Chapter 5: I Will Carry You

Barely-controlled panic arrives with the first dawn of the Games. The day my sister and her prospective fiancé are to be tossed with 22 others into a fight to the death.

Despite what is to come, I actually slept fairly soundly the night before, wrapped post-coitus in my husband's arms. We wore each other out much of last night making hot, anguished love, so that when I first stir awake against his chest, the first grey flecks of the morning are barely discernible. Somehow, with this knowledge, I manage to fall back to sleep, with Peeta snoring beside me.

We awaken much later to find that it is suddenly mid-morning, and we have just under an hour to get to the Square. The Games officially open at 10; as relatives of one of the tributes, if we're not there at the appointed time… I shudder to think what might happen. We haven't needed a Peacekeeper escort to our assigned seating, as is usually customary for families of the tributes. But on today of all days…

I think the sheer terror I am trying so desperately to keep hidden is making me do things that possess no emotional logic. Despite being in danger of being late if we don't hurry it along, Peeta and I take our time getting ready, though we shower together… and get a little frisky in the shower. It's half-past by the time we are at the sink, and I try to look the picture of dignity while doing up my hair in its signature braid. The slight tremble to my hands gives me away.

I let out a breathy sigh as Peeta inlays his palms over mine. "Let me." And he finishes weaving my chestnut tresses into its strand with great care. When he's done, I lightly touch, smiling shakily, pleased, as I turn back to look at him.

"Thank you…" We touch lips lightly, and I think I catch us both off-guard with how desperately I lunge in to deepen it. When we finally break apart, my grey irises are huge, stricken.

"Please tell me she's going to be all right."

Peeta grins down at me with love that should be impossible. "Hey, hey, what did I tell you on Reaping Morning? Primmy's going to be all right."

"And how did that turn out for us?" I bite back, almost involuntarily and unusually sharply. The blue in Peeta's eyes expands to include whole oceans, and I immediately want to chastise myself. I'm a horrible person, and an even worse wife. Here he is, trying to console me in one of the worst moments of my life, and I'm caustically sniping at him. As if it was somehow his fault that Prim was chosen, like his promise to me that she was going to be all right was a promise he somehow had it within his power to keep. We both knew he didn't, not any more than I did. The Reaping Ball doesn't care who you are when it picks you, how whole families are affected by likely losing someone they love so cruelly.

Draping my arms about his shoulders, I can think of nothing to say or do except shove my lips against his in a kiss so frightened, Peeta actually looks a little concerned for me when I finally release him with a sharp POP! Tears sting behind my lashes, but I refuse to let them fall.

"I'm sorry," I warble, bottom lip pouting. "I just…"

Taking my face in his hands, tilting my head back, Peeta kisses me so deeply it makes my head spin, and my legs nearly give out as I sag against him, sinking into it. "Hmmmm…."

"Ssssssh…. You have nothing to apologize for, my love." Keeping me at rest in his arms, I watch his eyes as they dart to the clock. "Twenty to the hour. If we don't leave now…"

I launch myself at him, folding my legs about his waist and kissing him breathlessly one last time. I am just about convinced that Peeta is going to take me right on our bathroom countertop when from all the way downstairs, a knock on the door interrupts us.

I jerk away, my lips flushed and rouged and very kissed, my hair tousled and in danger of coming out of my braid. "Oh….. hell!" I grouse. Peeta just laughs at my frustrated expression. He must think I look adorable, and I reward him with a scowl, though it's playful.

"That'll be the Peacekeepers," Peeta says.

Suddenly, I'm smirking, and pulling me back to me by his collar. My mouth a hair's-breadth from his, I whisper sultrily, "Well, we mustn't keep the Peacekeepers waiting." My smirk widens. "Although it sounds tempting."

Peeta grins, and we thus go for another round of frantic sex on the bathroom countertop after all, embarking on our own act of rebellion and effectively killing another ten minutes.

I must admit, it is a gamble whether or not the Peacekeepers would, in their impatience, break down the door and come in after us only to catch us mid-coitus. This is why Peeta and I our purposefully loud in our act of making love. But, perhaps in a reflection of how conservative a district Twelve is, no one bursts into our home unannounced to hurry us along. By the time we come downstairs, presentable if also a little rumbled, there is half a squadron of officers on our front stoop, all of them looking deeply uncomfortable. Only Darius, the friendly ginger Peacekeeper, has an amused tinge to his wince. The Head Peacekeeper, however, looks as purple as a radish.

