The Apprentice

AN: I apologize for not updating sooner. It's been a busy semester, and I've had to change my goal from finishing this fic in time for the Hunger Games to getting all the characters inside the Arena by that time. Thank you all so much for your patience, your favoriting, and especially for all your kind reviews!


"You're not happy about this, are you?" Cinna Raelius grins, green eyes sparkling with a blaze of gold, reminding me again of the medic from this morning. "Or is it that you'd prefer someone else?"

"You're a guy. I'm a girl," I seethe. "I'm also butt-ass naked. What do you think?" But yes, the honest answer is given a list of men I know, I can think of several I'd rather swap for Cinna Raelius right now. The first being my father-no, make that Xavier Malcovitch, the boy who doesn't care. Then my father, who's seen me since I was a child, then Victor fucking Ivan Klerkov who'd rather look elsewhere, and then-

…No. I'm not going to go there now. Or ever. I'm Petra Angelovna, Baba Yaga Angelovna, and even if I wasn't the Butcher or the Stone-heart or District 6, Female I'd still never have a chance of a life with him.

"Don't ask me what I'm thinking right now unless you want an honest answer," Cinna winks, taking me in from feet to face. I flush crimson.

"I've seen worse."

I'm indignant. "What?"

"Girls. I've seen worse," he repeats with a shrug. "That's what I'm thinking right now. For a Tribute, you'll do fine. Besides, you've got a kickass outfit, if I do say so myself. In an hour's time, no one in Panem's going to give a damn about your lack of breasts."

I glower, but there's no point in fighting or firing him. We've got less than an hour to get me and Malcovitch dressed. I cross my arms.

Cinna seems disappointed. "What, no clever retort?"

I shake my bare shoulders at him and stick out my tongue. My breasts are so small they barely bounce. He grins.

"There's the spirit. Now close your eyes," Cinna insists, pulling a silken sash from the dressing table. "Go on, do it! I promise I'm not going to try anything, and something this good deserves to be a surprise."


The soft touch of silk brushes against my face with every movement I make. So far from the texture I've guessed at raw silk and leather for the basic bodice, but beyond that I can't tell. My stomach is still bare and my chest barely covered, and I console myself it can't be worse than Avitus' Outfit.

And by now it's too late, anyways. I have no choice but to trust Tiberia's instinct.

…even though she's blind.Tasha and Klerkov trust her, too, I remind myself. Right, a blind crazy woman and the word of an Addict and a Drunk. Oh, chort.

"Talk to me," I blurt.

"What?" Cinna Raelius asks.

"Just..I don't know. Talk to me. It's been a shitty day and I'm going crazy."

"Five minutes ago you wanted me to shut up," he chuckles.

"Yeah. Five minutes ago. And now I want you to talk." I demand. "So talk."

I hear the slight jingle of metal. Chainmail, I think.

"And what would her majesty request I speak of?" He asks pompously.

"Har, har. That sounds like chainmail."

"Not saying," Cinna reminds me, drawing weight down onto my head. A helmet, I would guess, but the spikes of my hair remain untouched. "Spoilers."

I cast in the dark. "So what's it like?"

"What's what like?"

"Being a…Stylist's apprentice. A Medic's brother. A Capitol citizen. Anything."

"To the first, not as glamorous as it would seem," Cinna indulges me with an air of boredom. "To the second, hell. To the third, well, if you like comfort, overfeeding, overcrowding and entertainment designed for the simple masses, not so bad. I tend to experience ennui of all three, myself."

"Oh."

"Oh, what?" he asks.

"I just didn't think having a medic for a brother would be so bad, that's all," I reply.

"Clearly you've never had an older sibling," Cinna scoffs, yanking what feels like a leather straps tight across my chest, then lacing what can only be a corset.

"Four," I say softly, eyelashes catching the inside of the sash.

"What?" He asks absently, fingers running the laces expertly.

"I had four."

He doesn't sigh, doesn't say anything, but I hear him exhale slowly and feel his breath on my bare back. It sends a shudder up my spine, one he mistakes for tears. "Petra, I'm sorry, I didn't mean-"

I shrug. "No, but you just assumed."

"What I meant was you've never had an older sibling like mine."

"Would you like to talk about something else, then?" I ask, dry-eyed.

"Would you?"

"Sure." He has me stoop, and place my hands on his shoulders as he kneels to slide my feet into the shoes. More leather, by the feel, but stiff and heavy.

"Now put your left foot down and give me your right, but be careful-"

"What is that-!" I yelp, suddenly three inches taller and incredibly wobbly. I put my other foot down in a desperate attempt not to keel over and feel fingers grate under my right heel. "Oh, sorry-" I groan.

"No worries," Cinna Raelius grits his teeth. "Occupational hazard," he continues unconvincingly.

"You let her put me in heels?" I demand, balancing precariously as he bundles my right leg into the boot, covering me from foot to mid-thigh. "What were you thinking!"

He laughs, still wincing. "I was thinking that Tiberia is the greatest artist this country has ever known, and if she chooses you and says you can wear boots, you damn better be able to wear them."

