Spoilers: Major spoilers up to early events in Catching Fire.

Disclaimer: I still don't own these characters, and would you believe me if I told you that they were already broken when I found them?

A/N: When I posted my recent fic, "Masquerade," I genuinely had no intention of writing anything else in that particular alternate universe, but that plot bunny wound up bringing a friend. A very demanding friend. It is possible to read this fic without having read "Masquerade," but that story will offer some background details that aren't included here. This fic takes place 12 years after the previous one. :)

A couple other quick notes about this story – my descriptions of Katniss and Peeta's children will differ slightly from the descriptions in canon. This is very much an alternate universe, so these are alternate versions of their children who have have different circumstances, experiences, and – in small ways, even genetics – to shape them.

Also, while I was writing this story, I stumbled across a fic on AO3 by SeekingAnotherWorld, called, "The Sacrificed Sister," with a character named Sage. I had already named a character "Sage" in my own story, though the character in my fic is male and is in no way related to SeekingAnotherWorld's character. The only similarity is the name, and please know that it was entirely unintentional.

As always, I also thank my Lord Jesus Christ for his incredible mercy and grace and his many blessings. I would be utterly lost without him.

A Gilded Cage

Helena Mellark woke with her heart pounding in her chest.

For an instant, even with her eyes open, she was still in her parents' mentoring suite, staring at the screen, watching those mutts swarm around her little brother.

Sage had fought. He'd fought with everything he had until the mutts–

She cut that thought off and squeezed her eyes shut, trying to will the images away. Trying to forget the sounds he'd made.

It didn't really work. It never did.

But at least when she opened her eyes again, she was in her bedroom.

She let her head fall back against her pillow and took a few deep breaths, staring at the darkened ceiling above her. There was a little moonlight peaking through her curtains, and if she looked hard enough, she could almost make out the shapes of the clouds that her dad had painted above her bed four years ago, when she'd told him that she felt like a bird in a cage.

So, he'd given her the sky, the only way he could.

That had been before...before Sage had died.

Dad didn't paint much anymore. Not unless he had to. The Capitol expected at least a few new paintings each year, and they always went to the highest bidder.

Helena hated those auctions. Everyone there wanted a piece from – a piece of – Peeta Mellark. A piece of the Star-Crossed Lovers. A piece of her family, like they hadn't taken enough already.

Helena's hands curled into fists, bunched in her blankets, but the anger drained away as quickly as it had come, leaving a familiar, bone-deep weariness behind.

It would never be enough. She'd learned that years ago. They would always want more.

The only question was: what would they take next?

Sitting up, Helena shoved her blankets back and slid her legs over the side of the mattress.

For a minute, she just stayed there, gazing down in the dark in her nightgown, feeling the cool air against her skin, digging her toes into carpet. It was plush. Soft. Of course it was. Nothing but the best for the family of the Star-Crossed Lovers. The best flooring...the best furnishings...the best surveillance.

They still weren't sure how many bugs there were. They knew of at least a dozen, plus a couple cameras, but there were undoubtedly more, so they were always careful.

Always.

Helena snorted faintly at that.

As a little girl, it had taken her a while to realize that most families didn't have all their important conversations huddled in the bathroom with the shower running full blast. It had taken her longer still to realize that most families didn't play "the quiet game" in certain rooms of the house, either. (Sage had won, most of the time. He'd always been a little less likely to speak, never seeming to feel the pull of words quite the way she did.)

Her heart aching with the thought, Helena finally pushed herself up from the bed, sliding her feet into her slippers. She stood and walked over to her bathroom, turning on the light by waving her hand at the sensor on the wall. She splashed some cold water on her face at the sink, wanting the chill to chase away the wrung-out, groggy feeling her nightmares always left her with, then dried her face with a towel and stared up at the mirror for a long moment.

The Seam-gray eyes she'd inherited from her mother had dark circles under them that she'd probably be hearing about from her stylist tomorrow, and her blonde hair was tangled around her shoulders and down her back. She looked pale, washed out in the light of the bathroom, the mint green silk of her nightgown looking oddly bright in comparison.

