Chapter 18.
Eamon and Blair spent the rest of the morning at a distance, with Eamon silently but vigorously venting his frustration inside the cave, while Blair remained outside. What she was doing, Eamon didn't know nor did he particularly care. He'd hoped that Blair was different from other Careers. The entire ordeal had left a bad taste in his mouth and now he wasn't sure what to do next.
Just as he was sitting down to figure things out, Blair's head appeared through the waterfall.
"Eamon, can you come out here? I need your help with something," she said, avoiding looking at him before disappearing from view again.
Eamon gritted his teeth; he didn't particularly care to help her at the moment. But he got up all the same. What could possibly be giving someone who was clearly so capable a hard time? He emerged from the cave and a wave of heat washed over him with the sun burning brightly directly overhead. Blair was standing at the edge of the spring, concentrating on drawing something in the soft dirt with a stick.
Eamon dried himself off quickly and walked over to her. "What's the problem?" he said shortly.
"The problem is that we need to move. It's too cosy here, the Gamemakers will kick us out before long. And I doubt they'll be particularly polite about it."
"So what's this for?" he asked, motioning to the symbols and shapes etched into the dirt at her feet.
"It's a map. Sort of. Only the bits of the arena I can remember. This is why I need your help." She took a deep breath before continuing, still avoiding his gaze. "Half the tributes are gone, but most of the best ones are still here. We need all the help we can get, and anyone that's made it this far has got to have some skill at least. Which is why, since we're leaving anyway… I'm willing to help look for your friend. Madeline." The last word seemed to get stuck in her throat.
Eamon almost stumbled at those words. Whilst he was still angry at her, a large chunk of that anger was now replaced with shock and confusion. "Wait, really? But how? You said it yourself, I have no idea where she is."
She tapped the map with the stick in response and Eamon took a closer look, still bewildered by Blair's sudden change of heart on a subject she was insistent on just the previous night. A large circle encompassed a bunch of other shapes.
"This is the Cornucopia," she said, tapping a triangle in the center of the circle with a semi-circle just underneath it. "Assuming it's in the middle and that the tail points north, which is usually how it works. And just beneath it are the ring of pedestals."
"I assume these are those big mesas and mountains," said Eamon, pointing to four expansive blob-like shapes north, south, east and west of the triangle.
"Mhm. There's more that seem to make up most of the arena, but I haven't mapped those yet. Then you've got these branching forests that fill the gaps between them. On the outskirts they get a bit more open, which is where we are. Hard to say for sure though, I've only mapped to the southwest because that's the way we came."
"I'm not really following though," said Eamon slowly, "I mean, if you need my help to fill in the rest of the map that's kinda…"
"No not that, but I think I've figured out a way to help us find her. I just need to know if you know where she was on the pedestals at the Bloodbath. Because I wasn't watching her."
"Uhh… she was on the far right-hand side I think?"
Blair made a mark on the semi-circle. "So if she turned around and ran straight away, she's probably somewhere on the east side of the arena, right?"
"That's a lot of ground to cover…"
"I know… okay, would she have gone into the forests or the mountains do you think?"
"Forests, no question. Same as us. It's not as exposed."
"Okay, so in that case we should make our way along the perimeter, hit up the southeast section and then the northeast."
"If you say so, it's your plan."
"Alright, well let's pack what we need and get the hell out of here."
It was still bizarre for Eamon to see Blair going to such lengths for Madeline when she'd been so apathetic towards her earlier. What could possibly…? And then two explanations hit him at the same time. Either it was a ruse, which if it was, he couldn't fathom what she'd get out of it… or it was her way of apologising for her actions earlier. Blair didn't strike him as the type of person to openly say sorry, and whilst it hardly made up for what she'd done, perhaps there was still hope for her after all.
To ease their burden, Eamon and Blair packed only the essentials, leaving behind the lantern, the soap and the climbing hooks – they could always come back for them. After a paltry lunch of a banana each, they refilled their water bottles and bid farewell to the spring. The spring had provided a sense of recluse and tranquillity, but as they began moving eastward through the trees they were drawn very much back into the reality of the Games. The pace was slow, and their body language stiffened as every inexplicable sound was like a crack of thunder signalling imminent assault.
Eventually, the tension eased off, although the pair of them still refused to let down their guard. They weren't really sure what, if anything, they were meant to be looking for, and soon enough, began to fill the time talking about themselves. They talked about what their preparation for the Games had been like, which to anyone else it might have seemed trivial considering the circumstances, but Eamon enjoyed it anyway. Blair was still a curiosity that he simply couldn't wrap his head around; her fallout with the other Careers, her impressions of him, his feelings while watching her interview with Florence Whittaker, the hot chocolate they'd shared in the cave, and now relenting to look for Madeline. And yet, despite her brutish attack on Nora, he got the distinct impression that she wasn't inherently malicious like he'd been led to believe of Careers. More so that she still had morals and doubts but being trained in the ruthless academies of District 2 had left its mark. Indeed, of all the things Nott had prepared Eamon for, she was not one of them.
