Chaos. Mayhem. Panic.
My teeth snap shut, I wrench. Tear. Snow staggers back, bucking in shock, swearingscreamingscrabbling all at once and now I know—we all know—beyond certainty that this monster, this pretender, with all his polished words is only man in a wolfskin, nothing more.
His soldiers are toy soldiers, just like his stallions. Broken, spiritless, obedient, utterly incapable of independent thought. Just like Aquilla's, just like Crane's, they freeze at the sight of the impossible, mesmerized in their own failings. It's all the time I need.
I rise, spit blood, hair, and ragged flesh. Scrabble to the nearest, he raises his baton, too late—
I wrest it from his fingers like I would wrestle a ram by its horns. Bring his fist nearly to the ground, twist the metal from his strained wrist then bring it down against the nape of his neck like I'd stun a pig. Over and over and over I swing. He lies senseless. Their armor's too strong. Too protective. I can't harm them…but I can still hurt them.
They rush to Snow, or stand, shell-shocked.
I run to Marcus.
Some move to stop me. Not fast enough.
I drop low, slide on my hip, feel sand and stone shear away my skin, grit my teeth and swing for the side and backs of their knees where the armor is weakest, know any animal, however fierce, however thick its hide, can be brought down once its legs are crippled. We humans are useless, lumbering, slow. We stand, balanced precariously on two small, spindly sticks. We're naked and hairless, clawless, toothless, limited by dark and no sense of smell. I've seen enough Hunger Games to know we make easy prey.
The two still bent over Marcus go easily enough. I slam the collar behind their helmets, send them spinning into the sand.
"Get up!" I yell, hoisting him up, one-handed. "Get up!"
But Marcus falls, groaning senselessly. Blyad. "N'yet! GET UP!"
"Enough, Tribute!"
A spray of bullets pepper the sand at my feet. They cannot deter me. I'd rather be shot than raped to death.
"No! Bring her to me!" Snow snarls as he is dragged to his feet, bright red blood soaking from his groin. "Bring her to me alive!"
Marcus is curled, contorted, clutching at his broken hands and moaning. I know he doesn't have the strength to stand. There was never really any hope of escape, but there doesn't have to be. Snow can bleed and feel pain. He can be killed. It doesn't take an army or a formed resistance, only one ugly girl in her nightdress to take down their empire. There's dozens of soldiers here, and every single one of them saw his shame. Any one of them could choose to end it now, with one shot…
…but no one does.
It's not loyalty that holds them back. Then what—? Fear?
Slowly the Peacekeepers advance, and I feel their doubt in the slowness of their motions. I'm a Tribute, a child, a girl. Even after what I did to them, what I did to Snow—perhaps because of it—not a one of them wishes to harm me.
I drop the baton. Stand defiant. "You can rape me, you can kill me, but no matter what sick, disgusting things you or your men do to me or how much I scream they'll always remember me as the girl who bit your balls off."
So there.
"Not after I make an example out of you, Butcher," Snow wheezes.
His hot blood is still dripping down my chin. I spit a long, salty string. "You already have."
"Don't…" a hand clutches weakly at my leg. "D-don't goad him…"
Marcus Raelius is Capitol. He's intelligent, a Medic, he's leader of Libertas, and he can go fuck himself for all I care. It's not smart to antagonize Snow any further…but every second his attention is focused on me is another in which Marcus lives. And I—I did this for what? For him? Panem? I don't know. Already that split-second of realization is fading into doubt, shrunk to the smallest of embers. I have to act, act now, before my courage fails me again.
They grab my arms. Drag me forward. But gently. These men—and women—even anonymous and helmeted I know they do not wish to hurt me.
"You do not realize what is at stake. You cannot. This nation cannot abide internal dissent. It will not survive it. Do you understand?" Snow demands, still doubled in agony.
"I understand: you're a rapist slovoc who treats people like shit."
His Peacekeepers remain still and silent.
"The Districts are vital. Essential. If you destroy the Games, Petra Angelovna—if you destroy me—then Panem will fall. And quickly. Your mother, your father…entire Districts would vanish overnight—you were outraged tonight, Petra Angelovna, by the deaths of a few dozen," he reminds me. "Shouldn't the death of hundreds of men, women and children at the hands of these so-called Resistance cells outrage you more? Shouldn't the threat to millions of Panem's citizens set your conscience in torment?"
