Mr. Dolittle had not specified the time the results would be posted. Lilith had accompanied Athena to check once in the morning, but his noticeboard had been empty. So, after their Espionage: The Art of Secrecy lecture, they headed to the third floor again, now with Olympia, Archie, and Regulus in tow.
Almost noon, the school buzzed with its usual lunch crowd. Weaving through a throng of sophomores who'd spilled out from the Kelvin Theatre, they arrived in the passage leading up to Mr. Dolittle's office. By the looks of it, they were the last to do so. A gathering of their classmates could be seen outside his door, and Athena quickened her pace. As if by the forces of nature, the cluster automatically parted to let her through.
"Is it up? Is it up?" she asked no one in particular.
Nobody answered her. People merely scattered into their respective cliques, whispering in agitation. The energy in the hallway was palpable. Even their gang received attention as they approached. The watchful gazes were unsettling, but the real sense that something had gone awry hit when Lilith regained sight of Athena, whose profile exposed her simply staring at the board. Lilith and Olympia exchanged dubious glances.
"Thena?" said Olympia uncertainly.
She turned, as though set to slow motion. There was definitely no glee. Her face was expressionless, her eyes vacant as they landed on Lilith and stayed there. Lilith was poised to ask what was wrong when she glimpsed the bold letters in her peripheral vision and had to do a double take. On the sheet of paper tacked to Mr. Dolittle's clover green felt was printed:
A collaboration between GM 401 Road to The Arena and the 21st Hunger Games
The position of Head Gamemaker's Apprentice has been awarded to
LILITH GOLD
Lilith's jaw went slack. She blinked. She ran her eyes over and over the alphabets, but they failed to change. She read the memo again and again, but still it made no sense.
It can't be, she thought. There's been a mistake. A huge mistake.
A huge, terrible mistake.
Shaking her head uncomprehendingly, Lilith caught the stares and felt as if a thousand spotlights had just been aimed at her. All at once, she understood: The weird looks had not been for them—they had been for her. Everyone was still here, waiting for the drama, the showdown.
Struggling to filter out their negative aura, Lilith focused on Olympia to Athena. The ginger was just as baffled, but there had been a shift in the blonde's gaze. Hurt had penetrated her blue eyes, and the cold manner about them was alien but plain all the same:
It belonged to someone who felt betrayed.
That made Lilith the traitor, and it made her want to cry.
"The—" Lilith had hardly choked out the syllable when Athena recoiled as if she had been struck. Lilith froze, her arm, which had been reaching towards her best friend, stopping dead in midair.
Athena didn't utter a word—she didn't have to. She shook her head too, but in disgust and disappointment, every move a dagger to Lilith's heart. It might as well have been her who had been slapped. Athena began to back away, small steps at first, then she spun on her heel and ran. Lilith made to pursue but Olympia thwarted her efforts.
"I'll get her," she promised, and dashed off.
"You don't deserve it," spat Jason. He peeled off from the assembly after Olympia but Archie seized his collar.
"Shut it, Gatsby," Archie growled, shoving Jason back with so much force the medical student stumbled several feet before finding his balance.
Cheeks splotchy, his chest heaving, Jason scanned his surroundings like he was surveying them. Then he glowered at the taller boy from afar.
Just before he fled, he muttered, "You know I'm right."
Regulus and Ptolemy combined only just restrained Archie, who seemed ready to hunt their classmate down and smash him to pulp. They managed to hold on to him until Jason rounded the bend and vanished. Wrestling himself free, Archie shouted at the bystanders.
"What are all of you looking at? There's nothing else to see! Get out of here, all of you!"
Not a muscle twitched. It was like his uncharacteristic outburst had been a spell, transforming them all into statues. Archie's bellow still seemed to echo between the walls when Regulus piped up.
"C'mon, guys, get a move on," he urged with contrasting composure.
This lifted the enchantment. Ptolemy and Demetrius helped him shepherd their peers away from the immediate vicinity, but even as they went, people glanced back over their shoulders, murmuring to one another. It was fortunate Archie strode up to her then. He wasn't broadly built, but his proximity allowed for most of the dirty looks to be shrouded from her view.
"Lil?" His voice had returned, all soft and gentle—the way it was supposed to be. She gazed up at him in a daze. The rage had dissipated from his face, which was now filled with pure concern. "Are you okay?"