"Mr. and Mrs. Mellark, didn't you hear us knocking?"

"Why, no!" I feign shocked mortification. "My husband and I had rather pressing business to attend to."

Ever the diplomat, Peeta tries his best to save face, though he isn't trying as hard as he normally would in a tense situation, and it's clearly a struggle for him not to laugh. "Our apologies, Officer. We overslept, and we didn't get…. much rest to begin with." In spite of myself, I turn pink, biting down on my lip to keep from grinning dopily. "We really are sorry to have kept you waiting, but perhaps you might have thought to fetch my mother-in-law? I don't suppose you have yet."

"I'm right here, son," a voice pipes up from the middle of the Peacekeeper posse. Now I actually am mortified, letting out a squeaky yip at the realization that my mother heard us having sex.

We have to go at a light jog to have any hope of making it to the Square on time. I can tell that some of the cadets accompanying us are out of shape, and more than a few shoot us withering looks as they barely keep pace with us, their charges. We're mounting the steps to the scaffolding with only two minutes to spare, by the Justice Building clock tower. The Hawthornes are studying us curiously, but with abject relief. Gale looks a little green around the gills, and I feel for him: my stomach has gone back to twisting itself into knots.

"What took you guys so long…?"

"Not now, Gale!" I hiss. I am absolutely not discussing my sex life with my hunting partner.

The clock strikes the top of the hour, and the jumbotron screens go live. We see Capitolites in the city streets screaming with bloodlust and excitement, and I whimper. I turn to take in Peeta, who looks ghastly pale.

"Hold me!" I plead.

And he does, for how can he do anything else?

The screen shifts after the seal of Panem appears on the screen, and we get our first look at the arena.

It's a molten hellscape. The Cornucopia appears to be set in a circle of erupting volcanoes, the plain on which the tributes are to run for the supplies comprised of cooled magma – igneous rock, I recall the term from when I was in school.

The cameras capture the environment and the tributes' first reaction shots from multiple angles: we see through the first-person eyes of one of the tributes, then the camera does a close-up of the boy from 10, one of the twelve-year-olds. There's the Cornucopia, with a holographic, floating clock counting down the final sixty seconds. If the tributes step off their pedestals any earlier than this timer reaching down to zero and a gong sounding, land mines blow their legs off. But for all the angles we are shown, my sister is not among them. Neither is Rory. Neither of the District 12 tributes are in sights, so I have to resort to wide shots to scan the expanse with my eyes frantically.

Where are you?... Where are you?! At last, when the timer hits ten seconds and dwindling, I spot a flash of blonde hair. My sister Prim is very still, her eyes popping with fear, but to her credit, nothing in the rest of her face gives away how terrified she must be. Anyone else besides me, who knows her better than anyone, would be hard-pressed to tell that she is barely holding it together.

With 5 seconds to go, I spy Rory next. And I'm all at once shocked and relieved to discover that he has been placed directly next to my sister, at her immediate left. I have to wonder if this orientation was strategic, intentional, on the part of the Gamemakers. Keep the star-crossed lovers together in their last guaranteed moments of safety, and then drive them apart, likely with the help of attacking tributes. Holding each other's eyes, Prim and Rory reach across the slight space between their pedestals. Their fingers are just barely out of reach of each other, but it makes for a dramatic moment and the camera zooms in….

… just a tick before the gong sounds.

With this dangerous Ring of Fire at their backs, none of the tributes even think about trying to flee for the volcanoes. No one would, even if they wanted to. If given a choice between which death is the quickest and the least painful, making the Run to the Cornucopia is in the case the safer bet.

I'm now thankful that Prim and Rory were situated together. Rory immediately leaps off his pedestal, reaches Prim in less than a quarter of a second and gentlemanly takes her by the waist to lift her down.

"I'm fine, really…. RORY!"