Damn him. Damn them both. I didn't ask to be Reaped. I'm an ugly, uneducated girl from District 6. The minds of both these educated men are far above me. I did this for Marcus. For Malcovitch. For Mason and her parents, Odair and Annie Cresta…and only seconds later I still struggle to understand why.
"You're cruel," I finally decide. "So don't even pretend to feel guilty about killing."
"Killing is, at times, a necessary evil," Snow pants. "You know this."
He's right, damnit. But— "You tortured those people."
"Those specifically selected people, yes," Snow says without a trace of apology or relish. "I find excesses to be a deterrent to further anarchy—whether physical violence, or psychological, as demonstrated tonight."
Psychological? I don't know that word. But the earnestness in his eyes is clear. He means me. He means—"You mean rape."
"Only because you are not afraid of pain." Moments ago he had me on my knees. His dismissive tone disgusts me.
"Don't tell me you weren't going to enjoy that, Snow. Don't tell me Johanna Mason's never had to do the same damn thing, to you and the rest of the Senators that fancied a fuck. You use women—pizda, you use little boys—!" I remember Aquilla's threat to Malcovitch with renewed fury, "—on a sick whim."
"I could kill you now," he reminds me. "Should kill you now. Yet you could be useful to me, useful to Panem, Butcher, even now."
President Coriolanus Snow is the most powerful man in Panem. He could've had me killed a dozen times already tonight…yet he hasn't. He needs me, I realize. No, he…wants me? I find myself staring into a familiar face, a face not unlike Marcus', the weary grey skin and lines of a man with few friends. A man who craves not admiration but understanding. Agreement. Acceptance. I'm shocked. Repulsed. Saddened. I'm an ugly, uneducated girl from the Districts and he's the President of Panem.
…and we're the same. We're both alone. Snow doesn't just want to make me his pawn, but his ally.
Why—?
"Come, let us reason, " he seduces me. "We're more alike than you realize, Butcher. You have done what you must—whatever you must—to protect that which you value most. Panem needs such resourcefulness, such audacity. Come, shall we set aside our differences? Shall we go our separate ways as partners and equals?" he croons. "Or must we part tonight with you as a prisoner?"
Since being dragged from bed I've assaulted five men, one a Senator, two of them Gamemakers, the fifth the President. I've insulted many more. I am Petra Angelovna, Tribute for the 74th Hunger Games, and I am the People's favorite, the Ugly Girl who went back for her District partner, the Butcher who drew blood, the Driver of Horses. If this is the protective influence of a Tribute, I can't imagine how much power a Victor holds.
…So this is why he needs me. I am Petra Angelovna, and he is afraid. Snow is Panem's President. A Victor is God. The rich may think they own them, but it is for the Hunger Games that crazed crowd this morning died. Not ideas. Not revolution. Not resistance, but entertainment.
"Yeah. Sure. We can be partners. Your balls and my virginity can keep each other company."
I hear Marcus' sharp intake of breath, while the Peacekeeper holding my right arm gives a strangled chortle.
Snow sees. He always does. "You find the Tribute's insolence amusing, do you, soldier?"
"No, Excellency."
"Indeed. Did you not laugh?"
It's a trap. Answering yes is admitting to treason, and answering no would be a lie. I'm new at Snow's game but even I can taste the sickly sweet stench of death in his tone, like his parting words to Aquila. The Peacekeeper—this man, standing next to me, touching me, even—is about to die.
"I await your answer," Snow says curtly.
"No, Excellency."
"Indeed?" he sneers. "Release her. Remove your helmet, and present arms."
The reflective helmet sweeps back, revealing his face. He takes the pistol from his hip, knees, offers it to Snow. There's a slick sheen of sweat beading across his brow, but his hands never shake.
Why did you laugh, durak? Did you think it was funny? Were you just caught off guard? Or do you agree—?
"Liars and traitors," Snow hisses, with the barrel of that weapon trained on the soldier's stoic face. "Two things I cannot abide. You make no plea for this man's life, Butcher?" his cool gaze is leveled at me. "Nor you, Raelius?"
"No."
"No?" Snow asks. "Elaborate."
