It isn't until later that night, when I'm getting ready for bed that I hear the knock on the door of my room. "One second!" I say, because I've just gotten out of the shower and am only wearing a towel.
The person who knocked does not wait though, instead coming in without permission and shutting the door behind them.
I glare at Prometheus, clutching the towel to my frame and about ready to yell at him when he sits down in one of the chairs by the window, pulling out a cigarette and lighting up. The room instantly smells like the burned down match and I sigh, going into the closet to put on pajamas.
"What do you want?" I call out to him, pulling a silky tank over my head before stepping into a pair of cotton shorts.
"How'd your day go?" he asks as I walk out of the closet, toweling my hair so it'll dry quicker. We didn't have a chance to talk at dinner; Iris was too busy stammering on and on about the favorite tributes polls the television has been screening all day, and that fact that I'm in the top ten, but so are Artemis, Apollo, the tributes from Énas, Dyo and a few others from various republics.
I shrug at him, grabbing a brush off the dresser before sitting in the chair across from his. "I'm decent at throwing knives," I say, absently running the brush through my curls. "And of course, plants."
"Of course," Prometheus smirks, eyes lingering on the bare skin of my legs a moment longer than they should. I cross them self-consciously, draping the towel across my lap. He sighs, giving a small apology. "You look so much like your mother."
I give him a dumfounded look. "Everyone says I look like my dad."
"Maybe in the eyes," Prometheus says. "But the rest is Demi. Though when she was your age, she had her hair really short after it got caught in one of the milling turbines during harvest. I had to cut it off with a knife before she got her head sucked in."
For a moment, both Prometheus and I are silent, before I ask, "Why tell me about you and my mom? And Plutus? I mean, you could've been my mentor without having to complicate things. Or you could've waited to tell me until later. Why'd you tell me straight off?"
"I needed you to know you could trust me," he says, blowing a ring of smoke. "A lot of mentors have given up with their tributes from the start when their republic hasn't won in a long time, but I'm not going to give up on you, Kore. I can't. I owe your mom that much."
"Because you didn't save Plutus?" I ask, and it's a bit of a low blow but I still ask it anyways.
Prometheus' expression turns grim and he looks down at the table. "Yeah. And because you could've been my kid, too, had I not gone into the Games."
"Not really," I say, trying to ease his conscience. Plus the thought of being Prometheus' kid is…weird. "I mean, without my dad and my mom getting together, I'd just be wasted DNA."
"I still would've treated you like you were mine," Prometheus says. "When I found out Demi was pregnant, Gods, I was so happy…"
"And then you were drawn for sacrifice," I say, to which he nods. "And it wasn't safe."
"No. The Capital would've used Plutus and your mother against me like there was no tomorrow. Like I told you on the train, Kore, they own us. Every single one of us."
"And you want it to change?"
He nods. "Yeah."
"Then why are we talking in a room that could be bugged?" I ask, raising a brow at him suspiciously.
In answer, Prometheus smirks. "Atlas spent a good amount of time in Tría after he won. Let's just say surveillance loops are his specialty. Yours and Artemis' rooms are safe for conversing. Anywhere else though, hold your tongue."
I blink. "Are you sure the two of you aren't really Gods?"
Laughing, Prometheus dashes his cigarette out in a bowl on the table. "We're as human as you, kid."
"Right," I murmur, finished brushing my hair so I set the brush on the table and begin to braid the strands absentmindedly. "So I see you've already gotten my nickname out there?"
"Gave a tip to the local news department," he says, leaning back in his chair and putting his hands behind his head. "You're officially Elláda's sweetheart, just as sure as the twins are the awe-inspiring savages. While you're a peach, they're a lime. It'll make an alliance the crowds will go wild for."
"And what about…sponsors?" He knows what I mean in the way I say the word, curling in on myself a bit and sighing as if it leaves a bad taste on my tongue.
"I'm only going to resort to that if you don't get any sponsors for your general appeal, Kore. If you keep rank in the favorites and impress the Gamesmakers enough to get a decent score, maybe it won't come down to that," Prometheus says, staring out the window. He isn't actually looking at the streets of the Capital though; last night I found that the window is made of holograms, and I changed it so the landscape looks like a lush meadow, overgrown with wildflowers. "Nice choice," he says, as if guessing my thoughts. "Demi still like flowers as much as I remember?"
"Yeah," I say. "She kind of passed on the trait."
He glances at me out of the corner of his eye then, gaze lingering. "You sure you're only sixteen?"