They were beginning to skirt the base of the huge, rocky mountain range south of the Cornucopia when Eamon flung out an arm to stop Blair from continuing. Something on the ground had caught his attention. He leaned down to pick up the thin, broken strand of a yellow-green plant and held it up at eye level.
"What is it?" asked a clearly perplexed Blair.
"Confirmation," grinned Eamon. "We've found her."
"Err… what?"
"This is rye grain. It grows in patches out here, but this little guy has been shredded up and thrown on the ground all by his lonesome. By a person, not nature," he added.
"What are you talking about Eamon? It's just a plant on the ground, there's tons of them. That's about as much confirmation as that twig over there."
"Which is what anyone who isn't from District 9 would think. However to anyone who is from District 9, this may as well be a giant, glowing billboard. That, and I noticed like, two more just like this one evenly spaced apart back that way," he said, jerking his thumb over his shoulder in the direction they'd come from. "Didn't want to say anything 'till I was sure."
"Eamon I still don't-"
"It's a trail," he said with a hint of excitement creeping into his voice. "She threw grain stalks on the ground knowing I'd be the only one to recognize it. If we keep going in this direction we'll find more. If we don't, I'll admit you're right and we'll move on, sound fair?"
Nonplussed, Blair nodded and followed suit. Sure enough, twenty paces up ahead, another discarded rye stalk lay in the road. Blair was still unconvinced, but they continued anyway. After all, it wasn't like they had any other leads. But just as Eamon was beginning to get hopeful, a sight a few meters up the trail drained that hope away.
"Okay," said Blair seriously, crouching down with him to look at it. "I think you might have a point."
A number of similarly shredded stalks were dyed scarlet in a pool of dried blood. There were other pools, streaks and droplets of the stuff nearby. A big fight had clearly gone down here. Eamon's hands began to shake he considered the possibilities, unable to help himself from starting with the worst.
"It's definitely her but she's not dead," said Blair uneasily, trying to reassure him. "Her cannon hasn't gone off. If she fought someone, it's possible she came off better."
"Madeline wouldn't kill someone. No way."
"Neither would you, if you could avoid it. She might've if she didn't feel she had a choice."
"Or she could be injured," he said flatly.
Blair shifted uncomfortably, "Yeah… I didn't really want to say that though. If she is injured we need to move quickly."
She helped Eamon to his feet before looking around and sighing, "Blood trail goes off in this direction. If she did get in a fight she might've run for a while without leaving the trail." Eamon nodded, clearly uneasy.
They kept moving, although the droplets of blood on the ground soon became scarce. It took them another twenty minutes of combing the area to find the trail of rye again, at which point they had barely over an hour of daylight left. And it only got worse from there.
"This leads into the mountains," said Eamon slowly, taking a sip of water and staring skyward.
"She must've panicked. Still, the fact that the trail's picked up again and with no blood is a good sign. But if we're gonna go up there we've got to get going. Don't wanna be climbing up that in the dark."
Eamon flexed his fingers and gloves and sighed, "Wishing we'd brought the climbing hooks now."
"We're only following the trail. Anywhere that she can climb, we ought to be able to as well."
They'd spent the entirety of the games thus far in the shade and protection of the trees, so moving into the exposed, rugged landscape was a bold move. Especially since navigating the steep, rocky cliffs and slopes was no easy task, let alone looking for a specific path laid out by Madeline's trail. The trail itself wasn't easy to spot either, as the shredded yellowy grains were hard to spot against the sandy-coloured earth. On several occasions they would make accidental deviations from the trail, putting them in precarious positions before being forced to backtrack.
Still, being as fit and trained as they were, Blair and Eamon worked well together to make rapid progress and before long the trees they'd emerged from looked positively tiny from high above. The route they walked may have been relatively steady, but Eamon knew they could just as easily be going up in a way where one misstep would spell the end.
"Damn," grunted Blair, "Have to admit, she's starting to both piss me off and impress me with how high she's climbed."
"You and me both. You were a sight for sore eyes when you weren't sweating like a fountain," grinned Eamon, earning him a middle finger.
Indeed, although it wasn't the tallest mountain around, they were roughly three quarters up as the sun began to set. However the grin vanished when the trail brought them over a crest and saw the Cornucopia nestled in the valley below.
"Shit, I didn't realize we were this close to the center!"
"Me neither," said Blair sheepishly. "In my defense, the map was just a rough sketch. Let's just stay low and keep moving, hopefully anyone around won't spot us."
Before they could move much further though, Eamon spotted something moving out of the corner of his eye in the distance and tapped Blair on the shoulder to get her attention. They crouched and squinted as a number of shadows ran across the northern mesa on the opposite side of the Cornucopia.
They were a long way off, but Eamon could make out six orange-clad figures; specifically two girls being chased by a group of four some thirty meters back.
"Careers," muttered Blair. It was weird for Eamon to hear her say that, given that she was also a Career. "Who are they going for though?"
Even from a distance, Eamon recognised the lavender hair of one of the girls. "Vesper. From Seven. No idea who the girl with her is though." A knot formed in his stomach as he realised how easily he could have been allies with her.
"Well how many girls are there left? There's me, Madeline is somewhere on this mountain, Vesper, Jasmine and Hilda are chasing them… and the District 10 girl, Francesca. Must be her."