"Not for you."
"Not for me, no," he continues, circling us. "But for certain…other parties," his foot finds Marcus' face with a gentle caress. "And you, Raelius? Tell her. Explain to poor Petra Angelovna why you won't save him."
"She's…already…familiar with that fact, Coriolanus," he manages to gasp. "So let us go, or…kill us."
"I said, explain," Snow's sandaled foot finds his broken ribs. And digs.
Marcus Raelius lets out a wracked scream, every wrinkle on his face etched into stark contrast under his tears. I can count every one of his friendless years.
Snow is armed, now. We're outnumbered. No hope of escape. There never really was…but all my attempts to distract him from Marcus have failed. No point in begging for mercy—no man would make that mistake twice. The baton lies between my feet, but a bullet would pierce me before I could ever hope to grasp it.
Snow wants me. Craves my attention and understanding. Desires an ally, not only a pawn…
Klerkov's words: You must fool the world into seeing you for what you really are.
What am I to Snow? Who? If I act, if I deliberate then I am lost. I must be and simply be…
"Tell me," I say. "You were willing to send Cinna to his death. So you owe it to me."
"He is but one man of questionable allegiance, and is thus statistically irrelevant when the fate and freedom of millions is at stake," Marcus pants, as dust clings to his lashes.
Snow chuckles. "Hear him, Petra Angelovna. The noble and compassionate leader of your Libertas allies! The so-called Resistance. Resistance? Against what? Tell me, Petra Angelovna, are we not more alike than dissimilar? And yet he a hero, and I a tyrant," he concludes bitterly.
He's right, damn him. Bl'yad. "I've been in the Capitol one day," I finally state. "I'd hardly know."
"Yet already it appears you have decided," Snow counters.
"So have you."
He nods, that cold, calculating smile again on his face. "So it would seem. Yet my hand has stayed. Why?"
Not mercy. Never mercy. "You're toying with me. With all of us."
"No, no, Petra," he tuts. "You must do better than that. You've missed something obvious, Think. Truly Think."
Clotted blood. A sweating soldier. Marcus sprawled like a dead man. That woman with her yellow skin and graying lips…all of them have died for me. I didn't ask you, didn't want you to, it's not my fault, yet I still fee guilty. I miss my father and mother, miss Tasha and Klerkov, hope Malcovitch dies at the mines before the Games even begin…
I'm an ugly, uneducated girl from 6. Yet the President of Panem values my intelligence. Even Marcus said I might have been a genius…and the only thing between us and death tonight is entertaining Snow. Every second lived is a second earned.
I grit my teeth. "It wouldn't serve any purpose to punish him without punishing me."
"Exactly."
The butt of the pistol finds my cheek. Blinds me. I feel a tooth dislodge. I am not Marcus Raelius. I do not take this pain lightly.
Ch'yortbl'yadpizdavsezayebalopizdetsnakhuibl'yad!
I scream until my voice breaks, throat raw and ragged. Scream for my papa though he's a thousand miles away. I writhe in the sand, sobbing, and when the stinging stops and my sight returns there's blood on my hands, and a flap of flesh the size of a steak peeling from my face. Each heartbeat is a stab to my skull. "Bl'yad. B'lyad. Fuck!" I shout, burning eyes clenched shut.
There's a shot, the soft tumble of a body next to mine and I know without looking that that insubordinate soldier lies dead beside me. "I am wearied of my indulgence," Snow states. "Observe."
I open my eyes. It's meat, only meat, we're meat and nothing more…
"What do you feel?" Snow prods.
"Pain." Mudak.
"For him," he insists. "Anger? Sadness? Guilt? ...nothing?"
"I didn't know him. It's your fault if you can't hire some soldiers with discipline."
"The She-Bear snarls," Snow drawls, placing gentle traction against the shredded skin on my face with the tip of that gun. "But you didn't answer my question, Petra Angelovna. What do you feel?"
"Yes! Fuck!" I thrash. "Okay? Yes! All of it! Bl'yad!"
"And do you truly find him, then, to be 'statistically irrelevant'?"
Marcus Raelius blanches.
