1. The first rule of dealing with tributes is to never get attached.

On a normal night, Sandy flew through the city on his clouds of golden sand, sending out steams of gold to bring good dreams to those few he could.

This night, the last night, was always the exception.

Tonight was reserved for the children of the Games, from tiny Ava asleep in her room to the aging Catherine de Bourgh who had come along to help the younger mentors with her particular brand of advice. The ancient Seelie princess seething in her sleep, even as she flinched away from her chains, the monstrous wolf and the aging man it was trapped in, the Victors that had to swallow far too many pills to fall asleep, the tributes who weren't allowed to and that fluttered solely at the edges . . . Every one of them got sweet dreams tonight. It was all he could give them now.

A pretty wedding for Diana, a feast for Bob, Gibbs' family alive again, Hastings standing victorious in the wake of a rebellion . . .

Even with Pitch far away and locked away in a district, the dreams still wanted to turn dark, so Sandy patrolled diligently every year. He was on his first round now, but he would have to come back to make sure memory didn't turn the sweetness to poison.

Jack was next. Sandy floated through the door and sent out a curl of sand. A snowball fight with his friends, perhaps. A more innocent game for the boy to play.

As the sand floated through the room, it illuminated all it passed, including the clothes that had been emptied from the drawers and stuffed under the bed until there wasn't room for another sock. Jack lay on top of the covers, a rolling pin and the salt shaker from the kitchen clutched in his hands.

Sandy frowned. A question mark pulsed over his head, but there was no one awake to see it.

The sand touched Jack's cheek. He jerked awake instantly. He swung wildly with both of his improvised weapons. The pin passed through the sand, but the salt sizzled where it hit. Sandy jerked back.

Jack was on his feet, eyes scanning the room. He frowned when his eyes rested on his escort. "Sandy? What are you doing here? What's this?" His voice was wary.

Sandy pursed his lips. Miming the concept wouldn't be easy. He sent up an image of Jack sleeping on the bed.

"Yes, I know I was sleeping. I need rest for tomorrow. What were you doing?"

Sandy sent images of candy and cakes dancing over the image of the sleeping Jack's head.

Jack frowned. "You were . . . giving me good dreams?"

Sandy nodded.

Jack lowered his weapons. "Huh. That's the first time that's happened."

Sandy drooped. The Dark Days had ended with him bound to the president's will, and that didn't include bringing light to the districts.

"Normally it's those horses bringing nightmares. That's why I woke up when I started dreaming."

Sandy straightened. He sent an image of an eye over his head, then a question mark.

"Yeah, I can see them," Jack said, sitting on the edge of his bed. "I know a lot of people can't. Jamie could," he added as an afterthought. "Before Pitch took him."

Sandy sent up another alarmed question mark.

Jack rubbed his arms. "We fought them," he said quietly. "All of us. Guess we went too far. The head guy tried to get Jamie's dad to kill him and Sofie. It almost worked, but the rest of us got there in time. Only," he swallowed. "Not quite fast enough. When he saw it hadn't worked, he dragged Jamie off. Pulled him under the bed."

The clothes stuffed under Jack's bed glowed in the soft light of the sand.

"We're still looking," Jack said quickly. "He could still be out there."

Sandy nodded.

Jack rubbed a hand over his face. "I don't know why I'm telling you this. You're Capital. You don't care about kids dying."

Sandy used the stream of sand to smack him in the head.

"Hey!" He looked at Sandy indignantly but he relaxed a bit when he saw his expression matched on Sandy's face. "Guess you do care, huh?"

Sandy nodded firmly.

"Huh," Jack said again. "Wish you could talk and explain all this better."

That made two of them. It was getting late though, and Jack needed his sleep. Sandy sent out a gentler curl of sand. Jack's eyes started drooping when it touched him.

"Night, Sandy," he murmured before dropping off.

Sandy sent him a dream of finding his friend. Then he found another blanket and tucked it around the boy.

For tonight at least, there was no need for Jack to be able to fight the moment he woke.

. . .

Abby's first memory of the Games was being curled up with her mother and her brother on the couch while the final battle played out on the screen. Her mother had pressed a hand over their eyes and started singing to cover the sound of the screams. "It'll be over soon," she promised when she stopped for breath. "Just a little longer, darlings, and it will all be over."

Her mother had been found to be an unfit parent just a few months later, and Abby had been sent to a new home.

Her brother wasn't with her, and she dreamed of him being reaped.

The problem with the Games, she decided as she got older, was that it wasn't like the movies. She never knew who she was supposed to be rooting for until it was all over and they released the edited version which meant she normally ended up rooting for someone that died, and then she got upset and got in trouble.

But she liked the parties and the excuse to try out her new clothes, and she liked the idea of her job being to be friendly and help people, so she decided to try for being an escort.

