SONG: Lemon Tree by Fools Garden
The ledge grew thinner as they walked, and Iris knew that soon they would have to leave the shade of the canyon and brave the desert, without any water. Her head pounded with every step she took and Iris dreaded having to walk in the sun again. One look at Agata told her that her ally was similarly suffering - at least she wasn't alone. She hadn't been alone the first time, either, but she didn't want to think about that now.
She wondered how it was going to end. There was almost always a 'final fight' of sorts, an epic showdown, a winning battle. Sometimes it followed a feast. Who would it be? Who would she have to fight? Iris refused to entertain the idea that it wouldn't be her. She already knew that she had to win, and she didn't have time to doubt herself. Would it be Minerva from Two? Or maybe River from Four? Whoever it ended up being, she hoped it wasn't Agata. Until she'd allied with her, she'd thought she would end up killing Agata, or die at her hand. Now they were working together to stay alive. It seemed an impossible situation, and yet here they were. Sharing food. Sharing stories. Walking side by Agata she walked with now was a different one to the Agata who had pinned her to a wall and threatened her. She was still a cat, but her motivations had changed. Or maybe Iris was no longer the mouse she wanted for dinner.
Once upon a time, Iris had expected to go through the arena alone, and yet she'd made three allies. Part of her wished she had done it alone - maybe it would have made it easier, not having their deaths hanging over her head. But even if that were true, she wouldn't be here without their help. She would have died in the Bloodbath if Kasia hadn't dragged away. She would have been killed by the scorpion if Christopher hadn't fought it with her. She owed them, and would never have the chance to repay them. She hated to keep them locked away, but she needed to stay focused. She would give herself time to deal with what she'd seen when she was home. When she was safe.
"We're here," Agata said, interrupting her train of thought.
She looked down, and saw a vaguely conical rock formation, twisting its way up and out of the canyon. "Climb?" Iris asked, already knowing the answer.
"Yeah. We'll do the same as before," Agata said. "Me first."
She didn't tell Iris not to panic like she had last time, but Iris saw her thinking it. She set her jaw in determination - she could do this. She'd already done it once before and survived - it would be easier this time, she told herself, trying to steady her rapidly beating heart.
Agata reached upwards, clasping onto a piece of rock sticking out of the wall. She began pulling herself up. Iris waited until she was a few metres ahead, before following. I can do it, Iris told herself. She just wouldn't look down this time.
She began to climb, closely following behind Agata, carefully copying the other girl's movements. It felt easier this time, although she could still feel the beginnings of panic rising up. "How are you doing down there?" Agata called, looking down at Iris.
Iris looked up at her shakily. "Well, I'd give you a thumbs up, but my hands are occupied."
"Yeah, please don't do that. We're nearly there - only halfway to go."
"You know," Iris said, pulling herself upwards, "I didn't expect you to be a glass half full kind of girl."
"I am in this kind of scenario."
"Great," Iris said. Her fingers ached as they scraped against the rough canyon wall. And they were only halfway up. Maybe she should try being a glass half full person too - 'only halfway to go' sounded much more doable. Only halfway to go, Iris, she said to herself.
She got to the top relatively panic-free. Agata hauled her up over the side of the canyon and Iris rolled onto her back, closing her eyes as the sun bore down on them. "You did better that time."
"Yeah," she replied. "I didn't almost kill us."
"Great job."
"Thanks." God, she would kill for a bottle of water right now. It was strange how much that phrase had changed for her. Because now, she actually had to kill for what she wanted.
Iris gave herself a moment to collect her thoughts and her breath before sitting up and looking around. The ground was solid beneath her, and she could see more dunes in the distance. "How far away is the Cornucopia?" she asked. Her bearings were off - they hadn't come back the way she had come that first day, with Kasia and Christopher. She couldn't even use the sun to figure it out, because she was afraid she would burn her eyeballs out, it felt that hot. Were the Gamemakers turning the heat up? She wouldn't put it past them.
"Took about two hours when I was with the pack, but I think it'll be less with just the two of us."
