Author's Note at the end of chapter

"Poverty isn't bad housing, dirty clothing, families of 10. It's never having been loved or even respected. Not knowing the difference between love and abuse. A kiss that wasn't a down payment on a blow." – Father Jones, Call the Midwife, S1 E2

Whatever had been Enobaria, disappeared after the events of the 74th Hunger Games. Physically, the shell that I used to be still sat in my parent's bedroom, the curtains pulled tight regardless of day or night. From the outside the house would have looked silent and deserted. The idea of food made me ill and the idea of venturing outside filled me with a terror so severe that my body would shake uncontrollably.

It wasn't that I was scared of the outside world. Really, what was there left to be scared of anyway? The worst thing in the world had already happened. No, it was that the outside world held something much worse than fear. Out the front door there was sunshine and people and a world that seemed to be continuing as if the very heart of it hadn't been ripped out. It made me sick to hear the birds chirp or a distant call from the street. Locked in the cocoon of my parent's bedroom, I could believe that the world had come to a halt, just as it should have.

After what might have been two weeks, I had lost all the muscle tone that I had spent years of training cultivating. My skin that had been bronzed caramel by the sun since I was a child, had turned as pale as Clove's had been when she lay on the cold metal table in the Capitol medical lab. Once, I caught sight of myself in the reflection of a window and I no longer recognised the person there. She had hollow cheeks and sunken eyes. Most unrecognisable of all was the defeat etched into her face.

It took three weeks for someone to knock at the door. I ignored it. I knew it had been coming. As much as I wished it, the world would not leave me alone to die. A feral, manic laugh slipped from my lips at the thought that the girl who had never had anyone, would not be left alone to die when it was the one thing she wanted.

I lay in the darkness, curled into a ball on top of the faded covers of my parent's bed and listened to the knocking, wondering without interest who it was. I could come up with only two people who would bother to try – Domitius and Amica. I placed my money on the former, but perhaps that was just me hoping for that. If there was one person I never wanted to face again it was Amica. How could I looked at the only person who had ever been kind to me, and know that I had been responsible for the deaths of two of her sons? How could I looked at her features and not be reminded of the menacing boy whom I hated, but who had stayed with Clove when –

I couldn't think of that. I could bring myself to go down that path, even in my own mind. The last three weeks, it had taken every ounce of energy I could summon just to shut the thoughts down whenever they slithered into my mind. That was why it was so much safer to sit in the room that filled me with anger and longing at my long dead parents, because anything else outside that door would only make me think of her.

Vaguely I became aware that the knocking had ceased and I briefly allowed myself to hope that they had given up, that the effort had been a courtesy one and that they didn't really have any desire to rouse me from my darkness. It was strange that it was the absence of the sound that I noticed more than I had the sound itself, and I found my ears were straining, wondering if something more would come.

Lethargy aside, when there was a loud crash my irrepressible instincts sent me flying into a sitting position, my heart pounding in my ribcage and making me feel light headed with the sudden adrenalin.

A moment later when there was footsteps in the hall, I dropped my face into my hands and groaned. I couldn't believe that anyone had bothered enough to actually break through the door. It wouldn't be hard, but it would take far more effort than I was worth to anyone.

The next knock was insistent and on the other side of the bedroom door. Even though it was just knuckles on wood it had a tone of impatience and stubbornness and I knew that my wishes were not going to be headed by the universe.

The small room suddenly felt claustrophobic. It was stuffy with the curtains shut tight against the daylight and no possibility of escape. There was no lock on the door and nothing to stop whoever it was from entering and breaking into my carefully constructed shell. Panic sent adrenalin sweeping through my body and once that feeling would have made me react with force, hitting out at anything I deemed a threat, reaching for a weapon so that I could control whatever happened next. But I no longer cared and now the adrenalin just overwhelmed me and left me feeling even more powerless, sending me back into a foetal position on the covers, my only defence against whatever was demanding entry.

"Enobaria?"