Yes. And No. I don't matter. Malcovitch doesn't matter. None of us do. The important ones are the men like Marcus, his Uncle and Snow and the war between them. And yet…yet I want to live. And that man, that Peacekeeper, all the Resistance here tonight, their families, their children, do they not matter? Did their deaths mean nothing? Does that mean their lives—our lives—mean nothing, too?
…and if that's true, then for the first time I understand the Hunger Games.
Snow has made me question. So much. Yet it is not enough. I cradle the flesh back onto my cheek, seek the only consolation left me after my father butchered poor little Lily: "You're still the one that killed him."
"Very well. You leave me little choice," Snow stands, resigned. "I have alerted Gamemaker Crane that his face has been avenged. And now…now, Petra Angelova, this pain will become more personal."
His foot finds my shoulder. Rolls me moaning to my back.
"You try to rape me, Snow, I'll bite your fucking cock off," I still manage to mutter.
"No," he assures me. "Nothing so vulgar."
He places one heel against my breast. And digs.
It collapses. I feel his foot grate into my ribs. I gasp. Clench. Can't breathe—!
"Leave her alone!" Marcus rasps.
"Or you'll what, Raelius?" Snow sneers. "Your threats are futile."
"Look at you. Look at all of you!" he cries. "Armed men with guns, picking on a little girl! You're pathetic!"
"A little girl?" Snow asks icily, and that pressure, that pain that unbearable pain finally relents, and for the slightest second I will it all away, let Marcus take the pain, the punishment, it's just too much, just too much…
"Is that what you see?" I hear Marcus' fingers crunch as Snow stomps down, hard.
He lets out a sob of pain and rage, and my courage comes back to me. Pizda, Marcus. You're intelligent. You're more important than a simple Tribute, you're the only one who's not irrelevant. Think, mudak, think!
"You're the pathetic one, Raelius," President Snow taunts him with a swift kick to his ribs. "Know this: you couldn't protect a woman if you tried."
DISTRACT HIM. Despite the pain, whatever the costs. And it nearly costs me everything. "LEAVE HIM ALONE, YOU BALLLESS FREAK!"
"Oh, Petra, Petra, my Petra," he circles me like a vulture in flight. "You are so easily replaced. You should be more careful."
"You're wrong, Snow," I pant, each word like fire to my face and chest, fingers pressing that gaping flesh back in place. "You can't replace me. Ugly butcher's daughters are a bit of a rarity here in the Capitol, thanks to your enhancements and surgeries. You might be able to pay an actress, pay off my parents, pay off my Mentor and Escort but you'll never get away with it. You said it yourself: the people love me. And they'll know."
"Is that what you think?" he muses. Snaps his fingers. "Bring me the girl."
…Ch'yort.
She's been standing shrouded in the shadows the entire time.
"Come now Pettra," Snow gestures her forward silkily. "What do you have to say?
"I'm Petra Angelovna," her voice is mine, down to the hitching breath. "You're wrong, Snow. You can't replace me. Ugly butcher's daughters are a bit of a rarity here in the Capitol, thanks to your genetic enhancements and surgeries. YOu might be able to pay an actress, pay off my parents, pay off my Mentor, Escort, Stylist and Trainer and their helpers but you'll never get away with it. The people love me. And they'll know."
I am aghast.
"Did you really think, Butcher, that I would leave something so important to mere chance or circumstance? That I could not contrive my own design to use you despite your refusal? Did I not say to you, truly, that Panem needs you, and would take what she needed with or without your consent."
"H-h-how—?"
"We've recorded your every move. Every conversation. Every word," he boasts. "Pettra can pass for you anywhere in Panem."
I have to think. Fast. Faster than I have ever done… "Is Pettra there willing to face the Arena in my stead?"
"Is Pettra there wiling to face the Arena in my stead?" she asks me earnestly.
"Shut up, suka, I'm warning you."
"Shut up, suka, I'm warning you."
"You're a khui-sucking capital durak. You should've let him take your tongue...or does he find it useful in more ways than one?"
"You're a khui-sucking capital durak," she echoes perfectly. "You should've let him take your tongue…or does he find it useful in more ways than one?" And the answer in her dull eyes is yes.
"Pettra is willing to do whatever I tell her. She is afforded good keep, and gets to see her precious rebel family again. She will perform any task I require, and has learned to do so with enthusiasm," his smile becomes grotesque.
