—A Rose for Death—

The Arena was more uncanny at night. District tributes lurked inside, either bloodthirsty or afraid—both of which tempt them to act upon their urges. Fight or flight. Selfish human nature infects its host with rage, violence, aggression, everything until all that is left is carnage.

A gust of wind sent a cold shiver down Persephone's spine. She liked to believe it was the weather and not her fear of waltzing into a lion's den, nor the way lies eased out of her lips in front of Doctor Gaul.

It was almost like an instinct to cover her tracks and maintain social images.

The ride to the Arena was silent in the truck, guarded by Peacekeepers in every empty corner. Persephone and Coriolanus were high priority as Capitol students, but Academy Rouge Mentors were infinitely important.

Mentors would not be allowed any more injuries—not after the President's son was fighting for his life.

Persephone kept her gaze on her shoes, the glares Coriolanus sent her passing through unnoticed. She only hoped to save Sejanus soon enough, though a more radical part of her desire was to talk to Reaper once more.

The truck doors unlocked and opened wide. "Get out." One of the Peacekeepers instructed as he motioned for the two to file through. Persephone's legs trembled with every step, fearing the possibilities.

As much as she craved to believe it, the tributes would likely jump her regardless of her sympathy.

On a moonlit night, the ominous Arena taunted her relentlessly. It called for her name, to walk among the horrors of murders and spilled blood from every Hunger Games.

"Persephone, what were you thinking agreeing to this?" Coriolanus stopped her with a clamped hand on her shoulder. He was fuming, utterly angry for her personal decision to throw herself into danger. "These tributes have gone savage, worse than how they were in the zoo."

"Coryo," Persephone hid her quivering hands and pounding heart, "I know what I'm doing right now. I know this is dangerous, but Sejanus is in there. Our friend. And they're gonna tear him apart if we don't get him out."

"You don't have to do this." His nostrils flared, grip tightening as he took a step closer to her. Coriolanus had little interest in the safety of Sejanus after he entered a dangerous situation on his own, but she was more important. She was his First Lady and, as Highbottom described her, his swan. "I can rescue him. You don't have to be here."

"Doctor Gaul asked me first, Coryo." She furrowed her brows and slid her hand up to release his grasp. "She wants me to prove something and I care about Sejanus, I need to make sure he's okay."

"Move along." Another Peacekeeper commanded. Persephone trembled, shallow breaths escaping her parted lips. In the back of her mind, she already knew none of this was her duty. She did not have to save Sejanus and blindly enter the Arena.

But something in her urged her to do the right thing.

A little birdie named humanity. It sang once before when Reaper first unlocked the cage.

Persephone's breath hitched once she entered through the unlocked gates, hand flying to catch his own next to her. She jumped and spun around at the sound of the gates slamming shut with a metallic boom. A swan was not immortal to fear.

Coriolanus lightly tugged her hand, still connected with his, toward the turnstiles of the Arena. Its dim red lights provided enough visibility to follow the shadows. The scene felt all too familiar to Persephone, her mind recalling the incident just a day ago of the bombing.

The past felt so far away.

"Don't worry," the boy whispered to her, thumb running over skin, "I'm gonna protect you."

A promise not guaranteed he would keep.

"Enjoy the show."

Her head snapped to face him when the automated voice rang out in the Arena. Persephone's hands trembled more than before, causing her to inhale deeply through her nose and shut her eyes momentarily.

Ignis endures, she held her breath, Ignis prevails, she exhaled.

Once her eyes opened again, she took cautious steps forward and scanned her surroundings. For a moment, Persephone wished Reaper would form from the shadows and grant her one last word again. Even if she was lucky he survived the first few hours of the Games, his impending doom awaited.

If he refused to kill any other tribute for survival in a peaceful act of defiance, there was almost no chance he would be crowned as the victor.

She blinked rapidly to adjust her vision to the dark. Just as the two passed an untouched bow and arrow, Persephone scouted Sejanus keeled over Marcus's body. Her body filled with relief, carefully racing to usher him out.

"Sejanus," she whispered to the boy, crouching down next to him. The boy whipped his head around, shocked to find her, and turned the other way to catch a glimpse of his other friend. Persephone laid a hand of comfort on his shoulder, as if beckoning him to leave the body of his old classmate.

Within all that empathy, she knew it was a heavy burden to leave someone so close twice. Once for freedom, the other in death.

"Thought they'd send my Ma," Sejanus admitted, his defeated tone only fueling her wish to never disturb the boy as he grieved.

Coriolanus took a step closer. "I wish they had."