No, she wasn't. It felt as if she would never be again. Her chest ached like there was no end. The stinging in her eyes was intensifying by the second, and she was holding in the quiver of chin as barely as Regulus and Ptolemy had held onto him. Lilith wanted very much to cry, but not here—not without Olympia and Athena. Athena! Lilith swallowed hard.
"I don't know how this happened," she croaked.
"Of course you don't," whispered Archie, squeezing her shoulders.
"It can't be me. It just can't be," Lilith mumbled. "There must be some mistake. Tell me there's been a mistake."
"There's been a mistake," he said obligingly, but it was no use. The dam collapsed, and a hot, fast, unceasing river of tears cascaded down Lilith's cheeks. Archie wrapped her in a hug at once. "Hey, don't cry. It's okay..."
"It's not okay," she spluttered. "Thena hates me..."
Saying it aloud only made her sob fiercer.
"She doesn't hate you," assured Archie, stroking her hair. "She just needs some time. Shh, it's going to be okay. Once she calms down and digests the news, she'll know it's not your fault."
"No," said Lilith, pulling back from him. Something was slicing through her disorientation, granting her mind sudden clarity—and determination. "No, she shouldn't have to"—she sniffed—"digest anything. There's been a mistake, and I—I can make it right. I just need to find Mr. Dolittle. He can help me."
Powered by her newfound resolve, Lilith wiped the snot and tears from her face with the back of her hand. Then she wheeled around, marched up to Mr. Dolittle's door, and rapped it. There was no response.
"Mr. Dolittle?" she called, knocking more vigorously still. She kept at this routine until Archie grabbed her wrist. She could have yelled at him, or thought she could, but then she saw the hand he was cradling—the skin glazed with yet-to-dry mucus, the knuckles red and raw. Hers—and all her anger and imagined scoldings evaporated.
"He's not in, Lil." Archie gave her a sad, sympathetic look. "Why don't we come back after lunch? He has office hours at one thirty. You can probably catch him then."
"I don't want lunch," said Lilith. "I'll just wait here."
"You're going to stand here for one and a half hours?"
It wasn't an unkind statement—Archie was never unkind. Well, until Jason, anyway—but when put like that, it made Lilith feel foolish.
"I don't want to miss him," she said, a little defensively. "But you go ahead."
But Archie did not go ahead. He inhaled deeply and glanced around, his dark eyes in search of something.
"Why don't we sit over there?" He inclined his head at a row of picnic tables across the atrium, near the vending machines from which Lilith and Olympia had purchased their refreshments before Snow's guest lecture. "There's only one way into this corridor. We'll still be able to see when he comes from there."
That was probably true, but Lilith remained reluctant. She couldn't risk missing Mr. Dolittle. She had to make this right.
"C'mon, Lil. There's no point in you standing here."
Archie grasped her hand and she didn't resist as he led her out of the passage. At the intersection where the north and east hallways met, he paused.
"I can save us a seat if you want to go wash up." Lilith looked at him blankly, then hesitantly, as she realized they were outside the bathrooms, and Archie added, "Don't worry. If Dolittle appears, I swear I'll stall him until you're out, okay?"
Striving not to worry, Lilith popped into the ladies and was instantly glad for Archie's thoughtfulness—she wasn't going to get any help from Mr. Dolittle in this mess. Hurriedly, she splashed water onto her face and rinsed the slime from her hands, the joints of her fingers smarting as they contacted the citrus-scented soap. This pain was nothing. It wasn't the reason her concealer pen refused to steady; she was so strung out. Powder would have to suffice in subduing the puffiness under her eyes.
Archie had settled himself with his back to the table, which played host to his satchel and a pair of thermostatic containers from the vending machines. Lilith sat next to him so they both faced outwards—faced Mr. Dolittle's office—and was offered one of them. The seal had already been broken, meaning the chemical reaction within the inner jacket had started. The heated contents steamed slightly, issuing a faint floral fragrance.
"It's only jasmine, but it's still tea."
"Thanks." Lilith clutched it between her palms and glued her eyes to the elevators. She didn't know Mr. Dolittle to be a stairs sort of person.
