𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐞𝐧

── the feast

          "𝔚e shouldn't go." Those were Cato's only words on the matter, turning away from the announcement and settling down beside the fire with the rabbits. 

"What? Why?" I spun to stare at him. Both of us had just admitted that the feast would provide us with a way out, so why now were we not going to go?

"We shouldn't. We'll run into Thresh, Clove, Foxface, Peeta if he's still alive." Cato shook his head once more, skinning the rabbit quickly as he hummed to himself. "We don't want an all out brawl."

"Aren't you even a little tempted to see what's in the bags?" I question. "You said it yourself, this could be our way out? We could leave the games."

"It's not worth the risk."

"You don't think that." I shook my head. "Cato, we could leave. We could go."

"We could die." Cato turned, staring up at me. His eyes were narrowed and calculating. "If Clove is there, she's a long distance killer. She will kill one or both of us. Not to mention Thresh, or Peeta..."

I went quiet at that. He turned away from me once more, shaking his head at the thought of it all, and my shoulders slump in. We're at a stalemate. I can't really argue with him on this, so I don't try to. Instead, I pretend to go along with what he says and slump down next to him.

Neither of us say anything for a moment, but Cato hands me the rabbit and wraps an arm around my shoulder all the same. I feel slightly guilty, knowing that my brain doesn't want me to drop it. I had an inkling, something told me, that we had to be at that feast. I had to be at that feast.

It was the same feeling that I had in my gut when I knew I couldn't leave the forest, or when I saved Katniss. It was the same feeling from back home, when I could sense if the weather was going to turn, or if something was going to go wrong with the cows. My father had always told me to trust those senses, and I wasn't going to leave it be, not if I felt so strongly about it.

I had to get to that feast.

──⭒─⭑─⭒──

As nightfall hits, Cato and I both settle down to sleep. But where he falls into a deep sleep, I stay awake. The sky is dark, and there had been no deaths today, but I knew that wouldn't be the case for tomorrow. Feasts always cause fatalities, but I could only hope that my face wasn't one of them.

Through a crack in the rocks, I watch the moon cross the sky. At what I judge to be about three hours before dawn, I begin to leave, knowing that this was the time that Cato would be in deep sleep. Looking down, I press a soft kiss to his cheek, before extracting myself from the hollow and making the long, cold walk towards the Cornucopia. My breath comes out as white puffs in front of me, but it reminds me of cold November mornings, working at the farm.

If I allow myself, I can imagine my cattle dogs racing around my legs as I walk, following me towards the top fields to fetch the cows in. I can almost hear their soft moos, the sound of their hoofs on the muddy floor. My back aches as I walk, and I sigh.

When the games are all over, someone can properly look at it, and it'll feel better. Cato's medicine was only doing so much for the bruises at the moment.

I don't try to take a new route, not trusting myself to, and instead follow the stream towards a hiding place by the lake, one that I'd found closer to the start of the games. I don't see any other tributes, not even a puff of air from one of them, so either I'm first here or they're already here.

Shuffling down, I burrow myself into the undergrowth, warming up slowly as the sun begins to rise. Nothing goes on for a moment, and I think I'm in the wrong place, but as the first ray of sun glints off the gold Cornucopia, there's a disturbance.

The ground before the horn splits in two and a round table, with a snowy white cloth rises into the arena. On the table are four backpacks, two large black ones with the numbers 2 and 11, a medium-size green one with the number 5, and a tiny orange one, that must be marked for 12.

The table has just clicked into place when a figure darts out of the Cornucopia, snags the green backpack and sprints off. Foxface had obviously come up with the most risky of all the ideas. She has the situation in her hands, because no one's going to chase her when their own backpack is already on the table.

I huff. It was a good strategy, but she's cost me time. I have to be at the table next, because I need to decide which pack I'm going to take, 11 or 2. Each district still has both of their tributes in play, so do I grab 2's backpack or 11's?

I sprint for the table, and I can feel the danger before I see it, diving to the side as a dagger goes flying past my right ear.

"Oh shit." I hissed. Clove had come to play, and I only had my spear. I wasn't getting rid of that any time soon. I'm at the table now, grabbing 2's backpack and slinging it over my shoulder. 11 I'll leave for Thresh, but no way was I letting Clove have 2. As I turn, the second knife catches me across the forehead, opening a gash that has blood running down my face, blinding my eye and filling my mouth with the taste of iron. My own blood.

Then Clove slams into me, knocking me flat on my back, pinning my shoulders to the ground with her knees. For my friends and family's sake, I hope it will be fast, but Clove means to savour the moment. Feeling as if she had time.

"Where's your boyfriend, Eleven? Where is he?"

"Who?" I spit blood to the side, staring up at her.

"Where's Thresh?" She doesn't know, I realise. She doesn't know about Cato.