Marcus lets out a bitter laugh. "And when she wins the Games you've rigged for her, she'll turn into a Capitol loyalist and you'll use her sway over the crowd to quash the Resistance. You'll have to be more creative, Coriolanus. You're growing too predictable."
"Resistance?" Snow corrects him. "The Rebellion. If I let you continue in this fallacy, Raelius, there's something you have yet to learn: if you want to win the people, you have to reach them first. One right word, one well-released tidbit or video…one untimely assassination of a Senator…you have to strike fear, Raelius. So subtly they don't know they're being manipulated. But the art of subtlety was never your specialty, was it?"
He doesn't need me anymore. He'll kill me. Kill Marcus. That's it. We're both fucked, and Panem with us. But President Snow just made a fatal mistake: he backed me into a corner. Even the smallest of animals can prove lethal once in a trap. I have nothing left to lose by doing something absolutely crazy. He can only kill me if he still has her.
She's his ace. His betting horse…and he's played his hand too soon.
She's just like you, mudillo. She doesn't want this, it's not her fault…
Given the choice helping Snow or hurting him and damn the consequences, she chose to become his bitch.
That's not fair, you made the same decision yourself.
I shake my head. Can't afford to see her as human. "There's a flaw in your plan," I force myself to say. "And you're too blind to see it."
"Oh, do tell."
"It's something obvious," I parrot his words, still clutching my face. "Think, Snow. Truly. Think."
My head is battered and bloodied, and Pettra has curves and breasts were I do not…but I've seen enough Victors transform within hours from starvation in the ring to plump, luscious beauty that the Capitol's tricks and Stylists could easily explain.
"Bring her!" Snow commands. I am lurched forward onto my feet. We are stood side by side. We're of height, yet she more comely. She's pale, shaking with fear like a wind-tossed leaf. I understand, then: tonight has been a test for her as much as I.
The soldiers stare long. "Identical," they finally say.
"Is that what you see?" I taunt him as he taunted Marcus. "Look again."
"My dear Butcher, you're bluffing."
"Am I?" I ask. "Two words: Holli Carnegie."
He cocks his head, intrigue then sudden understanding making his cold smile turn to dread.
"Stop her—!"
Too late. I kick her knee. Hard. Like I would a bucking bull. I feel the ligaments pop and bones shatter underneath my toes. She lies screaming on the ground, right leg twisted grotesquely, blood and bare yellow bone poking sharply from the inside of her shattered shin. Marcus looks sick. Marcus looks fucking petrified.
"It appears Pettra has a broken leg," I tell him. "May the odds be ever in her favor." Then the anger and mad elation of that chariot ride hit me all at once: I laugh.
Pettra laughs.
The guards begin to laugh.
Marcus tries to smile, but fails.
President Snow chuckles even.
"You're a fool, Petra Angelovna," Snow laments, like a long-suffering parent. "We are all liars here, and have the played the Game far longer than you. The Crowd's favorite can always be killed from within the Games. You've done nothing now but doom both of you to death."
"You'll still be the one who killed her," I remind him. "Not the Alliance. Not me."
"Execute them," he orders, as Pettra begins to sob anew. "Not her. The Alliance can do the rest."
And that's it. I'm done. I've gambled with the Devil, came so close…but I lost.
But something stirs in the back of my mind, silent yet so insistent, something like—
Something like Xavier Malcovtich. The Crowd's favorite can always be killed from within the Games, Snow said. But not before. Never before. I went back for Xavier Malcovitch, and the Capital shit their pants. That's my story. My key. That's who I am.
…and no one knows it better than Cry-baby.
"You think it'll be that easy?" I shout. "You've forgotten something. Something very important, Snow. But go ahead. Kill me. I'd love to see your entire Capitol fall because you're too blind to notice—!"
"Notice what, Butcher?"
"That you've forgotten."
"Forgotten what?"
"Forgotten who," I correct.
"My dear Butcher, you're stalling," Snow hisses. "Only this time, you have nothing left to bargain with. Execute them."
"Execute me, you'll execute yourselves," I address the Peacekeepers for the first time this evening. "And your families. Are they 'statistically irrelevant' to you? You kill me and you kill everything you love and hold dear in this sick city. I promise you. It'll be gone by sunrise."
