Chapter 40
(Gale POV)
All night she sleeps curled up in my arms wearing nothing but my shirt. It's probably one of the sexiest things I've ever seen even though absolutely nothing happened outside of actual sleeping. And I love having her sleep in my arms. It's the best feeling ever. I sleep more than I did the night before but mostly because I'm over tired.
I get up just before sunrise to go check my snares. I get a few rabbits and that's great news. I'll have to clean them pretty quickly so that we can cook them and eat before we get going again but Rory can help me. And if we cut it all up small enough, we can cook it faster with smaller fires. This is good though, we need this nourishment to keep our pace today. If we don't stop for too many breaks, I think we might be able to make it to 13 tonight.
When I get back to where everyone is camped out, a few people are awake. I ask them to collect some sticks so that we can get a couple small fires going. Not too big because I don't want there to be a lot of smoke but large enough that we can cook quickly and then put them out. I find Rory and have him help me start cleaning them. The only knife I have is my pocket knife but as we get started, Madge comes over, now wearing her green dress again, and hands me a large kitchen knife.
"Here, this will help." She says, handing me the knife.
"Where'd you get that?" Rory asks before I even have a chance.
"I grabbed it as I was leaving just in case we needed it." She says with a smile.
I shake my head and smile. This girl is great. She thought of everything. "Thank you." I tell her.
We manage to get them cleaned much faster having that knife and I take them to a nearby rock and start cutting the meat into small pieces as Rory then takes them and skewers them on sharp sticks. It isn't long before we've got them cooked and everyone is eating. We drink the rest of the water and then refill the bottles and canteens. We clear away the traces of our presence here and start walking again. Now that we found the river all we have to do is follow it. That will help save us a little bit of time since we won't have to worry about keeping in the right direction.
As we walk, I notice Madge is wincing a little as she walks.
"Your legs hurting?"
"No. My feet are just sore. I'm fine though."
"Do you need a break? We can stop."
"Don't be ridiculous, we've just gotten started for today. I'm fine, really. If I could tolerate those dreadful high heels all the time, I can tolerate this." She insists.
"Okay, but tell me if you do need to stop."
"I will. By the way, I didn't tell you yesterday, but I talked to Drew and I found out how he knew so many things about me."
Anger flares through me and I turn to her, stopping us from walking. "You talked to him? When? Why?"
She looks at me and gestures for us to keep walking. "Calm down. It was fine. I wanted to know how he knew some of the things he knew about me. I mean It didn't make sense. Turns out he has been hacking into the Capitol signal to listen in on me. In my house, my room, at school."
"I really wish you hadn't gone and talked to him. He can't be trusted, even out here."
"He asked me about us too. He wanted to know how long we'd been together."
"Not nearly long enough." I tell her with a wink.
"He told me I was lucky we never got caught because we would've been punished."
"For as heavy of a stalker as he was I think he may be right on that. We are lucky he didn't catch us. He would've turned us in for sure."
"I have you to thank for me finding out who he really is you know."
"How so?" I ask, having no idea what she's talking about.
"He'd made me promise to stop talking to Avox and I'd agreed because he said it made him worry about me getting caught and I didn't want him to worry. Then you encouraged me to keep doing it. If I hadn't been so encouraged by you I never would've had that conversation with Martin where I told him my name and he warned me not to trust Drew. Before that, I was just resigned to marry him no questions asked because that's what I was supposed to do. So really, you saved me." She explains, squeezing my hand.
"I think we have Martin to thank for a lot of that too."
"Oh I agree! In fact I really wish I could've gone and gotten him off the train and brought him out here with me."
"Really?" I ask, not sure I like that idea.
"Not for romantic purposes." She says giving me a look because she can tell I'm feeling jealous. "I just think that it would've been nice to rescue him from the life he didn't deserve, you know?"
"Well maybe one day he'll get out too. You never know. There were plenty of times I never thought any of us would get away but here we are, out here on our own."
"It's so surreal. I haven't felt this happy or this free, ever. I really hope we find what we're looking for."
"Me too." I tell her. I'm starting to get nervous but I don't want to say anything. If we get there and it's nothing, then all of us are going to have to find a way to live out in the woods, on our own and that's not a task I think this group is prepared for.
(Madge POV)
When we stop for a break, I slip off my shoes and soak my feet in the river, being much more careful than I was yesterday. Gale stays with me and I think it's mostly because I told him I spoke to Drew yesterday. He didn't like that and I think he's going to stay much closer to me now, at least until we find District 13.
"Your feet look really bad. Is there anything in your first aid kit that you can put on them?" Gale says when he sees them.
"I was going to use something on them last night but decided I don't want to waste any supplies on this. We may need that first aid kit for actual injuries at some point." I tell him.