They liked her bubbliness and how her dark clothes contrasted with the neons everyone else was wearing that season, so she was hired and handed the hardest job they had: District 5. Gibbs and Franks.

She didn't see what all the fuss was about. Gibbs just needed a hug, and although Franks teased her about the chemistry books she read on the train, he was much nicer than the so-called Charming had been.

Paula and Stan were nice too; Stan flirted with her some, but he was a perfect gentleman, and Paula let her make a fake wound on her arm with some makeup to scare Stan with.

It had been perfect, right up until Paula dropped her district token while she was standing on the plate.

Then Stan got stabbed.

And then, the next year, Vivianne's allies betrayed her, and Donnelly got hit with an arrow.

EJ drowned. Chip was eaten by mutts.

Jimmy made it to the final eight before -

Wendy.

Sacks.

Zoe.

Delilah.

And stuck right in the middle, Franks, after he was supposed to be safe.

Somewhere in there, she saw the coffins they were sent home in. They looked more like packing crates.

She went home to her own coffin - black silk, extra padded, vampire lace blanket - and she very carefully poured just the right chemicals on it.

Everyone assumed the fire was an accident.

Then Tony. Bright, funny, Tony, that Gibbs, with hollow eyes, told her had to win, no matter what.

Anything for Gibbs, anything at all, so she smiled and dined the sponsors and donated the maximum amount escorts could donate.

And when the tributes were dropped into a desert and Jeanne, half-dead, asked for water from District 5's only mentor, she didn't say a word when Gibbs held their money back to save it for medicine for Tony's wounded arm.

She cried until she had more mascara on her face than her lashes once she was safely home. She felt stupid for wasting the water. She never told Gibbs.

And neither of them ever told Tony.

So many names.

And now it was Kate and McGee, and Abby was lying in the bedroom she borrowed while the Games were on, listening to Tony babble with fake cheer while Gibbs made his way through his first three cups of morning coffee. Kate would be up soon to get those pastries she liked, and McGee would pick foods based off his carefully designed meal plan.

In a few weeks, she told herself firmly, she'd be taking one of them home.

That wasn't quite good enough, but it got her out of bed and reaching for the shade of lipstick McGee liked, so it would do.

"Just a little longer," she whispered, trying on a smile and trying not to let it shake. "It'll all be over soon."

. . .

The word snow always conjured two images in Charming's mind. Their president, of course, a man he found it safest not to think too much about, and the tribute. His Snow.

She'd been so pale and quiet at first that if it hadn't been for her stunning face, Charming might have overlooked her. But every mile they put between them and District 4 - and, more importantly, her stepmother - brought a little more life into her cheeks and a little more fire into her eyes. By the time she was dropped into the arena, she was ready to fight, and Charming was ready to break every rule in the book to find some way to let her stay in the Capital when she won.

He'd been eighteen, just old enough to work, and he'd been convinced she was the one.

And she may have been, but she hadn't been the last one standing.

She'd died slowly, bit by bit as the blood drained out, and he'd driven himself mad trying to whip up enough sponsors to send in a parachute to save her.

Not enough. Never enough.

Not then, not the next year, when quiet Rapunzel was almost relieved to be reaped if it meant getting away from her adopted mother, and he thought he'd been given another chance.

Not real, not real, not real, part of him had chanted, but he could save her, he could keep her safe, he could -

He'd known better than to try again, he had, but late one night on television he'd seen the Games Relda's son, Jacob, had been reaped with Rose Briar, and they'd fallen in love on national television.

The district, he had decided, fuzzy headed from lack of sleep, was cursed. It was cursed, and it was up to him to break it.

So when Ella came, Ella with her hands raw from cleaning and her stepmother's words ringing in her ears, he had known -

Relda had tried to talk to him. He didn't remember what he'd said to her, but he assumed it had been the wrong thing. Snow had told him once that he always lived up to his name until he opened his mouth.

She'd been teasing him, then. If she saw him now, she probably wouldn't be.

Now it was Moth, and he knew better than to try. He'd had his chance. Three chances, even, like the fairy tales he'd watched as a child had always had. You only ever got three chances.

He didn't care for the boy, and he'd barely seen the girl, but the coffee still tasted like dust as he swallowed it mechanically. Relda was fond of the boy he knew, and he respected Relda.

He respected her, so before the boy could come wandering in wearing that ratty hoodie of his, he told her, "They're going to die, you know."

Relda's old, wrinkled hands grew white as she tightened her grip on her mug. "Charming," she warned. A fly buzzed past her.

"Watch how you speak, boy," Canis growled, the savagery of his Games suddenly more evident in his aging voice.

"It's not an opinion," Charming snapped. "It's the orders that are being given. They're not going to last the Games."