She sighed, turned off the light, and walked back into her room to put on her robe, then headed in the direction of the kitchen.

Warm milk and honey had been her answer to nightmares for as long as Helena could remember, something Grandma Aster had suggested in one of her letters. These days, it didn't really do much to actually help her get back to sleep, but the mix of warmth and sweetness was soothing in its own way.

She paused when she reached the end of the hallway, though, noticing her mother's familiar silhouette standing by the kitchen window, the one that looked out over their backyard. The curtains were open, and the light from the moon was brighter here, making her mother look almost ghostly.

Helena glanced around the room, expecting to see her father somewhere nearby – her parents were rarely apart if they had a choice – but it seemed like, for once, her mother was alone, gazing out at the the darkened garden. That last part, at least, wasn't a surprise.

(When Helena had been about six, Aunt Prim had sent some saplings from District Twelve, a small handful of pine and some oak. Mom had planted them in the back garden, and in a few years, they'd grown taller than the iron fence that ringed the house, hiding it from view. Helena remembered the way her mother had smiled, lighter somehow, whenever she walked around in the yard, her fingers brushing the bark of each tree as she passed.

Then, one day, they'd came home from filming an episode of Dad's baking show to find the trees being cut down by a landscaping crew. Drusus, their Capitol-appointed head of security, had ordered it, claiming that they provided too much cover for a potential intruder. A low, carefully manicured line of bushes had replaced them.

Years had passed since then, but Mom had never really stopped looking out that window, as though she could still see the trees if only she just stared long enough.)

Knowing better than to startle either one of her parents, Helena cleared her throat softly. "Mom?"

Her mother turned to look at her immediately, concern flickering over her features, her eyes sharp with worry. "Helena? What's wrong?"

Her voice was hoarse. Brittle.

Like she'd been screaming. The thought came unbidden.

(Her mother had screamed when Sage died, screamed and screamed and screamed, her cries joining his, like she was being ripped apart too. When it was over, when Sage's cannon had sounded, her mom had spun away from the screen and tried to launch herself at one of the peacekeepers who was guarding them, ready to tear him apart with her bare hands. Dad had been the one to hold her back. She'd shrieked and raged, but Dad hadn't let go, tears running down his face while she fought him. He'd had no other choice. If he hadn't done that, Sage might not have been the only one to die in the end.)

Helena called up a reassuring smile automatically. "Nothing's wrong, Mom. I just couldn't sleep. I couldn't stop thinking about the interviews I have tomorrow."

The lies slipped easily off her tongue. She'd stopped bothering her parents with her nightmares years ago. The nightmares they had already were bad enough. They hadn't needed to know how often her own, imaginary Games had plagued her sleep from the time she'd turned twelve.

(They'd arrived in District Twelve early on Reaping Day, and with instructions to remain in Town, they'd wound up staying at the Mellark Bakery. The new bakery, anyway. The old one had burned down when Uncle Bannock had died.

Restless and unable to be tempted by the same kind of treats their dad often made on his baking show, she and Sage had asked to see the piglets that had been born a few weeks earlier in the small pen out back.

"Fine, go ahead," Grandma Jan had said, her voice hard. "But there's no point in getting attached. They're raised for slaughter."

The words seem to echo around in Helena's skull later that afternoon, as she stood in the main square in her Reaping dress, waiting to see if her name was drawn.)

These days, it was Sage's Games that haunted Helena at night, but that was all the more reason to keep silent. She knew how much pain the memory of those Games caused her parents as it was.

(She'd been so sure that she was going to be in the 94th Hunger Games. She'd been eighteen, and it had been her last Reaping.

She was twenty-two now.

Sage had been fifteen. He would always be fifteen.)

Her mom's eyes narrowed faintly at her smile, and Helena finally let the expression fade.

"Really, I'm okay," she assured again. She was. She had to be. "I think I'll just get something to drink, then try to head back to bed."

