The 75th Hunger Games {COMPLETED}

Pain

I woke up in the morning to complete silence around us. When my watch had finished we had shared another moment of passion before I snuggled into Caius’ side and fell asleep to the sound of his heartbeat. I almost didn’t notice the silence because I was still too content in his arms. They were wrapped around me and my body was pressed against his.

I looked up at him and he dropped his head to kiss me. His lips gently parted and I slid my hand up over his chest until my fingertips were hidden in his hair. I almost felt like he was going to heat things up again like he did last night, but he pulled back and left a tender kiss on my temple.

“Morning.” He murmured.

“Morning,” I held him tighter for a moment before I tried to slip out of the sleeping bag.

“Where are you going?” He grabbed me by the waist and pulled me back into him.

“To get some food, let go of me.” I smiled.

He kissed me again, deeper and more purposefully than the last time and I almost let myself fall in.

“Stop that!” I gave him a small unconvincing push.

“Alright then, but just for now.” He grinned.

I crawled over to my pack and pulled out some crackers for us to eat, as well as some of the berries that we had picked yesterday. As we ate I became increasingly aware of the silence around us.

“Caius, do you notice anything weird?”

“I know what you’re thinking; there’s no breeze, no birds, nothing. It’s been the same since early this morning.” His lips drew out into a thin line and his face became sullen. “I think there’s only going to be another few days.”

“There were no cannons yesterday.”

“I guarantee that’ll change today, something’s coming.”

“Why do you think yesterday was so quiet?”

“I don’t know, probably a lot of interesting personal developments.” He gave me a wicked smile and I laughed. “We should probably move on out of here soon though.”

I wasn’t about to disagree. We ate fast and gathered up the sleeping bag. The more we walked, the more anxious I became. Caius took my hand in his and I instantly thought back to that night before the games where Peeta comforted me on the roof. I wondered what he was thinking about right now.

We walked in a silence that echoed throughout the entire forest. When our feet crunched on the dry leaves we would move faster.

Caius was right; something is definitely coming.

By mid-morning I was squeezing Caius’ hand so tightly that my fingers felt almost numb. My heart started racing when Caius stopped us.

“What?” I heard my voice crack.

“Do you hear that?”

I started listening intently and heard crackling. Please don’t let that be another pack of mutts.

And then I saw the forest to my left glowing. “It’s a fire…” I breathed.

“Run.” Caius pulled my arm and we started running.

Almost as soon as we started the fire was at our heels. We dodged the trees and I took a quick glance over at Caius before a wall of flame invaded the space between us, nearly singeing my arm as we were forced to part our hands. I yelled out to him and only just caught his response.

“Just keep running!”

I didn’t stop; I had no plans to stop.

The fire drew me far out and away from where I had last seen Caius. I almost couldn’t believe how fast the fire was moving. There was almost no chance for me to extend my distance from it. As soon as the thought ran through my head I started to get away. Any relief I felt was short lived.