Her call of his name pitches abruptly into a yelp and Rory wheels around to find one of the thirteen-year-olds – the boy from District 8 – making an unserious rush at him from behind. Rory flips him over his shoulder, knocking the kid's wind out of him. And then Prim jumps on him, bringing her boot down hard on his face. There is a CRACK and a howl as the poor boy's nose starts gushing blood, caved in. I wonder if his deviated septum has been broken. If so, it won't take too long before it is a struggle to inhale and thus breathe. True to my prediction, within the next minute, the boy's breathing has become labored, and he succumbs.

BOOM. The cannon fires.

Rory looks at his lady love, eyes serious and grave. "Prim, we've gotta get out of here."

A huge rebel yell makes them both jump as they watch the dangerous boy from District 7 – the one who got a seven in training – jump Rory with an axe he must have already gotten at the horn. Having grown into his body, and strong besides, Rory isn't afraid to tackle the guy to the ground and wrestle him to protect his dearest.

Beside me, I can hear my husband whispering to himself, sounding every bit like the wrestling coaches who trained him during our schooldays. I actually attended one of Peeta's matches once, and had told myself I wasn't going in order to blatantly check out the Baker's youngest son.

"Keep his arms pinned… don't let him trap you in a box. Box him out first…"

Despite not having a wrestler's training, Rory still has the build for it, and thus manages to make the pin, grappling the boy's axe out of his hands in the process. Thinking resourcefully, Prim dashes to it, picks it up, and with a mad howl hurls the blade into the boy's chest. There is blood, and a gurgling sound before Rory finishes the job by snapping the kid's neck. The camera doesn't fail to hide how regretful he appears.

"All right," Rory gets to his feet, hearing the cries of battle in the near distance. "Now we really have to go." Taking Prim's hand in his, the might-be-a-couple run away full-tilt from the Cornucopia, with only the axe and a single backpack between them, both taken off their second victim. I hope they will be able to make do with whatever is in there, though if the Games drag on as they are wont to do after the initial Bloodbath, I don't have much hope.

As it turns out, though, this year's batch of Careers apparently didn't get the memo that the best Games entertainment comes from drawing out the killing.

With everyone except for Prim and Rory taking their chances at the horn, once the Careers arm themselves first, they go into a possessed frenzy of murder. Blood gushes everywhere, dribbling into the crevices of hardened magma to mix with lava below. I scramble into my husband's lap and bury my face into his shirtfront. I can't bear to watch, even as I have to listen to cannon after cannon after cannon:

BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

"It's so horrid…" I whimper.

I lose count before long, but the BOOMs just keep on coming. It makes me wonder if there will be any tributes left alive.

Finally:

"Snow's Roses, 21," Peeta breathes.

I emerge from his shirtfront, eyes red. "What?" I clutch at him. "Where are Prim and Rory?! Are they…? Were they…?"

"They're alive!" Peeta breathes. "Look!" And he points to where my sister and her maybe-boyfriend are crouched on the black silty slopes of one volcano. They are careful to keep out of reach of the lava flowing down the sides.

I count in my head. 21 apparently already lie dead…. Prim and Rory are among the survivors…

"Who's the other?"

The camera answers that question for us. It's the girl from 4, the only other 18-year-old who was Reaped. I didn't see it, turned into Peeta as I was, but I imagine she must have simply gone blood crazy and turned on her allies after they razed the rest of the competition. She is doubled over on her knees, winded, covered in flecks of crimson.

The footage cuts back to Rory, who is watching her intently.

"Primmy! Primmy, give me the axe."

My sister passes the blade to him wordlessly, fearfully. The Career's back is turned to the only other two kids still alive. Perhaps she miscounted the cannons, and thinks she is the Victor in the shortest Games on record and is simply waiting for the cannons to sound.

Rory is no District 7 tribute – I doubt he's ever even seen an axe before today, much less used one – yet he shows no fear as he tilts it back and hurls it with all his might.

Hearing a whistle on the wind, the District 4 girl snaps her head up, but too late –

THUNK.

BOOM.

By sheer luck, the blade goes right into the last Career's skull.

There is silence for a moment. Then, Prim and Rory glance at each other, and, with a strangled gasp, rush into each other's arms, embrace and kiss.

Our entire district is on its feet, cheering and whooping. In the bloodiest Bloodbath on record, the shortest Games on record, District 12 will have its third Victor, guaranteed. I am nearly throttling Peeta as I fling my arms around his neck.