"You going to be making one of the bids for my innocence then?" I ask, no hesitance in the sentence.
He shrugs, giving me a lopsided sort of smirk. "If you want."
I reach out with my foot and kick him in the knee then, laughing when he curses at me, rubbing at the spot before beginning to chuckle right along with me. It isn't until the laughter dies down that I start to think seriously about what he's just said, and not so much about Prometheus himself, but the idea that people pay to have sex with the Victors like they're nothing more than a piece of meat. One would think that once you were given the title of a God, you'd be above such measures, but I guess not.
"The Capital really does own us then, doesn't it?" I ask, staring at him with sad eyes.
He nods, setting his hands on the table with a sigh. "Like I said, Kore, I wanted your mom and your brother too. But I couldn't; it wasn't my choice. Not once that final trumpet went off and they called my name, gave me the crown, the title, the glory."
"The honor," I mock. "Plutus used to say it was the honor of having to kiss the Capital's ass."
"In that," Prometheus says, taking out another cigarette, "he was completely right."
As he lights up, filling the room full of smoke, I stare at the meadow on the hologram screen, wondering how in a world where there can be such beauty and good, there can also be such violence and bad, too.
The next day in the training center, I'm sitting over in the survival unit tying knots and singing to myself when I feel a presence at my side and look up.
Hades hesitates for a moment before sitting next to me, eyes dark and blank as he looks at the knots my hands are forming. "What use is that?"
"Making nets to trap things," I tell him, glancing over to the archery station where Artemis and Apollo are once again stationed. A second ago they were bickering, but now they're both staring at Hades and me with questioning expressions. I turn away from them with a blush and look back at Hades, who is still watching my hands tie latch of rope after rope together.
"What were you singing, before I sat down?" he asks.
I gawk at him; blink when he gives me an expectant sort of look and then shrug. "A lullaby my mom taught me."
"What's it about?"
"Death," I say levelly. "I sang it to my brother when…" I trail off, shaking my head. Like hell I'm going to tell Hades about Plutus. "Never mind."
"When he died?" Hades asks emotionlessly, causing my hands to fumble and my eyes to snap up to meet his. For his part, the expression on his face is completely blank, while mine contorts into one of suspicion and anger.
"How did you know that?" I hiss.
"Hestia told me," he says, as if that makes bringing up Plutus okay. "How'd he die anyways? Heat stroke?"
"No," I say, turning back to my net. "It's none of your business, anyways."
"Fair enough," Hades says, and it is silent again as I continue to work. He doesn't get up to leave either, though it's clear I'm done talking to him. Instead he just keeps watching me, and when I dare to look at him out of the corner of my eyes it's to see he's studying me now, no longer the knots I'm tying.
"What?" I ask, venom dripping into my tone.
Turning to face him full-on now, I realize just how close his proximity is. There's a hair's breadth between us, enough so that I can see his eyes aren't completely black as I had originally thought, but rather a very, very dark gray. Despite the tan of his skin, there are freckles under his eyes, and there's a scar cutting from his lower lip and down his chin. His hair hangs in sweaty tendrils around his face, shaggy and out of place, and the muscles in his neck look strained, like he's nervous and trying.
The anger inside of me melts, and I let my expression soften, parting my lips before saying, "I didn't mean Hestia any harm, yesterday. Really, I didn't. I only tried to show her what she shouldn't touch in the arena, because she didn't know."
"She told me," Hades says after a moment, his eyes never leaving mine. "We're not going to ally with you though."
I give him a blank sort of look; I hadn't thought he would.
"I don't trust those twins you're with. Or that Pan kid. I'd watch my back around them, if I were you."
"And I suppose you have an opinion about Hebe, too?" I ask, raising an eyebrow at him archaically.
Not getting my take at sarcasm, he says, "No. She's harmless, but not of much help."
"Well thank you oh knowledgeable one," I say, turning back to my knots and trying to secure one in place, but my fingers fumble and slip over each other.
"Here," Hades says, and before I can tell him no, he reaches out and secures the knot for me, untangling my fingers from the rope. There's a sharp shock where he touches me, causing both of us to pull our hands away quickly. "Thank you for helping Hestia," he says after a moment, clearing his throat awkwardly. He rises to his feet, and with one last glance at me, he says, "Good luck," and leaves.