Persephone followed in suit of the boy as he lifted himself from the ground and brushed off her hand. A light frown painted her lips, his defiance proving difficult with her task.

"You both need to go, Perse-"

"No, Sejanus," she caught his attention again as she grew more inclined to cry, "we need to leave, please, we have to go. The tributes have the opportunity to kill us, we have to go."

"I really would like to leave, I would," Coriolanus leaned forward into the boy's face with an angry whisper, "but I promised to get you out. We promised."

"Why?"

As his gaze flickered to the girl, Persephone pleaded with her eyes. The fear was eating her alive. "Because I care about you. You're my friend, Sejanus, and you wouldn't be a good one if you were dead."

"I have to do this." Sejanus muttered. His stance was unmoving. "I have to go where the cameras are-"

"You think anyone's watching this?" There was a distinct bite in the blonde boy's words. Even in the moonlight, his face was contorted with irritation—anger, even. "Gaul caught the feed. Tributes kill you in here, she's just gonna say you died of the flu."

Her ears perked up at the sound of a metal weapon scraping against the rubble. Persephone's heart sped up impossibly, hand resting once again on his bicep with her eyes wide. The Arena was a fest of blood and hunger. "Sejanus, look at me. Please."

He only averted his gaze to face her when he registered the crack in her voice. She was in pain, he could see it so clearly.

"There is nothing you can do here. Nothing for the tributes. They will rip you apart, even as you offer them clean water. In their eyes, nothing is safe. No change can be made as long as we're stuck here." Her eyes described all her emotions—worry, despair, even her grief from hours before. She was stern, but empathic. "Once we get out, and I mean it, we can change all the Games. Everything. No more tributes, no more Games, just peace."

"How can I make anything change, Perse? Nothing helps."

"You stood up to Gaul in class, remember?" She watched him nod. "You're smart and your father is rich. One way or another, you can use both those things to change. There isn't a limit when it comes to someone like you, Sejanus. I believe you can do so much to help the Districts, but none of that includes your death in this Arena tonight. Make the change yourself."

A clang caught her attention from afar.

Persephone had to get him out now. "You're dead if you don't come with us. Listen to me, there is some real good you can do outside. Real change. You can do as much as you want with your father's fortune, commit to any plan of your choice in ending the Games, but please, I can't lose you as my friend."

"What if nothing can change? What if I can never put a stop to all of this?"

"You can." She assured him, blinking back tears of her overloaded emotions. "You can change everything and I will be right there with you, carrying your dream on even if you abandon it or die. Please, let me help you-"

A shiver crawled up her spine mere moments before one of the tributes ran out from the dark with a weapon raised high in the air.

"Run!" She heard Coriolanus shout.

Her feet were moving before she could process the danger. Persephone ran with a guiding hand hovering over Sejanus. She sprinted across the rubble. Few glances were given to the boys as she checked for their safety. Her lungs burned. She ached for rest, for air.

Run.

She mimicked Coriolanus and lifted herself above the turnstile, following closely behind them. In her effort to usher Sejanus out before her, the tribute caught up with her first and yanked her back by her blazer.

"Please-" She attempted to plead. Her voice was cut off by his sword slashing in the air at her throat. As she scrambled away, his blade cut into her back. The small of her back. Persephone already knew her stitches burst open upon impact.

Her blood curdling scream rang out in the Arena.

Something in Coriolanus snapped.

His eyes filled with vicious hatred, unfiltered rage consuming his body. He observed the way his First Lady, his pretty swan, struggled for strength. In the dark lighting, he still noticed the faint outline of her blood forming a patch under her uniform.

She was bleeding at the hands of a District tribute. He struck down Persephone, his Persephone, and raised his hand once more. He was sure the boy was going to kill the Capitol sweetheart that belonged to him.

Before he could let his love die, he acted against it.

For her, he wanted to stress. He did this all for her. Not because he was sick and twisted in his head, but to save her life. To save the life of the girl he uncontrollably loved. He struck his hand to save her sweet smile and compassionate heart.

Love makes you do crazy things—manic behaviors when it comes to a sociopath.

Through her hazed vision, blurred from the pain and her tears, she could just barely find the figure of Coriolanus striking the boy with a makeshift club from the rubble. Persephone pushed herself painfully from the ground and wrapped an arm around Sejanus to help him up.

She could hardly feel a thing from all the adrenaline in her body.

Distantly, she watched as the blonde boy beat the tribute until he collapsed to the ground. Despite his protest of not harboring the desire to hurt him, went against it and delivered the final blow to end the boy's life.

In cold blood, Coriolanus killed a man for Persephone.

The first of many.

