Dawn. Cold, bleak fingers of light push through the clouds. Byron doesn’t look up to watch it like he normally does. He’s sitting under a huge tree, the boxes he’d managed to grab from the Cornucopia scattered around his feet. There wasn’t much in them. Nothing worth risking his life like he had. A length or rope, a small loaf of soft white bread, that sort of thing. Not even a knife or something useful. His eyes flick to where his axe is suck into the ground by the blade. The handle glints a little in the morning light and he looks away again.
Byron takes a deep breath, feeling it shudder through his chest. This is really happening. He’s in the final three of the Games, and he’s going to have to kill someone. The thought makes him feel distinctly queasy. This isn’t like death at home, where the animals go dumbly to their ends, silent and patient and trusting. Here, the death is just as fast, but so much more awful. He tries not to picture the girl’s face in the dull gleam of the Cornucopia. Her eyes had been huge, he’d noticed. Massive and shocked and agonized in the white of her face. And then there’d been Carmen.
She’s the one he’s worried about. The other kid, the boy from Six, doesn’t seem like he’d be much of a challenge. That blow last night had been a fluke, pure and simple. That’d been immediately obvious from the look of complete shock on his face. And he’s smaller than Byron, and he’s only got a knife.
Byron stops, shaking his head slightly. No, that wasn’t the way he could think. Never underestimate your opponent. That’s what all kids from Ten were taught the moment they started work in the horse yards. Even the small colts could break your neck with a kick, so your guard had to be up at all times. Constant vigilance! Byron can almost hear his grandfather’s cracked old voice shouting out the words as the pairs of kids shuffled around the animals in the pens. He wonders what his grandfather would say if he’d been around to see this. Him, the one everyone always said was too nice, too soft, in the final three of the Hunger Games.
He gives a humourless little snort of laughter. Part of him still wants to curl into a little ball and make the chaos and fear all around him disappear, but it’s not as strong as it was when he first arrived in the Capitol. He pushes it away, and sets his jaw. He can do this. It won’t be easy, and it’ll be something he’ll hate himself for for the rest of his life most likely, but…he swallows. No matter what, life is always going to be better than death. There’s too much he’s not done for it all to end yet.
He drags his thoughts back to the two things standing between him and home and the rest of his life. The kid, Benji. Small and wiry and scared looking, but he’s more of a killer than Byron is now. And he’ll be desperate. Fear can do funny things. It’s like the animals back home – corner them, trap them, and they’ll lash out, even if you’re twice as big as they are. And he’s seen Benji lashing out. He’s definitely the lesser threat, but still dangerous, regardless.
Byron tries not to think about just how little he is. Almost…fragile looking. Had he looked that small and scared when he was Benji’s age? He’s sure he was bigger than the kid is. Taller, maybe. Definitely stronger – he’d roped his first bull calf at eleven and started breaking the colts with the men not long after he’d turned twelve. Back when Reapings were just a day off work and everything was still bright and life was good.
He shakes his head as if the action will get the thoughts out of his mind. His eyes flick down to the length of rope he’s been playing with and gives a little smile as he sees what his fingers have made. Old habits die hard he thinks as he slides the slipknot of the lasso up and down the rope. It might be useful after all. The rope rolls between his fingers as he moves on to the other tribute left.
Carmen, all hard and cold, changed from the girl he’d pulled Tyrion out of the bloodbath with. He’d seen that in her face the night before, in that emotionless tilt of the head, in the dark stains that clung to the blade of her sword. The thought of fighting her scares him, and his palms go sweaty as he remembers the girl from Four and the boy from Seven as her sword had cut them down. Who knows how many of the other faces had been her doing?
At least he’s got a weapon with a bit of reach. She’s got longer arms, but he’s got strength, and he’s not bad with an axe. Mentally, he thanks the girl from Seven for those few minutes in the Training Centre. Hands apart, angled down. Don’t choke the axe.
He doesn’t know which he’d prefer to face. A little kid, or someone who, for just a short time, had almost been a friend. Almost. You never really made friends in the Games. Allies, sure, but there’s a world of difference in those two things, and he’s got no doubt that she won’t hold back. So he won’t either.
Byron stands, his knees cracking after sitting for so long. The rope feels comforting and familiar in his hand and he twirls the lasso a couple of times, listening to the swish of the rope through the air.
It sounds like home.
***
Benji’s mind is spinning as he stumbles through the mess of rocks and vegetation that have become his whole world. Them and the blood-stained knife he still grasps. The vines seem to reach out as he brushes through them, the tendrils snagging his hands, his arms, his hair. If he didn’t know better, he’d almost swear the things were alive. Benji slashes blindly at one tangling creeper and is vaguely surprised when there is a small burst of sparks and a few wires curl out of the severed end. This is the Hunger Games; nothing has a mind of its own here. Everything must bow to the Gamemakers and their power.
