The Weight of the Crown

The Spark Before the Fall

The door slid shut behind her with a mechanical sigh. The training room was empty at this hour, or nearly. Auren didn't like crowds when it came to finding her reflexes again, her instincts. What she did here wasn't graceful, or spectacular, or even seductive enough for the Capitol's cameras.

It was raw. Honest. Animalistic.

She shrugged off her jacket, tied her hair into a high ponytail, and headed to the armory. Her eyes landed immediately on the knives, not the ceremonial ones, but the matte-gray alloy blades, perfectly balanced, each one dancing between weight and speed. She picked up one. Then another.

With a confident gesture, she activated the touchscreen embedded in the floor. A cold light flicked on. Spotlights marked a circular zone, and within seconds, the first holograms rose.

Humanoid figures, tall, stocky, fast, armed, surged from the floor like ghosts, unpredictable and lethal.

And then she began to dance.

It was a cruel choreography. Her knives flew, slicing through air and simulated flesh, planted with a precision born of honed muscle memory. She moved like flame, unpredictable, elusive, dangerous. With each fallen enemy, she spun, ducked, feinted, attacked again. Nothing existed but the beat of her heart and the song of metal.

When she drove her last blade straight into the throat of an approaching hologram, right where the trachea would've vibrated, silence fell.

Her breath was short, but her face remained impassive. She wiped her blades on her pants, then turned around... and saw them.

Behind the now-transparent glass, a small group of tributes had gathered to watch her.

Katniss. Peeta. Johanna. Beetee. Wiress. Mags. And leaning nonchalantly against the wall, arms crossed over his chest, that infuriating half-smile playing on his lips... Finnick Odair.

Auren held his gaze without flinching, then opened the door, ready to leave. But she had barely crossed the threshold when Finnick's voice stopped her.

"I tried digging up some info on you, you know."

She paused, without turning around. He continued, softly.

"Before coming here. Before meeting you. The Capitol's archives are a mess, locked up tight. But I have my... methods."

Auren turned her head slightly, just enough for him to catch the edge of her cheek.

"Morbid curiosity? Or just looking to expand your little black book?"

"Neither" he said. "I've always been a little fascinated by those who came after me. The victors... the ones who survived the arena when I would've sworn mine was the worst there could be."

A pause.

"And yet" he breathed, arms crossed, "you were almost impossible to find. No replays. No iconic moments. Just vague mentions, censored articles, conflicting testimonies. It's like... they wanted to erase you."

Auren smiled, a sad, almost weary smile.

"They don't like it when a girl beats them at their own game. Especially not when she does it without falling in love with another tribute along the way."

Finnick took a step forward, not threatening, not intrusive. Just... present.

"Were you always alone?"

She looked him dead in the eye, her dark gaze hard as stone.

"No. I had the dead to keep me company."