That's when the twins assault me, giving all kinds of questions like did he threaten you or did he ask you if you wanted to come to his room tonight or something or does he want to ally with us or did he ask you anything about your underwear? I shake my head at all of their questions, explaining to them briefly about how I helped Hestia a bit yesterday and he was just thanking me. They don't much need to know anything else he said; it doesn't matter anyways.
The twins and I work in the combat area up until lunch, sitting together again with Hebe and Pan. The Demigods are all glaring at our table when I sit with my tray, the last one there because I dropped something while in line and insisted I help the servant clean it up; it didn't feel right letting someone else do it for me when I'd been the one to make the mess.
"Why are they looking over here?" I whisper to everyone at the table, trying to keep my voice as low as possible.
"Didn't you hear?" Apollo asks, giving me an incredulous sort of look. "You've moved into the top five of the favorites poll, Kore."
"What?" I ask, eyes going wide. "But I was still number eight yesterday. What am I now?"
"Three," Hebe says next to me matter-of-factly. "You're right behind Zeus and Hera from Énas. You took Ares' place."
"Great," I sigh, setting my face in my hands. "Because the guy didn't already hate me enough."
The rest of the day continues in a tiring fashion. I finish my net, teach Hebe about which plants not to eat, find myself overly surprised to see Pan knows how to use camouflage so well he basically disappears into his environment, try to climb ropes and fail miserably with the twins, go back up to the Énteka's republic department and have dinner.
Prometheus doesn't come to my room that night, and so I curl up on my side in bed and stare at the hologram of the meadow in my window, homesick and resisting the urge to cry. I realize that I haven't shed a single tear since the moment my name was drawn, and I don't plan to. I won't give the Capital the liberty of breaking me. Plutus never screamed once while they were whipping him; he held his head high until safely home. And I will do the same.
On the third day of training, I make a big mistake.
It's not that I'm meaning to or anything, but the instructors are all hell-bent to break up the little circles everyone has been in sync with since the first day. They split the Demigods apart, as well as the middle districts, and the little group I've found myself housed in. While Hebe and Pan are sent off to the archery station, Apollo is sat at the survival skills station, and Artemis the sword fighting station, a heavy scowl on her face as she'd earlier admitted to hating the weapons with a passion.
I'm thrown into the combat ring again, and of course my competitor is none other than the boy from Dyo, Ares. It's evident on his face that he still hates me, probably more so today because I've held my rank as number three in the favorites poll. I want to say I have nothing to do with it and that it's not my fault that my mentor had a thing for my mom and had a kid with her that got killed so he feels like he owes it my family to make sure I come home to them, but that'd be a really dumb thing to say. Plus, I'm not going to be a coward that tries to back out of this.
If he kills me before the Games, at least it saves the others the trouble.
The instructor for the combat ring is a burly man with a scraggly beard that obviously does not care that Ares is three times my size and has an apparent personal vendetta against. He squares us off in our respective corners of the ring, telling us not to inflict any serious damage to one another, and to save it for the real Games. Tell that to Ares, I think, noticing the boy's blood-lusting expression. And just as I am about to give up all my morals and tuck tail and run at realizing I'm probably about to get my ass kicked bad, the instructor calls fight and it's too late.
I give Ares a wide-eyed expression, staying in my corner of the ring as he blatantly charges me. All those years of wrestling with Plutus suddenly snap into instinct and I quickly jump out of Ares' way, causing him to tumble off the mat. The others at our station laugh at him, causing his face to turn red and his anger to swell.
Oh Gods.
When he charges at me again, I ball my hands into fists and quickly strike out, nailing him right in the nose before ducking under his swooping arms. While my frame is substantial, I'm still pretty short, way shorter than him, so finding a way under his jabs is easier than expected.
Ares stops after I have punched him, and turns to face me again. His nose is bleeding, and it's evident in his eyes he's ready to kill me right now. Adrenaline spikes in my veins at the thought of it, and when he comes hulking toward me in an intimidating stance, I jump up and kick my leg out, nailing him in the chin with the side of my foot. I can hear his teeth clack together, and blood begins to pour out of his mouth.
The tributes at our area, which were whooping and hollering for him before, go silent. Out of the corner of my eye I see a few tributes at other stations have stopped too, their eyes on Ares and me. It makes my breath rush out and distracts me long enough that when Ares comes at me again, I'm not ready for it.
He tackles me to the ground, all of the air rushing from my lungs. It reminds me of the first time Plutus did something like this to me when I was six; it was the day I learned quickly how to escape someone's grasp when they've got me on the ground. And with good reason too; every time I've fought someone stronger than me, be it Plutus or the occasional kid at school who got on my nerves, they always tried to use their strength against me and pin me down. But they never expect me to keep fighting once they've got me on the ground; Ares is no exception to that.