Her mom must have known there was something she wasn't saying because she walked forward to cup Helena's face in the palm of her right hand, her thumb brushing over her cheekbone in the soothing way Helena remembered from when she was little.

Her mom didn't speak...but she rarely did when she was home, saying less and less over the years. It was like pretending to be the woman that the Capitol expected her to be demanded all of her energy, all of the words she had to offer.

Helena stared into her mother's face for a moment, allowing herself to lean into the touch. Despite having just turned forty, her mother didn't look like she'd changed much from the girl who had arrived in the Capitol at sixteen. Time, as well as a steady, rich diet, had softened some of the harsher angles of her profile, but the change was subtle, one Helena only noticed because she'd seen so many pictures from her parents' Games. Up close, there were creases between her mother's eyes and around her mother's mouth, but they were faint, almost invisible. Her dedicated team in the remake center softened every line and wrinkle as it appeared, banished every blemish, and dyed away the gray that had been wanting to creep into her hair. No, everyone would agree, Katniss Everdeen looked far younger than forty. (As long as you avoided her eyes, Helena thought. She wondered, sometimes, why the audiences in the Capitol couldn't see what she did when she looked at her parents.)

Helena reached out to take her mother's free hand, giving it a squeeze between both of hers. Her mother smiled faintly, just the smallest upturn of her lips, then lowered her right hand and turned back in the direction of the house's master bedroom. It was at the end of another hall, opposite the hallway Helena had just come from, so when the door opened, she had a clear view of her father, sitting up in bed, waiting for her mom to return. When her mother started toward the bed, the door stayed open just long enough for her to see her dad reach for her, the way a drowning man might reach for a life raft. Her mom reached back, and the door closed with a soft click.

Feeling like she'd intruded, Helena looked away, searching for the light sensor on the wall. A quick wave of her hand turned on the kitchen light above her, though she winced at the sudden brightness that filled the room. But it didn't take long for her eyes to adjust, and her feet carried her automatically over the the cabinet that held their mugs. She got the milk out of the refrigerator next, then grabbed a pot to heat it in and took the honey out of the pantry. The motions were familiar, relaxing somehow, and with nothing else to distract her, her thoughts inevitably began to wander.

Though it was the nightmare that had woken her, she hadn't entirely been lying when she'd told her mom that she couldn't stop thinking about the interviews she had tomorrow. She wasn't nervous about them – she and Sage had grown up giving interviews practically from the time they could talk – but they were on her mind.

She could already imagine the questions she would get...questions about her goals, her plans, now that she had graduated from the Capitol's best college. Not that that it really mattered what she wanted. It hadn't mattered when she'd graduated from high school, either. The audiences in the Capitol had been gushing over the idea of her following in her mom's "fashion" footsteps since she'd been six years old, walking down the red carpet in a pretty dress, holding her mom's hand.

So, after high school, she'd taken a four year degree in Fashion Design. (She hadn't ever let herself think about what she might have chosen to study if it had been up to her. There was no point.)

It hadn't been all bad. She'd enjoyed parts of it – the drawing, mostly. She wasn't nearly as skilled as her dad, not even with a formal degree under her belt, but she'd always liked it. And...her classes had been something to focus on. Something she could throw herself into when her grief for Sage threatened to overwhelm her...when she looked across the room and still expected her little brother to be there.

("I'm glad it's me. I'd rather it be me than you."

"Sage-"

The words died on her tongue. They'd promised each other that they would never volunteer if one of them was reaped. She wouldn't volunteer for the girl, and he wouldn't volunteer for the boy. Both of them in the the Games at once...they knew what that would do to their parents.

Sage seemed to guess what she was thinking.

"We knew it was going to happen to one of us. At least this way, they won't be able to reap you anymore.")

It didn't take long for the milk to heat enough, and Helena moved the pot off the burner, turning off the stove and pouring the milk into her mug. She added a couple drops of honey, stirring them in with a spoon, then wrapped her hands around the mug, hoping the warmth would settle in her bones.

