Chapter 24:
Day Two
Jendaya 'Jenny' Barrett, 18, District Eleven
None of this was going to plan. She wasn't supposed to have an ally she wanted to protect. She wasn't supposed to have her supplies stolen by that bitch from Eight. She wasn't supposed to be weaponless. Yet every time Jenny tries to just leave Iroha, move on before she gets even more unwilling to leave, something stops her from going through with it.
She can't leave Iroha without any food or water, which would happen if she took their supplies with her. Jenny has no doubt she can outrun the new mother. It would be so easy for her to do. And yet…she stays with her. Maybe it's out of masochism that she wants to keep being near the woman who has what she has regretted for the last few months.
Maybe she's weaker than she thought.
No. Jenny is not a weak woman. She survived hell with Kane and pulled herself up from the poorest parts of Eleven into the wealthy woman she is today. She is anything but weak. Which is why she is going to leave Iroha.
…After they go into this building together.
There is one thing that makes Jenny a little scared and that's whatever the Gamemakers are up to with these buildings. They gathered that information about them for a reason in the private sessions and she's just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Surely they will be using that information somehow in this arena. Jenny just hasn't figured out how yet. Which is why she's still with Iroha, right? It's safer at this point still to be with someone else in the arena. Yeah, that's definitely it.
"So do we go in?" Iroha asks her as they stand in front of the large purple double doors. They've spent the last few minutes staring up at the doors, contemplating if they should go in or not. It feels like a huge trap, but at this point, Jenny doesn't know if they have the option to not go in anymore. Surely Lisia will want them to enter after they've debated it so much.
"There might be food in there and that's worthwhile enough to check it out," Jenny points out, yet stays frozen in place.
"Or maybe weapons," Iroha adds quietly and Jenny nods her head. Yeah, that would be quite nice, considering they don't have their knife anymore. "Seems suspicious the whole knives disappearing thing. Not…exciting…for her final Games if people just bleed out from one injury."
"I agree," Jenny says. "And a woman like Head Gamemaker Arune doesn't settle for not exciting…" She's banking on Lisia having something up her sleeves with these buildings and wanting the audience to see them, which will stop her from killing them. "Come on, let's do this."
Iroha nods her head and takes a deep breath as they step up to the doors and each push open one of the large doors. They pause to take in the building in front of them, still a thing of beauty despite the lack of decorations filling the space. The floor and walls are made of a deep purple crystal that reflects the light of the sun shining through the open doors behind them, along with fire from the torches on the black obsidian pillars line the room, leading back to an altar that stands in the middle of the room, one of two things within the building.
The other thing is a large dragon.
"Can't say I saw that coming," Jenny says nervously, starting to take a step back towards the doors, but they quickly slam shut, keeping them inside. Shit.
The dragon slowly pulls himself up, purple scales sliding against each other as he comes up to his full height, towering over them. His black head only makes the bright yellow eyes stand out even more, until he bares his sharp teeth at them. "One of you belongs here…the other does not…" he says in a slow deep voice, free of malice, aside from the faint graveling undertone.
Iroha and Jenny share a look at this and Iroha reaches over to grab Jenny's arm tightly in fear, before seemingly realizing what she's done and dropping it. "Will you tell us who?"
"Hmm," the dragon says as he starts slowly walking over to them, tail swishing behind him, and the two women press their backs against the door. He stares at them for a long minute before fixing his gaze solely on Iroha. "You. Come with me." He turns back to Jenny, narrowing his eyes and baring his teeth. "You stay right there. The only reason you are still alive to have this conversation is because I am the dragon of temperance. Do not test my self-restraint if you wish to live."
Jenny nods her head quickly and the dragon turns away from her, back towards the center of the room. Iroha nervously looks after the dragon and at Jenny, before her curiosity wins out and she decides to follow after the mutt as he explains things to her. "As the first one here, you may receive my weapon and be the champion of Nemrinth. But you should practice temperance with the weapon, for it does not work as normal weapons do."
"What does that mean?" Iroha asks as she steps up to the alter as Jenny narrows her eyes in jealousy at Iroha getting a good weapon and she has nothing. She could steal it from her…
"Hmm…" Nemrinth says as Iroha stops in front of the weapon that Jenny can't identify from her spot. "That is information I cannot reveal. Everything has a price in this world. Now take it."