Both those girls were threats to win; if the Careers killed them without suffering any casualties of their own, they'd be hard to beat.
Suddenly Francesca diverged from Vesper and ran north on her own, while Vesper kept heading west. Neither faltered, leading Eamon to believe they'd decided to split up to confuse the Careers. And it momentarily worked, as the foursome came to a stop and hesitated. Hilda pulled out a bow and shot an arrow at Francesca, but it missed, and she continued over the edge of the mesa and out of sight. The warhammer-wielding Landon was shouting something and although Eamon and Blair couldn't make out what they were, it soon became clear as all four of them continued after Vesper, doubling their efforts to make up for the lost time.
Vesper was fast as lightning, but it made no difference as she soon reached the western most edge of the mesa. Unlike Francesca however, the sheer canyon cliffs offered no way down and she was soon cornered.
"Game over," said a monotone Blair. "She's done."
Eamon sighed. A bad way to go for someone so strong.
Vesper turned and walked towards her opponents tall, proud and fierce. As she pulled out her curved dagger, it was clear she wasn't going to go down without a fight. They circled her but were clearly hesitant to strike first, despite their overwhelming advantage. They knew Vesper could be just as deadly as any of them. She was saying something, loud and confident, although again, Eamon and Blair couldn't make out what exactly.
There was a moment of still silence before it all went off. Jasmine initiated by throwing something small with incredible speed, but Vesper was faster. She dodged, and the projectile flew past her, burying itself in Dennis' right hand, causing him to drop his spear in a howl of pain. Vesper took advantage of Jasmine's momentary shock and pounced on her with the reflexes of a panther, narrowly avoiding an arrow loosed by Hilda and burying her dagger deep in Jasmine's neck.
"District 1: Jasmine Wilde," the cannon resonated.
Before Vesper could free her dagger from Jasmine's body however, Landon had crossed the distance between them in two steps, and with a one-handed, almost-lazy flick of his hammer, pounded Vesper square in her side. The blow sent her flying several metres to land in a heap on the ground, unable to get up. Landon stood over her, and with two hands this time, brought the hammer over his head with terrifying speed.
Eamon turned away at the last second. The cannon's declaration of "District 7: Vesper Rhodes," told him all he needed to know.
"She went out swinging at least. That's how I'd want to go," said Blair quietly beside him.
"You were right… he's a monster," said Eamon.
"I think that monster has just noticed us watching."
Eamon whipped back around. Sure enough, Landon had stepped away from Vesper's body and despite being so very far away, was looking directly at Eamon and Blair and gave them an overly-happy wave. Blair gave him an unenthusiastic one in kind. She wasn't immediately concerned; even in broad daylight it would take him hours to get down from his mesa, much less climb up their mountain. Still, it was clear he had the pair of them in his sights.
"Come on, let's keep moving," muttered Eamon.
With the sun was well and truly below the horizon, Eamon and Blair turned their backs on the Careers and continued up the mountain. The Cornucopia disappeared completely from view as they made their way over another crest, however the trail was now impossible to see under the veil of darkness. They decided it was futile to continue so elected to set up camp in a crater set into the mountain.
A sound echoed through the crater and the pair tensed up. An eerie wail.
"Hello?" called Blair into the darkness.
The wail stopped.
"Madeline?" said Eamon uneasily.
A small dark figure emerged from under a rock shelf and flung itself at Eamon.
"Eamon! I knew you'd come! You have to help, I-I don't know what I'm doing!" blubbered a tearful Madeline as she hugged him tightly.
Man I've put this story on the backburner for a long time. I have a lot of great ideas for this story and some of them have really started coming into effect as you can see from this chapter, I just had issues with writer's block and motivation. Definitely my longest chapter and in my opinion one of the best so far. Hope you enjoy!
24th Place: Cecilia Moreau - District 12 Female. Killed by Hilda Blythe.
23rd Place: Axel Costa - District 1 Male. Killed by Eamon Cunningham.
22nd Place: Ivanna Merchant - District 6 Female. Killed by Vesper Rhodes.
21st Place: Paige Delaney - District 8 Female. Killed by Karmichael Damocles.
20th Place: Owen Magnussen - District 8 Male. Killed by Landon Starr.
19th Place: Zoey Townsend - District 3 Female. Killed by Dennis Kessling.
18th Place: Spencer Nash - District 7 Male. Killed by Blair Lynch.
17th Place: Cooper Hastings – District 10 Male. Killed by Karmichael Damocles.
16th Place: Alys Redding – District 5 Female. Killed by Landon Starr.
15th Place: Timothy Crow – District 3 Male. Killed by Madeline Skylock.
14th Place: Harvey Goodwin – District 12 Male. Killed by Holdhorn.
13th Place: Kale Fox – District 11 Male. Killed by Eamon Cunningham.
12th Place: Nora Wormwood – District 11 Female. Killed by Blair Lynch.
11th Place: Jasmine Wilde – District 1 Female. Killed by Vesper Rhodes.
10th Place: Vesper Rhodes – District 7 Female. Killed by Landon Starr.