"And you may need your feet at some point. Use the stuff, it's why we put it in there." He insists and I know I won't get out of using it. I know he's right in that I need to use it but I really want to save it if we can.
I open my backpack and pull out the first aid kit. I let my feet dry off in the sun and then start applying some ointment to them in the raw spots. I use as little an amount as possible, still feeling like I should ration it as much as possible. As I'm applying it, Drew comes up to where Gale and I are sitting.
"Are you hurt?" Drew asks me.
"I'm fine." I tell him, not even looking up, hoping he will just go away.
"Are you seriously gonna come up and try to talk to her right here in front of me?" Gale challenges him, anger edging all around his voice.
"I'm simply making certain that she she isn't injured." Drew replies without even looking at Gale, keeping his eyes on me.
"It doesn't matter what you're trying to talk to her about, I warned you never to talk to her. I meant it."
At that, Drew turns to Gale. "I don't need your permission to speak to her. I'm actually pretty sick of the way you seem to think you're in charge of things in general. So if you could just back off, that would be great."
Gale is on his feet and in Drew's face in a split second and I'm struggling to get to my feet and break this up before it spirals out of control.
"And what? You think you're in charge because you're Capitol royalty or something? We're all here because I found a map and had a plan in place in case something happened. You're just here because you're some sort of psychopath who intentionally followed a girl into the woods when you knew she didn't want you to."
"Stop it, both of you!" I say trying unsuccessfully to put myself between them.
"You're one to pass judgement considering you intentionally started a relationship with someone who was spoken for. I wouldn't exactly describe you has being of high moral character." Drew argues back.
"Does it still count as her being spoken for if you manipulated the system to be with her in the first place? Cause I'm pretty sure it doesn't. Regardless though, I'm warning you one last time to stop trying to talk to her."
"Or what? You don't think I'm actually afraid of you, do you?" Drew snaps back at him.
And with that, Gale throws the first punch, nailing Drew right in the mouth and then the two of them fall to the ground in a full on brawl. They go at it for a few minutes with me yelling for them to stop before a couple guys from our group show up to see what the commotion is about and break it up, pulling them apart. Once they're apart, I grab Gale by the arm and pull him away from everyone. His eye is already showing signs of swelling so I'm sure it'll be black.
"Was that necessary?" I ask, annoyed at both of them for what just happened.
"I think so." He says as he pulls his shirt off, dipping it in the cold river water and holding it to his face.
"I've already said everything I needed to say to him. I'm with you. You don't need to fight over me. He's not worth it."
"He may not be worth it, but you are and I'm telling you right now that he has not grasped the fact that you two aren't together anymore. I'm looking out for you because he can't be trusted."
I put my hand on his arm and wait for him to look at me. "I love that you want to protect me but I need you to not pick fights. Hate him all you want, I certainly do, but physically fighting with him doesn't actually help anything."
"I don't want him talking to you."
"He can't hurt me with his words. He actually can't hurt me anymore at all. As soon as I knew the real story about him, he lost all ability to hurt me. So let him talk to me, it doesn't mean I'm going to talk back and befriend him. I can ignore him and plan to do just that. I would really like it if you could do the same."
He leans his forehead against mine. "I can try. That's the best I can promise you."
"Good enough. Thank you." I tell him, tilting my head up and kissing him.
I rub a little ointment from my first aid kit on Gale's face where I see swelling. It's Capitol grade medicine so it should heal it right up without it ever bruising. I glance over to where Drew is sitting, further down the river bank. His lip is bloody and it looks like his cheek may have gotten bruised too. I'm a little torn about if I should offer him some medicine too but I decide not too. With him, I feel like it's better not to offer anything. If I do, he'll see it as an opening, as a way to continue something with me and I can't let that happen.
The group gets walking again and thankfully, Drew stays to the back of the group and Gale stays to the front. No one in the group really says anything to us about the fight but I do notice Gale's mother looks displeased. She hasn't spoken to me very much since all this started but there hasn't exactly been a time for chatty conversations. She's been polite in what little interaction we've had but I'm secretly nervous that she won't like me. I hope that once we find District 13, I'll be able to get to know her and give her a chance to get to know me, outside of my image as daughter of the mayor. I'm actually hoping that everyone in the group can get to know me as more than just daughter of the mayor. Who I've appeared to be all these years is not really who I am and I'm looking forward to showing them that I'm my own person.
As the sun starts to set, we come over a hill and all stand in silence as we lay eyes on what used to be District 13 but is now mass piles of rubble, overgrown with weeds. My heart sinks, my hand comes up to my mouth and tears come to my eyes. Is this it? Is this all that's left?