"Good," Iris said. She didn't think she'd handle much longer without water. Her legs were heavy as she walked, and the pain in her head and throat was impossible to ignore anymore. She didn't want to think about the last time she'd walked through the desert dehydrated, but it was getting harder and harder to keep thoughts of her last alliance in a box. She remembered the salty taste of the urine she'd had no choice but to drink - the feeling of her throat drying out completely - the ache in her head that felt like it had split in two. She wondered if she'd ever feel hydrated again, or if the ghost of that horrible dry trek would haunt her throat and her head for the rest of time.
Iris was trying to keep her thoughts, her memories, buried in that box - but without anything to occupy herself with, they crept to the surface. She remembered the shocked sound Axel had made after she punched him at the parade. The warm spray of blood on her face from the boy from Nine's throat. She remembered Kasia, whose favourite colour had been orange, and the dull thump Christopher's head made as it fell from his neck to the sand. She thought of Pomponia, who had done nothing but help her, and of Jordie, and of Haylee. She wondered if Haylee was even watching her, or if she was passed out drunk somewhere, which was more likely. A giggle almost burst from her throat, and she pinched her arm as hard as she could. I'm losing it.
Was Jordie watching? She hoped he wasn't, and hoped he was at the same time. It was comforting to think that her little brother was safe at home, watching her on their barely-functional TV, or from one of the TVs in the factories. Was Emily still taking care of him, or had her resolve crumbled as Iris expected it to?
Thinking of home hurt, but it was better than thinking about the more distracting things - the things that were fighting their way to the front of her mind the more she tried not to let them. She tried counting her footsteps, which helped for a while - she counted them all the way up to 100 before starting over from 1. Agata walked silently next to her, and Iris wondered if she was struggling to keep a box of her own shut, too.
It was a weird feeling, being so far away in her own thoughts and yet still hyper-aware of her surroundings. She wondered if that was some primal, evolutionary instinct kicking in. If her ancestors' years as prey animals had given her this ability to have a million different things at the front of her mind and still be aware of every crunching footstep, every gust of wind, every noise around her. She wondered if that would go away if - when - she left the arena.
She had a sinking feeling that it wouldn't.
There was a dark spot in the distance, and Iris counted to 100 three more times before it started to become something that looked like a forest. It was another 400 before they reached it. When the shade swept over her skin, Iris nearly groaned in relief. She wondered if she'd ever want to feel the sun on her skin again, or if she'd spend the rest of her life trying to get away from it.
This forest looked different to the oasis she'd spent the first night in. It was a tropical forest, with vines hanging down from the canopy of trees, but it wasn't quite a rainforest, like some of the arenas she'd seen. There were no mangoes, to Iris' disappointment. Maybe there had never been mangoes in the first one, either. Maybe that had been a hallucination. Maybe this was a hallucination, too. Iris wasn't sure if it was a symptom of dehydration, but she was beginning to feel like her surroundings weren't real. It felt like she was in a dream.
Iris closed her eyes tightly, willing herself to focus. She couldn't lose it now, not when she was so close to going home. She wasn't sure where the idea came from, or when she'd remembered the dark scorpion blood she still had in a container, but the idea seemed like the best one she'd had in days. Pulling it out of her backpack, she held the stuff out to Agata. "We should camouflage ourselves," she said. "If they come here, we don't want to stand out."
"I mean, good idea, but I really don't want to put that all over me. It smells awful."
"Sorry to break it to you, but you already smell awful. I'm sure this won't make it any worse."
"Wow, thanks," Agata said, rolling her eyes, but she took the little container anyway. "Oh, I almost forgot. We can use these as well." She showed Iris some tubes of what looked like paint. "I think it's camouflage - you're good at art, right? You can paint us."
"I haven't painted since kindergarten," Iris admitted, "but I can try."
"Well, something's better than nothing, I guess. There's not a lot, but between these and your scorpion juice, there should be enough to cover our exposed skin."
"Please don't say scorpion juice."
"Scorpion juice," Agata said immediately.