She took a small sip and sighed.

If she was lucky, if the Capitol was satisfied enough by her compliance, then she might be able to intern with Cinna or Portia for a few years. They'd retired as stylists for the Games long ago, but they both still ran their own, immensely popular brands, as well as officially designing for her parents (and in the case of "The Katniss Everdeen Collection," unofficially too). She could learn a lot from either of them, and after that...maybe she could start her own clothing line or even open a shop. It might not have been what she would have wanted to do otherwise, but it would be hers.

If, she thought again, staring down at her mug. Maybe.

Those were dangerous words, and for just a moment, she wished she was drinking something stronger. Her eyes strayed over to the liquor cabinet on the kitchen's far wall, the one that was only used when they were forced to entertain "guests" at the house who expected something alcoholic to drink. Her parents never touched it otherwise.

She hadn't understood why until she'd stolen a couple bottles of beer from it when she was fourteen and smuggled them into her room, eager for the escape they seemed to promise.

She'd spent the next day utterly sick and miserable...and terrified too, because she remembered talking while she was drunk, but she couldn't remember what she'd said where the bugs might have heard her, and even at that age, she'd known that one wrong word, one slip of the tongue, was all the Capitol needed. She'd admitted everything to her parents in tears, in the bathroom, with the water running in the shower as fast as she could get it. The fear she'd seen in their eyes that day had been much worse than any punishment they'd given her.

That alone would have been enough for Helena to swear off alcohol for good, but a few months later, Grandma Aster and Aunt Prim had found Haymitch unconscious in his house back in Twelve. A doctor from the Capitol had confirmed their initial diagnosis – liver failure. Due to his status as a Victor, Haymitch had been granted a special medical dispensation to receive treatment in the Capitol itself, and he'd accepted it...grudgingly, and only because they had all begged him to, but he'd made his feelings clear, even as he lay in his hospital bed in the Capitol Medical Center.

(Haymitch glared back at them with red-rimmed eyes, his skin an odd shade of yellow, faint tremors in his hands.

"They can't use me against you if I'm dead," he muttered, then turned away, sinking back into his pillow and saying something about "Effie" under his breath.

"Effie wouldn't want you to give up either," her mother retorted sharply.

"Yeah, well, she's not here, is she?")

Haymitch had been in the Capitol a total of five months, and before the doctors had released him, they'd told him in no uncertain terms that he needed to stop drinking, or he'd quickly undo any good they'd managed to accomplish. Helena still remembered the hollow way Haymitch had laughed at that.

Seven years. The treatments had bought him another seven years.

But a few months ago, he'd been hospitalized again, and this time, the doctors were less hopeful. His liver was failing once more, and his heart and lungs were showing signs of failure too. The specialist in charge of his care had grimly warned that the sixty-three-year-old Victor might not have much longer.

Helena swallowed hard, then finally managed to drag her eyes away from the liquor cabinet and finished the rest of her milk. She rinsed her mug and the pot at the sink, as well as the spoon she'd used, then placed them in the dishwasher and put the honey back in the pantry.

The Avoxes, who served in the house at the Capitol's insistence, would have gotten everything in the morning, but she preferred not to add to their chores if she could help it. She had no doubt that they were under orders to report everything they saw and heard, but knowing that they had even less choice in their role than she did, Helena found it difficult to resent them for it. She always tried to make their jobs a little easier when she could.

She was about to wave her hand at the sensor on the wall to turn off the light when something on the floor caught her eye. It wasn't far from the kitchen island, tucked in a far corner by the baseboard. She bent down to look at it more closely, and quickly recognized it as a piece of ceramic...a fragment of one of their dinner plates, judging by the hints of the pattern she could see. Her shoulders slumped in realization, and she walked over to pick it up, careful not to cut herself on the sharp edges.

It was easy enough to guess where it had come from.