Iroha slowly reaches over and takes the weapon, stepping back quickly from the altar as if she suspects there's a trap, but nothing happens to her. She takes a few steps backwards towards Jenny, clutching the weapon to her chest. "Thank you for this, oh great Nemrinth," she says carefully, continuing to keep her eyes on the dragon as she walks backwards to Jenny.
Nemrinth follows after her and Iroha picks up her pace, nearly tripping as she tries to get back. "Flattery will get you nowhere with me. Now, my counterpart? Oh yes, she would love flattery. Now go."
Iroha turns and runs the remaining distance over to Jenny, finally letting her see the glowing crystal dagger in her hand. Damn it, she wants that. Why did Iroha get to have this weapon but not Jenny?! …She knows the reason. It's because of what she revealed in her private session. She wonders if the Gamemakers will let her have any weapon like that.
The dragon still approaches them, this time focusing on Jenny.
"I can sense…" Nemrinth says slowly, blinking his eyes at Jenny. "A…desire in you. A desire for what I have given her." He slowly slinks back to his spot behind the altar, resting his head down next to the empty spot, still staring at Jenny with those large yellow eyes. "Perhaps you should go see my sister Udhyl. She might be willing to give you her blessing."
"Is her blessing another weapon?" Jenny asks and Nemrinth picks up his head to nod once at her before setting it back down with a thud. She knows it's a bad idea trusting this mutt…but can she resist the offer coming straight from the Gamemakers to get a weapon for herself? Absolutely not, especially if she is going to leave Iroha soon. "Where can we find her?"
"Look for the golden doors on this side," Nemrinth tells her as the doors fling open, making both of them jump as they bang open on the walls. "Now leave me before my restraint completely dissipates over you being in my temple."
Jenny doesn't need to be told twice and she quickly scrambles out of the building, Iroha close behind her. The doors shut behind them and Jenny peers over at them, her heart racing a bit from coming face to face with a mutt of that kind.
"Are we really going to intentionally seek out another dragon mutt?" Iroha asks her as Jenny turns to scan the buildings around them, trying to find the golden doors Nemrinth spoke of, before setting off west.
"If it has another weapon for us to use, then yes, we are," Jenny tells her, hint of jealousy in her voice as she storms off towards the other buildings, Iroha right behind her. She slows her pace at that, wanting to keep in line with the woman now that she has a good weapon to use while Jenny is weaponless.
For now.
Rodrick Tang, 18, District One
Rodrick is really starting to think the Gamemakers have something against him, yet he doesn't understand why. All he's done is exactly what they expect of him to do! He killed in the bloodbath without blinking an eye. He went hunting right away yesterday and tried to kill that boy from Seven.
So why was he punished and had a dragon try to burn him to death? Why wasn't he the one that got to claim that shining crystal weapon instead of Kaz, the one who hasn't made a single kill yet?! For once, he seems to actually be in agreement with Marian over something: both of them are not happy that they didn't get to have that weapon. And Kaz seemed oblivious to that.
Rodrick grimaces as he peels back the bandages on his leg, taking another look at the burn there. He is lucky they had every other supply they would need in the cornucopia aside from good weapons or else Rodrick would be in really bad shape. Well, worse than he currently is. The burn cream numbed the blistering skin and seemed to be expediting the healing, but he still is going to be slowed by it for a few days. Which he cannot let the other careers know about. He doesn't doubt that most of them would use it to their advantage.
He'll show them all that a burn isn't going to slow him down. It's what he came here to do, after all. Prove to his mother that he can do this… What does she think of his actions so far? She should be happy that he has a kill so far, but she has to be disappointed that he is just sitting around after his injury… He has to keep moving, he can't just keep sitting around and letting his mother be disappointed in him. He's already done enough of that by winding up in jail.
Rodrick tries to stand up, barely holding back a whimper of pain before flopping back down to his spot. Nope. He's not going anywhere today. Not with this burn. Shit.
He'd rather pay attention to the idiotic chatter of his allies than focus on the thought of his mother being disappointed by him.