The voice was not one I had expected but not even that could inspire more than a small spark of alarm. My mind tried to process what my ears were telling me but I could only conclude was that I must be delusional.

"Enobaria Reyes, open this door!"

The voice was unmistakable with that tone, though it had been many years since I had heard it. Still, I'd know that soft, slightly husky voice anywhere. The realisation, and the inevitable memories that came with it, sent me spiralling again and I curled into myself tighter. Tears squeezed themselves with admirable determination between my closed eyelids and soaked into the faded blue cover beneath my cheek.

The sensations of the world faded like the beautiful nothing that had wrapped around me when I took the Morphling tablets that Hazel had given me. Distantly, I heard a click and a swish and then there was a creak and the ground dipped, tilting alarmingly and I knew with dismay that she'd sat down on the bed. I could tell though that she had no come close enough to touch me and I was grateful for that small courtesy.

"En?"

I'd never understood how someone could have kindness and command in their voice at the same time. Both of them struck me like a blow in the chest, tugging my eyelids to open and my brain to function. I blinked away the blur that was either over my eyes or my brain and tried to make out the face above me. The first thing that hit me was red, read hair, and it was if I was twelve years old again and meeting Junia for the first time. But with awareness came memory and I knew that I was not twelve and too many years had passed since then, too many years and too much pain for both of us. The last time I had seen my training partner, Junia had me slammed up against a wall in the Training Centre and she had been hissing that I was the one that should be dead.

I remembered as if it was yesterday the pure hatred in her eyes. It had been yesterday in a way, because I'd looked at myself in the mirror and seen there the same loathing and rage. The old Enobaria would have preferred that hatred to the pity that was etched on Junia's face now but I was too exhausted to care either way.

"Domitius was worried about you," Junia said simply, this time, her voice devoid of emotion. She raised a hand a flicked a lock of deep red hair from her eyes. Despite the almost eight years since I had last seen her, she looked remarkably similar. She had the large, innocent eyes and doll-like features that made her look child like, even at twenty-five. Those eyes were still a strong, deep blue that contrasted surprisingly with her auburn hair and they still had the steely determination that I remembered.

"He can't have been that worried." My own voice surprised me because I didn't remember telling it to speak. It had been so long since I spoke aloud and it sounded dry and hoarse. Junia wriggled slightly in her spot, seeming to settle herself even more and I realised miserably that she was not going to leave. Feeling my muscles protest any movement, I uncurled myself from my tight ball and pulled myself painfully into a sitting position. I tucked my knees up under my chin and regarded Junia with an inhospitable gaze.

She, in turn, seemed unperturbed by my anger and shrugged. Of course she wasn't fazed. She had spent six years in the Centre, training with me and under the fiercest fighters of the district. She might look doll like and innocent but Junia had been trained to kill too.

"He thought you might launch a dozen knives into him if he came," she said calmly. "You weren't very nice to him last time you saw him."

She was lying. Domitius would not be afraid of me and he certainly wouldn't be worried about how nice I was to him. But I couldn't be bothered to consider why she would lie.

"He would deserve it if I did," I replied stonily. The thought of him inspired a flicker of my old anger. It felt good. Anger and violence were familiar and comfortable and they brought with them a sense of power. I lifted my head a little higher and glared openly at Junia.

"I'm surprised you can stand to look at me, Junia, considering I killed the man you loved."

I was challenging her, looking for that flinch of pain that told me I was right. I wanted to push her, push her out the door and the only way I knew how was to use Manius. It hurt to remember the guilt but it would be better for both of us if she just left.

She didn't flinch though, nor break my gaze. Instead she sighed sadly and clasped her hands in her lap.

"You can try that if you want, Enobaria, but it has been eight years since I hated you so I'm not sure it will work. I was grieving when I said those things to you, and I'm sorry for them now. They were not fair and they were not true. Manius' death was not your fault."

A confession and an apology were the last thing I had expected. I didn't know what to do with an apology. I wanted anger, venom, blame, guilt. I wanted to add Manius' death and Junia's pain to my list of sins. Just one more death I was responsible for.