Canis's silverware snapped in two.

Relda's gaze was steady. "How do you know this?"

He scowled. "I'm still allowed to collect money, but I'm not to campaign. You know what happened the last time an escort was told that."

They did.

Relda's face was still pinched, but she reached for the bowl of rolls with surprisingly steady hands. "They may surprise you," she said levelly.

"I doubt that," he said shortly. The fly settled on the chair next to him. He batted at it with his napkin.

The fly's head swelled and turned into Puck's.

Charming shouted and leaped to his feet.

Puck's head grinned at him. "Don't disrespect the magic, Charming."

"No shifting at the breakfast table," Relda said disapprovingly. "We talked about this, Puck."

Charming finally found his voice. "That is disgusting," he said levelly. "Excuse me."

He made his way from the room, pushing down the nausea in his throat.

(If you have a single scrap of humanity left, you will get attached, and it will break you.)

2. Don't betray your tributes.

Mr. Tumnus was very glad that the tiny daughter of Eve that he'd first reaped hadn't been the one he'd ended up bringing to the Capital. He wasn't sure he could have brought himself to follow his orders if she had been the one.

It wasn't much easier with her sister. His hands shook as he shook the vial as instructed. She had been so brave to volunteer, and the way she and the son of Adam looked at each other, sideways and hesitant, made him want to go to a quiet place and cry.

It was wrong, it was very wrong, but if he didn't do it, than Mistriss Jadis would find out, and if Mistriss Jadis found out, than she would report it to Queen Mab, and -

He was only a faun, just a faun, and he couldn't be expected to stand up against the Unseelie queen herself. He couldn't even stand up to Mistress Jadis.

Polly and Digory had gone to wake young Susan and Caspian. There was no one in the breakfast room but the Avoxes, and they had been spelled long ago.

Whimpering a little, he poured the potion into both the children's drinks.

It wasn't meant for them, he reminded himself firmly. They were just the means to get the magic into the arena. It would flow out with their every breath until the Seelie were weak and confused. It was meant to make sure none of the enemy fey emerged alive, not aimed at them at all. He wasn't really betraying them.

If he knew all too well what hosting such powerful dark magic was likely to do to them, than he would have burst into tears again, so he pretended that he didn't know.

When the children finally came out, he was crying anyway. Polly patted his arm kindly.

Caspian and Susan were staring at him.

"I'll be very sorry to see you go," he said weakly.

He had to leave the room before he did something stupid, like blurt out the whole sad mess.

. . .

Hastings remembered Jason. He had been clever. Clever enough to make up for his weak magic, but not clever enough to make up for being so relentlessly, impetuously angry.

He had also been determined to get home to his girlfriend.

Leesha.

He had failed Jason. He had hoped that if it ever came to it he could make up for it by saving Leesha.

Hastings had hoped a lot of things in his life. Most of those hopes had ended with graves.

He eyed Leesha critically as she picked at her food. "At least drink something," he ordered. He turned back to Seph. "You too. As much as you can."

The boy was still too thin. At least he was eating.

He didn't - He didn't know how to do this. How to be a father. How to keep his son alive for long enough for that to matter. How to explain to Jack, still idealistic Jack, what he would have to do when it came time to choose between Leesha and Seph.

He did know how to make decisions that would have left another man breaking mirrors rather than looking at them.

So he ate his breakfast and combed through the memories of every plan, every rebellion of the last few months, and tried to figure out what had tipped his hand enough for Snow to see the need to punish him. He looked at Leesha when she talked.

But mainly, he looked at his son.

(You killed enough people in your Games. Kill anymore, and you might start thinking there's no way out.)

3. Do not fall in love with a tribute.

Anne hugged Diana desperately. "You have to fight," she told her fiercely. "Like when we performed Boadicea."

Diana smiled wetly. The tears had soaked her cheeks. "Like you did."

Anne nodded firmly before turning her attention to Gilbert and hugging him just as fiercely.

In a world that increasingly felt as fragile as the faerie stories she spun, he was reassuringly solid, and the arms he wrapped around her were warm enough to cut through the cold that had wrapped around her like a cloud blanket ever since she'd gotten Matthew killed.

She forced the tears back sternly. "I know I've been perfectly dreadful, but you mustn't think that means I won't get you good sponsors. All you have to do for that is spin a good story, and I'm very good at that."

Gilbert's arms tightened for a moment. She let him for just a second before she straightened and gave a sniff that would have done Marilla proud. "Into the breach, then," she said bravely. "The transport will be here in a minute."

If this was a story they would both come back, but even Anne wasn't a good enough storyteller for that.

. . .

Catherine had been complaining all morning about everything from the time the tributes got up to what they ate for breakfast. Mr. Knightley was long used to tuning her out. Bingley's nervous chatter, Darcy's increasingly curt responses, and the grief sharpened edge of Mr. Bennet's wit were newer distractions, but he managed them.