But then, as we quiet down, we see images of the Capitolites in the street, booing lustily. They don't look happy. I wince, hardly daring to breathe. There is such a thing as having too much blood too fast in the Games. Too many kills, too many deaths in the first days lowers the entertainment value.

My husband knows me so well, so intimately, that he must read exactly what I'm thinking, for he leans into me and whispers low, "I don't think they're unhappy the way we think they are…"

And indeed, I realize, with what Claudius Templesmith, the Voice of the Hunger Games, is now saying over the intercom, that Peeta's right. Trust my love to make me see things in a whole new way.

"Attention, tributes, attention: as a reminder, only one Victor may be crowned. Good luck, and may the odds be ever in your favor."

My eyes bulge huge with the implications. The Capitol audience isn't booing over there being too much death too quickly. They're booing because Rory and Prim – the star-crossed lovers – are now in the Top Two, and will thus have to kill each other. Ordinarily, this is the kind of entertainment value the Capitol would eat up mindlessly… except now, they're not just accepting it. My body thrums in thrilled nervousness/terror/excitement.

Rory eyes Prim with such heartbreak, such love, that I nearly want to cry. Then he very slowly, very deliberately gets down on one knee.

I turn to Peeta frantically, still sprawled in his lap. "What's he doing…?"

"Sssh, Katty girl! Sssssh!" Next to us, Mother is making some weird crossing gesture across her chest.

"Primrose Cyan Everdeen…" Rory begins slowly. "In more ideal circumstances, I would be doing this back home and not…. here…" He glances about the empty, volcanic arena, with a distastefulness that is almost amusing were it not also potentially seditious. Treasonous, even. "But, I don't know how much time we have left, so here it goes: Will you marry me?"

Prim has a shaking hand to her mouth, tears in her eyes. She's trembling, and I feel a lump catch in my own throat. Even under this morbid, hopeless backdrop, I can't help but be thrilled for her. By comparison, I didn't do things traditionally; I was the one who proposed marriage once Peeta and I came of age and we were well established in both of our careers. It was characteristically practical of me, now that I think on it. Peeta hadn't minded – he had just been elated that he would get to be with me and love me and make love to me whenever and wherever we wanted.

"Yes, I will! I will! Oh Rory…" And a sobbing Prim throws her arms about his neck and kisses him deeply. Only when they dreamily break apart does it dawn on either of them and Prim begins to shake again, though for a much more despairing reason. "But…."

Rory' smile is sad. "We could marry right now, before one of us…. has to go."

To my surprise, Prim is shaking her head. "A ceremony isn't necessary. I already feel married to you in my heart."

Mother is starting to weep quietly beside me, her wails so loud I almost miss hearing what's said next:

"… But who says one of us has to… go?" Neither the emphasis nor the euphemism is lost on me, even if I can't begin to tell what it means. Once again, I look to Peeta for help, but he appears as baffled as I am.

Opening the backpack they recovered, Prim rummages through it until she finds what she is looking for: a pair of gingsu knives (at least, that's the term Caesar helpfully provides us with during running commentary). Quietly, solemnly, Prim hands one blade to Rory while keeping the other. He seems to get her meaning before the rest of us do.

"Together?"

Prim nods. "Together." Then she points her own blade at her chest, pressing the tip against her breast, directly over her heart. Rory copies her, almost in awe.

Carefully stepping in, Rory swoops down and kisses my sister's lips quickly.

"One."

Craning up, she gives him a kiss goodbye in return. "Two…"

Both of them gaze at each other with love, determined that their partner in the arena and in life be the last thing they see. "Three," comes the chorus in unison.

"Stop!... STOP! …." Claudius Templesmith sounds remarkably frazzled. "…. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present the winners of the 80th Annual Hunger Games."

Dropping the knives, Prim and Rory step into each other's arms, embrace and kiss, at the same moment our entire Square goes berserk. I fling my arms about Peeta's neck, then draw back to gaze into his eyes. Swooping in, I kiss him on the mouth. He responds instantly, large and strong hands weaving into my hair as our mouths battle and urge each other open so our tongues can push through and dance while we make out.

We're lost in our own little world, just as my sister and her… her fiancé are onscreen. There will be time later to talk. But for now, just being together is enough as my husband and I kiss and anxiously await our loved ones' safe return and with the knowledge that we will soon have a wedding to plan.