"It was my fault," I shot back when I had recovered enough to speak. "I left him to die, alone and in pain, and I turned my back on him."

Junia fixed me with a gaze so steady it made my stomach flutter nervously. "President Snow and the Capitol killed my husband, not you Enobaria Reyes, no matter how mightily you might think of yourself."

The disguised insult surprised me just as much as the apology had. Slowly I processed Junia's words. Ice slithered through my veins at the mention of the President and I had to press my lips together to hold in my hiss of anger. And then I processed the other part of what Junia had said.

"...your husband?"

A look of triumph flashed across Junia's face and too late I realised that my voice had been curious, not angry. Without explanation Junia climbed to her feet and held a hand out to me.

"Come on, there's someone I want you to meet."

Despite her words she didn't give me much of a choice as she leaned down, clasping my hand in a firm grip, and pulled me roughly to my feet. I was forced to support myself or crash to the ground. I could have fought back, lashed out, refused, but they were things that the old Enobaria with will and energy would have done. Instead I found myself following meekly behind Junia as she led me from the bedroom.

Sunlight was streaming through the front door which had been left wide open and I flinched away from the light and the outside world. It was too bright and it hurt my eyes and made my head swim. Mercifully, Junia hesitated in the open doorway, my hand still captured in hers, and gave me a moment to adjust to the sunlight. She only gave a moment though, and then she was pulling me down the front steps of the house and into the outside world for the first time since returning from the Capitol.

I stumbled through the blinding spots dancing in my vision and then found myself sitting on the bottom step, pushed down my Junia's hands on my shoulders. When my vision cleared some I stared out across the ragged remains of our front garden. It was mostly just a scrawny patch of unattended grass, but it was the figure sprawled in that grass which really caught my attention.

A child lay on their back, partly obscured by the swaying green stems. All I could see in the sunlight was the small spindly arms and a flash of dark hair.

A red hot poker stabbed in my chest. Against all logic, my little sister was sprawled carefree in the grass, just like she had been years ago before the anger and hatred spread through her tiny body like a disease.

"Aixa!" Junia's voice beside me made my panic spike a familiar jolt of adrenalin. It spurred the child too and I saw with a sinking heart that the dark haired little girl wasn't Clove. She didn't look anything like her when she rolled onto her stomach and lifted herself above the line of grass stalks and wild flowers. Her face was too round, her hair a shade too light and her smile was too genuine. But her dainty little face and full lips looked just like Junia and her wavy dark hair, broad smile and piercing black eyes were the spitting image of Manius. She bounded through the grass towards us, skidding to a halt with a childish playfulness that I didn't recall ever actually seeing in a child before. I knew before Junia explained, exactly who this child was.

"Enobaria, this is Aixa, my daughter."

A/N: Welcome, readers new and old! For the new ones, this is part 3 of my Enobaria: Snow, Blood and Steel Trilogy. I strongly suggest that you at least flick through parts 1: Snow and 2: Blood if you want this chapter and story to make sense, but if not, I'll just tell you that this picks up a few weeks after the end of the 74th Hunger Games and will continue till the end of Mockingjay, and the entire story is follows canon.

To my old readers, thank you so much for returning! I love you all so much. I know I promised that part 2 would be finished off with an AU chapter when this one was uploaded, but it's turned into a very, very long piece and I'm still working on it. I didn't want to hold up the rest of the story, so I will let you know when I've uploaded that and you can take a break from heartache and go live in a world where thing aren't quite so terrible for a few thousand words.

This part of the trilogy is my favourite, so I sincerely hope you all continue to stick with me for it, because I can promise you that it isn't all heartache like the last few, and there are more than a few happy surprises.

Till next time dear readers.

- Lu

PS. I HAVE to thank Forbidden Moons, who over the last few weeks has reviewed what feels like every chapter of the last two parts. It gave me great delight to come home each day and see all your reviews there, so thank you for taking the time to read it all, and even more to let me know your thoughts. It's appreciated beyond words.