but my first thought would be to die myself. Somewhere, deep down though, I don't think I would. I know what she'd want is me to win, to bring riches to district 12 to keep her mother and sister alive. But I would be dead inside, and there would be no going back. With no her, there's no me.
As we run, the light slowly dawns over the arena and when we're almost at the edge of the woods, a figure steps out.
Orella squeals as she almost ran into the boy, who is now cowering back against the tree. "Wait, please! I have a proposition!" says the boy hurriedly, his pupils crossed as he tries to look at the blade pressed point blank at the ridge of his nose, right between his eyes. Orella has him pinned to a tree with her knife raised.
"What would we want from a ratty little kid like you?" says Orella, glaring at the boy who is the same height as her, but her power is obviously present. Cato crosses his arms and simply watches, because after all, any of us could take out this measly child.
"I can help you, please, give me a chance to show you," he pleads again, his hands now held up in a sign of no resistance.
"How?" leers Glimmer over Orella. Orella shoots her a look as if to tell her to back off, this is her kill.
"I...," the boy starts, quivering. "I started digging up the bombs from where we came into the arena, and-"
"You're going to blow us up or something?" Cato asks pointedly and in a voice so low the boy starts.
"No, no! Of course not, it's to guard your supplies, I can activate them and have them keep your supplies safe! All I ask for in return is safety, please!"
Cato narrows his eyes and nudges Orella. "Let him go."
"What?" she protests.
"I said, let him go." with that, Orella grudgingly lets the boy down. "Go ahead, boy." says Cato and pushes him towards the edge of the woods. He stumbles but keeps moving, walking a little faster than it really needs.
He hurries to the Cornucopia where there is a large, square black thing on the ground, dirt dug into it's crevices.
"The bombs are deactivated after sixty seconds, but I can reactivate them and put them in the ground around the pile of supplies, so anyone who doesn't know how to approach them in a certain pattern will get blown to bits." the boy says knowingly and unfaltering. I suspect he must be from district 3, who deal in technology. All of them are particularly smart, which would explain how he came up with this idea.
"Won't it blow up the supplies though?" asks Clove thoughtfully. Cato is still in a stance where he can attack the boy if needed, and I can tell he's not one to trust easily.
"I can set it up in such a way that if one bomb goes off, it will kill who ever stepped on it but won't trigger any more bombs, so the supplies will be safe. I can also set them up so there is one way to the supplies, so we can still use them." he beams somewhat and looks hopefully at all of us.
"Who said anything about we?" points out Marvel with a snide finger pointing at the boy.
"Well... I..." the boy is hiding his trembling fingers again, looking down.
Cato shrugs and presses his lips into a line. "Fine. We'll give you a small amount of food and protection for some time, but any smart play and I'll break your neck in an instant, and that's a promise."
The boy nods firmly and asks in a now quiet voice. "It's just, I had a hard time, lifting the bomb and digging it up..."
"Marvel, Lover Boy, off you go." He waves his hand and turns to the Cornucopia. I'm not one to complain but Marvel does in an instant.
"I'm not trudging off with twelve and some shrimp from three, I'll be doing all the heavy work." he protests angrily.
"I'll break your neck too if your not careful," he says calmly. "Girls, you go help too," Clove gives him an almost unbelievable stare before he laughs and puts his arm around her. "Just kidding, you're coming with me."
Marvel, Glimmer, Orella and I all stare at the two wondering off to the Cornucopia, our mouths a gape.
"The damn nerve," spits Orella and strides over to where we rose into the arena where the district three boy is already digging using a knife. I join her, and after a while so do the other two.
The work is hard and heavy, and thankfully we finally see Clove and Cato doing a bit of work. The two of them begin to pile up the supplies a little way from the Cornucopia in a sort of pyramid shape, and we keep digging up the bombs and carrying them over to them. I do most of the carrying, as I am used to it after the years of bringing in the flour for the bakery each morning. During my seventh or eighth trip, I lost count, I start to think of home. My father will be watching me, and he will be the only one who really understands why I've put myself in such a vulnerable position by joining with the murderous careers. Most people must be saying that the Star Crossed Lovers thing was all a rouse. A power play. But he'll know that this is the only way to guarantee her safety, because the careers are her only true threat. Except the Capitol... but I have no way of controlling the deaths bought at their hand.
I put my mind back to work. There's nothing worse than thinking of the possible ways she could die, it's more terrifying than my darkest nightmares.
After all the bombs have been dug up and new holes have been created around the pyramid of supplies we leave the district three boy to sort out the technical stuff. He's given a few slices of bread before he starts, and we all sit in the shade of the Cornucopia. The work has taken most of the day, and the sun will set in couple of hours so there is not much point of hunting when there is no signs of where the other tributes are. We eat in silence, but my mind is whirring with every possibility. Ever since we entered this arena my mind has been buzzing. How to keep her safe, how to get her out alive, how to sacrifice myself... Nothing has sprung to my mind yet, and I don't think it ever will. I'm not good at tactics, plans, forethought. Even though the girl who has added the meaningful spark to my existence depends on every single one of my actions, I can't think of how to keep her safe from here on out. I render myself a failure for that.
A failure.
It's as if I have come so far to keep her safe but cannot go that one bit further to keep her alive for sure. My thoughts get deeper and more potent to my ever blurring mind.
"Stop day dreaming about the stupid girl and get some sleep." Glimmer says irritably. I don't know how long it's been dark for now, and I don't know how long I've been sat looking into the palms of my hands where the hemp bracelet Ben gave me sits, curled in on itself, already worn and looking dirty.
"I'm just going to get some water." I say and stand up, leaving Glimmer to guard the sleeping careers as I step carefully over the safe route the district three boy taught us. He sleeps a far distance from the rest of us, but remains inside the confines of the Cornucopia.
I get a water canteen and step back, then make the short walk down towards the lake. The moon is reflecting beautifully over the still water, and as I dip my canteen into it's clear depths the ripples distort the crescent.
I look around, and take in the scene. The trees all around the lake have the faint sound of animals whispering between them, the occasional hoot of an owl calling out. The smell of deep forest pine gratefully fills my nostrils and engulfs my senses deliciously. As the ripples I created ebb, and the clear moon and tiny, pin pricked stars reflect off the iridescent surface I decide, no matter how brutal and bloody my death here may be, I have died in a beautiful place.