"I can't believe I missed out on seeing a dragon!" Tiv whines, seemingly unable to grasp the fact that this dragon was trying to kill them with fire. "When can we go to another one of those buildings?"
"Yeah, go right ahead," Rodrick gestures off to the buildings as he sneers at her excitement to run off to get killed by a dragon. Maybe he should go ahead and let her go. One less person standing between him and victory. "Go right to the firebreathing dragon that tried to kill us."
"It didn't try to kill me," Kaz speaks up, looking up from the crystal weapon that rests in his lap, one hand protectively on the hilt. So he is smart enough to not trust them to try and steal it. "And didn't try to kill that boy until we entered. And let me take this."
"Which is odd," Abel says from Kaz's side where he's been watching the rest of them with distrustful eyes. "Why attack some of you but not the others? What's the reasoning?"
"I doubt there's any reason aside from entertaining or not," Tiv scoffs as she leans over to tap the sword with her nail, only for Kaz to pull it away from her. "I just want to get myself a fancy weapon like that. Do you think all of the buildings have a weapon like that?"
"Most likely," Abel tells her as he looks around at the other buildings. "But seems likely they also have dragons or some kind of mutt guarding them. Do we want to take the risk of entering one where the mutt will attack us?"
"In case you missed it, genius, we're in the Hunger Games," Rodrick scoffs at him and rolls his eyes. "You don't win without taking risks."
"Of course," Abel says quietly, putting his head down as he stares at his leg braces. "We're all aware of that. But if there's some sort of pattern to this, it's worthwhile to try and figure it out before rushing in blindly."
Tiv pouts at that and sighs loudly, clearly anxious to get out there and do something after being left behind yesterday. "Can't we at least go look for tributes or something?"
"I doubt we'll be allowed to find anyone today," Marian speaks up for the first time in a while, having been unusually silent through all of this. Rodrick narrows his eyes at her, suspicious of whatever she is up to. "She won't want her final Games going too quickly. So guess we should figure out the pattern."
Her tone has him suspicious that she has an idea of the pattern, but before he can say anything, a loud screech has them all looking up at the sky and grabbing weapons, and Rodrick can't help the shrill scream that escapes him at the giant bird flying in the sky in the distance. "What the fuck is that?!"
Marian bursts out laughing at his reaction and he glares at her, squeezing the hilt of his knife and contemplating how bad of an outcome it would be if he drove it into her head right now. The rest would probably retaliate and he isn't running away from them right now. "It's called a mutt, you idiot. You face a firebreathing dragon but scream like a small child at the sight of a bird mutt in the distance?"
"I- it's different!" Rodrick says defensively as he crosses her arms at her. "Birds of prey just have a freaking look to their eyes!"
Before Marian can answer, the bird swoops down in the distance and picks up some four legged mutt, carrying it into the air, before letting it fall to the ground and swooping after it. They all cringe at the thought of being caught by that bird…that is not how any of them wants to die.
"I think we can all agree that we're not going in that direction," Abel tells the group and they all agree right away with him. An unsettling quiet falls over their group as they stare at where that bird mutt swooped down out of sight.
"Okay maybe I can wait with going to one of those buildings," Tiv says, finally getting it through to her airhead brain that the mutts aren't something to mess with. She turns back to Kaz and gestures at the sword. "Now are we going to see if that works differently than the knives?"
"Obviously it does," Rodrick tells her, rolling his eyes at his dumb District partner. "Why else would it have a fucking dragon guarding it? It has to be special."
Kaz picks up the sword from his lap to stare at it closer. The sun catches it and reflects light off of it, making it even more blindingly bright than before. "We won't know until we find another tribute and…I use it on them."
"Or we give someone a light scratch to test it out," Tiv offers and the others all give her looks right away at that.
"Yes, and when it shatters without using it on an actual tribute, that will be just great," Marian tells her, giving a little laugh despite barely hiding her annoyance in her eyes. "Look, Lisia isn't going to let us find tributes today and Rodrick ain't going anywhere with that leg. And none of us want to get close to that bird mutt. So we need to sit tight and put our heads together to figure out what is going on with this arena."
There is little that Rodrick would find less enjoyable than sitting around with this group all day but he really doesn't have a choice here. God, he can't wait until he can get away from this group of imbeciles. And once more, he's suspicious of her tone. "Do you have any theories?" he asks her, narrowing his eyes.