(It had been the anniversary of Uncle Bannock's death one year when she'd walked into the living room to find her dad with his hands braced on the marble mantle of the fireplace, his eyes closed and his chest heaving. On the floor, scattered around his feet, were the shattered remains of the over-sized vases that had stood on that mantle for years.

It made her think of other broken things she'd seen growing up – lamps, vases, dishes...even a glass table once.

She had always thought it had been Sage.)

Helena stared at the shard for a moment, then walked over to the trashcan and threw it away. She turned off the light, and the kitchen was plunged back into darkness as she started in the direction of her room, her footsteps echoing in the quiet. She doubted that she would fall asleep again – especially now – but she might get at least a little rest if she could relax enough.

She glanced at the backyard as she passed the kitchen window, eyeing the low line of bushes there. The tall, iron bars of the fence loomed over them, dark even in the moonlight. She turned away and walked down the hall, her feet carrying her easily along the well-worn path.

Soon enough, she'd reached her bedroom. She shrugged off her robe and tossed it over the back of a chair, then kicked off her slippers and slid back beneath the covers of her bed, staring up at the ceiling once more.

Drawing a deep breath, Helena closed her eyes and tired not to dream.

Morning came too soon.

Helena had spent the rest of the night either tossing and turning or watching as the silver light of the moon gradually turned into the warmer light of the dawn.

By 6:30, she'd given up any pretense of sleeping and gotten up to shower and have breakfast. She was ready and waiting when her stylist, Valeria, arrived an hour later. The house came fully equipped with its own make-up and dressing room, but Valeria always brought her own supplies with her in some impressive-looking totes - totes she had the Avoxes carry inside. Like Helena had known she would, Valeria tutted over the dark circles under her eyes and insisted on doing a couple different eye masks before she was satisfied. Helena knew better than to argue with her.

Valeria had just started pulling things out of her wardrobe when the phone on the nearby wall rang. Helena picked it up, unsurprised to hear the familiar voice of her personal assistant on the other end.

"Helena, darling, good morning."

"Good morning, Camille," Helena answered, wincing faintly at the way the other woman had said her name, though Camille was far from the only one who did that.

Helena met her fair share of people in the Capitol who spoke her name the same way...turning every syllable into something overly familiar, almost possessive, like they owned the name itself. Maybe they thought they did.

(When her mother had been nearing the end of her pregnancy, the Capitol had hosted a baby naming contest, with every Capitol citizen welcome to submit a name. Once that initial list had been complied, the names had been put up for a vote, with the audience choosing their favorites. The top ten names had been presented to the Star-Crossed Lovers so they could pick one from the list. Helena supposed she should be grateful that they'd been given that much, at least.

It had been enough, in the end. Her dad had told her once, his words almost drowned out by the sound of rushing water, that Cinna had been the one to suggest "Helena" because it had been the name of an old forest that had existed before the Dark Days, just like the forest outside of their district...the one her mother loved. Helena wondered sometimes if Cinna had done even more than they knew, if he'd whispered the name into the ears of dozens of his patrons to get it on the final list, beating out names like Hortencia and Antonia.

Helena snorted faintly. Her little brother's name might have suffered the same fate, but he'd been born a month-and-a-half early, too soon to narrow down the contest's final list.

She'd teased Sage sometimes that he definitely would have been a Julius or an Atticus or an Orion.)

Helena blinked, realizing her thoughts had drifted, and she shook herself a little, trying to focus. She must have been even more exhausted than she'd realized – she knew better than to get distracted when talking to Camille. She'd been handpicked by Drusus, and something about her always put Helena on edge.

She pushed as much friendliness into her voice as she could.

"I'm glad you called. I had a question about the schedule for today. I know my interview with Leo Alonso is at 11:00, but I see I have an interview with Decima Auclair at 12:30. Will that be a working lunch?"

"That's actually what I wanted to talk to you about, darling," Camille answered. "There's been a change of plans. Your interviews have been canceled for today, and your schedule has been cleared. President Snow wishes to speak with you."

Helena's mind went blank for a moment, and dread pooled in her stomach.

