Author's Note
I do not own the Hunger Games.
They had no prey for this morning, so they shared the two bread rolls from the backpack she gave Nathaniel between them. It wasn't like they'd keep much longer anyway; they were already going hard. She ate hers in a few easy bites and licked the crumbs from her fingers before tracing them over her arm.
"That way goes to the sea," she said, pointing in roughly the right direction.
Bunny frowned. "How do you know that?"
She shrugged.
Nathaniel said nothing.
"I'm going to take Nathaniel down there. See what we can find."
Bethany had thought there was something down there at least.
"I'll go with you," Heaven said.
Bunny sighed. "I'll stay here and keep house then I guess."
With that decided, they packed up hers and Nathaniel's food into one of their backpacks – food was precious, here – and tied everything else into his blanket to leave on his bed.
Because it was crazy, but she did trust Bunny.
They filled their canteens at the stream, capping them and clipping them to their belts before continuing on.
"I hope Bunny's okay," Heaven said for the sixth time.
Nathaniel rolled her eyes. "If you're worried about her that much, go back to her."
Heaven opened her mouth and then closed it again as though she had no intelligent retort. Luciente stepped ahead of her and continued the path through the woods. They were thinning out quickly around them. They were near the cliff.
Soon enough they were stepping out of the tree line. In the daylight she could see how the land opened up around them, dropping away into the sea, which seemed to stretch out forever. The light glinted from the water, glistening.
"Woah."
For a moment, they all stood and gazed out to sea. It could be endless, Luciente thought, covering the entire world.
But something told her that somewhere out there there was land.
Land that should be theirs for the taking, whispered something deep inside her, territory they could claim and haunt and defend until time reached its end.
Nathaniel was the first to break away. "So where do we start?"
Luciente pointed to the beach below them. "We need to get down there."
He glanced down at the water one last time before shuffling back to joint them. "Of course we do. We best get going then."
Heaven took a step to the left, glancing along the coastline. It stretched out as far as they could see, the trees lining the edge, but appeared to slope in several places, leading down to the sand.
Luciente broke away from the view over the sea and followed her two allies as they headed for the closest of the slopes.
There was something down there, something powerful. She could feel it, deep in her chest, pulling at her heart. Nothing she had ever encountered pulled like that, but perhaps the arena was disrupting things. It was an unnatural place, and yet she could feel something, like the ground under her feet itself was humming.
It wasn't often she found something she wasn't sure about, and she didn't know if she liked it.
The climb down to the beach was long, steep, and sandy. The three of them half climbed, half slid to the bottom. The call was all around them here, hanging in the air, shrill and insistent. Luciente closed her eyes and reached out to it. She could feel it, smell it, taste it, almost tangible.
Nathaniel shivered, tugging his arena jacket together around his shoulders, and reached down to pick up a length of vine. "Maybe we can lay some traps."
Heaven smiled. "I'll help." She glanced up and down the beach. "Isn't this exciting? I've never been to the beach before."
"We were on a beach for the bloodbath," Nathaniel pointed out as Luciente began to drift away from them. Behind her, she heard Heaven huff in annoyance.
"That doesn't count!"
"Then this can't possibly count since we're still in the Hunger Games!"
Luciente held her arms out, listening to the hum, and kicked at the sand. It was so loud here that it was impossible to tell what direction it was coming from. It seemed to be coming from everywhere and nowhere at the same time, cold and warm all once, a thrum of energy shining brighter than the sun.
Nathaniel and Heaven managed to put together a few basic traps and then joined her in walking along the beach. Nathaniel glanced up at her with those pale eyes of his, so like her own and Ariel's.
If she had children, she wondered suddenly, would they look like her and him, with their pale eyes and pointed features, or would they look like Hyperion, with his human eyes and broad shouldered build? Would they sense the world like she did or see it like him, living with his eyes shut?
"Can you feel that?" Nathaniel asked.
She smiled down at him. "Can you?"
"What is it?"
"What we're looking for."
Whatever it was, it wasn't on the beach. They had passed midday, and it would take them a good while to get back to the other end and return to the cabin. Luciente took his hand as she turned around and began to walk back towards where Heaven was stood on the water's edge a short way away from them.
The water's edge.
The water.
She stared out to sea.
The thrum of power echoed back, and she caught a shimmer of yellow and an even more distant flash of blue, amongst the ghostly silver and pale purple of fairies far too far to make out true forms.
She led Nathaniel over to where the tide was lapping up the sand and dipped the toes of her boot into the water.
Even through her clothing she felt it.
The water.
But—
The water itself, or—
"We should get back to Bunny," Nathaniel said.
"I hope she's okay," said Heaven for what had to be the twentieth time.
Luciente followed as Nathaniel began the trek back towards the treeline.
Some things were worth it.
Nathaniel's traps had caught two rabbits, one dead, one alive and squealing. She drove a projective through its eye and helped him disentangle them.
"At least we've got food," he said with a smile.
She ruffled his hair with a bloody hand. "At least someone succeeded at something today."
She was going to have to come back.
THE FALLEN
District Six Male: Wylie Cooper. Killed by Cairn Aphelion of District Two. Placed Sixteenth.
Wylie was such a sweetheart. He was one of the youngest tributes and such an upbeat little kid who was really trying his best. Ultimately though, with someone going to die in that confrontation, he was the most vulnerable. Thank you for him SongofFete!
District One Male: Damon Newbury. Killed by Hyperion Ripley of District Ten. Placed Fifteenth.
Damon was not a sweetheart, but he was a very good Career. I loved having him around, especially since the Career pack is a bit of a mixed bag this year. Thank you for him JAJ!
CURRENT ALLIANCES:
CAREERS: Nike Arellano [D1F]; Cairn Aphelion [D2M]; Livia Dolabella [D2F]; Ilenia Costello [D4F]
OMEGAS: Shelley Fisher [D5F]; Arielle Wayne [D6F]; Azrayk Blaze [D9M]; Hyperion Ripley [D10M].
SCYTHE GIRLS FT 1/2 OMEGAS: Nathaniel Volkner [D5M]; Abundance Harper [D9F]; Luciente Ripley [D10F]; Heaven Jonas [D11F].
LONERS: Sedge Hastings [D12M]; Tamika Tran [D12F]