That gets their attention.
"Execute them! Execute them now!" Snow roars. But his guard only raise their weapons half-heartedly to shoulder in the flickering torchlight. They've seen what their leader is capable of. Seen one of their own gunned down like a dog. The air is still permeated with the scent of burning flesh, the night still echoing faintly from their screams. He'll execute them, same as he did those rebels, and never even blink about it.
…but on the same token, what if I'm right? What the hell will the Resistance do to them, and their families and loved ones, if it gains power with the knowledge of what they've done in Snow's name? They remember the mob today, same as me. And it terrifies them.
He strikes me. I fall. My head hits stone and the world spins, human torches whirl above me and a blade passes beneath my eye…
Snow places a foot against my throat. Presses. I gasp.
"Petra—!" I hear Marcus cry.
"You. You are truly magnificent," he informs me, a trace of remorse and disgust mingling in his look. "You will simply not give up. But Panem cannot abide your insolence, however amusing I may find it, and however intelligent you may seem."
"Y-you said there were few rarer pleasures th-than the unknown," I manage to whine. "D-don't you at least want to know—?"
"No, no, my dear. You've done well. Too well, in fact. And death is the greatest unknown. I fear my riddle beats yours, indeed if it does exist."
"Looks like we'll both get to solve it tonight, then," I choke.
"Forgive me, if I doubt."
"You're not even going to guess?"
"Why guess, Butcher, when I can just as easily level this gun at the head of your companion, a companion you would sacrifice anything for?"
"Because I can't trust you now," I nod up to the bloody stain on his robes. "And besides, it doesn't matter if you kill Marcus or not," I breathe. "If you kill me tonight, he wins."
"Then let us test this hypothesis of yours. I believe you are bluffing, you assure me you are not. Very well," he addresses the Peacekeepers. "Hurt him."
They do.
Marcus matters. I do not. But if he dies, no one in Panem will remember him. Libertas and the Resistance may limp on, or may well be rounded up and executed this very night…but if Snow kills me, he'll die himself, and the Capitol with him. No more Hunger Games. No more starvation. No more little boys like Xavier Malcovitch, no more children forced to fight to the death or whore themselves out to survive…
I am Petra Angelovna. My father's Stone-heart, and I want to live.
…but even I could die for something as great as that.
I'm sorry, Marcus. I'm so sorry, Lily. I'm sorry when it mattered most I couldn't protect you. Marcus has gone silent, a welcome mercy from his screams…but over the pounding in my ears I hear him breathing. It's not too late. Not yet—
"Any last words, Butcher? Ordinarily I'd have the Peacekeepers torture you. Rape you. Kill you. But the second has them feeling nauseous right now. You are ugly, Petra Angelovna, ugly and unloved. Know that you get to die a virgin only because you are so singularly disgusting no man will touch you."
No. He would have always killed me himself. Because the regret in his eyes, the respect, the waste…for both Marcus and myself, is real. I've seen it before in my father's weathered face.
Regret. I know regret. I can use her.
"Malcovitch," I whisper. It's an apology, nearly a prayer—
"What?"
"Malcovitch," I cough again, fingers scrabbling against his soles. "You forgot about Malcovitch."
"Good Games, then. Are the rumors true?" Snow presses harder. My eyes begin to bulge. "Have you really been so desperate as to be molesting that idiot child?"
His leering voice comes as though through fog and sleet. "You. For. Got. Mal. Covitch."
"Xavier Malcovitch is no threat to me," Snow deliberates, remembering my mention of Holli. "The only danger that imbecile poses is to himself. How long do you suppose he'll last in the Games without your protection? Do you think the Careers will kill him quickly, or will the Alliance prolong his agony to gain the attention of their Sponsors?"
"Wrong," I choke. "Xavier Malcovitch…most dangerous person…Panem…now..."
"Really?" he leans down to mock me. "Pardon me if I doubt you, dear Petra."
"Leave Marcus alive," I whisper. "I'll tell you what you need to know."
"I have heard enough, Petra Angelovna," his voice holds the sincerity of an apology. "I fear I have indulged you for far too long…so as you say in 6, do svidaniya."
"He's too stupid to understand a bribe or threat!" even as my vision dims I see his eyes sharpen.