She'd met the president a handful of times, usually at the official functions surrounding the Games, and that had been enough for him to star in a number of her nightmares over the years. An unexpected meeting couldn't mean anything good.

She was careful to keep any fear from her tone.

"I see," she said easily. "Are my parents returning home early, then, or will I be joining them at the Presidential Mansion later?"

She always got a copies of her parents' schedules along with her own, and she knew her parents both had busy days ahead, with her mother making an appearance at a fashion show and her father signing copies of the latest recipe book he'd published. They'd already left earlier that morning, and given the large crowds that were sure to be waiting for them, their schedules wouldn't be as easy to clear as hers had been.

"You misunderstand, dear. The president wishes to speak with you alone."

That dread migrated from Helena's stomach to her spine, a deep cold spreading down her back and through her limbs.

She felt numb as she spoke. "I'm honored by the president's attention."

"A car will be there to pick you up at 9:00. Don't be late."

"I'll be ready. Thank you."

Camille hung up, though it took Helena a few seconds longer to set down the receiver she held, her muscles frozen, sluggish.

She managed to convey the news to Valeria, who immediately bemoaned the fact that the outfits she'd had in mind "simply wouldn't do" for a meeting with the president. She tossed a stack of clothes aside and began digging through the wardrobe again in earnest.

After about a half an hour, Valeria had selected a sleeveless, knee-length purple dress with a ruffled collar that flared out and spilled modestly down the front of her chest, ending at her waist. The fabric was a soft violet that shimmered blue in the light – one of Cinna's designs. She pulled out a pair of matching shoes, then led Helena over to the make-up chair.

By the time Valeria was done, additional touches of blue and purple around Helena's eyes brought out the gray in her irises, and her lips were a light shade of pink. Her blonde hair was pulled up in a twist, the ends curling artfully around her head, a few strands framing her face.

Valeria fussed over her appearance for a few more minutes before a long, white limousine pulled into the house's driveway.

Helena's numbness continued as she slid into the back seat of that limo, and the drive through the Capitol passed by in a blur. Not even her arrival at the presidential mansion was enough to break through the fog, and she was led through the long, winding corridors by an Avox, feeling like she was in a daze, until finally, they reached an imposing-looking door at the end of a long, grand hallway.

She was quickly ushered inside the room, and the door closed behind her. Her eyes were immediately drawn to the large, ebony desk taking up one end of the office...and to the man sitting behind it. The man who held her life and the lives of her family in the palm of his hand. Her heart caught in her throat.

With the wealth of medical technology at their fingertips, it wasn't all that unusual for citizens of the Capitol to live into their early hundreds, and President Snow was only a year away from celebrating his 110th birthday. But, his health had been in decline already during her parents' Games, and for decades now, rumors about emergency surgeries and experimental treatments had appeared fairly regularly, though the rumors always disappeared as quickly as the people who spread them.

Whatever the truth was – however he'd managed to cling to life far past everyone's expectations – the President had gradually stepped back from the public eye, relegating most of his duties to his deputies, appearing only briefly during the Games to wave at the crowds, even forgoing his speech at the Tribute Parade. Rumors about who might eventually succeed him had been even more persistent than the rumors about his health.

Helena herself hadn't seen the president since the 88th Hunger Games, the first year she'd been eligible for the Reaping, and looking at him now, it was clear why.

President Snow was utterly unmoving, seated in a gilded wheelchair, his hands folded in his lap. He had clearly lost a great deal of weight because his dark blue suit, though obviously tailored, seemed to hang on his thin frame, and his cheekbones stood out sharply against the sunken hollows below them. His skin was terribly pale, almost translucent, though the circles under his eyes were such a deep purple that they were nearly black. His hair, which was somehow an even brighter white than it had been before, was combed back from his face, but it was thinning, and his beard, though neatly trimmed, was sparse. The only real color on his face was a line of crimson around his mouth, just barely visible behind his lips.