"He's out there right now, hunting down your precious district partner. Thresh!" I scream at the top of my lungs, before a punch to the windpipe cuts my voice off. Her head is whipping from side to side, and in that moment, I've got her scared.

She's careful now, looking more cautious as I laugh.

"Liar. You're lying?"

"Am I?" I question, wriggling my fingers. She's only sitting on my shoulders, trying to hold down the top part of my body. I take a deep breath, before feeling her weight. She's light, only smaller, smaller than me. I've moved cows heavier than her before, and as my fingers grasp around my spear, I know what I have to do.

Clove opens her jacket, and it's lined with an impressive array of knives. Unlike her district partner, Clove doesn't seemed to have caught on to what I can do. I admit that, over the course of training, I didn't show my full strength, but I'd been working with cows that weighed anywhere between 500-900kg since I was seven.

"I think, I think we'll start with your mouth." She traced the line of my lips with the tip of her blade, before becoming unnerved as I grinned. "What? What!"

"If only you were as clever as Cato." I winked, before reaching up with my hand and grabbing the back of her hair. It doesn't take that much strength for me to pull her down and off me, slamming her into the floor. She tries to get up, but I roll over, pushing the entirety of my weight down and into her body, crushing her to the floor. "You'd have worked out, I'm a dairy farmer. Your district partner did though."

"Cato!" She began to shout, as I pulled a knife free from her jacket, taking a deep breath. "Cato!"

"He's not going to come." Her eyes go wide. "No one's coming to save you."

My father's words ran through my head. I could kill, I had killed sick and elderly cows before. He'd told me that this was no different, that a person was no different. I took a deep breath, closing my eyes.

When I open them, I'm back on the farm. I'm hovering above an old cow, my father beside me, and the dogs yipping at my feet.

"There we go, Mitzi." My father is calm, helping me steady the gun. "Right at the temple. There's no pain, quick and easy."

My hands tremble as I place the device at their temple, finger hovering over the trigger.

"It's not going to hurt them." He promised, and I nod. Closing my eyes again, I take a deep breath and push. But it's not the click of the gun that goes off, it's the sound of a cannon. When I looked down a second time, it's not a cow beneath me, but Clove. The dagger is in her temple, pushed to the hilt, and my shoulders slump.

In that moment, it hits me. 

I've killed my first person. I stumble away, grabbing my spear as I turn, trying not to be sick. I expect no one to be there, but then I see him. Thresh is hovering by the other side of the table, both of us staring at each other. He's gotten bigger, if that was possible, filled out more, but his eyebrows are furrowed together as he watches me.

I'm trembling as I stand there, but I manage to turn, throwing 11's bag at him. He catches it, and we stay there for a moment. 

"We're even." I manage to get out. "We're even, no more debts, nothing owed. We're even."

He nods, slinging the backpack over his shoulder as I do the same. He reaches down, pulling the dagger free of Clove's head and taking the rest of her daggers, splitting them between us. I take half, and he takes the others, before we both stand and nod at each other.

There's a shout from further away, and I know that voice. I know that Cato's coming.

"You should go, Thresh." I muttered, stepping away from the dead body. He hums, pushing Clove's body away as both of us back up. "I'll deal with him."

Thresh's eyes flash with understanding, before he turns tails and runs and I turn back to deal with Cato. Jogging towards the sound of the voice, I hear the crashing through the undergrowth, before Cato appears. His eyes are wide, worry plastered across his face as I head him off, not wanting him to see Thresh.

"Mitzi." The look on his face is a mixture of relief and anger.

"I'm alright, I'm alright." I press my hand to his chest, stopping him from walking out into the clearing, where Clove's body is being picked up by the hovercraft. 

"What-? I thought we weren't going to go." He hissed, before his thumb brushed the blood away, pressing to the gash on my head in an attempt to stop the bleeding. "Clove?"

"It's alright. I'm fine."

"Thresh killed her." He assumed, looking at the spear in my hands that was clean, no blood to be seen on it. I opened my mouth to correct him, but noticed the look in his eyes. Clove had been his district partner, and he now looked murderous. I'd have been the same if Cato killed Thresh. "What happened?"

"I got the pack, okay? That's what matters at the moment." I nod, trying to convince him, before pushing him backwards and away. "We need to go. Cato, please."

He looks torn between following orders, and going after the others.

"Please, Cato." I pleaded with him, seeing the way his eyes turned back to mine, shoulders slumping. "We have to go."

This time, he listens, leading me back and away from the clearing as the guilt settles in my stomach. I had killed Clove, I had killed my first person, but I couldn't tell Cato. He could never find out.

──⭒─⭑─⭒──

Hiya,

It's been a while, but Mitzi's killed her first person, and Thresh and her have seen each other again, before parting ways. Also, Mitzi's lying to Cato, good times!

Let me know what you think,

Love Li xx