I hope a lot of your questions will be answered in this chapter. This might be the last chapter in Annie's perspective for a few chapters, but I haven't decided yet. So that's just a heads up in case it does change...but I would like to keep it in her point-of-view because I think it would be more of a challenge and it wouldn't be as long. But like I said, I haven't decided yet. So, we'll see. Anyways, feedback is appreciated. Hope you enjoy! Happy Reading! :)
Lover is Childlike: the Low Anthem
My reflection was odd. Was it me? The girl with the green eyes, the girl with the dark flowing hair, was she me? Yes. She looked familiar. I touched her face, it was mine. "Your name is Annie Cresta." They told me. "You knew Finnick Odair."
I shook my head, watching the eyes of the girl. There was a truth hidden in them. My mind was in a fog. Words hugged my thoughts, interlacing with stories I had forgotten. "Mermaid-like," I breathed. "Awhile they bore her up: Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes." I could hear my voice, raspy and quiet. I could hear my words, silly, nonsensical, but I couldn't stop them. "As one incapable of her own distress, Or like a creature native and indued unto that element…" I told them playing with the mysterious ring on my left hand. My hands trembled, reaching my lips. The shuttering noise was back. I covered my ears, hoping the frames would move slowly. I hoped the frames wouldn't pass me by. I played with the loose ends of my hair. Flowers, that's what they would put in my hair. Flowers, as I danced near the sea or a lonely brook.
The room of people stood just beyond me, one of theirs circled me, engulfing me in a tide of questions or accusations…I couldn't understand it. "You knew Finnick Odair. You feigned madness. You lied to the Capitol." He said, anger inching into his loud voice.
My fingers grazed my lips. Talking, always talking. "On this decree, they are all by nature equally free and independent…" I whispered, my voice ringing clearly though. I couldn't stop. The words spilled from my mouth, only answering in riddles. Come back Annie! I commanded myself to focus. To speak. To do anything to save myself, but all I could do was stare. All I could do was tremble and speak nonsense. For God's Sake speak! Speak Annie! Tell them you didn't know! Save yourself! Save Finnick! …Who's Finnick?
"You knew of the rebellion?" He interrupted, frustrated and now standing in front of me, between us, between me and the girl in the mirror.
I continued, like a mindless songbird. "Free to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness." My voice shook and my heart beat in strange palpitations. The words of an old constitution danced upon my lips without command. "I read that somewhere," I muttered. "Or did I?" Snap out of it Annie. Come back!
The man shook me furiously. "Did you know of the rebellion?" He barked. "This isn't a game Miss Cresta." He said with more composure.
I shook my head gulping, now rocking back and forth. I couldn't stop. I couldn't. "No. This is thy sheath." My fingers danced lithely on my lap as I muttered on, "Sweet flower…nightly shall be to strew thy grave and weep." Tears pricked at my eyes as I began crying.
"What do you know?" The man asked, he looked like a misshapen figure from a past I once knew.
He edged in closer and I remembered the face that my heart naturally, desperately missed. The handsome boy with the golden skin, the bronze hair, and the beautiful smile, he was fresh in my mind. "That death's unnatural that kills for loving…Some bloody passion shakes your very frame," I croaked through my tears.
The frustrated man turned to the glass pane that separated me from the room of people. "I'm sorry sir, she won't speak. She only talks in the form of nonsense." He snapped, shaking in fear.
A deep cold voice rang out, "Remind her then." An older man walked in the room, staring at me with a small smirk on his red lips.
Remind me? A picture of a handsome boy standing on a stage waving, reciting a poem played. It was the most beautiful poem I'd ever heard. "Do you know who he's talking to Annie?" The older man asked me. His hair was white as snow. His lips swollen, his cheeks were sullen; his eyes were dark, like a serpent. I shook my head. "You my dear." The old man smiled. I could smell the rose on his lapel. The scent was strong and sweet, with a tint of bitter rust. "Such a pity, such a beautiful girl…mad, you poor dear," He said, touching my face. His thumb pulled at my cheeks, and eyes searched mine ravenously. He slapped my cheek softly with the tips of his fingers, "Do you remember Finnick Odair?" He asked.
I didn't answer for a while. He paced around me and watched me. The boy came to mind. We met under waves, I could see his smiling face, grinning at me. "Yes." I breathed.
"What did he tell you?" The President asked. My recollections were hazy. Did he tell me anything? Did he tell me everything? No. Finnick had secrets. That's all.
"He told me nothing." I said softly, fidgeting in my seat. I couldn't stay still. My hands reached for something, but found only air. "Don't leave me." I could hear his voice, but I couldn't remember my days with him. I could only piece some memories together, but even those seemed diluted, delusional.
The President grinned. It was unsettling, the menace in his eyes. "No, Annie…darling, please try and be cooperative." He said, pacing around me again.
"He told me nothing," I said again, more certain this time.
He laughed coldly, "Now that won't do Annie." He frowned, with a sinister glare. "Do you remember Finnick Odair?" He asked again, this time anger was rising in his voice.
I nodded. I did. I remembered him. But I didn't remember his importance. He mentored me in the games, that was it. Right? "Yes." I nodded.
"You loved him very much, didn't you?" I thought back, letting my fingers tap nervously at the bottom of the chair.
I gulped, "The boy I loved is dead." I said with certainty, even though I couldn't remember. "Finnick mentored me in the Games." There was the faceless boy from my games, then the handsome one that I knew to be Finnick.
The President smiled, "No. He's very much alive…because you never loved the boy from your games. You loved Finnick, and he loved you." He said in my ear, sweeping his hand across my throat. "Must I remind you?"