I suck in a deep breath, pulling my legs up from where they're stuck between the muscles of Ares' arms. The training suit I'm in is plenty flexible, so when I get my knees on either side of Ares head the movement is precise. And at the same time that I strike out with my elbows at the joints of his arms– which are holding him up and pinning me down– I also twist my knees locked around his head. The movement of my elbows pressing into the pressure points in his joints causes Ares' arms to buckle, while the force behind the twist of my knees demands Ares to throw himself off of me because of the sudden strain on his neck.
Without hesitance, I roll onto my side and stand back up, barely aware of the astounded murmurs of the other tributes as Ares stands, shaking his head. I realize then that some of the blood from his mouth has dripped down the side of my face, staining the top of my training uniform. It's all over his in spittle puddles, but he doesn't care. He's too enraged, throwing himself at me in one last attempt to get me down.
I strike at him then, punching him right in the Adam's apple. I know it's not enough to kill him, like hitting someone in the windpipe would– a tip given to me from Mom for when I traveled on the more dangerous sides of town– but it is enough to stun him and put him down on the ground, gasping for breath.
That's when the instructor finally calls time, and everyone in the room is staring at me. The Demigods most of all, though glowering would be the most appropriate term.
I swallow dryly, backing off of the mat and wiping blood from the side of my face. At least Prometheus will be pleased there's no injuries they'll have to try and cover before the Interviews in two days.
Sighing, I move away from the station and try to ignore the steadfast glares of the Demigods, or the scared stances of some of the other tributes. Artemis and Apollo are in no such state though; instead running up to me and giving a chorus of amazing and spectacular but I just kind of shrug them off. It's almost lunch time, and I'm hungry and a bit embarrassed and totally scared out of my mind, because I know I've just put a walking target on my back.
I've seen Ares at the other stations. While his brutality may not work against me in a strictly hand-to-hand manner, it will when he's thrusting a sword into my chest, or throwing a knife at my back, or, Gods forbid, bashing my head in with a rock. It's something I definitely wouldn't past him, that's for sure.
And the night gets even worse when I get back up to the holding apartment, being bombarded by Prometheus, as word from the event in the training center has spread. "Do not let him near you," Prometheus says, his first words to me since breakfast when he asked me to pass him the butter.
"You're not mad?" I ask, instead of replying to his comment directly.
"Oh, I'm bloody pissed," he says. "But also bloody proud. That being said, you know what this means, right?"
"I have a target on my back?" I sigh, sinking down onto the sofa.
"Well, at least I can't call you a complete idiot," Prometheus says, sitting down next to me.
"I know I should've just let him pin me so I wouldn't draw attention, but you should've seen the look in his eyes, Prometheus. I thought he was going to rip out my spine and use it as a belt, or something!" Much like the rock thing, it's an act I wouldn't put Ares above.
Prometheus sighs, already has a cigarette out to ease his apprehension. "At least the news spread… Now the Gamesmakers have something extra to consider when you go to see them tomorrow."
"And I've got a direct enemy in the arena."
"Let's not dwell on it," Prometheus says, eyes moving to track Pan who has stepped off the elevator and gone into the kitchen area to get himself something to drink. "Eh, kid, you want a tip? You stay away from that Ares bloke too. His mentor's stated he's about five kinds of crazy."
"Only five?" I scoff.
"It's more like twenty-bajillion," Pan says from where he's pouring orange juice into a glass, shocking both Prometheus and I that he's spoken. "I thought it was really cool, that Kore beat him."
"Thanks, Pan," I say, giving him a genuine smile. "I was really impressed with your camouflage the other day. That was amazing."
Pan's cheeks heat up at my comment, and Prometheus looks between the two of us and snorts, blowing smoke through his nose and looking much like a grumpy, old bull. "Enough with the touchy-feely shit. You've got to interact with the Gamesmakers tomorrow, think you're ready for it?"
I look down at my hands in answer, frown. "Not at all," I say.
"Yeah," Prometheus says. "Well you'd better hurry up and get on it then, Kore. If you've already got a target on your back, then you need a high score. Make that boy fear you more; and maybe, just maybe you'll keep your head."
Blinking, I rub a hand over my face anxiously. Gods, I can only hope tomorrow won't be complete disaster.