He's right. In the last day I've faced a Reaping, a Mob, vaccines and a pelvic inspection. In two days time I'll be facing the Arena. It puts things like shoes into perspective. "You weren't surprised, then?" I ask timidly.

"Not overtly so, no." Cinna Raelius says smoothly as the soft clack of metal begins to take hold around my waist. "Victor Ivan Klerkov is renown for being a killer, a drunk, and a voracious hit with the ladies. We Stylists don't pay much attention to public appeal so much as we look at cloth. The Games' audience generally cares more about the Tribute's dress, but a Stylist's life is made by dressing a Victor. And Klerkov's costumes have been cohesive throughout the years, too much so to be coincidental. Perhaps the workmanship of an excellent imitator, but every art student hears of Tiberia, and those wise study her well. I merely recognized her signature. I sought what I believed to have been her Apprentice, and instead found the Master. And for that, Petra Angelovna, I'm glad I stayed, even if only to get my fingers stomped."

"Tiberia," I say suddenly.

"What about her?" He asks. More metal. Tight and cold across my chest and arms.

"She's old. Really old. Tasha said she was a Stylist for the first Hunger Games."

"Pushkina was right," he consents, strapping my forearms with silk stocking.

"So she'd have some good stories." Stories of a world before the war, before District 13 was annihilated…

"Stories? Try Outfits." Tight cinch. More leather. "Her Victor's Gown collection for District 1 is still on display in the Capitol Museum. Seventy-one years later and it's still the most photographed exhibit in Panem. Over half of those costumes were never worn, if that gives you any idea how impressive she was."

"Never worn?" I ask, a sinking feeling in my throat.

"They," he struggles for the right words as cold metal encases my arm. "The Tributes they were designed for weren't always the Victors."

I shudder. "So they died."

"If you prefer to see it that way, then yes. They died."

There's a nervous drop in the pit of my stomach. "I thought Klerkov said she was the best."

"Best at Outfits, surely. But you can't mistake that for winning. Outfits will only get you so far."

"How far?" I press.

"Based on what I've seen of your costume, which is only one of twenty-four?" He chuckles. "I can't really say until I've seen the competition, now can I? Hold these," he orders, quashing my breasts together under the leather and into my ribs. It nearly knocks the wind out of me. "High as you can."

I slap him. I mostly miss, but still hear the satisfying thwack of skin on skin.

"Careful," Cinna warns.

I sneer."You're worried I'll break a nail?"

"I'm worried you'll split my skull. Those nails are sharp. They're also heavy. So hold these," he again hands me my breasts, "but not to tight or you'll lose what little you have, got it?"

I sigh in resignation, cupping them gingerly, for an awkward moment reminded of Crybaby's spying and my panic. With a jolt I remember it was only last night, and already it seems a world away. Yesterday I was screaming in rage and burst into tears when my Mentor saw me. Today, strangers can order to me to undress at will and I comply.

"…but District 1 has Cassius, he's always the retro-modernistic look," Cinna's voice brings me back. "District 2 has Agrippina, and she'll go for nude, I'm almost positive. Twin incest is a popular subject amongst the manga subculture right now-don't tut, Petra Angelovna, I'm just stating a fact," he counters sharply. "Alright, now let go as quickly as you can-"

My fingers and nails grate out of pre-formed metal cups, now cinched and tight. My breasts barely fall, but even squished, boosted, assaulted and augmented from every direction it's everything in the Capitol's power to get the damn things to touch.

B'lyad. It's also painful.

"You might have warned me it was going to hurt," I hiss, breathless.

Cinna laughs. "Pain is the price of beauty, Petra. Not that you'd know anything about it. District 3…Gallus. Neoclassical," he continues his lecture. "He's running out of ideas, hence the shunting from 1 and now 2. If the old crow doesn't dress a Victor this year, he'll be posted to 7 or above, I should think. Districts 7 through 12 have mostly Novices this year, no great talent there, I went to all their Masterpiece exhibits last year and walked away not only unimpressed but wholly disappointed. Although the female Tributes from 8 and 10 will still have the advantage. "

Right. They're sexy. Looks won't let you live in the Arena, but they will buy you food, water and medicine if you have even the slightest amount of courage, or cleavage. Which, judging by the amount of pain, I might now actually have.

"You do realize I don't have a clue what it is you're saying, right?" I frown as he buckles the last cold metal plate tightly into the leather crisscrossing my arms and back. "You are so your brother's brother."

"None of that," Cinna Raelius says, the sharp hint of a snarl unmasked by his pleasantness. Something heavy is attached slowly to my shoulders, draping me with weight and heat. I hear it whisper as the trane falls, fanning out on the ground behind me. "What I just said, Petra Angelovna, in terms that you're too droll, uneducated, or unappreciative to understand is that given the circumstances, I'm betting on you." His left hand tears the blindfold from my eyes, and with his right he spins me before the mirror.

The lights blind me. I blink. Focus.

Cinna grins. "What do you think?"

…well, fuck.