"Yes," I whispered, my voice was broken. The President ordered them to play a reel. There I was, wrapped in his arms. They had several clips of us, private ones. I loved him. It was obvious. There was a man back in District Four named Finnick Odair and I loved him. I loved him. I still love him. Come back Annie! Tell them! Tell them you don't know. Save yourself! Save Finnick!
"Where is Finnick?" President Snow asked.
"I don't know," I answered quietly, honestly. I wasn't going to give in. I had to stay out of the dark. I had to think of a way to get out, to escape. I couldn't let the attacks consume me.
Snow looked dissatisfied, "No Annie…tell us, where is Finnick?"
"I don't know." I repeated, now very aware.
"Were you a part in the rebel resistance?" Snow asked, very serious.
I shook my head, "I don't know what that is."
"No?" He asked, smiling slyly. He touched my cheek, wrapping my hair between his fingers.
Don't leave Finnick. I told myself. Don't be consumed. "No," I breathed.
Snow grabbed my hair, now very angry. "Let me show you what happens to rebels," He said, slapping my face, this time hard enough to knock me from the chair. He ordered the screens to change from the images of Finnick and me to executions within the districts. Body after body, man, woman, child, were dismembered and tossed aside for the camera and the entire world to see.
Horror paralyzed me. "No! Stop! Please," I begged as blood splattered across the screen and I cowered in the corner of the white room.
Snow laughed, "Oh darling, I can't even begin to describe to you what will happen to your dear Finnick if we find him." He sneered, picking me up by the wrist, crushing my jaw in his hand.
"No! Don't hurt him!" I gasped in his grip.
"Where's Finnick?" He asked with less patience.
I clawed, scratching at his hand. My feet were lifted off the ground. "I don't know! I don't know! Don't hurt him! Hurt me! Kill me!" I begged. I had to save him because I loved him. The simplicity of our love I remembered, only some of the days, only half of the moments, only that I had once loved him unconditionally.
Snow shrugged, giving me a half-hearted sneer of a smile. He was desperate. "That would be too simple. Do you know what happened to your mother?" Cold snaked into my body as I remembered the day I tried so hard to forget.
"N-no," I stammered, the letter appearing in my mind. It's funny what your mind remembers and then forgets. It's funny how the mind works. Hopelessness began to creep upon me. Fight this. I commanded. But I was weak.
"What about Finnick's mother?" Snow asked.
"They killed her." I answered remembering the bloodstained rocks and purple water. The ocean was treacherous that day.
Snow nodded, walking me back to the chair. "Yes my dear, I killed her." He said, sitting me down, placing my hands in my lap, as he would prop up a puppet.
"W-why?"
He shook his head and then adjusted my chin, pushing my hair from my face, like I was a wilting rose. "Because killing you would be too easy. Killing you means one of two things for the Capitol. It either fuels Finnick's fire against us…which I think we can all agree isn't very good. Or he dies with you, which is my preferred option of the two…but not a good one still. We need Finnick to keep the members of the Capitol happy, entertained if you will." He said, his official manner coming back as he began to develop his composure. "Without you he won't perform now will he?"
"But his family…?" I whimpered. I could feel it, the madness, plague me. Fight. I ordered, but my authority was weak.
"…Will act as punishment for his crimes, like yours…he doesn't deserve death." Snow said, staring at the mirrored wall that separated us from the room of people. "As long as the two of you are in my grasps, you will never die. You will live and you will play nice, like all the other victors." He promised, turning back to me. Fear was swirling in my mind. "Now, darling, where's Finnick?" The words seemed to leave me again. The attack was stronger this time. My true voice was trapped under heaps of nets and secrets. My hopes were devoured by the lions Snow created. I couldn't see him anymore. I couldn't see Finnick. He was lost to my mind. And I was lost from him.
My mind went blank. My eyes stared at the girl in the reflection. She wasn't I and I wasn't she. "I don't know. I never knew a Finnick." The girl answered.
The old man frowned. "Come on Annie…let's not play dumb today." The scent of roses was on his breath. His lips were deep red, crimson.
I shook my head. "I don't know a Finnick sir." Words that weren't mine filled my mouth, slaying my tongue. "He is dead and gone; At his head a grass-green turf, At his heels a stone." I recited absentmindedly. Stop. I told myself, but the command came like a whisper.
The old man ran his hand through my hair, "Such a pity."
I could feel my heart breaking, but I didn't understand the cause. My hands were unoccupied. I reached out, but for nothing. I cried, my lips quivering as I buried my face in my hands. "Clamb'ring to hang, an envious sliver broke…Fell in the weeping brook," I said, sobbing into my palms.
The old man's cold glare weighed on me. The fury and power of his eyes pressed against my ribs. I couldn't breathe. Panic pierced me. "Take her away." He said to the Peacekeepers.
"No! No!" I screamed. They tossed me into a new room, a much darker, colder one. I curled up into a ball, pressing my knees into my chest. "Oh my love, trapped in this cage, please set me free, my dear…" I muttered the old lines, not remembering their meaning. "Please…Please…Please…" I repeated, tears streaming down my face.
"Annie?" A familiar voice rang out as I cowered in the cold cell. "Annie is that you?"
"I don't know," I whispered, my cheek pushed against the stone floor.
"Annie, it's me…Johanna." The voice said desperately. Pictures were starting to form that seemed more clear, but they became hazy within seconds.
"Finnick?" I asked for the boy they tortured me over.
The woman's voice was distressed but in a way, comforting, "He's safe Annie…"
"Am I?" I asked her quietly.
"I don't know." We sat in silence for what seemed like days. I rarely slept. Some days were better than others. Some days I screamed for Finnick and his safety. Most days I fell into a deep depression. I couldn't leave it. I couldn't fight it. I could only speak nonsense, unable to say anything else. I couldn't escape. I was confined, by the Capitol and the walls of my own mind.