If Emma was nervous, she didn't show it. She smiled at him slyly. "If you continue to stare at me so, Mr. Knightley, I shall begin to fear I've something dreadful in my teeth."

"Not at all," he told her stiffly. "I was merely - thinking."

"Thinking what you would do if you never saw me again," she said shrewdly. She arched an eyebrow as she pushed herself away from the table. "A little faith would be much appreciated."

The others were rising too. They'd left breakfast too late. They really should have been waiting by now.

He caught her arm and held her back as the others exited. "I have every faith," he assured her. "You are perfectly capable as long as you don't let your cleverness run away with you."

She gasped in mock astonishment. "Mr. Knightley saying there's such a thing as too much cleverness! I wonder at you, truly."

She didn't understand. He could never make her understand, and now - He gripped her arms more tightly. "You have allies," he reminded her. "Use them."

"But don't trust them," she finished. "I know that much." She leaned up to kiss his cheek. He was startled enough to let her go.

She laughed as she danced away. "Cleverness," she told him, smiling impishly. She disappeared through the door only to lean her head back in. "Oh, and Mr. Knightley? If I am terribly unfortunate and do die tragically, you are free to feel as affected as you please, but I must beg you not to write poetry. I have a perfect horror of poetry that is not riddles, and a riddle about my death would never do." She disappeared back into the other room.

He stared after her helplessly. He should have brought up her father. She would have been careful for her father's sake. Or if he had told her more, given her more certainty than the hinted at promises that had gotten them into this mess, perhaps -

She was clever. She was fast. She was well trained.

Perhaps that would be enough.

(If you're already in love, there's no help for it.)

4. Try to give them helpful advice.

Robin paced in front of both of them.

"Whatever happens, don't lose your head," he ordered them. "It gets to you in there. It's not like it is in the woods. You'll get jumpy. Don't let that mean you make mistakes."

Will nodded tightly. Will was on a hair trigger anyway. It was that jumpiness that had him pushed him into joining Robin's band. If he couldn't control that in the arena, he was dead. Robin wouldn't let that happen.

"That goes for you too," he told Rowan.

She scoffed. "I won't be alive long enough to get jumpy."

"That's not true," Marian tried to assure her.

Rowan just tapped her foot impatiently.

Tuck spoke up for the first time. "It is not too late to be free of the curse you laid, child. It was done in haste. It can be undone."

She raised her chin. "I'm not afraid to pay the price."

Tuck sighed. "Just like Robin," he murmured.

With her chin raised defiantly, it was hard to argue with him. Something about the chin, the eyes . . .

Robin shook it off. "Survive," he told both of them. "But remember that whatever you do, there's going to be a price." He met Rowan's eyes when he said that.

But then, he thought both of them already knew that already.

. . .

"Don't fly," Ijori counselled Rhys. "It'll draw too much attention."

"Don't run," Myrtle told Ella. "You trip when you run. Like Addie does. Just walk fast and find a place to hide."

Ella fought the urge to scream at the order.

. . .

The others were out getting donations. Supposedly. Gru did not trust them.

He looked at his assembled tributes. "You are about to undergo the most dangerous weeks of your lives," he began.

"Assuming you live that long," Dr. Nefario put in.

He looked at him sourly. "Yes, thank you. Assuming you live that long." He raised a finger for emphasis. Bob and Edith were both staring at him, wide eyed. "There is only one rule: Survive. I will expect you to do so." He looked down at the minion. "Bob, if you do not, it will reflect poorly on your performance report. Edith - "

"I don't have a performance report," she interrupted.

"You do now," he improvised. "Consider it an application process. Do not disappoint me. Either of you."

Edith raised a hand.

"Yes?"

"Won't one of us have to?" she asked.

"Technically, yes," he admitted. "I recommend making sure it isn't you."

(There's no predicting what's coming next. How helpful can any advice be?)

5. Be inspiring.

"If you get killed for my idiot nephew, I won't speak to you for the next hundred years," Morgan warned Terence.

He looked at her blandly. "I thought you were trying to discourage me from dying."

"Impudent boy," she said throwing her hands up in despair. "Connoire, try to stop him from doing anything too stupid."

"I don't see how I'll succeed when the rest of the district has failed," she said doubtfully, "but I'll try."

Morgan said something, but the sound of the hovercraft approaching blocked out her words.

(This comes easier to some than others.)

6. Know your allies.

Indy sat next to Marion on the hovercraft. She was staring straight ahead. He leaned just close enough to whisper in her ear. "Together?"

She nodded tightly.

He leaned back but left his arm on the shared armrest.

A minute later her fingers crept into his.

(Know your friends.)