"Gross." Iris opened the container of scorpion blood first, and slathered it over her face and neck before offering it to Agata. Her ally cringed at the viscous green liquid, but followed Iris' lead before wordlessly handing her the paints. "After we do this, let's look for water."
"Oh, yes please," Agata said. "Best idea I've heard all week."
Iris wasn't exactly sure what to do with the paints, but it seemed to come naturally. There were only four tubes - khaki-looking green, greenish grey, medium brown, and dark brown - but it came as easily to her as breathing. It was almost intuitive, mixing colours together until she found one that matched the trees around them. She would have liked to have copied the pattern of the bark, but she couldn't get the shapes right, and besides, there wasn't enough paint for that.
After she had covered both of their exposed skin, she spread the remaining paint lightly over her and Agata's clothes and backpacks. It wasn't a perfect paint job, but it would hopefully keep them hidden if the Careers were to approach before they were ready. "Wow," Agata said, holding up a hand and admiring it. "You'd better take up painting when you get out of here. You're a real Michelangelo."
"Thanks. Who's Michelangelo?"
"Oh. We learnt about him in school. He was an artist from a place called Italy. He made this beautiful painting called the Creation of Adam, which has two men stretching out towards each other, and they're surrounded by soft clouds that look like mashed potatoes, and ugly little babies." She grabbed Iris' hand and stretched it out towards her, before stretching out her own arm dramatically, gently touching Iris' fingertip with her own. "It's beautiful."
"Who are the men?" Iris asked, curious. She'd Capitol art on the television a few times, which was mostly solid blocks of colour and boring lines. She'd never heard about painters from the time before, or places with strange names like Italy. She desperately wanted to know more.
"I'm not sure," Agata said. "We have a book at school, but it doesn't say anything about the paintings, just what they're called and the artist's name and birthplace. It's an old book," she added quietly, which Iris took to mean 'before the dark days', which meant it was probably a book Agata wasn't meant to have. Although, if she learnt about it in school, maybe it wasn't illegal. Maybe it was only illegal for Districts that weren't One.
"Well, I guess one of them is called Adam," Iris said, bringing it back to the painting before Agata started to say more about just how old the book was. "And maybe the other is Michelangelo." She wondered if Caesar and Claudius had a reference photo of the painting up for the Capitol folk, or if they would edit this part of their conversation entirely.
"Maybe," Agata shrugged. She grinned. "I think they would be a cute couple."
"I wish I could see it." Iris was jealous. She often wished she had grown up in one of the wealthier districts. There would be more food, and a good certainty that someone would take her place if she was reaped. The schools sounded better, too - of course they mostly learnt about fighting, but by the sounds of it they had time to learn about art, too. In Six, they learnt how to read and write and do basic math, but the rest of it was mostly about learning how to make car parts and work on machines. They certainly didn't have any books that weren't written before the Dark Days. Did Agata even realise how lucky she was, to have grown up like that? Of course, they had both ended up in the same place, but maybe Iris wouldn't have had to go through what she did if she had grown up somewhere else.
"I wish you could too," Agata said, and the two girls smiled sadly at each other. "Let's go find some water."
"Best idea I've heard all week," Iris grinned.
Agata laughed and rolled her eyes. "Come on, Six, or I'll leave you behind."
They began walking downhill, hoping to see or hear a stream or something. Iris would have loved to have a book of ancient paintings in her hand, but even more than that, she wanted a bottle of cool, fresh water. She'd never ask for anything again, if only she could have some water.
There was a crack, and Iris felt something break beneath her feet, but before she could look, Iris felt the ground falling away from her. She let out a shriek, and landed hard on the ground. It wasn't ground, though - it seemed to be moving beneath her, clicking and chittering, but it was too dark to make out what she had landed on. Nothing good, she was sure of that. She looked up and saw Agata looking down at her from the pit she'd just fallen into. "Iris! Are you okay?"
Her eyes adjusted, and Iris saw why the ground was moving - because it wasn't ground at all. She had fallen into a pit of shiny black scorpions.
I'm literally obsessed with TBOSAS I have seen it twice now and would go back if going to the movies wasn't obscenely expensive
shoot a comment my way if you can be bothered :D