Farther down, at his throat, there was some sort of clear tube, though it was largely hidden by the white silk scarf that served as his cravat. But, in the silence of the room, Helena heard the soft hiss of forced air at regular intervals, and she realized that whatever that tube was connected to, it must have been helping him breathe.

She forced herself to walk forward, moving farther into the office, a practiced smile coming to her lips, though it hadn't felt quite so empty since Sage had died.

"Ah, Miss Mellark," President Snow said, his voice betraying no hint of weakness. "Please, have a seat."

She obeyed immediately, choosing one of the elegant chairs in front of his desk; the red velvet of the cushion was soft where her bare legs rested against it, but she hardly noticed, her muscles rigid beneath her relaxed facade.

"You must excuse me if I seem...indisposed," the president continued, "but I wanted to personally offer my congratulations on your graduation. Your district must be very proud – few individuals from Twelve have achieved such success."

She knew what was expected in response, though it was an effort to force the words from her throat.

"Thank you, sir. I'm very aware of how fortunate I am, and I'm grateful."

Snow smiled, the expression tugging oddly at the hollows of his cheeks. "Do send your parents my greetings. They are well, I trust?"

"Yes, they are."

The President inclined his head, as if pleased, though his smile shifted into something colder, his blue eyes glinting faintly.

"I hope you also will allow me to express my sympathy regarding the news about Mr. Abernathy's declining condition. It is never easy to lose those who are most precious to us. It is, however, a valuable reminder that we should appreciate all that we have been given before it is too late."

The words seem to hang in the air, and Helena heard them for the warning they were.

"Yes, sir. I agree completely."

Snow studied her for a long moment, then leaned back in his chair again, apparently satisfied. "You are indeed an intelligent young woman, Miss Mellark. That brings me to the reason for this meeting."

Helena tried not to tense further as she heard the door open behind her, footsteps following an instant later. She turned in her seat, feigning simple curiosity, a pleasant smile on her face.

A man stood behind her now, a tall man with wide shoulders and short, dark hair that was slicked back into a carefully teased series of waves. He looked to be only a few years older than she was and had a long nose and sharp cheekbones, a neatly trimmed goatee around his mouth and chin. He seemed to have a relatively simple sense of style for someone from the Capitol, though his eyes were an icy hue that fell somewhere between blue and green. Whether they were natural or enhanced, Helena wasn't sure.

He wore a blue-gray suit with a navy blue scarf at his throat, a matching handkerchief in his pocket. The jacket of his suit resembled a trench coat, reaching to his mid-thigh, and the lapels were a shade darker than the rest, a subtle, abstract pattern decorating the fabric.

"Helena Mellark," Snow began, "I would like you to meet Tiberius Beaumont. He previously worked as the Chief Administrative Officer in both District Eleven and District Five, and I have recently appointed him to my Cabinet as the Minster of Finance."

Beaumont held out a hand in greeting, and Helena quickly stood to accept it.

"Congratulations on your appointment, Minister," she told him.

"Please," he said, "call me Tiberius."

He bent to kiss the back of the hand he now held, and Helena resisted the urge to pull it back.

"Mr. Beaumont has a number of engagements in the coming weeks," the president added, "and as he has been away from the Capitol for some time, I thought it only appropriate that he have someone to accompany him to ease his transition into his new role. Moreover, a young lady as experienced with the press as you are will surely be a valuable asset to him."

Beaumont still hadn't released her hand, though he straightened at last, acknowledging the president with a small dip of his head.

"You could not have chosen better, sir."

President Snow smiled in response, glancing at Helena once more.

"Mr. Beaumont has a very bright future ahead of him, Miss Mellark, as do you. You'll enjoy getting to know each other quite well, I'm sure."

Helena's stomach clenched as the implication of those words seemed to settle heavily on her shoulders, the small hopes she'd had the night before withering before her eyes.

But she smiled again and said the only thing she could: "Of course, President Snow. I look forward to it."

Fin

A/N: Thank you so much for reading, and please let me know what you think!

Take care and God bless!

Ani-maniac494 :)