Somewhere behind him he hears one of the mutts let out a yowl. The fear crawls into his throat, the cold fingers constricting until it feels like he can’t breathe. Benji pushes on, trying to ignore the ache in his arm, and the gore drying on his face and hands. The metallic smell of blood surrounds him as he plunges on into the perpetual gloom. The yowl sounds again, closer this time, and moving towards him. For a moment he panics, and then his mind kicks into gear.
“You can do this,” he mutters to himself, glancing this way and that, looking for the best option. Running is pointless; the things behind him can move twice as fast as him, and he refuses to die with their claws in his back.
No. If he’s going to die, it’ll be on his own terms.
The dark hole of a doorway peers at him through the foliage, half hidden behind a pile of twisted steel and stones. Benji glances up quickly, taking in the crumbling bulk of a building slowly being overrun by the jungle around it. The first four storeys are already encased in vines and thick roots, which explains why he hadn’t noticed it until now. It’s dark and dangerous looking, but there’s nowhere else to go.
His foot catches on a crack in the asphalt beneath him, and for a moment he stumbles, sending jagged ripples of pain through his already throbbing arm. Benji bites down on his lip, stifling the cry of pain. He can’t be weak now. The darkness of the building’s interior swallows him up, the sound of his shuffling feet deadened by the layers of vegetation and the piles of rubbles that fill the building. From what his straining eyes can make out, the floors have partially collapsed, making the inside of the place look like a giant cheese.
Outside, the mutt slinks into the clearing, ears back, lips curling back off its long teeth. It sniffs at the blood-stained footprint the meat had left on the crumbling ground. For a minute its tongue laps at the warm liquid and something close to a purr rumbles from its throat. Then it raises its head, green eyes glowing in the gloom and prowls forward, following the scent into the building before it. It won’t be long now; the mutt can sense the weakness in its prey.
Benji freezes. There is something else in here with him, something large, and almost silent. He can hear the occasional scrape of stone against stone as whatever – or whoever – it is makes its way over the piles of wreckage behind him.
His heart lurches and the wire of the knife handle bites into his palm. His arm hurts. He just wants this all to be over.
He’s totally unprepared for the attack when it comes; a silent assault from one side. His head slams into the ground and stars burst across his vision. Benji feels something huge and warm and furry crushing him, sending fresh pain though his arm. He swings the pommel of the knife down onto the creature’s head with all his strength, and feels it shift slightly with a snarl. Two massive cold green eyes suddenly flare out of the gloom right in his face, and Benji can’t suppress the scream that jolts past his heart in his throat.
For a second the face in front of him is Abi’s, her mouth curling open into that awful scream as his knife bites into her leg. Then the fetid hot breath on his cheeks jerks him back to reality, and he lashes out again and feels the mutt recoil from the blow.
It’s now or never.
Benji scrambles to his feet, ignoring the flaring pain in his side and turns and runs. His breath rasps loudly in the oppressive silence and darkness. He’s nearly at the top of one of the huge rubble mounds when he feels the claws sink into his leg. He kicks out frantically, but the beast hangs on, and the claws are soon replaced by tearing teeth. Benji screams as he feels the skin ripping off his leg. He can’t help it; he’s never felt pain like this before. Not even the time he’d stuck his tongue on a live wire back home as a dare when he was eight. The pain in his arm from earlier, that was nothing, nothing compared to this.
His knife slashes down, and there’s a yowl from the creature and the teeth relinquish their grip slightly. Benji yanks his leg free, and he’s free, at least for a moment. His hands scramble on the rubble as he hauls himself up and over the top. He’s just beginning to descend the other side when his mangled leg gives way and he topples over, crashing and bouncing over the lumps of rock and steel beneath him. He lies dazed for a second when he reaches the bottom, his whole body one throbbing hub of agony.
Benji’s eyes crack open, and he finds himself in a large open area that is a lot lighter than the part of the building that he’s just come from. One part of his mind reasons that it must be sunlight filtering down through the gaping holes in the ceiling. His attention is dragged to the top of the rubble heap he’s just rolled down as the snarling face of the mutt appears, green eyes flickering with distinct hatred. Benji can see the jagged cut across the top of its head, and one of its pointed ears has been all but shorn off, matting the fur on the creature’s neck and chest with blood.
He scrambles backward, dragging his mutilated leg after him. He won’t look at it, or he thinks he’ll lose what little control he still has over himself. He can smell the blood, almost taste it; a thick cloying taste in the air all around him. The huge cat prowls down the side of the rubble heap, tail twitching, muscles coiled. Benji continues to shuffle away from it, his knife scraping over the stone of the floor as he goes. He won’t let go of it – how he managed to hang on during his fall is beyond him. It’s almost like the weapon has become part of him, an unwanted extension to his aching arm.
The mutt lets out a coughing snarl, and Benji could almost swear the thing was laughing at him. He might still be able to do this. The cat is wounded, and he still had his knife…
Then his hope dies as a second pair of glowing green eyes appear at the top of the pile of stone and the snarling doubles in volume.