"He's not going to appear sooner just because you don't eat or drink," remarked Archie after a while. Lilith glanced over at him.
Why did he have to be so logical? So logical and so nice. He didn't have to be here; he didn't have to forgo lunch just because she did. With Olympia and Athena gone, though, his company was the next best thing she could have—that she wanted. No shining armour today, with his maroon V-neck sweater over a gingham collared shirt and navy slacks, but categorically a knight. Literally, it was in his blood. He was being such a good friend, and Lilith wasn't acting grateful at all.
She took a few sips to placate him but no more. It was only jasmine after all. Her body seemed incapable of keeping liquid in, at any rate; even her tears were brimming back up to the surface.
"Oh, Lil—" Archie swiftly exchanged her tumbler for a packet of tissues.
"I can't have Thena hate me," squeaked Lilith, blotting up her eyes. "I don't know what I'll do if she's not my friend..."
"Trust me, she doesn't hate you," he said bracingly, "and she'll still be your friend. She'll always be your friend. It's going to be okay, Lil."
"Yeah, yeah," she agreed, yearning to be convinced. "I just have to fix this."
He pulled her towards him and she leaned her head against his shoulder for what must be the longest ninety minutes of her life. She felt tired from the wait, drained from the stress, but when Mr. Dolittle finally emerged—from the elevator indeed—Lilith snapped to attention. Thoroughly invigorated, she sprang to her feet and launched into a sprint. In spite of her heeled boots, she made one clean corner after another and halted just inches from the man.
"Miss Gold!" Mr. Dolittle gasped, alarmed. "May I help you?"
Lilith nodded fervently. "Yes, sir, you may."
"All right." His eyes as suspicious as his tone, he gestured towards his office. As she'd basically ambushed him at the lift lobby, there was still some distance to go. Lilith walked alongside him, fighting down her impatience and anxiety. "I believe congratulations are in order," he said, by way of small talk, and Lilith pounced on her chance.
"That's the thing, sir. I think there's been a mistake. I can't be the apprentice."
The ex-Gamemaker's brows arched in curiosity, whether at her statement or because she'd blurted it out in a single breath, she didn't care.
"How do you mean?"
"The Head Gamemaker can't have chosen me. I know he can't have." Lilith gazed at him expectantly. "Perhaps there's been a miscommunication?"
"Hmm." Mr. Dolittle studied her quizzically. "Coriolanus warned me this would happen."
"Excuse me, sir?"
"He warned me you'd think there's been an error and told me to reassure you that no such thing has occurred."
In her worsening befuddlement, Lilith became cognizant of two facts at the same time: that they'd reached the office, and Archie had gained on them. She stared from one male to the other, her somewhat cousin's surprised expression only substantiating their tutor's absurd claim.
"Look," said Mr. Dolittle, unlocking his door and letting them in, "I know all of you consider Miss Click to be 'the Chosen One,' but the Head Gamemaker has made his decision, and it is very clear. Unless you have any academic grounds that prohibits you from fulfilling this role, Miss Gold, which—as far as I'm aware—should not be the case, since that would have rendered you ineligible for this course in the first place, I'm afraid there's nothing to be done. Of course, you are free to bring up any concerns you may have to him directly tomorrow, but I doubt it will make a difference."
"Tomorrow, sir?" repeated Lilith.
"Yes. You're supposed to meet with him. It's written on the memo."
Heading outside, Mr. Dolittle indicated his bulletin board, drawing her eyes to the words beneath her name that had been entirely overlooked before:
Please report to the following address on Tuesday, October 5th, 17:00 h.
Hunger Games Division, Room 1212
Citadel
1 National Plaza
Please bring along your student ID for identification purposes.
They weren't foreign or anything, but only one piece of information seemed to register.
In a mechanical voice, Lilith said, "My lessons don't end till half past five tomorrow, sir. I won't be able to make it." Then her brain lit up. "Is it possible for me to meet him today?"
"Let me give his secretary a ring," Mr. Dolittle hedged.
Snow's secretary, Gaia, transpired to be a letdown. Snow wasn't available today; the earliest he could be rescheduled for was for six the evening next. Another twenty eight or so hours before the matter could be resolved wasn't desirable, but what choice did Lilith have?
None, really.
He'd left her with no choice—no choice at all.