Marian gives a simple shrug in response. "Nope."
Rodrick suspects she does have a theory, but she's remaining quiet about it. Which means he is not going anywhere with her alone. He knows that cold look in her eyes. It's the look of someone who wouldn't hesitate to betray a supposed ally if it means getting themselves further. It's the same look he knows he has in his own eyes.
The question is which one of them will make the first betrayal?
Artem Nobyl, 14, District Five
Artem didn't know what was wrong with the first building they got near, but he wasn't going to question Grey's decision to keep moving on to the next one. It was all he could do to try to help Sasha keep moving along as they followed after him, sweat pouring down his back from the heat of the day.
"Come on, we're almost there!" Grey calls back to them, waving over his shoulder at them to pick up the pace. "Once we get there, we can stop for some food and water."
"I swear, if we don't stop at this one," Sasha mutters under her breath, letting out a huff as she tries to keep going.
"I'm sure we will," Artem tries to reassure her, but he's honestly not sure about that… But still, he has to trust that Grey has kept going forward for a reason. He's already done way more for their alliance than Artem would be able to do on his own. He got them food and water, helped patch up Sasha's wound…and what has Artem done? Nothing.
Grey turns back around again and lets out a huff of annoyance at their slow pace before backtracking to take over helping Sasha walking from Artem and she mildly protests it. "Come on, if you don't pick up the pace, we'll be sitting ducks out here in the sun."
"I'm trying my best," Sasha tells him, letting out a little whimper of pain when she jostles her wound.
"Well try harder please," Grey answers before they fall into silence as they close the distance to the building. Artem can only hobble behind them, feeling once more like he isn't doing enough for the alliance. He can't even help Sasha with walking around…
How would he possibly survive without Grey?
He fights back a sniffle and wipes at his face, not wanting to let either of them know what he's feeling right now as Grey leads Sasha up the steps to the building. But instead of pausing for food and water, he pushes ahead to the large green double doors in front of them. He pauses to glance back at the two, making sure they're going to follow after him. "Come on now, I'm sure there's something worthwhile in there."
"Can't I just sit out here?" Sasha asks, breathing heavy as she presses her hand against her wound. When she pulls it away, there's a bit of fresh blood on her hand. "I think I need new bandages."
"You know we don't have enough to spare right now," Grey tells her, shaking his head before turning back to the doors. "Let's go."
Artem shares a look with Sasha as Grey opens the doors, also wishing they could stay out on the stairs and rest for a minute. He hasn't had to move this much in…well, ever really. He can feel his armpit bruising from all the use on the crutch, blisters forming from his hand sweating as he desperately gripped it to avoid falling. At least he isn't injured like Sasha…
He takes a deep breath as he follows after Grey, Sasha right behind him, but he stops moving immediately when he nearly runs into Grey. Sasha does bump into him and Artem has to reach out and grab Grey's back to stop himself from falling. "Quit moving!" Grey barks back at them, hint of anger in his voice before turning back to face the reason they have all stopped.
"Finally, someone has arrived at my temple," the dragon who's face is right in front of Grey says, her voice velvety and the words almost merge together. Green scales reflect the light around her, but her belly and head are bright white, nearly clear scales. She grins at the three of them, showing off the rows of very sharp teeth and Artem can feel himself peeing a little bit. That's it, they're all going to die. "I couldn't believe that those disgusting virtuous dragons were visited first. Don't you know who I am?!"
Grey bows his head to the dragon and she lets out a laugh that sends a chill down Artem's spine. "It is a shame that we have not heard of you yet. Please, enlighten us, magnificent dragon."
The dragon backs up to stand to her full height and stretches out her green wings, nearly touching the opposite walls of the building. "I am Vulthuryol, the envious!" she says loudly, voice echoing around the building. "You have chosen wisely. None of the rest come close to me. Bah, stupid Naymia being visited first." Artem is shaking in fear as he looks over at Sasha when she grips his arm tightly. Her face is full of fear as well. Somehow, Grey seems to be the only one not afraid right now. Vulthuryol settles back down on the green crystal floor, swishing her tail back and forth as she watches them with her teeth bared. "Now, technically I am only supposed to let one of you in here, but I know the envy the other two feel in their hearts." She takes the time to look at Artem and Sasha, "Both of you envious of those around you, wishing you could be like them. Well…I do happen to know a little bit about envy. You can stay. Just don't touch anything."
