The next few weeks pass by relatively calmly, if you can look past the fear that set in when Thread arrived and the new wave of starvation wracking the district – which I can't. The food packets my district receives each month in the year after I've won the Games, one of the few good things to come out of this all, start to arrive rotten. The tesserae is in the same state or doesn't arrive at all, even though more and more kids add their names over and over to the reaping. There's many desperate enough to eat the disgusting fillings of the packets that can only be called food by someone who has never seen, smelled or tasted actual food. Posy, who was so happy when the first package arrived months ago, has sunken in cheeks like never before and has gotten very quiet.
Katniss and Gale are both still healing, and even if they were in hunting-condition, it's too dangerous with Thread on the loose. I am by now absolutely convinced that he was trying to get something on Katniss to get at me. He shows up around me, my family and friends far too often for it to be a coincidence and sometimes even attempts to goad us into doing something he'll be able to arrest or even execute us for. Luckily, even notoriously hot-tempered Gale manages to swallow his anger. Because Thread is out for blood and he'll take anything he can get.
I know Snow must be behind this; he is the one who sent us Thread. That also means the rebellion must not be completely beyond his control yet, because otherwise he would surely not be bothering with finding a legal reason to hurt me, he'd just have me killed. He still fears what reaction my untimely death might cause. Not that I can do much to help the rebellion along at this point. Haymitch just told me to sit down, shut up and stay alive when I asked him what I could do to get Twelve to rebell. "We're not ready,"he elaborated,"And there's barely enough people here anyway. Nor does the Capitol need us - if they'll make an example of a rebelling district, it would be Twelve."
As much as I hated it, I had to admit he was right. So now, after weeks of doing nothing useful - not counting my academy (Snow knows what it is, no use calling it anything else) - I'm sitting on the couch with Mum and Katniss, waiting for the mandatory viewing announced for tonight.
Caesar is as happy as ever, chatting about tonight's big event, as he calls it."That's right, this year will be the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Hunger Games, and that means it's time for our third Quarter Quell!"
"What? That's ages away,"I say, scowling. Part of me is still hoping the rebellion will be in full swing by then and the Games won't happen.
We turn to our mother, whose expression is solemn and distant, as if she's remembering something. "It must be the reading of the card."
The anthem plays, and my throat tightens with revulsion as President Snow takes the stage. He's followed by a young boy dressed in a white suit, holding a simple wooden box. I think he might have been at my Victory Party, but I couldn't say for sure. When anthem ends, and President Snow begins to speak, to remind us all of the Dark Days from which the Hunger Games were born, I stop thinking about anything else. When the laws for the Games were laid out, they dictated that every twenty-five years the anniversary would be marked by a Quarter Quell. It would call for a glorified version of the Games to make fresh the memory of those killed by the districts' rebellion.
These words could not be more pointed, since I suspect - no, I know- several districts are rebelling right now.
President Snow goes on to tell us what happened in the previous Quarter Quells. "On the twenty-fifth anniversary, as a reminder to the rebels that their children were dying because of their choice to initiate violence, every district was made to hold an election and vote on the tributes who would represent it."
I wonder how that would have felt. Picking the kids who had to go. It is worse, I think, to be turned over by your own neighbors than have your name drawn from the reaping ball.
"On the fiftieth anniversary," the president continues, "as a reminder that two rebels died for each Capitol citizen, every district was required to send twice as many tributes."
I imagine facing a field of forty-seven instead of twenty-three. Worse odds, less hope, and ultimately more dead kids. The year Maysilee died. That was the year Haymitch won...
"May went that year," says my mother quietly, reaching for my mockingjay pin, eyes sad. "Maysilee Donner. Her parents owned the sweetshop. They gave me her songbird after. A canary."
I don't reply, I just swallow almost painfully. We haven't spoken of Maysilee, other than me telling her where I got the pin, and she telling me she already knew, having remembered them giving the pin back to Madge's mum when Maysilee's casket arrived in Twelve.
"And now we honor our third Quarter Quell," says the president. The little boy in white steps forward, holding out the box as he opens the lid. We can see the tidy, upright rows of yellowed envelopes. Whoever devised the Quarter Quell system had prepared for centuries of Hunger Games. The president removes an envelope clearly marked with a 75. He runs his finger under the flap and pulls out a small square of paper. Without hesitation, he reads, "On the seventy-fifth anniversary, as a reminder to the rebels that it was their families who suffered from their actions most and that the Districts's birthrates fell steeply, only relations of previous tributes will be reaped from an all-female pool."
I don't really react at first. Rory's safe. Livia and Estelle are twice as likely to go in. And Katniss... I turn to my big sister. Her eyes are hard, her hands clenched to fists, but she attempts a smile."Well, we always knew I'd be going in. They just made it a bit less obvious to everyone else that the reapings rigged. twice the chance to get reaped."
)o(
Sorry to anyone who wanted Prim to go back in, but it was never going to happen. Just like Katniss said, it was always going to be her. Question: Later, for arena chapters, should I stay in Prim's POV or do Katniss's? So far, I'm undecided...
bad news: I'm off to boarding school for nine weeks and I a) don't know if I'll have time to write and b) don't know if I'll have internet
so in case I actually can't update, I'm very sorry but it doesn't mean the story's abandoned it just means boarding school is lame.
Love you all, my darlings!