Chapter Thirteen

A/N: Thank you to Morgan, Lya200 and MissMellark16 for reviewing the last chapter.

Overnight, the trio had come to a mutual decision that they could no longer procrastinate and stay hidden in the cave. There were only a dozen children remaining, as Abby had heard the booming sound of a cannon in the middle of the night, and so it was finally time to make their move. This was a war, after all, and they could not win it by running away from the enemy. That was not the way that their parents had fought, and it was not the way that they had become so famous.

So, just before the sun began to rise, the three took the decision to climb down the rock face, something that took a great deal of time to accomplish, glancing down the cliff every few moments, to ensure that no Careers had emerged from the place where they were hiding, or that no other Tributes had acquired a bow from the Cornucopia. Of course, they had been awake all night watching out for such occurrences, routinely waking and falling asleep so that two of them were on guard at any one time, ready to take out any potential threat. It had only been when she had awoken from her slumber that Abby had realised the child, or the young adult, as the majority of those remaining were, had been felled by one of Harry's knives.

"Hurry, Belle!" Abby whispered, a little more forcefully than she would have liked to, on reflection. The youngest of the three had taken her sweet time climbing, through no fault of her own, as she had managed to injure her ankle near the top of the cliff, and had had difficulty climbing since then. She had not complained, the poor little thing, but the elder of the two girls was aware that she was in pain. Immediately, she became a little guilty, and offered a hand to the blonde as she reached the bottom. "Are you alright? Can you walk on your own?"

"Yes." the younger replied quickly, and took a couple of steps to prove her point, attempting to hide her wince at the pain caused by doing so. A glint of pride glimmered in Abby's eyes, as she saw the child, for she could not be called a young adult at the mere age of eleven, deal with her discomfort so dismissively. Of course, she would have rather that it was not necessary for her to do so, but it was comforting for all of them to see that Isabelle was just as strong as the rest of them.

"Good. Come on, then." Harry sighed, and he wrapped the girl's arm around his shoulder nonetheless, not allowing for her to protest, as they had already begun to move quickly in the direction of the cave at the opposite base of the rock. There, they would have the opportunity to rest for a brief time, before they set about looking for the Careers' secret weapon, and the method that they were using to kill off children in such a remote space without even being in sight.

After five minutes of running, or limping in some cases, and looking over their shoulders to check that none were stalking them, the three eventually collapsed to the ground of the cave, panting and red faced after the sprint that they had undertaken. Perhaps they could have run a little slower, but none of the group had wished to run into the Careers, and the quicker they moved, the smaller that chance would be.

Luckily, they had not run into any other Tributes since the previous night, something that was particularly appreciated by the eldest of the three, who was still a little shaken by his first kill, though he tried not to show this in front of the girls. His stubborn reluctance to show emotion in front of others was one of the only things that Abby really disliked about her old friend, and it was only for the reason of her being his friend that she did not sigh in annoyance at his disinclination to show his true feelings.

For the rest of the day, the young trio remained seated in the cave, examining the walls and trying to find the place that the Careers had kept to themselves, their secret weapon. After all, the quicker they could find the entrance to the area in which the group must have been hiding, as they could remain so completely out of sight, the quicker they would get past the sport murderers and out of the Games, and if they could get out within the next eleven days, they would be able to force the Hunger Games to be ended for good. They searched for hours, and found nothing. At least, until Abby felt a gap in the wall.

"Harry, Belle, I've found something." the brunette whispered, turning her head to face them, though she kept her hand in its place on the wall, in case she should lose the location of it and have to begin their search again. Once the two had come to her side, she brought the hole to their attention, and soon it was agreed. This was no time eroded roughness in the stone. This was design. This was the entrance to whatever the Careers were using to kill the children.

However, just as they were about to pull the door, or what they assumed to be a door, open, they were shocked by a sudden darkness over their heads, as if a shadow had been cast in the early morning sunlight. It barely took them a moment to realise that that was exactly what had happened, and Harry reached into his belt for the throwing knife that rested there. Much to the luck of the young girl whose shadow it was, Abby had been the first of the group to see her face, and managed to grip the hand of her friend, just before he released it in the direction of her skull.

"Harry, stop! Don't hurt her, she's one of us!" As the girl walked further into the cave, the sunlight bounced off of her olive coloured skin, giving her an even closer resemblance to a painting that her father had once showed her, the only painting that he had never once showed her mother. "You are one of us, aren't you?"

"Yes." Costa answered, a smile on her face. "And I swear I will not let you down. I want to make you proud, especially after what your mother did for my poor aunt."

With a smirk that she had expressed for a little while, not having had cause to, Abby introduced the girl to her companions. "Harry, Belle, meet Costa-Ruanne Chilrana."

A/N: Please review, guys, just so I know if you like it or not!