Chapter 14
I'm always watching, always listening but will never be found
All the careers gasp in shock and I have to bite my lip to stop from gasping myself. A piece of my hair must have fallen out when I was stealing the supplies. I am mad at myself even though they are nothing I could have done about it.
"She must have got here when we were all fighting that thing." Logan says, stating the obvious.
"No shit Sherlock." Rosegold aggressively replies digging her finger nails into her hand while muttering to herself.
"Do you think that that was the only time?" Victoria asks.
"It has to have been, we had someone on guard every other time we were out." Scally says beginning to pace. "What should we do?"
How dare they under estimate Faye Finch Crossley.
"We will set up traps and always have someone on guard." Rosegold says.
"We should have been doing that from the start." Evan mumbles under his breath.
"Well we didn't Evan so we are just going to have to start it now, aren't we." Rosegold says angrily.
"Do you think she's watching us right now?" Lily says cautiously looking around.
Marcus burst out laughing. "Kid where do you think that little girl would hide to watch?" He says pinching Lily's cheeks.
I can't help but let a silent giggle, they really should have paid more attention to my sister's games.
Lily whips her head around so that his finger flies into her mouth and she angrily bites his finger like a young child would. Everyone laughs at this but Marcus just scowls.
After some arguments the careers begin to set traps for me, I am so honored they would do that for the little girl from district five. I have torn out a piece of fabric from my coat and I am using blood from my arm and a stick to draw out the cornucopia and the traps so I know the way to go in and out around the traps. I am slightly offended that they underestimated my hiding ability. I mean Evan should know better, never once when we were younger was I ever found in hide and seek.
The traps they made were pretty basic and obvious, well at least to me. I put the piece of blood covered fabric in my pocket so I can look at it if needs be. They all begin rambling on about tactics, weapons and their home districts.
I decide that I want to go back to the river and find somewhere to camp. I saw a few hollow trees; although they would make the perfect hiding place it is too obvious. I think I saw a few dirt caves covered by roots. That would be a good place to hide as it is dark and no one but me could fit in there.
I jump down from the tree I am hiding in and walk to the pond which has been my life line. I stand ten meters away from the pond and stare at it. Maybe I was wrong; it is very hard to see in the pond. I see a shadow swim around near the surface. No fish in that pond is that big.
I stand staring at the pond from a distance for ten minutes when I decide I was wrong. I just begin walking to the pond when a small rabbit goes up to the pond to take a drink. As soon as the rabbit comes near the pond a wrinkly scaly green-blue hand come out of the water. It has large spiky cream claws. The rabbit tries to run but his effort is in vain. The claw scrapes through the rabbit splitting it in four pieces. As the mangled corpse of the once cute rabbit is dragged into the pond, I get a chill up my spine as the blood is smeared on the grass. I turn around and begin to take a few steps away from the pond and turn around to run when I hear the sloshing of water. I look over my shoulder and see it.
A green figure of a man drags itself across the grass towards me. The creature is terrifying and that is the only way to put it. It's holding a large trident in its hand. Its face reminds me of a dragon except it has gills. Its upper body is human and its lower body is a tail like a mermaids. Exactly like a mermaid. But it can't be one of them, they are supposed to be beautiful and not kill rabbits. I watch as it slowly drags its body towards me.
It lifts the trident baring hand and throws it at me. I only register what's happening a moment too soon and fall on the ground. The trident flies above me and hits a tree, splitting the tree in two. I get up from the ground try to run.
I can't run because something is tugging on my ankle. I trip and look down at my ankle. Its hand is gripped around my ankle pulling me closer to him. I desperately try get away but I can't. I need to get out of its grip.
The thing is pulling me with him towards the water, to do to me what he did to the rabbit. I feel tears fall down my cheeks. I try kicking him but it doesn't work, he is to strong and his claws are digging deeper and deeper into my poor, skinny ankle. I look behind me and see a long line of blood smeared on the grass behind me that has come from my ankle. So much blood, too much blood.
I try to get my knife so I can cut off my ankle or something but its hand but I can't reach it. It is shoved into my front and I can't turn over to get it. I feel helpless. They are nothing I can do to protect myself. I look desperately at the creature silently pleading him not to do this. He doesn't show emotions, no mercy, no pity, no anything.
I am about to start screaming nonsense and accepting my death. But that's what the capital wants, they like my begging and pleading. I won't give up, I won't let them win. I close my eyes and take three deep breaths.
Think, think, think
I desperately search my mind for anything that will help me anything that I can remember on how to defend myself. I wish I wasn't so small and so weak. I am useless. I am not strong, I am powerless. I have nothing. I am not even that smart. I don't stand a chance, I can't even kill. I am powerless. My fight is useless why bother?
My family
I think about my family. I remember how much pain I went through when Finch died. I don't want that to happen to them again. I need to survive this, imagine how awful it would be to see someone you know a slow, painful death. I claw at the ground trying to stop him pulling me into the pond. I don't want them to suffer.
What can I do? How can I stop this? What even is this?
I heard sloshing sound and opened my eyes to see that the thing still gripping my ankle is in the water and trying to pull me in with him. With one sharp yank he pulls me in the water with him. As soon as I am he deeper and deeper into the pond, I didn't even know the pond was so deep. I don't want to drown.
I don't want to drown. When I am asked if I would rather be burnt to death or drown I choose burnt in a second. The thought of being suffocated by water scares me. I don't want to drown. I have to get out of here.
