𝔞𝔪𝔭𝔥𝔦𝔱𝔯𝔦𝔱𝔢 ✩ 𝔣𝔦𝔫𝔫𝔦𝔠𝔨 𝔬𝔡𝔞𝔦𝔯

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CHAPTER SIX

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Upon a rather uncomfortable armchair in the innermost carriage of the steel train which was rapidly advancing towards the Capitol was where she sat. Most would find such an expensive chair a splendour, but for Odelya it just seemed immensely excessive for a piece of furniture of its sort.

Swirling around to take in the ambience of the capitalistic vehicle, Odelya recognised the array of delicacies which adorned the table opposite; such exquisite luxuries not found even in the most privileged of Districts. The only opportunity Odelya had to endure such a splendour was due to the pain of Finnick.

District people were starving, they were ravenous - such innocent victims were forced to take out tesserae in order to avoid perishing alongside their families. Parents couldn't feed their children, children couldn't feed their siblings. Once beloved pets were the source of food for desperate people's.

Yet, the Capitol inhabitants had no shame in their grand displays of wealth. Forget did they the source of their own income - businesses owned in the heart of Panem were fuelled by the labour force of disadvantaged workers.

Such thoughts enraged Odelya, but these were subsided by guilt at herself grasping anything edible within reach and fuelling herself with pure tastes of colourful joy.

The berries were perfect pockets of sweetness, softly fragranced for the tastebuds. Sat did they there in sunlight, reflecting the spectrum of reds to blues. They were a work of art conjured from such tiny seeds and each one born to become so sweet.

Regardless of how such overwhelming thoughts consumed her mind, Odelya was thankfully not alone in such an intense environment, for her saviour sat in just the seat to the left of her.

She felt the need to express her thankfulness to Apollo, he just needed to understand the extent of the impact his great courage had made on both her and Reign.

He had seemingly released some sort of songbird named gratitude into the depths of her heart, of whom's song would be ringing in her ears forevermore. Such melodic words sprung up in her throat and yet happened to get trapped before reaching the tip of her tongue.

"Thank you."

This seized hold of Apollo's attention, as previously before he had been staring mindlessly out of the windows which displayed various passing landscapes.

"M'sorry?"

"Thank you. I cannot express to you how grateful I am for what you have done for my brother. Our world was shattered with the deaths of Melody and Orion and for the last of us to be slaughtered by the Games would be such cruel irony."

"I appreciate your thanks but I volunteered for the memory of Melody, not for Reign."

"Pardon?" Odelya was taken aback.

"I didn't volunteer to save Reign. I did it because that is was Melody would have wanted. I volunteered for her."

This caused any words forming in Odelya mouth to fade away. Apollo still thought about Melody? Still cared enough about her as to volunteer for his own death just to save her only remaining brother.

"You still think about Melody?"

"Of course. You know I loved her so much, so deeply." Apollo said with a distinct glisten of sadness in his eyes.

Melody and Apollo had been besotted with each other since they were chubby cheeked children. One year he was pulling her pigtails on the playground and the next they shadowed each other wherever the other would go. Odelya vividly remembered Melody's delight at the gift of flowers picked freshly for Valentine's Day when she was but eight.

No one thought they would last. What primary school relationships last? Theirs did. Together had they been for six years when Melody was reaped and then her death created a sense of hell in Apollo's world.

He hadn't laughed since she died. Not for four years. Smiling was also remotely foreign to him, only on certain occasions did it occur, typically under pressured conditions.

"My Mama tells me I'm mad. For volunteering for my dead childhood girlfriend's brother. Last thing she will ever say to me is that I am a fool with a death wish."

"Age has no value in regard to the ability to love."

"I just can't get used to living without her Odelya. Now that I know what loving her feels like and what it is like to be loved by her, I just cannot imagine loving another or living forever without her love."

"Grief is a complex experience. But I found personal solace in the company of those I love. I noticed you barely speak to anybody, anymore."

"She's the only one I loved. The only one who ever truly loved me."

"Not your family?"

"Mourning is not such a concept of which they understand. According to them, I am too young to be so immensely distraught over a lovers demise. They don't understand the meaning our love fuelled me with. Such ignorance to a cruel, real emotion leads to a great resentment, over the years it just turns to indifference. Any love I held for them or they for me died with an axe in their heads like her."

"She truly adored you, Apollo. But such love for you would not be enough for her to wish you to undertake such a great mission of suicide just for you to reconcile."

Apollo merely disregarded her last comment and remarked, "I'm nothing but grateful to be able to reunite with her soon."

He truly did have a death wish.

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