"What about me?" Grey asks as he takes a bold step closer to the dragon and Artem tries to reach out to stop him.
"Ah you may come with me," Vulthuryol turns her head to lead him back into the room, past the white pillars. "I have a weapon for anyone who feels envy in their hearts like me. Or anyone really, just so that those nasty virtuous dragons aren't the only ones with weapons out in the arena."
"Th-there are more of you?" Artem asks quietly, letting out a squeak of fear as Vulthuryol whips her head back around to fix him with a glare. He tries to hide behind Sasha, but she just pushes him in front of her.
"Yes, there are, unfortunately," Vulthuryol tells them, letting out a small blast of fire in annoyance. "Sydrunth thinks he's so much better than the rest of us. Ha, look who was visited first! Not him. And those virtuous ones think they're all high and mighty, but they're just as bad as us. At least we'll tell you to your face our intentions."
"And what are your intentions?" Grey asks curiously as he stops at the stairs up to an altar and thankfully bringing the dragon's focus back to him.
"I want them to praise me like they are praising the others," Vulthuryol tells him. "I want to be the first to have their weapon used. So take it, Grey Pendleton, and make the others envious that you have a weapon that won't disintegrate after one use. The weapon of Vulthuryol!"
Grey takes the weapon as Artem starts slowly backing up towards the open door, dragging Sasha with him. He really doesn't want to overstay his welcome in this temple and doesn't trust the dragon mutt to not flip on them in an instant. "I will make sure to use this. Thank you for this."
"Hmm, will you be thanking me?" Vulthuryol asks him, tilting her head as she studies him. "That's for you to find out. Now get out of here, I want them to envy you!"
As Grey walks towards them, holding a blow dart gun made of stark white bone…Artem will admit, he does feel a bit of envy in him towards Grey. But he tries to quickly push that feeling aside as Grey smiles at them. "Come on now, I'm not breaking my word to a dragon."
"But – the break?" Sasha asks as Grey sets out down the stairs. "I can't keep moving like this."
Grey stops walking, his back turned to them for a few seconds and Artem can see him take a deep breath, before he turns to face them with a forced smile. "Fine, we can rest for five minutes, but that's it."
"Thanks," Sasha says, hint of bitterness in her voice as she lowers herself to the ground. She lifts up her shirt to look at the bandages on her side, finding them filled with fresh blood. Grey frowns at the sight of her injury, but stays put.
"How many bandages do we have left?" Artem asks, deeply concerned for his ally.
"Not enough to change them now," Grey shakes his head at them. "I'm sorry, Sasha, but we can't. All the more reason to find other tributes so we can steal supplies from them. Now that I have this," he waves the blow dart in his hand and Artem doesn't understand why the weapon unsettles him. "I can protect you two better."
As nervous as Artem is for finding other tributes…he trusts Grey to protect them. And they won't be able to survive on their supplies for much longer with three of them… "You're right, we need to find other tributes."
Grey gives him a big smile at that, making Artem feel like he made the right call. "Absolutely. Now let's go, Sasha. It's time to get moving."
And we have Day Two! A death free chapter, but certainly not an actionless chapter because we have more dragons! Honestly I'm just hella excited for the dragons and to write them so yeah, we're gonna see more of them lol. Lisia didn't put all this work into her arena for the dragons to not be seen XD And now we have the puzzle pieces getting moved, more weapons are getting brought into the game...but just what will those weapons do? Hmm...guess we'll have to wait and find out. And how interesting that only one of them has tried to actually kill tributes in their temple, hmm...interesting.
We love to see some tension within alliances and this chapter gave us that in all three POVs lol. The Games just have a way of doing that to people lol. And also it helps when the people are not necessarily good people XD
Just a reminder that sponsoring is open! Get those gifts in if you're interested in sponsoring because you never know when someone is gonna go!
RQ #24: Who do you think will be the first one to use one of these weapons?
Alrighty, I'll see you all soon with Night Two!