I can't defend myself with my fists. My knife is too blunt to cause any that much damage. The pepper spray won't work under water. I might be able to go above the water for a few seconds but it would pull me down before I got a chance to get out. But even a second is enough time to spray it. That is the only way, it's risky but possible.
It removes its claw from my ankle most likely to slit my throat. I take my chance. I stab the thing under its arm and swim up to the top of the water. I have never swum so fast in my life. The adrenaline must be kicking in as I am already close to the top of the water in a matter of seconds.
As soon as I reach the top I take the pepper spray out from my belt. I take of the cap and pull it up to the surface of the water only a moment too soon. I see the thing emerge it is about to pull me down but I spray it in its eyes.
It stops from shock of the pain and closes its eyes and diving back under water, desperately trying to get all the pepper out of its eyes. I take it as my chance, I pull myself out of the pond and I have never been so relieved to be on land in my life. I crawl away from the pond not wanting to see what would happen if I apply pressure to my ankle.
I drag myself away from the pond, not caring where I go just that it's away from the thing in the pond. I am coughing water and trying to pull a shriveled up ankle behind me. I think that it is going to catch me, I know it will. Its stronger but I'm smarter. At least I hope I am.
My knife is to blunt and the pepper spray can't kill. I have weapons.
The trident!
I drag myself using all of my strength to try get to the trident before it gets to me. I drag myself across the ground hearing my own despite panting and loud heart beat in my ears.
When I get to the tree I use the trident to pull myself up on my feet. I let out a high pitch scream of pain from the sudden pressure on my ankle. I pull the trident out of the tree. And when I'm holding the trident, I can feel the power it possesses even though it's heavy. I look at the thing on the ground pulling itself towards me; I give the trident a weak throw. Normally with that little power the thing would not travel a meter. But this was different the trident flies through the air and hits the beast killing him instantly.
When I see the trident come out the things back I know its dead. I fall down on the ground and gasp for breath trying to recover from the pain, physical and mental. I lay my head against the trunk of the tree and close my eyes.
I nearly died
I sit there until my breath became steady and I wasn't close to crying. I open my eyes and look at my ankle and gasp in horror. It is a bloody mess. The skin is ripped and peeling of it is bleeding, a lot. Whole chunks of my skin are only hanging off by a tread. I pull my leg closer to me and look at it closer. I poke at it my finger. I spent a few hours at capital learning about injuries and how to heal them in the wild. After a bit of poking and wincing, I find out that it is not broken but very badly injured. I think most of the damage is external instead of internal.
I drag myself around and I gather up some branches that look sturdy. I rip of pieces of my jacket. I sit there and wrap the sticks and branches around my ankle until I am satisfied that it looks okay and I will be able to walk on it. I stand up and walk around a bit putting some wait on it. The cast is okay. I could definitely do better with proper supplies. I will try and rob from the careers tomorrow.
I walk over to the dead creature. Shocked at what I did. I fall down beside it. I grab the knife out of my belt and cut of a scale from its tale. I stab the scale in the middle making a small hole in the middle. I untie the rope Finch gave me and put the scale on it and then re-tie the rope. I look down at the rope and smile. I have the stone with the dent, Faiths charm and now a teal scale.
After a few minutes I hear talking in the distance and I know it's the careers. I am about to run away and hide. But I decide on the last second to rip out a piece of my hair and put it on the things body. If it's the careers they'll get the message. Then I get up and limb away to hide behind a tree so I can watch.
Three of the careers walk into my view: Lily, Scally and Logan.
"I heard someone screaming at it would have had to be her." Lily says. "Who else in the arena could make that sound?"
"Lily you might have miss-"Logan begins but abruptly stops when he sees the dead beast.
"What do you think happened to it?" Scally asks circling the beast.
"Clearly it stabbed itself with its own trident, none of us did it." Logan answers, nervously looking at it as if afraid of the truth.
"Somebody killed it." Lily says kneeling down.
"No, none of us did it, who could have?" Logan says.
"The fox." Lily says holding up the piece of hair I left there.
Logan eyes widened. "How would she kill that thing by herself?"
"Maybe she had an ally." Scally suggested.
"You mean the girl from seven, even with her it would be amazing if they killed it." Logan says.
"Do you think she left her hair here on purpose, if she did that means she heard the conversation from earlier?" Lily says.
"And if she did we under estimated her. If we underestimated her then we don't even know what she's capable of." Logan says dramatically.
Scally kneels down and puts his hand on top of the things body.
"It's still warm. If it's warm, she killed it recently and if she killed it recently that means that she's probably listening." Scally says.
It took them bloody long enough to connect the dots.
I am filled with worry and panic so without even thinking I grab a stone and I throw it away from me. It creates a small noise that alerts the careers and they rush to the area. I crouch run away for a few minutes and then I get up and sprint away in no apparent direction, ignoring the pain in my ankle.
I find a safe tree after ten minutes and climb it. I find a branch to rest in. I don't have much to do; I left my back pack and water bottles at the pond. My throat is dry and I am very tired. I root out the map I made of the careers camp out of my pocket. I study the map and try finding the best root to go with a thorn up mess of an ankle and a few careers on watch. After studying the map for half an hour I unrap and rerap my ankle. Finally after a hour and when the evening chill is giving me goose bumps I head back to the now monster free lake I decide to listen into the careers for a few minutes before they go hunting for the night.
When I get to the tree I observe from. When I get to the tree, I notice that I seem to have caught them just before they are about to go hunting. I hear enthousiastic talking.
"Let's go hunt for a fox!" Rosegold yells, followed by a loud cheering.
And I know their talking about me.