But it's not until everything's gone black that I'm able to gasp. I cough. Choke. Retch. Clutch my throat, my face, drink in smoke-stained air as though sweet and newly blown from the mountain tops, never breathed before. I gulp it down greedily despite the pain, like a suckling pig snouting at its mother's teat.
I drag myself to Marcus. Still breathing. And his heart pumps weakly in his chest. I roll him slowly to his side, every motion of my arm an agony.
Snow watches, hawk-like. "I'm waiting."
"You can't buy his silence," I state, "Xavier Malcovitch is incapable of understanding pretend. He's got…'societal mental retardation'—just ask Marcus! He. Can't. Lie."
His gaze turns wary.
"You can buy my parents, my Mentor and my Escort. You might even fool them. But ask yourself, Snow, can you fool Xavier Malcovitch? Are you clever enough to fool the foolish? Because if you're not, if Xavier Malcovitch knows you're bluffing, he'll have no choice but to tell the world. And who do you think they'll believe? Her?" I gesture to that cringing doppelganger crying over her ruined leg, "or the little boy who screams?"
Doubt kindles in his eyes.
"And if you arrange for some kind of tragedy, lose two Tributes to 'the Resistance'…after the mob, the shootings, the bomb…people aren't going to be blaming some resistance movement, they'll be blaming you. You've already covered it all up, focused the media on us instead, so won't that just make the people angry at your inability to protect us? To protect them?" I ask.
The doubt in his eyes is now a brushfire, threatening to seep through the mountains and forest, devouring who it will.
"You said it yourself, Snow. People don't like liars…and Panem cannot abide to find out you're one of them."
I count the slow seconds as his jaw shifts. That fire has become an inferno. He knows.
"The crowd is fickle, Snow. And dangerous," I emphasize. "I'm their favorite. So ask yourself, are you feeling clever, bastard? Are you?"
But he didn't get to be President by backing down easily. He must be seen—he must always be seen—to have the last word. Even here. In front of the assembled Peacekeepers, the idea to spare us must come from him. "Xavier Malcovitch can be replaced."
"Xavier Malcovitch is irreplaceable." I reply. "Apparently there's a lack of retarded boys here in the Capitol," my hand tightens on Marcus' sleeping shoulder. "You lot seem to be in the poor habit of culling them."
"Xavier Malcovitch is replaceable, I assure you," Snow counters. "You all are. You're nothing but pawns in my Games. My Hunger Games, Butcher. I'm afraid this spider's web is too complex for you to unravel."
I brush the hair from Marcus' dark face. "The web will fall when the crowd kills you, Snow. Fuck the web. Down with the spider."
It's too bold. Too brash. But Snow could never accept my surrender. I survive because I alone can entertain.
"Say another word, Butcher, and I'll change my mind about raping you."
"Go ahead," I spread my legs. "I've been waiting since I was thirteen for a man to want this."
We stare. And if I blink, if I falter, if I fail, then all will come to ruin.
Embers. Ash. Sand. Blood. My heart, my breath, Snow's penetrating gaze. Then—
Snow laughs. He genuinely laughs. Tears of mirth fall unbidden down his face, falling faster and faster until he can no longer fight them away. But there's a dark and deadly glint in his eyes, that begrudging respect a shepherd sings when speaking of the cunning wolf who continues to raid his hold. A wolf—his wolf, he brags of her to his neighbors, friends and rivals—who must still be killed. And he will hunt her, kill her, and mount her pelt for the world to know he has conquered. Snow is the loneliest man above an evil empire, and all that stands between us now is this black humor. He could kill us all here tonight, forget his humiliation…or repay it a thousand-fold for all of Panem to see. These soldiers will live to have no doubt that although the Gods can bleed, they can't be killed. And their wrath will be terrible to behold.
I am allowed to live—Marcus, the Peacekeepers, we are all allowed to live—on a whim. "Oh, Petra. Petra, Petra, my Petra," Snow wipes his tearing eyes. "What am I to do with you? You are ever so amusing, but I am afraid I must kill you."
He claps his hands. "Return the whore to her cell. And the wretch to her bedchambers…I hear this year's Hunger Games might just be the deadliest yet."
AN: Forget Princesses. Let's start a self-saving peasant trope, okay?