Something about the power he felt as he stole a life was so exhilarating. It was a drug he wished to live off of for the rest of his life. An addiction he was willing to risk. His chest heaved up and down as his eyes remained wide. He had yet to feel guilty for murder.

"Come on, Coryo!" Persephone shouted for him, sharing the weight of Sejanus once he dropped his weapon and ran with them to the gate. In the distance, she spotted a couple tributes racing to share a piece of the action.

"Open the gate!" Coriolanus yelled at the Peacekeepers. The three students slid through the entrance, just narrowly avoiding what seemed to be Coral and her allies.

She pulled her pitchfork from the gates and struck them again, angry that the chance to kill a Mentor slipped through her fingers.. "Watch the screens, gorgeous. Cause I may have missed you tonight, but your songbird's next on my list."

Persephone could hardly register the way her group filtered away from the gates. She breathed out a sigh of relief, all the pain from her back surging to her mind at once. Spots danced in her vision, causing the girl to stumble to the side.

The boy next to her stretched out to catch her and allowed part of her weight to slump against him. The cut on his own back burned, but he felt obligated to support her. After all, he only killed the tribute in the Arena not by the opportunity to feel powerful, but because the boy hurt his First Lady.

"I'm sorry," Sejanus began to plead, "I- I'm so sorry, Perse, Coryo. I'm so- all of it..." He was filled with intense guilt—his friends got hurt as they ripped him from his reckless antics. Persephone was damaged the most, his emotions eating him alive when he registered that the sacrifice of her bloody body was for him. A car door slammed shut faintly, their attention averted to Sejanus's dad from afar. His voice grew bitter. "My father. Let the buying begin."

Persephone sniffled, tears drying on her sweaty cheeks. Coriolanus combed her messy stray hairs down with his fingers, his free hand perched on her waist to catch her if she fell. While the girl was too consumed with holding onto her consciousness, Strabos Plinth gave the boy a proud nod from a distance, reminding him all he did for Sejanus did not go in vain.

When her fist balled up his shirt over his chest, his gaze found hers again. "Are you okay?" Coriolanus asked her, brows knit with worry. He couldn't tell if he was faking it or not anymore.

She sucked in a breath from her nose and nodded once before visibly wincing. "This hurts so much more than before," Persephone's voice was laced with pain, "thank you for being here with me. For saving me."

He nodded, observing her face until his features twisted and his heart dropped. "The rose." He mumbled, brushing his fingers over the ear he settled it above. Coriolanus craned his head around and stared off into the Arena.

In the midst of their escape, they left a clue of their recent presence. Doctor Gaul urged for no casualties, but what of a calling card?

A telltale sign—where there was ice cold snow, a rose follows.

Silence ensued between the two students for different reasons. Coriolanus was pondering, Persephone was worried. In their own worlds, their fingers were still linked lazily, as if neither of them desired to part with the other.

Their souls were intertwined, and they were too coiled together to unwind.

She was ripped from his presence when he dragged himself away to Doctor Gaul's lab and she was led to the nearest emergency room. Persephone settled, staring blankly at her hands as she hallucinated Arachne's blood again, against the edge of a gurney as the last of the stitches were sewn.

A part of her yearned for the boy who comforted her before, back when the gunshot was the only injury she ever sustained. She would grip his hand so tight at every stabbing pain from the needle, he would wipe her eyes of any tears, assure her everything would be okay, and embrace her as if she were formed of glass.

But Coriolanus was not present. His aura was absent in the room, amplifying the bitter cold of loneliness in her mind.

The only images occupying her mind were the boy and a glimpse of her bloody wound and its ripped stitches. A new incision crossed over the old scar, creating a mildly repulsive sight.

"Persephone," Dunamis Ignis barreled through the door, igniting a jolt of shock to rush through her body. Half her mind was still in the Arena, jittering and itching to run at the slightest sound. "Persephone, my dear, I heard what happened, I rushed as soon as I heard."

She barely finished clasping the buttons of her shirt on, relief washing over her. Persephone's only wish was that her overbearing father never got the chance to see how bad her wound was. She imagined he would roll his eyes like always, talk her down, fix her appearance, superficial things about the way she looked instead of caring for how she felt in the moment.

When his arms embraced her, careful of her new stitches, and he leaned back to cradle her face, another dangerous realization struck Persephone. She remembered this feeling like her body was there, but her mind was not completely. It infected her recently, despite appearing so far away from her.

The only other occasion where time slowed in front of her eyes and her soul felt so dull was when Arachne Crane was murdered.

It was a cruel twist of fate to suffocate her so slow it was undetectable, for Persephone was shell-shocked once again.