Disclaimer: All Hunger Games characters and core personality traits are the property of SC. I own nothing, nor do I plan on profiting from using her work. No copyright infringement is intended.
Chapter Four
Katniss felt like a possum.
She had never before experienced anything like the rush of alarm and confusion that flooded her mind; the flashing of images and burning questions. Still, she didn’t dare open her eyes or so much as twitch even the smallest of her panicky muscles. The girl instead laid as limp and lifeless as the rodent her and Gale had once dubbed “the coward of the forest”. Hardly the mighty warrior Haymitch had believed he was sending into the games.
She knew nothing.
Upon regaining consciousness, the fallen tribute couldn’t even begin to guess where she was, who was near or how much time had passed since she’d acquired her last haunting memory. Katniss could not say immediately whether she was intact or irreparably injured, as her mental state was accompanied by frustrating physical numbness.
She wasn’t even sure she was still alive.
Blessedly, the longer she dwelled there the more awareness the intelligent contender was able to gather about her current situation.
For one, she was most definitely not where she’d been when her brain had systematically shut down. Her body was no longer on the hard leaf and blood littered forest floor that was the cornucopia field she had dropped to with her would-have-been assassin. In fact, she found herself nested in so much comfort and warmth that she was very nearly able to convince herself it had all been a dream. That she was in bed, in her terrible—wonderful—home back in Twelve, fighting away the reality of a new day’s chores.
That sweet notion was dismissed as instantly as it had occurred to her. The burlap and clothe remnant mattress she shared with her beloved sister Prim had never felt this soft or luxurious beneath her, not even after a brutal week of hunting and hunger.
The light of day appeared dim through her clenched eyelids, much weaker than the beams from the beating sun that had shined brightly upon the Game’s immediate slaughter.
Wherever she was, she had been placed there. Thus her commitment to imitating a corpse was fooling no one.
“Is Her Highness still enjoying her nap?”
The sneer came from far too close and was distinctly feminine. But it was the chilling ring of loathing in the speaker’s voice that caused Katniss’ pulse to force enough blood into her head to nearly knock her out cold a second time.
She’d heard it before, though grossly distorted, sweet and charming as Glimmer from Direct One had given her interview with Flickerman. It held no such playfulness now and Katniss felt that the heat of the busty blonde’s hate alone might burn her.
Her obvious defenselessness was setting in when an impossibly more lethal tenor announced itself in her proximity.
“I’m going to have to kill you eventually, subordinate. Please… continue to assure I find it a gratifying experience.”
She needn’t open her eyes to know without doubt that Mellark was looming directly over her.
His existence inside her personal bubble of space shocked her to her core. She was sure she had been intensely hyper-aware of her surroundings, was a skilled hunter who’s life and family depended on her ability to spot even the smallest movement, hear even the tiniest rustle in the distance. Pathetically, she hadn’t the slightest idea of the deadly predator perched within inches of her resting, vulnerable body.
The boy was like nothing she could have even imagined. Katniss pictured him in a huge, institutional facility in district One; training for hours and hours in the art of becoming entirely inanimate. The machine-like male would tone and master his body to the point of inhuman control; would ignore every ache, every itch… would require less air than even the best of district Four’s graceful ocean divers. He’d spill one’s blood before they even had the vaguest idea they were not alone.
He was bred to kill. He lived for it.
Katniss bit back her fear, kept still, and reminded herself that she was bred to survive. And she was only alive because of it.
“She’s a joke, Peeta. She’ll only hold us back,” Glimmer hissed from a comparably safer distance. She had an accent that was very faintly Capital and equally foreign to Katniss, who wondered if district One was divided by separate social classes like Twelve was. Mellark carried no such variation in his smooth pronunciation.
“Already we could have hunted out half the arena but here we sit…guarding your pet as the rats scurry further and further away, finding cover and safety for a night they never should have seen.”
Mellark laughed, a sound just as breathtakingly elegant as it was laced with barely suppressed irritation. “And you’d do what, toss one of those arrows at them? I’ve seen you use that bow you’ve chosen for yourself, ” he seemed to taunt, “rest for the night. You clearly aren’t killing anyone alone.”
The black haired female winced inside of herself. She knew she hadn’t successfully obtained her weapon but it landing in Glimmer’s talons was a heavy blow. Katniss made a solid mental note of Peeta’s words, and briefly wondered if they had been meant for her ears.
“Better in less skilled hands than her filth-“
A soft, dangerous growl admitted from the back of the male’s throat, every bit as feral as the occasional wolf Katniss had been unlucky enough to encounter in her woods but just fast enough to escape.
Both women trembled at the guttural warning, and even though his counterpart continued, her tone was palatably more docile.
Glimmer’s voice made it clear that she was not exempt from Mellark’s scorn, “Be reasonable. I won’t allow you the mistake of bring a wild card into our ranks and arming her to the teeth.”
“If I planned to give her the bow, you wouldn’t be holding it right now,” he said simply. “Now leave us. Go watch our supplies before our allies squirrel away all the food.”
The space around them seemed to heat with Glimmer’s obvious rage at being dismissed but Katniss was only partially aware because it was at that moment that the career male began to gently, sensuously run the tips of his fingers over the exposed flesh of her collarbone.
She wasn’t sure if the gesture was genuine in his intention or if it had been meant to further infuriate the gorgeous other woman. Irrespective of his motive, he left a trail of fire across every inch he touched and she was wholly unable to suppress a tremor of instinctual reaction.
Any hope of him having not noticed it was dismissed by a deep, indulgent snicker.
“Such risk and burden for a play-thing?” Glimmer fumed, her voice advancing closer.
Having no reason left to continue her half-baked show, the Seam beauty open her eyes and met instantly with Glimmer’s violent stormy blues. The adjustment to the dim light helped her keep an unbothered, half-lidded gaze that was nearly shattered to pieces when she noticed the female Career’s perfect features were splattered with dried blood. She glanced slowly up and down the length of her adversary and did all she could to mask the feelings of complete inadequacy. Even drenched in gore, Glimmer was breathtaking.
The blonde’s pale skin bloomed with a crimson hue, so enraged by the lack of fear or recognition that her hand moved instinctively to a hunting knife on her belt.
Mellark barked out another laugh, seemingly delighted at the quick exchange, and ran his fingers through Katniss’ hair approvingly. She felt every bit the indulged pet she was accused of being but forced back anything but acceptance of his protection.
For all of Glimmer’s top dollar training, Katniss, in that single moment, saw in her something she had seen from many of her school mates, petty girls whom had reject her over the more attractive features she’d inherited from her comely mother. Only thinly veiled in those navy eyes was a very human glint of good old fashion feminine jealously.
She heard Haymitch’s advice in her head as she sat up, unhurried, and leaned her body lazily against her tenuous guardian. If Mellark’s interest meant his protection, and the Capital’s interest meant their sponsorship, she just might survive the first portion of the games without her bow.
Glimmer, as alluring as any creature Katniss had ever seen, looked between the twosome before addressing Peeta evenly. Her curvy posture melted into a suggestion in and of itself.
You don’t have to settle, Peeta. You know this? I can take care you myself and we can do any with the degenerates all together,” she purred.
Mellark didn’t bother taking his eyes off his cooperating hostage as he responded coldly, “If I wanted a barren, venomous, pain in the ass, I would have taken you when the rest of our district was passing you around.”
For the first time, Katniss second guessed whether Mellark would take her life in these games. It suddenly seemed much more likely that another member of District One would beat him to it.
Leave a Reply